ABSTRACT
Starting in the nineteenth century, liberalism tended towards a procedural formalism and a cultural vacuity, which were challenged by the materialist philosophies of Nazism, Fascism and Communism that sought to re-construct positive liberty on a non-religious, supposedly scientific basis. And following their eventual collapse in the twentieth century, liberalism has insisted on its own latent materialism. Connecting anti-liberal with ultra-liberal ideas is a cult of mere will, which is unmediated by civic institutions or highbrow cultural traditions – a kind of will-to-power in a novel guise. By replacing liberal value moralism with virtues of humility, generosity, loyalty and fraternity, one can renew statecraft and diplomacy in a quest to build a more equitable world order. Edmund Burke rejected the possessive individualism of liberal thinking in favour of social freedom. True liberty is secured by what he called “equality of restraint”, not empty free choice. Liberalism and its illiberal enemies have little to say about the social nature.
