ABSTRACT
A significant part of the reformulation of liberalism by F.A. Hayek and Michael Polanyi is a rapprochement between it and tradition and custom. Rather than conceiving liberalism rationalistically as essentially opposed to tradition and custom, they have recognised that liberty depends upon them, that a free society must be, to a large extent, one living by inherited traditions and institutions. The doctrine of liberty, which is realised by the fact of life being guided by such intuitively (i.e., tacitly) known principles as in science, law and language, and having as its aim the service to these principles which are immanent in "principled" practice; can only be transmitted by practice. For the most part, classical liberalism has in fact rejected unviable notions of liberty although it has sought for an abstract definition of a general liberty rather than a concrete understanding of more specific liberties.
