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Letters

ECONOMISM Richard Spady’s article “Economics as Ideology” (April) has some excellent insights. Spady argues that economics functions as an ideology when it imposes its rigid anthropology—dominated by a simplistic, utility-maximizing mythology of the individual—on the material it . . . . Continue Reading »

America and Liberalism

The American experiment.” I cringed whenever Richard John Neuhaus used that formulation. We live in a country, not an experiment. I seek to purify my soul so that I may be worthy of citizenship in the City of God. But in this temporal frame, I have never wanted to be anything other than an . . . . Continue Reading »

Utopian Temptation

Why Liberalism Failedby patrick j. deneenyale, 248 pages, $30 Patrick Deneen asserts that liberalism has failed. He also asserts (in a recent article) that “the exceedingly narrow victory of Donald Trump may be understood as the last gasp of a dying conservatism that has been destroyed by American . . . . Continue Reading »

Illiberal Democracy

Demopolis: Democracy Before Liberalism in Theory and Practiceby josiah obercambridge, 222 pages, $24.90 Liberal democracy is a modern synthesis. Liberalism—a respect for human or natural rights; limits on the scope and power of public authority; state neutrality on fundamental questions of, . . . . Continue Reading »

Postliberal Theology

Blood pressure is rising. Folks are worried about “illiberalism.” In a November issue of the Washington Post, Anne Applebaum warned of a rising “neo-Bolshevism” assailing the West: “Donald Trump, Viktor Orban, Nigel Farage, Marine Le Pen and Jaroslaw Kacyniski.” Others have more . . . . Continue Reading »

The Metaphysics of Democracy

Liberalism began as a political project that sought to curtail the role of religion in public life. Religious impulses haven’t proven easy to expel, however, even in secular societies. Contemporary secular liberalism aspires to be a universal project that supplants traditional religion and . . . . Continue Reading »

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