Books like Liberalism — picked by fans

Helena Rosenblatt correctly finds liberalism’s origins in the French Revolution, but she emphasizes its much longer prehistory, going back to the ancient Romans. She conveys a wide range of ideas in the liberal tradition of political thought and practice and especially draws attention to the values of generosity, civic-mindedness, and love of freedom.

Rosenblatt does not stint from describing the less attractive sides of some liberal thinkers and theories, especially in Europe during the nineteenth century. This is a beautifully written work of scholarship showing mastery of historical detail.

Liberalism values reasonable arguments, incremental reforms, and resistance to cruelty. These values receive plenty of support, but they can also sound a bit tame and boring. Enter Adam Gopnik – to his credit, he acknowledges all this, yet he manages to give liberalism his passionate advocacy. He conveys the joyous side of communities based on reasonableness and toleration.

Gopnik paints liberalism with a human face–or multiple faces–by telling stories about great liberal thinkers from history, such as John Stuart Mill and his friend, lover, collaborator, and (eventually) wife, the remarkable Harriet Taylor.

The famous British philosopher A.C. Grayling tells the story of a hard-fought struggle over the past five centuries for the rights and freedoms now enjoyed in Western democracies. He emphasizes that our rights and freedoms are both precious and precarious: they could easily be lost if governments and citizens don’t adequately appreciate them or don’t understand how difficult they are to win.

For Grayling, our rights and freedoms began to contract around the beginning of this century. He points, for example, to the rise of state surveillance, particularly in response to terrorism but often just for the convenience of policing.

Despite its subtitle, this is one of the most comprehensive histories of liberal thought and practice ever written and is up to date with many recent developments, having been published in late 2023. It should be read alongside Edmund Fawcett’s similarly grand-scale history of liberalism.

Where it differs is in a somewhat more polemical or argumentative tone from Alan S. Kahan, who has a distinctive interpretation of liberalism, its essence, and its many challenges (particularly current challenges from populist politics). Kahan’s arguments won’t convince everybody, but they’ll dominate discussions of liberalism as a political outlook for years to come. If you don’t agree with Kahan’s interpretation of his topic, you’ll at least need to explain why–his book is that important.

Ikenberry is the leading scholar writing about the origins, the evolution, and the working of the liberal international order.

He sees deep connections between liberal internationalism, liberal democracy, and democratic capitalism.

Ikenberry charts the transformations that have occurred in the liberal order, from its successful creation after the Second World War to its consolidation and expansion after the end of the Cold War to the challenges it currently faces.

He is acutely aware of liberal order’s faults and limitations, but insists that it remains the world’s best hope.

Allegedly the father of conservatism, Burke could as easily be deemed the father of liberalism, though neither label is appropriate. Easy to read, and a bit of a rant in sections, Burke’s Reflections is a good source if you want to pick up rhetorical skills. Besides the prose, it's interesting to see how someone who was known to have supported the American pleas for political representation and sympathetic to their grievance as well as those of the Irish people tried to explain how what was happening in France in the early years of the revolution was something profoundly different to anything that had ever happened hitherto, and on no account to be compared to the Glorious Revolution. Very few of his immediate readers could see what he was getting at.  

Studying at Oxford, I was surprised that quite a few of my lecturers, including Ronald Dworkin and Jerry Cohen, hardly ever discussed the importance of culture in our lives. As someone who believes in the motto Know from where you are coming in order to know where you are going, I do not underestimate the power of culture, religion, and tradition in shaping communities. My library research discovered the excellent DPhil dissertation that Kymlicka wrote while he was in Oxford. This dissertation was a fresh air for me, accentuating the need to take culture seriously. Kymlicka reshaped his dissertation into this book which I regard as one of his very best books. Kymlicka presents the liberal view about the nature and value of community culture and bridges between liberalism and multiculturalism. I share this view and promote it in my own studies.

Kymlicka and I later cooperated in writing together… show more.

ER's many accomplishments perhaps overshadow the importance of her as a political force after the death of Franklin. I like this book because it spells out what an important role she played in the Truman administration, in particular, and during the Eisenhower years in keeping alive the beacon of liberalism in the Democratic Party.

Connecting the recent past with our contemporary moment, this book shows that humanitarian agendas have shaped the post-Cold War world in deeply unsettling ways.

I love this book because it brings together both academics and practitioners in a single volume, putting them into conversation with each other. All of the contributors are specialists in humanitarianism, but they approach this subject from very different angles and perspectives. Together, they raise provocative questions about humanitarian governance in the 21st century.

This book made me think deeply about the political and economic relationships involved in humanitarian activities. Above all, it invites us to learn from the less savory aspects of the history of humanitarianism in order to build a better humanitarian system in the future.

Another influential book explains why left parties decided to rebrand and adopt seemingly suicidal economic policies. Mudge traces the evolution of left parties' economic policies and the adoption of neoliberal policies as a function of their adaptation to waning voter loyalties.

This book explains the motivation behind the Third Way rebranding that many such parties underwent.