The Great Obstacle to Our Liberty

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The great and overarching question was always what are the limits of in some ways, you could say, the human ma nation. And at the core of the liberal project is the idea that nature is the other great obstacle to our liberty. i think you see a continuous set of arguments from proto liberal thinkers like francis bacon and thomas hobbs,. figures like john locke, and even in the american tradition, a John dewey.

Political Scientist and author Patrick Deneen of the University of Notre Dame talks about his book Why Liberalism Failed with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. By liberalism, Deneen means the modern enterprise--the push for self-actualization free of the constraints of tradition, family, and religion that typifies modern culture. He argues that both the left and the right have empowered the state and reduced liberty. He argues for a smaller, more local, more artisanal economy and a return to the virtues of self-control and self-mastery.