Rise and Fall of Western Liberalism

Author: (English) Anthony Arblaster / Cao Haijun
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2004-10-01
Features: As a comprehensive history of liberalism, this book stands out as one of the few that can rival Anthony Arblaster's The Rise and Fall of Western Liberalism. With its vast framework of liberal thought history, attention to historical details and intellectual contexts, and meticulous of various layers of connections, particularly its diagnosis of the challenges facing 20th-century liberalism and its revelation of the problems it exhibits as an ideology and political practice, it meets the reading needs of Chinese scholars. This book is a renowned and influential work in the field of liberalism research. Since its publication, it has garnered widespread academic attention and citations. Compared to other related research, the book's uniqueness, as stated by the author Anthony Arblaster, lies not only in meticulously the genealogy of Western liberalism but also in exploring its modern dilemmas and its subpar performance in political practice and social ideology. The problems in Western society in the 21st century seem to validate the author's pessimistic stance—the outward progress of liberalism and the decline of its inner vitality. Of course, although the author identifies as a left-wing individual, he is not an anti-liberalist. In the book, he attempts to identify the root causes and propose effective solutions.