"In Search of a Lost Liberalism: Constant, Tocqueville and the Singularity of French Liberalism," Katholike Universiteit Leuven, December 11-13, 2008.

The dominant stream of contemporary political philosophy identifies itself as the inheritor of the modern liberal tradition exemplified by Locke, Hume or Kant. The unfortunate result of this identification is that an interesting portion of the liberal tradition is lost: that of French political liberalism. Initiated by Montesquieu, this tradition lived its moment of glory during the first half of the nineteenth century with the majestic writings of Constant and Tocqueville. This lineage continued well into the twentieth century, in the works of Raymond Aron and, today, Claude Lefort. France’s nineteenth century liberals were fascinated by the rapid transformations their society was undergoing. Fully aware of the novel risks that threatened a levelled society and driven by fear (of despotism as much as of revolution and anarchy) Constant, Tocqueville, Guizot and others developed a distinct brand of liberalism. For all their differences, these authors shared Montesquieu’s vision that only power can check power and that freedom depends on the existence of intermediary bodies. In the course of the twentieth century, this tradition has been revived along different lines. Writing against the backdrop of totalitarianism, Aron and Lefort sought inspiration in their nineteenth century predecessors and developped theories of liberal democracy that proffer a valuable counterbalance to those of their Anglo-American contemporaries. This French liberal-philosophical tradition exhibits a number of highly specific features. Methodologically speaking, it proceeds in an explicitly comparative manner so as to reveal the historical particularity of political constellations. Content-wise, French liberalism differs from other liberal approaches in that it does not see the individual and the state as sharply opposing each other, but as complementary. In this sense, French liberalism has an unmistakable republican slant. Rather than a necessary evil or a useful instrument, the state is recognised as an indispensable precondition for individual freedom. In addition, French liberals have an eye for the underlying structure of society. This is the tradition’s characteristic “transcendental” point of view, grasped, for instance, in Montesquieu’s notion of the “spirit” of the laws or in Lefort’s conception of “the political” (le politique) by contrast to “politics” (la politique). The purpose of this conference, organised in honour of professor André Van de Putte’s retirement, is to bring to light the specificity of this French political-philosophical liberalism and to examine how its analysis of modern society is relevant for today’s political-philosophical debate. The conference homepage is here: http://www.lostliberalism.be/.