Definition of liberalism
By definition, Maurice Cranston rightly pointed out, 'a liberal is a man who believes in liberty'. (Roy Bentley, Alan Dobson, Maggie Grant, David Roberts, "British Politics in focus" 2000). In two different ways, liberals accord liberty primacy as a political value. First, liberals have typically maintained that humans are naturally in 'a State of perfect Freedom to order their Actions as they think fit without asking leave, or depending on the will of any other Man'.( http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberalism/). Mill argued that "The burden of proof is supposed to ith those who are against liberty; who contend for any restriction or prohibition.... The a priori assumption is in favor of freedom..."(http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/liberalism/). This might be called the Fundamental Liberal Principle. According to john Locke all people have certain natural rights such as right to life, liberty and property which can not be removed except by the agreement of people themselves.
Miniature of Muhammad re-dedicating the Black Ston...
Controversial cartoons of Muhammad, first publishe...
El Fagr's 17 October 2005 headline page.Locke also argued that there should be limits to the powers of government such as the executive should be separate from the legislature so power pluralized.
The economic root of liberalism is market system and capitalism. According to Adam Smith, there is a hidden hand of the market which consisted of thousands of individual decisions made by buyers and sellers. Produce the right goods and profit would follow or the other way round.
Liberal political theory is concerned with two key concepts, freedom and toleration. These two cores of liberalism may have different view on the events followed the recent publication of cartoons of the prophet Mohamed in a Danish newspaper. I am going to look at the difference of the view between these two cores of liberalism in first part of my assignment.
The Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy began after editorial cartoons showing the Islamic prophet Muhammad were published...