Skip to main content

ETHNOS_APP

Home • Search • Journals • List 0

Keynes, Liberalism, and 'The Emancipation of the Mind

Bibliographic Data

ID5751977
AuthorsRichard Toye (0000-0003-3200-7525, University of Exeter, corresponding author)
Year2015
Volume130
Issue546
Pages1162-1191
Publication date2015-10-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe English Historical Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0013-8266 • E-ISSN: 1477-4534
PublisherOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/ehr/cev215
OpenAlexW2192000462
LanguageEN
Citations received4

This article offers a more systematic assessment of John Maynard Keynes's attitude to Liberalism, and his engagement with the Liberal Party, than has previously been attempted. It does so as a means of exploring how the study of ideologies should be approached. To Keynes, ideologies were not simply constellations of fixed principles; in his view, policies were always contingent on circumstances, and thus what was appropriate now would become outdated in the future. The Liberal, therefore, needed a flexible and experimental psychological attitude, in order to devise solutions that were appropriate to changing conditions. Using his 1925 lecture 'Am I a Liberal?' as a starting point, it is argued here that Keynes saw Liberalism primarily as a discursive practice in the public sphere, that is to say as a technique for 'doing politics'. We need not take Keynes's evaluation of his own Liberal mind-set at face value, but it nonetheless casts light on the nature of Liberalism in this period. In spite of the Liberal party's electoral decline, the political conditions of the 1920s were particularly well suited to Keynes's vision. For him, Liberalism depended upon, but would also help to facilitate, what he referred to as 'the emancipation of the mind

Economics · Emancipation · Epistemology · Ideology · Law and economics · Liberalism · Order (exchange) · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Positive economics · Sociology · Value (mathematics) · Economic Theory and Institutions · Law · Philosophy · Political Economy and Marxism · Weber, Simmel, Sociological Theory

  • L. T. Hobhouse's idea of a European Federation

    Open Access•ALESSANDRO DIVIDUS•History•2023

  • Malthusian Moments in the Work of John Maynard Keynes

    Open Access•Duncan Kelly•The Historical Journal•2019

  • Expedience and experimentation

    Open Access•Stefan Eich•American Journal of Political…•2025

  • The Counterrevolution in Development Economics

    John Toye•History of Political Economy•2018

Unique citing works4
Citations per year0,5
Citation span2018 - 2025 (8)
Citation velocityrecent
Highly citedNo
Citation typesNeutral: 3

Tools

Open DOISci-HubOpen Access
Ethnos_APP • Open Source Project • MIT License • Frontend v2.0.0 • Privacy and Cookies • API Documentation: api.ethnos.app/docs • API Source Code: GitHub • DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17049435 • Frontend Source Code: GitHub • DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17050053 • cruz.rio.br • Expectantes Misericordiae