On a Contradiction in Mill's Argument for Liberty

Mill took very seriously the warning example from China that even a civilised country could stagnate and become a backwater of world development. Although certain sections of Mill's On Liberty have been scrutinised, evaluated and debated with intense care, this, his most fundamental warning to his own society - that it was systematically undermining its own pre-eminence - has stimulated relatively little investigation. This article notes Mill's concern with social stagnation and suggests that, even in terms of his own presentation of the balance of social forces, his proposed countermeasures of ‘eccentricity’ and ‘refusal to bend the knee’ are futile gestures quite insufficient to combat the tendencies he outlined

Argument (complex analysis · Balance (ability · Contradiction · Epistemology · Law and economics · Mill · Political economy · Political science · Sociology · Emile Durkheim and Sociology · European Political History Analysis · History · Law · Philosophy · Political Theory and Influence · Psychology

• A New Exploration of Mill's Essay on Liberty

  Open Access•Richard B Friedman•Political Studies•1966

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• On Liberty and Liberalism

  Allanah Ryan, Alan Ryan et al.•The American Historical Review•1976

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