|Peter Boettke|

Hayek famously penned an essay "Why I am Not a Conservative". I have often argued that folks need to read that essay in conjunction with his "Errors of Constructivism" to get a good sense of his position on why as true radical liberals we must be wiling to question all of societies values, and submit them to critical evaluation, but why epistemologically we cannot do so be assuming any 'Archimedean point' from which to commence our evaluation. We must always question within specific contexts, and criticize on the margin while holding other values as given at that moment if we are to avoid serious errors in our reasoning about society. Root and branch constructivism is merely an illusion of the revolutionary, and a dangerous illusion at that. But that doesn't mean we are trapped in the status quo either. Hayek is giving us a framework for engaging in social criticism from a radical liberal perspective that is within our epistemological boundaries of the humanly possible. Think about that. Now think long and hard about this passage from the essay "Why I am Not a Conservative."

But the main point about liberalism is that it wants to go elsewhere, not to stand still. Though today the contrary impression may sometimes be caused by the fact that there was a time when liberalism was more widely accepted and some of its objectives closer to being achieved, it has never been a backward-looking doctrine. There has never been a time when liberal ideas were fully realized and liberalism did not look forward to further improvement of institutions. Liberalism is not averse to evolution and change; and where spontaneous change has been smothered by government control, it wants a great deal of change of policy. So far as much of current governmental action is concerned, there is in the present world very little reason for the liberal to wish to preserve things as they are. It would seem to the liberal, indeed, that what is most urgently needed in most parts of the world is a thorough sweeping-away of the obstacles to free growth. p. 399 in The Constitution of Liberty (Chicago, 1960), emphasis added

This sense of excitement about the voyage into the unknown future, and the embrace of the possibility of discovery and creativity that the liberal society makes possible is one -- among many -- reason I am excited to get my hands on Deirdre McCloskey's forthcoming book, Why Liberalism Works (Yale, 2019). Liberalism is a social philosophy that is grounded in the recognition of its constant need for renewal and reconstruction. It is never a fixed doctrine standing still and telling the context of history -- STOP. It is, instead, a welcoming of the new and novel, of the fulfillment of its ideals, and the greater recognition that we are one another's dignified equals. Liberalism says YES and the cosmopolitan liberal order turns strangers into friends and enemies into partners. It is an emancipation doctrine -- from dogma of the altar, from repression by the crown, from violence from the sword, and from exploitation from the privileged mercantilist class. it is an ongoing project, and will always fall short of complete fulfillment of its vision of peaceful social cooperation; change is ceaseless, and the effort to improve institutions is constant. Hayek's great intellectual gift isn't a completed system, but an intellectual framework which can aid future generations is their unique effort to reconstruct the principles of justice and political economy. As Hayek told his readers in the first paragraph of The Constitution of Liberty:

If old truths are to retain their hold on men's minds, they must be restated in the language and concepts of successive generations. What at one time are their most effective expressions gradually become so worn with use that they cease to carry a definite meaning. The underlying ideas may be as valid as ever, but the words, even when they refer to problems that are still with us, no longer convey the same conviction; the arguments do not move in a context familiar to us; and they rarely give us direct answers to the questions we are asking. This may be inevitable because no statement of an ideal that is likely to sway men's minds can be complete: it must be adapted to a given climate of opinion, presuppose much that is accepted by all men of the time, and illustrate general principles in terms of issues with which they are concerned.

It had been a long time, Hayek continued, since the ideals of liberalism had been effectively restated. He made that judgment close to 60 years ago. He himself took several stabs at providing that restatement -- The Road to Serfdom; The Constitution of Liberty; and Law, Legislation and Liberty -- each with great strengths and some glaring weaknesses. Our times, I would call, does not need naysayers, but the articulation of a vision of the rights and dignity of all individuals, and invitation (in fact a welcoming hand) to all who seek to escape the oppression of dogma, of violence, of crushing poverty.

As Hayek wrote in the concluding paragraphs of his essay "The Intellectuals and Socialism" (1949):