The Liberalism.org Show

Liberals have ceded the family to social conservatives for decades — and Lauren K. Hall thinks it's a mistake liberalism can't afford. In this episode, host Aaron Ross Powell talks with Hall, professor of political science and associate dean of academic affairs at the Rochester Institute of Technology, about her Liberalism.org essay "Why Liberalism Needs the Family." They discuss why classical liberals have under-theorized this pre-political institution, how siblings, trust, and the wider "village" cultivate the citizens that markets and self-government require, the false binary between total family autonomy and state intervention, and why over-scheduled, over-supervised childhoods may be quietly producing adults more comfortable with authoritarianism.Further Reading:Why Liberalism Needs the Family — Lauren K. Hall, Liberalism.orgFamily and the Politics of Moderation: Private Life, Public Goods, and the Rebirth of Social Individualism — Lauren K. Hall, Baylor University PressThe Radical Moderate's Guide to Life — Lauren K. Hall's SubstackLet Grow — Lenore Skenazy's nonprofit, with the tiered intervention guide Hall recommendsMore from Liberalism.org:Yours, Mine, or Ours? Liberals Need a Theory of the State — Michael C. Munger

Can a half-hour of sitcom reruns make you a better liberal? Shal Marriott thinks so — and in this episode of the Liberalism.org Show, host Aaron Ross Powell talks with Marriott, a PhD student in political science at McGill University, about her article "Sitcoms: A Defense." They discuss how popular television can cultivate liberal habits of character beyond mere tolerance, why appreciating pluralism requires something closer to delight than grudging acceptance, what Adam Smith and Judith Shklar have in common with It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and whether the low stakes of fictional worlds offer a space to practice the discernment that liberalism demands.Further Reading"Sitcoms: A Defense" — Shal Marriott, Liberalism.orgLiberalism as a Way of Life — Alexandre Lefebvre, Princeton University PressOrdinary Vices — Judith Shklar, Harvard University PressMore from Liberalism.org"Mini Tacos, Murder, and the Problem of Getting Exactly What We Want" — Sarah Skwire"What Early Liberals Knew, We'll Remember" — Jason Kuznicki

In this episode, host Aaron Ross Powell talks with Matt Zwolinski, Professor of Philosophy at the University of San Diego and a Liberalism.org Fellow, about his article "The Enemy Is Power, Wherever You Find It." They discuss why liberals have traditionally focused on state power while neglecting its private forms, how institutional design can disperse and counterbalance power through mechanisms like competitive markets and federalism, and what both the left and classical liberals should learn from the current illiberal moment about the dangers of concentration.