Recent political developments across large parts of the globe have made it clear that liberalism is in crisis. Several political regimes and political leaders have little time and respect for liberal values but it is important to understand that in many cases they have been empowered by popular social attitudes that have turned against liberalism.
In order to understand this phenomenon, Rudrangshu Mukherjee goes back to the origins of liberalism to understand its substantive ideas and lineage. He shows how liberalism, a Western doctrine, flourished when Western empires dominated much of the world. Ironically, while values like freedom, democracy and citizenship were nurtured in the West, they were denied to the people of the countries that had been colonized by Western nations. Liberalism in the West thrived by being illiberal elsewhere.
The contradictions within made liberalism vulnerable to attack. Totalitarian regimes swept it aside, and other doctrines replaced it with increasing frequency.
In the twenty-first century, in both the East as well as the West, liberalism appears to be fast disappearing. This important book tells us why.
About the Author
RUDRANGSHU MUKHERJEE is Chancellor and Professor of History at Ashoka University of which he was the founding Vice Chancellor. He was educated at Calcutta Boys’ School, Presidency College, Calcutta, JNU and St Edmund Hall, Oxford. He was awarded a DPhil in Modern History by the University of Oxford. He taught in the department of history, Calcutta University, and held visiting appointments at Princeton University, Manchester University and the University of California, Santa Cruz. From 1993 to 2014 he was the Editor, Editorial Pages, The Telegraph. He is the author of many books—these include Nehru & Bose: Parallel Lives; Awadh in Revolt 1857–58: A Study of Popular Resistance; Spectre of Violence: The Massacres in Kanpur in 1857; The Year of Blood: Essays on 1857, Dateline 1857: Revolt against the Raj. He is the editor of Great Speeches of Modern India and The Penguin Gandhi Reader and the co-author of New Delhi: The Making of a Capital and India: Then and Now.
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