What is a Liberal Society?

Let me identify the set of ideas that I am operating in. I am essentially a Constitutionalist operating in an economic society which might be described as post-industrialism. Industrialism is characterized as trade that permits large markets, and the factory system of social organization that is designed to serve such broad markets.

The key is that individuals should have protected rights that higher and more powerful organizations cannot abrogate. The same is true of business organizations, but their rights are subject to those of individuals. Government sets rules both individuals and corporations must operate under and government has the power to enforce those rules, subject to those individual rights.

Government is responsible to ensure that the operations of individuals and businesses are not damaging to the society as a whole, and it sets rules of behavior to make sure that individuals and businesses treat each other fairly. Enforcing those rules is what we call the "Rule of Law", and everyone is subject to the rule of law no matter how powerful.

The courts exist to make sure the rule of law, not arbitrary actions of powerful individuals, is what applies. Legislatures made up of elected representatives of the voters set new rules to fit new conditions and modify the older ones that are out of synch with realities. The courts step in the make sure that such rules do not violate the protected rights of individuals and organizations. The most basic right after the right to life is the right to ownership of property. The most essential rights protected by government are the right to life, the right to property, and the enforcement of contracts. These are all subject to the requirement that everyone has the rights and no one can use social or government power to take those rights away.

In this system, individuals have the greatest degree of freedom. Their actions and decisions are presumed to be proper and acceptable unless shown to be damaging to others or a violation of reasonable law. Businesses have similar freedoms but are slightly subordinate to the freedoms of individuals. However, each is subject to enforcement of any fair contracts they make. Notice that individuals, while subject to laws that protect society and enforce fair contracts, have the greatest degree of personal freedom. Businesses have similar freedoms of their own actions, but are expected to act with fairness and within the needs of society. Subject to the rights of individuals and businesses to operate individually without interference, the government sets rules to guide the interrelations of the people and organizations that make up society, and the courts step in to ensure that conflicts are mediated within this ideal.

Since the most valuable assets of any society is its' individuals, government also must establish a safety net to protect the most vulnerable and at risk people.

To make such a liberal society work requires maximum free access to information. A very few clearly identifiable areas of information need to be kept confidential. These are primarily national security, corporate strategy and a few trade secrets. Such areas need to be as limited as possible. They need to be kept confidential as long as they are significant, and no longer, so they have to be subject to time limitations. All exceptions must be justified and justified repeatedly.

Please notice that within this system, free enterprise has great freedom, but not unlimited freedom. Free enterprise is the highly flexible method of organizing ~groups~ to provide goods and services, but it must also be limited where it violates the rules that protect society as a whole. The costs of production need to be enforced on the individual businesses rather than handed off to society as a whole, and businesses must operate transparently to the maximum degree possible. Individuals have greater freedom to act than businesses do since their actions are not as likely to damage society generally.

This, in a nutshell, is a description of liberal society. The key to being liberal is that the interactions must be rational, logical, and within the rule of law, and those actions and their results must be freely available to review. There are also areas of individual or corporate privilege, which are presumed to be outside of review unless there are valid reasons to believe that the corporations or individuals are violating the reasonable law. To the extent that government operates non-rationally, arbitrarily, irrationally, or outside the rule of reasonable law, or that information is improperly kept from public decision makers and the public in general, it is not a liberal society.

In my opinion, this is a liberal, post industrialism society. It implies the safety net, but also describes the rights of both individuals and corporations. The requirement for rationality means that religion cannot run or have veto power on government, since religion is faith-based and inherently not rational.