The Outlaw John Locke: & why liberalism is worth fighting for

by John MacBeath Watkins

Liberalism has produced the largest, most successful Utopian experiment of all time. Yet, most people don't realize how radical liberalism was at its inception or how radical it still is. Thinkers like John Locke proposed an entirely new basis for the legitimacy of governments, a clean break with the rule of force, faith, and custom that had been the basis for government from the beginning of history. Locke himself argued that there was a right to revolution if a terrible ruler could not be removed by other means, and fled his native country after he was implicated in a plot to kill the king. He could only safely return in the company of an invading army.
A period of polarization and religious wars made the old basis for the legitimacy of governments untenable, leading to a revolution in how society is organized. The Outlaw John Locke shows how a philosophy that says we are all born our own masters revolutionized the way we think about issues from government to marriage, and how we take this revolution for granted at our peril. We live in a time of unprecedented wealth, scientific knowledge, and cultural attainment, but fail to understand what brought us these things, and could lose them if we don't defend them.

335 pages, Kindle Edition

Published December 14, 2018

Reviews

[Jacob · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very well done book, written by the owner of my favorite used book store.

[Daniel Bender · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book is very good in the beginning. Fun, insightful and valuable.

But it never gets to real talk about John Locke

And the second half is basically 2016 American politics. It was very disappointing !

[Debflowers7 · Rating 2 out of 5]

There were definitely nuggets in this book that I found valuable, but there was a lot of side tracking that was superfluous, and I ended up skimming through it. I was actually hoping to stay more focused on democracy and the relationship with liberalism.

[Alexandria Avona · Rating 4 out of 5]

No comment.

[Mike Horne · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book does an OK job explaining how liberalism began. But the second half of the book is just political punditry. This book needs the discipline of a strong editor.