Review: On Liberty and Liberalism. The Case of John Stuart Mill by Gertrude Himmelfarb

Ten, C. L. Political Theory 3, no. 3. 1975.

Abstract:

Professor Himmelfarb argues that the essay On Liberty conflicts with nearly everything else Mill wrote except his essays on women. Whereas the Mill of On Liberty propounded and defended the “one very simple principle” of liberty, the “other Mill” was aware of the complexity of social and political life, and sought to qualify the pursuit of individual liberty with other values, such as “duty, morality, discipline, the public good, tradition, community, nationality, society” (p. 168). Mill was preoccupied with the question of women’s liberation, and it was this urgent practical issue which led him to formulate his principle of liberty: “the doctrine of liberty was required for the liberation of women” (p. 181). By showing that men, too, though to a lesser extent, were victims of society’s tyranny, Mill gave both men and women a common interest in promoting individual liberty against the claims of society, custom, and tradition. On Liberty was written under the close supervision of Mill’s wife, Harriet, and her influence pushed Mill to adopt the absolute value of liberty, an extreme position that differed from Mill’s customary, moderate mode of thought.