Customer Reviews

The Orange Book: Reclaiming Liberalism

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is a most revealing collection of essays by LibDem MPs and MEPs. Chris Huhne calls for legalising wars of intervention and for an EU `rapid reaction force'.

The LibDems want to `replace' the NHS and to allow private `alternative providers', which opens the door to US `health corporations'. They want to end national pay bargaining in the public sector. They advocate privatising the Royal Mail.

The contributors all say nice things about local democracy. Yet the coalition government's recent Localism Act gave 126 new powers to central government over local.

Nick Clegg urges Britain to join the euro. As the euro crisis deepens, this looks even more stupid. He writes, "the vast majority of the electorate is both confused and undecided on the big European questions." This is patronising and untrue: there is a consistent 2/1 majority against joining the euro.
Clegg writes of `the overwhelming case for European integration'. He states that the EU is moving `in a more open, decentralised, accountable direction'. Really? He writes of the "threat" of mass migration from Central and Eastern Europe, as if it were not real. (In 2002 there were approximately 4,000 workers from the A8 nations in low-skilled jobs in the British economy. Now there are 235,000.) He urges a referendum on the EU Constitution. Good idea! But what has happened? Another promise broken.
Vince Cable too praises the euro, writing of `the likelihood, and desirability, of the UK joining the euro zone at some stage'. He urges dismantling the Department of Trade and Industry, general de-regulation and abolishing capital gains tax.

Let me state first and foremost that I am an American; thus, this book was not specifically targeted towards me. That being said, The Orange Book was a great read.

Written by a compilation of various Liberal Democrat MPs, each chapter of this book covers a different political topic related to liberalism. I should note that the "liberalism" discussed in this book would be more accurately described to my American friends as "classical liberalism," or more appropriately, "libertarianism." The authors shun big government solutions to the problems that permeate British society, instead favoring actions by individuals.

Unlike the Conservative Party, which favors economic liberalism, and the Labour Party, which favors social and political liberalism, these Lib Dem MPs argue for all three (and also a fourth, called personal liberalism). By allowing individuals to act freely with minimal government intervention, they claim, British society can become vibrant and more successful.

They also argue for more rule at the closer to home, stating that Westminster and Whitehall cannot truly appreciate not fundamentally solve the problems at the local level.

The only part of the book that undermined their argument for smaller, more effective government was the chapter on the National Health Service. While American libertarians would argue that a form of socialized medicine would be antithetical to their movement, the Lib Dem MPs instead argue that the NHS should be kept, but with reform.

As it stands currently, the free-market liberals in the Liberal Democratic Party are a minority. Hopefully, this book will convince the Lib Dem leadership that, by embracing free-market reforms first preached by the Tories, they can make their movement truly about freedom on all levels.

All in all, I recommend this book for any student of politics, especially American libertarians and my British friends across the Pond that are tired of Westminster delegating their daily affairs.