The Liberalism Trap

Abstract The Liberalism Trap identifies a methodological problem in contemporary political theory: focus on liberalism has become an interpretive custom directing engagements with politics. Though scholars have long analyzed the meanings, merits, successes or failings of liberalism, little attention is paid to how such preoccupations shape the way we study political questions and texts. The book evaluates the effects of these preoccupations by turning to John Stuart Mill—the so-called father of modern liberalism—arguing that Mill’s canonical status as a liberal is habitually substituted for his political arguments. The book works against that substitution through a comparative reading of Mill’s proposals concerning gender, class, and empire. That comparison recovers a thinker motivated not by ideological certainties but by a politics of uncertainty and draws into view the complex strategies that Mill employs across his work on domestic and imperial questions. Recovering Mill’s uncertain politics also sets into relief the interpretive costs of reading through liberalism. That even the paradigmatic liberal is unduly constrained by this label suggests that taking a break from our preoccupations with liberalism might be warranted. In all, The Liberalism Trap integrates an innovative reading of a canonical thinker with a methodological critique of interpretive practices in contemporary political theory.