liberalism

Definition

The quality of being liberal.

Etymology

Circa 1819, from French libéralisme circa 1818. Equivalent to liberal + -ism.

Example Sentences

• "Whether some distant cousin really belongs to the extended family of liberalisms is a matter of healthy dispute."
• "This poses obvious problems for statistical inference in that what may appear as ‘declines’ in non-white racial liberalism may actually be due to increases in representation of non-black racial/ethnic minorities whose racial attitudes are more conservative."
• "But liberalism has no obvious answers to the biggest problems we face: ecological collapse and technological disruption."