Liberalism
A Counter-History
Domenico Losurdo (Author, University of Urbino), Gregory Elliott (Translator)
A Verso book
One of Europe's leading intellectual historians deconstructs liberalism's dark side.
In this definitive historical investigation, Italian author and philosopher Domenico Losurdo argues that from the outset liberalism, as a philosophical position and ideology, has been bound up with the most illiberal of policies: slavery, colonialism, genocide, racism and snobbery.
Narrating an intellectual history running from the eighteenth through to the twentieth centuries, Losurdo examines the thought of preeminent liberal writers such as Locke, Burke, Tocqueville, Constant, Bentham, and Sieyès, revealing the inner contradictions of an intellectual position that has exercised a formative influence on today’s politics. Among the dominant strains of liberalism, he discerns the counter-currents of more radical positions, lost in the constitution of the modern world order.
Book Details
- Hardcover
- April 2011
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ISBN 978-1-84467-693-4
- 6.5 × 9.5 in
/ 384 pages
- Territory Rights: USA and Dependencies and the Philippines.
Endorsements & Reviews
“There is always something to learn from books by Domenico Losurdo.
And [this book] is no exception, for the outstanding knowledge of modern
and contemporary political thought, the rigorous philology and the pursuit
of sources that have been forgotten or expunged.” — Il Corriere della Sera
“Vast historical research recommended for the depth of the ‘excavation’ and for the
wealth of new material that emerges.” — Il Sole 24 Ore
“The latest, original work by Domenico Losurdo, a philosopher-historian of great
lucidity, author of always innovative books … travels through and analyzes the dark,
deep and often malodorous side of liberalism.” — La Stampa
Also by Gregory Elliott 
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Paperback
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Paperback
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Second Edition / Paperback