Philosopher and historian of ideas, born in Riga, Latvia. Most of his academic career was at Oxford, where he became a fellow of All Souls (1932), professor of social and political theory (1957), and Master of Wolfson College (1966). His philosophical works included Karl Marx (1939), Historical Inevitability (1954), Two Concepts of Liberty (1959), and Vico and Herder (1976). Later works included The Crooked Timber of Humanity (1990) and The Magus of the North (1993). He was widely recognized as one of the leading intellectual voices of his generation.
|
Western Philosophers 20th-century philosophy |
|
|---|---|
| Sir Isaiah Berlin | |
| Name: | Isaiah Berlin |
| Birth: | June 6, 1909 |
| Death: | November 5, 1997 |
| School/tradition: | Analytic |
| Main interests: | Political philosophy, History of ideas, Liberalism, Philosophy of history, Ethics, Zionism |
| Notable ideas: | Distinction between positive/negative liberty, Counter-Enlightenment, value pluralism |
| Influences: | Bentham, Mill, Marx |
| Influenced: | Most contemporary liberal thinkers |
Sir Isaiah Berlin, OM (June 6, 1909–November 5, 1997), was a political philosopher and historian of ideas, regarded as one of the leading liberal thinkers of the 20th century. His 1958 inaugural lecture, "Two Concepts of Liberty", in which he famously distinguished between positive and negative liberty, has informed much of the debate since then on the relationship between liberty and equality.
Life
Berlin was born into a Jewish family, the son of Mendel Berlin, a timber merchant, and his wife Marie, née Volshonok.
His work
|
The Liberalism series, part of the Politics series |
| Development |
| History of liberal thought |
| Contributions to liberal theory |
| Schools |
| Classical liberalism |
| Conservative liberalism |
| Cultural liberalism |
| Economic liberalism |
| Libertarianism |
| Neoliberalism |
| Ordoliberalism |
| Paleoliberalism |
| Social liberalism |
| National varients |
| American liberalism |
| Canadian liberalism |
| Australian liberalism |
| British liberalism |
| Ideas |
| Individual rights |
| Individualism |
| Liberal democracy |
| Liberal neutrality |
| Negative & positive Liberty |
| Free market |
| Mixed economy |
| Open society |
| Organizations |
| Liberal parties worldwide |
| Liberal International · Iflry |
|
ELDR/ALDE · Lymec CALD · ALN · Relial. CLH |
| Politics Portal This box: view • talk • edit |
Berlin is best known for his essay "Two Concepts of Liberty", which was delivered in 1958 as his inaugural lecture as Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory at Oxford. While Berlin granted that both concepts of liberty represent valid human ideals, he believed that, as a matter of history, the positive concept of liberty has proven more susceptible to political abuse. Hegel (all committed to the positive concept of liberty), European political thinkers were frequently tempted to equate liberty with forms of political discipline or constraint. In this way of thinking, Berlin contended, demands for freedom paradoxically become demands for forms of collective control and discipline — those deemed necessary for the "self-mastery" or self-determination of nations, classes, democratic communities, and perhaps of humanity as a whole. There is thus an elective affinity, for Berlin, between positive liberty and political totalitarianism.
Berlin's essay "Historical Inevitability" (1953) focused on a controversy in the philosophy of history. Berlin is also well known for his writings on Russian intellectual history, most of which are collected in Russian Thinkers (1978), edited, like most of Berlin's work, by Henry Hardy (in the case of this volume, jointly with Aileen Kelly).
Berlin's writings on the Enlightenment and its critics — for whom Berlin used the term the "Counter-Enlightenment" — and particularly Romanticism, contributed to his advocacy of an ethical theory he termed value-pluralism. For Berlin, values are creations of mankind, rather than products of nature waiting to be discovered, though he also argued that the nature of mankind is such that certain values — for example, the importance of individual liberty — will hold true across cultures, which is what he meant when he called his position "objective pluralism." — Isaiah Berlin, Two Concepts of Liberty "The very desire for guarantees that our values are eternal and secure in some objective heaven is perhaps only a craving for the certainties of childhood or the absolute values of our primitive past." — Isaiah Berlin, Two Concepts of Liberty "Philosophers are adults who persist in asking childish questions." — Isaiah Berlin, quoted in The Listener, 1978. — Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty" "Injustice, poverty, slavery, ignorance - these may be cured by reform or revolution. — Isaiah Berlin, 'Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century', in Liberty "The simple point which I am concerned to make is that where ultimate values are irreconcilable, clear-cut solutions cannot, in principle, be found. — Isaiah Berlin, 'Introduction' to 'Five Essays on Liberty', in Liberty "There exists a great chasm between those, on one side, who relate everything to a single central vision ... — Isaiah Berlin, The Hedgehog and the Fox
Trivia
Isaiah Berlin was once confused with Irving Berlin by Winston Churchill who invited the latter to lunch, thinking he was the former. Joshua Cherniss, 'Isaiah Berlin: A Defence', The Oxonian Review of Books Claude Galipeau, Isaiah Berlin's Liberalism, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994.| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| NAME | Berlin, Isaiah |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION | British political philosopher and historian of ideas; wrote on positive and negative liberty, value pluralism, Enlightenment and Counter-Enlightenment |
| DATE OF BIRTH | June 6, 1909 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Riga, Russia (now Lithuania) |
| DATE OF DEATH | November 5, 1997 |
| PLACE OF DEATH | Oxford, Oxfordshire, England |
User Comments Add a comment…