memes

Yes.

Liberalism is a word that means different things to different people, especially from country to country.

Having its origins in the assertion of bourgeois right against conservative forces, liberalism of all its different varieties is generally an ideology of the urban bourgeoisie. Very broadly, liberalism asserts individual autonomy against the intrusion of the community into that. The main source of ambiguity in liberalism is the divergence between “economic liberalism” and “civic liberalism”.

“Economic liberalism”, sometimes called Neo-liberalism or “big-L Liberalism” advocates a laissez faire economic regime, i.e., the right of property-owners to exercise the power of money unhindered by regulations, redistributive taxes and so on. Economic liberalism therefore easily makes common cause with the traditional sources of conservative politics – the landed aristocracy and Christian fundamentalists. Neo-liberalism (“Economic rationalism” in Australia) favours reliance on market forces to resolve social problems, rather than methods of state regulation.

“Civic liberalism” on the other hand, emphasises the importance of individual autonomy against determination by traditional norms, racial prejudice, entrenched power relations and economic disadvantage. Under the banner of “equality of opportunity”, civic liberalism can come close to forms of communitarianism in emphasising the responsibility of the community to secure the basic conditions of life of members of the community, or, under the banner of “freedom of the individual” on the other hand, to libertarianism, in emphasising the rights of individuals to make “life-style” choices free from interference by the community, provided they do no harm to others.

In the U.S., “liberal” has the specific connotation of seeking to promote the social good without challenging the right of the ruling class to rule. Thus, the American ‘liberal’ who wants higher wages and a better health service is quite distinct from the labour activist who aims for much the same things but whose conception is that this entails a fight against the ruling elite.

From Marxists.org