The shift from an essentially liberal, that’s with a lowercase ‘l’, to a neoliberal nation has been most evident in the last few years.

How do we define ‘liberal’, as used in the context of an overarching philosophy for a population? This is quite a challenge since the concept has changed very much over time. A simple definition from ethics.com is “Liberalism is founded on the belief that individual freedom should be the basis of a just society.” The explanation goes on consider some of the aspects of freedom including who may marry who, religious freedom, where to live, what career to choose and so forth. Possibly the most broad definition can be found in the UN Declaration of Human Rights which is aimed at allowing all people to live lives with dignity no matter what their colour, religion, ethnicity, education level, gender, even their self definition. In simple terms fairness and equity for every one, no mater what ethnicity, gender, religion, hair colour or whether left or right handed or any other self-definition.

The fight for those basic rights has been a long, arduous and bloody journey, and sadly still continues today.

From about the year 800CE to the sixteenth century, the Holy Roman Empire spread and controlled the religion of Christianity through Europe, from Italy to the North Sea, and it influenced governance, education, law and civic control throughout Europe, into Britain and Ireland. Kings and those in high office swore allegiance to the papacy.

During the 12th and 13th centuries, the power of the papacy dominated European life. Kings and rulers, knights and feudal lords swore their allegiance to the Pope, Emperors continued to go to Rome for their coronations, claiming the title Emperor-August, as did Charlemagne on his coronation by Pope Leo III, with the congregation calling “To Charles, the most pious, crowned Augusta by God, to the great peace-making Emperor, long life and victory.” (Bruce L Shelley: Church history in plain language (1995) p.174).

The earliest European colonial ambitions included the notion that colonised peoples should be Christianised and fall under the same religious and legal framework as in the Holy Roman Empire; all falling under the authority of the Roman church. Those who remained barbarians were not treated as fellow believers and condemned to what ever punishment was considered appropriate.

And then came the Gutenberg Bible, the printing of the Bible and making it available beyond the selected, privileged few led to the Reformation.

The transition from an overly controlled population to one which accepted at least religious difference emerged after the Reformation in Europe which but only after the Hundred Years’ War, and not satisfied with that bloodbath, followed by the Thirty Years’ War, fought on the right to freedom of religion. It took more than arguably half the European population to be killed through bloody battles, burning at the stake and starvation for a time of reckoning to be faced, to declare, somewhat reluctantly, that religion was a matter of personal choice.

Liberalism has moved along apace in Europe, and most democratic nations with voting rights becoming universal for adult populations, abortion rights, same sex marriage, gender definition, equality under law and so forth. Some people still find these freedoms a bit much and there is a bit of push and shove and they surface in political discourse from time to time. The US Supreme Court decision which protected the right to abortion through-out the US was overturned and very quickly some states passed laws banning abortion and others placing severe restrictions on the availability of abortions. Much the same we see that immigration is an issue, as is race relations, attempts to rewrite the laws as it were.

Recent election campaigns in Australia have had abortion rights on the agenda as well as ‘law and order’ despite the prevalence of crime being at historically low rates. Interestingly, I had a conversation with a tradesman who was cleaning graffiti painted in a picnic area by the beach. He commented that there is so much more graffiti than he can remember. I disputed that, suggesting that since it is his job to clean it up, he is far more aware of it as an issue. I also wonder how one candidate who is rumoured to be a regular illicit drug user can stand for a law and order ticket. Perhaps randomised drug and alcohol testing should become a regular feature in parliaments as it is in many workplaces.

The fundamental rights promoted through liberalism are those of personal well-being and the protection of personal freedoms, including what to produce, what to buy, what to wear, what to consume, where to live, and equality under law.

Governance has changed from autocracies such as nations and kingdoms developed and reinforced through alliances with religion to become today’s democracies. Through industrialisation and a broadening of economies, the population shifts from serfdom to working and middle class urbanisation saw the need to supporting infrastructure, roads, power and other services to be constructed to service the needs of the growing urban and suburban populations. Governments, at all levels, Local, State and Federal have accepted as part of their roles to provide certain infrastructures, roads, power, water, sewerage, public transport, hospitals and health services, among others. The rates and taxes collected by governments have been used to pay for these services, and the charges are ongoing; we all pay our share of these taxes and charges, or as few of them as we are able, but still accept that in our democratic world basic services should be available. For major infrastructure projects governments borrow, traditionally by raising government bonds, but we are also seeing major banks and corporations financing such projects as major roads and charging a fee for users; a toll. No longer is it the governments providing the infrastructure, but that has been passed on to investment bodies, a Neoliberalism has emerged which is far more demanding than those objecting to the freedoms achieved which upset some religious and moral sensibilities.

My first encounter was needing to pay a toll to cross Sydney Harbour on that famous bridge in 1973. A depression era build using borrowed money, but in state government hands. It felt a bit like paying a fare for the bus or train. Collections by the government agency which provides and maintains the service.

New roads in Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland are contracted to and financed by the investment corporation Transurban, and they are reaping in bucket loads of money for a simple commute or a trip away for the weekend. On a recent ABC Four Corners programme, examples were given where people just going to work could be paying as much as 10% of their wages on tolls… just to get to work and back. If the toll is not paid in a timely manner, through fines and various administrative fees, a $3.00 toll can quickly escalate to over $300.00. Transurban reported profit after tax for 2024 of $326 million, an increase of 414.2% over 2023. In part because of an agreement that toll fees rise at CPI rates.

Governments, wanting to demonstrate economically responsible by not having budget deficits to meet their commitments, pass their responsibilities for infrastructure to private corporations and tax payers pay an additional price for the infrastructure used to go about their everyday lives.

Much the same with the privatisation of power generators and telecommunications has seen the sell-off of state owned infrastructure to profit hungry investors.

In this, the liberal demands for fairness and equity are passed of to highly profitable corporations who are not subject to the checks and balances and scrutiny democracy allows. Neoliberalism can be very profitable.

Another example of the greed of neoliberalism is in the retail services such as banking, supermarkets and hardware. Competition has been squeezed out in those sectors with a few major players writing profits which are well above the sorts of profits written by similar corporations in other markets. Wages for workers in those industries are not great but executive salaries are pretty good. But the pricing of the goods on sale and the relationship with suppliers are questionable. In his 2022 book, Liberalism and its discontents, Francis Fukuyama quotes a former US Solicitor General Robert in the Nixon and Ford administrations, Bork who stated that ‘anti-trust laws should have one, and only one, goal, which is to maximise consumer welfare, understood in either terms of prices or quality.’ (p34) Or to use a wonderful Aussie expression, the pricing and quality provided should pass the pub test. Transurban, the banks, the major retailers and other large corporate service providers are struggling to pass that test. Oh I just got an insurance renewal, so include insurance providers, where the cost of insuring a vehicle has increased but the resale value has decreased (how is that fair?)

It is time to go back to the basic tenets of liberalism where fairness and equity for all become the norm.