Nick Cohen and Adrian Wooldridge discuss Adrian's book \"Centrists of the World Unite: The Lost Genius of Liberalism.\" They discuss how liberal institutions and ideologies have become corrupted across multiple domains - from \"Woke\" identitarianism on the left to neoliberal capitalism and global managerialism. Adrian identifies three main liberal overreaches: left liberals pushing extreme social policies, neoliberals promoting unfettered markets, and globalists supporting unmanaged immigration and multinational institutions.
They discuss how these failures created conditions for authoritarian populism, with examples like Trump and Brexit, though Adrian argues these represent bad solutions to real problems rather than legitimate alternatives. They also talk about how tech companies pose a civilisational threat to liberal values by manipulating preferences and fracturing attention, and concluded with optimism about liberalism's historical pattern of revival after apparent deaths, suggesting current incremental adjustments by politicians like Sir Keir Starmer could lead to a new liberal renaissance.
Adrian Wooldridge @adwooldridge is a columnist for Bloomberg Opinion and an author. His book Centrists of the world, unite! The lost genius of liberalism\" has just been published. Adrian's book lays out a centrist agenda for today’s problems. It reminds us of the dynamism and fixed principles that have shaped the successes of liberalism and warns us against splitting into sub-groups that fail to grapple with the common good.
Nick Cohen's @NickCohen4 latest Substack column Writing from London on politics and culture from the UK and beyond.