While the Swiss people have settled – twice – the question of the amount of the audiovisual licence fee, at least for a while, the discussion on the offer provided by this compulsory levy must continue. The same applies to France.
Consecrating a heritage whose core is individual liberty, liberal-conservatism can form a coherent synthesis rather than a fragile compromise. Here is an outline, drawing on Burke, Scruton and Kolnai as well as Smith, Tocqueville and Hayek.
The Alpine Republic likes to think of itself as a model of liberalism. Yet, between the complaint against a French satirist and the government's silence in the face of European sanctions against Jacques Baud, the country is failing the test of defending freedom.
In touting the idea of a label that would distinguish «reliable» media from others, Emmanuel Macron betrayed an authoritarian attitude of believing that one or more individuals have the legitimacy to define what everyone should trust.
Musical improvisation is a beautiful metaphor for free expression: an art of addressing others, seeking clarity and weaving a fragile harmony, where each voice is prepared but daring.
Maximum freedom of expression and a ban on alcohol in public spaces. Pornography and prudishness... There's no shortage of paradoxes on the other side of the Atlantic, but not trying to hide them is less hypocritical than believing oneself to be devoid of them. A lesson for Europe.
Far from heralding the end of journalism, artificial intelligence can free newsrooms from mechanical tasks and offer more time for investigating, analyzing and polishing texts. On one condition.
Economics is a language of models and equations. Yet its foundations are philosophical. Giving heterodox currents back their rightful place means restoring the vitality and pluralism of this discipline - and thus its link with liberalism.
The Iran-Israel crisis has revived an old Western temptation: regime change. The illusion of immediate political transformation, however, runs up against the fact that regimes come and go, while peoples, their history and culture remain.
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