Liberal conservatism
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Liberal conservatism is a political philosophy which generally means combining elements of "conservatism" with elements of "liberalism". As these latter two terms have had different meanings over time and across countries, liberal conservatism also has a wide variety of meanings. There are two principal ones:
1) Historically, it often referred to the combination of economic liberalism, which champions laissez-faire markets, with the classical conservative concern for established tradition, respect for authority and religious values. In this way it contrasted itself with classical liberalism, which supported freedom for the individual in both the economic and social spheres.
Over time, the general conservative ideology in many countries adopted economic liberal arguments and this sense of the term "liberal conservatism" fell out of use, and "conservatism" was simply used instead. This is also the case in countries where economic liberal ideas have been the tradition, such as the United States, and are thus considered "conservative". In other countries where liberal conservative movements have entered the political mainstream, the terms "liberal" and "conservative" may become synonymous (as in Australia, in Italy and in Spain). The liberal conservative tradition in the United States combines the economic individualism of the classical liberals, now generally referred to as "economic conservatism", with a Burkean form of conservatism (which has also become part of the American conservative tradition, for example in the writings of Russell Kirk). In that sense it is now referred to in the US and increasingly Canada and the UK simply as "conservatism".
2) Another meaning for the term that has developed involves stressing what are now conservative views of free-market economics and belief in individual responsibility, in combination with socially liberal views on defence of civil rights, environmentalism and support for a limited welfare state. This philosophy, also known as conservative liberalism, is that of Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt and current British Conservative Party leader David Cameron, although the latter has been accused of reneging on liberal social and economic policies in favour of more traditional Tory values[citation needed].
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