The Relationship Between Value Pluralism And Liberalism Of Isaiah·Berlin's

Since Isaiah·Berlin proposed the concept of Value Pluralism, many fierce debates were promoted around it in 40s-70s of 20th century. And one of the important subjects is the relationship between Liberalism and Value Pluralism, which attracted many scholars'attention. Western scholars discuss with value pluralism as the great challenge to liberalism, but this paper does not plan on sorting this problem out, instead I go back to Berlin's ideology which embody a kind of tension that come from a paradox in his ideology. On the one hand, Berlin criticised the suprior emphasis on positive freedom via the critique of anti-enlightenment thinkers to traditional liberalism, on the other hand he is tyring to turn the dawnfallen tendency back by confirming the concept of freedom, critique on the positive freedom and advocacy of negative freedom. Thees two part seems to be a paradox but actually a kind of dialectical relationship, which aims to promote the development of liberalism by the reflection of the concept. Discussions triggered by the tension of Berlin thoughts embodied in the controvercy between George Claude and John Gray on the relationship of value pluralism and liberalism. therefore this paper attempts to analysis the real demands of Berlin's thought by the dispute. This paper draw a moderate conclusion that the value pluralism essentially is a way to argue liberal but not to subversion. This new understanding of Berlin's value pluralism and liberalism means a lot to further study on liberalism.