liberal1 adjectiveliberal2 noun
liberallib‧e‧ral1 /ˈlɪbərəl/ ●○○ AWL adjective 
WORD ORIGINliberal1
Origin:
1300-1400 Old French, Latin liberalis, from liber; ➔ LIBERTYEXAMPLES FROM OTHER DICTIONARIES
- liberal immigration policies
- a liberal interpretation of the original play
- a liberal view of homosexuality
- He has quite liberal views for someone of his generation.
- I was fortunate enough to have very liberal parents.
- In a liberal society you may have the right to express your own beliefs, but not necessarily to cause offence to other people.
- In the 1840s, President Herrera promoted a policy of gradual liberal reform in Mexico.
- Some liberal Democrats want to introduce stricter price controls.
- Firmly distanced from the levers of power, the liberal parties were unable to carry conviction among their potential constituents.
- If its people called you a liberal subversive in the pay of effete capitalist Western powers it was regarded as fair comment.
- In order to reveal these foundations we must therefore examine the main tenets of conservative and liberal political thought.
- Last year, Working Assets distributed $ 2. 15 million to 36 liberal non-profits, as earmarked by individual customers.
- My parents are broadminded, liberal and understanding to the extent that I probably could never match.
- Pius remained implacably opposed to the assumptions of liberal bourgeois civilization.
- The Monopolies Commission took the line that the benefits of a more liberal regime outweighed any drawbacks.
- While the Cold War period was dominated by realism, liberal approaches continued to be developed.
Longman Language Activatora country or system of government in which people have freedom
a free country, political system, or society is one in which people are allowed to live their lives in the way that they choose, express their opinions freely, take part in political activity etc: · We will continue our struggle until our country is free.· They were able to return to visit their family in a free Czech Republic.· Sometimes you realize how lucky you are to live in a free society.
a liberal society or system is one in which people have the right to express their own opinions, live their own way of life, have their own religious beliefs etc, even if these are different from those of most other people: · In a liberal society you may have the right to express your own beliefs, but not necessarily to cause offence to other people.· In the 1840s, President Herrera promoted a policy of gradual liberal reform in Mexico.
people/attitudes that are not strict not strict in the way that you punish people or control their behaviour: · The younger teachers generally had a more lenient attitude towards their students.lenient with: · Some police officers have criticized judges for being too lenient with car thieves and burglars.
someone who is easy-going does not care about being strict, and is usually calm and relaxed: · Our parents are pretty easy-going, and they don't mind if we stay out late.
someone who is soft seems weak because they are not strict enough with other people: · He doesn't have the right personality to be an army officer, he's too soft.soft on: · They accused the government of being too soft on crime.
allowing people to do, say, or believe what they like without fear of being punished or criticized: · I've tried to adopt a fairly tolerant attitude towards his behaviour.tolerant of: · She's not very tolerant of other people's failings.tolerant towards: · You should try to be more tolerant towards other people.
behaviour or an attitude that allows people to do, say, or believe what they like without fear of being punished or criticized: · Tolerance was not a quality you associated with my parents.tolerance of: · The government is beginning to show more tolerance of opposition groups.tolerance towards: · The school encourages an attitude of tolerance towards all people.
willing to understand and respect other people's ideas, opinions, and behaviour, even if you do not approve of them: · I was fortunate enough to have very liberal parents.· He has quite liberal views for someone of his generation.
willing to accept and respect other people's beliefs or behaviour although they many be very different from your own: · My mother's quite broad-minded. She understands my decision to bring up my baby on my own.
a permissive society or person allows behaviour, especially sexual behaviour, that many other people disapprove of: · In the permissive society of the 1960s anything was possible.· It's not always true that young people have a more permissive attitude towards sex.
not strict enough, especially through laziness or carelessness: · The report criticizes the lax security at many prisons.lax about: · I think the school has been too lax about bad behaviour in the past.
allowing someone, especially a child, to behave in whatever way they want because you love them: · Parents can easily fall into the trap of being over-indulgent with their first child.· She was brought up by a succession of over-indulgent relations.
WORD SETSadversarial, adjectiveamnesty, nounanarchism, nounanarchist, nounanticlerical, adjectivearms control, nounbigot, nounbigoted, adjectivebigotry, nounbilateral, adjectiveBlimp, nouncarpetbagger, nouncaucus, nounchancellor, nouncoalition, nounconsensus, nounconstituency, nounconstitutionalism, nounconsumerism, nouncredo, noundemagogue, noundestabilize, verbdétente, noundisorder, noundissent, noundivine right, nounferment, nounfirebrand, noungerrymandering, nounheartland, nounhonours list, nouninterventionist, adjectiveisolationism, nounliberal, adjectiveliberal, nounliberalism, nounlobby, nounlobby, verbMaoism, nounnationalistic, adjective-ocracy, suffix-ocrat, suffixopinion-makers, nounopinion poll, nounpersonality cult, nounpetition, nounphoto opportunity, nounplacard, nounplatform, nounpolitical, adjectivepolitical asylum, nounpolitical geography, nounpolitical machine, nounpopulist, adjectivepork barrel, nounprivilege, nounpropaganda, nounrealpolitik, nounrevolution, nounsoapbox, nounsound bite, nounstump, verbsubversive, adjectivesubvert, verbwar of words, nounwheeler-dealer, nounwheeling and dealing, noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM THE ENTRY
a liberal interpretation of the original playCOLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES a leading member of a Tory think tankCOLLOCATIONS FROM THE CORPUSNOUN
a liberal interpretation of the original play· He is committed to democratic ideals such as majority rule.
a leading member of a Tory think tank· This liberal approach to Scripture is dealt with more fully in a later chapter.· Elsewhere there is greater flexibility, less certainty and a more liberal approach to economic and political diversity.· Among organisations that would like to see a more liberal approach are student broadcasters and hospital radio stations.· While the Cold War period was dominated by realism, liberal approaches continued to be developed.
· This liberal attitude has its benefits for the university.· Where inmates were once locked up for 23 hours everyday a more liberal attitude now prevails.· They're hardly likely to have the most tolerant or liberal attitudes are they!· He has such expertise and a liberal attitude to such matters.
· In this image the state in liberal democracies is separated from its society by only a thin membrane of formal legality.· These rights to additional forms of participation and opposition in the political process seem an essential element of a liberal democracy.· Bureaucratization and centralization were also tied to the growth of liberal democracy and socialism in intended and unintended ways.· Contemporary elite theorists have argued that these conditions are not remotely met in liberal democracies.· Classical elite theorists had sought to show that liberal democracy was a utopian ideal incapable of realization.· Revolutions are only contemplated by cadres with intense preferences: most workers in liberal democracies will not vote for a revolution.· Pluralists deny that higher social classes monopolize power and believe that in liberal democracies the wishes of the people determine government policy.· Synods were not like the parliaments of liberal democracies.
· He says that the council has already had extra funding, how much more do the labour and liberal democrat councillors want?· They are all Republicans except my stepmother, who is a liberal Democrat.· The liberal democrats and labour say their budget was the only way to prevent drastic cuts.· In 1994, the now-retired liberal Democrat, Rep.· Some cuts, but steering a way from too many job losses is the option favoured by the liberal democrats.· Mosk, though a loyal liberal Democrat, demurred, citing the right of free political association.· The liberal democrats wanted a more modest overspend ... seven million.· A liberal Democrat from San Francisco, Sen.
· The second thing that some universities do is provide liberal education for its own sake.· He has received the advantage of a liberal education, and possesses a very extensive degree of legal knowledge.· There are vocational arguments for traditional liberal education.· But pure liberal education exists to civilise its beneficiaries rather than to fit them for employment.· Can society afford the luxury of providing young children with the beginnings of a liberal education?· But Newman was right to warn of the utilitarian threat to liberal education.· The task of providing liberal education belongs chiefly to the humanities.
· Yet the liberal interpretation of divorce laws appears to have led to the alarming trends already observed.· The traditional liberal interpretation is rooted in an approach to history fundamentally at odds with that of Soviet historiography.· The middle classes According to the liberal interpretation, as we have seen, such liberalization was under way.· It is notable too that this liberal interpretation is proposed by the jurist, and merely adopted from him by the emperor.· These conclusions have led revisionists to cast doubt on three of the assumptions underlying the liberal interpretation.· This, of course, relies on a liberal interpretation of the coins from Barton Farm.
· The Basic Law strongly reflects the liberal principles of the limitation of state activity and the autonomy of the economy.· The pronunciamientos of 1824-20 were a combination of officer discontents, thwarted ambition, and liberal principle.
· Yet the prospects of this constituency making a major political impact and extracting liberal reforms from the regime appear poor.· He also announced liberal reforms including greater press freedom and the abolition of laws governing subversion.· Of course this liberal reform would mean a dramatic increase in the cost of the probation service.· Middle-class pressure for liberal reforms was ineffectual.· In the light of revisionist work it is difficult to treat Nicholas's resistance to liberal reform as a matter of chance or historical accident.· So long as radicals were on the rampage, staying in the centre meant leaning ever farther towards liberal reform.· No piecemeal liberal reform will make one iota of difference.
· In a liberal society we assume that it can not be objectively defined.· This distinction reflects the separation of the state from the individual in a liberal society.· However, in a liberal society a democratic system of government is not considered sufficient by itself to legitimate public power.· This was the liberal society and state.· But this, as I have indicated, does not in all cases make for the construction of a more liberal society.· This is a central value in a liberal society.· Unlike the natural sciences, in a liberal society the social ones did not even have the stimulus of technological progress.
· So came what I am calling the liberal state.· For decades prior to 1776, men had been catching the vision of the liberal state.· The liberal state simply mirrors these external systems of domination.· For conservatives it represented the vanity of social engineering and the breakdown of the liberal state in the face of impossible demands.· So democracy came as a late addition to the competitive market society and the liberal state.· One of the contradictions of the liberal state is that capitalism has required rational administration and greater state intervention.· The liberal state fulfilled its own logic.· In the liberal state, and competitive capitalism, it is the system of representative institutions.
· One was the simple protection of individual rights against an encroaching state, the basic defence of rights in the liberal tradition.· He has an impressive grounding in Western thought and argues that book-banning is an honorable part of the Western liberal tradition.· In these circumstances it was easier for a liberal tradition to develop.
· Inside, liberal use of first-class photographs, imaginative illustrations and visual pages enhance the articles and invite you to read them.· It promises liberal use of time-lapse photography, aerial camera work and feature-film-quality musical scores.· Certainly liberal use of candle grease is in order.· In all these cases the treatment is simple: put back the skin fats by the liberal use of moisturising creams.
· But the report's biggest confusion is over whether the state has the right to impose western liberal values on minorities.· Thus, the Amish espouse the best of both conservative and liberal values.· A kinder, gentler place shot sweetly through with liberal values?· Anti-discrimination measures are, of course, reflective of liberal values, many of which are in fact currently under attack.· Although support for some of the liberal values is confined to a minority, it is a growing one.
· But here, too, recent analysis presents a bleaker picture than that of the traditional liberal view.· She was easy to work with, and her liberal views and conciliatory style were similar to his own.· In the liberal view, the historical process is altogether too rich and complex to be reduced to class struggle.· Q.. You have a reputation for publishing liberal views.· Second, Marxism is a challenge to the liberal view of economics.· They rejected the liberal view that the commune was a barrier to economic progress.· In the classical liberal view trade unions, like business monopolies, are impediments to competition among producers in the free marketplace.
· Mr Massow said the controversy had pitted the Tory leader, William Hague, against his own party's liberal wing.· Of all the federal departments, Treasury is not one where we have learned to find the liberal wing of our presidencies.· His departure was widely portrayed as a defeat for the liberal wing of the party.· Zwygart, a teacher and a member of parliament, was described as being on the party's liberal wing.
PHRASES FROM THE ENTRY
- But Newman was right to warn of the utilitarian threat to liberal education.
- But pure liberal education exists to civilise its beneficiaries rather than to fit them for employment.
- Can society afford the luxury of providing young children with the beginnings of a liberal education?
- He has received the advantage of a liberal education, and possesses a very extensive degree of legal knowledge.
- The second thing that some universities do is provide liberal education for its own sake.
- There are vocational arguments for traditional liberal education.
WORD FAMILYnounliberalliberalismliberalizationadjectiveliberalverbliberalizeadverbliberally
1willing to understand and respect other people’s ideas, opinions, and feelings: a more liberal attitude towards sexuality I had quite liberal parents.2supporting or allowing gradual political and social changes OPP conservative: a more liberal policy on issues of crime and punishment3allowing people or organizations a lot of political or economic freedomliberal state/society/democracy etc4generous or given in large amounts: a liberal supply of drinksliberal with If only they were as liberal with their cash. → liberally5not exact: a liberal interpretation of the original play6liberal education a kind of education which encourages you to develop a large range of interests and knowledge and respect for other people’s opinionsliberal1 adjectiveliberal2 noun
liberalliberal2 ●○○ AWL noun [countable] EXAMPLES FROM THE CORPUS
- Failure to correct them only fuels the right-wing demands that obliterate the very protections that liberals cherish.
- Most liberals, like other feminists, believe that schools are partly responsible for instilling sexist attitudes into children.
- That decision did not win her much support from liberals and moderates.
- The liberals were democrats, while the afrancesados believed in reform from above.
- The beauty of this plan is that it would appeal to both conservatives and liberals.
- The number of committed liberals among the middle-ranking landowners who dominated the zemstvos was not large.
- You know, I feel much closer to Meany, whom I despise, than a lot of the liberals.
THESAURUS
adjective a right-wing person or group wants low taxes, a strong army and police force, and the individual to be free from government interference as much as possible: · right-wing political parties· Some of his supporters are very right-wing.· right-wing policies on gun control
adjective a left-wing person or group wants the government to make society more equal by increasing taxes for rich people, and taking control of important industries and services: · a left-wing newspaper· His views are very left-wing.
adjective [usually before noun] supporting policies and principles which will protect the environment: · green politicians· the Green Party· The government is under pressure to improve its green credentials (=to seem more like it wants to protect the environment).
adjective supporting political ideas that will involve great change: · radical politicians· a radical economic reform programme
adjective supporting political ideas that will allow people to have greater freedom: · They want the government to have a more liberal policy on drugs.
adjective having political opinions which are not extreme: · People generally become more moderate as they get older.· The bill is supported by moderate Republicans.
adjective having political opinions which are considered to be very unreasonable by many people: · His views on immigration are very extreme.· an extreme right-wing organization
WORD SETSadversarial, adjectiveamnesty, nounanarchism, nounanarchist, nounanticlerical, adjectivearms control, nounbigot, nounbigoted, adjectivebigotry, nounbilateral, adjectiveBlimp, nouncarpetbagger, nouncaucus, nounchancellor, nouncoalition, nounconsensus, nounconstituency, nounconstitutionalism, nounconsumerism, nouncredo, noundemagogue, noundestabilize, verbdétente, noundisorder, noundissent, noundivine right, nounferment, nounfirebrand, noungerrymandering, nounheartland, nounhonours list, nouninterventionist, adjectiveisolationism, nounliberal, adjectiveliberal, nounliberalism, nounlobby, nounlobby, verbMaoism, nounnationalistic, adjective-ocracy, suffix-ocrat, suffixopinion-makers, nounopinion poll, nounpersonality cult, nounpetition, nounphoto opportunity, nounplacard, nounplatform, nounpolitical, adjectivepolitical asylum, nounpolitical geography, nounpolitical machine, nounpopulist, adjectivepork barrel, nounprivilege, nounpropaganda, nounrealpolitik, nounrevolution, nounsoapbox, nounsound bite, nounstump, verbsubversive, adjectivesubvert, verbwar of words, nounwheeler-dealer, nounwheeling and dealing, noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES a leading member of a Tory think tankCOLLOCATIONS FROM THE CORPUSADJECTIVE
· He is committed to democratic ideals such as majority rule.
a leading member of a Tory think tank· They are generally in opposition to white liberals, environmentalists and some gay and lesbian political powers.
WORD FAMILYnounliberalliberalismliberalizationadjectiveliberalverbliberalizeadverbliberally
someone with liberal opinions or principles OPP conservative