^aDepartment of Government, Smith College, Northampton, MA 01063, USA. E-mail: mbukovan@email.smith.edu

Abstract

Claims by liberal states to be furthering democratic values and material prosperity are being contested due to the manner in which liberal states are attempting to provide for their own security, to the way in which democracy is being more forcefully projected onto the international order, and to the dislocations and inequality associated with global capitalism. The appeal of liberalism as a form of political and economic organization has declined even as its tenets have come to be taken for granted by virtue of their grounding in scientific reasoning. A sustainable resolution to the crisis of legitimacy of the liberal state requires the internal regeneration of the liberal state itself, a renewed commitment to dialogue in multilateral institutions, and a persuasive revitalization of the claims liberal states make that render their example attractive to others.