Abstract

John Gray's recent critique of liberalism, and his case for an apparently relativistic “post‐Pyrrhonian”; political philosophy, are shown to be wanting. Weaknesses in Gray's critique are identified and discussed: the characterization of liberalism as universally prescriptive, confusion about whether liberalism is a genuine tradition, and misunderstanding of the relation between conduct and the value of freedom. A formulation of liberalism that is not universalist ("temperate”; liberalism) is offered, and it is shown that one of liberalism's vital concerns—controlling political power in order to protect freedom — is a hiatus in Gray's theory.