以个人主义为话题写一篇不少于120词的英语作文

Question

以个人主义为话题写一篇不少于120词的英语作文

Answer 1

individualism
Political and social philosophy that emphasizes individual freedom.Modern individualism emerged in Britain with the ideas of Adam Smith and Jeremy Bentham,and the concept was described byAlexis de Tocqueville as fundamental to the American temper.Individualism encompasses a value system,a theory of humannature,and a belief in certain political,economic,social,andreligious arrangements.According to the individualist,all valuesare human-centred,the individual is of supreme importance,andall individuals are morally equal.Individualism places great value onself-reliance,on privacy,and on mutual respect.Negatively,itembraces opposition to authority and to all manner of controlsover the individual,especially when exercised by the state.As atheory of human nature,individualism holds that the interests ofthe normal adult are best served by allowing him maximum freedomand responsibility for choosing his objectives and the means forobtaining them.The institutional embodiment of individualismfollows from these principles.All individualists believe thatgovernment should keep its interference in the lives of individualsat a minimum,confining itself largely to maintaining law and order,preventing individuals from interfering with others,and enforcingagreements (contracts) voluntarily arrived at.Individualism alsoimplies a property system according to which each person orfamily enjoys the maximum of opportunity to acquire property andto manage and dispose of it as he or they see fit.Althougheconomic individualism and political individualism in the form ofdemocracy advanced together for a while,in the course of the19th century they eventually proved incompatible,as newlyenfranchised voters came to demand governmental intervention inthe economic process.Individualistic ideas lost ground in the later19th and early 20th century with the rise of large-scale socialorganization and the emergence of political theories opposed toindividualism,particularly communism and fascism.They reemergedin the latter half of the 20th century with the defeat of fascismand the fall of communist regimes in the Soviet Union and easternEurope.Seealso libertarianism.