Individualism

Individualism gives priority to the agency, identity, and experience of individuals. It treats the individual as a primary unit of moral, political, or social life.

Autonomy: The capacity to govern oneself and make choices according to one’s reasons or values. Individualism gives self-direction a central place in accounts of a good life.
Renaissance humanism: A movement that revived classical learning and emphasized human capacities and worldly life. Its attention to human dignity helped shape later accounts of individual worth.
Communitarianism: A political and ethical approach that stresses the role of communities in shaping identity and obligations. It challenges accounts that treat individuals as independent of their social ties.
Liberal democracy: A political system combining representative government with civil liberties and legal protections. Individual rights and political participation are central institutional expressions of political individualism.
Individual rights: Claims held by persons that constrain how governments or other people may treat them. Political individualism often expresses personal priority through rights that protect each person.
Protestant Reformation: A sixteenth-century movement that divided Western Christianity and challenged the authority of the Roman Catholic Church. Its emphasis on personal faith and conscience contributed to individual religious responsibility.
Relational autonomy: An account of self-governance that emphasizes how relationships and social conditions shape agency. It questions the image of autonomous individuals as self-sufficient or socially unformed.
Civil liberties: Freedoms protected against unjustified interference, especially by government. They translate respect for persons into protections for speech, conscience, and association.
Authenticity: The quality of acting or living in a way that reflects one’s identity and commitments. Cultural individualism often treats a distinctive, self-authored life as an ideal.
John Locke: An English philosopher whose political theory grounds legitimate government in natural rights and consent. His account of persons with rights became a major source for liberal individualism.

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