John Dewey

Abstract

Abstract This chapter focuses on the relationship between the American philosopher John Dewey and the theologian Reinhold Niebuhr. Although a generation apart in age, Dewey and Niebuhr were among the major proponents of the social and economic liberalism of the 1930s in its opposition to the predominant laissez-faire ideology of the day—a form of classical liberalism that Dewey labelled ‘pseudo liberalism’ and Niebuhr identified as American conservatism. While Dewey and Niebuhr collaborated on various political causes, they engaged in a controversy over the meaning of liberalism. In 1932 Niebuhr attacked Dewey in Moral Man and Immoral Society and in subsequent articles and books. Dewey, in return, responded critically to Niebuhr in print. This chapter deals with the personal relationship between Dewey and Niebuhr, their conflicting evaluations of liberalism, and the many ways in which their respective views of liberalism came together in the assault against the conservatism of the age.