Childhood represents a problem for liberal theory. Insofar as we are all children first, we are actually born unfree and unequal. Lately I’ve had a chance to read a bit into what looks to be a fascinating exploration of this problem: Freedom’s Orphans: Contemporary Liberalism and the Fate of American Children, by David L. Tubbs. Tubbs sees the clash between the interests of children and adults as a key weakness in modern liberalism, and maybe even in classic liberalism as well.

I may or may not agree with Tubbs on any given point, but what I find interesting and important here is that someone has undertaken an intellectually serious exploration of the issue. Tubbs looks at the liberalism of Isaiah Berlin, and critiques the feminism of political philosopher Susan Moller Okin and the liberal legal theory of Ronald Dworkin as well, all from the standpoint of childhood. Moving from theory to practice, Tubbs also considers Supreme Court jurisprudence on privacy and related issues, again, with a focus on childhood.

Your specific views on these issues may be less important than the chance to confront a serious and systematic argument on this too-little-explored problem for liberalism. As Tubbs says:

…in recent decades liberal political theorists and jurists have gone about their work as though the personal freedom of adults is a political value that outweighs all competing interests, including some closely associated with the welfare of children. This viewpoint has been taken as an article of faith, or as if the current course of action is self-evident. The result is a number of large gaps in liberal thought….

Tubbs probes those gaps and challenges liberal thinkers to explain, as they often have not, “why the personal freedom of adults should routinely outweigh the competing interests of children.” That strikes me as opening up a fascinating debate.