Page 32 of FA Hayek’s 1973 essay “Liberalism” appears as chapter one of this article. Articles about liberalism and the economy (2022), which is Volume 18 (professionally edited by Paul Lewis), of The Collected Works of FA Hayek (footnote deleted)
But for these reasons, while it seems certain that an unrestricted democracy will abandon liberal principles and take discriminatory measures in favor of various groups in favor of the majority, it is doubtful that democracy can sustain itself in the long run by abandoning liberal principles. If government takes on tasks so vast and complex that they can effectively be governed by majority decision-making, it seems inevitable that the effective powers will devolve from democratic control into a bureaucratic apparatus. Therefore, abandoning liberalism in democracy is unlikely to lead to the destruction of democracy in the long run. In particular, there can be little doubt that an economy that seems to be endowed with democracy requires a government with authoritarian powers for its effective behavior.
