According to Hayek, collectivism stands in contrast to the signal Western insight, beginning in the Renaissance, that the individual is the sacred center of culture. An individual’s desires, needs, and interests are the only social realities available for rational analysis, which must serve as the basis of responsible statesmanship. It is individualism, which he sometimes calls liberalism, that provides the proper social philosophy for those who wish to defend the West, and individualism stands opposed to collectivism.
