Why Rethinking 'Economic Freedom' is the Key to Defeating the New Right
Why Rethinking 'Economic Freedom' is the Key to Defeating the New Right
We need to rethink what 'economic freedom' means if we want to defend freedom itself
It has often been said that the New Right, or the 'dissident right', the new authoritarian reactionary movement that was born on the internet but has since spread into real life mainstream politics, has a 'Christian' and a 'Nietzschean' faction. The 'Christians', often ultra-traditionalist Catholic converts, yearn for a time when families were stable, and communities were strong, and believe that they could only bring this better society back by forcing society to accept their religious values. The 'Christians' are egalitarian because they truly believe the Christian teaching that all people are equal, but they are highly authoritarian, with their ideas often compared to the regime in The Handmaid's Tale. On the other hand, the 'Nietzscheans' are relatively less authoritarian, and are generally not concerned about religious values. However, unmoored by Christianity as well as rejecting the Enlightenment as a whole, they fundamentally reject the idea that all people are equal. Instead, like Nietzsche himself, they believe that the elites should get to thrive, and remake society in their image, without being constrained by the demands of a society that values egalitarianism.
On the surface, the 'Christians' and the 'Nietzscheans' don't seem to have much in common. It has long been hypothesized that their common ground is in their opposition to the left, particularly the 'woke' left that arose in the 2010s. Wokeness is explicitly against traditional religious values, and does not even uphold the religious freedom of individuals as much as old-school liberalism does. Liberalism descended from the religious wars of Europe and hence has a special respect for religious freedom, which in practice often means carving out generous exceptions for individual believers in its otherwise progressive program. The 'woke' left, strongly rooted in postmodernism and critical theory, sees religious belief as just another form of oppressive power that needs to be dismantled, and are hence unwilling to grant such exceptions on principle, even when they wouldn't amount to widespread discrimination in practice. Hence, in the balance between religious freedom and social justice, classical liberals give about equal consideration to the two, while the woke left always favors the latter to the exclusion of the former. Therefore, for the 'Christians', while they have never loved left-liberalism, wokeness represents an existential threat on another level. On the other hand, what the 'Nietzscheans' seem to fear most about wokeness is its inherent constrain on the free development of individuals. An ideology that primarily sees people as belonging to identity categories, rejects colorblind meritocracy as inherently 'systemically racist', and sometimes even rations speaking privileges based on immutable characteristics, is inherently going to limit individuals' free and spontaneous development. The Nietzscheans, in an echo of Nietzsche's own worries more than a century ago, seem to fear that this would rob humanity of the potential for greatness.
While the reactions of both the 'Christians' and the 'Nietzscheans', in turning to a highly authoritarian politics that totally rejects the fundamentals of the Enlightenment, is definitely misguided and dangerous, I guess as a classical liberal I can see where their concerns are coming from. Indeed, I do share these concerns when it comes to wokeness, especially how it was sometimes practiced in the 2010s, even though I am neither Christian nor Nietzschean. (I also suspect that their embrace of fundamentalist religion or an anti-democratic Nietzschean worldview is a symptom of their frustrations, rather than a true commitment, in many cases.) However, the question is, why didn't these people just embrace classical liberalism or libertarianism? After all, these ideologies are firmly opposed to the excesses of wokeness that made them worried in the first place, and would satisfy their concerns. There would likely still be some religious fundamentalists who wouldn't even accept a genuine 'live and let live' libertarianism, and extreme Nietzscheans who reject libertarianism because it would not allow them to dominate other people, and also actual white supremacists who reject classical liberalism's colorblind racial equality, but these kinds of extremists have always been around, and have always constituted only a small minority of the population. Most 'Christians' would likely accept a libertarianism that truly promises to leave them and their families alone to practice their faith with complete freedom, and most 'Nietzscheans' would likely accept a libertarianism that truly embraces meritocracy, and allows them to rise and fall on their own merit. And I also have faith that, in our modern society, most people are not white supremacists. From what I see, then, a successful libertarian movement would likely be able to take away the majority of the support and energy in the New Right, so that it would collapse.
But first, we do need to address the question, as to why these people didn't just embrace classical liberalism or libertarianism. Indeed, libertarianism experienced something like a renaissance in the early-to-mid 2010s, and was essentially the default ideology of the early woke skeptical movement. It wouldn't have been for a lack of awareness of libertarianism that the 'Christians' and the 'Nietzscheans' didn't become libertarians. Instead, they actively made the decision to reject libertarianism, and embrace authoritarianism. Some of the people that might have been on our side are now engaged in what I believe is the most dangerously authoritarian political movement since WWII, and this should merit a lot of soul searching among libertarians of all stripes.
The fact is, libertarianism is failing to attract people, and not just those who have joined the New Right either. If we zoom out of the New Right for a while, and look at the broader picture, we would see that Pseudo-Libertarian Economics, what has long been deemed to be 'economic freedom' in the political mainstream, is being increasingly rejected across the political spectrum, and across basically all Western countries. The US Republican Party, once the home of small government, balanced budgets (at least theoretically) and free trade, has been almost completely taken over by Donald Trump's MAGA movement, which embraces protectionism and trade wars, while being slightly more generous about social security spending. They even invited the General President of the Teamsters union to their conference this year. In the British election this year, the more economically populist Reform UK Party took away a whole chunk of the Conservative vote, while failed Prime Minister Liz Truss, who heartily embraced the Reagan-Thatcher program as the antidote to Britain's economic malaise, lost her seat. In France, Marine Le Pen's National Rally, which openly embraces a substantial social welfare program, has effectively supplanted Les Republicains to become the major party on the right. Meanwhile, at the other end of the political spectrum, staunchly left-wing Millennials and Zoomers have forced the US Democratic Party, the British Labour Party and the French Socialist Party alike to move leftwards, essentially giving up on the 'neoliberal' or 'third way' compromise made famous by Bill Clinton and Tony Blair in the 1990s. It is clear that, across the political spectrum, the kind of 'economic freedom' that was once popular in the late 20th century is increasingly being rejected. In a democracy, you simply can't sell a product that nobody wants to buy anymore. Clearly, 20th century-style neoliberal 'economic freedom' is not wanted, and this, I think, is what is dragging libertarianism down.
Like all the other voters rejecting neoliberalism, both the 'Christians' and the 'Nietzscheans' likely have good reasons to reject classical libertarianism's economic program, if you think about it. The 'Christians' are very concerned about family breakdowns, declining birth rates, and failing communities. They tend to blame liberal culture for it, but I think economic reasons are probably more to blame. If we fixed the underlying economic conditions, these problems would likely become much improved if not completely go away, as long as we also don't allow postmodern critical theory (which is both divisive and anti-family) to dominate society. The dilemma for the 'Christians' here is that the left would fix the material economic conditions that underlie the problems, but would also likely limit their religious freedom, as well as allow postmodern critical theory to take over, at least to some extent. On the other hand, classical libertarianism would offer the opposite, i.e. freedom of religion, free speech to oppose postmodernism, but no relief economically. This logically leaves them with little choice but to embrace New Right authoritarianism, even if they didn't actually want to go that far initially. For the 'Nietzscheans', while they might not want to admit it, they likely understand that Reaganite neoliberalism doesn't really offer a level playing field in terms of meritocracy. The use of taxpayer dollars towards corporate welfare, for example, makes a mockery of any commitment to free market economics. While classical libertarians have opposed corporate welfare, they have been practically powerless politically, and have usually sided with the 'lesser evil' in their eyes, which is just a fancy way to say support the party that hands out favors to corporations at the expense of enterprising individuals. This is why there is a general frustration towards corporations in the New Right, which has been (unhelpfully) channeled by politicians like Ron DeSantis into a war on 'woke corporations'. In many ways, the New Right culture wars are driven by frustration towards wokeness, but are also somewhat rooted in frustrations with both Reaganite pseudo-libertarian economic policies, and the failure of classical libertarianism to truly offer something better.
The logical conclusion here is that a libertarian program would likely be able to draw away most of the support of the New Right, and hence comprehensively defeat the New Right, if it can find and embrace a suitable economic program, in addition to continue upholding classical liberal values socially (which would of course include opposing wokeness). Right now, it is the failure of libertarianism to find and embrace a popular economic program that is dooming it, and enabling the rise of New Right populist authoritarianism instead. Therefore, to defeat the New Right, libertarians need to develop a better product to compete with it, by thinking outside the box economically. This is where reconciling aspects of left-libertarianism and right-libertarianism, to produce a new fusion, might be useful.
On Pro-Freedom vs Anti-Freedom Views of Society
We need to argue for utilitarianism and organicism against the anti-freedom ideologies
One thing that I have repeatedly emphasized and explored in recent months is that freedom does not exist in a vacuum. You can't just talk about freedom in a theoretical sense, and expect it to apply well to the real world. Instead, we need to look at what is happening in the real world, and think about how we can advance freedom in the specific context of our society, in the here and now.
Today, I want to build upon my recent observation that there are actually four competing ideologies or philosophies in the Western political landscape right now, and discuss how we can defend and advance the cause of freedom in this particular landscape. Basically, the four ideologies are constructionism and utilitarianism on the 'progressive' or 'left' side, and organicism and reactionism on the 'conservative' or 'right' side. Constructionism is the belief that society is made up of interlocking systems of oppression which are socially constructed, and the dismantling of these social constructs is required for the liberation of women and minorities. Utilitarianism is the belief that policy decisions should be aimed at increasing happiness, or at least reducing suffering, as much as possible. Utilitarian liberalism has a long history, going back to the 19th century British thinkers Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. Organicism is the belief that society, as it exists, is the product of many centuries of lived experience and wisdom, and on this ground it opposes attempts to abruptly and radically change society, especially if it is rooted in abstract philosophy alone. It is the core essence of classical conservative thinking, going back to thinkers like Edmund Burke. Finally, reactionism is the belief that society is fallen, and nothing good can come out of it, so all proposals for change must be rejected, except for proposals to turn back the clock to a previous glorious age. Given that reactionaries think that modern society, with its guarantees of individual freedom, is a fallen state, they have no problem with trampling on long-standing guarantees of freedom to achieve their backwards-looking utopia. So this is a summary of the four ideologies we have. You can read my previous article if you want a more detailed explanation.
Of the four ideologies, constructionism and reactionism are fundamentally illiberal. Constructionism demands that existing society, as a whole, be deconstructed for the sake of what they see as justice for women and minorities. This would include radically changing the language we use, the social norms we have, the way we see historical events, and so on. Given that their demands are put in terms of justice and ending oppression, there can be no compromise with those that don't want it to happen, even if they are the vast majority of the population. Therefore, such a program must be enforceable via undemocratic and illiberal means, including by limiting free speech if necessary. On the other extreme, reactionism fundamentally sees our present society as fallen, which leads to the view that 'rescuing' society back to a previous glorious state should take precedence over respecting the preferences of those currently living in, and shaped by, the 'fallen' society. Therefore, reactionism does not have any respect for freedom, democracy, or indeed anything else that stands in the way of their glorious restoration. There have been no successful 'glorious restorations' yet in the West, but I guess Iran's 20th century Islamic Revolution, or alternatively the fictional utopia of Gilead in The Handmaid's Tale, could give us insights as to what it would look like. It is clear that both constructionism and reactionism are enemies of freedom.
Luckily, the other two ideologies are much more compatible with freedom. Although utilitarianism and liberalism are fundamentally different as one emphasizes maximizing happiness and the other emphasizes maximizing freedom, there has been a strand of liberalism justified on utilitarianism going all the way back to John Stuart Mill, which just shows how liberalism and utilitarianism, and their core ideals of freedom and happiness, usually go hand in hand. After all, you can't really make people happy without respecting their freedom. When one says that gay marriage should be legal because gay couples deserve to be happy too, one is making both a utilitarian and a libertarian argument, for example. On the other hand, organicism strives to protect the long-standing values and institutions we have, because they represent many generations of lived experience and wisdom. At least in the English-speaking West, this would have to include a long tradition of guarantees of basic freedoms, going all the way back to the Magna Carta. Putting it simply, utilitarianism seeks to advance happiness, and in the process often advances freedom, and organicism seeks to protect the freedoms we already have from attacks by authoritarian forces. Therefore, in many ways, utilitarianism and organicism largely overlap with the concepts of 'positive libertarianism' and 'critical libertarianism' that I talked about last time as constituting a 'dialectic of freedom'. This is to say, in our current society and political landscape, 'positive libertarianism' is mostly represented by utilitarians, and 'critical libertarianism' is mostly represented by organicists. This means if we can get utilitarians and organicists to work together in a productive dialogue, we would have the best hope of maintaining and advancing freedom.
In conclusion, the hope for freedom in the West right now, and for the foreseeable future, lies in promoting both utilitarianism and organicism, and especially a productive dialogue between the two, and also in successfully arguing against both constructionism and reactionism, the ideologies promoted by the illiberal-left and the illiberal-right respectively. Going forward, I will be looking at how we can achieve this in further detail, from multiple angles. In particular, I will be looking at the intra-left argument for utilitarianism over constructionism, the intra-right argument for organicism over reactionism, as well as the very important but often overlooked arguments of organicism vs constructionism, and utilitarianism vs reactionism. I think getting to the bottom of all this is essential for building a 21st-century framework to defend and advance freedom.
TaraElla is a singer-songwriter and author, who is the author of the Moral Libertarian Manifesto and the Moral Libertarian book series, which argue that liberalism is still the most moral and effective value system for the West.
She is also the author of The Trans Case Against Queer Theory and The TaraElla Story (her autobiography).