Is Postliberalism Right Wing?
Contextualizing Modern Politics Using an Exhausted Framework
In a previous article, I discussed what the left and the right wings—born of the French Revolution—generally stand for when we use these terms today. I argued that the left wing broadly stands for a priority of equality, global fraternity, and liberty in social ordering, while the right wing broadly stands for a priority of hierarchy, blood and soil, and subjection to law in social ordering. A just and rightly ordered society would sit somewhere near the middle, between the extremes of the left and right wings.
Here, I want to explore where postliberalism sits on this left-right spectrum. But since postliberalism is most simply defined as that which comes after liberalism, it will be helpful to first explore where liberalism sits on the spectrum. If you’re tired of analyses of liberalism, skip ahead to Pt. II. The main argument of this article is that liberalism is not synonymous with leftism, nor is postliberalism synonymous with rightism. This is an invitation to think about the broad possibilities of our postliberal future, and to contextualize them in the common, albeit exhausted, language of “left” and “right.”
I. Is Liberalism Left Wing?
Most people today use the terms “liberal” and “leftist” synonymously. To the extent they draw any differentiation between the two, it is usually with the understanding that leftism is simply liberalism taken further, or taken to its extreme. Here I hope to show that while liberalism is generally left wing, it is not synonymous with the left. To better understand this, a quick refresher of what is meant by “liberalism” is in order.
What is Liberalism?
Etymologically, liberalism is derived from the word “liberal”, which means in some sense “free.”1 This could have either a positive or a negative connotation. “Liberal” could mean one with a noble, generous, or magnanimous disposition, as in one who is “free from” menial duties as a free person, free to pursue the arts (i.e., the liberal arts), or free in attitude, leading to generosity. But it could also mean one who is licentious or unrestricted, as in one who considers himself free from social norms or the rule of law, or one who shows no restraint in speech or action.2 The “ism” qualifier modifies “liberal” to indicate a practice, system, or doctrine of liberality. Therefore, liberalism means something like the doctrine of freedom.
Critics of liberalism usually attribute to liberals a licentious definition of freedom. By freedom, liberals do not mean freedom to pursue that which is good—as in an ordered liberty—but freedom to pursue that which one wills, full stop. According to this understanding of freedom, we can see in liberalism the emphasis, however slight or great it may be, on freedom over order. Some would describe this as a priority of potency over act—that is, a priority of that which could be over that which is.3 Under such a view, we can trace liberalism back to the original sin of Satan in denying God’s rule, choosing his own will over the divine order in the diabolical non serviam. Taken to this extreme, liberalism is the opposite of, and mutually exclusive of, a just and right political system due to its rejection of proper order.
Today there is a tendency to make liberalism the sole evil political ideology. If liberalism is the original fallen politic, the original disobedience, and the original disorder, it is hard not to think that there are really only two true political positions: a proper order (something akin to a fully integrated society)4 and an improper order (freedom from the proper order, i.e., liberalism). However, I think it is sufficient to simply attribute to liberalism an overbroad commitment to individual freedom and maintain that it is just one of many ideologies that is incompatible with a proper political order. Exploring where liberalism fits on the left-right political spectrum can perhaps help us understand this better.
Situating the Liberal
Given that liberalism is an overbroad commitment to individual freedom, it seems that its most obvious home on the left-right spectrum is with the left wing, though perhaps only on one value: liberty. Committed liberals emphasize liberty over subjection to law—freedom over order. They do not necessarily emphasize equality over hierarchy or global fraternity over blood and soil, though in practice they often do, as hierarchy and family or nation are unchosen boundaries that threaten their overly-expansive understanding of an individual’s rights and freedoms.
In contemporary American politics, what we call the “left” and the “right” are both parties of liberalism.5 Progressive liberals, which we can call “left liberals,” tend to think that equality enforced by a powerful yet detached state will provide people with the most freedom by affording everyone opportunities of choice that would otherwise be denied them due to their class, gender, wealth, or some other unchosen constraint. As such, left liberals tend to emphasize equality over hierarchy for the sake of freedom.
On the other hand, conservative or classical liberals, which we can call “right liberals,” tend to regard individualism and freedom of the marketplace as the best means to achieve the greatest liberty, decrying state action as a limitation upon free choice and an infringement of rights. Seeing themselves as rational individuals in a global marketplace rather than the product of lineages bounded to nations, right liberals tend to emphasize global fraternity over blood and soil, at least implicitly.
Left liberals fault right liberals for creating a situation that limits equality, which limits free choice for all. Right liberals fault left liberals for using state power to create equality, which limits the free choice of individuals in market activity. But while left liberals emphasize the left-wing value of equality and right liberals implicitly emphasize the left-wing value of global fraternity, both are simply utilizing different means toward the same end—maximizing liberty.6 For this reason, both left and right liberals are broadly left wing. But because the liberal is in the end concerned most with freedom, not with equality or global fraternity, neither group is identical with a pure left wing, as described in a previous article.
As an aside, we may ask why right liberals are considered to be on the right, while left liberals are considered to be on the left. It is probably because right liberalism leads to visible inequality, whether intentionally or by inevitable outcome of free market practices. Some right liberals are elitists who are fine with hierarchy and see a free-market meritocracy as the best way to secure power to those who are most worthy of wielding it.7 Other right liberals are non-elitists who dislike hierarchy and tend to regard everyone as blank-slate individuals equally capable of industrious market activity. But in the end, all right liberals promote a free market that inevitably leads to massive disparities in wealth among market participants. Left liberals can more plausibly claim liberty, equality and fraternity, and it is probably for this reason that they are seen as “left wing,” while right liberals are seen as “right wing.”
II. Is Postliberalism Right Wing?
If you asked most postliberals today whether postliberalism was a left-wing or a right-wing movement, they would say that it is right wing. This is in part due to a reactionary disposition—our society today is much more easily classified as left wing than right wing, and postliberals are tired of the social ills caused by leftism, so they push right. But while postliberalism may be to the right of our current political order in certain respects, it is not synonymous with the right wing.
What is Postliberalism?
Just as we discussed what liberalism is, it may be worth asking what we mean when we call something “postliberal.” On its face, postliberalism is a political ordering beyond or after liberalism. Unlike liberalism, postliberalism does not place freedom as its highest ideal. As of now, postliberalism is primarily defined in terms of what it is not. This makes postliberalism a broader and more amorphous category than liberalism, the contours of which we have had the benefit of centuries to define and see play out. At this high-level, postliberalism is something of a contentless negation of liberalism.
Readers of this site, and those generally on the academic right, will understand postliberalism to be not merely the successor to liberalism, nor simply the rejection of liberalism as such, but also a politic that rediscovers traditional ideas of community, solidarity, subsidiarity, the common good, right rule, and many other Western political notions handed down through a lineage of thinkers, from Plato to Aristotle to Cicero to Aquinas to Botero. We can call this a content-laden form of postliberalism. But as it stands today, postliberalism is largely an undefined movement that understands its successorship to liberalism, but not yet the content or shape that it will ultimately take.8
Situating the Postliberal
So where does that leave postliberalism on the left-right spectrum? If liberalism is generally left-leaning since it emphasizes the left-wing value of freedom, then it seems apparent that postliberalism is generally right-leaning, as it rejects this as the highest value and, explicitly or implicitly, embraces its contrary, which is subjection to law. In this sense, postliberalism is to the right of liberalism. However, this analysis is somewhat superficial.
If we explore the content-laden understanding of postliberalism that is proposed by thinkers like Vermeule and Deneen, along with the implicitly postliberal arguments of various integralists, then hopefully we will discover postliberalism to be akin to a true centrism on the left-right spectrum, finding its home near that harmonized politics argued for in a previous article. This would be a postliberalism that recognizes the proper balance of hierarchy and equality, blood and soil and global fraternity, and subjection to law and freedom. We may call such a position “right wing” insofar as it is to the right of the current political order, but when placed on a broader left-right spectrum, it would fall near the middle.
But could postliberalism come in left-wing or right-wing variations? We need not look too far into the past to see that, yes, indeed it can. These positions are roughly typified by the two competing ideologies to liberalism that arose in the mid-19th and early-20th centuries: communism and fascism. Communism was an illiberal leftism that tried to unite the proletariat brotherhood of workers of the world against the higher-class bourgeois for the sake of equality (and secondarily, for liberty).9 Fascism was an illiberal rightism that sought to preserve blood and soil, social hierarchies, and a stern order against what they saw as the decaying forces of both liberalism and communism.10
While communism and fascism are not the only forms that a postliberal left or right could take, they serve as useful examples of the sort of illiberal ideologies that arise at the further ends of the left-right spectrum. Given all this, it seems that postliberalism as such is a movement that could ultimately occupy the left, right, or center of the spectrum. It will occupy the position of the content given it, for better or worse.
III. A Word of Warning
I hardly need to reiterate the problems of an illiberal left wing. Communism led to the deaths of millions and was condemned by the Church.11 And today, the specter of a different form of illiberal leftism is haunting the West.12 This is a leftism that does not tolerate viewpoint diversity, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of association, or many other liberal values. In it, we see a publicly mandated and enforced morality, albeit with different understanding of the common good than those thinkers of the postliberal right. On this, most readers will agree.
It would be prudent to consider, however, that far from being a mere theoretical possibility, an ascendant illiberal right is as real a risk as an illiberal left. Our political pendulum often swings with wild overcorrections to the ills of the day. It is not hard to imagine that some on the right will be calling to push beyond an Aristotelian harmonization of left- and right-wing values, instead entering the realm of complete negation of the values of the left. It was less than a century ago that Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany rose to prominence. While these right-wing powers ultimately lost as liberalism emerged victorious in the aftermath of World War II, who is to say that an unbridled right may not rear its head again in the future? Those who are perceptive to the cracking of liberalism may already hear it in the distance.13
It is important for postliberals of good will, many of whom are Catholics, to keep this in mind: a far right sees in Christianity the very seeds of leftism.14 And this is no wonder, as Paul tells us that “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free person, there is not male and female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”15 Misunderstood, what is this but an affirmation of all that the left stands for? In this formulation is a breakdown of blood and soil, a breakdown of hierarchy, indeed a breakdown of nature’s order. The far-left may remove Christ from Paul’s formulation, but the far-right removes the formulation from Christ, and ultimately removes Christ altogether. In the end, both extremes retain only dangerous half-truths.
A predominant thread in right-wing academic thought, from Nietzsche to Spengler to Evola, is that Christianity’s moral code preserves, protects, and furthers weakness, keeping man from achieving greatness. Such thinkers were highly influential to the Nazis and Fascists and continue to be influential today.16 Far from being materialists, they believe in the great spiritual potential of man unbounded by a slave morality that protects the weak, lesser, or outsider. Understood thusly, far-right thought, rather than being closer to the truth than far-left thought, perhaps shares more in common with the non serviam of Satan than either liberalism or the debased materialism of the left. At the very least, its dangers should be apparent.
While political movements will always have to make strained alliances and house unwieldy elements, I hope that postliberals may take these considerations to heart, tempering any excesses that they may see and preparing for a potential future where they may have to defend left-wing values from a right-wing regime. For while the Church’s light shines brighter in these troubled times, we must not forget that ours is a context that is increasingly secular, and a secular population that despises leftism may look for solutions more expedient than Aristotelian harmonization or Catholic integration.
Conclusion
I hope that this analysis of liberalism and postliberalism in light of the left-right spectrum is helpful in conceiving of political regimes broadly, and possible postliberal positions specifically. Liberalism’s failure is still fresh. Deneen is still our Nietzschean town crier declaring that liberalism is dead to a public that does not yet see the ramifications of this. But for those of us who are taking the failure of liberalism seriously, may we prudently do what is in our power to help shape the coming postliberalism into a political order worth defending.
Liberalism, Online Etymology Dictionary. (Douglas Harper, April 4, 2024). https://www.etymonline.com/word/liberalism.
Alexis De Tocqueville, Democracy in America. (Penguin, 2003), 54–55 (“There is a liberty of corrupt nature, which is affected by both men and beasts, to do what they list … and all the ordinances of God are bent against it. But there is a civil, a moral, a federal liberty … it is a liberty only for that which is just and good; ....”) (quoting Magnalia Cristi Americana).
D.C. Schindler, “What is Liberalism?” (New Polity, May 2020). This primacy of potency can be traced back to nominalists such as William of Ockham in the 13th century. Ibid, 13.
See, e.g., Thomas Crean, Alan Fimister, Integralism: A Manual of Political Philosophy. (Editiones Scholasticae, 2020).
At least, in rhetoric they are. Today, both left and right forms of liberalism are pushing in illiberal directions, with the left liberals increasingly intolerant of viewpoint diversity, and the right liberals increasingly creating a meritocratic elite with entry for only the upper tiers of society. See Adrian Vermeule, “Why I Lost Interest in the Liberalism Debate.” (The New Digest, Feb. 3, 2024).
See Patrick J. Deneen, Why Liberalism Failed. (Yale Publishing, 2018), 47 “Both ‘classical’ and ‘progressive’ liberalism ground the advance of liberalism in individual liberation from the limitations of place, tradition, culture, and any unchosen relationship.”
For instance, the heroes of Ayn Rand’s novels are great and individualistic capitalists who largely despise the working-class laborer’s attempts at collective action. See Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged. (Signet, 1992), 979 “The man at the top of the intellectual pyramid contributes the most to all those below him…. The man at the bottom who, left to himself, would starve in his hopeless ineptitude, contributes nothing to those above him….”
“The proletarian liberates himself by abolishing competition, private property, and all class differences.” Frederick Engels, The Principles of Communism. (1847), Question 8.
“From beneath the ruins of liberal, socialist, and democratic doctrines, Fascism extracts those elements which are still vital.” Benito Mussolini, The Doctrine of Fascism. (1932).
Pius XI, “Divini Redemptoris,” (1937).
See note 5, above.
See, e.g., R.R. Reno “The Return of the Strong Gods,” (First Things, May 2017), https://www.firstthings.com/article/2017/05/return-of-the-strong-gods.
See Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morality. 1887. Translated by Carol Diethe, (Cambridge University Press, 2007), First Essay, Chapter 16, 33 (“In an even more decisive and profound sense than [the Reformation], Judea once again triumphed over the classical ideal with the French Revolution: the last political nobility in Europe, that of the French seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, collapsed under the ressentiment-instincts of the rabble…”).
New American Bible Revised Edition, Galatians 3:28.
See Matthew Rose, A World After Liberalism: Philosophers of the Radical Right. (Yale, 2021). Evola was critical of the fascists because he did not think they went far enough. Ibid, 52.