The new right is not what you think. It's worse.

I said in my interview with the Connect & Disaffected podcast last year that following the collapse of the neoliberal consensus both left and right were casting around for new or previously discarded ideologies to help us make sense of the world. The faultlines of modern politics are being shaped by familiar historical struggles as socialism and fascism modernise themselves in response to the manifest recent failures of liberalism. I wrote recently on the more mainstream right-wing liberalisms and recognised them as a sort of 'honourable enemy', noting their respectable philosophical roots and still significant political base.

Today's blog on the other hand concerns the new right. I am not here referring to the Trumpian 'new right' nexus as it's commonly used as a term in US-facing news media. The constellation of  alt-right, anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim xenophobes, the traditionalists, neo-reactionaries and paleo-conservatives who have rallied around Trump's presidency reflect an easy-to-understand conservative impulse – the right rummaging through its graveyard of dead and discredited ideologies.  

The real 'new' right, the ones who represent a genuinely innovative response to the crisis of liberalism, are the so-called 'intellectual dark web' (IDW). Although IDW like to label themselves 'classical liberals', it's not accurate to see them as a simple resurrection of some form of Victorian British liberalism [although there are certainly superficial similarities, which we’ll return to]. Nor is it sufficient to understand the IDW purely in terms of what motivates them – their [white] [male] Gen X grievance and fear of loss of relative status. There are features of the IDW – most notably their hostility to universalist liberalisms, their deep commitment to Santa Barbara-style evolutionary psychology, general support for UBI schemes and flirtations with race realism – which they share in common with the alt-lite and which suggest a different perspective on archetypal liberal universalism. If the IDW are neo-Victorians, then they believe in social Darwinism on steroids. 

Michael Brooks is right on this. The IDW are laying the seeds of a new political narrative – a narrative that seeks to supplant the discredited rule of the neoliberals and co-opt the resentment of the alt-right, while outliving them both. The left is building its own counter-narrative, quite successfully so. But we need to know our opponents, and pay attention to what they're saying, because if the popularity of the Petersons and Harrises of the world is any guide, IDW-like ideas are finding an audience on YouTube and Twitch and spreading into a mass consciousness.

 A thesis statement

Which brings us to the motivation for today. The race realist Winegard science bros have a new piece on Quillette "The Twilight of Liberalism?", laying out the clearest thesis statement for the IDW I've yet encountered. To be clear, the Winegards are trash. So is Quillette - which is essentially the house rag of the IDW. The Winegards latest piece hits all their usual tropes – cultural Marxism, the authoritarian left, IQ fetishism and the cult of automation. But buried in the piece are hints of something honest about the IDW.

“[I]t is not the abstract logic of liberalism that is flawed,” they write, “but rather the attempt to apply it to fallible humans. Like communism, liberalism conflicts with immutable human characteristics.” Immediately, we encounter a pessimism that is at odds with the liberalism tradition, which is fundamentally optimistic about human nature and grounds its conception of natural rights on axiomatic suppositions about the universal human experience. The Winegard bros dismiss this outright in terms that are familiar to critics of capitalism on both the right and left: classical liberalism as an ideology was adapted to a social world still rooted in a traditional social order, which provided the social reproduction necessary for the capitalist mode of production to take off. Their critique - shared by many communitarians - is that as it matured, capitalism eroded the social foundations on which it relied and what it offered in exchange (universal equality, unlimited freedom, and ‘hedonism’) was a poor substitute.

The Winegards propose an ‘evolutionary mismatch’ between the ideology of capitalism and features of the human mind - or at least the minds of most people - that is as a severe as the supposed mismatch between utopian socialism and human nature. Determining whether a cultural technology is in fact maladapted is notoriously difficult. And it ignores the fact that biology and culture co-evolve. But as a thesis statement, the idea that [some] people cannot adapt to modern social life unites the misogyny of Jordan Peterson to the racial pontificating of Andrew Sullivan and Sam Harris, to the elitism of Steven Pinker, and the cultural conservatism of Ben Shapiro and Christina Hoff Summers. It dichotomises the ‘cognitive elite’ - the genteel folk of the IDW who can calmly philosophise and make a living from Patreon - and the masses who engage in manual labour and require a firmer hand. The ‘cognitively inferior’ include women, of course, but also non-whites, cultural Muslims, trans men and women, the poor, the young, the religious and the irreligious alike. Some people simply aren’t morally equipped to be ‘free’.

There are precedents for these beliefs, of course. The Winegards are barely disguising their re-purposing of the Bell Curve, and Murray has long argued that his argument in that book is all about meritocracy and its totally not his fault at all that cognitive differences happen to be racialised. Sure buddy. But this worldview is also implicit in much of behavioural economics and the ‘authoritarian libertarianism’ of Richard Thaler & Cass Sunstein’s ‘nudge’ approach to public policy. Neoliberals, drawing on mid-twentieth century views of the Mont Pelerin society, have long believed that society needs to be governed with a firm hand to deliver outcomes that are optimised for the greater good. The wrinkle that the IDW add is that some [Westernised men] can govern themselves free from the state, but that others [largely women and non-Westerners] are categorically incapable of doing so.

The IDW are therefore critics of liberalism, but critics who think we cannot possibly improve upon it. The theory is not wrong, it just has the wrong subject. Classical liberalism is therefore an ideology by and for the ruling elite - and not for everyone else. Liberty for me but not for thee. The various members of the IDW have different emotional reactions to the burdens of rule - the Weinsteins and more centrist-leaning adherents look upon the ‘cognitive inferiority’ of humanity with regret, but treat benevolent rule as the white man’s burden [recall Brett Weinstein’s incredibly patronising response to the Evergreen controversy]. Those of a more conservative inclination, including Shapiro, Peterson and the Winegard bros, believe strongly in the need for order and discipline of the masses, lest they ‘slump into an empty and unsatisfying hedonism that is ruinous to communities and to society more broadly.’

It is for this reason that the IDW are properly categorised as a right-wing movement. Their reverence for order and hierarchy puts them in good company amongst conservatives. The alt-right, neoliberals and libertarians all serve the interests of power and hierarchy in different ways. Fascists do so consciously, libertarians by neglect and neoliberals behind a veneer of technocratic governance. The IDW are the apologists of domestic empire. If fascism can be thought of as the application of the tools of colonial rule to the metropolitan population, then the IDW narrative is the justification of imperialism and the ‘tutelage’ of ‘inferior’ peoples brought home to justify dominion over the majority of the population.

Unlike their neoliberal colleagues like Pinker, who tend to believe that with the right combination of education and public policy, the masses can [eventually] mature to enjoy the full right and privileges of liberal citizenship, the IDW are pessimists who are prepared to write off the vast bulk of humanity as a burden upon the white man’s pursuit of a glorious future. As best, the masses are to be pensioned off with a UBI so they no longer disturb the peace - at worst, as Matt Christman of Chapo Trap House fears, they are rhetorically preparing for a future in which their ‘cognitive inferiors’ are either permanently enslaved or fenced off and left to die on the doorsteps on the enclaves of the elite as climate change burns the world down around them.

It is for this reason, also, that the IDW serve as such a gateway to the actual alt-right. It’s not fair to call a fan of the IDW a fascist. But they are certainly travelling on the same road, because their diagnosis of the crisis of liberalism is the same [including their complete and utter aversion to any consideration of a socialist solution]. An IDW-rationalist looks at the cognitive divide and thinks they’re going to come out on top; a supporter of fascism probably recognises they aren’t going to. At the leadership level, the two movements probably share 99 per cent of their beliefs, but unlike the Richard Spencers of the word, the writers at Quillette are unwilling to lower themselves to engage with the MAGA cultural wasteland. It remains to be seen which is the more effective political strategy.

What is to be done?

I’ve said many times that the first step of any socialist movement is to defend and uphold liberal democracy. Without upholding the basic principle that every citizen is entitled to equal dignity and equal say over the decisions that affect their interests, we cannot argue that a materially unequal society is one that does not uphold the social contract. Mere rejection of the IDW is not enough however. The IDW are very, very good at propaganda and are learning how to package misogyny, racism and transphobia under a veneer of scientific and philosophical legitimacy that is superficially persuasive to many people.

The left is getting better at countering these narratives - but there’s a disconnect between the very online progressive movements who are the ground troops of this war of stories and the movement activists who are seeking and contesting power. It doesn’t help that many of the [white, male] writers and academics who naturally support this movement enjoy socially privileged positions and access to expert knowledge. For many serious politicians, the IDW may be beneath their notice. But its cultural influence should concern us. We won’t be able to enact our agendas if the narrative ground has been disappeared beneath us.

The Establishment Right - Not Dead Yet

I've written several times before on the tensions within the liberal democratic consensus, and how the Great Recession (and Iraq War that preceded it) exposed and aggravated them. Both in my first book (“Politics for the New Dark Age: Staying Positive Amidst Disorder") and in my writings on my blog, I’ve argued that only democratic socialism offers the possibility of both more 'freedom' and more democracy – while also delivering on the left's other social goals included fairer, more resilient progress. There is, in other words, left-wing populism and it is good.

I've always been interested in the anatomy of right-wing political philosophy, because we on the left have to understand our opponents if we are to defeat them. The purpose of today's blog is to look briefly at the two 'establishment' right-wing liberal philosophies that are still in contention – neoliberalism and right-libertarianism – and see how they're responding to this moment of crisis. My interest in writing about this topic was sparked by a recent episode of Jacobin's "The Dig" Podcast with Daniel Denvir, discussing the history of neoliberalism. Like most leftists of a certain age, I find it both hilarious and gratifying that some people nowadays self-consciously identify as neoliberal (including my old friend @EconoMeager) rather than taking it as the invisible aether in which we all swim.

An anatomy of fools

Neoliberalism and right-libertarianism share common DNA. Philosophically, they are distinct from the various flavours of conservatism: idealist and utopian – neither especially empirical nor pragmatic – right-wing liberalism permits a degree of social and personal freedom that is anathema to the hard right. They are too 'centrist' for reactionaries in the same way that liberal democrats are too 'centrist' for us on the left. Both neoliberalism and libertarianism are committed to the Hayekian consensus of modern economics: that individual autonomy is the only just way to satisfy individual preferences, and that it is also economically efficient if every social actor engages in autonomous self-help in pursuit of those preferences. At a stretch, both may even argue that autonomous free contracting provides the social glue that binds society together and enables peace and prosperity amongst societies. It posits a harmony between individual and collective ends that is, of course, empirically false (because of collective action problems, market failures and a half dozen other factors).

Of the two, libertarianism gives ontological primacy to the autonomous individual. The boundaries of the private – including and especially private property – are sacred in a very literal way. Upholding the negative rights of the individual – the absence of violence or coercion – is the sine qua non of a just society and no violation of that principle can be tolerated. Right-libertarians distrust the democratic state (as do left-libertarians) because of the significant potential threat it poses to those rights. However, because of the primacy of principle, they are blind to the way in which unequal structures of wealth and power are just as much of a threat to individual freedom as the state. Right-libertarianism justifies authoritarianism by neglect – if it's not the state, then it's not exploitation. And it’s for this reason that right-libertarians tend to have the Trump-iest populist politics.  

Neoliberals take a different tack, and here I am relying explicitly on Dan's interview with the economic historian Quinn Slobodian. Neoliberals give primacy to the market as whole. They value the collective ends of efficiency and growth, and therefore are attracted towards the technocratic and utilitarian. For neoliberals, democratic impulses threaten the efficient operation of the market, so the legal institutions of the state must be made immune from popular accountability. Neoliberals are very comfortable exercising state power, but are deeply ambivalent about its democratic form and are prone to actual honest-to-goodness authoritarian behaviour. Neoliberals are less committed to the principle of individual autonomy – although it’s a valuable aesthetic ornament – and as a result may be more sceptical towards private concentrations of power that corrupt market efficiency (for example, they are often committed to breaking up monopolies in the interest of preserving competition). Neoliberals are anti-populists - and are preserving their elite status by standing with the Never Trumpers.

Different narratives, different faults

The Great Recession, therefore, posed a different challenges to neoliberals and right-libertarians. Like the Iraq War before it, the Great Recession showed that the idealistic utopianism of right-wing liberals was no better at economic management and securing international peace than the utopianism of the left-wing communists. But because of the affective weights they place on different elements of their political and economic model, each diagnoses the political threat from populism differently. These different viewpoints will determine their response to the populist moment and affect their short- and long-term political trajectories.

The neoliberals have the same response as always. The cause of the Great Recession was clearly too much state intervention in favour of housing loans, driven by populist visions of expanding home ownership. Put in charge of their own destiny, people vote for idiots like Trump who blindly rip up decades worth of international law and institutions. The state just needs to be run by smarter people, and if the masses cannot be educated, then they can at least have their biases studied and manipulated so they no longer get in the way. Neoliberals are most content with moving in the direction of further liberal undemocracy: while they can tolerate Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, they’d much rather live in Xi Jinping’s China than Trump’s America.

The libertarians, too, identify the state as the problem but their response to the current moment of crises has been less coldly calculating and more emotive. For libertarians, the cure for economic inquality and sluggish growth is worse than the disease. Blind to the threat posed to their liberties by private concentrations of capital, libertarians have been eclipsed by the populist right. The true believers remaining are those wealthy or privileged enough to be immune from the consequences of their own ideology. Other [let’s suppose white, working-class] men and women who have been materially affected by the Great Recession are those most likely to follow the siren song of illiberal democracy and right-wing identity politics, trading away the rights and freedoms of others (migrants, women, LGBT communities) so long as they preserve their own slice of the economic pie. It’s only self-interest after all.

What is to be done

I think the left writes off neoliberals at our own peril. Right wing libertarians have always been a fringe movement: well-funded, yes, but incapable of gathering lasting popular appeal outside small groups of narcissists. The defection of most of its voting base into nationalist reaction has shown libertarianism for the paper tiger it always was. But the neoliberals are playing a longer game. When Trump is gone, and the populist moment has passed, they’ll [deservedly] get credit for opposing his free-spending, institution-smashing policies. Moreover, the more they discredit Trumpism, the more they’ll delegitimise the very idea of populist democracy itself. The WTO may be saved by the very people now trying to destroy it. Neoliberals, in other words, retain their considerable social capital amongst elites, and that social capital is going to given them a great deal of political and ideological power in the long-term. If and when right-wing populism fails, it will be up to the left to resurrect the cause of popular democracy.

Why ‘Libertarian’ Socialism

The introduction and promotional materials of Politics for the New Dark Age are fairly upfront about the ideological perspective I’m arguing from:

“[I]t articulates a holistic progressive ideology located at the nexus of two broad themes: first, the practical superiority of cooperative solutions in social problem-solving, and second, a liberal, rights-based understanding of the social contract predicated on the equal inherent dignity of all human beings.”

Throughout the book, I employ the common term ‘socialism’ to describe the first such theme, and likewise ‘libertarian’ for the second. Although the book shies away from debates about ‘-isms’ – because all such things have been written before and better – it’s fair to locate the book within the libertarian socialist tradition. Now, I could just as easily have employed ‘democratic socialism’ or ‘liberal socialism’; I don’t see sufficient difference to warrant splitting hairs. Regardless of terminology, at the core of my argument is the necessity of progressives putting the liberal democratic social contract back at the centre of our political and economic program, particularly in these times in which democracy is under conscious attack by those on the right who would prefer to see it fail.

Ultimately I elected to use the word ‘libertarian’ consciously, which connects best with the psychological roots of political behaviour that underlie my model. We are a social species: we achieve our greatest potential when part of an interdependent whole. Yet our individual attitudes towards freedom and authority are prior to the social constructs in which we operate. Libertarianism is “not anarchism, which seeks the destruction of all cooperative social institutions,", but a recognition that the objective of social cooperation is to maximise the freedom of the individuals that comprise that society to seek their own happiness. 

Five Reasons to be Left-Libertarian

So if we presume that our choice of particular words has value, what does ‘libertarianism’ as a concept do for us on the left? Here are some (interrelated) ideas:

1)      It correctly identifies our opposition as authoritarians – on both right and left.

First and foremost, libertarian self-identification makes it clear that those, on both the right and left, who would replace dynamic social interaction with hierarchy [and violence] are the primary opponents of social and economic progress. Hierarchy can be socially useful in some circumstances as a mode of organisation - otherwise we as a species wouldn't have a capacity for it. But decision tyranny is anti-thetical to democracy, equality and liberty; we don't accept it in our politics and we shouldn't accept it in our economics either. 

2)      Putting the individual first inhibits recourse to utilitarian and centrist arguments.

Secondly, and as I write in Chapter IV, liberal individualism prevents us from falling into the trap of utilitarian thinking (which is often closely related to, but distinct from, authoritarianism) which would put the needs of the many ahead of the needs of the one. In the same way, it ensures that technocrats and centrists, who would impose public policy out of their own sense of the greater good, are prevented from doing so against the consent of individuals directly affected by their decisions.

3)      It disavows revolutionary instincts which put the social contract at risk

Equally importantly, a liberal or democratic socialism disavows the revolutionary, anarchist and/or separatist instincts of some political actors (including on the left). In chapter IV, I describe how the desire for social and conceptual cohesiveness can drive those with a low tolerance for compromise to seek to impose revolutionary change on others (through authoritarian and violent means), or separate themselves from society altogether. I note that this revolutionary tendency is an explicit part of traditional Marxism; and the same tendency for utopian thinking remains a problem on the left (and right) to this day.

Although Politics argues that the Manichean conflict between left and right is not to be feared, there is a limit to how far that conflict can be taken while maintaining a viable society. Fighting to advance social progress is one thing, ripping apart the social contract altogether in the name of one’s ideology is quite the other. Preserving the corrective and selective properties of the political ecosystem is key to ensuring that social equilibria are adaptive. So this tension, between fighting political battle  and the preservation of society as a whole is, I believe, the central challenge of all democratic politics. How hard can we seek to reshape social equilibria without destroying it?

4)      Focusing on choice and freedom allows a critical perspective on all forms of power, both political and economic, that oppress the individual

Libertarian, or democratic socialism, recognises the fundamental equivalency of all forms of power. The adoption of individualism renders choice and freedom the key determinants of a just society. While a classical liberal will recognise the essential need of all individuals to have the equal right to self-determination, the liberal socialist recognises that inequalities of wealth and power will make some individuals more free than others. What the libertarian socialist seeks is decision freedom and the end of decision slavery: the state wherein no individual is forced to choose between two undesirable outcomes purely as a result of material necessity. The ‘democratisation of the means of the production’ means precisely that: expecting the same standards of democratic accountability, transparency and participation in economic life as we routinely expect in political life.

5)      It requires permanent scepticism towards traditional forms of hierarchy and power, challenging social adaptations that can no long justify their usefulness

Lastly, from an evolutionary perspective, a critical or libertarian approach institutionalises a position of permanent intellectual scepticism towards all forms of traditional power. As argued elsewhere, one of the key challenges of a political activist with an evolutionary perspective on social and cultural institutions, is to question whether social norms and rules are functional and adaptive or maladaptive and harmful. While the conservative instinct is to see traditional or “common sense” rules as adaptive by default, a libertarian mindset does not accept the legitimacy of any source of authority that cannot continue to justify its ongoing existence. In this way, it acts as a permanent check against the ossification of social structures and a key driver of sustainable progress in the social status quo.