The Neo Strategy: A Centrist Strategy for Libertarianism
It really is the opposite of the paleo strategy
Where is libertarianism these days? To put it mildly, not a significant political force, and also going nowhere. Ever since the Mises Caucus took over the US Libertarian Party, and took out all the cultural stances from the platform, support appears to have collapsed even further. At this rate, I think there is a real likelihood that the Libertarian Party will be supplanted by either the Forward Party or the Green Party as the third largest party by next year's election. Let's face it: libertarianism is effectively dying, and if we do nothing, it will be too late to save it.
Part 1: The Failures of Paleolibertarianism and Beltway Libertarianism
Let's be honest. One important reason libertarianism just can't get off the ground is paleolibertarianism, otherwise known as the paleo strategy. While libertarianism did enjoy several brief surges of support in the past 20 years, including during and after the 2003 Iraq War, during and after the 2012 Ron Paul campaign, and during the free speech wave of the mid-2010s, none of these surges lasted. People flocked to libertarianism because they were attracted by its anti-war and free speech platform, but other things turned them away. The paleo strategy was basically an attempt to align libertarianism with paleoconservatism, which in practice meant trying to recruit racist and reactionary people into the movement. There were two main justifications for this: firstly, it was the end of the Cold War, and we had an opportunity to put an end to the military industrial complex. Paleoconservatives were fellow travelers in this regard. Secondly, a populist movement against the elite establishment would likely be good for freedom. However, on both fronts, the results of the paleo strategy are a clear failure by now: more than 30 years after the end of the Cold War, America and its allies are as hawkish as ever. And although there is now a right-populist movement in full force, it seeks not to restore classical liberalism but to abolish it. The new populist movement is an alliance between paleoconservatives, religious authoritarians and theocrats, neoreactionaries, and even a few fascists, with the libertarian voice made redundant. Just how libertarianism, a movement meant to resurrect classical liberal values in the 20th century West, aided the rise of a big anti-liberal movement in the 21st century West, deserves some in-depth study and soul searching at least.
The problem with paleolibertarianism is that it tried to build a movement with the wrong base, and build alliances with the wrong people. Paleoconservatives, racists, reactionaries and the religious right are always going to prefer authoritarianism. These people don't have a libertarian bone in them. It's almost like trying to get Elon Musk or Bill Gates to support socialism. It's just not happening. Meanwhile, by being seen to be associated with racists and reactionaries, the libertarian movement lost many opportunities to build its base with young intellectuals dissatisfied with the status quo and technocratic neoliberalism. The far-left has had a near monopoly on this market in the past 15 years or so, which is why the postmodern deconstructionist movement I call 'critical anarchism' is now so large that it poses a real threat to free speech. This means that, not only did the paleos make libertarianism lose vital opportunities, they effectively aided the growth of not one, but two, very illiberal movements.
To be fair, paleolibertarianism arose as a response to another kind of failed libertarianism: so-called beltway libertarianism. As the name suggests, this refers to a brand of libertarianism that lived within think tanks with close ties to establishment politics. Back in 1980-2016 or so, the US Republican Party, and to some extent their counterparts in other Western countries, followed an ideology called fusionism, which included free market economics (with lots of corporate welfare), a hawkish foreign policy, and conservative religious values. Beltway libertarians believed that they could work within this paradigm, and push for more free market policies. Their obsession with libertarian immediatism (i.e. shrinking government as quickly as possible) made them blind to the fact that Republican fusionism was not a movement for freedom at all, but a front for a bunch of vested interests. Given this, they were not going to let go of corporate welfare or the military industrial complex anytime soon. At least the paleos could see this. They woke up to the fact that beltway libertarianism would never be able to bring an end to the endless, needless wars. This is why, the answer to the paleo failure is not to return to beltway libertarianism. (I also think that both the paleos and the beltways share one critical fault: they are too close to the Republican Party.)
To make libertarianism viable, we need to take the libertarian movement away from both paleolibertarians and beltway libertarians. To be able to do this, we need to build an alternative base to take the movement back. One that can actually develop a pro-liberty consensus, unlike the populist right.
Part 2: A Centrist Libertarian Strategy
I would call the new strategy the 'neo strategy', for several reasons. Firstly, it is a new strategy. Secondly, it is diametrically opposite to the paleo strategy. Finally, just as paleolibertarians wanted to attract paleoconservative support, we want to attract would-be neoliberals. Not that I'm a fan of neoliberalism: their foreign policy views are a disaster, as their support for the 2003 Iraq War showed. However, the kind of people who would normally support technocratic neoliberalism are, in one word, 'moderates': sensible, non-extreme, rational, compassionate people, the kind of base that we would want. The paleos failed because they attracted the wrong kind of people, built the wrong kind of base, and ultimately aimed for the wrong kind of momentum. Having a centrist, sensible base would prevent that.
The path of the neo strategy runs through the center, not the left or the right. Classical liberalism and the political center are a natural fit, in the context of the early 21st century West, while both extremes are openly anti-liberal. Therefore, we need to first encourage a revival of the philosophical traditions of the center, and pit them against the alternatives at the extremes. These include genuine Burkean conservatism on the center-right, and a reasonable, gradualist, reformist progressivism on the center-left. Both of these traditions are highly compatible with classical liberal values, while their further-right and further-left rivals are not. We need to relentlessly point this out.
Part 3: The Strategy: To Expose the Hypocrisy of Coalition Politics
The core strategy is to persuade both the Burkean center-right and the gradualist center-left that a libertarian politics is a better bet than their current coalition politics, in terms of achieving their desired outcomes. On paper, this should not be difficult: classical liberal values are conducive to both Burkean conservatism and reformist liberalism, and the rise of illiberal alternatives on the far-left and the far-right are making moderates on both sides pretty uncomfortable. However, there's also something called tribalism, which makes people rationalize that their side is always right, even if it sounds wrong. It's the reason why many Republicans ultimately voted for Trump in both 2016 and 2020, despite not being truly comfortable with his politics. To get people to see the truth, we need to first get them to overcome the tribalism. This represents yet another important part of the neo strategy. We then need to get them to see that both the left-coalition and the right-coalition, as it stands, is hypocritical and at least partially illiberal, because of the need to pander to the extremes. This situation is getting worse, because the extremes are getting more and more influential. The silver lining is that we now have a real chance to get moderates on both sides to abandon tribalist coalition politics.
The other thing that must be done is to implement ranked choice voting (RCV). Without this, providing a centrist alternative of any kind, including of the libertarian kind, will be broadly seen as a spoiler (just see how the current discussion of a No Labels alternative for next year is being received). This will severely hamper the neo strategy. Instead, we should refrain from electoral politics unless and until RCV has been implemented. Before then, we can work to amplify the voices of liberty on both sides, and build the coming libertarian consensus in preparation. But we absolutely cannot be seen as spoilers. Therefore, we should push for RCV, and not participate directly in electoral politics before this happens.
Conclusions
The neo strategy provides a new path forward to revive classical liberal values in the context of the 21st century West. This path goes through the moderate center of the political landscape, and builds alliances with both moderate Burkean conservatives on the center-right and moderate reformist liberals on the center-left. We then aim to get them to see the hypocrisy and authoritarianism inherent in both the left-coalition and the right-coalition, in order to convince them that a libertarian politics is the only way they can achieve their goals. Finally, we push for the implementation of ranked choice voting, so that in the future, a centrist libertarian alternative can be provided at the ballot box without becoming a spoiler.
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).