The term was coined by Cato's Brink Lindsey in an article wherein he lays out the logic of the political pairing:
The conservative movement--and, with it, the GOP--is in disarray. Specifically, the movement's "fusionist" alliance between traditionalists and libertarians appears, at long last, to be falling apart.
[snip]
Libertarian disaffection should come as no surprise. Despite the GOP's rhetorical commitment to limited government, the actual record of unified Republican rule in Washington has been an unmitigated disaster from a libertarian perspective: runaway federal spending at a clip unmatched since Lyndon Johnson; the creation of a massive new prescription-drug entitlement with hardly any thought as to how to pay for it; expansion of federal control over education through the No Child Left Behind Act; a big run-up in farm subsidies; extremist assertions of executive power under cover of fighting terrorism; and, to top it all off, an atrociously bungled war in Iraq.
This woeful record cannot simply be blamed on politicians failing to live up to their conservative principles. Conservatism itself has changed markedly in recent years, forsaking the old fusionist synthesis in favor of a new and altogether unattractive species of populism. The old formulation defined conservatism as the desire to protect traditional values from the intrusion of big government; the new one seeks to promote traditional values through the intrusion of big government. Just look at the causes that have been generating the real energy in the conservative movement of late: building walls to keep out immigrants, amending the Constitution to keep gays from marrying, and imposing sectarian beliefs on medical researchers and families struggling with end-of-life decisions.
[snip]
Today's ideological turmoil, however, has created an opening for ideological renewal--specifically, liberalism's renewal as a vital governing philosophy. A refashioned liberalism that incorporated key libertarian concerns and insights could make possible a truly progressive politics once again--not progressive in the sense of hewing to a particular set of preexisting left-wing commitments, but rather in the sense of attuning itself to the objective dynamics of U.S. social development. In other words, a politics that joins together under one banner the causes of both cultural and economic progress.
[snip]
Furthermore, it has become increasingly clear that capitalism's relentless dynamism and wealth-creation--the institutional safeguarding of which lies at the heart of libertarian concerns--have been pushing U.S. society in a decidedly progressive direction. The civil rights movement was made possible by the mechanization of agriculture, which pushed blacks off the farm and out of the South with immense consequences. Likewise, feminism was encouraged by the mechanization of housework. Greater sexual openness, as well as heightened interest in the natural environment, are among the luxury goods that mass affluence has purchased. So, too, are secularization and the general decline in reverence for authority, as rising education levels (prompted by the economy's growing demand for knowledge workers) have promoted increasing independence of mind.
Yet progressives remain stubbornly resistant to embracing capitalism, their great natural ally.
[snip]
Hence today's reactionary politics. Here, in the first decade of the twenty-first century, the rival ideologies of left and right are both pining for the '50s. The only difference is that liberals want to work there, while conservatives want to go home there.
The Wilkinson/Goldberg repartee in response to Lindsey's thesis touches on several of the memes that have surfaced on this blog recently with respect to morality, traditionalism, economics and political philosophy.
Goldberg lays out the straight-up Burkean conservative thesis for opposing change, liberaltarian or otherwise:
Goldberg:
"When you listen to libertarians there is sometimes, not always, a sense that we can throw all this stuff [conservative cultural traditions] into the dustbin of history [...] and a pox on these silly opiates of the masses when it may be that those opiates of the masses have the remarkable preventative effect of keeping us free."
The basic conservative view is that our freedom and society are very fragile and that we shouldn't cavalierly make changes to our social order because we don't know where we are going to find ourselves as a result.
Wilkinson responds by drawing out a comparison between liberals and conservatives as distinguished by their moral sensibilities, rather by political philosophy or party affiliation (though clearly there is a logical overlap).
As noted in a prior GingerPost, Jonathon Haidt's research into moral psychology posits 5 vectors of moral sensibilities:
We present theoretical and empirical reasons for believing that there are five psychological systems that provide the foundations for the world's many moralities.
The five foundations are psychological preparations for detecting and reacting emotionally to issues related to:
1) harm/care,
2) fairness/reciprocity,
3) ingroup/loyalty,
4) authority/respect, and
5) purity/sanctity.
Political liberals have moral intuitions primarily based upon the first two foundations, and therefore misunderstand the moral motivations of political conservatives, who generally rely upon all five foundations.
Wilkinson argues, essentially, that liberals and libertarians are "liberal" by moral disposition, as denoted by Haidt's moral reasoning research, rather than because they agree with commonly described "liberal" political policy positions on economics. The challenge then for libertarians, like Wilkinson, is to convince Democratic Party liberals that their moral intuitions would be better served through an alliance with libertarians on economic issues rather than by turning to big-government European-style progressivism to address issues of social justice.
Wilkinson:
Political institutions and economic institutions rest on a cultural underpining that in turn rests on a certain calibration of people's moral sentiments. So, at an abstract level, we're probably in agreement.
But looking at the data, the more liberal a place is in terms of its moral intuitions, the better it is on a lot of metrics. And that's the thing that is hard for a lot of conservatives to swallow.
[snip]
What I want to do is say: If you care about welfare and justice, then I am going to tell you how to do that. You need a high level of economic growth, you need a government limited to a certain set of functions that it can perform competently, and that the things you care about as a dispositional liberal are going to be best served by the moderate liberal-libertarian political identity. Don't be seduced by the statist Democrats because they aren't going to achieve the liberal ends that you care about.
I have to say that I agree with much of this.
On the one hand, Goldberg/Kalb/Dreher and other traditional conservatives have to account for the Scandinavian phenomenon, which is the fact that culturally liberal environments, as defined by Haidt, tend to be more highly functioning, prosperous and civilized societies. Would you rather live in Sweden or Saudi Arabia?
On the other hand, given that we are proceeding through such an unusual environment economically-speaking at present, there is a great danger that Obama (even assuming he is philosophically disposed to do so) will be unable to reign in Democratic impulses to lay a much greater claim by government on our collective economic life as the end-game of the present emergency-driven legislative process rather than simply as a temporary crisis mitigation strategy. And, if this is the ultimate political outcome, then I don't have terribly high hopes for its successful conclusion. Hell, even as a crisis mitigation strategy, it isn't like there isn't already a terrible lot of risk on the table.
But, on the more significant question, what does the animal look like on the liberaltarian bumper sticker of Wilkinson's new political party? A donkey-head with an elephant-butt or the other way around?
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