Looking at the Right's history over the last century, one notices many variations and strains of thought, with differing factions gaining ground in different periods. Because the Right sees so much as fundamental—the liberties of the individual and the family; our relationship with generations past, those who live today, and the unborn—and liberty itself cannot be centralized, a diversity of viewpoints and factions emerge. That is why for the Right it is much more vital, and more difficult, to unite the various pieces than it is for the Left.
As the Left becomes more aggressive in pushing its top-down values, from wokeism to Modern Monetary Theory, the Right often finds it difficult challenging or halting its opponents—even though most people are clearly opposed to the Left's notions. Yet, as the last midterm elections in the United States showed, popular disapproval for one party does not necessarily translate into a mandate for the other one.
To win, the Right needs a clear alternative, a cohesive and coherent ideological vision, and a realistic, concrete program. Especially for the conservative and center-right electorate, it is not enough to be against something or someone. You need to be for an idea or present a positive, optimistic vision for the future at the top, in order to energize and organize a movement at the grassroots level.
In recent years, there has been constant pressure on right-wing politicians and organizations to reject the "fusionism" of the Ronald Reagan years and turn towards a conservatism that is economically left-wing—a type of social democracy-conservatism hybrid.
Differences among the center-right factions will always exist. The Right's diversity, anti-conformism, and ability to facilitate a competition of ideas are all assets. But that should not lead to divisions and exclusions within the Right, since that would surely result in defeat, as history has witnessed time and again.
I understand the frustration that comes when facing an aggressive Left that fights to annihilate its political opponents. Yet conservatives cannot win by copying left-wing tactics. If they follow this path, the Left will always come out victorious. The Right has its own tradition, values, and models—it can only win when it remembers and coalesces around what unites instead of what divides. Capitalist free-market economies rooted in conservative values such as family, property, community, liberty, and tradition can work and have worked in the past.
Modern Monetary Theory in economics and wokeism in culture produce a costly artificial conflict that the West cannot afford at this moment. Not when China is aggressively asserting its economic and geopolitical dominance and Russia feels more emboldened. Both MMT and wokeism, as progressive notions, have as their essence the centralization of power, government interference, segregation of individuals, and reduced liberty.
The alternative to them is a free-market system which gives all individuals a better chance at life, at protecting the environment, at conserving history and tradition, and limiting massive indebtedness and avoiding over-taxation. The Right needs to explain that the bigger the government's slice, the smaller the share for individuals and families. The bigger the government's say in our lives, the lesser our freedoms. Interventionism—for whatever good reason—always distorts the harmony that the interaction of individuals creates in markets.
Markets are the sum total of human needs and desires. They work and self-correct because they are driven by human intentions. They fail when governments intervene to further their own interests.
Often we hear talk of the common good, without any specifics as to what it is or who decides it. Can we really trust bureaucrats—often accountable to no one—to do what is good for a society, instead of the multitudes of people who interact in markets? Only individuals and families can know what is good for them, not the monopoly we call government—regardless of which party runs it.
The compatibility between the natural, indestructible human needs of belonging, protecting, and creating and the free-market capitalist system stands at the center of the fusionist proposal.
Instead of flirting with disastrous left-wing notions, the Right needs to lay the groundwork for future victories by presenting what it stands for and doing so in an understandable and credible way. Models of success can be found in the Reagan and Margaret Thatcher governments, in many aspects of the Trump administration, in the state of Florida under Governor Ron DeSantis, and in South Dakota under the leadership of Governor Kristi Noem.
In Italy, the Right won only when it united libertarians and conservatives, under the leadership of Giorgia Meloni. The Right in Spain can only form a government if it does the same. The same is true in France and even at a European level where currently the center-right EPP governs unnaturally with the Socialists, instead of the conservative ECR.
The recipe for success is simple. The Right needs to gain ground on the cultural front, just as much as it needs to pursue the economic policies that have made countries great—low taxes, fiscal responsibility, entrepreneurship, free markets, and free and fair trade.
The best welfare program is still a job, and competition and free markets still ensure more choice and freedom, so long as they remain free from agendas not shared by the majority of people. Restricting the power and reach of the government and giving power to individuals and families—effectively the market participants—is how Big Tech and political influences in the private sector can be stopped. When people can enjoy economic liberty, they have the means to finance and support organizations and community groups that will fight and compete for what they believe in, without giving governments or big corporations more power, decentralizing decision making in the process.
This new fusionism of supply-side economic policies and a major focus on culture, individual liberties, families, property, and communities can be a formidable alternative to wokeism and socialist, progressive policies—enough to inspire and form a winning coalition throughout the West.
Nikola Kedhi is an economic commentator, financial consultant and contributor to various media such as Fox News, the Daily Signal, Newsmax, Il Giornale, The Federalist, CapX, The European Conservative, and Mises Institute. The article expresses solely the opinions of the author, who can be reached through his twitter account https://twitter.com/nikedhi95 and Substack https://nikolakedhi.substack.com/
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
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