So, what’s the deal with modern liberalism and its inability to fight illiberalism?
Note: never say ‘modern’ illiberalism. There’s no such thing. Illiberalism has always been with us, pretty much intact since our first tribal meetings, with only a few costume changes to mark the passage of time.
Liberalism was born out of the fight against illiberalism. Let’s date it, somewhat arbitrarily, for the sake of argument, to John Locke in the late-17th century. Nearly some 400 years of back and forth between the rights of man versus divine rights of kings, tolerance versus intolerance, science versus superstition, meritocracy versus hereditary privilege.
Etc. & Etc.
For a while there, in the not-too-distant past, liberalism appeared to have gained an unassailable upper hand with the defeat of European fascism, Japanese imperialism, and the containment of Stalinist communism into ultimate submission around 1990 or so. More or less. Give or take. The End of History and all that.
By almost every measure, what triumphed couldn’t be thought of as a perfect, ideal liberalism, not by a long shot. There remained too many people subject to tyranny in its many forms, enforced and maintained with the assistance, sometimes even encouragement, of many of the leading global liberal states. Integral tenets of liberalism, individual rights, say, or freedom of expression in its countless manifestations, were not bestowed on everyone, even those living under the flag and mottoed banners proclaiming all men to have been created equally with inalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Still,
there was a sense of progress, arguably the beating heart of liberal principle, inevitable and onward progress, each generation achieving more, striving higher than the previous one. Everything illiberalism in all its forms stood in opposition to and would never be strong enough again to be able to successfully undo and annul.
Hello, 2025.
No.
Further back.
2015.
2000?
1994?
1980?
When exactly did The Great Retreat begin? When did we transition from liberalism to neoliberalism, taking us along the road to the current state of illiberalism?
Ronald Reagan and his trickle-down economics, and his ‘shining city on the hill’? A not so subtle ode to White America nostalgia. Or maybe it was the shock doctrine pillaging of the Soviet state and establishment by the West, Boris Yeltsin and Vladimir Putin, establishing the Russian gangster capitalist oligarchy. How about Bill Clinton and Tony Blair’s neoliberal Third Way triangulation. Maybe Newt Gingrich and the Tea Party. 
The US Supreme Court’s election interference in 2000 and the ascendancy of George W. fucking Bush. The election of America’s first black president and the subsequent rise of a 2nd U.S. confederacy.
All pieces to the puzzle of how post-war liberal order crumbled in the face of its undead adversary. Impotent to resist the reactionary onslaught. In America, not once, but twice! A four-year emergency light flashed bright red. Warning, Will Robinson! This is bad. Warning! Warning!! This is really bad. But it’ll get worse, much, much worse, if you don’t do something now. Warning, Will Robinson!
Yet,
no counterpunch. Pushback minimal and tentative for fear of ruffling too many feathers. A big sigh of relief. Safe in the belief that the threat had passed. Liberal democracy’s guardrails had been sorely tested but held firmly. Nothing to see here, folks. A mere blip. An outlier. An historical anomaly.
Pheee-ew!
And here we are.
2025.
Liberalism, in its neoliberal form, learned nothing, too wrapped up in its mythology of inevitability. Too certain that reasonable people would ultimately win out. Bouts of irrationality were to be expected, they concluded, but wouldn’t last. It would burn itself out with the intensity of its own heat. There was absolutely no need to hunt it down where it lived, to confront and contest it forcefully. Illiberalism, in this view, was a manifestation of malcontent with the presiding neoliberal order. We needed to listen to the grievances, not punish anyone for acting on them.
Taking stock of the situation, the neoliberal establishment has decided that the real enemies are those demanding a broadening of liberal principles and policies, not those calling for liberalism’s extinction. Maybe there is something to being too liberal, neoliberals think. Maybe liberalism’s has gone too far, got too woke, challenging orthodoxies like gender and sexuality, a state’s right to commit genocide. Maybe illiberals are onto something. Maybe we have had too much immigration.
Maybe too many people have been given too many rights.
Maybe the reactionaries are right, the neoliberals say. Maybe we need to rethink this whole idea of liberalism. Isn’t liberalism all about big-tent inclusion and tolerance of every view across the political spectrum, no matter how unfounded, malformed or malignant that view may be? neoliberals ask. Civility in the face of incivility sits at the core of liberalism. Hearing everyone out. Understanding and accepting the fact that there are both sides to any issue.
Liberals’ intolerance of illiberals’ intolerance betrays the very principles of tolerance upon which liberalism was founded, neoliberals declare.
So, in the spirit of cooperation, it is the duty of liberals to put a human face on illiberal policies. To champion a more compassionate system for mass deportation. To put the boot down on all forms of protest that make illiberals uncomfortable. To nip in the bud any social advancement or acceptance that undermines firmly and obstreperously held illiberal beliefs.
By making everything just a little bit less liberal, we might be able to reconstruct liberalism into something even illiberals can learn to live with.