I worry that, in writing this, I will have inaccurately captured the views of many of the forum's libertarians--and in fact may simply be accidentally describing paleoconservatives instead. But as per the dichotomy advanced here, many (I imagine particularly JohnDule and dead0man) seem to in fact ride the middle between liberalism and libertarianism--do not worry, this means you are probably "normal".
American political discourse in general, and the political-compass-as-political-heuristic in particular, has a way of unintentionally binning two very different ideologies, that of libertarianism and small-l "liberalism" (insert here also "neoliberalism" if you wish). This is primarily a product of the Cold War and post-Cold War political milieu, wherein the thrust of both ideologies--then seemingly intertwined--was against "central planning" and "government intrusion".
Since the emergence of Donald Trump as an important political figure in 2016, the perceptions of the two ideologies by their holders seems to have substantially diverged, to the point where the point where they self-differentiate in a way that would not have been understood in, say, the 2010s. It may be that now they are over-differentiated by some people (particularly, say, right-wing pseudo-libertarians), but this still bears some discussion as to why, say, Blairite and DeadPrez might accidentally fall into similarly-quantified ideological spaces that are nevertheless quite different. Consider the diverging ideological fates of Bill Weld, Gary Johnson, and the Pauls in the Trump era. Weld seems to have become essentially a Democrat, Gary Johnson is a LINO for his accommodation of the state in the form of (checks notes) driver's licenses, and the Pauls seem to have become differently mobilized against an apparently encroaching New World Order in the form of Ukrainian democracy.
The fault lines between libertarianism (read: primarily an absence of the central state) and (neo)liberalism (read: primarily the enshrining of individual rights) can be demarcated along a variety of axes. I will try to cover some in brief, but this is not meant to be comprehensive.
Surveillance: This is one of the primary points I would like to address, and it pertains not only to surveillance as customarily imagined in the Bush Era--wiretaps and cameras--but also to the generic collection, quantification, and collation of data on any hypothetical subject, whether by corporate bodies or by government at any level. This is an important area to point out because I believe that, in general, distinctions in one's attitude toward surveillance are of ever-increasing importance in determining one's political placement.
"Liberals", constituting a presumably college-educated class with interests in the maintenance of the information economy and the improvement of corporate or state efficiency, do not seem to have any real problem with data collection by either sector. It is in fact their lifeblood, and many of them will make their livings as
observers of this information. (Some publications, such as
an article by Erica Marat, have even referred to the increasing importance of surveillance in modern governance as a neoliberal project, and a similar theme of the relationship between neoliberalism and observation has been present for decades in critical literature on, say, urban planning)
Contrast this with libertarians, who at the very least regard state data collection as something that is unnecessary, if not outright malevolent, and who, in our current age, have a growing suspicion of corporate data collection. Libertarians, and now many of their colleagues to their right, regard themselves as the
observed, and as such view the increasing legibility
1 of human interaction with suspicion. (Also note that corporate data collection, such as credit card transactions and call detail records readouts, can often themselves be used to serve the state in its investigative capacity) I recall once explaining a potential crime-focused research project to a friend of mine with sympathies lying somewhere between libertarianism and Trumpism; his response was "why?"
We can see this difference in action in terms of the varying attitudes these two groups have towards federal law enforcement, and it plays into their distinct beliefs about the legitimacy of institutions in general. For liberals, federal law enforcement is a way to protect a system--
their system--against assailants of all varieties, as well as against generic crime. Libertarians, viewing themselves instead as potential victims of this system (and harboring, of course, anti-state viewpoints) would probably prefer the entire apparatus be destroyed. (There is a potential exception for dealing with, say, border security) I note that this point about law enforcement in particular is likely subject to change based on who has power or who the state's opponents are, but for the time being I stick with it, as it has been essentially correct since at least 2017.
Foreign Policy: Perhaps the most obvious distinction, liberals tend to be internationalist, well, liberals. The promotion of the market economy and individual rights may be accomplished by an active foreign policy that utilizes a variety of tools--ranging from foreign aid to force--and focuses on strengthening international (liberal) institutions.
Libertarians seem to fall into what Walter Russell Meade would have called the (pukes) "Jacksonian" camp--advocating a primarily reactive foreign policy that deals with protecting or advancing America's material or security interests in particularistic and bilateral fashions, if at all. Recall that Ron Paul's proposed response to 9/11 was to authorize mercenaries to hunt down Osama Bin Laden.
These two camps were temporarily united during the Bush Era, as for liberals, American unilateralism in Iraq was unjustified and in defiance of multiple international bodies, while for libertarians it represented yet another instance of America taking up the obligations of other countries (ex.: nation-building), spending money it didn't have, and acting
intrusive.
Today, the two occupy directly opposing camps, as international cooperation and the liberal international order is viewed by libertarians as a vehicle for government intrusion and regulation, while liberals naturally regard it as good and just, a defense of democracy, self-determination, human rights, and global commerce. Their mutual opposition to one another seems to me a more natural arrangement, as the two were similarly situated in the 1990s when American action was in the form of nation-building projects and interventions against genocide.
Centralization: Liberals seem to be essentially utilitarian on this issue, and were in fact very pro-decentralization in the 1990s, but may have reversed course since the 2010s. Libertarians, by contrast, treat the centralization of political power in and of itself as an evil. This has an ironic inverse, as they may be willing to accept extremely small local tyrannies with little oversight, and to view disruptions of these arrangements as "oppression" from the federal government. We saw this during the civil rights era but can also note it in reactions to the overturning of
Roe.
Note above the two camps' diverging attitudes on federal law enforcement. This is also echoed at the level of the municipality, but in reverse. While libertarians may be generically anti-law enforcement, where they do have preference, it seems to be for local (typically rural) departments over "feds", while liberals view local departments (perhaps with the exception of large, "smart", or data-driven cities) as bastions of reaction, local preference, non-standardization, and bigotry.
Democracy & Monarchy: This is perhaps the hardest to characterize because of its inconsistent nature. Libertarians have been known in the past to occasionally voice support for monarchy, perhaps viewing it as less intrusive than that of a sprawling, small-r republican bureaucracy. Nevertheless, libertarian localism also compels them against far away, seemingly "foreign" governments, and often renders them small-d democrats in preference. Libertarians, having perhaps a somewhat nationalistic streak (at least here in America) may also knee-jerk opponents of such concepts as the current British monarchy.
Liberals, meanwhile, are far more in favor of democracy as a hypothetical concept, but often distrust direct democracy and prefer rule-by-experts, and seem to disregard modern constitutional monarchies as any sort of problem.
In contemporary discourse, it is common to see libertarians bash "neoliberals"--not, as have socialists, as the new (in the 1990s) administrators of a reinvigorated and unleashed capitalism, but instead as the architects of a global system of surveillance, regulation, and intrusion. In this way, the Trump Era appears to have unleashed the two ideologies from the narrow constraints of "fiscally conservative, socially liberal", which described so little about either group.
Nevertheless, it does also expose the problems of self-reflection in each ideology. Libertarians may become unwitting allies of their left-wing, anti-systemic enemies, all the while not realizing that the system they oppose is one they cheered on in its creation. Liberals, on the other hand, remaining unaware that the fanatical devotion to "liberty" they so despise is a necessary ideological tool for constructing the system they now defend. The deregulation and balanced budgets of the 1990s would likely not have been possible without the use of ideological devices abhorrent to Third Wayers.
Today, the two have found new allies, as liberalism becomes better-wedded with the bureaucracy it at one point sought to tear apart, and libertarians make bedfellows with those whose adherence to principles of individual liberty, decentralization, and pacifism is at best a product of mere expedience. However, as the Soviet Union and its collapse made libertarianism the younger, more hard-edged brother to (small-l/neo) liberalism, maybe in turn the prospect of an ascendant China can drive the two ideologies--and others, such as conservatism--together once more.
1. A concept I steal from James Scott in Seeing Like a State and something that I hopefully demonstrate I consider one of the key issues in current political cleavage.
