I remember those days of–what?–three years ago when the “new fusionism” was supposed to be an alliance of pro-lifers and foreign policy hawks. And then there was “liberaltarianism.” Now it’s an alliance between “neo-Benedictines” and “libertarians.” The idea is that folks who want to live in Alasdair MacIntyre-style local communities heavy on religious identity and traditional morality can make common cause with libertarians to get the state off their backs and allow them to set up communities that reflect their values.

As Rod “Crunchy Con” Dreher says:

the Benedict Option is looking to be the only viable solution to a truly conservative/traditionalist social order. If that can only exist in America within a libertarian meta-order, then perhaps we should explore the possibilities of a new fusionism.

Philosophy geeks may be reminded of the “utopia” section of libertarian philosopher Robert Nozick’s Anarchy, State, and Utopia. Nozick argued that a libertarian political order could allow for just these types of experiments in community life and that utopia just was the possibility of multiple such experiments coexisting side-by-side.

The trick, though, with the idea of “thick” communities enjoying autonomy from the dread liberal state is that it’s not clear how you balance communities’ desires for self-determination with the individual rights that good liberals think the state should protect. It may be unfair that advocates of federalism and states’ rights have been tarred with the brush of white supremacy, but the ugly historical reality is that community autonomy has all-too-often been used to oppress individuals and minorities.

Of course, a true traditionalist might argue that individuals are properly subordinate to the community and that liberal individualism is a decadent system that makes true virtue impossible and undermines communal bonds. And such a person might argue that individual and minority interests must sometimes be sacrificed for the good of the whole.

Personally, as I’ve argued before, I think we ought to be more circumspect about our ability to clearly perceive the good and that the fragility of human selves ought to make us wary of demanding political communities that embody a “thick” conception of the good. And I believe this for theological reasons: we are finite, sinful creatures prone to running roughshod over the weak. One of the justifications of the liberal state, as I understand it, is to protect the weak from the certainties of the strong. I don’t want to pretend that this is an easy or obvious balancing act, but I’m not prepared to endorse the “night-watchman” state as a recipe for social peace.

p.s. Be sure to check out John Schwenkler’s take.