A great danger will continue to threaten the future of freedom in 2025. It is not a new threat, but one that has become more urgent since the rise of populism in the world over the past thirty years, including with the election of Donald Trump. (On the rise of populism, see Manuel Funke, Moritz Schularick and Christoph Trebescb, ‘Populist Leaders and the Economy’, American economics magazine2023.)
Populism from the right, which is more common in Europe, is no less dangerous than populism from the left, which has been the main variant in Latin America. But the threat I want to emphasize is not populism as such, which I have discussed elsewhere (see especially my Independent assessment article “The impossibility of populism‘), but its frequent identification with what journalists often call the ‘libertarian right’. It seems to me that Donald Trump himself has mentioned the word ‘freedom’ (though significantly not the more demanding ‘freedom’) more often lately –For example:
“For purposes of national security and liberty throughout the world, the United States of America believes that ownership and control of Greenland is an absolute necessity,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Ignore the funny anthropomorphism in the quoted statement. Instead, consider how the likely problems caused by populism will be identified by the enemies of freedom as failures of libertarianism and classical liberalism. This could bring freedom back decades – and that’s if we’re lucky.
One set of catastrophes will likely be economic. For example, if Trump would only succeed his rate promisescan we expect a recession after the supply shock. If the federal government responds by increasing its spending and the Fed partially finances it by creating money, inflation will worsen the problem. It is easy to predict that a populist government will worsen the problem of price controls.
Another kind of catastrophe would be war. For many Trump supporters, both among enthusiasts and among those who believe his collectivism is less dangerous than that of the “left,” this cannot happen because he said he forever opposed wars. One of the least damaging foreign adventures is that the Panama Canal cannot be handed over to the US government without a fight. Sending missiles against Mexican drug gangs would also be a threat case belli– which is apparently a current fear among the least sycophantic people in Trump’s entourage. According to the WashingtonPost (“The Trump team says the comments on Canada, Greenland and Panama are part of a broader plan”, December 28, 2024),
Some inside [Mr. Trump’s] There are real concerns about whether he will cross the line from harsh rhetoric and economic warfare to military intervention. Trump has threatened a 25 percent tariff on Mexican imports to stem the flow of illegal drugs and has privately discussed the idea of firing missiles into Mexico in an effort to take out cartels.
Even if none of these catastrophes occur, any suggestion that such games or clowning have anything to do with the ideal of individual freedom can only jeopardize its future. John Maynard Keynes was right that ideas matter in the long run.
Take the case of Xavier Milei, the president of Argentina, who describes himself as an anarcho-capitalist or, more recently, a minarchist. He seems cut from a different cloth than the kind of illiberal populists I was referring to. (See under recent press releases “An interview with Javier Milei, the President of Argentina”; Javier Milei, “My contempt for the state is endless“; And “Javier Milei, free market revolutionary“-all in it The Economist (dated November 28, 2024.) Milei clearly has some economic insight and competence: during his first year in power he has already significantly reduced inflation, balanced the budget and currently appears to have reversed his country’s long decline stopped. this was mainly due to previous populist rulers. (See Ciara Nugent and Michael Scott, “Argentina: Did Milei prove his critics wrong?” Financial timesDecember 10, 2024; and Mary Anastasia O’Grady, “Measuring Argentina’s progress from Milei,” Wall Street JournalDecember 8, 2024.)
But Milei has also ended up in bad company. He expressed his support for many far-right and illiberal populist politicians in Europe and America. Whether or not he succeeds in his important Argentine venture, he will have further contributed to identifying libertarians with illiberal lunatics.
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For someone who can draw, it shouldn’t be rocket science to create an image for this post illustrating a dangerous pass in the Alps, inspired by a passage from a short story by Guy de Maupassant (1850-1993), The Auberge (The inn):
Le ciel palissait sur sa tête; and it is a bizarre lueur, born one day, that makes the vast ocean of cimes abrupt, which is a penny of the car folks. At this point it’s a vague sorting of the next elle-même that returns into space. Perhaps there are more loins than most that exhibit a rose like the chair, and the only red device is the lourds of the Bernoises of the Alpes.
[Translation:] The sky grew pale above his head, and suddenly a strange light, from which no one could tell, suddenly illuminated the immense ocean of pale mountain peaks that stretched for many miles around him. It seemed as if this faint brightness emanated from the snow itself, then spread out into space. Gradually the highest and most distant peaks turned a delicate, fleshy pink color, and the red sun appeared behind the lumbering giants of the Bernese Alps.
Below is the best I could get from DALL-E after giving “him” the passage and at least an hour of explanation on my part. Often I repeated to the bot that the valley must be dark and foreboding, and that only the peaks can be pink. The drawing remained far removed in words from Maupassant’s image:
A dangerous pass in the Alps, by DALL-E (trying to imitate Maupassant’s style The inn)