Fusionism Revisited: Stephanie Slade's Case for Renewing the Libertarian-Conservative Alliance Amid the New Right's Rise

Stephanie Slade, senior editor at Reason magazine, explores the philosophical roots and contemporary fractures of American conservatism in her new book Fusionism: Liberty, Virtue, and the Future of the American Right (University of Notre Dame Press). The work traces fusionism—originally articulated by Frank Meyer at National Review—to its mid-20th-century synthesis of classical liberal commitments to limited government and free markets with traditionalist emphasis on virtue and moral order.

Nikolai G. Wenzel, in a review published by the American Institute for Economic Research's The Daily Economy and reposted on RealClearPolicy, highlights Slade's analysis of the "Dissident Right." He identifies three strains: national conservatives seeking to wield state power for national priorities, theocons aiming for a moral order through politics, and neoreactionaries blending critique with conspiracy. Wenzel notes the book's strength in diagnosing how these groups have abandoned skepticism of administrative power, echoing failures like trade policy with China, post-2008 bailouts, foreign interventions, and cultural shifts including DEI.

Slade's earlier writings, including a 2021 Liberty Fund essay on Meyer's fusionism, argue that liberty and virtue are mutually reinforcing rather than in tension, with virtue best cultivated voluntarily rather than imposed. Podcasts and discussions from the Acton Institute and Adam Smith Works further contextualize fusionism as a response to collectivism during the Cold War era.

Critics and observers in libertarian-conservative circles observe that both major parties now compete over the scope of government intervention rather than its limits, with the administrative state cited as a central driver of cultural and economic dislocations. Slade proposes recovering fusionism as a path forward for a divided polity, emphasizing individual responsibility over coercive solutions.