I am a little confused by what Novak means when he uses the the word "liberal." I understand on page 22 the liberal theory that the rule of law protects the people from both "the private other and the public state." (I assume that by "private other" he is referring to unregulated capitalism-feel free to correct me if I am incorrect.) However on page 84 he refers to the "ascendancy of liberal constitutionalism and free-market economics" as if they were complementary or connected. To my 21st century mind, free-market economics is a conservative mantra.
Likewise, back on page one, his thesis is that the existence of extensive regulation in the nineteenth century explodes the liberal (?) myth of governance during that time. Again, I admit to being stuck in the 21st century, but that sounds like a conservative myth to me.
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I think your comment points out the dangers of using labels - conservative, liberal, right, left, hawk, dove, etc. - as a mechanism to attempt to define or categorize anyone's political position. One size does not fit all - many individuals have multiple political positions that run the gamut from liberal to moderate to conservative - and tagging them with one label or the other is neither accurate, meaningful, nor instructive. Another point goes to the accepted meaning of the terms being used. Who can concisely and consistently define the meaning of terms such as "conservative", "moderate", and "liberal"? If each class member was called upon to write their own definitions of each, I suspect the end product would demonstrate much greater dissimilarity than consistency. If that proved to be the case, what is the definitional worth of even using such terms?
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