Libertarians and Liberals

 Thanks to William Wallace for his pithy encapsulating the difference between Liberals and Libertarians. 

The difference between Liberals and Libertarians is that Liberals position liberty within community: the limits on individual freedom are set by consideration for others.  (In this Liberals follow J. S. Mill, Adam Smith’s The Theory of Moral Sentiments, and many others.)  Libertarians reject the idea that individuals are rooted in communities.  They are for individual freedom without qualification.  For them the pursuit of individual self-interest provides the dynamic for economic growth and personal freedom; state interference only limits both.

In his post on Liberal Democrat Voice,  Lord Wallace goes on to apply the distinction to the current Covid-19 situation and contrasts the approach of the Liberal Democrat party with that of Johnson's Tory government and of the more extreme libertarians. (It has to be said that there are one or two dissenting voices in the Comments section, quibbling at the definitions, but they seem good to me.)