Readers of National Review are well aware of the intra-conservative debates over the proper role of “fusionism” for the future of our movement. One popular position holds that the Republican Party pre-Trump largely stood for the fusionist principles that had animated Ronald Reagan and that what our moment calls for is a return to that status quo. The other popular argument asserts that the failures of the pre-Trump Republican Party are synonymous with the failures of fusionism — and that Trump’s election demonstrated the need for a new set of guiding principles.

In Fusion magazine, I argue with Matthew Malec of the Ethics and Public Policy Center that both sides have it wrong mainly because they both falsely equate the “establishment” wing of the conservative movement with genuine Reaganite fusionism — the recovery of which would necessitate pulling from both the “establishment” and the “New Right” policy agendas (I use these terms knowing that they are a imprecise):

Taken as a whole, the path we would like to see the conservative movement traverse in the years ahead is not one that draws only from the establishment or populist wings of the coalition. It grants that both have legitimate points: The establishment’s preference for free markets is correct. So too is its criticism of populists’ undue pessimism. But the populists are right about the need to combat illegal immigration, decouple from China, and fight the culture war. And they are right that the establishment ignored these issues for too long.

For a detailed account, read the whole thing here.