What is Conservative? What is Liberal?

At the heart of the conservative (right-wing) vs liberal (left-wing) debate is a very crucial concept, which many people simply refuse to accept: A society can either be free or equal, but it cannot be both. This is counter-intuitive to most people in liberal democracies, who want above all else to live in a perfectly free and perfectly equal country. Such a paradise, however, has never existed on Earth and never will.

While it is true that certain forms of freedom and equality are connected, such as equality under law and freedom of opportunity, freedom and equality are more frequently at odds. And yet, for most people in the West, the ideas of liberty and equality are inseparable; so much so that they are frequently confused with one another and even used as synonyms. But elementary common sense suggests that where freedom is to be promoted, inequality must result and where equality is to be established, freedoms must be curtailed.

As John C. Calhoun, the seventh vice president of the United States wrote:
"Now, as individuals differ greatly from each other, in intelligence, sagacity, energy, perseverance, skill, habits of industry and economy, physical power, position and opportunity,—the necessary effect of leaving all free to exert themselves to better their condition, must be a corresponding inequality between those who may possess these qualities and advantages in a high degree, and those who may be deficient in them. The only means by which this result can be prevented are, either to impose such restrictions on the exertions of those who may possess them in a high degree, as will place them on a level with those who do not; or to deprive them of the fruits of their exertions. But to impose such restrictions on them would be destructive of liberty,—while, to deprive them of the fruits of their exertions, would be to destroy the desire of bettering their condition."

In other words, if everyone is perfectly free, the gifted will rise to the top and the less fortunate will sink to the bottom; hence, everyone is unequal. Only if the gifted are impeded from rising too far - and the less fortunate are elevated on their shoulders - can perfect equality be established; hence, the strong are hardly perfectly free.

The difference, then, between the conservative ideology and the liberal ideology, is that the conservative seeks to maximize freedom, while the liberal seeks to maximize equality.