Understanding vs. Control
I was struck today by another distinction between liberals and authoritarians that seems to summarize quite a few observations for me.
Liberals want to understand other people's behavior;
Authoritarians want to control other people's behavior.
The goal for the liberals then, seems to be to figure out things to do that will accommodate and acknowledge other people's behavioral realities. They don't always manage to accomplish this, but the attempt is the important part.
Authoritarians, on the other hand, see control as an accomplishment in itself, so what they set out to do is less important than that it manages to bring more people under their control.
There are, of course, corollaries. For instance:
Liberals are mystified by people whose behavior they can't understand;
Authoritarians are frustrated by the behavior of those they can't control.