I don't think it's so much about liberal authoritarianism - it's more about Utopian ideals. Utopians, by their very nature, don't think things through much, or at least that's always been my impression - they basically go 'life would be perfect if only THIS would happen', then run with that thought. Both liberals and conservatives have their own utopian vision of things as they should be, and both, in theory, believe in peace and freedom and stuff like that - the main difference is that the liberal version is usually an idealized version of the FUTURE, of life as it could be if we did this this and this, whereas the conservative version is an idealized version of the PAST, of how good things used to be and how they could be again if we did this this and this. The reason that the liberal version tends to show up in science fiction more often is simply that it's easier to write stories about - nifty stuff that might happen in the future is much more interesting to read about than nifty stuff that's already happened, usually in the not-very-distant past, and that most people already know about. And yes, Wells, was definitely a Utopian in certain respects, but I think that was mainly in his later years - remember, he created one of the original dystopian futures in 'The Time Machine'. (It may, in fact, have been THE original, but don't quote me on that.)