The Neoconservatives
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Mark Gerson. The Neoconservative Vision: From the Cold War to the Culture Wars. Lanham, Md. and London: Madison Books, 1997. x + 368 pp. $27.95, cloth, ISBN 978-1-56833-054-9. Reviewed by David Rovinsky Published on H-Teachpol (November, 1997) Neoconservatism in American politics is a policy, welfare, government regulation of the phenomenon that social scientists, especially that economy, religion in the public sphere, and race majority whose political home remains to the left relations became part of the conventional wisdom of center, have never fully understood. The term of American political life. To the extent that the is regularly misused, primarily in reference to Left has resurrected itself, it has done so by em‐ free-market philosophy during the 1980s and bracing many of the arguments of neoconser‐ 1990s. In this sense, neoconservatism is not prop‐ vatism. erly distinguished from conventional conser‐ In The Neoconservative Vision, Mark Gerson vatism, or "paleoconservatism," in the parlance of presents a detailed synthesis of neoconservative the neoconservative. Neoconservatism refers to a thought, going back to the battles among pro- and specific intellectual school in the United States de‐ anti-Stalin factions within the American socialist scended from the liberal anti-communism of the movement of the 1930s. In the wake of World War World War II era and its aftermath. It is distin‐ II, democratic socialists were frequently lumped guished primarily by its rejection of the pro‐ together as "fellow travelers" with pro-Soviet in‐ nounced radicalism of both the American left in tellectuals. The future neoconservatives resented the early years of the Cold War, and early twenti‐ this association, and quickly came to see the radi‐ eth century conservatism. Neoconservatism is cal Left as more of an enemy than the main‐ thus not simply another branch of American con‐ stream Right. Gerson takes his summary of the servatism; in fact, a substantial majority of its ad‐ writings of neoconservatives from Sidney Hook, herents continue to support the Democratic Party, Lionel Trilling, and Reinhold Niebuhr in the 1930s despite their intellectual proximity to the Republi‐ and 1940s through the observations of the likes of can administrations of the 1980s. The 1980s repre‐ Irving Kristol and Michael Novak as they contem‐ sented, in some ways, the climax of the neocon‐ plated a world without Communism. Based upon servative movement, in that its views on such an extensive reading of neoconservative journals matters as Communism and American foreign H-Net Reviews and essays (the favored form of neoconservative inherently have difficulties standing up to totali‐ writing; Gerson observes that neoconservatives tarian regimes, for these latter ideologies are able write few books) as well as dozens of interviews to penetrate into democracies and influence polit‐ with major neoconservative personas, Gerson ical debate. provides an impressive and perhaps unprecedent‐ For American intellectuals, the McCarthy pe‐ ed review of the literature of neoconservatism, riod dominated the 1950s. This was a difficult pe‐ one that will make The Neoconservative Vision an riod for all American leftists, as all were suspect‐ important reference work for students of political ed of connections to the Soviets. During the Mc‐ ideologies and American political thought. Carthy hearings, the split between pro-Soviet and The neoconservatives began their political anti-Communist liberals became pronounced, as lives as New Dealers, originally opposing the ex‐ liberal anti-Communists refused to join in the treme laissez-faire individualism embodied by the anti-McCarthy hysteria encouraged by the far Republican Party of the 1920s. These New Dealers Left, while opposing McCarthy's witch hunts, rejected traditional conservatism not primarily claiming that they distracted from the true anti- for economic reasons, but for social ones. Tradi‐ Communist struggle, the Cold War. tional conservatives were white, Anglo-Saxon Neoconservatism came into its own during Protestants who discriminated against all those the 1960s and 1970s, and during these decades be‐ unlike themselves. The future neoconservatives came a force that would oppose the Left far more did not reject the mythology of American life. than the Right. Neoconservatives view the cultur‐ Rather, as representatives of traditional nine‐ al sphere as the most important one, a sphere teenth-century immigrant groups like Jews, Pol‐ from which economics and politics draw their ish, Irish, or Slavs, they sought to integrate them‐ meaning. Therefore, a battle over the definition of selves into American society through the accepted American culture is one that neoconservatives route of hard work and individual achievement, view as one for the American soul. The New Left only to fnd themselves excluded due to their non- appeared after 1960, with an agenda supporting British stock. To this day, neoconservatives are civil rights, the restructuring of the American uni‐ disproportionately Jewish and Roman Catholic, versity, and opposing the use of American mili‐ the "assimilated" immigrants. tary power overseas on the grounds that the Unit‐ Neoconservative intellectuals treat another ed States lacked the moral legitimacy to act as a group of intellectuals, the "anti-anti-Communists" global force. Neoconservatives joined the New (later to become the New Left), as their chief an‐ Left in opposing the Vietnam War, but on the nar‐ tagonists. In the wake of World War II, many rower grounds that the war, as defined by the Western intellectuals remained enamored of the Pentagon, was not winnable, and that the overall Soviet Union and "Uncle Joe" Stalin, convinced, as strategic interest of the United States in Southeast was Walter Lippman in the 1930s, that in the Asia was questionable. Neoconservatives also sup‐ USSR they had "seen the future, and it works." ported the civil rights movement, in that it offered Neoconservatives, the liberal anti-Communists, the potential for African Americans to join the argued, as did George Orwell in his novel Animal American mainstream in the same way that their Farm, that it was unprecedented for the intellec‐ own grandparents did. However, the civil rights tuals of a democratic country to fall under the movement soon spawned affirmative action pro‐ sway of a totalitarian ideology. Neoconservatives grams that offered elaborate racial and gender like Norman Podhoretz, editor of the journal Com‐ preferences to traditionally disadvantaged mentary, later went on to argue that democracies groups. Neoconservatives, sympathetic to individ‐ 2 H-Net Reviews ual achievement without regard to membership Left critique of the United States that is more ne‐ in a social or racial group, opposed affirmative ac‐ farious and that demands pointed opposition. All tion for both ideological and self-interested rea‐ neoconservative writing is inspired by this per‐ sons: they believed that the true path to success in ceived need to protect American culture and the the United States was the one taken by their own forces that support it. families, and they were resentful that the discrim‐ Neoconservatives believe that politics is ination faced by their own families (especially about morality, and that morality should infuse Jewish ones) was repeated, this time as reverse political behavior. Democracy thrives upon what discrimination. they call "the bourgeois virtues" of thrift, the de‐ Neoconservative disaffection with the laying of gratification, honesty, probity, and loyal‐ Democrats mounted particularly during the ty. The importance of individual moral responsi‐ Carter administration after 1976. They saw it as bility is the fip side of the classical liberal's insis‐ embodying New Left values, and the Iranian tence upon personal freedom and initiative; neo‐ hostage crisis and the administration's limp re‐ conservatives maintain that each side is needed to sponse to it showed that it remained a hostage to make the other work. For example, while material the Vietnam syndrome. For these reasons, most wealth is necessary for a thriving society with a neoconservatives supported Ronald Reagan's suc‐ high standard of living, it is not an end in itself. cessful bid for the presidency in 1980. Reagan This wealth can be put in the service of the things promised not to be afraid to project American mil‐ that truly "matter" in life, such as education and itary power and undertook a substantial buildup intellectual vitality; civil society, as in those medi‐ of American armed forces to send a clear message ating institutions that give society a collective ex‐ to the Soviets. At the same time, Reagan turned istence independent of the state; and religion. Re‐ Washington away from attempts at economic ligion is the source of the moral virtues that ani‐ management in the direction of a less fettered mate both individuals and the society in which capitalist economy, another favorite topic of neo‐ they live. conservatives, still chafing at the resentment This raises the question of the role of religion many New Left activists harbored toward capital‐ in public life. In recent decades, under the influ‐ ism and the way of life that upheld it. ence of modern liberalism, the practice of religion While Gerson's historical review of the neo‐ within public institutions has been discouraged conservative movement illustrates well the reac‐ on the grounds of separation of church and state. tion of the group to specific periods in American Neoconservatives, Jewish and Christian alike, re‐ political history, it runs the risk of obscuring the spond that this is too broad a reading of the con‐ common themes that have animated neoconser‐ cept. They note that the Constitution prohibits the vatism from the beginning. Above all, neoconser‐ establishment of an official state religion but does vatives stress the centrality of ideology and cul‐ not say that religion has no place as a motivating ture (they are two sides of the same coin for neo‐ force in politics. The state merely cannot do any‐ conservatives) in determining the course that a thing for interfere with the individual practice (or society ultimately follows.