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What It Means To Be Conservative

Owen Harries

t is not altogether easy to write on . For one thing, if your readership is at all a representative sample of the educated middle class, chances are that it Iwill be hostile to your topic, or at least sceptical of its claim to deserve serious attention. A long time ago, famously dubbed the Conservative Party the ‘stupid party’. Mill was, of course, a liberal—but then so are most (small ‘l’, naturally). The English conservative, , has recently written of his own growing up in the middle of the 20th century: ‘. . . [A]lmost all English intellectuals regarded the term “conservative” as a term of abuse . . . [it was] to be on the side of age against youth, the past against the future, against innovation . . . spontaneity and life.’

Owen Harries is a Senior Fellow at The Centre for Independent Studies. This is an edited version of a talk given to the Blackheath Forum in March 2003.

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As far as Australia is concerned, things don’t seem to have changed much if a recent review of R. J. White defensively (or perhaps several new books on Don Bradman is anything to smugly and archly) claims that,‘To put go by. At one point the author (Graeme Blundell) conservatism in a bottle with a label listed Bradman’s alleged failings: he couldn’t cope with sticky wickets, he was shaky against short- is like trying to liquify the atmosphere pitched balls—and he was (shudder) a ‘social or give an accurate description of the conservative’! beliefs of a member of the Anglican As well as hostility, there is likely to be ignorance. This is partly the fault of conservatism Church. The difficulty arises from the and conservatives themselves; it arises from the nature of the thing.’ nature of the beast. For conservatism does not lend itself easily to schematic, didactic exposition, widely accepted, both by conservatives and others, and conservatives do not readily engage in it. The as the ablest and most influential statement of best conservative writers tend to approach the conservative views—’s Reflections subject partially or obliquely, in scattered essays, on the in —is not a systematic or by anthologising examples, or in the course of statement of a position but an inspired polemic controversy over a particular issue. In introducing reacting to a particular political situation: a huge, Owen Harries his anthology, The Conservative , R. J. unprecedented upheaval in the most illustrious White defensively (or perhaps smugly and archly) and powerful country in . In that polemic claims that, ‘To put conservatism in a bottle with a is embedded, in unsystematic fashion, the tenets of label is like trying to liquify the atmosphere or give a . The reader has to do his own an accurate description of the beliefs of a member work in abstracting the latter from the former. My of the Anglican Church. The difficulty arises from abstraction be very selective and will not do the nature of the thing. For conservatism is less a anything like to the richness of the complete political doctrine than a habit of mind, a mode of work. feeling, a way of living’. Again, —perhaps the most The limits of influential conservative thinker of the last century— Two initial points about Burke’s Reflections: First, begins his essay ‘On Conservative’ by it was published in 1790, that is before the most acknowledging that, ‘It may be true that conservative violent manifestations of the Revolution—before conduct does not readily provoke articulation in the terror, the , the Revolution devouring the idiom of general ideas, and that consequently its own children, and the emergence of a military there has been a certain reluctance to undertake this dictatorship. Thus, Burke was writing with foresight, kind of elucidation’.1 And he immediately goes on not hindsight. to make it clear that he is not concerned to correct Second, at the time it was published, the this deficiency, but rather to describe the disposition Revolution was still hugely popular in England, seen to be conservative—to discuss, that is, a cast of as an immense liberating step forward for mankind character rather than a of ideas. by the enlightened opinion of the day. Most of us At the local level, I consulted the anthology of are familiar with Wordsworth’s ‘Bliss was it then to Quadrant articles, drawn from 25 years of publication. be alive’ reaction, and with that of Charles James Quadrant is Australia’s leading conservative journal. Fox: ‘How much the greatest event it is that ever But the anthology does not contain a single article happened in the world! And how much the best!’. In that attempts to set out the tenets of the conservative launching his denunciation of the Revolution, then, position systematically; plenty of articles that use Burke, was not expressing a popular opinion among conservative arguments in an ad hoc way, but not thinking Englishmen, but rather going against the one that tried to give a coherent answer to the tide. Among other things it was to cost him his close question: What is Conservatism? friendship with Fox. Bearing this resistance to formal treatment Central to Burke’s reaction to the Revolution was in mind, it is perfectly in character that what is a profound hostility toward what he called variously

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‘speculation’, ‘’ or ‘theoretical reasoning’ The latter has only the general view of as applied to social and political questions, and his ; the former, the statesman, has conviction of the danger of such applications. a number of circumstances to combine He was writing, remember, at a time when the with those general ideas, and to take in France seriously believed that into his consideration. Circumstances they could reconstruct the world from scratch by are infinite, and infinitely combined; the application of general, abstract principles—even are variable and transient; he who to the point of introducing a new calendar to mark does not take them into consideration the beginning of that new, enlightened world. And is not erroneous but stark mad—he is in holding this they were not exceptional but metaphysically mad. representative of the most sophisticated opinion of In other words, discrimination in terms of their time, putting into action belief about the power circumstances trumps consistency in terms of of reason that had been energetically propagated by principle and , and insistence on consistency representatives of the Enlightenment in preceding regardless of circumstances and consequences is decades. likely to be disastrous. If stated in these terms this Burke rejected that belief for two reasons, the first seems obvious, think of it the next time someone having to do with the nature of society and politics, insists that because we act in one way toward the second with the nature of human and country X (say with respect to human ) it their rational faculties. would be hypocritical and wrong not to act in the same way to country Y, regardless of the Burke was writing at a time between the two countries or of the difference in when the revolutionaries in France our relationships with the two. As Dean Acheson, one of America’s greatest Secretaries of , once seriously believed that they could put it, ‘I am not in the slightest bit worried because reconstruct the world from somebody can say, “Well, you said so and so about scratch by the application of , why isn’t all this true about China?” I will general, abstract principles even be polite. I will be patient, and I will try to explain — why Greece is not China. But my heart will not be to the point of introducing a new in the battle.’ calendar to mark the beginning of The sociologist was making the same that new, enlightened world. point in more general terms when, in his essay on ‘Politics as a Vocation’,2 he distinguished between two fundamentally different maxims concerning When he wrote Reflections, Burke had been ethical conduct. There is, first, what he terms ‘the intimately engaged in politics at a high level for ethic of ultimate ends’, which decrees absolute and three decades. He saw that activity as an infinitely unconditional fidelity to principle (in religious complex, difficult and delicate one. The number terms, ‘The Christian does right and leaves the of factors at work were many and the ways they result with the Lord’; in secular terms, ‘One must interrelated were complex. Politicians had to act be faithful to the principles dictated by reason and in concrete, discrete situations, not in general or , regardless of consequences’). And there is, abstract areas: second, ‘the ethic of responsibility’, which decrees The science of constructing a that one has a responsibility to take into account, Commonwealth, or renovating it, as best one can, the foreseeable circumstances and or reforming it, is, like every other consequences of one’s actions. The second, Weber experimental science, not to be taught a believed, is the approach appropriate to political life. priori. It is a matter of the most delicate The responsibility of a political leader is to the well- and complicated skill. A statesman being of his people, not to the purity of his soul, and differs from a professor at a university. the two do not necessarily coincide always.

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ociety, for Burke, is neither a collection of function of and practices that seemed Sloosely related , nor a mechanism often to be without serious purpose, or to be merely with interchangeable parts. It is a living organism decorative or even obsolescent, became a major and anything that affects the well-being of any part growth industry. of it will affect the whole. It is therefore, he insists, One example, not without relevance to recent ‘with infinite caution that any man ought to venture Australian history: In his book, Political Man, on pulling down an edifice which has answered in first published in 1959 and widely regarded as a any tolerable degree for ages the common purpose classic of its kind, the sociologist Seymour Martin of society’. Prescription is a solid argument in favour Lipset observes the apparently ‘absurd fact’ (his of an or practice. words) that 10 out of the 12 stable European and Although he did not use the terminology, English-speaking are . there are two problems of which Burke, and (Britain; the Scandinavian and Lowland countries; conservatives after him, have been acutely aware. Australia, New Zealand, ). This, to Lipset’s The first is that of unintended consequences—that, mind, could not be an accident and he looks for an because of the complexity and interconnectedness explanation. He suggests that during the rapid and of things, in initiating change on an ambitious profound social and economic changes of the last scale, almost invariably more is set in motion than 100 years—changes which apparently were making the initiator had in mind and the end result may the institution of increasingly irrelevant be quite different from the intended one. Thus, in and obsolescent—the preservation of the institution Burke’s words, ‘very plausible schemes with very played a crucial role in reassuring and retaining the pleasing commencements have often shameful and loyalty of those groups who were losing as a result lamentable consequences’. Or, if not more shameful ones, at least disappointing and disconcerting ones. A recent Society, for Burke, is neither a collection example: John Howard decides to subsidise first of loosely related individuals, nor a time home-buyers. The result? The subsidy gets capitalised into house prices; houses become more mechanism with interchangeable parts. expensive, first time home-buyers end up being no It is a living organism and anything that better off; all other buyers are worse off. Another affects the well-being of any part of it example provided by the Institute of Economic will affect the whole. Affairs: To stop elephants being killed for their ivory, the ivory trade is banned. This makes ivory scarce. Prices immediately go up and the rewards for of the changes—the , the traditionalists, poaching become greater. More people engage in it, the clerical and rural sectors. The persistence of the and we end up with more elephants being killed than central institution of monarchy was reassurance that there were before the ban was introduced. the world they knew and valued was not totally lost, The second, and related problem, is that of latent that there was continuity, that the new social and function. As well as their ostensible and apparent political could be adapted to and lived with. functions, institutions often perform other hidden On the other hand, in countries which in one way functions of a very important nature—something or another dispensed with monarchy (for example, that may not become apparent until we experience France, and the successor countries of the the consequences of those institutions being Habsburg Empire after I), reconciliation dismantled. To quote Burke: ‘In states there are and stability proved much scarcer commodities. often some obscure and latent causes, things which Thus, concludes Lipset, the changes which appear at first view of little moment, on which a apparently made monarchy more anachronistic very great part of the prospect or adversity may and useless in some respects actually increased most essentially depend’. What Burke understood its importance as a source of legitimacy and as intuitively and pragmatically was to become an an ‘important traditional integrative institution important insight in anthropology and sociology during a transitional period’. Lipset was writing in the 20th century, when the study of the latent nearly half a century ago, and whether today’s

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monarchies are still performing that important precisely because they tend to be more concerned latent function—whether, for example, in Australia with stability and what might disturb it, and because it has helped reassure those who have been losers as they have an organic view of society that stresses a result of significant economic and social changes the interconnectedness of things. If one’s focus is in recent decades—is an open question, though a on rights and needs, on the other hand, Burkean conservative would still maintain that, as and if one thinks in terms of rational patterns, then a long-lasting institution, the presumption should one may be less alert to latent functions.3 be in its favour. Another example: The historical treatment of The denial of birth out of wedlock, of illegitimacy. A couple If the complexity of the object of change—society, of generations ago, , with considerable the political order—was one reason why Burke justification, considered the treatment of illegitimate feared radical and rapid change, a second and just children and their mothers to be harsh, and also to as powerful reason was his reservation about the be unnecessary and wrong. Conservatives tended proposed engine of change; that is, the role of reason to consider the stigmatisation of illegitimacy to be in human affairs. Burke rejected the Enlightenment harsh but also necessary, because it was required to view of man as a predominantly rational, calculating, preserve the integrity of the most basic and vital logical being. His rational side exists, but it is a small social institution, the . Liberals won the part of his total make-up. ‘We are afraid’, said Burke, argument and their view prevailed. The stigma was ‘to put men to live and trade each on his own private effectively removed from illegitimacy. Very quickly, stock of reason, because we suspect that this stock without fathers proliferated. By the mid- in each man is small’. Habit, instinct, custom, faith, reverence, —the accumulated practical acquired consciously and unconsciously They were all arguing against the through experience—all this was more important prevailing intellectual tide of the than abstract reasoning. Collectively, and for better times, the , or worse, it constituted man’s nature, his human which insisted on the primacy of nature. Burke was not alone in expressing these views. reason and which saw customs and The great Scottish , , had habits and prejudice as impediments insisted on the importance of habit and custom in that should, and could, be swept the human make-up a generation earlier. And a year or two before Burke wrote, across the Atlantic the aside to restore the human mind to shapers of the American Constitution and authors its pristine state as a clean slate—the of The Federalist Papers—Alexander Hamilton and famous tabula rasa—on which reason —were insisting that in constructing could then write its message. a political order, the aggressive, selfish, acquisitive aspects of man’s nature must be taken fully into account. ‘A man must be far gone in Utopian 1990s in the , some very disconcerting speculation’, thought Hamilton, ‘to forget that men statistics were being pointed to: two-thirds of rapists are ambitious, vindictive and rapacious.’ and three-quarters of adolescent murderers had They were all arguing against the prevailing grown up without fathers in the house. Again, when intellectual tide of the times, the Age of a father was present in the household, teenage girls Enlightenment, which insisted on the primacy got pregnant 50% less frequently than when one of reason and which saw customs and habits and was not. In the judgement of many conservatives, prejudice as impediments that should, and could, the social cost of effectively legitimising what had be swept aside to restore the human mind to its been illegitimate had come very high. pristine state as a clean slate—the famous tabula Conservatives may be more attuned to the rasa—on which reason could then write its message. appreciation of latent function than are liberals At the same time as Burke was responding to the

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Revolution, his radical-anarchist contemporary, Modern Denial of Human Nature. Pinker, who is a —now forgotten but a very Professor of Psychology at Massachusetts Institute influential and representative intellectual figure in of Technology, asserts in the preface that, his time—was writing of children as ‘a sort of raw When it comes to explaining human material put into our hands’, their minds ‘like a sheet thought and behaviour, the possibility of white paper’. Dealing with adults, the task was that heredity plays any role at all still to erase what, over time, had disfigured the white has the power to shock. To acknowledge sheet. It was in that act of that the human nature, many think, is to endorse revolutionaries in France saw themselves engaged. racism, sexism, war, greed, genocide, For them, what passed for human nature was not , politics, and neglect something to be taken into account as a given, and of children and the disadvantaged. Any either accommodated or curbed, as the authors of claim that the mind has an innate The Federalist Papers believed, but to be altered. organization strikes people not as a Thomas Sowell, the American historian of ideas, hypothesis that might be incorrect but 4 has generalised this point: In their approach to as a thought it is immoral to think. political and social policy, those with a strong faith in reason and the malleability of human minds— Part of the book’s value is that it provides copious who believe in the possibility of the perfectibility examples to support these assertions. Several 100 of human beings—will insist on the need to solve pages later he concludes that ‘the new sciences of problems, and the need to take all necessary steps human nature really do resonate with assumptions to remove all impediments to their solution. On that historically were closer to the right than to the the other hand, those of a conservative disposition left’. While that may be true, it is surely also true who accept an intractable human nature as a given, that in much of social policy and many of the social and who do not believe that reason can always and sciences, blank slate thinking still prevails. necessarily remove the conflict between competing wills and interests, will think much more in terms of Burke may be seen as anticipating compromises and trade-offs—of improvement rather than solution, of working around the shortcomings Tocqueville in stressing the of human nature. importance of and One might see this as the crucial difference intermediate, voluntary, participatory between the French revolutionaries, with their notion of restarting history from day one and creating an associations, as against the state; entirely new set of perfectly rational political the actual particular wills of people institutions, and the American revolutionaries, going about their particular lives, who when it came to framing a Constitution, put as against the abstract General Will their faith in checks and balances and the separation of powers, to accommodate competing interests espoused by the Revolution. and to keep in control the effects of mankind’s aggressive, acquisitive and competitive instincts (what Christians would term ‘original sin’ and which Continuity and change could not be fundamentally altered). Turning back to Burke, I want to touch briefly on This conflict between thetabula rasa school and three further points before saying something about the human nature school has continued ever since the enduring relevance of conservatism today. and has been, and is, central to many debates about First, in contrast to what was happening in social and political policy. Many of the new sciences France, where everything was concentrated at the of human behaviour—evolutionary psychology, centre in , Burke put great emphasis on the behavioural genetics, cognitive neuroscience—bear local, the proximate and particular: ‘To be attached on it. For a very readable and informed current to the subdivision, to love the little platoon we account of the state of play, consult Steven Pinker’s belong to in society, is the first principle (the germ recent bestselling book, The Blank Slate: The as it were) of public affections.’ Here Burke may

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be seen as anticipating Tocqueville in stressing him to be one, only to be set upon furiously and the importance of civil society and intermediate, rightly by Burke’s biographer and fellow Irishman, voluntary, participatory associations, as against the Conor Cruise O’Brien.15 Burke was not defending or state; the actual particular wills of people going advocating a return to an aristocratic or monarchic about their particular lives, as against the abstract order. He was defending the mixed system that General Will espoused by the Revolution. existed in the Britain of his day—a mixture of Second, as against the abstract Rights of Man aristocratic, commercial, oligarchic and democratic proclaimed by the Revolution, Burke spoke of the elements. It was a society in which the Industrial particular and existing rights that man actually Revolution was well under way, and Burke was a possessed and enjoyed. He sometimes used the friend and admirer of . The admiration term natural rights, but meant by it the historical, was reciprocal: Smith once said that no one prescriptive rights inherited within the understood The of Nations as context of particular and legal well as Burke did, while Burke said of systems: the right of Englishmen, or that work that, ‘In its ultimate results’ , or Indians or Frenchmen— it was ‘probably the most important not of ‘Man’ in the abstract. Again, the book ever written’. particular are contrasted to the general, Again, Burke eloquently argued the and the historical to the theoretical and case of the American colonies against abstract. Rights are powers possessed the British , insisting that and enjoyed rather than claims all they were asking for—and rightly asserted. asking for—were the traditional rights For Burke, historical continuity was Edmund Burke of Englishmen. Equally eloquently central to his understanding of society. In one of and with great determination, he defended the his most striking and most often quoted phrases, rights and customs of the population of the Indian he described society as a ‘partnership not only subcontinent against what he insisted was the between those who are living, but between those rapaciousness, corruption and greed of Warren who are living, those who are dead and those who Hastings and the East India Company. And as a are yet to be born’. That is, the present is not the Whig he opposed George III’s attempts to restore of the living, to make of it whatever they and enlarge monarchical power. will. It is an entailed estate held in trust; morally, Far from opposing all reform he insisted that, ‘A those who hold it have a fiduciary responsibility to state without the means of some change is without hand it on in good condition. (Note that in this the means of its conservation’. The issue was not important respect, though in few others, there is an reform versus no reform; it was between the view unexpected affinity between conservatives and the that reform was an easy and simple matter that could Greens.) This trust the revolutionaries were in the be engaged in sweepingly and ambitiously, and the process of betraying. In the name of reason, view that it was a matter that required prudence and equality they were destroying all the historical and was best approached incrementally, testing the institutions of legitimate authority. ground carefully as one proceeded. And with authority gone, the result would be not The fact that Burke sometimes sided with those liberty but increasing dependence on naked force in authority, and sometimes with those resisting it to compel obedience and maintain order. With and even revolting against it, has led to another extraordinary insight, and no historical precedence charge against him—that he was inconsistent and to guide him (the concept of was still opportunistic. That charge is particularly feeble. to be invented), at the very outset of the Revolution, Burke was perfectly consistent in that he opposed when euphoria and optimism and reigned, the abuse of power, whoever was abusing it—, Burke intuited and insisted that it must end in terror corrupt company, intellectuals or mob. Another of and dictatorship. his biographers, the liberal John Morley, put it best Third, Burke has frequently been represented when he said that Burke often changed his front but as a reactionary. Even once declared never changed his ground.

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Conservatism and neo-conservatism being rejected, there is no point in appealing to those When, in what circumstances, do conservative ideas values to defend them. It is then that conservative become relevant and attractive? The obvious and arguments become indispensable: arguments usual answer to that question is given by Michael which defend the established institutions precisely Oakeshott: when there is much to be enjoyed, and because they are established, which warn against the when that enjoyment is combined with a sense that destructive affects, the unanticipated consequences what is enjoyed is in danger of being lost. It is the of overturning them. When prevails, combination of enjoyment and fear that stimulates conservative arguments must be resorted to in conservatism. order to counter it. That seems convincing until one considers: if one is living in and enjoying, say, a liberal or a social democratic or a capitalist society; and if Huntington observes that unlike nearly that society suddenly comes under threat, why every other , conservatism can’t one defend it with liberal arguments, or social democratic or capitalist arguments? Why does one offers no vision of an ideal society. need conservative arguments? There is no conservative Utopia. Indeed, An interesting answer to that question was conservatism has no substantive advanced by a young Samuel Huntington, about institutional content. It can be, and 40 years before he wrote The Clash of , the book that made him famous beyond academic has been, used to defend all sorts of circles. In an article on ‘Conservatism as an different institutional arrangements, Ideology’, published in 1957 in The American from traditional to feudal to liberal to Political Science Review, Huntington observes that capitalist to social democratic ones. unlike nearly every other ideology, conservatism offers no vision of an ideal society. There is no conservative Utopia. Indeed, conservatism has no What is particularly intriguing about substantive institutional content. It can be, and has Huntington’s argument—made, remember, in the been, used to defend all sorts of different institutional 1950s—is that it perfectly predicted what was to arrangements, from traditional to feudal to liberal to happen almost immediately afterwards in the 1960s. capitalist to social democratic ones. That is because In that decade there was a sudden and powerful it is concerned not with content but with process: upsurge of radicalism, associated initially with the with change and stability, particularly as they affect Civil Rights Movement and protest against the political institutions. Its true opposite is not, as is Vietnam War, but quickly going beyond that to often said, but radicalism—which is also reject the whole fabric of American society (with about change. Conservatism advances arguments Amerika spelled with a K). American New Deal that stress the difficulty and danger of rapid change, liberalism was denounced and rejected as ‘ and the importance of stability and continuity and liberalism’ or worse; the began their long prudence; radicalism expresses enthusiasm and march through the institutions. optimism concerning innovation, and boldness in It was in these circumstances that a group of embracing change. liberal intellectuals—almost all of them members So when does conservatism become an of the , many of them prominent appropriate ideology? It is, maintains Huntington, members of the New York Jewish intellectual the product of intense ideological and social conflict, community—began to oppose the radical movement, when consensus breaks down, and when an existing to defend American institutions and values with institutional order can no longer be defended in its classic conservative arguments. They were attacked own terms. ‘When the challengers fundamentally from the Left for doing so and derisively labelled disagree with the ideology of the existing society and ‘neo-conservatives’. It was meant as an insult, but affirm a basically different set of values, the common readily accepted by Irving Kristol—the godfather framework of discussion is destroyed.’ When, say, of neo-conservatism—and his colleagues. A neo- it is precisely liberal values and institutions that are conservative has subsequently been variously defined

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monarchy. When is taken seriously, and It is, I believe, largely an article of faith when there is more than one religion—or more than that the good America will ultimately one version of the same religion—in competition, prevail over the ugly and tawdry one— then far from being a unifying force it can become that the self-correcting mechanisms enormously disruptive. As the Muslim component of European societies becomes significant, and as the in the society will, with dedicated birth rates of Europe’s Muslims far outstrip that of conservative support, do the job. Christian Europeans, that is worth bearing in mind. T.S. Eliot, a very religious and very conservative as ‘a liberal who has been mugged by ’ and ‘a man, once reflected that ‘Ultimately, antagonistic liberal with a 14 year old daughter’. must mean antagonistic ; and However defined, they became an important ultimately religions cannot be reconciled’. force in American politics and have remained so. Many of them joined the . They are onservatives in general—and perhaps neo- well entrenched in the think tanks of Washington. Cconservatives in particular—have another They brought with them intellectual and polemical and more fundamental problem today. The society skills that had been in scarce supply on the Right, that they are concerned to conserve and defend is a and by the 1980s they had seized the intellectual capitalist society. delivers huge material initiative from the Left. It is not often that a political benefits. But capitalism is also an enormous engine scientist is provided with compelling evidence so of change. It depends on, and operates in terms of quickly to support his thesis as Huntington was in what Joseph Schumpeter famously called ‘creative this instance. destruction’. It creates new industries and destroys old ones (and therefore old communities) almost hat of the relationship between conservatism overnight. It demands mobility rather than stability. Wand religion? Not all conservatives are religious It damages the physical environment. It has created believers. Burke was, Hume was not. Oakeshott was and force-fed a popular that is, in many not, Kristol is. But virtually all conservatives, whether respects, incompatible with traditional values. It they believe or not, attach functional importance to demystifies and subjects to intense scrutiny all religion as a stabilising element. It is, or can be so, social and political institutions. in several respects. In so far as the existing order is How can such a system and conservatism ever sanctified and seen as a manifestation of God’s will, be compatible? This is a question that American it is obviously strengthened. In so far as it promises conservatives wrestle with constantly. And even as rewards in an , it can serve to curb the selfish they celebrate the operational ideal of American and aggressive instincts of human beings and can capitalism, they deplore much of what they see reconcile people to accepting their lot in this one around them as its product. It is, I believe, largely an rather than rebel against it. And many would article of faith that the good America will ultimately agree with Irving Kristol that religion is the most prevail over the ugly and tawdry one—that the self- important pillar of modern conservatism because, correcting mechanisms in the society will, with in the long term, it is ‘the only power that can shape dedicated conservative support, do the job. people’s characters and regulate their motivation’.6 But even if it does not, conservatives by In so far as a whole community has a religion in temperament are suited to fighting protracted lost common, it can indeed be a powerful binding force. causes. They are used to , for they are But with all that conceded, it is worth recalling also pessimistic by nature and are disinclined to the that at some stages of history religion has been a doctrine, ‘If at first you don’t succeed, drop it’. major destabilising force, particularly when there They will give it a good go. is religious division. It was a major element in the Are there other respects in which conservatism Thirty Years War, until the 20th century the most is relevant in today’s world? As far as Australia is terrible that Europe ever experienced. In England concerned, the country has certainly experienced far it played an important role in the Civil War of the reaching changes in recent decades—to its economy, 17th century and the temporary overthrow of the to some of its social and cultural policies, to the

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way in which its legal system functions in relation something Edmund Burke said at the height of to these changes, to its policy and the British power in the 1770s, when Britain had composition of its population, particularly in the big recently added North America and India to its cities. To this point, the Australian political system empire, when its economy was the strongest in and its institutions seems to be coping comfortably the world, when it ruled the seas. That is, when it with these changes. There are some signs of strain— occupied a position not too different from the one the crude right-radicalism of Hansonism at one end occupied by the United States today. Contemplating of the spectrum, the hysterical ‘I am ashamed to be all this power, Burke uttered a warning that seems to an Australian’ stuff at the other—but nothing that be pertinent in our present circumstances: is remotely system threatening. Among precautions against ambition, What about the rest of the world? Well, there is it may not be amiss to take precaution the European Union, an incredibly bold and radical against our own. I must fairly say, I dread attempt to change the whole political structure and our own power and our own ambition: fabric of a continent—the laws, money, institutions, I dread our being too much dreaded customs of the nation-states of Europe—and to . . . We may say that we shall not abuse replace them with a uniform system dreamed up this astonishing and hitherto unheard of and imposed by technocrats and bureaucrats. All power. But every other nation will think this in a continent with very diverse and we shall abuse it. It is impossible but that, systems, and not even a common language. The sooner or later, this state of things must whole project has been engineered by elites, with produce a combination against us which little democratic control or popular support, and may end in our ruin. often with the people of Europe being lied to about the nature of the enterprise. There has already been a strong conservative reaction in some countries— Endnotes 1 M. Oakeshott, in Politics and Other Essays notably Britain—but if things go seriously wrong (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1991). could quickly grow to formidable 2 M. Weber, ‘Politics as a Vocation’, From Max proportions, and the responsible elites could be Weber, ed. H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills (: thoroughly discredited, leaving an authority void Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1948). at the top. 3 c.f. John Stuart Mill’s observations of the difference And to come right up-to-date, we have an between the Utilitarian, Bentham, and the American President now committing his country Conservative, Coleridge: ‘By Bentham . . . men have not only to ‘nation building’ in Iraq but to ‘region been led to ask themselves, in regard to any ancient building’ throughout the Middle East—that is, or received opinion, Is it true? And by Coleridge, the creation of democratic systems to replace What is the meaning of it?’. Cited by Paul Binding, ‘Revaluation’, Times Literary Supplement (11 April the existing ones. The belief that democratic 2003). institutions, behaviour and ways of thought can 4 T. Sowell, A Conflict of Visions: Ideological Origins of be exported and transplanted to societies that Political Struggles (New York: William Morrow and have no experience or traditions of them—and Company Inc., 1987). that this can be done in a few years—is a 5 See the Appendix to C. O’Brien, The Great Melody: profoundly unconservative, indeed a radical, A Thematic Biography of Edmond Burke (University belief. Conservatives traditionally have believed in of Chicago Press,1992). the slow, organic growth of political institutions, 6 The seriousness Kristol attaches to religion is evident not their imposition from without. Yet the most from the fact that when he was editor of Encounter enthusiastic advocates of exporting back in the 1950s, he once rejected Oakeshott’s powerful essay ‘On Being Conservative’. In confessing are American neo-conservatives, which perhaps that he had done so, Kristol agreed that in many suggests that their break with their earlier modes respects the essay was a masterpiece, full of material of thought has been less than complete. that would merit the attention of anthologists for At a time when America and ‘empire’ are centuries. Why then did he reject it? Because it was increasingly discussed in the same breath—and ‘irredeemably secular’, and ‘Oakeshott’s conservative with growing resentment—it is worth remembering society is a society without religion’.

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