Talk:Conservatism/Archive 2

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Archive This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Contents

T. S. Eliot the Novelist?

I would like for whoever to compiled that list to name the "novels" of T. S. Eliot. He wrote lots of poems, plays, and essays, but no novels that I am aware of. Furthermore, his friendship with Ezra Pound during the former's fervrent support of Mussolini suggests that he might better be labelled as more Fascistic than Conservative, although his ardent monarchism is perhaps proof that he was a "paleoconservative", a conservative not in the American sense of limited government but in the European sense of support for the ancien regieme and divine right. Rlquall 13:25, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Yup. "Novelist" shows how little some people know about things they venture to write about.
I pretty much agree with you on Eliot's politics, other than the fact that his friendship with Pound proves nothing in this regard. Joyce stayed friendly with Pound, too, and I've never heard it implied that he was a fascist or anything of the sort. -- Jmabel 17:47, Aug 17, 2004 (UTC)

I don't know what Joyce was politically, other than to assume that as an Irish intellectual he was something of an Irish nationalist. Did he engage in any political activity that would tend to label him somewhere along the political spectrum? Certainly friendship with someone alone doesn't necessarily indicate agreement with their political beliefs; I am proof of that myself, but in absence of any evidence to the contrary one tends to associate a person's views with that of his closer friends. Was Joyce ever as close to Pound as Eliot seemed to be? I guess my appreciation or lack thereof for Pound's work was always at least slightly coloured by what I at least found to be his very unappealing political views, which never really affected the esteem in which I have generally held Eliot, perhaps because I knew that he was originally from St. Louis and figured that somehow, deep down, he really couldn't have meant all of it, although I suppose that now I imagine that he really did. Rlquall 18:29, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Pound was key in getting money for Joyce's survival and also in getting Finnegans Wake published. As for Joyce's politics, yes, he was an Irish nationalist, but very much at odds with the Roman Catholic Church and hence with the form of Irish nationalism that came to power. That's undoubtedly part of the reason for his self-imposed exile. His political hero was Parnell, a Protestant but an Irish nationalist, who was brought down by a sex scandal. (Needless to say, Joyce would have been hard to scandalize.) But all this is beside the point. I would say you should not hesitate to edit any remark on Eliot in the article, especially made by someone who apparently had only a vague idea who Eliot was. -- Jmabel 20:51, Aug 17, 2004 (UTC)

Well, I finally did the deed with regard to Eliot the Novelist. I would only ask anyone wishing to revert to please send me, or tell me where I can get, The Collected Novels of T. S. Eliot, for which I will gladly pay.

Rlquall 21:55, 29 Sep 2004 (UTC)

The Tension Inherent in "Conservatism"

This article still doesn't really suit me, not that such should be its primary purpose. Perhaps it is because of the inherent strain between the so-called "classic conservatism" which states that everything should be left alone and that it will get better and better on its own and the more typically American economic strain, in which "conservatives" are inherent activists, always working to lower taxes, remove governmental obstacles to productivity, etc. To American conservatives, reactionary elements in the Chinese government will never be "conservatives"; neither will they see the "Taliban" as such, because their social policies cripple the economy by denying particiaption in it to half the citizenry, the female half. Also, few American conservatives see Theodore Roosevelt as a conservative. He was more of a "conservationist", hardly the same thing. He was socially conservative in that he wanted government to do "good things" in a moral sense; while an official in New York he vigorously enforced a ban on the Sunday drinking of alcohol that strikes most economic conservatives as a ridiculous attempt to enforce morality by government in a way which bans actions by what should be free people in a free marketplace. His "Fair Deal" was in many ways a precursor to his cousin Franklin's "New Deal" and entailed considerable govermental intervention in the economy well beyond mere "trust-busting", which most conservatives do see as a necessity in a truly free market. Perhaps because he was a vigorous interventionist and believed in the "Big Stick" policies with regard to Latin America he is considered to be a conservative by some measures; this perhaps makes him more of an early "neocon" as American conservatives have had within them a strong isolationist stream -- along with "Impeach Earl Warren" the first John Birch sign I ever remember seeing (displaying my age here) was "Get US out of the UN!"

Rlquall 16:14, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I very much agree on Teddy Roosevelt. I've raised this before, but didn't feel like a fight on the matter. As for the fact that conservatives in different places don't agree and aren't comfortable being under the same name: well, this is even truer over time, in that few U.S. conservatives today would object to women's suffrage (strongly opposed by U.S. conservatives 100 years ago) or integrated schools (strongly opposed by U.S. conservatives 50 years ago). Nonetheless, those stances at those times can rightly be called "conservative" and the same contrasts apply to what conservatism means in different countries. -- Jmabel 04:02, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)

Anti-Statism

U.S. conservatism is probably more anti-statist than is typical elsewhere, more "libertarian", but hardly equivalent to it. Some of the harshest critics of post 9/11 measures like the "PATRIOT" Act have been from people on the "hard right" like Bob Barr. Conservatives are generally against drug abuse, but many see draconian anti-drug laws as a larger threat to freedom than that posed by drug abuse. Even social conservatives who want the government to ban things such as "gay marriage" are skeptical about things like "public-private partnerships" which they see as giving the monopoly power inehrent in government over to a few carefully (politically) chosen private hands, not "the market". George Bush is not really a hero to most "true-believer" U.S. conservatives as he has presided over the largest expansion of government since at least LBJ's "Great Society" and Vietnam War, if not FDR's "New Deal" and World War II. He is mostly regarded there as a "lesser-of-evils"; some conservatives are genuinely puzzled as to why he is portrayed by the mass media as a conservative when he is so unlike them. This is becasue George Bush shows little tendency to be an anti-statist. Most U.S. conservatives are less concerned about using the power of the state for conservative purposes than they are curbing its power. Reagan's rhetoric was well to the right of his acutal record but he did succeed in reducing the rate of the growth of government. Bush, far from this, has vastly expanded it. Perhaps part of this is political naivete on his part. By putting massive new federal funding into education, he apparently sought to appease his critics form his left. Instead, he still faces the same and more (He doesn't really meant it! It's nowhere near enough!) from the left and at the same point makes his core right-wing supporters, whose position is that education is a province of state and local government only, feel abandonned.

(unsigned, but this was User:Rlquall) (Correct.)

I basically think that's true: now if you can find some well-known individual saying that, quote him or her in the article, with citation. Or publish somewhere that (unlike Wikipedia) welcomes original research -- say, an op-ed column somewhere -- and then it would be legitimate for the article to quote your own published writing. (Just in case it's unclear, no sarcasm intended. I agree with you completely: "W" has coopted the label "conservative", he isn't one in most meaningful senses, but our opinion doesn't belong in the article: we've got to find someone to cite, and right now I have higher priorities than researching this. A citation to that effect would be very welcome.) -- Jmabel 21:39, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)

You hit it on the head. The reason that I didn't touch the article and put this in "talk" is that I would think that it needs verification beyond "I know it's true" to belong in the article. But I think that making what could probably characterized from a logical sense as "gratuitous assertions" is perfectly acceptable here in talk -- as acceptable as it would be unacceptable in the article. Perhaps this will motivate someone to do this. Sometimes this sort of thing has prompted me to be the one to do it on other issues, but this time I'll leave this to someone else. Rlquall 20:00, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Fiscal and Economic Conservatism

Where did the difference between "fiscal" and "economic" conservatism come from? This is a very arbitrary distinction, which seems to me contrived. What would the benefit of distinguishing between a balanced budget and the rest of the conservative economic platform be? And where, historically, does one find this distinction, other than here? Amicuspublilius 00:23, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Where are you from? It may be a matter of geography, but where I'm from (Canada), fiscal conservative refers to taxation/spending policy (balancing government budgets and not spending government money frivilously), whereas economic conservative means promoting free trade, a strong corporate sector, etc. Where they seem to overlap is that they both strive for lower taxation, albeit for different reasons (fiscally for practical reasons - removing frivilous spending lowers taxpayer burden; economically for ideological reasons - lowering taxation allows more private sector investment). If you want an example, here the Liberal Party of Canada has been widely seen as fiscally conservative since taking power in 1993 (although their spending practices have recently come under question) - they were the first Canadian federal party to balance the books in something like three or four decades and have established such as a new norm while tightening spending strings (notably to health care), at least early in their term. Their economic policy, however, has been middle of the road, some stuff which gets termed conservative up here, like touting free trade agreements, but still strong support for ideologically economically liberal ideas, like universal health care, child care, welfare programs, etc. A U.S. conservative may dub this "frivilous" spending and thus not fiscally conservative - but very few even very conservative Canadians would call universal health care a frivilous use of money. It is relative to a given population how policies will be received. As a further example, while not likely, I think we could imagine a country in which government taxation policy was very "liberal" and economic policy was very "conservative" or vice-versa. A country which runs massive deficits on huge spending, for instance, while touting free trade, personal responsibility over economic wellbeing, etc.; or a country which barely spends a penny on anything or anybody but has a national eye on every exchange of money that goes on. -- Matty j 02:03, Aug 30, 2004 (UTC)

Here are a few U.S. citations using the term "fiscal conservatism" in exactly the sense Matty and I understand it (BTW, I am from the U.S.): [1], [[2]], [[3]] [4] [5] Here is a particularly interesting one from the American Prospect in 1999 discussing Bill Clinton's fiscal conservatism: [6] Here is a citation from India: [7] Here is one from the UK: [8]. Do you have comparable citations for a broader use of this term to refer to economic conservatism in general? -- Jmabel 04:35, Aug 30, 2004 (UTC)

Cut paragraph on former East Bloc

The following was cut without comment (not by me: I'm just making the cut visible):

In the former Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact nations, the establishment consists of former communist party functionaries. The "conservatives", viewed from the perspective of desire a return to previous arrangements, are completely different from the "free market" reformers, who are, in fact, advocating radical change. This inversion, caused by the transition away from totalitarianism is sometimes the cause of confusion, as the "right" can refer to nationalist parties, or it can refer to old communist parties.

I think this is basically true, but it's not very well put and lacks citations. I think the article would be strengthened by a well-written (and possibly slightly expanded) version of this content, or by a separate article that could be referenced from this one, but I don't particularly think this content is worth restoring. -- Jmabel 05:55, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)

Conservatives, Republicans, and Civil Rights

"...many former southern Democrats joined the Republican Party, even in the face of greater proportional support for civil rights legislation among Republicans..." (emphasis mine). This may well be true, but it goes so against the "received wisdom" that it really ought to have clarification and a solid citation, not just simple assertion. In particular:

  • This refers to support for civil rights legislation in what period?
  • Does this refer to opinion polls of the rank and file, voting records in congress, or what?

If it is confined to the years up to the mid-1960s, I suspect it is true, because the strongest opposition to Civil Rights legislation came from conservative white southerners, most of whom would be counted at this time as Democrats.

"Barry Goldwater... argues that... conservatives split on the issue of civil rights... due to some conservatives advocating ends (integration, even in the face of what they saw as unconstitutional Federal involvement) and some advocating means (constitutionality above all else, even in the face of segregation)." This is doubtless a real quote, but it ignores the fact that some of the conservatives (not Goldwater himself, to his credit) were the active segregationists. I don't mind keeping the Goldwater quote, but it seems to me to be a bit to self-serving (for conservatives collectively, not for Goldwater personally) to stand without some comment on this matter. I suspect that comment would be more diplomatically added by a conservative than by me, so I'll give a week for someone to add this, but if no one does, I will try to write it myself, expecting to be "edited mercilessly". -- Jmabel 06:30, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)

Again, the multiple meanings of "conservatism" come out. Goldwater's conservatism was one of federalism and states' rights -- he wasn't comfortable with using the "commerce clause" to force people to be fair economically, and thought that the violation of the principle of free association was more dangergous than even segregation. Other Republicans, even conservatives, felt that the right of people of all races and religions to participate fully in the economy trumped the above concerns. Believe me, as a native Southerner I know that in the 1960s especially the term "conservative" was used to mean "segregationist" by segregationists themselves (which is why the old White Citizens' Council is now the Conservative Citizens Council). But this doesn't meant that conservatives are or were ever generally all segregationists, Conversely, George Wallace will forever in the minds of some be considered a conservative because of his early support of segregation, but in reality his economic policies as governor of Alabama were essentially indistinguishable from other Southern Democratic governors not identified with segregation (i.e., Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton).

Rlquall 13:03, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Quite. I would also add that Wallace was mostly opportunistic in his segregationism. He wasn't particularly a segregationist when he first ran for office, and once the cause was lost he abandoned it without any apparent qualms: in his last term as governor he was more than routinely good about bringing African-Americans into the state bureaucracy. BTW, the article doesn't mention Wallace and on the whole that's OK (precisely because other than on race and the Vietnam War his politics weren't particularly conservative), but his 1968 presidential run certainly does form part of the story of the realignment of the U.S. parties. This is marginally covered at Southern Strategy and in the article on Wallace himself, but probably deserves more treatment somewhere in a broader article on American political history. -- Jmabel 17:07, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)

Aggreed. In fact, GCW probably put more blacks into state jobs during his last term, when segregationism was dead as a political issue, than his Southern Democratic contemporaries. Also, it's little-known now, but he was endorsed by the NAACP in the 1958 race. Only when he lost that race did he decide to be a hard-core segregationist. (Don't think that the infamous "Segregation now! Segregation tomorrow! Segregation forever!" is in the article on him yet either. Probably ought to be.)

Rlquall, 3 Sep 04

Use of the term 'conservative' in American Protestant thought

In reading about the Second Great Awakening, I ran across these passages:

William Williams delivered in 1843 a discourse entitled "The Conservative Principle", and Charles White one in 1852 more specifically named "The Conservative Element in Christianity". These are merely examples of hundreds in the same vein, all calling attention to how previous empires had perished because they had relied entirely upon the intellect, upon "Political Economy", and upon "false liberalism". White gave full praise to the voluntary principle [that churches exist through the voluntary support of individuals, instead of state support], but warned that it presented the danger of a combination which might become dictatorial, "while the conservative vitalities of the Christian Religion are undervalued and dispensed with."... [A]s White phrased it, "The Christian religion, fitted precisely by its conservative qualities to such exigencies, communicates a silent, tranquil power into the interior among all the disturbing elements."
Europeans ... could readily perceive that, though America might make a show of gentlemen, both in Boston and in Virginia, who expressed aristocratic scorn of the mobs who supported Jefferson and Jackson, there really was no interest in America which could be called "conservative" in the sense comprehended by restored Bourbons in Paris or High-Church Tories in London. Practically every American of a religious temperament, whether Episcopalian, Unitarian, or Old School Presbyterian, accepted as axiomatic the separation of church and state and the competitive disorder of sectarianism. Yet Schaff had the boldness to claim for this liberal anarchy the adjective "conservative"...

We see here the word 'conservative' being used, in the middle of the nineteenth century, in a way that was unrecognizable to Europeans. This suggests to me that nineteenth century American Protestant thought (specifically: revivalism) may have been an antecedent of the "ideological conservatism" discussed in the article.

Do people think this possibility is worth mentioning in the article? I've never seen this connection made in discussions of conservatism, but that should not be surprising, since political scientists tend not to know anything about the history religion. -- Hyperion 01:59, 7 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I think it's interesting; I don't know quite what to make of it, because I am totally unfamiliar with Williams and White. So much of American intellectual tradition (left and right) goes back to Protestantism of one or another sort. This is as true of abolitionism and progressivism as it is of prohibitionism and today's Christian Right. -- Jmabel 08:00, Sep 7, 2004 (UTC)

I think that the uniqueness of American conservatism may well go back to this strain of thought. It is right in that, ACLU protestations to the contrary, unlike European conservatives who were generally "Establishmentarian", that is, in favor of a national church, no serious Amercian conservatives were ever in favor of a national church and it was the ideological forebears of today's conservatives, the Anti-Federalists, who only accepted the Constitution after the Bill of Rights was attached, and they put the non-Establishment clause in the First Amendment. Madison really wanted the First to go farther and say, "Neither the United States nor any State shall make any Law regarding the Establishment of any Religion," but was convinced that it would not be adoptable with that language at that time. American conservatism is small-government conservatism.

American conservatism is not descended from the idea of "divine right of kings". It is descended from the American revolution, the world's first conservative revolution, in which pre-existing rights were defended from Crown encroachment. The idedological underpinnings of the Confederacy were likewise based on attempts to use "state's rights" to justify a right of property in human beings -- which had been previously formally recognized in the Constitution and other documents. So the American Civil War was a failed conservative revolution to that degree, and cemented the idea in the mind of the American public, at least the Southern public, that conservatism was segregationist. But using government to prevent human rights is antithetical to what the American principle underlying conservatism is really about. Rlquall 13:11, 7 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Some notice should also be taken of the fact that conservatism is also often used in religion in the United States. Religious conservatism from an American pen usually means something along the spectrum of evangelicalism to Christian fundamentalism as those movements are understood in the USA. Jerry Falwell's annotated King James Study Bible claims to incorporate "conservative" views; but there is little political commentary in the book. Its conservatism consists of accepting a literal view of Genesis, rejecting the findings of biblical criticism, and similar doctrines that US fundamentalists stress. The phrase often implies sympathy for the religious right, which is in fact an ideological reform movement often hard to harmonize with Burkean conservatism. Smerdis of Tlön 14:48, 7 Sep 2004 (UTC)

So... is it worth trying to get this into the article? Or (as we already do with Liberalism in the United States) is it time to start a separate Conservatism in the United States article and merely summarize that here? -- Jmabel 22:44, Sep 7, 2004 (UTC)

I'm pleased that my tentative proposal got a quicker and more positive response than I was expecting. I was enthusiastic about my little discovery, since I've been puzzled by American conservatism for a very long time (following I guess Louis Hartz's train of thought that since the US is based on liberal ideas, American conservatives should be liberals, although I learned about Hartz only recently), and this seemed to be the first thing I ran into that shed light on it. I get the impression that writers of the article were struggling with this too, judging by the introduction of the unconventional term "ideological conservatism", not employed by political philosophers.

Anyway, to answer Jmabel's first reply: Williams and White specifically are unimportant, since these citations were just examples. Apparently this use of "conservatism" became quite widespread by evangelical Protestant writers in the period leading up to the Civil War. I can't say anything intelligent in reply to Rlquall since my American history is very poor. I think Smerdis's points are very suggestive and some of them could possibly be incorporated into the article. To bolster them, I can't resist giving this quotation of a leading fundamentalist Christian of the time I ran into here, which uses 'liberal' in a religious rather than political sense:

. . . the liberal attempt at reconciling Christianity with modern science has really relinquished everything distinctive of Christianity, so that what remains is in essentials only that same indefinite type of religious aspiration which was in the world before Christianity came upon the scene. (J. Gresham Mechan, Christianity and Liberalism, 1923)

It's not really my place to voice an opinion on whether this should be worked into the article or a new entry on American conservatism should be started, since I am new to Wikipedia, haven't made a significant contribution to this article, and don't really know that much about the subject. That said, my initial inclination was against starting a new entry, because encyclopedias of philosophy don't treat American conservatism separately in this way. On the other hand, considerations of symmetry would seem to require a new entry, given that a separate entry already exists for American liberalism. -- Hyperion 03:18, 8 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Plato and Aristotle

I moved Santayana from the list of novelists to the list of philosophers; his philosophy is better remembered than his novel, at least in my impression.

I also removed Plato from the list of philosophers, and added Aristotle. Plato's The Republic strikes me as a scarcely conservative document, calling for the establishment of a communistic society ruled by philosopher kings. By contrast, Aristotle's Politics contains a well known passage condemning utopias and attacks against property. Smerdis of Tlön 15:00, 7 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Concur. -- Jmabel 22:44, Sep 7, 2004 (UTC)
Another reason for including Aristotle is that when it came to economics, Aristotle worried about chrêmatistikê -- the pursuit of wealth for its own sake, as opposed to exchange for the satisfaction of natural needs -- and its possible harmful effects on the polis. -- Hyperion 03:35, 8 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Confucius

It seems to me Confucius is in a parallel strain of thought to the Western tradition of conservatism. His emphasis on tradition, gradual change and restrained government fits to me. Would it be too, er, radical, to link him in? -- User:Conflatuman, 13 Sep 2004

My view is that outside of an East Asian context, it would be ahistorical to link Confucianism and conservatism, unless one could come up with evidence that important conservative figures have actually been influenced by Confucianism. Otherwise, at most a one-sentence mention about the parallel. -- Jmabel 18:29, Sep 13, 2004 (UTC)

Philosophers and politicians

Moving Santayana made me think --- are Edmund Burke, Alexander Hamilton, and James Madison philosophers, or would they be better included among the politicians? Smerdis of Tlön 19:40, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

A growing strain...?

Near the end of the article "A growing strain has appeared in the conservative movement in the United States. This strain takes the form of the divide between the paleoconservatives and the newer neoconservatives."

  1. what evidence (if any) is there that the strain is "growing"? In what sense is it any bigger now than in 1992 (I deliberately pick the first presidential election year after the end of the Cold War).
  2. in what sense (other than a pleonasm about the etymology) are neoconservatives "newer" than paleoconservatives? The term "paleoconservative" is certainly of more recent vintage and was a response to neoconservatism.
  3. Are these two sentences useful at all in the context where they appear? I'm inclined to delete them, unless someone can give a good reason to the contrary. -- Jmabel 07:20, Sep 10, 2004 (UTC)

I would sense that the "growing strain" is this: Many "paleos" are basically isolationists, the "neos" are emphatically not such. This really didn't matter as much in times of peace (by '92 the first Gulf War was pretty much all over) as it does now. Some "paleos" still have something of the Fortress America mentality. They aren't interested in "Old Europe" or "New Europe" to any great extent, and are similar to the "America Firsters" of the 1930s. However, this strain is rejected as increasingly unrealistic by many, even many who once felt that way themselves, as unreflective of 21st century realities. Most "paleos" are still deeply disturbed by Bush, as they most assuredly were his father; they support him only as the "lesser of two evils", whereas the support of the "neos" is still fairly enthusiastic for the most part. On the whole, I would say that true conservatives are only slightly more accepting of GWB than true liberals are/were of Bill Clinton. Rlquall 14:31, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

You "would sense". Let's either get this appropriately into the article or not, but none of this convinces me that these two sentences in their present unlikely location in the article serve any purpose. Don't we address this all better above? Also, you didn't address my question: in what sense are neoconservatives "newer" than paleoconservatives? -- Jmabel 19:43, Sep 10, 2004 (UTC)

The reason that I almost never touch this article is that I think that pretty much everything in it should be documentable, footnoteable, etc., and won't enter anything into it based on "I think" or "I suppose". The reason that I even bother to make such comments, other than that this is what "talk" pages are for, is to prompt someone with all the right tools to take action.

"Neocons" are generally "new converts" to conservatism. The current "neocon" movement traces its ancestry back to Norman Podhertz (sp?) and Commentary magazine in the 1970s. Most of them were/are moderate to liberal on social issues (affirmative action, homosexual rights, etc.) and "conservative" only or primarily in the sense that they support a strong defense and a vigorous, active foreign policy. (For a while, many of the same people were called "neoliberals".) Sen. Henry M. "Scoop" Jackson (D.-Wash) was such a creature before they were named. Neocons shifted their opposition from Communism, after it fell, to Muslim extremism as a new threat to freedom, largely doing so even before 9/11/01. Most neocons are strongly pro-Israel and many are Jewish (whereas almost no "paleos" are). The term "neoconservative" is now relative, as the movement is no longre truly new, and was never stridently conservative beyond the pale of defense and foreign affairs (by this definition, Ed Koch is more or less a neocon).

Rlquall 20:55, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Yes, of course, but I'm pretty certain that the identification of "paleoconservatives" in contrast to simple "conservatives" is even more recent than that of "neoconservatives", so in what sense are neoconservatives "newer"? And again, given that the matter is discussed at greater length elsewhere in the article, are you objecting to my deleting these two stray sentences? -- Jmabel 21:52, Sep 10, 2004 (UTC)

You're correct that the term "Paleoconservative"/"paleocon" is even newer as a term than "neocon", it just represents an older philosophy that its adherents generally still think of as "the" conservatism. I'm still torn on whether those two sentences add anything to the article, and you seem to have devoted a lot of reasoning to why they don't, and since unnecessary, non-contributory statements really don't belong in an article, if you delete them I certainly won't revert them.

Rlquall 20:30, 13 Sep 2004 (UTC)

classical conservatism and philosophers

I'm inclined to add the following at the end of the section on classical conservatism; since it may be controversial, I'm "staging" it here first. Please respond here if you think this addition is wrong:

Elements to this position of Burke's can be found in Aristotle's critique of Platonic idealism or in the philosophy of Burke's contemporary Immanuel Kant, especially in his Critique of Pure Reason.

Jmabel 22:23, Sep 14, 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for the "heads up". Conservatives can certainly claim Aristotle, although not ones enamored with the free market, but Kant is a different matter altogether.
I take it that the section on classical conservatism you refer to is "Classical conservatism as non-ideological". There are two problems here. First, classical conservatism is skeptical as to what reason can accomplish, as far as improving society goes, anyway. Whereas there has not been a greater defender of reason in the history of thought than Kant. Kant made a critique of reason in so far as it goes beyond empirical experience; but anything having to do with society is empirical, so Kant saw no limits to building a good society coming from reason at all.
Second, Kant was full of ideologies: the social betterment of manking through education (Erziehung), the attainment of perpetual peace through that process occuring across the nations that matter.
I have never heard of anyone referring to Kant as a conservative. The liberals like to claim him, but I think their claims have little foundation. But that doesn't mean that conservatives can claim him as one of theirs. -- Hyperion 05:54, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)
As in so many things Kant is a transitional and intermediate figure. Yes, I suppose that in morality, Kant didn't see much limitation to the powers of reason, and didn't place much faith in the value of inherited tradition. So how about:

Elements to this position of Burke's can be found in Aristotle's critique of Platonic idealism. Something of an analogy can be drawn to Burke's contemporary Immanuel Kant, in his Critique of Pure Reason, arguing that certain matters of metaphysics were simply beyond human reason and must be viewed as matters of faith (although Kant, unlike Burke, felt reason to be quite sufficient in the area of morality).

-- Jmabel 06:13, Sep 17, 2004 (UTC)

Much better. Nothing I would object to here, although I still am not in complete agreement, though that's not required of course. In my opinion, you're making Kant out to be like Hume. I would say that holding that Kant argued that "certain matters of metaphysics were simply beyond human reason and must be viewed as matters of faith" would be to misrepresent Kant. One should distinguish between "pure, theoretical" metaphysics and applied or practical reason here. When it came to the former, Kant didn't think one should maintain faith: one should just go where the critique of reason leads one: that is what enlightenment is all about. When it comes to the latter, and that includes theology, Kant still didn't say that one must have "faith". Instead, since questions like does God exist or is there an afterlife can be resolved neither by any possible experience nor by pure reason, they are outside of both pure reason and natural science. But that does not mean that we must fall back on faith to answer them. Practical reason gives us answers to such questions, and that is a form of reason -- not faith. -- Hyperion 16:37, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)
"I have therefore found it necessary to deny knowledge in order to make room for faith. The dogmatism of metaphysics that is the preconception that it is possible to make headway in metaphysics without a previous criticism of pure reason, is the source of all that unbelief, always very dogmatic, which wars against morality." [9]
I think you are still missing the spirit of Kant. Kant says that he is making room for faith, not falling back on it. If you go on to read the passage you cite from, you'll find Kant writes:
Such widely held convictions, so far as they rest on rational grounds, are due to quite other considerations. The hope of a future life has its source in that notable characteristic of our nature, never to be capable of being satisfied by what is temporal (as insufficient for the capacities of its whole destination); the consciousness of freedom rests exclusively on the clear exhibition of duties, in opposition to all claims of the inclinations; the belief in a wise and great Author of the world is generated solely by the glorious order, beauty, and providential care everywhere displayed in nature. (CoPR, p. 31; KdrV)
So when Kant is talking about "faith" (Glauben), he is not talking about belief without foundation; instead he argues that by showing that metaphysics is irrelevant to morality and religion, he has found the proper ground for the latter two. This goes completely against the spirit of Burke, which is brought out so well in the article. The article states: "Burke was troubled by the Enlightenment and the by belief that 'Reason' is a sufficient base for justice: he argued, instead, for the value of tradition." Kant sided squarely with the Enlightenment and reason against Burke and tradition here.
So if you want to make a connection between a philosopher and classical conservativism, Kant is not the right philosopher. Staying within German idealism, the obvious philosopher to refer to here is Hegel, not Kant. Hegel is widely recognized to combine aspects of liberalism and conservatism, and he criticized Kant for abstracting from tradition. (And I am not saying this because I want to "demean" conservatism or Burke: Hegel is my favorite philosopher, and I believe he finished what Kant started.) -- Hyperion 19:41, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I don't disagree with any of this: what I was saying was that in some ways Kant's questioning reason in metaphysics is analogous to Burke's questioning it in morals and politics (even thought Kant would not have agreed with the latter). Both were in the spirit of their times in this, the transition from the Enlightenment to the Romantic Era. But I can see now that this is trickier than I thought and certainly not easily addressed in a couple of sentences, so I will back off on such an addition to the article, unless someone else wants to propose a better (and still reasonably brief) way to say this. -- Jmabel 20:44, Sep 19, 2004 (UTC)

I'm glad we're getting to understand our respective positions better, even if that is not leading to much new "copy" ;-). Now I know what you mean by Kant as a transitional figure -- transitional between the Enlightenment and Romanticism. And that gives me a better sense of why I had misgivings about your proposal discussed here. Respectfully, I think you are giving too much importance to the fact that Kant's and Burke's lifetimes overlapped (with Kant's containing Burke's). The Enlightenment had a different form and development in each of the major countries of Europe, so it's very risky to make comparisons of contemporaries across countries.
I don't know much about Burke, so I can't judge the extent to which he had romantic aspects. But the German Enlightenment most definitely peaked with Kant. (I would say that it continued up through Hegel, but that's beside the point.) In my opinion it would be wrong to say that Kant was "transitional" to romanticism, since German romanticism was largely a response and reaction to Kant. If there were already romantic elements in Kant (which there must be if he is to be a "transitional" figure), then why would you have a whole profound movement reacting to his uncompromising stand on reason? There is nothing romantic in Kant. There can be nothing romantic in someone whose whole conception of reason turns around the "transcendental subject", which has absolutely no particularity.
I am convinced now by the way that this article must mention Hegel. Here is a quote from something I just found from a Google search (unfortunately the original PDF file is gone):
[T]here is a type of conservatism, as represented by Burke and his ideas, for which the synthesis of opposed theoretical traditions, of the kind mentioned earlier in connexion with Hegel, is of the greatest importance. Indeed, we may go further than this and suggest that, given the significance of Burke for the history of conservatism, this synthesis of opposed theoretical traditions, namely those of `pre-modern' and `modern' political thought, is actually central to traditional conservatism. It is a fundamental aspect of the character of conservatism as an ideology. Traditional conservatism just is a system of ideas which constitutes (either implicitly or explicitly) a synthesis of this sort. It could be argued that conservatism, understood in this particular sense, is not simply one form of the ideology (so called `moderate' or English conservatism) amongst others. It is the dominant and paradigmatic form.
The relevance of what has been said for the question of the ideological location of Hegel's political thought should by now be obvious. Like Coleridge in England, and Comte in France, Hegel follows and expands upon the ideas of Burke by offering his readers, quite explicitly and in a theoretically sophisticated manner, a creative synthesis of `pre-modern' and `modern' political thought. In so doing, he brings to fruition and provides a theoretical justification for a tendency which is actually central to the ideology of traditional conservatism from its inception.
So if one wants to build a bridge between conservative thought and philosophy, a mention at least of Hegel is essential. (This also follows because Hegel is increasingly coming to be recognized as providing the main alternative to liberalism. (Communitarianism is just a stripped-down and degraded form of Hegelianism.)) Hegel is the thinker who provides the most fully worked out philosophical explication of classical conservatism. -- Hyperion 22:21, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)
I'm very weak on Hegel, so you may be more qualified than I to write this. As for Kant as transitional to Romanticism, I recommend Michel Foucault's The Order of Things (Les Mots et les Choses). Let's just say that in Kant he has seen the episteme on horseback. -- Jmabel 01:02, Sep 20, 2004 (UTC)
OK, maybe I'll try to slip in a little about Hegel if an when the urged to do so grabs me; or maybe someone else will run across our musings and try his or her hand at it.
So yet another projected addition. There is still the issue of Christian fundamentalist influences on ideological conservatism to attend to. I am more than ever convinced that this is the key to understanding ideological conservatism. I was just reading Richard Hofstadter's Anti-intellectualism in American Life, and Hofstadter certainly subscribes to this idea. -- Hyperion 02:38, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Economic conservatism

I don't think the paragraph beginning "Generally, economic conservatism opposes graduated taxes..." is particularly good. It seems to describe more of a "soft libertarian" position than a specifically conservative one; roughly the position advocated in the U.S. by Jack Kemp. Oddly, it doesn't even mention strong support for capitalism! (It also leaves out any discussion of charity and noblesse oblige.) I am not sure that I am the best one to try to rewrite this paragraph, because it is not a political view with which I have much sympathy. Could someone else take a shot at it? If no one else has done so within a few days, I may plunge in (and in any event I reserve the right to jump back in as an editor), but I'd rather see someone with more sympathy for the position take the first shot at characterizing it accurately. -- Jmabel 22:53, Sep 14, 2004 (UTC)

Hayek paragraph removed from article

I've removed the following article from the section Conservatism vs. Fascism on the basis of lack of relevance:

In The Road to Serfdom, Freidrich Hayek, who describes himself as a "classical liberal", makes the case for Fascism to be considered as a form of socialism. At the time of its writing, Hayek desired to critique what he saw as the rampant leftism of the age. However, a critique of leftism and Communism would not be well-received. As such, Hayek wrote a critique of the economic policies of Nazism. The intent of the book is clear: Nazism and fascism utilise forms of state control of the economy. By criticising Nazi state control of the economy, Hayek clearly also intended an implicit critique of socialist and communist state-controlled economies.

What is the relevance to an article on Conservatism of a putative classical liberal holding the opinion that fascism resembles socialism or communism? What does this have to do with conservatism (other than, I guess, some --mostly U.S. -- conservatives agree Hayek on this point, but there is no citation to indicate that) I have to suspect that someone just wanted to get this paragraph in the Wikipedia someplace and for some odd reason wasn't willing to simply put it at Freidrich Hayek, or The Road to Serfdom, which is where I'd think it belongs. And why would Hayek be any more relevant than just any of the rest of the literature on totalitarianism? -- Jmabel 06:38, Sep 17, 2004 (UTC)

confusing passage removed for discussion

Removed from Economic conservatism:

What fiscal conservatism (from the classical conservative position) strives for is a free and fair market in order to better society: unfettered corporatism and monopolistic enterprises are arguable anti-conservative. Whereas anti-ideological conservatism is not opposed, in principle, to such regulations, ideological conservatism might be. Where the markets themselves become moral agents, as in the philosophy of Ayn Rand and those in her Objectivist school (e.g. Alan Greenspan, current US Federal Reserve Chairman), antitrust laws, environmental legislation, and labor unions become intolerable.

What a mess. There may be something worth saying here, and if someone can fix it, something like this may be worth restoring but, again, what a mess:

  • "What fiscal conservatism (from the classical conservative position) strives for..." Almost gibberish. This has nothing to do with fiscal conservatism. Period. It may have something to do with economic conservatism. Maybe the meaning here is "economic conservatism"? and the parenthetical position means nothing? Hence maybe this should be: "Economic conservatism advocates a free and fair market in order to better society: however, unfettered corporatism and monopolistic enterprises are arguable anti-conservative." And it seems to me that (above and below) we already say this.
  • "Whereas anti-ideological conservatism is not opposed, in principle, to such regulations, ideological conservatism might be."
    • To what "regulations"?
    • "...might be..."??? What is this, somebody's draft notes? Conjecture? There's no citation, so I can't go back to a source and work out what might be meant.
    • As far as I can tell, this sentence should simply be dropped. Period.
  • "Where the markets themselves become moral agents, as in the philosophy of Ayn Rand and those in her Objectivist school (e.g. Alan Greenspan, current US Federal Reserve Chairman), antitrust laws, environmental legislation, and labor unions become intolerable." Coherent, but in and of itself of not of obvious relevance to this article. Objectivism is certainly on the political right, but it's not particularly conservative, it's more a sort of right liberalism or right libertarianism. Now if someone wants to write coherently (and with citation) about the infiltration of Objectivist thought into conservative circles via Greenspan and others, fine, that would belong in this article, but this isn't it. I can't even tell if this is meant as an example of economic conservatism or a contrast to it.

Jmabel 06:57, Sep 17, 2004 (UTC)

POV issues

1. The paragraph beginning "The interests of capitalism, fiscal and economic conservatism, and free-market economy do not necessarily coincide with those of social conservatism..." is really rather POV. It really should have some citations and say who makes this argument. I happen to believe that the analysis is totally correct, so (unlike some other passages) I can't bring myself to delete it, but it really isn't appropriate to Wikipedia standards; someone should do some research to get citations and bring it up to snuff. -- Jmabel 07:01, Sep 17, 2004 (UTC)

2. The paragraph beginning "It can be argued that classical conservatism tends to represent the establishment..." seems more like it belongs in an essay than an encyclopedia article. Again, what it says is relevant and seems essentially correct, but this ought to cite some authority saying this: it doesn't belong in the narrative voice of the article. I'm leaving this alone for now, but can someone fix this? -- Jmabel 07:12, Sep 17, 2004 (UTC)

"Contemporary conservative platform"

"Contemporary conservative platform Assuming this is a quotation from Kirk, would someone please cite page number? Thanks. -- Jmabel 07:17, Sep 17, 2004 (UTC)

Balanced budget

I have deleted the claim that Clinton was "forced" by the Contract With America in to a balanced budget. This is a POV statement as against the mere fact that he achieved one. If you want to cite someone at reasonably authoritative as making this claim, fine, add it to the article with citation, but there is no way it should be asserted as fact in the narrative voice of the article. My own view is that this was the famed Clinton "triangulation" in action and that it was mainly a (rather successful) attempt to coopt the Perot people. I'd rather just leave both hypotheses out of the article (it's not an article about Clinton, after all), but if the "Contract" hypothesis must be added (with appropriate citation) I'll do the legwork to find a citation for the other. -- Jmabel 05:02, Sep 19, 2004 (UTC)

Conservatives in Entertainment

It'd be nice to have more sources claiming the listed entertainers are conservative. I find it hard to believe that, for example, David Lynch is a conservative.

I don't see the relevance of including entertainers at all, unless they are active political commentators. How does Bo Derek's conservatism affect anyone? It would make as much sense to have a list of conservative architects or football players. Pi9 06:37, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
David Lynch is a conservative, because Blue Velvet depicts decidedly traditional forms of S & M. Rlquall 04:28, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Dennis Miller, Mel Gibson, and a few others are known as conservative activists. Entertainers who simply give a thousand bucks to the local congressman are not notable for their conservatism. Unless someone makes a strong defense for the section, I'm going to cut it down and make it Others or something similar. -Willmcw 06:58, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Perhaps rather than deleting information from the article, could you do a few minutes of searching and find some well known entertainers who happen to be conservative? There are a lot of liberal activist entertainers, and I admit there are fewer who come to mind for the conservative end of the political spectrum, but surely there are notable ones anyway. Dennis Miller hosts a conservative news talk show, for example. My point is: if you feel the celebs listed aren't known for their conservative advocacy of issues and politics, find some who are. It's always better to add/correct information than to delete information (i.e. replace with "others"). --ABQCat 07:13, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)
I tend to agree that it's better to add than substract. Looking at it again, it occurs to me that the base problem is with the heading. It should specify entertainers who are also well-known for their conservative statements or activism, instead of people who are famous for entertaining and are not outspokenly conservative. -Willmcw 07:29, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Lapham article worth mining

In an article -- "Tentacles of Rage" -- in the September 2004 issue of Harper's, p. 31- 41, Lewis H. Lapham gives an interesting rundown of the shift from a liberal to a conservative consensus in the U.S., before launching into a diatribe of his own against the latter. The article contains much useful material worth mining for this article (and/or for Neoconservatism, where I'll also drop a note, and for a possible factored-out article on conservatism in the U.S.). I'll probably mine it for a few quotes pertaining to the mid-century liberal consensus, which will go at Liberalism in the United States. -- Jmabel 23:13, Sep 22, 2004 (UTC)

Herbert Hoover

I don't think Herbert Hoover, who has been dead for forty years, belongs on the list of "leaders and commentators" which is otherwise comprised of mainly contemportary figures. He certainly deserves mention as someone associated in the public mind with conservatism, but in another context. (His presidency was from seventy-five to seventy-one years ago.) But I'm not certain that he belongs in the philospher list with Santayana either. In reality, a figure more like modern small-government conservatives, and far more admired by them, would be Calvin Coolidge.

Rlquall 12:45, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Concur. Hoover was more of a progressive, especially in his devotion to social science. -- Jmabel 19:35, Sep 28, 2004 (UTC)

Bias

Number 4 in the introduction is extremely biased, first in its implication that conservatism and compassion are the same, and then by its flowery praise of Bush administration policy.

The connotation is the conservatives may in the main believe this with regard to "comapassion" and "conservatism", not necessarily that it is true. Also, I would dare say that many if not most conservatives do not regard the comments about Bush as being necessarily "praise", but, far from it, condmenation in that he has "liberally" mounded up debt on social programs; the point is that it is his rhetoric, not his policies, which are "conservative". (Feel free to go back and sign your comment.)

Rlquall 13:51, 30 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Ambiguity

"Economic liberalism coupled with social conservatism is typically referred to as populism or fascism." This sentence is very confusing. In British usage, the term "economic liberalism" means laissez-faire!

Bear in mind that laissez-faire was originally a liberal philosophy. There is nothing inherently anti-statist or anti-government about conservatism, at least in Europe. (anon)

Yes, actually "Economic liberalism" means the same in the U.S. (although it isn't used much). What this person obviously meant was "fiscal liberalism". I'll fix that. -- Jmabel 00:40, Oct 6, 2004 (UTC)
Libertarians don't champion free markets because of ideology, at least most of the people I've met have purely utilitarian reasons as well. --Tmh 14:07, 1 Oct 2004 (UTC)

David Lynch?

David Lynch is listed here as a conservative. Does anyone have a source for this? It seems a little unlikely, given the style and content of his films.(anon 195.92.67.209, unsigned)

  • May I second that? If this doesn't get a citation within a week, I'm inclined simply to remove it. -- Jmabel 17:16, Oct 8, 2004 (UTC)
I deleted Lynch a while back and he was re-added anyway. The best support I can find is that he was friendly with the Reagans, but that does not automatically make someone a conservative. These lists....ah well. Cheers, -Willmcw 05:24, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

About "'Right-wing' is not necessarily 'conservative'"

This part seems strange to me. Taking into account the origin of right and left in politics (the places in parliament in the French Revolutiona according to political stands), those who oppose change are by definition what makes up the right wing. The fact that conservatists have opposed change from parties that can be described as right, has more to do with the placing of parties on a two-dimensional political spectrum and the problems of the definition of conservatism itself in modern society, than with the placement of conservatism on this spectrum. Auke - 12-10-04 - 23:57

Sorry, I disagree. On the one hand, one can be a gradualist reformist -- conservative but not right-wing -- and on the other, one can be (or be a follower of) a right-wing, charismatic leader bent on tearing down many of the foundations of society -- right-wing, but not conservative. Or, for a different example of right-wing but in many ways not conservative, look at Ayn Rand, utterly opposed to tradition as a basis for practice, but certainly on the political right. Yes, "right-wing" and "conservative" are correlated, but they are not even close to interchangeable. -- Jmabel|Talk 23:03, Oct 12, 2004 (UTC)

Recent edit by 24.6.127.24

I find some of the recent edits by User:24.6.127.24 mostly to be either hairsplitting or misleading. However, they are not actually false or imbecile. Would someone else please weigh in on whether these should be kept, reverted, or some of each? -- Jmabel | Talk 05:41, Oct 17, 2004 (UTC)

I'd have to agree, they do come off as pro-conservative to me. The content may have a place, but not in the way it's currently presented. ShaneKing 05:48, 17 Oct 2004 (UTC)

History...

The following was recently added to the "History of conservatism" section by Stbalbach. I've cut and moved it here for discussion; I'm not firmly opposed to adding this or something like it, but I'd like to see some discussion first:

The medieval origins of the split between conservative and liberal can be traced to the rise of the medieval town and the rise of commerce in the 10th and 11th century. Prior to this period Europe was almost entirely rural and there existed very little trade and commerce; money for the most part did not exist and the economy was almost entirely feudal. As towns grew with rising populations and trade increased, the needs and values and outlooks of those in the country versus those in the urban areas diverged.

I presume that the (implicit) claim here is that the towns were liberal and the countryside conservative? I don't have too much argument with the former (but this isn't the article about liberalism). What evidence is there for conservatism having an intially rural base? I think of it as having an initially aristocratic base, independent of geography. Certainly in 1789 one could hardly call the French peasants uniformly "conservative": until the land reform in the Directoire era, peasants in some areas were one of the most radical forces in the Revolution: it wasn't a bunch of urban liberals out there burning title-deeds and châteaux. Similarly, in the U.S. many of the most radical forces were rural, and this remained the case until some time in the first half of the 20th century.

Do you have any citation for conservatives initially having a rural base? And in what countries? -- Jmabel | Talk 22:39, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)

I don't have an online cite. It is from a history class taught by a Harvard professor. It would be mistaken to project modern values of liberal/conservative on medieval europe (1789 is modern). Conservative means keeping the status quo (feudalism, monasticism, warrior aristocracy culture) while "liberal" would mean a change of that system such as usury (debt), the franciscan order, merchant culture, and other urban trends that rose in conflict with established orders of the time as a result of the rise of urban centers. Stbalbach 00:30, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Again, I agree with you on the urban origins of liberalism -- I think that is uncontroversial -- but my question is about the specifically rural (as against simply aristocratic) origins of conservatism. Citation doesn't need to be on line, no problem with books... -- Jmabel | Talk 00:46, Nov 11, 2004 (UTC)
The warrior aristorcracy of medieval europe was originally entirely rural, there were no cities, it was based on feudalism and manorialism, which is a land-based economy; it was the established order, what had always been since the fall of the Roman empire. The rise of the medieval town in the 11th century was a new thing, it stood in contrast to the established order of landed warrior aristocrats. Under feudalism one couldnt be a lord without fiefs by definition; merchant princess were not lords or part of the ruleing aristocracy, that did not begin to happen until the Renaissance (transition to the modern era) when lords were forced to monetize land as serfs moved to the freedom of towns. My source is class notes from a course called "The High Middle Ages" taught by Professor Philip Daileader who teaches at the college of William and Mary and has a PhD History from Harvard. This is nothing new or controversial in medieval studies, it is a common meme, I've not seen anything to suggest this is a controversial topic. Stbalbach 02:34, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I don't think that we're going to come up with a definitive century or country where we can say that the Conservative/rural - Liberal-left/urban thing began, but it is almost universally recognized, and like most things which are, at least partially true. It is certainly largely true in North America with regard to cultural conservatism. There is little serious opposition to abortion rights or gay rights in most major metropolitan areas (often protestors, when there are such, are from nearby or even distant suburban and rural areas); in rural areas there is little support for the same ideas. But conversely, there is an agrarian socialist tradition in rural America. For example, my electricity, gas, and water all come from socialized entities and there is no outcry for privatization – far from it, their privatizaton is almost universally opposed. But privatization is only conservative in the economic sense, Burke wouldn't necessarily see it as such since it often represents a radical departure from the way things have been done. Ditto with Social Security "private accounts". (Let "conservative" George Bush call for the privatization of the TVA and the end of farm subsidies and see how long he has a "Solid South", or any real support in the Lower Midwest. The last Republican to do such a thing, Barry Goldwater, was the last Republican to suffer a true electoral "wipeout" of carrying a single-digit number of states.) The Nonpartisan League, Populist Party, and the such like were originally rural movements, and it was up in the Dakotas where there were state-owned flour mills, not the industrial Northeast. The "Nonpartiasn League" began as a rural movement, as did, obviously, the Minnesota Farmer-Labor Party (now Democratic-Farmer-Labor). The greatest supporter of the Tennessee Valley Authority, which largely benfitted the then-agrarian Upper South, was a Senator from the prairies, Nebraska's George Norris. Farmers are famous for being socially conservative (there are very few openly gay farmers, for example) but farmers certainly expect favorable government intervention in the economy on their behalf more than almost any other group. Somehow I don't think that Western Europe is all that different in this regard, but am less certain as I have spent less than three years of my life there, and over four decades here. I realize that everyone, more or less, has all the images in their mind of the reactionary French peasantry defeating the Paris Commune, but this is far from the whole story ...
Rlquall 04:26, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Certainly after the land reform under the Directory, the French peasantry rapidly became conservative. By the time of the Paris Commune, France was well into its present pattern.
Yes, the aristocracy, by definition, held fiefs, but increasingly, by the time conservatism becomes an identifiable philosophy, they didn't necessarily live anywhere near their fiefs. Think how much of the French aristocracy was gathered around the royal court, at any time from Louis XIV onward. I believe it's Robert Brenner of UCLA who has been the "point person" on questioning a lot of the traditional wisdom on just who the early capitalists were in France and the UK and on the roles of town and country in this period. I see we don't have an article on him at all. A quick internet search finds [10]; hope that gives some clue why this isn't as obvious as the received wisdom.
I know Brenner's work second-hand, but through a friend who generally knows her stuff. I'll try to do some research on that front in the next week or two: we should have an article on him, I gather that his work has stirred up a lot of controversy, but also a lot of re-thinking in this area. -- Jmabel | Talk 07:13, Nov 11, 2004 (UTC)
Here's what I get from that review: The English Civil War was a bourgeois revolution marking the transition from the tail-end of feudalism to the beginning of capitalism. "Conservatives" in the sense of defenders of the existing order were on the side of feudalism, not capitalism. A peripheral note -- Modern U.S. "family values" conservatives are the heirs to Cromwell and the Puritans, if anyone it the modern world is. Jerry Falwell would have made a very fine publicist/"spin doctor" for Cromwell in my opinion. The dissolute lifestyle of the Royalists (by definition, a Cavalier attitude) would have met with the disdain of the evangelical Protestants who seem to define the social strain of U.S. conservatism, and their new allies are conservative Catholics, Cromwell's mortal enemies even more than the Cavaliers, which shows how history doesn't quite repeat itself. 44 years ago, Catholics voted in droves for JFK because they were in many places still an oppressed minority with a liberating chance to vote for one of their own. Today, the Catholic/Protestant division in the U.S. is so nearly over, or at least so much less than it was, that apparently most or at least lots of "conservative" practicing Catholics voted for an Evangelical Methodist over "one of their own" who seemed secularized and even condemned by some bishops. Catholic bishops entreating their members to vote for a "good" Protestant over a "bad" Catholic marks a new era for U.S. politics and the end of the New Deal coalition, more than ever before. The "conservative" U.S. consensus is still largely based on social issues. Ask how many of those who are vehemently opposed to gay marriage are also for raising the minimum wage, and you'll learn how non-monolithic American conservatism is. Somehow, this seems largely lost on the American Democratic Left.

Rlquall 13:06, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Comments? This is a re-write for inclusion:
Prior to the modern formation of a conservative ideaology, medieval Europe saw a schism between urban life and rural life with the rise of the medieval town in the 11th and 12th centuries. Prior to this period Europe was almost entirely rural with no population centers and there existed very little trade and commerce; money for the most part did not exist and the economy was almost entirely feudal land based. As towns grew with the rising population boom of the high middle ages and trade increased, the needs and values and outlooks of those in the country versus those in the urban areas diverged. The land-based feudal lords were the conservative elements of the society, while the town merchants and freemen were the liberal elements bringing far-reaching changes eventually displaceing feudalism entirely. Roots of the urban and rural split between conservative and liberal can be found here.
BTW why am I doing this here instead of in the article as normal? Is this article under lock down? Thats normally the reason you edit changes in the discussion section, when a mod has steped in. Jmabel? Stbalbach 23:25, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)
We ended up here because I was initially inclined to revert this. I figured that bringing it over to talk was much more productive than a probable edit war: and it has been. I think at this point we are much closer together. I'll do the next round by carrying what you wrote here back into the article, then let's proceed to edit as normal. -- Jmabel | Talk 08:27, Nov 12, 2004 (UTC)
Just in case it is unclear: I placed Stbalbach's revised version into the article so that it is in the edit history, than did some significant edits and additions to it. Stbalbach, if you are not happy with what I wrote, just clobber it in usual Wikipedia editing style; we'll probably do fine. I'm not looking for a battle here, just trying to build a strong article. -- Jmabel | Talk 08:54, Nov 12, 2004 (UTC)
You've got it right. This is now an excellent explanation of the origin of rural conservatism and urban liberalism, showing that it goes back several centuries before the Directory land reform. This sort of collaboration is Wikipedia at its best.

Rlquall 06:48, 13 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Maybe I'm being too picky this week...

...so this time I won't delete anything, but I wonder about this recently added paragraph:

Throughout much of the 20th century, one of the primary forces uniting the occasionally disparit strands of conservative thought was an opposition to communism, which was seen not only as an enemy of the traditional order, but also of western freedom and democracy in general.

Is there any reason to believe that conservatives were particularly more opposed to communism than liberals were? I mean, in the U.S. of the 1950s and 1960s, at least, "liberal anti-communism" was almost a cliche. -- Jmabel | Talk 08:50, Nov 12, 2004 (UTC)

In the mid-20th century, most U.S. liberals were pretty strongly anti-communist, at least in part so that those on the right couldn't get away with lumping everyone on the left together. This explains, in part, Truman going to Korea and Johnson to Vietnam . In fact, no less of a right-wing commentator than George F. Will has stated that between 1945 and 1970, the United States Democratic Party was the preeminent anti-communist organization in the world. There was an anti-statist quality to one strain of the older Democrat idedology. But almost all strains of the right (all of the mainstream ones, at least) were truly united by their anti-communism as well, so while it is true, it isn't particularly unique. There were a few liberal apologists for communism, but they were hurt twice by Kruschev, first by his "de-Stalinzation" showing how bad it really had been, and then by his own indefencibly boorish behaviour, such as taking off his shoe at the U.N. to pound the table and the "we will bury you" speech. By the time that the tanks rolled into Prague in 1968, there weren't really a lot of thoughtful people who weren't anti-communists, but lots of them still didn't like Reagan's too-strident (to them) tone a few years later or direct confrontation, which he (and Margaret Thatcher) loved. (User:Rlquall, unsigned)

Herbert Hoover

I'm getting ready to pull the string on Herbert Hoover unless someone can tell me why not. 1) He's been dead over 40 years, the other names on the list are still living or have died in the last five years. 2) He wasn't even all that conservative. His impact on contemporary conservative thought is around zero. He's just a figure that liberals like to use to bash conservatives, as if he somehow singlehandedly invented and implented the Great Depression.

Rlquall 22:59, 13 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I concurred before, and still do... -- Jmabel | Talk 03:32, Nov 14, 2004 (UTC)

Classical Conservatism

I didn't much care for the idea in a new paragraph that was anonymously added about how one's view of the U.S. constitution was a test of one's conservatism. That seemed to assume, among other things, that Wikipedia was entirely aimed at a U.S. audience. Rather than attempt to saw off someone who may prove to be a valuable newcomer at the knees, I chose to rewrite that paragraph rather than just delete or revert. This may well belong somewhere else or not at all, I leave it in the capable hands of others.

Rlquall 14:33, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

"Economic liberalism"

The following seems to me to be so totally wrong that I don't know what to do with it: "Economic liberalism coupled with social conservatism is typically referred to as populism or authoritarianism."

Populists don't particularly favor economic liberalism. They certainly favor a liberal fiscal policy, but that has only a loose etymological connection to "economic liberalism": the latter basically means laissez faire. As for authoritarianism, it has nothing to do with any particular economic policy; I suppose it does involve social conservatism, but since the rest of this is so garbled, that doesn't seem to be worth much. Was there a coherent thought here? If so, please feel free to reword. Otherwise, I will delete this, it wasn't much more than an aside anyway. -- Jmabel | Talk 20:03, Nov 29, 2004 (UTC)

I see that "...or authoritarianism" has been reverted as vandalism. As indicated above, I still have a problem with the sentence. Does it perhaps mean some thing like, "Fiscal liberalism and expansive domestic investment by the government coupled with social conservatism is typically referred to as populism"? That's close to true,

This all feels very redolent of Nolan, and I wonder if what is going on here is that this was written by someone whose knowledge of this does not extend much past the Nolan Chart. I'll give another day or so for response, then I'll feel free to edit. -- Jmabel | Talk 02:19, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)

I think the problem extends to the prior statement: "Economic and fiscal conservatism coupled with social liberalism is called (at least in the U.S.) libertarianism, or (in its more extreme form) anarcho-capitalism." It's got the (increasingly touchy) problem with "libertarianism", but more importantly what the US Libertarian Party and anarcho-capitalists, advocate is not really fiscal conservatism. Fiscal/economic conservatism still advocates some government intervention in the economy, which is more than just a "Night Watchman" state, and it is usually associated with ideas of philanthropy and social responsibility, which anarcho-capitalism is not. And I don't think anarcho-capitalism is defined by support for social liberalism (though the Libertarian Party is). I'm also not sure that the term "economic Liberalism" is accurate. Lots of ideas seem to be being conflated into a unified theory in a way that strikes me as original research. It may be a problem with the whole bit on "Ideological Conservatism" which is very long and a bit confusing. Is this really called "right conservatism".

"Thorough-going conservatism"

I've cut the following, which was recently added to the "types of conservatism" section.

5. Thorough-going conservatism refers to conservatives who are conservative on every issue--such as George W. Bush and most of his cabinet. Disregarding the rhetoric, this type of conservatism is actively pushing for the privatization or abolishment of all government-sponsored social program such as welfare, Medicare, or social security, as well as governmental protection agencies such as the FDA and EPA. They have been attacking government programs by calling them "red-tape" and "Washington bureaucracies" while sabotaging these programs with lack of funds in order to show that government programs don't work.

Clearly this is more POV than encyclopedic content. I don't thing the notion of "Thorough-going conservatism" as a distinct type of conservatism is meaningful. I also think that the notion that Bush, et. al., are "conservative on every issue" borders on silly. We've just had User:Silverback (who I disagree with on a lot) on Talk:right-wing politics] trying to write Bush out of the conservative camp entirely. Neither of these views belongs uncited in an encyclopedia. -- Jmabel | Talk 01:05, Dec 3, 2004 (UTC)

"Economic and fiscal conservaitsm"

I have deleted this:

Economic and fiscal conservatism coupled with social liberalism is called (at least in the U.S.) libertarianism, or (in its more extreme form) anarcho-capitalism. Economic liberalism coupled with social conservatism is typically referred to as populism.

"Economic and fiscal conservatism" makes no sense since economic conservatism is described just above that as a product of fiscal conservatism. There is nothing implicit in the belief that budgets should be balanced, deficits avoided, taxes low, to make you a supporter of the US Libertarian Party (rather than the Republicans, pre-Dubya at least, or even some Dems). On the matter of economic conservatism this is described as the wish to minimize government intervention in the economy, but the Libertarian Party opposes all government intervention in the economy. Anarcho-capitalism goes further and opposes government altogether. Neither of these are conservativism. Jmabel explains above the problem with the reference to Populism. Perhaps the article should explain why these aren't forms of conservatism, in the same way it does with fascism. (Anon... 212.140.125.129 11:40, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC))

I don't agree with all of your reasoning, but I'm happy to see this deleted. -- Jmabel | Talk 23:58, Dec 3, 2004 (UTC)

Country-specific information

Someone might want to break out country-specific information into separate articles, as has been done with Liberalism. -- Jmabel | Talk 23:39, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)


  • With the section on Conservatism in different countries I added in about a paragraph of info. on the history of Canadian conservatism, and I added on the names of famous Canadian conservatives to you're list such as Sir John A. Macdonald, Borden, Diefenbaker and Mulroney, why was it all taken off this article?????? - Chris Gilmore
    • You are editing anonymously, so its hard to know what edit you are referring to, but I don't see in the history any indication that anything like that has been deleted. -- Jmabel | Talk 22:41, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)
  • Oh sorry, I've had some computer problems, maybe it just didn't load what I added. I'll rewrite it if thats alright, I thought it might be interesting for some people to have a reference to Canadian conservatism which definately qualifies as one of the most unique brands of conservatism.

I agree with the proposal to separate country-specific info. A related issue is that the American stuff is creeping over the whole article. For instance, I see that neoconservatism and compassionate conservatism are listed as types of conservatism, though they are both uniquely U.S. movements (And neocon has a second long reference under US as well). -Willmcw 00:50, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Adam Smith

Is it appropriate to include Adam Smith in the list of conservative philosophers? He has inspired modern conservatives but was the antithesis of conservatives in his day.

That's a good point. You could add a short note to Adam's entry explaining that paradox. -Willmcw 06:42, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)


People moved to List of conservatives

The list of people (especially entertainers) was getting overwhelming. As with some other movements and philosophies, conservatism now has a list of its own. Cheers, -Willmcw 05:22, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Iraq and NPOV

"Social conservatives generally wish to preserve the current state of their society and impose their society's values on others societies, as opposed to supporting the natural advancement of societies, as liberals do. A notable contemporary example is the Second Iraq War, whose supporters (conservatives) wish to impose their values (such as democracy) on the various societies of Iraq. The opposition (liberals), on the other hand, believes that imposing something on a society that is not ready for it will actually hurt that society, as it will react negatively towards what is being imposed on it(in this case democracy)."

I believe this particular passage needs to be changed as it is seriously lacking in neutrality.JetsLuvver 00:38, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

'The New Conservative' instead of 'Chronicles'?

As a representative of paleoconservatism, should the 'The New Conservative' be used in the external links instead of 'Chronicles'? 'The New Conservative' has a circulation of about 15,000, and I think I read that 'Chronicles' has one of around 6,000. Also, 'The New Conservative' was founded by the most well-known paleoconservative, Pat Buchanan. I'm going to go ahead and change it, but feel free to change it back if I overlooked something.

Is there room for both? -Willmcw 04:14, Mar 18, 2005 (UTC)

Ambiguous notion

When entering 'conservative' I wanted to look up the meaning of 'conservative extension of a theory' in the sense of mathematical logic. This is quite an important notion; you find it e.g. (without explanation!) on the page Von Neumann-Bernays-Gödel set theory. However, I have been redirected to 'conservatism', a completely unrelated page. There should be some disambiguation page. Tillmo, May 04 In the meantime, I have created a page conservative extension. Tillmo, May 04

Over Wiki-linking

This article is a bad example of over Wiki-linking. At its length, it would be fine for the same people and things to be linked more than once, I'll admit, but several times in the same para for things like Republican Party and Edmund Burke is a little bit much. Remember that style guidelines dictate that if the same person or thing is to be Wiki-linked more than once within the same article, there should be enough space between them that they are not both within sight of one another; i.e., repetition should not occur until the first link has been scrolled completely past and is out of sight in a normal view. Rlquall 03:40, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)

laissez-faire is liberal, not conservative?

  • This belief in small government combines with fiscal conservatism to produce a broader economic liberalism, which wishes to minimize government intervention in the economy. This amounts to support for laissez-faire economics. This economic liberalism borrows from two schools of thought: the classical liberals' pragmatism and the libertarian's notion of "rights." The classical liberals maintains that free markets work best, while the libertarian contends that free markets are the only ethical markets.

All the references to "conservatives" in this paragraph were just changed to "liberals." To being with, if it is so, then we should move the paragraph to the liberalism article. But is it true? Were Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher really liberals? -Willmcw 00:14, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)

In economics philosophy, a liberal is a advocate of laissez-faire. The doctrine advocating free markets and private property is called "liberalism." So, yes, Reagan and Thatcher were economic liberals. Here is the definition of liberalism from Merriam-Webster: "a theory in economics emphasizing individual freedom from restraint and usually based on free competition, the self-regulating market, and the gold standard." A conservative, in the U.S., is an advocate of economic liberalism (liberalism is also another word for capitalism). Also, note that what a conservative stands for depends on what country you're talking about. A liberal in some other countries is what a conservative is in the U.S. This article needs some work. RJII 03:16, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
I just noticed there is a whole section called "economic conservativism." What the hell is that? That section needs a total overhaul and a new name. There is no such thing as economic conservativism; at least it's nonstandard terminology. How can economic conservativism be the same thing as economic liberalism??? RJII 03:32, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)
If laissez faire is not conservatism, then we should remove it from this article (and move it to liberalism). Changing it to liberal, but leaving it here doesn't make any sense. Also, are all conservatives economic liberals? It seems that there are some who favor government intevention in the marketplace. Maybe rather than just changing the words there should be a re-write. I don't pretend to be an expert, but this seems muddled. -Willmcw 05:18, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)
My own personal Original Research: "Conservative" and "Liberal" have no meaning in political discourse except as epithets tossed about wildly, just as "Right-wing" and "Left-wing" have no real meanings. I recommend that people start editing according to reality instead of POV-oriented imaginations and other nonsensical standards. Tomer TALK 06:42, Jun 19, 2005 (UTC)

Leo Strauss

Nothing about Leo Strauss under the neo-con section? I think he deserves at least a passing mention. Without Strauss, we'd have no neo-conservatives (oh, if only :) ). --195.93.21.2 01:55, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Relation to nazism

Image:Http://www.joric.com/Hitler-1.jpg

conservatism=nazism

Conservatism equals WHAT? Excuse me but do I compare liberals to Communists? Conservatism is treating minoraties the same as majorities, not better like some parties I could mention. Why am I the only one complaining here?

Also the two sections of text right under the contents is very biased and are not very NPOV. All the subjects talked about in those parts are discussed later in the text, and there much more neutral. I tried to edit it to be a little more neutral (for an example i removed the text that said that conservatism is neccesarily oppresive, and added a part explaining the relationship between conservatism and facism. But I believe that the sections should be removed in their whole (except perhaps the first part of the first subject), since they do not add anything new to the text and is very non-NPOV written.

I don't want to do that myself before others have had an oppertunity to either better it or explain why it should be kept in. (unsigned user)

Please note that most of this talk page now refers to an older version of the article, that was primarily about U.S. conservatism. The article is no longer about the United States, it is about conservatism as a global phenomenon. That includes things like the Franco regime in Spain in the 1950's, and Ayatollah Khomeiny. I re-inserted the point that value-conservative regimes - such as those of the Ayatollah - are inherently repressive. There is no other way for them to function.

Nowhere does it say that conservatives are fascists, so it was unnecessary to insert a disclaimer. Nevertheless, I added the point that many conservatives are unhappy with the association, and clarified the historical and current ideological relationship. Once again: the article is not about the United States, it is not a disclaimer article, and the global history of conservatism is not always filled with nice people.Ruzmanci 11:55, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

Factual accuracy disputed

Please DO NOT INSERT COMMENTS IN THE MIDDLE of this text, but under it.

The factual accuracy of the entire article is disputed, because it is not what it purports to be, namely an overview of conservatism, but an article on Anglo-American, and substantially US-American, conservative traditions. As a result of the anglo-centrism of the article it contains factual errors in its description of conservatism, for instance..

  • the claim that conservatisms are historically related: in fact there are conservative traditions in other major cultures (China) which arose independently
  • it describes conservatism as an intellectual tradition arising around the time of the French Revolution, and ignores the great importance of conservatism in Classical Antiquity, among others
  • it greatly exaggerates the role of Edmund Burke, who can not in any way be seen as a founding father of an intellectual tradition, that already existed 2000 years before his birth.
  • with the exception of a few figures (who sometimes published in English anyway), it ignores the bulk of the European conservative traditions, especially southern European conservatism.
  • the categorisation of conservatisms is therefore inaccurate (because it is a categorisation of part of conservatism only), and would be substantially different if it included all ‘continental’ European conservatisms
  • the claimed relationship to the political right is false, and would be different if all European conservatisms were included, and if conservatism was used in the European sense.

The article in its present form can not be amended and that is not necessary. The simple solution is to give the existing article a new title, such as ‘Anglo-American Conservatism’, and to create a new overview article, on conservatism as a global and historical ideological and cultural phenomenon.

Ruzmanci 11:41, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Draft replacement

A short draft replacement, a new general overview article on Conservatism, is now linked from the main page. The present article would be renamed "Conservatism in America' or something like that.Ruzmanci 17:27, 21 July 2005 (UTC)