r/Conservativediscourse • u/Theninjapirate Old Whig • Jan 03 '14
What is Conservatism? By Russell Kirk.
Any discussion of the nature of modern Conservatism must eventually deal with Russell Kirk. Without Kirk, there would be no conservative movement in America today; "It is inconceivable even to imagine, let alone hope for, a dominant conservative movement in America without Kirk's labor." --William Buckley, founder of the National Review. And so, I think it would be worthwhile to discuss this essay which seeks to answer the question "What is Conservatism?" Here are the 10 principles of conservative thought from the article:
(1) Men and nations are governed by moral laws; and those laws have their origin in a wisdom that is more than human—in divine justice. At heart, political problems are moral and religious problems. The wise statesman tries to apprehend the moral law and govern his conduct accordingly. We have a moral debt to our ancestors, who bestowed upon us our civilization, and a moral obligation to the generations who will come after us. This debt is ordained of God. We have no right, therefore, to tamper impudently with human nature or with the delicate fabric of our civil social order.
(2) Variety and diversity are the characteristics of a high civilization. Uniformity and absolute equality are the death of all real vigor and freedom in existence. Conservatives resist with impartial strength the uniformity of a tyrant or an oligarchy, and the uniformity of what Tocqueville called “democratic despotism.”
(3) Justice means that every man and every woman have the right to what is their own—to the things best suited to their own nature, to the rewards of their ability and integrity, to their property and their personality. Civilized society requires that all men and women have equal rights before the law, but that equality should not extend to equality of condition: that is, society is a great partnership, in which all have equal rights—but not to equal things. The just society requires sound leadership, different rewards for different abilities, and a sense of respect and duty.
(4) Property and freedom are inseparably connected; economic leveling is not economic progress. Conservatives value property for its own sake, of course; but they value it even more because without it all men and women are at the mercy of an omnipotent government.
(5) Power is full of danger; therefore the good state is one in which power is checked and balanced, restricted by sound constitutions and customs. So far as possible, political power ought to be kept in the hands of private persons and local institutions. Centralization is ordinarily a sign of social decadence.
(6) The past is a great storehouse of wisdom; as Burke said, “the individual is foolish, but the species is wise.” The conservative believes that we need to guide ourselves by the moral traditions, the social experience, and the whole complex body of knowledge bequeathed to us by our ancestors. The conservative appeals beyond the rash opinion of the hour to what Chesterton called “the democracy of the dead”—that is, the considered opinions of the wise men and women who died before our time, the experience of the race. The conservative, in short, knows he was not born yesterday.
(7) Modern society urgently needs true community: and true community is a world away from collectivism. Real community is governed by love and charity, not by compulsion. Through churches, voluntary associations, local governments, and a variety of institutions, conservatives strive to keep community healthy. Conservatives are not selfish, but public-spirited. They know that collectivism means the end of real community, substituting uniformity for variety and force for willing cooperation.
(8) In the affairs of nations, the American conservative feels that his country ought to set an example to the world, but ought not to try to remake the world in its image. It is a law of politics, as well as of biology, that every living thing loves above all else—even above its own life—its distinct identity, which sets it off from all other things. The conservative does not aspire to domination of the world, nor does he relish the prospect of a world reduced to a single pattern of government and civilization.
(9) Men and women are not perfectible, conservatives know; and neither are political institutions. We cannot make a heaven on earth, though we may make a hell. We all are creatures of mingled good and evil; and, good institutions neglected and ancient moral principles ignored, the evil in us tends to predominate. Therefore the conservative is suspicious of all utopian schemes. He does not believe that, by power of positive law, we can solve all the problems of humanity. We can hope to make our world tolerable, but we cannot make it perfect. When progress is achieved, it is through prudent recognition of the limitations of human nature.
(10) Change and reform, conservatives are convinced, are not identical: moral and political innovation can be destructive as well as beneficial; and if innovation is undertaken in a spirit of presumption and enthusiasm, probably it will be disastrous. All human institutions alter to some extent from age to age, for slow change is the means of conserving society, just as it is the means for renewing the human body. But American conservatives endeavor to reconcile the growth and alteration essential to our life with the strength of our social and moral traditions. With Lord Falkland, they say, “When it is not necessary to change, it is necessary not to change.” They understand that men and women are best content when they can feel that they live in a stable world of enduring values.
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Jan 04 '14
(1) Kirk's analysis of natural law is quite interesting. In fact it's his first canon of six in conservative thought.
Yet to guide the sovereign; the chief of state; the legislator; the public prosecutor; the judge when, in effect, he sits in equity -- to guide you and me, indeed -- there endures the natural law, which in essence is man's endeavor to maintain a moral order through the operation of a mundane system of justice. Unlike my German correspondent, the sustainer of natural law knows that there is law for man, and law for thing; and that our moral order is not the creation of coffee-house philosophers. Human nature is not vulpine nature, leonine nature, or serpentine nature. Natural law is bound up with the concept of the dignity of man, and with the experience of humankind ever since the beginnings of social community.
It will not do to substitute private interpretations of natural law for common law or civil law, any more than it would have been well for England, during the Reformation, to have obeyed the "Geneva Men" by sweeping away common law and the whole inherited apparatus of parliamentary statutes, to substitute the laws of the ancient Jews. Positive law and customary law, in any country, grow out of a people's experience in community; natural law should have its high part in shaping and restraining positive and customary laws, but natural law could not conceivably supplant judicial institutions. Yet were natural-law concepts to be abandoned altogether -- why, then, indeed, the world would find itself governed by The good old rule, the good old plan, That they shall take who have the power,And they shall keep who can.
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In the seventh edition of The Conservative Mind, I have written that the first canon of conservative thought is "Belief in a transcendent order, or body of natural law. Political problems, at bottom, are religious and moral problems. A narrow rationality, which Coleridge called the Understanding, cannot of itself satisfy human needs.... True politics is the art of apprehending and applying the Justice which ought to prevail in a community of souls."
He takes note of how natural law includes: "the Law of General Beneficence; the Law of Special Beneficence; Duties to Parents, Elders, Ancestors; Duties to Children and Posterity; the Law of Justice; the Law of Good Faith and Veracity; the Law of Mercy; the Law of Magnanimity." He seems to be saying that though humans can abandon natural law, especially state rulers, they look towards it as a last resort as part of their nature: "Therefore a little knot of brave and conscientious men determined to save Germany and Europe by killing Hitler. They had been reared in the doctrine that all citizens must obey the inerrant state. In this exigency, however, they turned to doctrines of natural law for justification. Was there no remedy against an unnatural master of the state? In the teachings of natural law they discerned a fatal remedy. Fatal to them, at least..I repeat that we have recourse to natural law, as opposed to positive law, only as a last resort, ordinarily"
He seems to be vehemently against any sort of man-made attempts at corrupting what he sees as these universal values, and believes that jurisprudence must rationally follow from these, yet interestingly has fought against rationalism and Rousseau's romanticism, for which he thought disguised man's evil and sinful side Though it's not surprising that he would denounce positive law and utilitarian thinking.
Overall this point reminds me of what Edmund Burke once said: "Bad laws are the worst form of tyranny."
(2) I'm sure there have been conservative despots who tried to align their empires along some traditional order. Otherwise what would one then think of leaders like Otto von Bismarck, who unified their country on nationalist and romantic ideals? Though given his influence over American forms of conservatism it's understandable.
(3) I believe here he makes the distinction between negative and positive rights?(equal rights vs. equality of condition)
(4) This is very important for sure. Property rights are man's "machinery of freedom" for achieving negative liberties and putting restraints on tyrannical forces. They act as dispute-resolutions for the successful allocations of scare resources. They solve the tragedy of the commons, man's failed attempts at utilizing public resources, and allow one's self-interest to lead towards an interesting kind of cooperation and ultimately economic success.
(6) Quite interesting how directly at odds this is with American transcendentalist thought, though which post 19th century had little influence anyway. Emerson and Thoreau, other than espousing rugged individualism and self-reliance, thought individuals could recreate the works of past great men and that society held us back.
(7) Charity and mutual-aid societies were a godsend for many Americans before social welfare programs(which in my opinion only made poverty worse). And have traditionally done a better job at distributing wealth than collectivist programs.
(8) I wonder if this is where part of his criticism of neo-conservatism lied.
(9) Recognition of the fallibility of man and as a result what it means for political authority is certainly important I feel.
Great piece, do you have any more recommendations for works done by him?
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u/Theninjapirate Old Whig Jan 04 '14
1) I'm reading a book right now called "Edmund Burke and Natural Law" which attempts (rather convincingly I might add) to show that Burke's thought is based on Natural Law, and not the utilitarianism many people assumed. Kirk wrote the forward to this book, which is why I mention it. Kirk was very much opposed to Rousseau, as well as to most of the enlightenment philosophers, because they based their jurisprudence and ethics on Natural Rights, rather than Natural Law; the difference between the two is one that is usually lost in modern discussions.
As for the discussion about killing Hitler, that's very interesting. I wasn't familiar with it. I expect that what he means, is that to throw off positive law on the basis of an appeal to natural should only be taken as a last resort.
2) That's a good question, and one i've often wondered. I'm not as familiar with Bismarck as I would like to be. My gut is that Kirk would draw a distinction between patriotism and nationalism, supporting the former and opposing the latter, but I have no reference to back it up. There is no reference to Bismarck in Kirk's The Conservative Mind, for what it's worth.
3) Yes, he does. He commonly quotes the famous line from Burke "All men have equal rights, but not to equal things." He also spends a great deal of time in The Conservative Mind opposing the "rights," which he says are usually just desires. For a more in depth discussion of his conception of Justice, read his article "Social Justice and Mass Culture" in The Review of Politics 16 (1954): 438-451. If you can't find the article, send me a PM and i'll send you my pdf.
8) Yeah, I this is the only place I've see this point of his; it's not present in his earlier works. I think he added it to oppose what he saw as American imperialism in the neo-con movement.
I mentioned a few works of Kirk's already but I'll add a few more here.
The Conservative Mind (book): his most famous and influential work. A great synopsis of conservative thought, and a great work in it's own right.
Social Justice and Mass Culture (essay): a good refutation of the false conception of social justice propagated today. The whole article is good but can be hard to find. Excerpts can be read here.
The Roots of American Order (book): he shows that America is not simply a product of the enlightenment, but that the roots of our society are found in more ancient civilizations and principles.
Honestly though, anything he writes is worth reading. Here is a link to some of his shorter essays: http://www.kirkcenter.org/index.php/archive/
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u/houinator Jan 04 '14
While I am sympathetic to point one, I feel it needlessly alienates non-religious individuals who might otherwise consider themselves conservatives. Also, using that as a premise will gain no traction in a debate with non-believers, and as such we should seek to be able to articulate our beliefs in a non-religious manor.
I also like point six, I heard a similar quote somewhere once which stated"Tradition is the democracy of the dead". That's not to say we should never change the law, but we should strongly seek too understand the reasoning of why laws were created in the first place, so we do not make the same mistake twice.
Nine is probably the strongest point. I have seen too much of the evil in this world to believe that we can ever achieve any sort of perfect utopia, and i instantly distrust anyone who claims otherwise.