June 10, 2006
When I was at university in the 1980s I remember reading books that argued that liberalism was not only the dominant but even the sole intellectual tradition, and that the distinctions within liberalism (free market, social)seemed like the only political differences that mattered. Few were prescient enough to foresee the rise of the right, which was at that moment beginning to organize and craft a philosophy of its own; one that went beyond mere instinctive reaction.
Consider Hayek's response in his Constitution of Liberty to asking himself the question of whether there is such a thing as a conservative philosophy. He says that It may be a useful practical maxim, but it does not give us any guiding principles to influence long term developments.(p.411)
If conservatism did not exist as a political philosophy, then things have changed. As US Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan quips:
"The central conservative truth is that it is culture, not politics, that determines the success of a society. The central liberal truth is that politics can change a culture and save it from itself."
'Tis a nice paradox is it not? Especially for those who are free market liberals and social conservatives?
Liberals have historically understood themselves to be pushing aside the cobwebs of history, ending ideology, freeing society from illusions, overturning outdated power structures, and taking society to a morally superior, more prosperous place. This is the process of Enlightenment, and enlightened liberalism in the second part of the 2oth century took the form of an academic social democratic liberal philosophy of procedural democracy, scientific social improvement, expert knowledge, progress and activist government. It is a kind of utilitarian Fabism.
This form of liberalism has been under assault from both the right and left; but more so from a right wing populism that accepts the liberal case for a market order but not limited government. Once socialism is out of the way then the old 19th century battle lines between conservatism and liberalism reappear---eg., way that liberalism makes individual sovereignty the organizing principle of the economy, polity and society. The conservative argument is that liberalism's concentration on economic liberty makes it blind to what is happening to the polity and culture.
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This article at Pandagon argues that the enlightenment is so pervasive that fundamentalism can only exist, or appeal, when it is framed in enlightenment terms.