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November 2, 2006
In the light of this recent post over at public opinion about contradictions between the liberal and conservative strands of the Liberal Party we have these comments about the Liberal Party by John Howard in this speech, where he says that being both an economic liberal and a social conservative involves no incompatability. Howard argues thus:
The Liberal Party is a broad church... and we should never as members of the Liberal Party of Australia lose sight of the fact that we are the trustees of two great political traditions. We are, of course, the custodian of the classical liberal tradition within our society, Australian Liberals should revere the contribution of John Stuart Mill to political thought. We are also the custodians of the conservative tradition in our community. And if you look at the history of the Liberal Party it is at its best when it balances and blends those two traditions. Mill and Burke are interwoven into the history and the practice and the experience of our political party.
Howard adds that this means that liberty in our community is bound up with a sense of order. By personal liberty he also means a sense of individual and personal responsibility. If we are to enjoy personal liberty we must have an ordered society. So how does this work in practice?
Howard spells it out in terms of recent Australian history:
Contemporary Australian society understands that we do live in a world of change, they understand that globalism is with us forever, they may not like some aspects of it but they know they can't change it and they therefore want a government that delivers the benefits of globalisation and not one that foolishly pretends Canute-like it can hold back the tide. They accept and they understand that. But they also want within that change, sometimes that maelstrom of economic change, they want reassurance and they want to protect and defend those institutions that have given them a sense of security and a sense of purpose over the years. And that of course where our conservative tradition comes in. .... We believe that if institutions have demonstrably failed they ought to be changed or reformed. But we don't believe in getting rid of institutions just for the sake of change. We need to be persuaded that they are failed institutions. We shouldn't rise to the clarion call of radical change just for its own sake.
Doesn't the economic change through economic reform create the anxiety and the need for reassurance?
Update:
What is interesting about these excerpts is that Howard does not resolve the tension between liberty and order in terms of rights, or more philosophically negative rights. Rights are not even mentioned. Nor is Hobbes re order which is what underpins the national securtity state.
By negative rights is meant that there are things that none has a right to do, such as depriving another of the free exercise of his faculties. If we are to maximize freedom, people can only be free to the extent that they do not impede the freedom of others. Here, we would not consider something as "free" if its consequence were to reduce the freedom of others. Thus, (as with Locke) one is free to own the fruits of his/her labor, for this does not deprive anyone else. (Similarly, there can be equality before the law.) However, one cannot be free to steal, for this reduces the freedom of others. (Similarly, there cannot be freedom to redistribute wealth, which is inequality before the law.) Consequently, freedom is absolute once one precludes activities which remove it from others.
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"Doesn't the economic change through economic reform create the anxiety and the need for reassurance?"
Er, that's what Howard is saying. But it's worth pointing out that we have been going through a lengthy period of a low rate of difficult economic change, with rates of involuntary job loss as low as we've seen since statistics on them started being recorded, and rising real income. This is the dividend from the 1983-96 reform agenda.