[.ca] The Conservative Mind: From Burke to Eliot (ISBN 0895261715)

Should have been called Our Struggle:
The Conservative Mind is one of the sorts of books I like reviewing because it doesn't fit neatly into any single category. It's a challenge. There's plenty to recommend here to any reader who can follow it, and that may be easier said than done. Russell Kirk likes using large words, and even more, he likes making his allusions without reference and dropping names without background. I think it's unlikely that many readers will follow every statement without work, myself included I confess, but at least Kirk dispels the myth that all conservatives are anti-intellectual illiterates. Of course Kirk would be the first to deny that he is one of those nasty intellectuals, so I'll specify here that I use the term to mean an articulate, educated and well-read person who centers his life on affairs of the mind. I do recommend Kirk. Conservatives troubled by the neo-con trends today may like to read a philosophically erudite survey of the foundations of their beliefs. And liberals and otherwise uncommitted readers ought to know just how scary and truly deranged conservative thinking really is. I recall back to my high school days when I was learning to express myself philosophically. I told my conservative friends that conservatism meant living in the past, being unwilling to accept new ideas, and generally shutting themselves off from the world as it is today. Over time I had to abandon this attack because it seemed that no actual conservatives used the dictionary definition. And unlike conservatives, if I'm debating someone, I like to avoid straw manning them. How refreshing it is to see that I was right all along, but for Kirk this is not even a slur (though he would phrase it all differently). Rather than devote his time to specific ideologies, he examines conservatism as a broader mindset. It starts with Edmund Burke in the late eighteenth Century and extends roughly to the middle of the twentieth, so any mention of current events is entirely absent. Actually, most actual history is absent. The biggest problem I see here is not Kirk's fraudulent or delusional statements of liberal principles. It is not that he takes specific stances against a particular expression of human decency. The biggest problem is that I can't tell where Kirk stops and the various men discussed here begin. Kirk himself is ever present in nearly every page, stamping his approval or lack thereof on every word of every quote. He is a human filter, taking that aspect of conservatism in each man that he likes best and stamping it with the Kirk seal of approval. And after hearing what he wants to hear, he disregards the rest as so-and-so's deviation from true conservatism. I suspect that some of this is the subject matter. After all, according to Kirk and myself, there's not really that much variation in conservative thought. Heard one, heard them all, especially with true, old-fashioned conservatism (the neocons can still produce shock and awe). Is it coincidental that Kirk's favorite is Edmund Burke, and that Burke gets the largest chapter and the most references in later chapters? By Kirk's own ideas, this would not be unusual or wrong. In a nutshell (Kirk's), conservatives believe in the wisdom of man over the wisdom of a man. Hence their willingness to accept the order that has come down from their ancestors and their unwillingness to change except in the slowest and most thoughtful manner possible. Better the devil you know, I suppose. I wonder how Kirk would react if anyone ever asked him a specific question. If Kirk's thinking had prevailed in 1860, would we only now be granting emancipation after slow and careful consideration? I began reading The Conservative Mind as news reports celebrated the ten-year anniversary of the end of Apartheid (a conservative system if ever there was one). What, I wonder, would Kirk have suggested they do instead? Just ending a four hundred year old system like that? Sacrilege! Shouldn't they have carefully thought out the problem, and incrementally changed things so slowly that society as a whole never has to feel disjointed? It there's one thing Kirk makes clear, it is that aristocrats should never be made to feel worry about the great unwashed masses. When I said earlier that Kirk is scary, this is what I mean. His adulation for aristocratic and anti-democratic societies seems anachronistic and would be humorous if people didn't take it seriously. Kirk has wisely limited his vision to American and British conservatives exclusively (aside from Alexis de Tocqueville), likely fearing what would happen if he tried to defend other societies. After all, they have their ancestors too. I mentioned South Africa. There are others. One could say that the late Soviet Union was ruled by conservatives, adoring the legacies of Marx and Lenin. I doubt Kirk would praise them. Perhaps he would praise the Czarist system instead? On second thought, maybe he really would. It would fit with other passages. The Czarists respected private property (another conservative trait Kirk mentions prominently), especially as only a few people owned property in that system. I could go on, space permitting. But I still recommend reading this stuff. Despite the wordiness, it's not unfathomable. True, following the references can be tough, but it's not essential because Kirk really only makes a half dozen or so points early on and repeats them endlessly. This is old style conservatism. The conservatism of the old Victorian House of Lords, or perhaps the Prussian Junkers. It praises a classed society, a strictly religious one, and one that is not open to change. It is socially Darwinist, but not industrial. In fact, it is anti-scientific (and never let scientists lead). It is anti-educational, because too much learning makes the masses uppity. It is the stale, sneering, demon of closed minds in charge, desperate to avoid the real world. Read the book, but don't let this happen to you.

A Book Every Conservative Must Read:
"The Conservative Mind" is the book that created the modern conservative movement and is a book that every conservative should read. It isn't an easy read, it does deal intimately with the nuances of conservative thought all the way back to the 18th Century Whig politician Edmund Burke, but at the same time it explains in depth why conservatism developed the way it did and what the philosophical roots of conservatism are. Even those who aren't conservative but have an interest in truly understanding conservative political philosophy would do very well to read this book. In order to be an effective advocate for or against any position, it is critical to first understand what the position is. "The Conservative Mind" is a seminal look into conservatism as an ideology and as a political movement, and is critical to an understanding of what conservatism really is.

L. Ron Hubbard:
Churchill once said something like, a man who is 20 and is not a liberal has no heart; A man who is 40 and is not a conservative has no brain. Mind you, Churchill was a womanizing alcoholic, but he may have been on to something there. In this book, you can learn how to be a conservative. I liked this better than Dianetics and will probably love to be a conservative more than a scientologist.

Moral Absolutism and Natural Aristocracy:
You don't have to be a Conservative to like this book. I found it very useful in understanding the basic worldview from which a Conservative might operate; and from that, one can make good assumptions as to how Conservatives view Liberals. Kirk's thinking is profound, his reading extensive, and his arguments well-written. The major points I took away from this discussion are: 1) The Conservative assumes that the design of the world is not by accident, but by transcendental purpose. Metaphysical, permanent standards of Right and Wrong exist: moral standards are not relative. Similarly, the structure of society is not arbitrary. We should not attempt to alter society using science or social engineering, because we are strictly human, and our understanding is limited. Change, when it happens, should be modulated in such a way as to limit its effects on society. 2) A "natural aristocracy" exists in any society. It consists of the best and brightest individuals, and perhaps those born with reserves of wealth. No legislation or voter majority can eliminate it. John Adams defines a member of the natural aristocracy (in a Democracy) as anyone who has the power to influence at least one vote other than his own. 3) Individuals are born with certain Natural Rights, consisting primarily of property rights. Government should always act to protect property rights, especially in a Democracy, where the poorest elements of society may employ their voting power to redistribute the possessions of the wealthy few. A Democracy that gives unmitigated power to the people quickly deteriorates into the worst kind of tyranny. 4) Instincts and prejudices frequently have meaning: the individual may be foolsh, but the species is wise. The thinking of a few bright persons should not take precedence over tradition. Most of this comes out of Edmund Burke. The Natural Aristocracy theory is primarily from John Adams. The dozens of other conservative thinkers that Kirk discusses tend to modify or enhance the thinking of Burke and Adams. De Tocqueville, for example, sounds the alarm over the potential "Tyranny of Democracy", but that seems to follow from Burke's thinking on natural rights. I had a few exceptions with some minor points. Kirk argues, for one, that the American Revolution was somehow a "conservative revolution"; but I think you could make a more convincing case that it was in fact an Enlightenment-Liberal revolution. Also, he has a tendency to lump all of the different Liberals and Leftists together into a single agglomeration of "Benthamites" (after the British utilitarian/socialist philosopher Jeremy Bentham). On the whole, however, I can recommend this one to any reader interested in understanding how people think politically.

A Founding Document of Modern Conservatism:
Russell Kirk burst onto the scene in 1953 with the publication of THE CONSERVATIVE MIND, which helped set the course of conservative thought for years. (Murray Rothbard wrote somewhere that prior to this work, conservatives were generally called "the right.") This work went through several editions, and the final (seventh) edition came out in 1986. The focus of this book is Anglo-American conservatism, however Tocqueville does get some attention. Kirk starts with his hero, Edmund Burke (widely seen as the father of modern conservatism) and develops the principle conservative themes down to roughly present times. I found Kirk's discussion of American history quite interesting. He sees Jefferson as a conservative thinker and views Hamilton as a liberal. Kirk introduces you to a number of important authors who aren't generally mentioned by conservatives today. One such writer is the W.H. Mallock who wrote a number of important works attacking socialism and liberalism. Kirk's discussion of Mallock is important in that Mallock emphasized the importance of inequality. As Mallock noted, society advances when those of superior ability are permitted to utilize their talents as much as possible. The less able are in fact the principle beneficiaries of such a system. (This is what Ayn Rand called the "pyramid of ability" principle years later. Hence George Reismann, in CAPITALISM, appears incorrect in claiming that it was Rand who first identified the principle.) Russell Kirk was a member of the Old Right (other leading representatives being Robert Nisbet, Richard Weaver, and Donald Davidson). It's not quite accurate to label him a "paleoconservative" because paleoconservatism has a populist bent not present in the Old Right.