The saving grace of conservatives is that they do not like to think very hard, particularly when it comes to abstract theory. But this is also an affliction. On the one hand, conservatives’ distaste for thought seems crucial to their vital role as the ones who prevent society from floating away on flights of utopian fancy. But on the other hand, this leaves them bereft of coherent political philosophy – and this can weaken them at crucial moments.
We see this problem in the current predicament of the U.K.’s Conservative Party. The Tory conference is currently in full swing at the time of writing, and the talk is very much of division. On the one hand, the Thatcherite wing, embodied in Liz Truss (her tenure as Prime Minister was so short it hardly seems appropriate to refer to her as an ‘ex-PM’, though of course she is one), think that conservatism is about a small state and a free market. On the other, the ‘NatCon’ wing, embodied in Suella Braverman, think that conservatism is about national identity. In the middle, figures such as Jeremy Hunt and Michael Gove try to triangulate. Another wild card is what one might call the ‘anti-woke’ brigade, whose avatar is Kemi Badenoch, and who sit uneasily to one side; instinctively small-statist, but keen to use the state’s power to push back on culture war issues.
Nothing quite seems to tie all of these strands together except a mutual distrust of the Labour Party. As somebody who grew up on Merseyside in the 1980s in a Labour-voting household, I share this distrust. But ‘keeping Labour out of power’ is in itself not usually a proposition attractive enough to win over the electorate. Conservatives are going to have to do something which they hate: they are going to have to think. Why should there be a Conservative Party in 2023 and, if so, what should it be for?
Readers who like to play News from Uncibal bingo will not be surprised to hear me argue that the answer has to take us back to the dawn of modern politics, and therefore the figure of Machiavelli. As Leo Strauss convincingly argues in his Thoughts on Machiavelli, the modern era is defined above all by the subject of political power divorced from a doctrine of divine or natural right. And Machiavelli, as the figure who first deliberately and specifically sets out a theory of Government without reference to God or theology, is therefore the first truly modern political philosopher. In understanding modern politics, we must begin with Machiavelli, because he is the one who stated the case for modernity most strongly, at its very inception, when pre-modernity was at its zenith.
Machiavelli lays out the case clearly. If political power is not to rely on a theological justification (and the Conservative Party would obviously be wise to avoid such a justification!) then it has two options. Either it must present itself as a republic or a principality. A republic’s claim to rule is based on the fact that it represents the people: not necessarily in the sense that it is a democracy, but in the sense that it puts in place a system of law which reflects the norms, or nomos, of the populace, so as to maintain the stability of society across time. A republic, in other words, is concerned with keeping the ship on an even keel: making sure that society, in which each member of the population has a stake, continues to exist indefinitely in the manner in which its population is accustomed. A principality’s claim to rule, on the other hand, is based on the fact that it makes material or moral improvements in the lives of the population, and thus retains their loyalty. It does nice things for people, and they therefore like it.
An awful lot follows from the distinction between these two different justifications for government, but the main emphasis that Machiavelli himself lays on the subject is what he calls virtù, which is properly understood as the capacity for self-rule. Where the population are thought to possess this quality, then obviously the state they live in should look like a republic. Where the population are thought to lack it, then they need the rulership of a prince. What Machiavelli doesn’t say, but which naturally follows from this connection between virtù and the form government takes, is that there is therefore an incentive for a ruler who wishes to govern like a prince to construct the population as lacking in virtù – in modern parlance, to conceptualise them as ‘vulnerable’, so he can justify his own position by then doing things on their behalf. (This is the subject of a previous post on Machiavelli.)
This alone, as I hope you can see for yourself, explains an awful lot with regard to modern politics. But it also tells us where conservative parties in general and the Conservative Party in particular are going wrong: they can’t make up their mind what they actually think the job of government is. Do they think it is supposed to instantiate the model of a republic or a principality? And, lacking a coherent understanding, they get sidetracked into blind alleys.
Two such blind alleys are as follows. The first of them is obvious. There is already, in any jurisdiction, one political party which has the selling point of governing like a prince sewn-up. A hint: in the U.K., this party begins with the letter ‘L’ and ends with the letters ‘abour party’. The stock-in-trade of the centre-Left is identifying groups of the population that it can label as being vulnerable and therefore in need of the state’s assistance, and purporting to provide that assistance accordingly. ‘Give me your loyalty and I will give you nice things’ is the manifesto of every centre-Left political party that ever was; all that changes is the nice thing being offered. (Sometimes the nice thing is the avoidance of a nasty thing, as in ‘vote for us and we will prevent climate change’.) Conservatives are foolish to play that game, just as I would be foolish to try to take on Pete Sampras on Centre Court at tennis.
The second blind alley is thinking there is an important division between national ‘populist’ conservatism and free market, small-state conservatism in the first place. And this is where we really see the failure to properly think bear its distasteful fruit. To govern in the republican mode means, as we saw, to administer a system of law deriving from the nomos of the populace, who are perceived in general to have the capacity to govern themselves (since they possess virtù), and as a consequence to maintain the stability of society across time. This is almost the definition of conservatism, and you will see in it no dispute between anyone who has a feeling of patriotism and anyone who believes there should be a small state. In the republican model the point of the state is to be small: its job is not to do nice things for the population, but to do what is necessary to ensure that society remains stable – i.e., making and enforcing rules. And in this we see the distinctions between figures like Liz Truss and Suella Braverman evaporate (or, at least, we should do). The virtues of a free market are obvious, and they are consonant with the virtues of keeping the state’s nose out of society insofar as it is possible to do so, and in reflecting the stable norms of the society in question. Where the job of the state is merely to reflect in law the settled customs and habits, and moral sensibilities, of the population, then it will be small with respect to most things – there simply is no conflict.
Seeing the matter in these terms, of course, helps us deal in particular with the thorny subject of immigration. While a free market is basically a good thing, and strictly speaking free movement of labour supports a free market, open borders are undesirable because of the destabilising effects on society – and immigration should therefore be limited to what is manageable. There is no reason why sensible conservatives, beginning from first principles, should really argue about this, and it is here that we see the real difference emerge, indeed, between centre-right and centre-left. To a party like the Labour party, open borders are a fabulous idea because thereby the pool of vulnerable people, who are reliant on the state’s largesse, will increase. To a conservative political party, borders are (or should be) vital, because they are one of the central legal mechanisms by which social stability is maintained. Nobody should be against immigration on racial grounds, and nobody should be against immigration per se; the point is only that immigration must take place in accordance with legal rules which reflect what the members of the society in question consider to be appropriate.
The standard centre-Left argument against reflecting the will of the people with respect to immigration is always, straightforwardly, ‘Yes, but what if the members of the society in question are racists?’ And hence, of course, princely rule makes its appearance: the population cannot be relied upon to exercise virtù, and hence we must do it on their behalf. Conservatives need to be clear in their own minds why this is not the only sensible answer, and they will find that this clarity, once again, demonstrates no need for fundamental conflict within their midst.
The prospect of defeat has a way of focusing minds, and the U.K. Tory Party, facing a trouncing at the next general election, is showing signs of beginning to go through such a process. But this cannot be cast in terms of a fundamental dispute between free marketeers and national populists, because there is no such fundamental dispute. Obviously, it is totally unrealistic to imagine that we can ever return to A.J.P. Taylor’s prelapsarian world of July 1914, in which “a sensible, law-abiding Englishman could pass through life and hardly notice the existence of the state, beyond the post office and the policeman”. But the conservative vision of the state must nonetheless be a republican one: that its primary function is to administer and enforce a system of law which reflects the settled norms of the population, with a view to maintaining a stable social order which survives intact from one generation to the next. And nothing about this suggests that the state must be particularly big or that it must interfere extensively in the market. This would be a useful starting point for the intellectual project which the Tory Party in particular and conservative political parties in general have ahead of them: divisions between free marketeers and ‘national conservatives’ are relatively minor and can be reconciled. But you have to think about things first.
Dr. David McGrogan is an Associate Professor of Law at Northumbria Law School. This article first appeared on his Substack. You can subscribe here.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
“Fears that restrictions could be in place until Spring”.
Nah, it’ll be much longer than that. Would they bother with all this “vaxport” stuff and so on if this was going to end soon?
Oh and Fon et al, if those “vaccines” are so good, why would they be talking about continued restrictions with all the vulnerable having been offered these injections and 94% (or whatever) volunteering for these trials? An unprecedented rate and still not enough.
Spring? Which one?
I initially thought the vaccine passports were the end goal, but I now think that’s just part of the coercion campaign. The restrictions are obviously part of the coercion campaign, and the new goalpost shift is that not enough people have been stabbed twice.
The goal, in my opinion, is to inject as many people as possible ASAP.
My hypothesis is that they will release a new bioweapon (called “Covid-21”) that will be designed to bypass the s-protein antibodies.
I’m convinced that ADE will occur anyway, but it won’t happen fast enough to prevent the sheep waking up and going violently batshit crazy when they realize what has been done to them.
“Give us our liberty” – Sir Graham Brady.
A pity he’s too principled to be PM…
I think we just have to accept that the majority of the population don’t want liberty. They want to be swaddled, suck on a dummy and call that life.
Slow infantilisation of the British people especially since the death of saint Diana aided by MSM pushing moronic drivel such as “strictly”,repair shop and endless keep fit/exercise “stars” such as Joe Wicks, and don’t get me started on “footie” etc.
Sadly you are correct. Most people don’t want liberty, I find it very strange.
“Give me liberty, or give me death.”
Patrick Henry, 1775
And Fon, why do pharma need a trend of “altering Covid practices” to make “vaccines2 look “positive” if they are so good? Just asking, like.
(Don’t know why I’m asking, they has never once properly addressed my points. I’m all for free speech, but they seems more interested in rudeness and preaching than engaging in good faith).
Bunter is a weak coward, scared out of doing the right thing by a bunch of bought off scientists, if he really did want to end these ridiculous restrictions there are plenty of qualified people available to back that up. The buck stops with him he can’t stand behind Chris Whitty forever. There will be a brief respite over the summer school holidays to appease the middle class skive at homers and then it is another long winter.
Always was the plan. BLiar and co were always after stopping re-opening on June 21st, too risky to leave for too long, before the autumn virus season restarts.
I feel for the young who are destined by the million to a future with no purpose, not those supine middle classes who deserve what is coming.
You are correct. There will almost certainly be a lockdown again this autumn. As you say though sooner or later this will catch up with the self interested middle classes who have enjoyed the last 15 months lazing at home and they will richly deserve everything they get.
The only difference is how much of a reprieve they deign to give us in the meantime. The autumn.winter/spring lockdown is a done deal.
Johnson has abdicated his duty to a dubious group called Sage. He is allowing them to run the country as they see fit, and as they are communist members, anarchists, NGO’s, it’s not looking good. The Tory party need to get rid of Johnson, who got his majority by default.
“they are communist members, anarchists”
Grow up and stop sucking that ludicrous comfort blanket. There’s enough wild fantasy on the Covid side.
These down-votes are a useful measure of the ‘duggie quotient’ on the site – the proportion of hobby-horse jockeys using it to push political fantasies.
Theresa May speech is not good if you break down her speech she basically just saying. Give vaxxed the ability to travel abroad.
I suppose so but at least she is arguing for some form of foreign travel. Johnson seems hellbent on destroying the travel industry.
James Ward, mathematician:- “If you’re trying to run an NHS or even (sic) run an economy, the peak matters.”
These people have completely lost touch with any reality, even assuming they had it in the first place.
How can any country without an economy, which has been destroyed by the government of the day, assisted by the Opposition parties, think it can afford an “NHS”, let alone run one? The same applies to universities (e.g. Imperial, Warwick et al), the police, the Armed Forces, education, industry, transport, housing and the rest.
If you wreck the country, for personal and political reasons, and continue on this track, then the country is well and truly buggered. It’s high time people like Ferguson, along with the cretins that pass for politicians, have any pay withdrawn immediately.
“How can any country without an economy, which has been destroyed by the government of the day, assisted by the Opposition parties, think it can afford an “NHS”, let alone run one? “
It can, as it is demonstrating. The NHS is ‘afforded’ by the people that work within it. Since we are all clearly fed and watered with all our basic needs fulfilled, and yet we still have many people on furlough and the NHS is fully staffed, then we can obviously afford it. We don’t need those working in the NHS to do anything else.
The economy is doing its job and has been since the start of this. What is clear now is that the economy doesn’t work in the way that quite a lot of people believe it ought to. And it is that belief that many are struggling to let go of.
Those on the other side of the debate already knew that the economy can be run like this. So it isn’t a surprise to them when it functions perfectly adequately, nor have they any desire to return to a belief in the way the world works that patently isn’t true.
I don’t agree. The “economy” is now based upon yet more borrowing and QE, which bears no relationship to anything that is sustainable in the future, and won’t be if interest rates rise. The furlough scheme, if it indeed ever ends, will carry future consequential costs, if only in those of unemployment.
I would suppose “basic needs” to include adequate and timely medical treatments of all sorts, which isn’t happening, but I’m delighted to know that the NHS is fully staffed, which appears to run counter to the narrative of there being shortages of nursing staff and doctors.
Whether we are all clearly fed and watered is also questionable. I would agree that there aren’t large numbers of people dying on the streets through starvation, but there are many who live “on the brink”.
I’m afraid I don’t share your Panglossian view, and we must agree to differ.
I don’t agree. QE is propping the country up at the moment and this situation cannot go on forever. It will either cause rampant inflation or the international markets will loose confidence in the U.K.
To use a basic analogy, the U.K. is currently like a person who has lost their job using their credit card and overdraft to fund their lifestyle. While this situation lasts in the short term sooner or later they will hit the buffers and so will the U.K.
Try telling this drivel to families using foodbanks..
I agree, ideally they should also all be made to hand over their personal assets to the state to go towards paying for the damage they have caused but that will never happen. Part of the problem is that many government advisors and senior politicians have never done a days work in the real world and so have no idea how to run things. It should be made into law that nobody can enter government until they have achieved success in business.
ITEM: “Digital certificates for vaccinated Aussies who’ve had Covid jab ” – Australians who receive a Coronavirus vaccine will get a digital certificate to prove they’ve had the jab, according to the Daily Mail Australia“.
Well, it’s here, the vaccine passport heavy-lifter in the push for mass ‘vaccination’. Note that the federal government (a ‘Liberal'[!] Party government, take double note) is leaving it up to the six state and two territory governments to decide if, when and how it will be used to discriminate re access to venues and services. This stance displays all the moral detachment of the armaments manufacturer (‘we just make the things – it’s up to others if they use them’). The second level governments will also likely fob off their ethical responsibility by simply allowing private enterprises and public institutions to make the running on its use. Here’s betting that none will do a de Santis and ban the vax passport’s use in their state. It’s almost as if they sense there is something wrong with medical apartheid and want to keep at arms length from it whilst reaping its benefits.
All sorts of ideas are being floated for vax passport restrictions on Australians’ freedoms – to travel overseas, to cross state borders, to enforce lockdowns, withholding ‘franking credits’ (a key source of income for self-funded retirees), going to the movies, etc.
Ugly!
Phil
South Australia
Who would have thought we would get that from the fit, butch Aussies.
Until Spring? Next year?
Series of studies point towards natural coronavirus spillover event, scientists suggest
“The data that we have in our paper offers an observation that animals capable of being involved in Covid transmission were present in Wuhan up until the point of the epidemic being declared,” Dr Chris Newman, an evolutionary ecologist at Oxford University and co-author of the report, told The Telegraph. “But we don’t know if they had Covid.”
So no bats and no Covid but it all points towards natural emergence of course.
And no comments allowed – of course!
Did anyone seriously think we’d get our ‘freedom’ back on 21st June? If we want this to end WE have to do it! The government sees compliance as consent and it ain’t ever gonna stop! I’ve trying to tell people this over and over, that the unlawful Coronavirus Act is in place until AT LEAST September 2022, to give them enough time to destroy our society, our economy, our health, our minds…and bring in all sorts of new laws, diktats, and biosecurity measures to ensure we can never go back! They’re gas lighting us all the time, whilst laughing in our faces – you’ve only got to look at the marvellous jolly they had in Cornwall, keeping the plebs at arms length, or fully muzzled if they are servants, whilst they all mingled and chatted – rule free. Rules for thee but not for me!
And traveled here by aeroplane with no quarantine
Restrictions “until spring”. I would be quite happy to see restrictions placed upon Johnson, Hancock, Whitty, Vallance, Ferguson, etc., until spring. To only allow them half an hour each day out into the prison exercise yard until the spring… of 2099.
What a turn around.
Teresa May making “libertarian “ Boris look like an irresponsible fool.
Not only that but Boris Johnson has managed to be an even worse Prime Minster than Theresa May – a feat many thought unachievable.
The individual may change, but the script doesn’t.
It isn’t a difficult task – essentially just a statement of the bleedin’ obvious.
https://twitter.com/SpookdBlog/status/1403922367831678980 Have a laugh. Trump spoof.
To give her her due Theresa May is now a very good back bench MP with many sensible ideas and suggestions
Well, one or two (maybe).
Agreed. She was excellent.
She should have been shot as a traitor
Indeed.
“We are not seeking a competitive advantage”
What is the point of having a Prime Minister who thinks like that?
Now that she has received her bribe (AKA fees for a “speaking tour” of the US) for doing her utmost to stymie Brexit she can afford to be.
Her paymasters know she did her best and have released her from further obligations – for now.
Kim Jong-Johnson has never been bold and, in answer to the Daily Mail, Britain will never be free.
I should imagine there are quite a few nervous jabbed footballers around Europe today considering getting a full heart checkup ASAP.
It’s now being claimed that Eriksen had not been jabbed
In the (sort of ) words by Mandy Rice Davies “Well, they would say that, wouldn’t they? “
Isn’t it strange how a number of very senior doctors have suddenly turned into crackpot conspiracy theorists over the past 12 months or so?
Dr Peter McCullough has chaired several medical boards and is one of the most published researchers in his field of medicine. Poor bloke has completely lost it.
https://brandnewtube.com/watch/dr-peter-a-mccullough-fighting-against-this-fake-covid911-hoax_oTqJFiOPAQn5GVf.html
He’s the same doctor he always was.
Meanwhie the world around him has gone insane.
Yes I know he is.
I suspected so but irony doesn’t always comme across well on the internet.
Fair point. It’s probably the way I tell ’em.
It’s just an international p*ssing contest, financed by MMT, which this has degenerated into completely.
Boris&co now concerned that Germany’s numbers are falling whilst ours are rising again- God and the vaccines forbid!
And so on, a vicious circle we’re trapped in.
Until the money has run out.
“We all continue to pay the price of not following a policy of Focused Protection.”
The woke brigade in politics, media and medicine decided to play God instead, financed by MMT and not giving a toss about any collateral damage and victims, least of all in the 3rd world, of course.
To anyone sane, it was always clear how this would end.
“A senior minister has told the Telegraph of his fears that the planned four-week delay to the reopening will leave too short a window to open up before calls to lock down again in the autumn, with the risk that restrictions will remain in place until the Spring”
Well f. me, I never thought of that! Quelle surprise!
(And I never would have believed that the thought : “I thoroughly agree with Theresa May” would ever have crossed my brain).
“We won’t be free until Boris dares to be bold”
“Boris” is now proven beyond doubt to be a eugenicist globalist. If anyone thinks he is somehow going to save us they are exceedingly foolish.
Another useless speculative graph. Reminiscent of the 4000 a day lie.