Defining Conservatism

This is a follow-up to the discussion that followed on this post, and to a lesser extent on this one, about the definition of neo-conservatism and of conservatism in general. In a comment on the first one, Grumpy suggested that everyone read George H. Nash's The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America Since 1945. As it happens, I own a copy of that book, but have not yet read it. So I decided to start. I haven't gotten very far, but in the introduction Nash discusses the question of defining conservatism in a way that I think is useful, so I'm going to post a somewhat lengthy excerpt from it. In the paragraph below, the emphasis is mine, and is my own view.

Because this is an examination of what I have labeled "conservatism" in the postwar period, readers may perhaps expect a definition: what is conservatism? For those who have examined the subject, this is a perennial question; many are the writers who have searched for the elusive answer. Such an a priori effort, I have concluded is misdirected. I doubt that there is any single, satisfactory, all-encompassing defintion of the complex phenomenon called conservatism, the content of which varies enormously with time and place. It may even be true that conservatism is inherently resistant to precise definition. Many right-wingers, in fact, have argued that conservatism by its very nature is not an elaborate ideology at all.

One of the few Internet conversations in which I've ever lost my temper occurred in this context: a Thomist insisted that if conservatives could not supply a rigorously specific definition, acceptable to the Thomist mind, of the word "conservatism," then the term must be devoid of meaning altogether, with the clear implication that those who used it were hopelessly irrational. (This was on the Caelum et Terra blog a few years ago; I don't remember the topic of the post that led to the discussion.) But there are many things in the world that do not have precise definitions, yet which undeniably exist, although if they attract the attention of intellectuals they may be the occasion of many arguments: What is jazz?, for instance, is a question that can only have a rough answer. Of these things, one can usually assert without too much fear of contradiction that a specific example is of the class being discussed, and another is not, but there are always debatable instances. It's not so much that no definition is possible, as that its boundaries will always be vague. Few would argue that Coltrane's Giant Steps is not jazz--but is Interstellar Space classifiable as jazz only because Coltrane performs it? Certainly there are many who have declared, on hearing the latter, "That's not jazz."

Debates about this sort of thing are fine and useful up to a point, but for my part I find extended terminological arguments tiresome, especially as they're inevitably inconclusive. It's important to remember that the terms involved are descriptive, not prescriptive. 

Attempts to define conservatism abstractly and universally or in terms of one particular set of historical circumstances have led many writers into a terminological thicket.

How shall we extricate ourselves? Great as is the temptation to construct a pattern of my own, I have deliberately refrained from what I believe to be a dubious enterprise. The subject of this book is conservatism as an intellectual movement in America, in a particular period. Not all conservatism; not conservatism as an illustration of an archetype derived, perhaps from a study of feudalism or the Middle Ages. Rather, conservatism at it existed, in a certain time and in a certain place. Conservatism identifiable as resistance to certain forces perceived to be leftist, revolutionary, and profoundly subversive of what conservatives at the time deemed worth cherishing, defending, and perhaps dying for.

That's good enough for me.

At some point, however, an insistent reader may still object to my use of the word "conservative." How, it may be asked, can you label someone a conservative when he was "actually" a nineteenth-century liberal?.... To these questions one answer, I hope, will suffice: I have designated various people as conservatives either because they called themselves conservatives or because others (who did call themselves conservatives) regarded them as part of their conservative intellectual movement. I have counted diverse people within the conservative fold because study shows that, existentially, they belonged to the American conservative ranks in the postwar period. Whatever our sense (or their sense) of the propriety of these alignments may be, that was the way it was.

A nicely pragmatic and empirical approach, which is appropriate, because to me those are characteristics of conservatism. Which is not to say that pragmatism and empiricism are its metaphysical principles: conservatism in itself does not necessarily contain a metaphysical principle, but assumes that the ultimate questions belong to another realm. That's one of the things that distinguishes it from progressivism which frequently, if only unconsciously, is a metaphysical principle. 

(I  wrote all the above last weekend, intending to add a note about neo-conservatism and then post it. But before I could do that, Monday morning arrived with the news of the pope's resignation.)

Neo-conservatism presents an example of the definitional problem. Twenty or thirty years ago there was a reasonable amount of agreement about what it meant, although I am not going to attempt to formulate a definition. At minimum, it was known to refer mainly to specific people--Irving Kristol and Norman Podhoretz among Jewish intellectuals, Michael Novak and George Weigel among Catholic, et.al.  I have never been able to see that it was fundamentally different from any already-existing form of conservatism: it only mixed those existing strains in somewhat different proportions. But for various reasons, including hostility from both the left and the right, it became in many circles a pejorative used so indiscriminately that it became almost meaningless, and sometimes a veiled expression of anti-Semitism. And it's harder than ever to distinguish it from conservatism in general. As Rob G maintained when this was last discussed, this can be taken to mean that neoconservatism has mostly replaced conservatism proper. I don't really agree with this, but either way the case for holding on to the term is weakened, precisely because of the original definitional problem. It's hard to complain that a definition has been tampered with if it was never clear in the first place.

So if I were Supreme Arbiter of Nomenclature, I would forbid its use except in reference to the original group. 

For millions of adherents to Actually Existing Conservatism (Rob's term), conservatism consists of three ideas: limited government, free markets, and a strong national defense. Is that neo or paleo or what? They don't care. There's a reason why Nash's book is about the conservative intellectual movement. AEC is not my idea of conservatism, but they don't care about that, either, and I just have to shrug and remind myself that it's a label to be worn lightly.

 

Comments

[Rob G]

My interest in the nomenclature of conservatism revolves around my belief that much of today's Actually Existing Conservatism isn't really conservative, but is a sort of right-liberalism. It rejects certain Enlightenment ideas but accepts others rather uncritically, most notably an individualist autonomy (esp. in the political and economic realms) and a belief in human progress viewed as an ever-increasing instrumentalist control of nature by man.

One of the most difficult things to get AEC's to see is that the sexual autonomy preached by today's 'liberals' and the economic autonomy evident in consumerism and corporate capitalism have the same Enlightenment patrimony.

[Art Deco]

One of the most difficult things to get AEC's to see is that the sexual autonomy preached by today's 'liberals' and the economic autonomy evident in consumerism and corporate capitalism have the same Enlightenment patrimony.

And the implications of that are what? What do we do to avoid an 'enlightenment patrimony'

1. Re-institute hereditary subjection?
2. Reconstruct trade guilds?
3. Confer allodial property rights on those the nobility, clergy, and chartered foundations?
4. Re-construct open-field villages?

[Mac]

I expect Rob is speaking in an "ideas have consequences" way.

"much of today's Actually Existing Conservatism isn't really conservative, but is a sort of right-liberalism"

Oh yeah, I agree completely with that, but if you try to argue the point with someone who doesn't, you soon find yourself in that terminological thicket that Nash mentions. One can say it's conservative of the classical liberal tradition. There's no authority to which you can turn for a definitive statement of the meaning of the term. So when I run into that I find it more useful to turn the question into whether that Enlightenment patrimony is a good or bad thing rather than whether it's conservative.

[Art Deco]

Ideas may have consequences. So does social habit. So does physical geography. So does technology. So does demographics. So do pre-articulate tendencies in human behaviour.

If you institute price controls, you get shortages. If you extend various sorts of benefits through public agency, you get rent-seeking behavior. It really matters very little what the 'patrimony' of your 'ideas' is (and no, I concede very little to Rob G on this point).

[Art Deco]

"much of today's Actually Existing Conservatism isn't really conservative, but is a sort of right-liberalism"

Statements like that amount to the peacock displaying his tail feathers.

[Mac]

I would say rather that it's a perfectly reasonable view, and wonder why it produces such a snide reaction from you.

[Art Deco]

Because it is a form of word play which cannot be translated into description of actual social relations.

[Rob G]

"I find it more useful to turn the question into whether that Enlightenment patrimony is a good or bad thing rather than whether it's conservative."

Yes, I agree. In those cases the terminology isn't nearly as important as the ideas behind it.

And of course, the Enlightenment patrimony isn't all bad. But Christians, especially Catholics, should be aware of how very anti-Christian, and specifically anti-Catholic, much Enlightenment thought was.

Art, I was very specific about what in the Enlightenment patrimony I believe is objectionable. Don't be one of these clowns who immediately accuses people like me of being against indoor plumbing and modern dentistry.

[Robert Gotcher]

I don't think indoor plumbing was an enlightenment idea. Nor was modern dentistry.

[Art Deco]

Art, I was very specific about what in the Enlightenment patrimony I believe is objectionable.

Rubbish.

Don't be one of these clowns who immediately accuses people like me of being against indoor plumbing and modern dentistry.

I challenged you to make plain the implications of your mess in terms of commonplace social phenomena. What does that look like? Thomas Storck and John Medaille at least make some attempts. Let's see our host stop running interference for you and let's see you put your cards on the table.

[Mac]

Not so much running interference for as agreeing with.

"the Enlightenment patrimony isn't all bad. But Christians, especially Catholics, should be aware of how very anti-Christian, and specifically anti-Catholic, much Enlightenment thought was."

Yes. Seems to me the big question of our time is whether we can keep the good stuff and correct the bad. I'm not optimistic at the moment.

[Louise]

Does the Enlightenment patrimony offer us anything good, which the Church and the Gospel hadn't already provided?

I don't know enough to answer that question.

[Rob G]

Art: I am interested primarily in one thing -- that contemporary American conservatism comes to see that corporate capitalism and its associated consumerism are detrimental to and corrosive of the social values that conservatives claim to hold dear.

"What this looks like" is a secondary concern. Before we start tossing around solutions it'd be nice to realize we have a problem. That's what I see as the first goal: recognition of the problem. Let's see if we can't wake up the folks in the burning house before we start drawing up blueprints for the reconstruction.

[Mac]

That's a difficult question to answer, Louise. We can certainly say, and I tend to believe, that anything good in the Enlightenment was present implicitly in Christendom. But the fact is that an explosion of technological progress, political freedom, and, broadly speaking, wealth followed the Enlightenment and a major diminishment of the Church's place in society. ("broadly speaking" because as we all know industrialism created terrible conditions for some people even as it raised the general material standard of living.) So to argue that those things would have happened in Christendom anyway, and perhaps without some of the harshest accompanying problems, is at best speculative.

[Louise on the new 'puter]

We can certainly say, and I tend to believe, that anything good in the Enlightenment was present implicitly in Christendom.

That's my gut feeling.

[Rob G]

"We can certainly say, and I tend to believe, that anything good in the Enlightenment was present implicitly in Christendom."

Yes, and Enlightenment thought itself contains opposing tendencies, some of which are reconciliable with the Faith and some that are not. The overall trend, however, seems to be that the liberal, "progressive" tendencies devour or at least undermine the Christian, conservative ones. Liberalism is inherently tyrannical, and I think that any strain of thought that's been affected by Enlightenment ideas has at least the potential to become the same, given that one of its foundations is individualistic human autonomy. This is why Christians should remain somewhat wary of all liberalisms, even "classical liberalism," and not just swallow the thing whole.

[Art Deco]

Art: I am interested primarily in one thing -- that contemporary American conservatism comes to see that corporate capitalism and its associated consumerism are detrimental to and corrosive of the social values that conservatives claim to hold dear.

"What this looks like" is a secondary concern.

Which is by way of saying "contemporary corporate capitalism" is corrosive, but you have not a clue about what an alternative to "contemporary corporate capitalism" might be. Your whole exercise is onanistic.

[Mac]

I'm at a loss to understand the level of hostility you bring to this topic, Art. It seems to tap some disproportionate resentment in you.

[Rob G]

~~you have not a clue about what an alternative to "contemporary corporate capitalism" might be.~~

As a matter of fact, I do. I'd argue for a "small-market" form of capitalism with active localist/Distributist principles. I'd like to see far less collusion between Big Business and Big Government. Even though I don't claim to be a full-bore Distributist, I think that Storck, Medaille, et. al., as well as some of the Catholic writers at FPR, are definitely on the right track.

[Art Deco]

Each of these discussions has had one feature in common, Rob G striking poses but never referring to anything one could inspect or evaluate. Why he wishes to do that is a question he can answer himself. Yes it is irritating.

Now, consider the phrase, "contemporary corporate capitalism corrodes social values" blah blah. The obvious questions are:

1. What features distinguish 'contemporary corporate capitalism' from some other economic system?

2. What do you have in mind as an alternative to 'contemporary corporate capitalism'?

3. What social costs are incorporated in altering economic systems?

Life's full of trade-offs and it is stupid to evaluate economic and social systems with a purely configurative inspection. It is not as if there is a ready alternative to 'contemporary corporate capitalism' wherein we can see an absence of social corrosion. Soviet Russia embodied an alternative economic system; it was also a cesspit of divorce and abortion. Japan has more agreeable social metrics (except, ahem, with regard to abortion). It would be rash to attribute that to differences in the economic system. In any case, the place is a locus of 'contemporary corporate capitalism' (and garish advertising and the sex trade and twee popular music); it is also facing incipient demographic implosion, which the United States is not.

One should note that social practice in the United States is decadent in a way it was not the year my father was born, albeit street crime and a certain institutionalized cruelty are less present today. Yet both the world of 1928 and the world today feature 'contemporary corporate capitalism'. It might just occur to us that culture and social relations are influenced by economic practice but not a function of it. (Aside from occurring to us that when you run from some place you run to some place else).

[Rob G]

"It might just occur to us that culture and social relations are influenced by economic practice but not a function of it."

Well, of course. But the effect is reciprocal.

"both the world of 1928 and the world today feature 'contemporary corporate capitalism'"

True, and at that time various conservative critics were sounding the alarm about the rush to embrace "bigness" at the expense of the personal and local. Some of them have proved to be quite prescient.

[Robert Gotcher]

I suppose the question is, without getting into the emotional whirlwind, "What practicable public policies might move us in the direction of a smaller-scale, more local, more family friendly economy." The fact is, the concentration of capital gives the corporations excessive influence in our public life. And that influence, though not always negative, often seeks to undermine social cohesion so as to create more markets and seeks to reduce the expenditure of capital on supporting non-material (spiritual) goods. Hence, we tend to value and through corporate and government money at technical education and the sciences, but not the humanities.

Obviously, the move in the right direction starts with the self and personal choices, and with efforts to educate others as to true values. If we can decrease the consumerist impulse and increase the spiritual impulse, the corporations will have less influence.

[Robert Gotcher]

"throw corporate and government money," not "through."

[Robert Gotcher]

In those days it was the big business Republicans who were supporters of Planned Parenthood, as the original Cheaper by the Dozen hints at.

[Mac]

Backing up from specific legal and policy ideas, I object to the idea that one cannot criticize the philosophical errors of the Enlightenment, and/or posit connections between them and current problems, unless or until one has a complete blueprint for an alternate contemporary social order. Rob's basic point is not exactly startling; it's been under discussion by important thinkers for a century or two now.

[Rob G]

"the move in the right direction starts with the self and personal choices, and with efforts to educate others as to true values. If we can decrease the consumerist impulse and increase the spiritual impulse, the corporations will have less influence."

Well said, Robert. I fully concur. I guess where I see a problem is in getting many conservatives to realize that the consumerist and spiritual impulses are at odds!

[Art Deco]

unless or until one has a complete blueprint for an alternate contemporary social order.

I never suggested he should produce a 'complete blueprint', just as I never mentioned anything remotely related to plumbing or dentistry. I suggested he produce a sketch of an alternative. You notice he produces nothing.

[Art Deco]

I am not sure that Mr. Gotcher is correct when he suggests the balance between the commercial sector and the philanthropic sector has run increasingly against the latter, nor that the study of the humanities is particularly valuable given the condition of the academic humanities in our time.

Work rules are likely more agreeable ('family friendly') than they have been at any time since the advent of industrial discipline in the first three decades of the 19th century. Heavy industry is a rather less prominent part of the economy than it has been at any time in the post-reconstruction era, so the pathologies of scale are not arriving from that front. Mr. Gotcher appears to be referring to the irritants which derive from branded retail trade.

[Rob G]

"Rob's basic point is not exactly startling; it's been under discussion by important thinkers for a century or two now."

Exactly. It's just that many contemporary conservatives are not aware of the discussion. I myself wasn't until seven or eight years ago.

[Mac]

On the contrary, I notice both Rob G's offering sketches. Obviously you want something more detailed: "2. What do you have in mind as an alternative to 'contemporary corporate capitalism'?"

I repeat that to criticize the Enlightenment and attempt to trace the consequences of its errors does not place one under an obligation to supply that alternative.

[Robert Gotcher]

"Work rules are likely more agreeable ('family friendly') than they have been at any time since the advent of industrial discipline in the first three decades of the 19th century." Assuming you can get a full-time, permanent job with benefits. There have, of course, been some gains. But "work rules" is a very narrow slice of the human experience of the economy.

[Art Deco]

On the contrary, I notice both Rob G's offering sketches. Obviously you want something more detailed: "2. What do you have in mind as an alternative to 'contemporary corporate capitalism'?"

He provided no sketch.

I repeat that to criticize the Enlightenment and attempt to trace the consequences of its errors does not place one under an obligation to supply that alternative.

Intellectual genealogies are not my deal. Criticise the Enlightenment all you care to; parsing the effects of this aspect of culture on the run of both public life and mundane life is difficult. When you are done making sport of Voltaire or Gibbon or Hume or Thomas Paine, you are still in the society you are in or contemplating a past world which had a particular set of social relations.

Rob G has not said anything in this discussion that would indicate he has a hypothesis which isolates the ill effects of corporate organization and advertising from anything else that might cause things to go wrong in a society. (Quite apart from having any alternative in mind).

[Art Deco]

Well, Mr. Gotcher, medical benefits as a consequence of employment are an innovation of the 1940s; as a consequence of union membership, they have only a slightly longer pedigree. I believe company pensions appeared in the 1890s as an alternative to putting the very aged to work sweeping the factory floor, but even fifty years later the majority of workers were not expecting ever to retire unless they were disabled and dependent on relatives. My great grandfather retired in 1945 and died in 1949; he spent 3 months of the year with one son and 9 months with the other. He was born in 1857.

People do not work at home on a farm or in an artisan's establishment with journeymen and apprentices, so in that sense the workplace is less family friendly. I had a proximate relation who quit farming in 1949; he had a number of employments over the next decade and then settled into a job as a salesman which he held until his retirement in 1996. He was not sentimental about farming ("it was a hard life"). One fine day in 1957 his father finished some morning chores and headed inside for his breakfast before a day in the field; after breakfast, he had his customary brief nap; he died during the nap; he was 86 years of age.

I have nothing against blacksmiths and silversmiths. It is just that I have not a clue how to revive craft production.

[Paul]

I have a deep sympathy with conservative ideas and ideals and a deep disgust for the Conservative Party, precisely because the latter's enthralment to the money markets means they will sacrifice any of their ideas and ideals, and indeed the nation's industrial base, to please the bankers and financiers.

To make neoliberal economics and enthralment to the money markets *part of* the ideas and ideals of conservatism, rather than recognise how inimical they are to them, is to make political conservatism a self-contradicting joke. It is possible to point out that this is a problem without having any idea what a practicable solution might be, just as it is possible to point out that somebody is bleeding without having a clue about tourniquets.

[Robert Gotcher]

The Enlightenment reached its peak just as industrialization began. The steam engine isn't itself an Enlightenment idea. The effect of the Enlightenment was to truncate the meaning of the humanum so that the use made of the steam engine was oppressive. It made a materialist world view more "normal." Industrialization made possible a concentration of power which magnified the possibility of abuse. There is no doubt that there have been efforts to counter the effect, some more successful, some less so. To the extent that they involve either big government, the largesse of the wealthy, or both, they are simply a stop-gap, rather than an ordering of society according to the our social-human-spiritual nature.

Does that require guilds or master-apprentice systems? The first question is, what is wrong with them? They may not be as efficient according to a materialist interpretation of efficiency, but it certainly would be more human--or something like it.

Anything can be corrupted or abused, though.

I once worked for a quality assurance company. It was one of the most disedifying experience I've had. It is the Enlightenment-fueled understanding of what constitutes Quality and Efficiency which led to dehumanizing workplaces, even if there were pensions and health benefits. The benefits were granted because of external pressure or because they were seen as a means to an end--efficiency and production--and profit.

Is there an alternative? In order to come up with an alternative we need to change our own minds and hearts and those of many others; then alternatives will become more apparent. In the mean time we can individually and in small groups, or in our own workplace, whether we are owner or worker, live in a way that is more human.

[Mac]

Very well said, Robert.

[Rob G]

"Rob G has not said anything in this discussion that would indicate he has a hypothesis which isolates the ill effects of corporate organization and advertising from anything else that might cause things to go wrong in a society."

I believe that Enlightenment economics attempted to turn greed into a good by redefining avarice as "self interest," thus effectively removing it from the list of deadly sins (Edward Skidelsky has called this the "emancipation of avarice"). This idea loosed into the world a new philosophical view of the getting and keeping of wealth, one which went against the classical/Christian understanding of same. This economic idea, coupled with the Enlightenment's emphasis on the autonomy of the individual, set in motion a system whereby monetary accumulation is not only seen as a good, but is seen as the primary measure of progress.

Corporate organization and mass advertising exacerbated an already-existing problem by preaching this gospel of acquisitiveness to all and sundry. Happiness was having stuff, and stuff could be purchased on the installment plan. Thus happiness came to be seen as a function of how much you had.

This infection is so complete that the entire culture now operates on a biggerbetterfasterstronger principle, and we find ourselves in a society in which gratification of the self is the primary objective, and not only gratification, but gratification now. Talk about onanism -- the advertising industry is all about the creation of one gigantic masturbatory session.

And please, no BS about how "people were always greedy." Of course they were. But it's only in the past couple hundred years that greed began to be accepted societally as a good.

[Art Deco]

I believe that Enlightenment economics attempted to turn greed into a good by redefining avarice as "self interest," thus effectively removing it from the list of deadly sins (Edward Skidelsky has called this the "emancipation of avarice"). This idea loosed into the world a new philosophical view of the getting and keeping of wealth, one which went against the classical/Christian understanding of same. This economic idea, coupled with the Enlightenment's emphasis on the autonomy of the individual, set in motion a system whereby monetary accumulation is not only seen as a good, but is seen as the primary measure of progress.

1. Whatever physiocratic theoreticians thought they were doing or proposed in the realm of normative considerations, contemporary economics seeks to provide a description of collective behavior through stylized models and statistical research. Working economists are very clear that prescriptive answers to distributional questions are not to be had with these methods. Again, the descriptions are stylized. The models assume self-interest because that is the sort of behavior which can be treated most systmatically.

2. It is absolutely madcap to conflate 'self-interest' with 'greed'.

3. You seem to have confounded quite a mass of people, including the ordinary run of economist, with Scrooge McDuck. It is fairly common to see improvements in the production of goods and services as a measure of progress, but that is a different thing than 'monetary accumulation'.

4. Advertising is meretricious, but for established goods and services it serves mainly as an attempt to persuade people to make use of one provider rather than another for some object they already have.

5. One thing that occurs to me reading this is that you do not give people much credit. Do you honestly think large swaths of middle-aged adults think their personal happiness is contingent on replacing their Allstate insurance with GEICO insurance? People do have a lower threshhold of tolerance for discomfort than they once did. Just as an aside, my grandmother at age 75 had lost about 2/3 of the teeth on her upper plate; my mother at that age was having some novel problems but had 29 of her original teeth, albeit a great deal of gold in her mouth; nearing fifty, I have hardly a filling. There's a reason my grandmother had a higher tolerance for discomfort than I do, and not because she listened to too many Pepsi Cola ads on the radio.

[Art Deco]

Industrialization made possible a concentration of power which magnified the possibility of abuse.

I would suggest that you read Jerome Blum on the operations of early modern feudalism in Eastern Europe. There is more than one way to abuse people.

[Art Deco]

As a matter of fact, I do. I'd argue for a "small-market" form of capitalism with active localist/Distributist principles. I'd like to see far less collusion between Big Business and Big Government.

The principal colluders are as follows:

1. The financial sector. The trouble is that the impetus to suborn the state is a function of being heavily regulated, but the option of deregulation cannot be properly pursued in this sector;

2. Extractive industries;

3. Agribusiness, which is generally fairly decentralized.

4. Real estate, which is also quite deconcentrated (and heavily regulated).

A good deal of this is driven not by business, the political activities of which are often prophylactic and defensive, but by sleazy politicians. Your problem is less 'corporate consumer capitalism' than it is chuckschumerism.

What you gonna do? I miss the small bookstores which used to populate various neighborhoods where I have lived, but it is difficult to see how you preserve a position for them without being quite coercive and promoting rent-seeking behavior.

[Art Deco]

I have a deep sympathy with conservative ideas and ideals and a deep disgust for the Conservative Party, precisely because the latter's enthralment to the money markets means they will sacrifice any of their ideas and ideals, and indeed the nation's industrial base, to please the bankers and financiers.

If you were a real Brit, you would be disgusted by David Cameron's history of enthrallment to orthodontists and dentists, leading to a most unnatural and unBritish countenance.

Unlike....

[Robert Gotcher]

The fact that there are other forms of abuse at other times does not in any way impact the evil of the type of abuse we are describing in modern, capitalistic systems. It is a non-sequitur and a red herring to bring feudalism up.

No one, I think, is saying that modern post-enlightenment capitalism is the worst human society EVER. We are simply saying that some of the more anti-Christian principles of the enlightenment (not all the principles) have endarkened our society in a particularly and peculiarly insidious way. It is an evil effect of bad ideas.

[Mac]

"If you were a real Brit..." You should know to be wary of making assumptions about people you encounter on the net.

[Mac]

I don't have time to say much here, but just one quick observation, not necessarily on the main point: I do think there's a valid distinction between the idea that people should be left to themselves to work out economic matters to their own benefit, and the enshrinement of greed. Obviously there have to be some pretty strong limits on what's permissible in that first case, but the basic idea is fine. The more fundamental problem with the Enlightenment legacy, I think, is the elimination of the transcendent as a real factor in social and political matters, and the concomitant elimination of purpose beyond the immediate material.

[Rob G]

"It is absolutely madcap to conflate 'self-interest' with 'greed'."

No time to respond at length now, but the point is that avarice came to be seen as mere self-interest, and thus was no longer sinful. Tearing down barns and building bigger ones changed from folly to wisdom.

"A good deal of this is driven not by business, the political activities of which are often prophylactic and defensive, but by sleazy politicians."

Left-libs always blame the corporations, right-libs and libertarians always blame the state. Fact is, the abuses are driven by both. Our modern Leviathan has two heads.

To a certain type of conservative the only bad capitalism is crony capitalism, and the bad part of it is related entirely to the cronyism. It never seems to occur to them that beyond a certain size capitalist enterprises almost inevitably become cronyist, and that perhaps there is something inherently problematic with capitalism itself.

On middle class consumerism, look what "large swaths of middle ages adults" do on Black Friday. Look at the knuckleheads who line up overnight in freezing weather or rain to get the latest piece of junk that Apple or Microsoft convinces them is so much better than what they currently have that they just have to have it.

Really, can you look at this and tell me it's not completely FUBAR? Really?

[Paul]

Our modern Leviathan has two heads.

I'm not sure it has. It might just be two faces.

[Paul]

"Call me Dave" can do whatever he wants with his own mouth, Art. I'm sure your teeth are pearly white and lined up neatly, and that you're very proud of the fact, but we don't have an obsession with dentistry, or much interest in other people's.

The idea that the recession is best met by instituting expensive policies to harass the unfortunate and squaddies, or simply make life harder for people out of work, and lining the pockets of their friends in the City, while insisting that "we're all in this together", shows a clear non-grasp of old-fashioned Toryism. Although admittedly, talking unity while sowing divisiveness has a long, if undistinguished, political pedigree.

[Art Deco]

It is a non-sequitur and a red herring to bring feudalism up.

No, it is not. The feudal and manorial order is among the alternatives to 'contemporary corporate capitalism'. Different manifestations of it show you how that works out in practice. It puts things in perspective.

[Art Deco]

No one, I think, is saying that modern post-enlightenment capitalism is the worst human society EVER.

No one attributed that view to you.

[Art Deco]

Left-libs always blame the corporations, right-libs and libertarians always blame the state. Fact is, the abuses are driven by both. Our modern Leviathan has two heads.

1. I blamed politicians, not 'the state'. IRS employees get saddled with administering the goodies characters like Barney Frank arrange for their clientele, but these employees are not to blame for this sort of corruption.

2. "Always"? Don't be a knucklehead.