A critique of pure conservatism

I want to critique what I call:

Pure conservatism

Pure conservatism is a view held by few people. In terms of honest proponents of the view, I think they are likely found on both sides of the political spectrum, but especially in the center- the only place where it may be somewhat common. It is the view that we should be extremely reluctant to make changes.

Pure conservatism is not dependent on the type of changes- although the proponent may cautiously support a few changes they feel there is evidence for, and may support small, localized changes as an experiment. A proponent of pure conservatism would likely:

1. Oppose the ending of Roe v Wade- since it was settled law and shaped political institutions for the better part of a lifetime.

2. Support neither significantly greater leniency, nor significantly greater severity in criminal justice, especially if achieved quickly.

3. Oppose environmental destruction.

4. Oppose wars of foreign adventure.

5. Oppose both the abolition, radical expansion, or rapid changes to the welfare state.

6. Oppose expanding recognition of trans rights, but also oppose any kind of drastic ‘crackdown’ on trans people.

Of course the nature of philosophies like this is that most proponents have one or two (or a dozen or so) pet exceptions that they feel are justified. This is not necessarily inconsistent, because they may feel there is overwhelming evidence or reasons in some or another case.

The pernicious and common view that pure conservatism is in anyway compatible with actually existing rightwing politics- either now or anytime in the last few hundred years- should be rejected. C.f. Corey Robin- The Reactionary Mind- for good discussion. Most actually existing right-wingers [those of them who aren’t stupid] are careful to distinguish their view from pure conservatism- although I don’t think they have been very successful in creating a principled alternative.

There are two possible reasonably good justifications for pure conservatism as I see it:

1. A sense that things are phenomenally good now compared to most of history so we shouldn’t roll the dice.

2. A sense that society is more unstable than it appears, and this or that seemingly innocous intervention might lead to civil war, anarchy and mass death.

I don’t find these arguments tremendously compelling by themselves, but I think the bigger problem is the counterarguments to the doctrine.

The first problem: is that in a rapidly changing system, there is no theoretical guarantee that stopping some changes will make the system as a whole more stable. Stopping some changes can increase the overall rate of change, and decrease its stability. We might elaborate this in terms of the theory of the second best in economics. Per John Leach:

“The theory of the second best states that if all of the distortions in the economy cannot be eliminated, all bets are off. Eliminating or reducing another distortion might raise welfare, but can just as easily reduce welfare.”

Once there is at least one distortion in the economy you can’t remove (and there always is), there is no guarantee that removing the distortions you can remove will make things better. Indeed, your best bet may be to introduce additional distortions. The same is true of change. Once you can’t stop all forms of change, there’s no guarantee that stopping a particular form of change will slow change as a whole. Indeed if you want to slow change overall, your best bet might be to change things- potentially even quite drastically.

Consider measures against inequality. At first blush these might seem like an open shut case- attempts to change society, non-conservative- yet they can just as easily be seen as stabilization efforts- both inasmuch as inequality has been rising, and insofar as inequality appears to be having corrosive political and social effects.

What about something like gay marriage? Surely that can’t be justified in terms of the stabilization of society? Actually, I think it can. We have these fundamentally liberal norms. When the point that banning gay marriage is incompatible with those norms was raised, we had a choice- abandon or mar those norms, or accept gay marriage. If we’d actually rejected gay marriage in the long term, that would have been a profound and effectively ‘constitutional’ change to our self-conception and practice.

Obviously, being that I’m on the left, I do not accept the claim that all changes should be stabilization efforts, but I think even if we step into this framework- improvements are usually in part attempts at stabilization of some already existing states of affairs.

Another way to think about this is that we only control the political sphere when we are doing politics. If the economic, technological and the cultural spheres proceed apace, spinning out as they will without the political sphere actively guiding, there is little reason to think this will be stabilizing.

The second problem: The second problem is even more fundamental, and it is that change- and indeed rapid and drastic change compared to most of history- is itself a part of our society. Many load bearing aspects of our society depend on rapid change- cultural, economic and even political. We can imagine then a metaconservative who wants the level of conservation and change, and the processes involved, to remain stable. However, even metachanges in how things change are likely loadbearing in our society so we might have to imagine a metametaconservative, and so on and so forth. Our society depends on change and indeed ‘progress’. Without these, we would not just stagnate (as the conservative wishes) but likely collapse.

Some concluding thoughts: the pure conservative is right in their sense that we should think very carefully about what we do and consider how consequences spin outwards. Personally, I’m on the far left, but it seems to me that all of the political spectrum- left, right and center, are unreflective and unstrategic in a way I find both unserious and uncomfortable. Nevertheless, “think carefully before you do anything” is not an insight unique to conservatism.

The pure conservative may also be right that our spinning, swirling and wild mode of social change will destroy us in the end, but there’s no getting off this horse now. Hopefully, if it does, what ever comes in our place will take the better lessons, and leave the worse.

Let me be unbearably pretentious for a moment. I think of the Tao Te Ching counselling inaction for the wise ruler. It’s not clear to me that now, in this unfolding cascade, we know what ‘inaction’ would be.