Conservatism of Edmund Burke — Richard Bourke

it's important to realize that the identification of Burke with conservatism is a result of one particular event in world history and his position the position that he took in relation to that one event and that one event is defined revolution because Burke took a critical position in relation to the Revolution he subsequently later became associated with conservatism but of course that's a sort of complicated move so to speak about Burke and conservatism therefore involves having of you essentially three things first of all obviously Burke second of all conservatism and third of all the French Revolution which is a sort of key moment in world history in relation to which people orientate themselves in connection with whether something is conservative just to say traditional or retrograde or progressive and so I'm going to say a bit about each of those in and say a bit about Burke a bit about the French Revolution and a bit about conservatism because that I think saying something about all three essentially clarifies the position so we're working South was both a statesman and thinker writing in the 18th century and who's obliged as a statesman to take up positions in relation to basically British domestic politics the Britain at the time was both an imperial power underworlds power as a result of which Burke necessarily had to take up the positions in relation to international trade the British colonies and the European balance of power it's a result of this last issue the European balance of power that the French Revolution became important to him because anything that happened in France which was a leading power in the 18th century affected Britain so it was a result of that as soon as the revolution broke in France he was obliged in some cells to make a response as I said at the beginning he's responsible was it was critical and that's because interestingly he associated the revolution not with progress but with retrogression in other words he thought it was a step back in history not a move forward that's sort of difficult for modern commentators to understand because it's so fundamental to modern thinking both in Europe and in the United States and of course in Russia especially also it's so fundamental to think of the French Revolution as a progressive moment in history that's largely because I would say because of 2td ologies one the idea that the french revolution necessarily culminated in liberal democracy that's one two the ology the notion that something that happened in 1789 was inevitably going to develop it into the post-war and Western settlement liberal democracy in other words the so the second Association other word the second terminus as it's often seen of the revolution is communist revolution and thus to say Marxism Leninism was highly influential in construing 1789 as a stepping-stone on the way to comprehensive proletarian revolution but of course that's a view of history not in a store called fact and once again I would say there is no necessary connection between 1789 once again it's worth emphasizing the attempts to establish a parliamentary monarchy and France and proletarian revolution appropriate world's proletarian revolution so that's all a long way of saying that the French Revolution is associated from various angles with modern progressive ideologies but these are views of progress and God for his part had a different view of progress and he thought the attempts to stablish parliamentary monarchy in France was retrogressive not progressive and not anticipating these other later developments because how could it anticipate these other later developments because it's never thought of these later developments so the question is why did birth think that it was a retrogressive rather than progressive and that's because he thought the French attempt to establish parliamentary monarchy was done on the basis of having no durable foundations for the project does to say as far as Park was concerned if you're going to have a parliamentary monarchy you need various component elements and those component elements include intermediary ranks in society but the French Revolution in due course sought to abolish those a parliamentary monarchy would also require a system of property but the French Revolution soon began to undermine the system of property certainly as far as Brock was concerned and would also need sort of some foundation for authority a backdoor to the French Revolution undermined this also so Burke's view is actually that the French attempted to establish something but in the process of time trying to establish it they undermined all the component elements which were prerequisites for its establishment therefore the Revolution was self destroying and as opposed to being there for a moment looking into the sunny uplands of progressive future it was sort of introduced a downward spiral of anarchical strife and struggle into France and a new course in Europe and therefore and if one were to orientate oneself in world history one wouldn't seek to survive one would seek to conserve something it wouldn't be the revolution one well well I have to avoid it and direct themselves down a different course so that's why is that that's why this debate is so complicated works opposition to the revolution is his opposition to what he believed was a delusive vision of progress so by the time that Burke came to write about the French Revolution beginning in February 1790 was the first time we made a public took a public stand on anti revolution he was associated in Europe but particularly in British public life with the defense of two principles the defense of Liberty and the defense of the right of resistance against illegitimate government so this is what people associated him with however it's important to recognize that both these principles had limitations thus to say well the right of resistance had to be under extreme conditions I mean one couldn't just resist you know at all you know innovation to everything everything that one decided opportunity one didn't like and equally Liberty had preconditions for its security so in defending Liberty and the right of resistance he also at the same time was implicitly defending some view of authority so it's right to think of Burke like most political thinkers as defending some notion of authority and because his defense of authority became particularly prominent in the context of his opposition French Revolution people associate him with a sort of conservative defense of authority so it's worth thinking about why that is and it is indeed the case that Burke defended Authority and he defended Authority as having two component elements first of all Authority was legitimate enterprise was supported by popular consent that's number one but rather straightfoward at the same time as far as Burke was concerned Authority was more entrenched in so far as it was supported by what we might call traditional so without reason especially in a book he wrote called reflections on the revolution of France which was published in November of 1790 and Burke launched himself upon a defense of a particular notion of authority are supported by tradition but readers of that work therefore associate Burke with defense of authority as it were no matter what but I think it's important to realize that that is definitely a misinterpretation of what he is saying and of course he's defending some species of authority and some species of tradition but of course it wouldn't take long to recognize that every modern ideology that one can think of is supported by some vision of of tradition thus is a interesting of botulism I mean the support of its tradition there's the paraphernalia of logic escape a tradition there are liberal traditions and so on so forth but one spark is defending some species of authority some species of tradition it's not tradition at all costs as far as Burke was concerned in the end tradition was a way of protecting rights but rights for more fundamental to tradition in other words it's important to realize that for Burke thinking right if you like Trump tradition and therefore tradition is conditional so at this point we're getting into the terrain of conservatism which is often seen as a defense of tradition come what may that's to say a defensive tradition no matter what it's clearly the case that this is not a Brock's position so from that point of view and it's very difficult to an you know present brackets simply conservative there's not that sort of very important point to make enough to say that any virtually any modern political ideology that I can think of is seeking to conserve something and therefore all modern ideologies have some conservative component so I tend to think of conservatism as not a trans historical political category but rather a sort of variable and as soon as one realizes doesn't variable rather than a stable concept and I don't say that's meaningless but it begins to disintegrate and certainly conservative movements have reinvented themselves as traditions but if you then examine those traditions historically you will see that they've changed over time so I would say therefore conservatism is a has been a variable historical project over time and the interesting thing about burke is is that insofar as he associated with conservatism he predates any self-conscious existence of the ideology that's to say in his in the period in which brock is rising she was born in 1730 and dies in 1797 throughout that period the word conservatism doesn't exist in any european language second of all a conservative party does not exist in any European country so that's to say conservatism has to be a sort of belated projection onto the period so that's all to say that conservatism is has no historical traction in the period it makes no clear concern and sort of ideological sense in the period and therefore we have to talk about two problems of burke on conservatism rather than this later historical invention which is the conservatism of edinburgh you

Channel: Serious Science

Views: 45,778

Rating: 4.8446603 out of 5

Keywords: science, lecture, Serious Science, political philosophy, French Revolution, ideology

Id: 2_PM438D7p0

Length: 12min 55sec (775 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 27 2017