Conservatism and Ideology

Matthew Johnson, Mark Garnett, David Walker, Matthew Johnson, Mark Garnett, David Walker, Matthew Johnson, Mark Garnett, David M Walker

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781138852020
• eBook ISBN: 9781317528999
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Michael Oakshott described conservatism as a non-ideological preference for the familiar, tried, actual, limited, near, sufficient, convenient and present. Historically, conservatives have been associated with attempts to sustain social harmony between classes and groups within an organic, hierarchical order grounded in collective history and cultural values. Yet, in recent decades, conservatism throughout the English-speaking world has been associated with radical social and economic policy, often championing free-market models which substitute the free movement of labour and forms of competition and social mobility for organic hierarchy and noblesse oblige. The radical changes associated with such policies call into question the extent to which contemporary conservatism is conservative, rather than ideological. This book seeks to explore contemporary conservative political thought with regard to such topics as, 'One Nation' politics and Big Society, sovereignty, multiculturalism and international blocs, paternalism and negative liberty with regard to narcotics, pornography and education, regional and international development, and public faith, establishment and religious diversity.

This book will be published as a special issue of Global Discourse.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Citation Information
• 1. Introduction: Conservatism and ideology
• 2. What does it take to be a true conservative?
• 3. The conservative minimum: historical and transcendent subject
• 4. The unconscious Indianization of ‘Western’ conservatism –is Indian conservatism a universal model?
• 5. ‘The weaker-willed, the craven-hearted’: the decline of One Nation Conservatism
• 6. Neoliberalism, conservative politics, and ‘social recapitalization’
• 7. The rhetoric of neoliberalism in the politics of crisis Andrew Scott Crines
• 8. Government open data and transparency: Oakeshott, civil association and the general will
• 9. Book Review Symposium: Reconstructing conservatism? The Conservative Party in Opposition, 1997–2010
• 10. Book Review Symposium: The Conservatives since 1945: The Drivers of Party Change
• Index