Following the UK’s recent National Conservatism Conference, several commentators highlighted how out of touch the conference was with the national mood, as if to be ‘out of touch’ consigns a movement to history’s dustbin. Never mind that the average journalist doesn’t quite represent the everyman either, or that most popular intellectual movements begin life on the fringes, I think conservatives lose by believing that democracy is an end to pursue in itself. Although conservatism seeks the best for the people, that does not make it democratic, and may even put it in tension with it.
The Tory Party has traditionally maintained a broad coalition of support, since the voting reforms in the mid-19th century cemented a connection between Toryism and the people. Despite Labour enjoying more natural affinity with the working man, it’s the Tories who claim to speak for the whole nation. Particularly since the Brexit vote and 2019’s Red Wall, the Tories have leant into this demographic hard.
One can’t neglect the reality of liberal democracy, and conservatives should be savvy enough to capitalize on it. By standing for pragmatism and adaptability, a conservative politician even has the edge over the utopian instincts of democrats, socialists, and liberals. But conservatism should care about liberal democracy as an instrumental good, not one that contains significant moral weight. Great leaders are naturally popular with their citizens: history teaches that the line between demagogues and dictators is thin. In his essay Politics as Vocation Max Weber’s archetypal politician is authoritative, iron-fisted and most of all charismatic, winning the people over then harnessing the non-rational demos towards a common good.
The common good may not align with the latest opinion polls. Historically, plenty of conservative theorists have been sceptical of democracy. The phrase ‘national conservatism’, doesn’t imply a defence of liberal democracy, only that conservatism ought to capture a national spirit and prioritise the welfare of its citizens above other nations’. Liberal conceptions of nationhood still can’t escape atomization, unable to recognize the importance of organic collectives with communal identity.
Liberals also have a skewed anthropology. They believe there is an inherent desire for freedom or democracy as abstract ideals. But people seek wealth, security, glory and strength. The public have little desire or aptitude for policy-making. Plato compared statecraft to sailing a ship: one experienced navigator will always beat dozens of inexperienced, quarrelsome sailors.
To excavate the link between conservatism and democracy we must return to a primordial version of vox populii as sketched out by Romantic theorists such as de Maistre and Rousseau. These men understood society as an organic whole – a conservative doctrine – but did not consider liberal elections the extension of that philosophy. Rousseau believed in some national essence that leaders embodied on behalf of the people, which put the nation above individuals. Where the people resisted the will of the nation, they were in fact resisting their own interests. It was supremely illiberal. De Maistre believed the French Revolution’s triumph of liberalism a defeat for the people, instead defending Christian monarchism. Importantly, he argued there were compelling, non-rational grounds for authority, and it was precisely the invoking of rationality and preferences – as liberal democracy does – that created disorder in society.
Many of the world’s most popular leaders are nationalists, anti-globalists, populists, and religious conservatives. Here emerges the kind of democracy a conservative can utilize, knowing the group rationality of the demos is instinctively conservative and selfish. The Conservative Party knows this, hence why they started throwing ‘red meat’ to their supporters with anti-immigration, anti-elite, and anti-woke rhetoric. Although many ‘red meat’ policies are unnuanced and/or dumb, they demonstrate the affinity between conservatism and the people.
It is not just in the UK either. If anything, the UK has experienced milder backlash to globalization than continental Europe. The ascendancy of conservative movements throughout Europe (only six of the 27 EU member states have left-of-centre government) shows the limits of globalist-elite thinking. Eventually people tire of being told their natural inclinations toward familiarity and home are incorrigibly outdated. The policies of a 21st-century nation Western state are a marvel of social engineering but it is a very precarious structure. Dozens of etiolated cultures will either put down new roots, seeking fertile soil, or casually waste away. This process won’t be obvious, but in fifty years’ time the hallmarks of decline (or new birth) shall be laid bare. The metrics shall vary from architecture, fertility rates, religious attendance, substance abuse, scientific progress and everything in between.
One must not fall off the horse the other way and become anti-democratic, as many political parties and rulers have. A via media must include the demos without succumbing to it. This is the basis of a conservative approach to democracy. C.S. Lewis said that “the mass of the people, who are never quite right, are never quite wrong”; conservatives must reclaim this ambivalence. The ‘mass of the people’ have something to teach the politician, because the politician is detached from reality and elites develop weird opinions. But there’s a reason most people are not politicians. Governance is a skill that needs fine-tuning, and great leaders who seek power without letting it ruin them are rare. The conservative leader is, above all else, excellent at the art of politics – shrewd, personable, realistic, ambitious and concerned with glory.
Conservatism has its sympathies with populism, but must be cautious of its worst tendencies. I am not suggesting we must choose between the ‘people’ and the ‘elites’. There is an ugly facial expression elites wear of sneering condescension towards the common man. Insofar as the common man sees that expression and seethes, conservatives can use that emotion. But the populist panders to the people and becomes a mouthpiece for their grievances. A great leader sets himself apart from the mass and lives by higher principles, with the strength to resist public opinion even when it turns against him. The demos cannot be ignored, for the sake of maintaining power and governing for the common good, but leaders must never submit to the androgynous blob of ‘public opinion’ in place of principle. If leaders are out of touch with their voters, they are allowed to say that the people are wrong.
There is a way to thread the needle of democracy and conservatism, symbolized by Weber’s great leader, who reenchants the political landscape with charisma and visionary leadership. Conservatives resist the technocratic onslaught and the populist backlash by producing someone who acts for the good of the people while clearly governing them.
The Four Discoursemen 