Statism
What would we do without the so-called conservative “dogmatic aversion to statism”? For starters, we might actually start restraining the power of the central state and breaking up its collusion with concentrated wealth. In other words, we might start combating etatisme. Of course, that’s the point–in practice, most people who call themselves conservatives do not have a “dogmatic aversion to statism,” and when it comes to war and finance they are often defenders of an activist, centralized state. This actually makes a certain amount of sense, as most people who call themselves conservatives are, when you press them, essentially classical liberals, and classical liberals did not have a “dogmatic aversion to statism,” either. By comparison with their traditional conservative and monarchist foes in the 19th century, they were advocates for centralism and the expansion of the role of the state in the name of reason and liberty. Standardization, rationalization and uniformity in law and regulation were what most classical liberals prized, which is one reason why they tended to be strong nationalists hostile to the customs and privileges of regions and local parlements. The separation of modern strands of classical liberalism from nationalism (i.e., some forms of libertarianism) is a curious by-product of 20th century American politics, and I am guessing that this owes a great deal to influence of exiled liberals from central Europe on the evolution of these strands of American classical liberalism. These were exiles who were repelled by the nationalist politics of their home countries. In many European countries, it remains the case that nationalist parties are the direct descendants of classical liberal nationalists and the most classical liberal parties (outside Germany) tend to be inclined towards nationalism. As John says, “statist” is a somewhat useless designation, since at some point almost everyone accepts that there must be a government, and opposition to a centralized state as a matter of principle or “dogma” is a position held by relatively few people and many of them would not call themselves conservatives. Suffice it to say that when Will Wilkinson accepts the moniker “statist,” its value as a pejorative insult has been exhausted.
“The separation of modern strands of classical liberalism from nationalism (i.e., some forms of libertarianism) is a curious by-product of 20th century American politics…”
Lord Acton and Alexis de Tocqueville are by-products of 20th century American politics?
I would suggest that James Madison and Thomas Jefferson are more probable sources of the American conjunction of decentralism and classical liberalism than “exiled liberals from central Europe.” (I presume you mean 20th-century Austrian emigres such as Mises and Hayek.) Madison and Jefferson were both flagrantly inconsistent in their decentralism, but to be an inconsistent decentralist is not the same as to be a committed centralizer. Of course, many of the exiled liberals who came to the U.S. in the wake of the 1848 revolutions were exactly the kind of national liberals you criticize. They reinforced the centralizing tendencies that had developed over time from the National Republicans and Whigs and thereby helped nationalist liberalism win out over decentralist liberalism in late 19th-century America. But the tradition of American decentralist liberalism did not vanish — at the very least it remained available as a rhetorical weapon for anyone who opposed National Republican/Whig/GOP centralizers.
Classical liberalism had different strains, some of which were highly centralist and some of which were decentralist. The centralizers generally prevailed in government — just as centralizing non-liberals (like Bismarck) generally prevailed over decentralist non-liberals. This is where the term “statist” might be quite useful: there are classical liberals, traditionalists, and socialists who are in favor of enlarging the central state to accomplish their objectives. There are also classical liberals, traditionalists, and socialists (of the Bakunin variety, for example) who are opposed to centralized state power even when it might be used to further their own agendas, or who believe that large centralized government’s are inherently inimical to those agendas.
Political philosophies and ideologies are easily appropriated by political parties and governments. Hence to call a politician a conservative or a liberal may reveal very little about his actual policies. But “statist” is a more content-laden term than conservative, liberal, or socialist. That doesn’t mean that centralizers and aggrandizers of state power won’t try to criticize statism and position themselves as anti-statists, but the term, because it is relatively concrete, makes it easier to expose them as frauds. Your post is an illustration of this point: because statism is predicated on something concrete, you can show that so-called anti-statists are not actually against expanding State power or using it aggressively.
One can argue that the conservative movement is not conservative and that modern liberalism is not liberal, but there’s more abstraction and contingency involved in fighting those fights than there is in showing that, say, Republican critics of “statism” are not really arguing for a smaller State. That doesn’t mean “antistatist” can’t be appropriated, but then any term can be appropriated by political actors. There’s something to be gained, though, in making the appropriation as awkward and incongruous as possible.
I would think Madison’s role in the ratification debates supports my observation about the connection between classical liberals, nationalism and centralism prior to the 20th century. Jefferson’s role in arranging the Purchase is hard to square with clear anti-nationalist sentiment. There may be exceptional cases of liberals in the late 18th and 19th who were anti-nationalist (I am skeptical that you can include Tocqueville among them, esp. in light of his later career in Algeria), but like Kuehnelt-Leddihn among the Austrian liberals they would be exceptions that prove the rule. I may have overstated the importance of the emigres from Europe. It seems likely that classical liberals would have already been turning against nationalist ideas in the wake of WWII.
[...] (or a “Conservative”) Posted on 19 February 2009 by nathancontramundi Larison: [M]ost people who call themselves conservatives are, when you press them, essentially classical [...]
Don’t you think that if Jefferson and Madison deserve censure for the Louisiana Purchase and the Virginia Plan they also deserve credit for the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions and Jefferson’s ward republic idea? You expressed puzzlement that classical liberalism and nationalism could be decoupled. But the proto-liberalism of Madison and Jefferson had conflicting nationalizing and decentralizing tendencies from the start. The nationalizing tendencies, not surprisingly, tended to win out whenever they had power. Neither man, however, was as much of a centralizer as their “monarchist foe” Hamilton. There were better Federalists, of course, but they tended to be most anti-expansionist when they were long out of power.
I don’t want to defend the Louisiana Purchase or the Virginia Plan, but let’s not drop the context: the LP was not only an act of expansion, it was also the peaceful removal of an imperial foreign power from America’s doorstep. Madison’s notion of giving the federal government a veto over state legislation, an idea frequently invoked to show his centralizing desires, was more about diffusing power than concentrating it. History has disproved Madison’s belief that power is more diffuse in a large republic than in small states, but he certainly was not trying to create a consolidated nation state. Madisonian federalism, although not decentralized enough for my taste, is not nationalism.
Context is also important in discussing nationalism. Was John Bright a “nationalist” because he supported Home Rule for Ireland and greater autonomy for India? Because, that is, he loved Little England (a nation) rather than the British Empire (not a nation)? The commitment of many classical liberals to nationalism in the abstract arose from opposition to empire. After World War I, that commitment became problematic, but by then classical liberalism was on its deathbed. In any case, there had always been classical liberals who did not embrace nationalism.