Can Conservatives Govern?

Riffing on this David Brooks column on British politics, Peter Suderman critiques Cameronism here; Reihan responds here and here. I would add one observation: For American conservatives looking across the pond for inspiration, what's at stake in the current - and perhaps temporary - Tory renaissance has less to do with policy specifics (the shape of U.S. politics more or less ensures that any revived American Right will have to be simultaneously more libertarian and more socially-conservative than Cameron's Tories) than with the broader question of whether Anglo-American conservatives can successfully govern a welfare-state society in an era that isn't characterized by profound, late-Seventies-style disillusionment with the administrative state.

American liberals, of course, like to claim that the answer is no, and George W. Bush's two terms have provided a great deal of grist for their argument. Moreover, there's a sense in which the liberal "conservatives can't govern" meme dovetails with the oft-heard right-wing insistence that what the Republican Party needs post-Bush is ideological retrenchment, with a purer government-cutting and tax-slashing gospel replacing compassionate conservatism and its attendant heresies. The would-be retrenchers, of course, tend to insist that their favored course will lead the Republican Party to quickly regain the position it enjoyed in the Reagan era and the Gingrich moment, which strikes me as a fantasy - not least because where taxes and spending are concerned, the public mood circa 2008 is nothing like the public mood circa 1980 or even 1994. But beneath the fantasy you can see the glimmerings of a reasonably principled and consistent point of view, in which the American Right's mission is to play Dr. No on domestic policy (even if doing so consigns conservatives to the minority), while waiting for moments when liberalism massively overreaches - and then leveraging these moments into as much government-cutting as possible.

This is a vision of what conservatism ought to stand for that Alan Wolfe and Grover Norquist can shake hands over, with the former saying "you can't run the government" and the latter saying "yes, and we don't want to - so watch your back!" Meanwhile, those of who have rather different aspirations for the American center-right are left to watch events in the old country with interest, whatever we think about the wisdom of government mandated in-home health visitors.

Photo by Flickr user UCL Conservative Society used under a Creative Commons license.

Comments

It's time to stop pretending that there are enough principled conservatives in the Repiglican Party to give legs to your dreams, Ross. The Repiglicans are almost totally sold out to corporatist interests. The second most influential segment of the GOP is the Christianist one, and there is, of course, a lot of overlap between the two groups. Principled conservatives come in dead last and they're losing ground, not gaining it.

Posted by MoeLarryAndJesus | May 12, 2008 4:07 PM

To answer Ross's question in the post title: no. To understand why, read The Conservatives Have No Clothes: Why Right-Wing Ideas Keep Failing.

http://www.amazon.com/Conservatives-Have-No-Clothes-Right-Wing/dp/0470044365

Posted by Greg Anrig | May 12, 2008 4:41 PM

the shape of U.S. politics more or less ensures that any revived American Right will have to be simultaneously more libertarian and more socially-conservative than Cameron's Tories

Good luck with that. It seems to me that many (most?) libertarians are becoming increasingly disillusioned with social conservatives, in large part because social conservatism gave us eight years of George W. Bush.

Posted by Jeff | May 12, 2008 5:03 PM

I should add that I'm not sure social conservatives want anything to do with us (libertarians), either.

Many on the right openly mocked Ron Paul during the early stages of the Republican primary, The Weekly Standard recently ran an op-ed (widely read and discussed in libertarian circles) that described libertarianism as "poisonous to public life," limited government folks were wringing their hands at the rise of Mike Huckabee, and hell, just as a microcosm, half of Ross's posts make me want to kick him in the balls.

At the end of the day, it's simply not clear that the views of individuals who believe that it is both desirable and practical (not to mention moral) for the state to regulate the personal affairs of their fellow citizens is reconcilable to those who's ideology is best summed up as "leave us alone."

Posted by Jeff | May 12, 2008 5:21 PM

It would seem to me that the answer to this question lies more in what kind of conservatism we're discussing. If you're discussing the kind of Grover Norquist fiscally conservative maximalism, then of course not. When one sees no legitimate role for government, or has no trust in it, then there will be nothing but contempt for the actual act of governing. As with George W. Bush, with government the obstacle rather than a legitimate partner, government becomes nothing more than a vehicle to benefit one's allies.

It used to be that the Republicans and Democrats were about "governmental" conservatism or liberalism. The argument wasn't about the legitimacy of government so much as the scope of its role. So, you could have socially "compassionate conservative" Democrats and social libertarian Republicans. It seems that as the parties took on social identities, so too the oppositional nature of their view of government became more extreme.

Posted by James F. Elliott | May 12, 2008 5:26 PM

Ross, PJ O'Rourke answered your question a while ago.

"It used to be that the Republicans and Democrats were about "governmental" conservatism or liberalism."

Good point. Norquist could not have existed comfortably in an Eisenhower-led GOP. With our budget deficit exploding, we are going to have to raise taxes at some point. The GOP is too ideologically wedded to tax cuts and the Laffer curve to be able to govern responsibly by raising taxes. As such, today's GOP cannot govern. Add in things like Katrina and the trillions we are spending on things like Iraq and Star Wars and you have the failure of today's GOP.

Posted by Reality Man | May 13, 2008 12:26 AM

No party whose response to horrific condition in VA hospitals is "See, you can't depend on government" is serious about even trying to govern.

Posted by Mike | May 13, 2008 1:18 AM

Really, considering the paucity of your posting relative to MY, there's no reason for the abysmal proofreading in that final graf. Shame.

SO I HEARD U LIEK MUDKIPZ.

Posted by /b/tard | May 13, 2008 2:49 AM

If the Republicans cannot govern and are irrelevant, then the quesiton becomes how will the U.S. function as a one party state with the Democratic Party in control.

Given the situation in places like Detroit, it is hard to argue that the Democrats can actually govern any better than anyone else.

Posted by superdestroyer | May 13, 2008 5:05 AM

As a UK citizen who had her episiotomy sutures removed and the progress of her newborn checked daily by a professional with the education level of a Physian's Assistant, I have to take umbrage with your characterization of "health visitor's" when in the US you can't get midwifery at home (or elsewhere) for love nor money:

http://fructusventris.stblogs.org/archives/2008/05/guaranteed_heal.html

Socialized healthcare may not be PC, but its very good value for taxpayers when such trivial questions of solidarity are included in the equation!

Posted by Clare Krishan | May 13, 2008 9:06 AM

What the heck do you mean with your Dr. No reference? Dr. No ran a guano farm in the Caribbean while courting the Soviets and devising a torture marathon.

Posted by freddiemac | May 13, 2008 9:58 AM

Here's the best take on this ever, and it's an oldie but a goodie.

"If the Goverment is a car setting out to give every one a ride to work, then for 40 years the Republicans have been puncturing the tires, pouring sand in the gas tank, stealing the distributer cap, and, whenever they can get their hands on the wheel, driving it straight into the nearest ditch and then, pointing to the wreckage as the tow truck backs up to it, saying, See, this proves that people were meant to walk.

"And they do this so that they don't have to chip in on gas."

Posted by nitpicker | May 13, 2008 10:01 AM

Ross,

Compassionate Conservatism versus "Dr. No" is a false dichotomy. You don't think there are more constructive things conservatives can do? There are plenty of things we can do. We can advocate for pro growth economic policies that don't require net tax cuts, for example, changing the mix of taxes, improving American infrastructure, opening more of America's outer continental shelf and ANWR open to energy exploration. We can continue to sound the alarm about rising entitlement costs, and continue to propose compromise solutions (e.g., progressive indexing of Social Security benefits).

Posted by Fred | May 13, 2008 11:14 AM

Compassionate Conservatism was (is? is it dead yet?) all about trying to use big government to accomplish conservative goals. A nice fantasy (for conservatives anyway) but it totally ignores the fact that government is generally manages by a very permanent civil service which is very much entrenched leftie and very opposed to any conservative policies. What that means is that the permanent government will take the extra money but ensure that the conservative goals are either thwarted or run so badly that they become a laughingstock (NCLB is the best example of this - liberals decrying the biggest increase in Federal funding for education in 20 years because is involved actual standards). What Reagan seemed to know but Bush was too dumb to understand is that a Republican President cannot fundementally change the permanent government - at best he can limit its growth, try to clean up the most egregious parts and make them more efficient, and where necessary, completely circumvent it in order to get things done.

Posted by Holdfast | May 13, 2008 1:30 PM

opening more of America's outer continental shelf and ANWR open to energy exploration.

Really, even Boone Pickens realizes ANWR drilling is a pointless enterprise. LET IT GO.

Posted by TheTalkies | May 13, 2008 4:24 PM

"Really, even Boone Pickens realizes ANWR drilling is a pointless enterprise. LET IT GO."

The higher oil prices go, the more point there is in selling a little more of ours and buying a little less of Canada's. It means more royalty payments for the state and federal governments, more high-paying American jobs, a lower trade deficit, etc.

Posted by Fred | May 13, 2008 8:09 PM

@Fred: 'Cept that it'll be ten years before we pull up any sizable volume, and investing in large-scale infrastructure on a market already gripped with unrealistic expectations will lead to all sorts of boondoggles.

Posted by TheTalkies | May 13, 2008 9:28 PM

This is the so silly, "the broader question of whether Anglo-American conservatives can successfully govern a welfare-state society"

find someone else to blame, Ross. Don't you let conservatives take responsibility for their own mistakes. It is the ultimate in conservatism, these days. It's called passing the buck.

Posted by zic | May 15, 2008 8:47 PM