Conservatism: A Rediscovery II

Part two of the review of Yoram Hazony's 2022 book 'Conservatism: A Rediscovery'

This is part two of an article written by Elias Priestly, you can read part one here.

You can also read all of Elias’ previous articles on the Australian Natives Association website and find more of his content on 𝕏 @Aussie_EliasP

Section Three: Current Affairs

Section three opens with a chapter on liberal hegemony and how it took hold of and subverted Cold War conservatism to its own ends, obscuring the authentic conservative tradition in the process. Hazony points out that at the start of the 20th century most American politicians were Christian nationalists, making the contemporary concern over and rejection of Christian nationalism quite a change of trajectory. After WWI, American conservatives still had the strength and principles to reject Woodrow Wilson's liberal internationalism as manifested in the League of Nations. The point of the change of trajectory from this conservatism is traced to the end of WWII when the struggles of “God-fearing democracy” against the Nazi regime were concluded and “liberal democracy” began to become ascendant (p.264). Hazony also sees the Holocaust narrative as a key reference point and principle of legitimation for the new liberal revolution. Interestingly, this lends some support to those nationalists who believe that it is necessary to discuss the history of WWII and the holocaust in order to combat reigning liberal narratives.

However, the key achievements of the liberal revolution, according to Hazony, was the US Civil Rights Act (1964) along with the Immigration and Naturalization Act (1965), a point many nationalists would surely agree with; these pieces of legislation are undeniably foundational to the current liberal regime. Although Hazony does not mention Australia, we followed suit at the same time by dismantling the White Australia policy. Hazony sees desegregation as the one really laudable thing that postwar liberals achieved, but looking at the devastating results of desegregation, other nationalists may come to a different conclusion. Hazony does not bother to look at these results, unlike some of the other problems created by liberalism that he is happy to deride liberals for ignoring.

Moving on, a big reason for the failure of conservatism in the postwar period, in Hazony’s narrative, was the Cold War alignment of conservatives with liberals in the stand against communism. Hazony names Hayek and Leo Strauss as key examples of liberal thinkers who have been misidentified as conservatives. Most of his discussion on this point is interesting and helpful reading, and part of the book that is useful for young nationalists unfamiliar with the material to read and ponder. The problem of the subsumption of conservatives by liberals rings true in the Australian context as well, particularly obvious in the “broad church” of the Liberal Party which has largely destroyed political conservatism as an effective political force in this country.

In chapter seven, Hazony turns to Marxism, which he positions as the most dangerous enemy of conservatives even though it is fundamentally birthed from the philosophical weaknesses of liberalism. Hazony describes a “dance of liberalism and Marxism” which is one of the strongest points of the book. This dance goes as follows: liberals declare that all must be free and equal and that reason will determine the content of individual rights; Marxists use reason to critique liberal society for failing to live up to liberal axioms and values and demand new rights; liberals capitulate and adopt some of the Marxist demands; rinse and repeat (p.323). No doubt, some Marxists will protest and insist that this is a “dance” that is internal to liberalism itself. In any case, it is an accurate summation of the perpetual loss of ground that is typical of liberal “conservatism.”

Hazony laments that this process has resulted in formerly liberal institutions now being taken over by “woke progressives” who operate using a neo-Marxist framework cloaked in new terminology. This is a very familiar talking point, spouted by Jordan Peterson and many others, and doesn't require much discussion. Hazony’s solution is an alliance of liberals with conservatives with the stress on conservatism rather than liberalism this time (p.329). It seems Hazony hasn’t fully learnt the lesson he was trying to impress on the reader throughout this entire section. Alliances between liberalism and conservatism poison conservatism and render it defenceless to progressivism. A better option is for Burkean conservatives to develop their own institutions with the aid of those to their right.

The final chapter of this section, chapter eight of the book, is a short chapter presenting Hazony’s political ideal of conservative democracy, defined by the five principles of conservatism developed and explained in the first chapters, and set in contrast to the current liberal democratic order. This chapter simply advocates for the implementation of the ideas explained in sections one and two of the book, hence its short length. Once again, the best aspects of this project are the insistence on a concrete national identity against the idea of a “creedal” or “propositional” nation and the requirement that civic life be built upon a public Christianity. The worst aspect of this project is the return to assimilationist forms of civic nationalism that maintain the demographic replacement of Europeans, but simply boil the frog more slowly.

Section Four: Personal Lessons

In the last section, comprised of a single chapter called “notes on living a conservative life,” Hazony derives lessons from his own life on how to live as a national conservative. He tells a touching story of the romance that led to his marriage and his wife's conversion to Judaism, an interesting point that perhaps shows something of his own more sympathetic stance towards non-Jewish society, at least when compared to many other Jews.

The central point he makes in this chapter, which is that conservative beliefs are not enough and that you must live out conservative principles, is extremely important. Hazony stresses that it is necessary to actually repent and turn back to God. Not only that, but we must actively work to transmit conservative principles and traditions to the next generation. This was a moment when I thought that there are some aspects of national conservatism that gel very well with what the Australian Natives’ Association is aiming to do.

The stress on his own personal life when combined with the underlying focus on Israel and the Jewish tradition leads in an interesting and fruitful direction. Conservatism: A Rediscovery implicitly raises the spectre of a long-lost debate that is returning to politics, and which is vital to address, by virtue of the author's own personal identity as a Jewish Biblical Scholar. That debate was called the ‘Jewish Question; a question which notoriously led to the two answers of the Holocaust and Zionism. Today, with Zionism under fierce attack across the West, including in Australia, it is important to once again address the relationship between Jews and Europeans openly and without fear and threat of punishment.

There is a need for a New Jewish Question. Not for the purposes, as many may immediately jump to believe, creating another Holocaust but rather in the service of preventing one by allowing the purifying light of day to shine into even the darkest corners. This can only benefit both Jewish and Gentile communities and foster a dialogue between Jews and White Europeans that allows each side to openly present their own interests, rather than relying on subversive conspiracies. The relationship between Athens and Jerusalem should not be a subtextual aspect of books like this one, but one that is much more openly discussed. Since Hazony elsewhere laments the demise of Zionism among the Jewish intelligentsia and Zionism is also attacked across the board by both the authentic right and left in politics, this answer to the Jewish Question seems to be rapidly falling out of favour. If neither the Holocaust nor Zionism are acceptable answers, the question must be asked again and a suitable answer reached. P.R. Stephensen’s A Reasoned Case Against Semitism is a good starting point for this. St Paul also has an answer that Jews have desperately avoided for two millennia.

In the end, Hazony's “national” conservatism offers us nationalism in name while working tirelessly to hollow out the biological basis of the concept. His conservatism is much more solidly grounded, but neglects the Hellenic and Roman aspects of the tradition. Nationalists should beware of Hebrews bearing gifts. Nonetheless, there is much tasty substance to this poisoned treat of a book, and if you already have the antidotes of a robust racial theory and a sophisticated epistemology then…Bon Appétit.