The Contemporary Right

Abstract

Students of politics have long observed the so-called of the pendulum in politics. This proposition says that there is a secular swing in public appreciation, especially in democracies, between the conservative and the liberal spirits of politics.1 This is another way of stating the continuous disintegration and reintegration of the force of symbols in politics. Movements are seldom static in their persuasive force. Liberals like to point to the disintegration of conservative thought, demonstrated even by the more trivial of political changes, while conservatives are convinced, in general, of the law of the disintegration of liberalism. Such a conservative proposition arises from a study of the disappearance of idealism in a movement as it comes closer to the inner circle of power. As T. V. Smith has argued, the greater the element of compromise, i.e., effectiveness, in political decision the less becomes the element of ideality.2 Now the appeal of the liberal is, according to conservative thought, his support of the ideal solution, or the absolutely just situation. But as the liberal comes close to power, the necessities of decision constantly force him away from the lofty nature of his principle. Thus, inevitably as liberalism and revolutionism approach the effective organization of power, their elan vital tends to be dissipated in the practicalities of day-to-day politics. In this theory, conservatism is never dead, but its vitality tends to be coincident with the operation of the law of disintegration of liberalism.