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The death of the Old Right: when conservatives become radicals

G'day. David McKnight is a Senior Lecturer in Humanities at the University of Technology, Sydney and an expert on Australian political history. In his latest book Beyond Right and Left: New politics and the culture wars, Dr McKnight argues that "the Right-Left confusion is a symptom of a broader historic shift in cultural, social and economic ideas. This shift offers new opportunities for breaking out of the Right-Left bind and creating new ways of seeing the world." Thanks to David for permission to publish this extract. I read this book in manuscript form and endorsed it on the back cover: "David McKnight gives us the tools to work out where we stand - and what unites rather than divides us - as the struggle to defend our democracy begins in earnest."


The Death of the Old Right: when conservatives become radicals by David McKnight

One night about 30 years ago I drove in a battered car with a comrade through the darkened streets of inner Sydney, spray cans at the ready. That night we endlessly painted a slogan on brick walls, fences and the side of factories. The slogan read "Stop Work to Stop Fraser". It was just a few days after the notorious sacking of the Whitlam Labor Government by the Governor-General, Sir John Kerr, and the abrupt installation of the leader of the Liberal Party, Malcolm Fraser, as Prime Minister. The response of the Communist Party, of which I was a member, was to try our hardest to organize a general strike by trade unions to protest the assault on democracy represented by the sacking. Politically, lots of things have changed since then but I don't regret for one minute trying to help organize that strike.

One of the things that have changed is Malcolm Fraser's political outlook, and therein lies a significant key to understanding the new politics of social change. One of the trade unions which supported the strike was the metalworkers' union. Recently the same union invited their former foe to address their national conference about the issue of asylum seekers and their detention in detention camps. Trade union delegates interrupted Fraser's speech with applause several times and after the speech, the metalworkers' leader, Doug Cameron, commented that Fraser "had grown in stature since his period as Prime Minister. He is a true statesman for this country and a great spokesperson for the issue of humanity for all people around this globe."

The wheel has turned for the former Prime Minister who, for seven years had headed one of the most disliked governments in Australian history. Today Fraser is a changed man. Gone is the bluster and bullying of yesteryear. His government is seen to have failed according to the new orthodoxy of the Liberals and their economic rationalist philosophy. Fraser is in a philosophical no man's land. He is no longer a reactionary conservative nor is he an economic rationalist. He laments, "our generation is without a political philosophy relevant to our time and circumstances. We have a theory of globalization but, baldly stated, it is cold and technical. We need an idea of how our society will develop and how, in a more global society, people will relate to each other. We need a philosophical framework." As we shall see, Fraser's pinpointing of a crisis of political philosophy is accurate.

The journey that he made beyond the Right is not unique. From 1990 to 1997, another conservative, Robert Manne, edited Australia's premier right wing intellectual journal, Quadrant. In his time Manne penned many attacks on left wing causes. In 1990 he celebrated the collapse of communism but warned about the "fashionable new orthodoxies of radical environmentalism, feminism, gay liberationism, multiculturalism and animal liberationism". But soon after this he began to genuinely re-think his position and that of the magazine in the new post-Cold War world. This lead to deepening disagreement with most of his editorial board and to his highly public resignation from Quadrant. Today Manne supports many causes usually described as left wing. He supports a republic and feminism and he has championed issues concerned with indigenous people. He mounted the most effective attack on the Right's denial of the "stolen generation" of indigenous children. He has become an outspoken advocate for a more humane policy toward refugees. He now describes himself as someone on the Left and is regularly (and bitterly) attacked by conservative commentators.

Fraser and Manne are two examples of what one writer on the journal Lingua Franca called the diaspora of the "ex-cons" - conservatives who have cut themselves adrift from the Right. Lingua Franca also focussed on John Gray, professor of European Thought at the London School of Economics. Gray was once a house intellectual for Margaret Thatcher and a darling of the New Right. He wrote a book on John Stuart Mill and another on the theoretical godfather of the New Right, Friedrich Hayek. Of the latter, Hayek himself was effusive in his praise. It was "the first survey of my work which not only fully understands but is able to carry on my ideas beyond the point at which I left off". Today Gray is a savage critic of Hayek and of market-driven globalization which he regards as a form of fundamentalist utopia. Gray's ideas, which were touched on in the last chapter, will be examined in more detail and represent a new kind of conservatism which has a place in the reconfiguring a new politics beyond Right and Left in the 21st century.

Neo-liberalism is more radical than conservative. Its trajectory is corroding much of the social fabric. Genuine conservatives like Gray therefore become its natural and effective critics. Other critics emerged in the late 1980s as the tide of free market philosophy engulfed the Old Right. The Catholic ideologue, BA Santamaria, in his later years, regularly attacked the worship of the free market and small government. Deregulation of the finance and banking system, he argued, had enriched the few at the cost of the many. It had created an explosion of credit and debt. Worse, it expressed a breakdown in moral values because deregulation fueled "the cult of instant gratification" and "where the volume of money flooding every nook and cranny of the Western world is corrupting everything it touches".

Another critical voice was that of Charles Kemp, the founder of the oldest think-tank, the Institute of Public Affairs. By 1991 he had had enough of the simplistic nostrums of the economic rationalists. In Quadrant, he warned that the "great danger of extreme market philosophies is that they enthrone profit, greed and self-interest. After the horrors of the eighties it is not surprising that the restoration of decent ethical standards is figuring high on the agenda of the nineties." His ironically titled article "Those Terrible 80 Years?" points out that the era before market economics had enjoyed full employment, low inflation and a booming economy. By that time both of Kemp's sons, David and Rod, had rejected their father's position and become militant economic rationalists. Both became ministers in the Howard Government and the latter spent the 1980s at the head of the institute which his father founded unravelling his father's work and rebuilding right wing philosophy.

Finally there was the populism of Pauline Hanson and her One Nation Party, not so much a remnant of the Old Right as a new force prompted by its dissolution. Part of her appeal to many country people was her attack on economic rationalism which had closed banks, government offices and railway lines in country towns. One Nation's rural policy argued that Australia's competitors "have continued to protect their industries and national sovereignties while Australia has exposed itself to deregulation, free trade, globalisation and economic rationalism." To One Nation's constituency (8.4% of voters in 1998), a seamless connection existed between their fear of cultural globalisation and loss of national identity and their fear of economic globalisation and the loss of national sovereignty.

Social liberalism in Australia

The Old Right in Australia was often seen as a single force, labeled "conservatism" but it was actually an amalgam of different political ideas and trends, some of which now oppose the current neo-liberal and neo-conservative hegemony. The great icon of Australian Right, Sir Robert Menzies, for example, supported social justice and the welfare state. The Liberal MP who now holds Menzies' old parliamentary seat, Petro Georgiou, points out that "pro-market purists" in the modern Liberal Party damn any notion of social justice as a 'Labor plot' when it was in fact a foundation stone for the Liberal Party. Georgiou cites Menzies' colleague, Paul Hasluck, who said, "Although a traditionalist, Menzies was not a conservative in any doctrinal sense. His political thinking was in accord with the liberalism of Alfred Deakin and the liberalism of late nineteenth century England."

In a similar vein, the former Liberal Party minister Peter Baume, argues that "liberals welcomed measures, and continue to welcome measures, which empower people. Free public education empowered young people. Extension of the franchise empowered adults. Home ownership and income support empowered families. Anti-discrimination legislation empowered people otherwise powerless." Retired Liberal Party president, John Valder, actively campaigned against the war in Iraq on quintessentially liberal "human rights" grounds while former Liberal cabinet ministers, Fred Chaney and Ian McPhee together with former leader of the coalition, John Hewson, deplore the Howard Government's xenophobic attitude to race.

People like Petro Georgiou, Peter Baume, Ian McPhee and others were the first victims of the neo-liberal takeover of the Liberal Party in the 1980s. But they are more than this. The liberal tradition which they inherited had been deeply affected by 'social liberalism', a radical variant of liberal thought at the turn of the last century. Deeply influential in Australia, especially at the time of the federation of colonies, social liberalism became part of the conservative amalgam and its values and achievements are being studied anew by researchers such as Marian Sawer. Her work and that of others emphasises the gulf between social liberalism and modern neo-liberalism. Advocates of the latter, like Hayek, claim to be the inheritors of the true tradition of liberalism but this can be strongly contested. In my view acknowledging a vital social liberal tradition is important in trying to establish new philosophies beyond Right and Left and I deal with this in the final chapter of this book.

What is social liberalism? It is the name given to an important development of liberal thinking in Britain and in Europe which placed great emphasis on what is called 'positive liberty'. In the latter half of the nineteenth century social liberals argued that the era of liberalism as a philosophy opposed to the privilege of the aristocratic state had passed. These "New Liberals", as they were then called, believed that there was an important distinction between private and public spheres. In the latter it was possible to speak of a public good and a common interest. They argued that the abstract liberal notion of rights-bearing individuals and freedom of contract could become oppressive. 'Freedom of contract' for example, meant one-sided and unequal bargains between employers and workers. "The social liberals," notes Sawer, "did not seek the abolition of the market economy but believed that it must be subordinated to the democratic state which put the welfare of its citizens before the sanctity of contract and the rights of property." The 'New Liberalism' was influential in Britain and elsewhere well into the twentieth century. Discrediting it and seizing the mantle of liberalism was one of Hayek's main motivations (discussed in Chapter 3).

In Australia the popularisation of Green's ideas influenced Alfred Deakin, who was Prime Minister of Australia in the decade after federation and instituted a number of reforms with the support of the young Labor Party. This early Left-Right alliance between labourism and liberalism was vital in defining Australia as one of the most progressive democracies in the first half of the twentieth century.

The reforms included the establishment of a system of industrial arbitration, age pensions and, eventually, the vote for (white) women. In this context social liberalism was expressed specifically in Justice Higgins' 1906 famous "Harvester" judgement. This legislated a minimum wage based, not on market forces, but on a conception of workers as "human beings living in civilised communities". (Overturning the Harvester judgement was one of the early goals enunciated by John Howard who said in 1983: "The time has come when we have to turn Mr Justice Higgins on his head".)

A similar commitment to fairness and of the obligations of a state to its citizens was behind the introduction of old age pensions and what grew into the welfare state, said Sawer. As well, she points out, social liberalism provided an obvious framework for early feminist ideas and activism. Because it helped set a intellectual and practical agenda in Australia's formative years, social liberalism was a major element in the ideological make up of both the non- Labor and Labor parties. As Sawer said, it was translated into the Australian notion of the "fair go".

*

Dr David McKnight will be giving a seminar at The Brisbane Institute on Politics: Beyond Left and Right on 8 November 2005 at 6pm. See here for ticket details.

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Joyce crosses floor

Joyce crosses floor to save ACCC powers. See here.:

"If you take away from your choices the ability to cross the floor, then you need only send a proxy into the chamber, because there's no real purpose in you being there," he said.

"If it's self evident that you will vote for every piece of legislation as it comes up, then what's the purpose of you being in the chamber?"

It seems that the conservatives in the Government are beginning to think twice about Howard’s radical ideas. Well done Senator Joyce. The cracks in Howard’s armour are widening.

time to encourage others

John as Michael Brissenden pointed out last Thursday on the 7:30 Report:

In fact, there's an awful lot of fuss about this one act of defiance. Plenty of Libs and Nats have crossed the floor in the past. The difference is that the odd walk doesn't always result in the defeat of government bills. But while to cross the floor in the Labor Party is tantamount to treason, on the other side individualism is tolerated, even celebrated, at times. Even Eric Abetz has crossed the floor once. Senator Robert Hill, the Government's Senate leader, is a serial floor pacer. He's crossed 10 times on issues as diverse as tax and human rights. Ron Boswell, the Nationals Senate leader has himself crossed six times. The record, however, belongs to the former Tasmanian Liberal Senator Reg Wright who crossed 150 times. And Queensland Senator Ian Wood crossed 130 times. Perhaps they might have been better off staying there. In fact, since 1950, Members of Parliament have crossed the floor 439 times. But as the parliamentary services research notes that provide these helpful details also note, the effect of this action still remains largely symbolic. The Trade Practices Act is one thing, but Barnaby Joyce's threat to scuttle the VSU legislation is quite different. It's safe to say that any suggestion that he might threaten the Government's IR legislation would be viewed much more harshly.

Now that the Government has such a small majority maybe it is time to encourage others in the Senate to cross the floor.

how funny they sound?

David McKnight: "One of the things that have changed is Malcolm Fraser's political outlook, and therein lies a significant key to understanding the new politics of social change..."

Do these people have any idea how funny they sound?

Wasn't it Victor Hugo who expressed ironic delight at how much more informed, wise and intelligent his father had become with each stage of Victor's growing older?

Anyway, which history has this fellow been reading?

"(Menzies's) political thinking was in accord with the liberalism of Alfred Deakin and the liberalism of late nineteenth century England."

If that was the case, then I cannot imagine Sir Robert Menzies supporting "the welfare state."

The "welfare liberalism" of "late nineteenth century England" (I suspect he actually means early 20th Century Edwardian England) was driven by a concern for initiatives well entrenched in the Kaiser's Germany (which were calculated to discourage socialist unions) and out of concern about Germany having a better educated and generally healthier workforce than England.

The idea it stemmed from some generally  philanthropic cultural outlook owing to 19th Century Liberalism is pretty funny, isn't it?

What a bizarre anachronism. Pig Iron Bob as a harbinger of the welfare state?

Now do you get it?

C Parsons As part of your political enlightenment read this Webdiary piece from Margo, this in-depth SBS interview from George Negus and this article on Safecom.

Now on the topic of what sort of Liberal Menzies was, try Greg Craven, who is certainly not a leftie. Nor is Gerard Henderson.

Now do you get it?

the sublime Clarke and Dawe

Did anyone watch the sublime Clarke and Dawe on The 7:30 Report last night? Apart from being very good, they do attack all sides of the sepctrum.

The interviewee last hight was Nick Minchin, and he was giving his views on changing to vluntary voting.

Transcript here

Loved the final few lines.

INTERVIEWER: My point is - so when you do introduce it, how's it going to work?

SENATOR NICK MINCHIN: Well, Labor voters, for example, why should they be forced to vote?

INTERVIEWER: Don't we need an Opposition?

SENATOR NICK MINCHIN: Well, they voted last time and we haven't got an Opposition, Bryan. Have a look at your argument.

INTERVIEWER: That's true.

SENATOR NICK MINCHIN: It doesn't stack up terribly well - Greens are another - look, Greens agree about a lot of things. I reckon, if you've got a household full of them, that should count as one vote. One vote per house.

INTERVIEWER: It's not going to happen anyway.

SENATOR NICK MINCHIN: It's not going to happen anyway. But I tell you what - we'd go through those clowns on day one if it did.

INTERVIEWER: Senator Minchin, thank you very much for your time.

SENATOR NICK MINCHIN: Women, there's another idea. Can I borrow your pencil? This is good, keep them coming. Women...

Thanks, Margo!

This Webdiary thread motivated me to buy McKnight's book. Off to bed to start reading it.

Thanks, Margo!

social liberalism

I have purchased this book and have begun reading and am thus far enjoying it. However I have a question.

Does anybody know of any books specifically discussing social liberalism I might read?

so what's new?

Aldous Huxley wrote:

"For the last thirty years there have been no conservatives; there have been only nationalistic radicals of the right and nationalistic radicals of the left."

But that was in 1946... so what's new?

quote with no reference

Hey, Tim Gillin, I came here to see whether (on another thread) Margaret could provide me with a proper reference to an apparently brilliant Plato quote.

I'm annoyed. Another apparently excellent quote with no reference. Is a humanities student supposed to cite Webdiary? Or how can anyone check the context of the quote? I believe you that Aldous said what you say, and once again I really like the quote, but where the hell did he say it please?

Aldous Huxley quote

Jannice Caldwell asked me to hunt up the citation for the Aldous Huxley quote that I reiterated on this thread. I am looking into the quote for Jannice over the weekend and will report back when I have the result.

The full paragraph it is extracted from is from Aldous Huxley commenting in 1946 on the outcome of World War One.

"For the last thirty years there have been no conservatives; there have been only nationalistic radicals of the right and nationalistic radicals of the left. The last conservative statesman was the fifth Marquess of Lansdowne; and when he wrote a letter to The Times suggesting that the First World War should be concluded with a compromise, as most of the wars of the eighteenth century had been, the editor of that once conservative journal refused to print it. The nationalistic radicals had their way, with the consequences that we all know - Bolshevism, Fascism, inflation, depression, Hitler, the Second World War, the ruin of Europe ..."

The quote was used by R J Stove in an article discussing the Pope Benedict XV's attempts to initiate a negotiated end to World War 1.

Craig R Ed.: Tim I found that quote here if it helps.

Thanks Craig

Thanks Craig, I think that quote from the foreword to Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" covers it.

I ventured into the book courtesy of Amazon's great "Search Inside the book" feature, see this edition and can confirm it is in there, at the bottom of page xii and top of page xiii. To see try this.

I wish the internet was around when I was bumbling my way through university!

Brave New World

Jannice Caldwell, I think it comes from his foreward to Brave New World. Unfortunately, my copy is in my daughter's bedroom, and I dare not venture into that swamp to retrieve and check.

Quite right

Quite right Fiona Reynolds, the quote is from the forward which appears in the 1946 edition of Brave New World.

several usefully reflective hours

Margo, thank you for posting this. I bought the book on Sunday and finished it last night. A very interesting summary of how things have changed. I have always struggled with ideologies and idealogues. I could never find a coherent one I could subscribe to so have spent the last 30 years basically as an independent. One brief flirtation with the Young Liberals was enough and those I meet now are worse robber-barons than ever.

It is very interesting how McKinght analyses the shifts over that time (if I remember correctly he was an editor of Honi Soit about the time I came up). Notwithstading the shifts he identifies, the elements of the hard right now dominant in the Liberal Party have always been there. In some ways, Menzies may have been a moderating influence.

Again, thank you for several usefully reflective hours.

Yours aye.

Slightly off topic

Slightly off topic, check this BBC report about further charges against Bush's Republican Congressional leader, and major ally, Tom DeLay.

"The new indictment against the House of Representatives Republican leader contains counts of money laundering and conspiring to launder money."

Always though campaign financing, even post-Nixon, in the US was somewhat dodgy, and that both sides were very creative in their accounts. But money laundering?

Plus it seems Mr DeLay has upset many in the US media, according to this BBC report.

Wonder what 'old' Republicans make of the new breed?

Who would have thunk it?

Well well. Who would have thunk it? Someone who understands the journey I have undertaken over the last 30 years from initally being a supporter of Hayek's ideas to now someone who bitterly opposes them. Thank you David McKnight, I will rush out and order your book because my thesis is about this very topic, more or less. Thanks also for the link to John Gray.

My interest in this topic really began when I lived in a coal mining community which was on the recieving end of Hawke's economic and labour market reforms and Kelty's ACTU reforms in the 1980's. I have mentioned in a number of post that I am against the violence that proceeds out of ideology. Well, my first taste of that, as an adult, was in that community.The violence implicit in the way the trade unions operated, the violence of Hawke's reforms and later state Labor Leader Goss's agendas, was some thing I experienced at first hand. Earlier I had tried to stay away from the insanities of Bjelke Peterson or the UMFEU -all of which left me in no man's land, like where Malcolm Fraser is now.

At times, I supported both on single issues but never endorsed either fully. How could one when they were both as bad as each other in some ways. The whole experience left me totally disgusted with politics and the way people use power. However, things are on the up now that I have an better understanding of the forces involved. Education will do that for some people. :)

I have to say, the Webdiary has been a godsend with these discussion threads playing out the very dramas I am writing about and how they are affecting our society, politics, economics and culture. Now I'd better do some more writing.

modern day neoconservatives

Like many from the left, David seems to confuse the differences between the “old right” and its paleo-conservative and libertarian offspring to that of modern day neoconservatives.

The statist policies of the neoconservatives as summarised in John’s post, have evolved from the Marxist beginnings of its various founders such as Irving Kristol and has much in common with that of the current ‘socialist-democratic’ left and as such neither can hardly be called ‘radical’.

Like the majority of socialist-democrats the neo-conservative movement sees democracy as the best form of political economy. Contrast this to the debate between paleo-libertarians and paleo-conservatives as to the best way to achieve ‘minarchism’ (whether individual’s natural rights are best protected by market anarchism or self government through a federalist system with constitutional guarantees such as the US before it was effectively changed from a federated republic to a democracy).

David’s central premise that as some individuals whom may have been identified with certain aspects of conservatism in the 70’s and 80’s have now become socialist-democrats or radicals then ipso-facto social- democracy is the preferred system seems to me a long bow to draw.

Death of the ‘old right’ in the writings of Jefferson and the other Austrians whom draw their ancestry from Jefferson, Acton, Hayek, von Mises, seems hardly likely even in the Australian context. I like Murray Rothbards and the Austrian’s analysis of left and right better  (www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard33.html). Using Austrian analysis these so called conservatives were merely moving from one form of statism to another.    

“Neo-liberalism is more radical than conservative. Its trajectory is corroding much of the social fabric. Genuine conservatives like Gray therefore become its natural and effective critics”.

Gee, I just thought that the conservatives that had joined the left were the radicals.  In any case what is it that anything to do with freedom of choice has to be corroding the social fabric.

Like many on the left the paleo libertarians and conservatives share concerns with a decline in societal values – where they disagree is the question to which the state has a role in fixing them and  indeed that such government mandated transfers may in the long term be counter productive not only with freedom but a long term functioning society.
 
Just like the negative externalities in domestic welfare the statist foreign policy of the neo-cons that has its basis in expropriation of another’s resources is returning to haunt us.

American exceptionalism

Neoconservatism has been a peculiarly American phenomenon. In part, this is because ‘Americanism’ and ‘American exceptionalism’ are essential components of the foundation upon which the structure of neoconservatism is built.

Recently, however, neoconservatism has taken on new adherents from outside of America. These adherents are, naturally, extremely pro-‘American’ and follow the same beliefs that American neoconservatives do. They see ‘America’ as an exceptional nation, and, importantly, see America as a nation which other nations should aspire to become like and then, if the whole world should become like ‘America’, the world can then live in peace and in ‘democratic’ harmony.

The problem is that cracks appear straight away. The fundamental and crucial concept that ‘America’ is exceptional in the way that the neoconservatives would have us believe is an illusion. And because it is an illusion upon which neoconservatism is founded, so neoconservatism is doomed to failure. We are already beginning to see all the signs of that failure in Iraq.

Among neoconservatives many ‘complaints’ about those that oppose them is the question of anti-Americanism. Americanism for the neoconservatives can be demonstrated best by quoting them. There is this, for example from David Gelernter who writes:

“By Americanism I do not mean American tastes or style, or American culture – that convenient target of American-haters everywhere. Nor do I mean mere patriotic devotion; many nations command patriotic devotion from their citizens (or used to). By Americanism I mean the set of beliefs that are thought to constitute America’s essence and to set it apart; the beliefs that make Americans positive that their nation is superior to all others – morally superior, closer to God”. (1)

Or this, which I have quoted before, from neoconservative ‘founding father’ Norman Podhoretz:

"As a 'founding father' of neoconservatism who had broken ranks with the Left precisely because I was repelled by its 'negative faith in America the ugly', I naturally welcomed this new patriotic mood with open arms. In the years since making that break, I had been growing more and more impressed with the virtues of American society. I now saw that America was a country in which more liberty and more prosperity abounded than human beings had ever enjoyed in any other country or any other time. I now recognized that these blessings were also more widely shared than even the most visionary Utopians had ever imagined possible. And I now understood that this was an immense achievement, entitling the United States of America to an honoured place on the roster of the greatest civilizations the world had ever known."(2)

All that the neoconservatives have succeeded in doing is polarising the world in to those few in the world that believe America is, indeed, the beacon of light that the world ought to follow and those of us in the rest of the world – the vast majority of the world’s populace – that are able to see right through the absurdity of the neoconservative dreams. Most peoples of the world see neoconservatism for what it really stands for – militarism, endless wars, death, destruction, greed and a hatred for Islam which is causing chaos and fear around the world.

(1) David Gelernter, ‘Americanism – and Its Enemies’. (‘Commentary’, January 2005. p. 41.)

(2) Norman Podhoretz, ‘World War IV: How It Started, What It Means, and Why We Have to Win’. (‘Commentary’, September 2004, p. 36.)

a frightening picture

John Henry Calvinist, Jane Doe, Noelene Konstandinitis, thanks for the positive feed back. I have been trying to get a better understanding of just what has shaped Australian Politics over the last thirty years. Where are the so called “intellectuals” of the left and right, getting their ideas? It was only by delving into the origins and policies of the Neocons that it began to make sense. My earlier comment was based on information I gathered doing background research on the Neocons, I began to realise just how close the policies of Howard and Beazley are to that of Bush.

It is a frightening picture; Australia is squandering the profits of the resources boom, not investing in the future through education, infrastructure and health. We ignore the major threats of global warming and diminishing resources because they may be a problem for corporate profits. We give tax cuts to keep economic growth high. Our lack of imagination and investment in these key areas is dooming the next generation to poverty.

Other smaller countries are making the investments necessary for example Norway.

See Norway’s policy here:

I feel sad when experienced politicians such as Mark Latham are discouraging young Australians from taking part in the political battle. The only way to change, by peaceful means is to get political support, we need the support of a good media to get the ideas on the table and we need to fill our youth with the passion it takes to bring about change. We can show the narrow minded that there is a better way. We must make love dominate over fear and hate.

John Pratt, thank you

John Pratt, thank you for the link to Norway's peace policy which touched my heart and brought a tear to my eye. I wish Australia had such wisdom.

Since I am a radical now

Since I am a radical now, supposedly, being a RWDB and all, do I get to go around blowing things up? How about assassinating heads of state? Killing those of the people who will not join us? Causing famine and hardship to those whom I don't like? You know, all the hallmarks of the usual radicals.

Margo: Your call,  Stuart.

Dylan Documentary

Rogert Ebert on the new Dylan documentary.

the rise of the “Neocons”

The Liberal party and to some extent the ALP, has been hijacked by the thoughts of the “Neocons”, which is a strange mixture of left and right. Both parties as a result have become more radical.

I think the rise of the “Neocons” has been the main influence on Australian and US policy over the last twenty years. Howard and Beazley seem to be attracted to their ideas.

“The godfather of modern-day neo-conservatism is considered to be Irving Kristol, father of Bill Kristol, who set the stage in 1983 with his publication Reflections of a Neoconservative.

In this book, Kristol also defends the traditional liberal position on welfare. More important than the names of people affiliated with neo-conservatism are the views they adhere to. Here is a brief summary of the general understanding of what neocons believe:

1. They agree with Trotsky on permanent revolution, violent as well as intellectual.
2. They are for redrawing the map of the Middle East and are willing to use force to do so.
3. They believe in preemptive war to achieve desired ends.
4. They accept the notion that the ends justify the means — that hard-ball politics is a moral necessity.
5. They express no opposition to the welfare state.
6. They are not bashful about an American empire; instead they strongly endorse it.
7. They believe lying is necessary for the state to survive.
8. They believe a powerful federal government is a benefit.
9. They believe pertinent facts about how a society should be run, should be held by the elite and withheld from those who do not have the courage to deal with it.
10. They believe neutrality in foreign affairs is ill-advised.
11. They hold Leo Strauss in high esteem.
12. They believe imperialism, if progressive in nature, is appropriate.
13. Using American might to force American ideals on others is acceptable. Force should not be limited to the defense of our country.
14. 9-11 resulted from the lack of foreign entanglements, not from too many.
15. They dislike and despise libertarians (therefore, the same applies to all strict constitutionalists.)
16. They endorse attacks on civil liberties, such as those found in the Patriot Act, as being necessary.
17. They unconditionally support Israel and have a close alliance with the Likud Party.
More on Irving Kristol here:

“One of these policies, most visible and controversial, is cutting tax rates in order to stimulate steady economic growth. This policy was not invented by neocons, and it was not the particularities of tax cuts that interested them, but rather the steady focus on economic growth. Neocons are familiar with intellectual history and aware that it is only in the last two centuries that democracy has become a respectable option among political thinkers. In earlier times, democracy meant an inherently turbulent political regime, with the "have-nots" and the "haves" engaged in a perpetual and utterly destructive class struggle. It was only the prospect of economic growth in which everyone prospered, if not equally or simultaneously, that gave modern democracies their legitimacy and durability.

"The cost of this emphasis on economic growth has been an attitude toward public finance that is far less risk averse than is the case among more traditional conservatives. Neocons would prefer not to have large budget deficits, but it is in the nature of democracy--because it seems to be in the nature of human nature--that political demagogy will frequently result in economic recklessness, so that one sometimes must shoulder budgetary deficits as the cost (temporary, one hopes) of pursuing economic growth. It is a basic assumption of neoconservatism that, as a consequence of the spread of affluence among all classes, a property-owning and tax-paying population will, in time, become less vulnerable to egalitarian illusions and demagogic appeals and more sensible about the fundamentals of economic reckoning”

This leads to the issue of the role of the state. Neocons do not like the concentration of services in the welfare state and are happy to study alternative ways of delivering these services. But they are impatient with the Hayekian notion that we are on "the road to serfdom." Neocons do not feel that kind of alarm or anxiety about the growth of the state in the past century, seeing it as natural, indeed inevitable. Because they tend to be more interested in history than economics or sociology, they know that the 19th-century idea, so neatly propounded by Herbert Spencer in his The Man Versus the State, was a historical eccentricity. People have always preferred strong government to weak government, although they certainly have no liking for anything that smacks of overly intrusive government. Neocons feel at home in today's America to a degree that more traditional conservatives do not. Though they find much to be critical about, they tend to seek intellectual guidance in the democratic wisdom of Tocqueville, rather than in the Tory nostalgia of, say, Russell Kirk.

But it is only to a degree that neocons are comfortable in modern America. The steady decline in our democratic culture, sinking to new levels of vulgarity, does unite neocons with traditional conservatives - though not with those libertarian conservatives who are conservative in economics but unmindful of the culture. The upshot is a quite unexpected alliance between neocons, who include a fair proportion of secular intellectuals, and religious traditionalists. They are united on issues concerning the quality of education, the relations of church and state, the regulation of pornography, and the like, all of which they regard as proper candidates for the government's attention. And since the Republican party now has a substantial base among the religious, this gives neocons a certain influence and even power.

The same influences can be seen in the liberal party and the ALP, both parties, are trying to win the religious right.

The determination of both Australia's main political parties to maintain continuous economic growth flys in the face of reality.

We must all share in the resources of this planet, which has finite resoures. Continuous growth is impossible. As we see the growth of China and India and the effects all this growth is having on the enviroment. If the human race is to survive we must move to sustainabilty.

The major political parties in Australia are following the US lead and believe that "the faries at the bottom of the garden" can continue to create something from nothing. Peak Oil, Global Warming, Terrorism, are warning lights we must act know to develop new ideas and rethink our direction.

Athenian (direct) democracy

John Pratt, I'm assuming that the (substantial) quotes in your piece're from Irving Kristol's book... 'cause you weren't exactly clear about this.

In which case, I'd like to direct all Webdiarists to the actual evidence re Athenian (direct) democracy (little-known to non-specialists)... and, something that one Leo Strauss, for example, was far too 'philosophical' to consult.

After the traumatic events of the late 5th Century BCE - such as that war between Sparta and Athens - Athenian direct democracy then settled-down (sans any 'imperial' income, by the way) into seventy-odd years of EFFECTIVE governance of said city-state, with little sign of the "inherently turbulent political regime, with the 'have-nots' and the 'haves' engaged in a perpetual and utterly destructive class struggle" that Straussian's claim (without one real shred of evidence) so marred this city-state.

See the (impeccable, and very broadly-accepted) work of Mogens Herman Hansen for (exhaustive) empirical detail re exactly this subject...still, he's a VERY dry prose stylist, so I have little doubt that people anxious to 'refute' him won't 'bother' reading...much like their counterparts on the 'left', as I'm too well-aware.

And... as to 'real politic' approaches (shorn of any dissembling), I strongly recommend that all Webdiarists learn from the Ancient Chinese Legalists - the eternal masters of such, here.

Since these swine - unlike the neo-cons - had absolutely no pretence of being 'democratic', they can teach all of us about the real perils of accepting any such approach to politics...perils which FAR exceed Hayek's (historically unprecedented) so-called "road to serfdom"... especially since the ACTUAL road to serfdom (empirically) had nothing to do with Hayek's thesis...

And, when I said "all", I (especially) meant folks like Jay White & C. Parsons...since I'd purely LOVE to hear what such power-apologists have to say about theorists of pure power who make absolutely NO excuses.

Oh, and - considering the COMPLETE absence of neo-liberals amongst Economics Nobel-Prize-winners this century - in contrast to (highly-regarded) theorists of market imperfections... methinks that the current generation of neo-cons are simply using said ideology as a fig leaf, in order to aid those (particularly military-oriented) corporations in which they (undoubtedly) have a substantial financial stake?

The rest of your analysis (on the whole) Mr Pratt, I find myself basically in accord with. Now...unless the 'left' has any particular points to add here, why don't you leave it to us to answer the usual suspects?

Because... I suspect that those of us who've already commented here can easily handle things... sans the usual mess of personal attacks and such?

All the best.

kultur kampf

John Pratt,
A very interesting taxonomy of neo conservatism. I suspect however that the interest in cultural issues,(standards in schools, the current panic about the sillier excrescences of post modernism and the like)has more to do with constructing a 'social superstructure' on top of the neo liberal base than it has to do with ensuring a strong and authoritarian state, although I agree that this is part of it.

I have been following with interest News Ltd's current kultur kampf against school curriculum in English and history (it's never maths or science though-I wonder why?) I detect a number of strands to this latest jihad. One I think is the drive to finally 'privatise' education once and for all. There is a clear link here between this strand and the requirement of neo liberals to ensure that education activity is finally and wholly returned to the 'market', rather than as a public good, owned, however notionally, by the polity as a whole.

The second strand I detect, is a desire to continue the BS about 'political correctness' but in a more 'upmarket' tone than that usually employed by its tabloid rellies. This in turn is part of a wider campaign to loosen the (recent) purchase of various groups on the regard of others, the better to ensure that people return to 'as they were' prior to the post war boom, and the heightened sense of expectations and entitlements that followed the mass full employment of that era.

Methinks that Murdoch and the minions who write the ill informed bilge passing for social criticism in the News rags, are having a bit of a panic at the moment. Once called forth, the beast of popular outrage and calls for direct action against 'elites' can be hard to pop back into the cage. Just wait until people's ire is directed at those that fuelled the current debt binge, and at those who have designed a reprise of the 19th century in the current welfare and IR changes. I think we will be hearing a little less of the need to liberate the inner democracy of popular outrage, and we will be a hearing a lot more of the need for 'restraint in the interests of democracy and liberal values'. I can hardly wait. I hope I don't die laughing.

John Pratt. Thank you, thank

John Pratt. Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU! I am so glad that finally ONE Webdiarist has shown the education and wit to appreciate the nub of the neoconservative mind. I'm not sure how much is copied from elsewhere, but this straight-up and no-nonsense style of exposition should be compulsory reading for ALL Webdiarists, especially the interminable slogger, Damian Lataan!

I am dearly looking forward to engaging more directly with you, and this brilliant summary, but for now I have to type an essay that is due on the morrow.

But I would like to leave with this: I cannot tell you how overjoyed I am that finally an Australian shows they understand some of the seemingly contradictory tenets of the neocons, particularly the point that far from being antagonistic towards the welfare-state, they in fact have some well developed policies purporting to improve it.

John, I get the impression that you do not sympathize with the neocons, and I can't blame you. But I'm sure you will agree that most, if not all, Australians cannot fathom how revolutionary and radical their aims are, because we Australians are still basically convicts with NO clue about power and seizing it.

I can't wait for our chat. Tonight hopefully.

Ciao for now.

the corporate state is looming

The events described in David McKnight's excellent piece aren't unique to Australia. The UK and USA are both going though the same transformations. Everything he is saying is confirming that the corporate state is looming upon us and the Coalition and probably the Labor Party are both heading that way.

It's happened before but not to the degree it's transforming the world today. Germany was a good example in the early 30's. Hitler wasn't the beginning of Nazism in Germany-he was the end result of a society that had become ruled by powerful corporations.

Politics is personal

Politics is personal and the personal is politics: new technologies have empowered all of us. We use those new technologies, particularly the net, to free ourselves from various constraints - not least those of geography.

The old politics were poorly described by labels such as left and right. Today those labels are quaint historical curiosities.  I think ‘authoritarian’ and ‘libertarian’ say more - but admit that they are hardly snappy.

An old communist party member, like David McNight is always going to favour authoritarianism over the siren call of liberty. Basically he distrusts the people. Liberate yourself David! Take that final step. Recognize that the old reliance on authority, obedience and hierarchy is fading.

There are new possibilities now, new opportunities, new risks.

The siren call of liberty

Michael, I was baffled by your post. The siren call of liberty was the amorata of communists, anarchists and the multiplicity of capital-less disaffected.

The stern call of obedience, authority and hierarchy was the stock in trade of the ruling male dominating group, whether labour, liberal or opportunist, who had an interest in maintaining the insignificance of the employer, and the general status quo. You have got it utterly back to front.

David McKnight's graffiti actions were clearly supportive of our understanding of the history of our society as democratic. In that way, although he saw himself as a radical, his actions were clearly conservative.

a gathering storm

F. Kendall , you'd best ask them. There are plenty of university student associations and newspapers, church groups and youth political organisations like the Young Liberals/Labor. They say and do all of the kinds of things that such organisations have said since time immemorial.

You could email Greens candidate Ben Raue, who from memory is around 19 or 20 and ran in Werriwa, and who is no doubt much less cynical than me in that he bothered to do that at all. I think he'd be an excellent contributor to Webdiary.

The ABC informed me not long ago that one of the co-ordinators of the union campaign is 22.

I can't give you much of a general impression because my experience is that most young people don't bring up politics very often because they see it as impolite. I only discuss it here because it's discreet but otherwise would consider it inappropriate to even ask who someone voted for, just as I'd consider it inappropriate to ask what their religion was, unless they gave any indication that they wished to talk about it.

There's also perhaps a level of caution there, which might hide a bubbling pot, or a gathering storm but I couldn't be sure. It might just erupt to in to a simple "I've lost the plot" episode, like a Latham or a Brogden, which is why I've tried to raise the question of youth suicide here as often as possible, since I keep sniffing it on the wind, in these confusing times.

I don't know. Y'all, including Stuart Lord, went to the Iraq protests. I declined, thinking it would be a pointless and disappointing exercise. What were the young people doing there? Holding signs? Causing trouble?

There was a music festival called "Rock against Howard" at one point and Kerry Nettle showed up to support it but I never made it there. I once emailed her to tell her she should fix up one of the captions on her website to read "Kerry holds a joint press conference" rather than the clipped "Kerry holds a joint" but she didn't respond. There's definitely a link between music/politics amongst the young and it would often seem impossible to pry the two apart.

Beyond that I think my point about young people being cautious and discreet is perhaps the best observation I can offer, since the truth is I've no idea what most of them get up to, nor what goes on inside their heads, though I think you can be assured that something is going on in there, even if you'd struggle to get out of them what it is.

If Noelene is to be believed, the majority of 18-24 yr old voted for the Coalition, which is quite an intriguing statistic.

As for Dylan, I'm against his lonesome-traveller persona but then so was he, long before I was born. I like the 1990 album Under the Red sky, for the song born in time for the line "Not one more night, not one more kiss, Not this time baby, no more of this, Takes too much skill, takes too much will, It’s revealing. You came, you saw, just like the law. You married young, just like your ma.."

Make the most of your spare time now!

Solomon, if you think you're busy as a student, wait until you discover what it's like after you've left and you're learning your profession.  Make the most of your spare time now!

I confess that I stopped reading this article after the descriptions of Fraser, which I found quite shallow and agenda driven.  Fraser is a changed man?  I suspect he's the man he always was, but with more time on his hands to pursue his passions.

Transformation of self

Oh, Phil, I understand that. That's why I'm working very hard right now on "Transformation of self", as Catharine Lumby put it to me, because I simply wont have the time in the future. I do have to minister to my degree occasionally though - a bit like a kitten playing with a ball of string. It's fine, so long as I don't grow bored and let it roll away from me.

I'm trying to avoid the kind of crash & burn scenario that seems so common amongst people that never bothered to stop and think when they were young. Fiona's assertion to me that it is easy to "exist" but hard to live, is something that I struggle to relate to. It's never been easy for me simply to exist - in fact it took me about four years to convince myself that I did. With some people, I wonder whether there is anyone in there heads at all. I don't want to be one of those people that wake up one morning, after it is far too late, and realise that there is nothing inside them.

Question for Solomon

Hello Solomon, I think that I expressed myself poorly. I was not asking you about what were the various activities of other young people. (I'm very familiar with them).

The intent of my question was, "What is your opinion of what other young Australians are doing." You could start with the link provided in #1, if you wanted... I would be most interested to see what you thought of the ideas/work/etc of your peers.

naive and needlessly divisive

F. Kendall, I'm sorry my connection is too slow to properly examine the link. I've come across little that attracts me all that much so far. I like when young people form multicultural societies, or go around promoting tolerance, as they sometimes do at UWS. I also like when young 'n' old were out and about to support the mardi gras. I was stunned how pleasant, peaceful and civilised the atmosphere was amongst the onlookers.Beyond that I find youth-politics is as vacuous as it has always been. I don't like anti-globalisationists and I don't like the Young Liberals. It's nothing personal I just find their ideologies both naive and needlessly divisive, just as they were thirty years ago.
 
I think the young are better off focusing on love, relationships, friendships and on securing their future. Politics may be of assistance for all those reasons and so I'm not against it, though I'm still undecided whether joining is really worth the trouble.

I'm very close to my thinking with Latham here but I'm not quite as pessimistic about politics. I'll join the Labor party if I can see that it will create opportunities for me but I've become doubtful about whether they have anything at all to offer.

John, I thought the piece documented McKnight's journey from leftist extremist to moderate. Fraser and the other right-wing types were simply absorbed in to his own journey, as soon as they started to resemble his own views, rather than being the subject of the piece itself. I find little exploration of the problems of the moment here, just the usual speel that comes from the left.

Solomon...with that name

Solomon...with that name, you oughtta know that it's "spiel", not "speel". And, I'd have to say that your take on same simply betrays your age. McKnight - despite being an ex-Marxist (a breed I'm extremely suspicious of - with justification) - is basically-accurate about the shift to the right on the part of right-leaning parties over the last quarter century. Try reading some history, and you'll (rapidly) find out he's correct...

This - contrary to what you appear to assume - is very relevant to "the problems of the moment"...since, once the international housing bubble collapses, there'll be plenty in the electorate who'll be looking for genuine liberal/conservatism...which'll leave the 'Liberal' Party in EXACTLY the same straights as the late (unlamented) UAP. And, if you need that one explained, just ask your grandparents...

All the best.

live or exist

Solomon Wakeling, the choice is simple but scary: live or exist. If you choose to live, you must take on board the passion and the pain. If you decide to exist, just keep tuned to the weather, so you know in which direction to turn your tail.

On reflection, this sounds harsh, but it's true. Living involves risk, existing doesn't. Living is more fun, existing means chilling until you have reached absolute zero.

Best of luck, and I hope you choose the adventure.

prudence and patience

Fiona, I've found the world is designed to reward prudence and patience. I'm both. I'm suspicious of facile or indulgent expressions of political sentiment, as was Bob Dylan. I respect Margo Kingston because she's still around now that the crowds have dispersed, doing her damndest to get some genuine results. I'm watching closely and picking my battles carefully.

I'm really in no position to do anything particularly useful and neither is any other young university student. They are too busy (universities are selfish, time-stealing institutions) and political action should fall to those with a longer experience and greater resources. I find many of the accounts of sixties politicisation is vulgar in its naivety and soul-destroying in its relentless intrusion in to the present.

I'm listening to you. That's what you get from me and that is all you are entitled to ask.

I'm not sure what adventures you would prefer I have but I've had my share. Anything further would require means that I don't have and am doing what I can to obtain. The choices I see before me are either to co-operate, engage and work constructively with the existing social structure, or homelessness. Whilst I'm not happy with the way this country is heading and am tempted, like some I've known, to simply abandon it, I still have enough faith in it that I remain here and discuss the eternal question of "What is to be done?" with the likes of you.

In a way, I'm waiting for the country to "regain its equilibrium" as Keating says. I've also tried to make an effort to write in support to anyone that I think is doing real work. Gillard replied to an email to thank me today for writing in support of her. I thought writing that was worth doing, where as, some alternatives, like going somewhere and holding a sign, or creating endless verbiage about "economic rationalism", is not worth doing.

I've been around here long enough to know how McKnight's article will be interpreted by the Right, as well as knowing that they are probably correct. It's a false start and I'll be damned if I'm going to allow anyone else to lead me on a wild-goose chase.

Solomon, please believe me

Solomon, please believe me that I was not trying to deride you in any way! My sole aim was to suggest that - whatever you do with your life - do it with passion and commitment. Without that you will be nothing.

FYI, I've been on the money side and have seen what chasing unlimited dollars does to people. How many houses can you live in at one time? How many speed boats can you ski behind? Been there, wasn't interested. In essence, Solomon, I don't care whether you aspire to be and actually achieve being the next media - or whatever - tycoon, or the latest coolest hippie wherever hippies hang out these days (what would I know?). All I do know is that - assuming that you have the basics of life such as food, shelter, health, and the same benefits for those for whom you care - whatever you do please do it with CONCERN!

We are one species in one world. And the options seem to be decreasing. This is a frightening prospect, but it's a likely and ever-increasingly probable scenario. But remember also that we are social beings: whatever I do in the long run will affect you, and vice versa. Ripples in the pond, my friend. Interconnectedness. So it's up to all of us to engage, to be involved.

And this is Pollyanna signing off for tonight.

the modesty of my ambitions and the depths of my concern

Ah, Fi, I think you might be surprised at the modesty of my ambitions and the depths of my concern.

Politics used to be...

Politics used to be largely about "the workers", (Bob Hawke changed this in the 80's to "working class") versus those who owned capital of various kinds.


Now, it is about those who see the economy/personal wealth as of paramount importance, versus....who?

A short history of the Left

This reads like a short history of the left movement in Australia. The conclusion hasn't gone very much further than a belief in trade unionism and state welfarism. As such I appreciate its documentation of real-world experiences, as pieces of journalism and fragments of history but I have not got enough love left in my young heart to waste on its politics.

Hang on a minute...

Solomon, I'd have to take issue with your description of this piece as merely "a short history of the Left Movement in Australia", particularly since most of the Australians he discusses saw themselves as firmly on the centre-right. The recent re-writing of the left-right dichotomy is hardly established in historical terms... and, already (apparently) you're seeing 20th C Australian political governance as dominated by the left?

Hang on a minute...

Also, I find the little-discussed phenomenon of "ex-cons" a very interesting one. John Gray, in particular, I have found fascinating - particularly his book on the late-lamented Isaiah Berlin, and False Dawn his attack on US-style 'globalisation' that still reads very well after nearly a decade.

Personally, I've learned a lot from both sensible conservatives - and neo-liberals - (not to mention 'classical' and 'social' liberals), but we shouldn't make the basic mistake of confusing any of these political approaches, as they happen to be very different at base. Similarly, neo-conservatives - despite their pragmatic use of other political philosophies, are a very different group yet again. Can't say I've learnt much from the latter - however - except how not to conduct foreign policy... but, you never know, now, do you?

Similarly, the foolish equation of all 'left' perspectives with Marxism is also misguided. 'Bout time we all started listening a little harder, I'd say...

All the best.

the times they are a changing

Solomon, I would be interested in your opinion of what other young Australians are doing to interact with and reflect/challenge the peer views. Perhaps it is because of your youth that you don't recognise that the times they are a changing, for the first time since the 60's... no, no revolution: just a mustering current, like this website. Version 3, mentioned on opening page is ready to go except for finance... version 2 already gets more subscribers - 5000 in one particular day - than their server can handle.

Australian Innovators

The mention of the social fabric is very relevant and should be placed much higher on the scale of importance than it is. The major difference in today's marketplace is that very large companies can import container loads of goods from China at extremely low prices which are simply not available to small traders  except at very inflated prices.  They cannot compete.

The number of people who provide services for small companies might be rising but the amount they can charge is limited by the profitability of the small company. The social fabric has been altered to give profits to large companies and reduce the profitability of the small company market. The net effect is that there has been a rising barrier for entrepreneurs which will get even higher. I do not like the prospects for Australian innovators in the future.

See link here

See link here, created by a young Australian who would argue that his views are conservative... and I would agree.

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