Abridged Historic Right

The right, like the left, to my understanding came out of the French Revolution. Specifically, the foundation of conservatism is considered by many to be Edmund Burke's "Reflections on The French Revolution." A book I have not read.

So my abridgement is very compact, like the strap that keeps a Piano Accordion shut so the Polka cannot play. Which is also a metaphor for respectable conservatism - the voice that says "let's not get carried away".

Done well, conservatism is a bridle on enthusiasm to protect us from unbridled enthusiasm. Conservatism fundamentally exists to protect us from unintended consequences.

Let me try and put it thus: Most of us would agree that few people will miss mosquitos. As far as I know, the technology does not exist, to eradicate mosquitos, but I would assert that even something as likely to be as universally popular as eradicating mosquitos there would likely be unintended consequences.

A properly functioning conservative movement could be said to be rooted in or to Chesterton's fence, which is easier said than done. Chesterton's fence says that if someone come's along and makes essentially an appeal to personal incredulity, like "I don't understand why this fence is here, let's get rid of it." Chesterton's fence states one cannot alter the status quo without understanding why the status quo is the status quo.

Perhaps a fun example of Chesterton's fence failing would be Southpark inventor Mr Garrison's gyroscoping transport alternative "IT" where it takes one customer pointing out the redundant control buttons rendering the phallic and penetrative default controls unnecessary. Within the context of the story, Mr Garrison's design preferences could be safely scrapped. However, why not cut this gag from the show? In the greater context of Southpark satire, Mr Garrison's intrusive controls serve the function of illustrating how painful Airport security and Air travel has become, as residents of the world embrace anal penetration as the lesser discomfort.

A more complicated real world example, might be the cohesion of religious dogma driven bigotry to conservative institutions - like bigotry directed at homosexuals. It strikes me that Chesterton's Fence, a thought problem that came from a text called "The Thing: Why I Am A Catholic" would oblige one when a voice comes along and says "I don't understand why homosexuals exist, we should get rid of them." would not be permitted to take any action to try and purge the existence or practice of homosexuality from society, given that it is a more ancient tradition than say Catholicism. 

I feel it should be pointed out, that as at writing it is likely the case that anyone can observe unintended consequences arising from reforms that I am glad have taken place - the election of Barack Obama to the highest office of the USA, has had unintended consequences, that stand in stark contrast to Shepard Fairey's "Hope" posters. We are not living in the hoped for future, I assert. Similarly, there appear to be unintended consequences arising from marriage equality, a broad international movement that allows same-sex couples to legally marry and enjoy equal legal status to cross-sex couples. Those I have personally to take largely as hearsay, but it seems to be an unintended consequence of a changed perception of gay men within Queer identities. 

These unintended consequences, it should be pointed out, are not the realization of those negative consequences evoked by actual conservatives to try and scaremonger the public out of these reforms. Neither the advent of a black president, nor same-sex marriage have lead to the collapse of society. They have had unintended consequences that a historic conservative, which is to say, functional right should have soberly attempted to identify.

In some ways, under systems like the Westminister parliamentary system, the left-right historical dynamic is somewhat baked into the institution - commonly known as a system of checks and balances. I would specifically refer to the institutional dynamic of having a lower and upper house, or the houses of parliament and the house of lords, or the house of legislation and the house of review.

My previous post described an ideal left as a loose coalition with vigorous internal debate that are aligned on the broad recognition that some things have to change. In a legislative house, we have an institutional forum for these debates to take place, and in a house of review we have an institutional forum for the output, proposed reforms, to be scrutinized and reviewed for unintended consequences.

It is not that these designs realize so much as aspire to those ideals. In the UK the house of Lords were traditionally given to Land Lords and Clergy from the Church of England, not conservatives. Just privileged elites that were grandfathered in, that no doubt performed some conservative function. Furthermore, it seemed that despite the strictly conservative makeup of the House of Lords, Britain seemed impatient to have conservative voices heard in a debate, and so the legislative house, has been dominated by a conservative party. So we have left-right dynamics nested within institutions that are already set up with left-right institutions. 

A historical conception of the right, are defensive custodians. I'm not so certain if historically, those we label conservatives actually perform this function. This is because, I would guess, the status quo isn't a static status quo, it will contain some kind of agreed upon active path toward progress.

For example, deregulation is a now, somewhat antiquated path to progress. The idea that cutting regulatory oversight will allow commercial enterprise to liberate us all. This can be progress, if the circumstances that demand change, so the reality being, that markets (or whatever) are overregulated. However, circumstances may be that something is underregulated, like the financial sector in the lead up to the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. In which case, further deregulation is not progress but regress.

What needs must be done however, needs must be debated rigorously on the left, such that the right can consent to the best course of action to re-regulate a financial sector. That debate could be made more rigorous by left-wing voices from the 70s who brought in the deregulation reforms, now conservatively defending the reckless abandonment of reforms implemented. Chesterton's fence demands voices that for example, can represent why exchange rates were floated, why the gold standard was abandoned. This would be conservativism, or the right wing, functioning as I assert it to be historically intended.

To look at the sporting world by contrast, there has been a recent-ish push for deregulation, specifically of what qualifies someone to participate in women's sporting activities. Without getting into the issue, I raise it merely to point out that in this case the right-wing can be generally characterised as being against deregulation, in stark contrast to their attitude toward regulating the financial sector.

Both positions are reconcilable, as is the right's resistance to conserving the environment, the amazon rainforest etc. They are actively resisting changes to the status quo of exploiting the natural environment, hence why conservatives, are not as a rule, nature conservationists. Though there are certainly examples historically of conservative governments creating nature reserves and what not.

Progress requires friction, the left doesn't want to operate on slippery ice, it needs traction of some kind to operate safely. Ideally, the right would be like grass, operating on grass is fairly straightforward. It may be that the right functions more like ice-skates, in terms of, it can allow us to navigate on very dangerous, slippery ice, but not without a degree of skill, learning, training. 

I'm not sure if the symbiosis required between right and left tendencies is analogous to running across an open field, or whether it is more analogous to pulling off a triple-axle in ice-skates.

What I actually see, in practice are a polarized conflict between two radical left-wingers taking place in an extremely dangerous environment. Which is the subject I will turn to next. 

I don't look at institutions like the Republican Party, and think Burkeian conservatives. I see some corruption of the right, into something functionally more like a radical left, I see the left, as also a very radical left, but in many ways the radical elements are a smokescreen for a position far more conservative.

Stay tuned, or not.