Burke vs. Hobbes?
September 5, 2012 16 Comments
We’ve been saying for a while that the 2012 election is going to be a very pivotal one, that will set the course for America for decades (at least) to come. George Weigel has an unusual perspective on it. He writes from a Catholic perspective but a civil liberty perspective as well.
- Burke or Hobbes
- Romney or Obama
- America or France
Freedom or slavery
You likely think, gentle reader, that the 2012 presidential race is a contest between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. That, of course, is true, insofar as the names on our Nov. 6 ballots go. But the 2012 race for the White House is something more, something more profound—something with deeper historical roots in modernity’s wrestling with political power and how that power contributes to the common good.
Both were British subjects. Both had a profound impact on modern political theory. Both knew that religion and politics—Church and state—had been thickly interwoven into the history of the West, although here the deep differences between these two paradigmatic figures begin to sharpen: Hobbes tried to drive religious conviction out of the modern public square, while Burke fashioned a vision of political modernity that drew in part on the rich social pluralism of the Catholic Middle Ages.
In a Hobbesian world, the only actors of consequence are the state and the individual. In a Burkean world, the institutions of civil society—family, religious congregation, voluntary association, business, trade union and so forth—“mediate” between the individual and the state, and the just state takes care to provide an appropriate legal framework in which those civil-society institutions can flourish.
In a Hobbesian world, the state—“Leviathan,” in the title of Hobbes’s most famous and influential work—monopolizes power for the sake of protecting individuals from the vicissitudes of a life that is “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short.” In a Burkean world, civil society provides a thick layer of mediation—protection, if you will—that cushions the interactions between individuals and life’s challenges.
A Hobbesian world is a world of contracts and legal relationships, period. A Burkean world is a world in which there are both contracts—the rule of law—and covenants: those more subtly textured human associations (beginning with marriage) by which men and women form bonds of affection, allegiance, and mutual responsibility.
Continue reading Campaign 2012: Burke vs. Hobbes? | First Things.
- If you really want to understand the 2012 election, you have to know a little something about Hobbes and Burke… (archden.org)
- How Much is the State? (aphilosopher.wordpress.com)
- Democrats Restore Platform Language on Jerusalem – Wall Street Journal (online.wsj.com)