Borrowed Energy
By Alex Gourevitch

dissent magazine 
Summer 2012
http://dissentmagazine.org/article/?article=4339

The Reactionary Mind: Conservatism From Edmund Burke to
Sarah Palin
by Corey Robin
Oxford University Press, 2011, 304 pp.


Conservatism is idea driven. Its idee fixe is the defense
of inequalities of wealth and power against challenges
from below--that is the thesis of Corey Robin's provocative
new book, The Reactionary Mind. To some this might seem
familiar, even obvious. But the common opinion on the Left
is that conservatives are fire-breathing idiots, who make
up in heat what they lack in light. Robin's book is a
welcome correction of this simplistic view and puts the
debate where it ought to be: on the force and content of
conservative ideas. 

The Reactionary Mind is presented in two parts, but it is
really composed of three. The first, comprising a
substantial introduction and first chapter, advances the
thesis through a brisk, sometimes virtuoso, reading and
reconstruction of conservative thinking from Edmund Burke
and Joseph de Maistre to Michael Oakeshott and the greater
and lesser Kristols, Irving and Bill. The most absorbing,
and possibly most original, aspect of Robin's discussion
is of the anti-traditional, even radical, character of
conservatism. If conservatives are unified by the "animus
against the agency of the subordinate classes," they are
not static defenders of existing institutions. For Robin,
the raw power of movements for revolution and reform often
cast doubt in conservative minds about the value of old
hierarchies: "If a ruling class is truly fit to rule, why
and how has it allowed a challenge to its power to
emerge?"

On Robin's telling, conservatives have met this challenge
by separating a defense of hierarchy and privilege from
the blind defense of tradition. They have even showed a
tendency to admire the vim and vigor of new historical
actors and have often attempted to absorb and redirect
them toward the creation of new relations of domination
and subjection. Not only are conservatives not necessarily
traditionalists, argues Robin, they often cheerfully
celebrate the liquidation of an enfeebled ruling class so
as to install a more vigorous and virtuous one in its
place. According to Robin, "this is one of the most
interesting and least understood aspects of conservative
ideology. While conservatives are hostile to the goals of
the left . . . they often are the left's best students."
The conservative will to power also accounts for the
tendency of conservatives to see violence as a
regenerative force. An early chapter on Hobbes and a
concluding chapter on Burke are especially strong
meditations on the often violent and revolutionary
character of counterrevolution and contain some of the
most insightful writing of the book. 

for the rest of this review, go to
http://dissentmagazine.org/article/?article=4339

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