Stand on Tradition – The Weekly Standard

"To put it in a nutshell, Joo Carlos Espada tells us, his book "aims at providing an intellectual case for liberal democracy." This aim puts The Anglo-American Tradition of Liberty on a crowded shelf of mostly desiccated husks. What gives his work vitality is his wish to clarify why European democracy differs from England's and ours, and his search for what is common among various figures from the past 60 years whom he admires, and earlier thinkers similar to them.

These goals lead him to defend the substance and conditions of our Anglo-American life of liberty, not to attempt to explore freedom's deathless merits. To accomplish his task, Espada briefly discusses a large number of philosophers, statesmen, and scholars. This breadth means that he does not attend to scholarly minutiae, chains of philosophical abstraction, or detailed questions of policy. Each of his discussions is interesting, although some are more telling or reliable than others. I would especially recommend his remarks on Karl Popper, Michael Oakeshott, and Edmund Burke. His discussion of Alexis de Tocqueville is as good a 20-page presentation of what matters in him as one is likely to find.

Espada's concern is more with tradition than principle. John Locke's principled arguments promoting free government were useful in Britain and America because they entered countries that already practiced or defended limited government and the rule of law. In France, however, the "effect of the importation of Locke's doctrines," Espada tells us, quoting Anthony Quinton, "was much like that of alcohol on an empty stomach." Lockean principles came to light there as a wholesale reordering or destruction of traditional ways.

In general, indeed, the Europeans made themselves dizzy with rationalistic schemes. Their hope, stemming from Descartes, not to ground politics and morals on anything that we merely assume is, however, doomed to fail. In fact, it leads finally to relativism. For if all is not completely rational, then it seems that nothing is. Along the path to such relativism, however, came the disasters of the Marxist and Nazi attempts at total amalgamation and control. These were liberty's very opposites.

If the Anglo-American tradition of liberty is vital to liberty's existence, how can liberty prevail where this tradition never existed, or is now withering? Espada's answer to this pressing question is not simple, partly because of what he has in mind with "tradition." Sometimes he points to matters that were, or are, primarily English, quoting John Betjeman and T.S. Eliot on peculiar English tastes that range from "boiled cabbage cut into sections" and dartboards to Tennyson's poetry and Elgar's music. Other times he includes American practices advocated or instituted by Madison or noticed by Tocqueville. Occasionally, he points to tradition as attachment to one's own familiar routines. But we can see that such attachments could, in many places, as easily be illiberal as liberal.

What we most usefully learn from Espada's approach is that liberty requires (or is strongly aided by) a public and private disposition to allow competitive spheres of social, political, and economic influence rather than social and political monoliths; a proclivity to let people lead their lives without much interference from others; and support of government that is "limited and accountable." These dispositions and their objects are broader than "traditional" ways simply, and we can see how several concrete practices could be compatible with them. Espada, however, does not explore the varied ways to advance these liberal dispositions.

To what degree are these dispositions the seedbed or material of liberty, and to what degree are they liberty itself? Espada's intelligent discussion of liberty's tradition leads him to downplay some of its concrete institutions and principles. There is occasional mention, but little discussion, of religious toleration, a free and responsible press, free speech, good character, and the rule of law. There is mention, but little analysis, either of the place of expanding economies in modern liberal countries or of their disruptive effects on traditional ways.

Some of these practicessay, religious tolerationcould perhaps be dealt with within the general dispositions I just discussed. Some omissions might also be explained by Espada's wish not to identify liberal democracy with any current political party or movement, or to allow figures who range from Hayek to Oakeshott to near-socialists and social democrats such as Raymond Plant and Ralf Dahrendorf exemplify the Anglo-American tradition. Liberal democracy covers a wide range. Nonetheless, it is important to discuss these practices because instituting them clarifies areas where the limits, accountability, competition, and variety in authority that Espada connects to liberal democracy must be won and defended, and cannot merely grow. Tradition, habit, or "political culture" are not enough to support them, whatever their importance. This is especially clear with religious toleration and competitive economies.

In general, Espada downplays the place of principles, or the revolutionary ground, of American and even British liberty. He is taken with Hayek's notion of spontaneous order, and is wary of the schemes of founding and constructing that he believes belong to the hyper-rationalism that is one of liberalism's enemies. Yet the United States was founded explicitly, England had its own principled revolution in 1688, and the Locke (or Lockean) principles that thrived in welcoming Anglo-American traditions or practices are not identical with those traditions. The meaning and benefits of equal rights, religious toleration, voluntary action, liberated acquisitiveness, and limited government all needed to be rationally explained, justified, and defended, even in welcoming situations.

Indeed, relativism or irrationalism arises not only from an extreme reaction to reason's disappointed hopes but from eschewing reason in favor of guidance from race, nation, tribe, or other identities. From Nietzsche on, in fact, relativism is defended by some thinkers themselves. Liberal democracy deserves (and its founders present) an intellectual defense that can bring out what is true in it, even if this is not the whole truth about human affairs. Espada offers little defense of liberty itself, or even of the liberal way of life, beyond its moderation and the growth in economic and other information it might provide. He writes thoughtfully about the possibility of truth in the absence of comprehensive certainty, but he reaches no firm conclusion.

We should also point out that liberal democracies do not rely completely on already-friendly soil. They also produce resources with which to buttress their traditions, and favor practices that are conducive to them. Among these are virtues of character such as responsibility, tolerance, and industriousness that citizens need in order to live successfully in liberal democracies, and the attraction of friends and family that reasserts itself even amidst liberalism's geographic dispersal. In this regard, restless American individualism buttresses free government somewhat differently from the mixture of tradition, respect for authority, limited government, and "inner contentment with life which explains the Englishman's profoundest wish, to be left alone, and his willingness to leave others to their own devices."

It is not clear why the basic goals of liberal democracy could not be approached within several "traditions" were these virtues and natural charms to assert themselves, within limited, accountable institutions. Liberal principles must be asserted and defendednatural rights examined as true guides not arbitrary onesif one is to see why we should protect them, and how, when their traditional soil seems increasingly barren.

One virtue of Espada's wariness of rationalistic schemes is his distrust of experts and his keen sense of the current gap between ruling elites and many of the people they purport to help. This view informs his discussion of the European Union. Here we should remind ourselves that "experts" do not understand better than their clients the ends they serve, that much specialization is false, and that legalistic or pseudo-philosophic expertise in "just" distribution and "correct" behavior is often mere political imposition.

We cannot take freedom for granted todayanywhere. Liberalism cannot rely on practices, traditions, or dispositions alone, but also requires reasonable, convincing argument. Still, Joo Espada is correct to point to the importance of liberal traditions, and to the importance of the writers and statesmen who defended them. This thoughtful book will be valuable for all lovers of liberty.

Mark Blitz is Fletcher Jones professor of political philosophy at Claremont McKenna College and the author, most recently, of Conserving Liberty.

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Stand on Tradition - The Weekly Standard