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Roger Scruton on Brexit — and (if inadvertently) Trump
On Radio4, the BBC has posted a 15-minute reflection on the Brexit vote by the great English philosopher Roger Scruton. Scruton’s talk is an astonishing thing: for the sheer calm rationality with which it lays out its argument, for its insistence on championing the humble and traditional and unfashionable–and, I was struck again and again, for its applicability to our own country.
Consider this passage:
In modern conditions, in which governments rarely enjoy a majority vote, most of us are living under governments of which we don’t approve. We accept to be ruled by laws and decisions made by politicians with whom we disagree and whom we perhaps deeply dislike. How is that possible? Why don’t democracies constantly collapse, as people refuse to be governed by those they never voted for? Clearly, a democracy has to be held together by something stronger than politics. There has to be a first-person plural, a pre-political loyalty, which causes neighbors who voted in opposing ways to treat each other as fellow citizens, for whom the government is not “mine” or “yours” but “ours,” whether or not we approve of it.
It is true that a country’s stability depends to a great extent on economic growth. But it also depends upon social trust—the sense that we belong together, and that we will stand by each other in the real emergencies. Social trust comes from shared language, shared customs, instinctive law-abidingness, procedures for resolving disputes and grievances, public spirit, and the ability of the people to change their own government by a process that is transparent to them all.
Urban elites build trust through career moves, joint projects, cooperation across borders, and what the philosopher John Stuart Mill called “experiments of living.” Like the aristocrats of old, they form their networks without reference to national boundaries. They do not, on the whole, depend on a particular place, a particular faith, or a particular routine for their sense of membership….
However, even in modern conditions, this modern elite depends upon others who do not belong to it. The farmers, manufacturers, clothiers, mechanics, soldiers and administrators, for whom attachment to place and its customs is implicit in all that they do. It is surely not difficult to imagine that in a question of identity these people will vote in another way from the urban elite….
An inclusive, first-person plural [a “we”] is the residue of cooperation and trust over generations. Those who have inspired and guided the European project have tried to create such a first-person plural by using gimmicks and subsidies while suppressing the national loyalties of the European people. But it is nationality, the home country and its shared culture, that define the true European identity. It astonishes me that so many people fail to see this, or to understand that democracy, and national identity, in the end, depend on each other.
Take that last paragraph, edit it lightly, and Scruton is speaking directly to us:
Those who have inspired and guided the expansion of the vast administrative state in Washington, DC have tried to create a new American consciousness, teaching the American people to become dependent on the federal government, while suppressing their natural loyalties to their families, their schools, their churches and synagogues, and their neighborhoods. But it is love of country–not some vague loyalty to the globe, but love of the specific and particular, love of this country and its shared culture–that define the American character.
Our democracy, and our national character, in the end, depend on each other.
If Donald Trump stands for anything good and noble, then surely it is this: the freedoms and loyalties of ordinary American. “I am your voice,” Trump said at the convention last week. If that is to mean anything, then surely he must defy the new ruling class, opposing its efforts to use the federal government to remake this country.
Donald Trump is onto something–if only the candidate himself could see it!–and it is not division or racism or hatred but simply this: love of country.
Published in General
Oh, John, that is just beautifully stated.
Note, by the way, that I avoided the use of “subsidiarity” only because Scruton himself attacks it. He’s not attacking the concept, of course, but the use of the word by officials of the EU–in his view, they’ve subverted the word itself, using it simply as a cover or deception.
And on point #7, “International Institutions,” it’s telling, isn’t it, that the Clintons named their front organization the “Clinton Global Initiative [itals mine].” Note to Trump’s speechwriters: Use that! Contrast the Clinton Global Initiative with Trump’s program–an American initiative.
My list starts with God.
Yes, if Trump would concentrate on this theme of love of country rather than (as Rob Long says) re-winning his loyal followers by attacking Ted Cruz, it would be a cakewalk.
I’ve already written a post today, so I won’t tackle it now -but I think it is worth, some time, quibbling about the exact order of 0-6. It’s also worth noting whether “International Institutions” come before or after “humanity” or “the world.” No doubt, though, that any changes in the sequence would be adjacent and pairwise.
I agree. That said, I disagree with you Peter that somehow Trump is reflective of a major inherent difference. The left is starting at #7, and you’re trying your best to cheer on Trump for ham-handedly working down from #6.
Which politician is starting at #1? That’s who we should be rallying behind.
Curiously, Roger Scruton heaps scorn on subsidiarity, beginning at 8:48.
The EU purports to delegate authority to member states in most matters. The trouble is that since the EU decides which matters are subject to local control and which are not, it’s a fiction. When the EU is in charge of delegation of authority, the member states do not enjoy sovereignty. In other words, the EU’s version of subsidiarity is top-down instead of being bottom-up.
Edit: Just noticed that Mr. Robinson made a similar point. The Remainers and EU have co-opted the term to serve as cover for their power grab.
I wonder why Mr. Trump would think/feel/divine that attacking Cruz would be more effective in winning support than attacking Hillary Rodham Clinton?
That was a rhetorical question, I know you don’t know the answer. Only Mr. Trump knows the answer to that. If that is even his conscious intent?
This was news to me also. The Left ruins everything.
Trump is too busy beating Cruz in the primaries to notice this, or that the primaries are over.
Trump is a strategic knucklehead.
Unfortunately, our beloved bishops are as prone as EU politicians to disregard their own stated value of subsidiarity when applied to political ethics.
Consistency of ethical judgments between high- and low-level scenarios is a difficult devotion and a rare gift. It can even be reasonably debated how much person-to-person and political or global ethical equations should mirror each other.
Great post !! We’ve got a leader here! And the Left can snark and sneer all it wants to, but it’s like they say on a plane: ” adjust your own oxygen mask first, then assist others”.
We have what everybody in the world wants. We’re the light of the nations. And we’ve gotta preserve that light first–or we can’t help anybody else.
Does he address this issue in that video?
That tweet-length definition is just gorgeous.
He does indeed. And it’s only 15 minutes. See if you can find time to listen. You’ll enjoy it. A true mind at work.
Quotes from Sir Roger’s talk:
“They [those who voted for Brexit] were voting for the right to vote… on matters of shared national concern.”
“A government has sovereignty only if the [European] Commission permits it. And that is not sovereignty at all.”
“There is one circumstance in which only a referendum can answer the need of the moment, and that when what has to be decided is the question: Who has the right to decide?”
The terms “humanity” and “the world” are so broad as to be meaningless. Who can claim to speak for either?
No one claims to speak for the world or humanity, but surely we have some obligation to people just because they are people. I’m not saying its a bit obligation (it is less than any obligation placed on us by the nation), but I’m quite willing to believe our obligations to random people who don’t live in our country but are still people are greater than our obligations to the United Nations.
I did listen to it, and among its good attributes was that it didn’t waste the listener’s time. Scruton used just the right number of words and sentences.
If it is in our power to help people halfway around the world, then that is an opportunity that should not be ignored. But…
I’ve probably missed other reasons to prefer face-to-face expressions of charity to care via government/corporate agency.
Note also that this relates to news consumption. Though some individuals must focus on national or international concerns for the good of all, most of us should be more concerned with people we know.
Peter, a propos of this great piece by Scruton, I recommend to you and our fellow Ricocheti Dan Carlin’s recent “Common Sense” podcast on Brexit called “The Revenge of the Gangrenous Finger.” For those who know Carlin’s stuff this is really him at his most brilliant.
On my drive home from Cleveland to Boston, I stopped in Rochester NY to pick up my repaired car (where it had died on the NY Thruway five days earlier…longer story there than you want) and was driven from the rental car place to the repair shop. The middle-aged Enterprise Rental guy was excited when he heard that I was a delegate coming from Cleveland. He asked what I thought of Trump’s speech and I said I thought he hit is out of the park. He enthusiastically agreed. Hadn’t been a Trump guy but was now. Said there were “about seven, what I call ‘tingle moments’ in the speech.” And I said I loved the “I am your voice” line and he said Yeah! that was one of them.
I should also mention that when Scruton talked about the Treaty of Rome, the Interstate Commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution came to mind. These days conservatives tend to take the position on it that old conservatives resisted when it was held by the left, which means they are working against any Brexitification of our own governmental system.
Taking the world or humanity into consideration when we make decisions is a very different question from the one on the table. The issue was subsidiarity – at what level should issues be addressed. Trying to control things at the level of “humanity” or “the world” is an impossibility.
That line creeped me out. I thought it had echoes of the “will of the people” meme of the French and Russian revolutions.
Of course it does. Maybe so obvious that it’s unstated? Pace.
Um, there are only two politicians in the race.
Peter,
Just got back online. I listened to Scruton. He was magnificent. It was to listen to the Britain of old. That beautiful erudite discourse filled with knowledge and wisdom that we all considered uniquely British. This gives me great hope. All is not lost. We can recapture our sense of deep culture and purpose. If the British can do it others can do it.
Welcome back Britain. Now for America and the rest of Europe, there is work to be done.
Regards,
Jim
Common people have been forgotten by the politicians on both ends who focus on the chronic welfare, Wall St, K St or Harvard crowds.
I’m sitting in the Hellfire Saloon in Reno drinking whiskey with about 100 people. Guess who 90% are going to vote for
John Harmon McElroy’s 1999 book, American Beliefs: What Keeps a Big Country and a Diverse People United, is a good explication of what made the US strong and good. I used to use it as my reference text when teaching US Culture here in Japan. Although it’s almost too late to salvage those beliefs today, it’s still worth a read if you can find it. And Harmon said all those years ago about the same thing as Scruton about the culture.
With that kind of set-up, I’m guessing Yosemite Sam.
Eeyore, I’m the rootenest tootenest shootenest populist pablum peddler in the North South East aaaaaaaaaand West!
And someone else is driving home ;-)