It is time to enter the breach once more. This time, to answer a piece by Kit Kowohl in
the most recent issue of the Political Quarterly, about the political bias of historians - especially those working on on twentieth-century British political history. It is an intriguing piece, not least because it warns of the dangers to the discipline that result from the sort of political monoculture that we see at play. Still, I wanted add some elements that merit closer consideration, and that were perhaps not given the degree of attention that they deserve.
First, there is the avowed anti-expert stance of populist conservatism ("Britain has had enough of experts."). That goes back quite some time, to even before Brexit. Remember episodes like Michael Gove's war on WWI historians? Obviously, he accused them of holding views that none of them held. Worse still, Gove actually maligned views espoused a conservative prime minister (Winston Churchill), and the editor of a conservative newspaper (Max Hastings of the Daily Telegraph). Still, it raised his profile, and engendered an us vs. them narrative that came fully to fruition during the Brexit referendum. In a way, it laid the foundations for Oliver Dowden to threaten the National Trust with a withdrawal of funding, when it began investigating how far the nice country houses in its possession might have links to slavery. At stake was not the quality of the research, but that it had been undertaken in the first place.
The petty - and petty-nationalist - politics of Brexit are, of course, one reason why the relationship between historians and conservatism has broken down. No self-respecting academic would like to associate with a government that inveighed against rootless cosmopolitans, seemingly oblivious to the phrase's pedigree. But the malaise goes back further in time. Note that support for conservative positions began to decline in the 1980s. Why might that be? Could it be that the hostility of Thatcherism to established institutions, the abolition of tenure, the increasing disenfranchisement of academics would not have endeared them to conservative politics? How should they respond to Thatcher's reputed quip that history was a luxury that Britain could not afford? Then there were the nearly five years of Keith Joseph, leading light of Thatcherism, and the crisis that he unleashed upon the job market, also known the great hunger years. Is it really that surprising that academics took increasingly against conservatism?
Third, there was visible contempt for Literature, Philosophy, the study of foreign languages, and many others. History, however, was singled out for special opprobrium - partly perhaps in English common parlance a historian could be a disgraced former newspaper columnist who wrote about the past. Everyone could do it, and there was no need for professional historians. There is a reason why History Reclaimed, the culture war outfit, counts among its numbers mostly managers, writers of fiction, phrenologists, and other outrage merchants. It's nominal leadership has no expertise in the area with which it is most concerned: slavery and colonialism. Its leading light is a retired theologian with a weak grasp of the Bible. But its not just that: systematically, universities are undermined as a source of alternative authority. In England, academics will be policed by a 'free speech czar'. The legislation is so vague that it will either silence critical voices, or enmesh them in years of court cases. Self-censorship will be the order of the day. Simultaneously, civil servants are asked to monitor the social media output of prospective speakers, and to cancel anyone critical of government policy. No critical voices are supposed to reach the ear of government.
And then there is the - to put it politely - rather low wattage of the dominant strand of conservatism. It has nothing to offer in terms of alternative models or explicatory modes. Edmund Burke would fall foul of the current lot: the red wall MPs are no known for their subtlety of mind, and the less said about the ERG, the better. Perhaps one could do with some exporting refugees to Ruanda? Or adopt the faux upper class mannerisms of that Hyacinth Bouquet with evil intent, Jacob Rees-Mogg? Or go for the Dünbrettbohrer in the media, Pearson/Liddle/Hartley-Brewer? There is nothing there, there.
And yet, I agree with Kit Kowohl: the current state of intellectual bereftness that is conservatism is a bad thing. It certainly impoverishes our political culture. But, what are we supposed to do about this? Every department designate some poor schmuck to act as conservative liaison? With a remit to spy on foreign students & staff and to report every infringement of their visa to the Home Office?
Maybe, the solution lies elsewhere? Kit Kowohl noted the tradition of conservative affiliated work in his area of specialism, twentieth-century British political thought. That got me thinking about my field, and it emerged very quickly that there is no distinctly conservative approach. The guy who, in most ways, resembles the stereotype of a conservative scholar is in fact an old-fashioned leftie, while the one who does look moderately cutting edge, is a dyed-in-the wool conservative (note the lower case C). Maybe there are areas where conservatism has survived? Not as party-political affiliation, but as a mindset? Perhaps the focus on party politics also paints too negative a picture? Most of my colleagues will vote Labour or Plaid Cymru, but that is not from any strong convictions, but rather from a position of being left with no alternative voices? I suspect that many who subscribe to conservative values are left facing a similar dilemma.
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