Spanish Conservative Politics

Abstract

Any discussion of conservatism immediately entails problems of definition. Some question the concept’s usefulness. This writer acknowledges difficulties in giving complete precision to the concept but feels it is possible to identify political values and patterns of behaviour that can be broadly defined as ‘conservative’. He sees conservatism as a more or less effectively articulated response to the essentially optimistic political claims of the French Revolutionaries and their heirs.¹ Equally, it is suggested that the term ‘conservative’ describes those values, interests or groups which, implicitly or explicitly, question the idea that the application of reason and will within the political arena can totally transform society. Rather, conservatives, it is assumed, see politics as an essentially limited activity concerned chiefly to preserve order and stability and which carefully maintains a distinction between state and society. They also have a preference for established institutions or practices. They may, however, accept the need for evolutionary change or reform, in so far as the conservation of existing institutions presupposes their adaptation to changed circumstances. In this sense conservatives acknowledge the possibility of improving upon necessary imperfections in the established order. By the same token they must be distinguished from reactionaries and those on the ‘radical right’.