Oakeshott’s Idealist Political Thought

Abstract

“Iventure to think that the prospects of political thought to-day are darker than even those of theology. For the theory of politics has fallen on evil days, its ideas are for the most part misappropriated, its words mere jargon, and it is too far gone in decay to allow of any sudden rejuvenation.”¹ From an essay titled “The Authority of the State” published in 1929, these were Michael Oakeshott’s first published comments concerning political philosophy. Given their tone, it would not be surprising if they had been his last. However, in the twenties and thirties, Oakeshott had begun to think much about politics. The extent of his thought on politics has become more evident recently as some previously unknown works and notebooks relating to political philosophy have been discovered posthumously, and some of these published for the first time.² As with Oakeshott’s thoughts on philosophy, these early political works share a continuity with his later, more familiar works, such as those in Rationalism in Politics; yet these are also primarily focused on the concerns of idealism and expressed in its idiom. The genesis of the concerns that mark Oakeshott’s later work is here (e.g., the interest in authority, caution about democracy, dislike of contract theory), but the basis of those concerns is not a quiet reflection on English tradition, but once again philosophical idealism. It will take a developed appreciation for Hobbes to alter the character of Oakeshott’s political thought, and before exploring that alteration in the next chapter, I will here examine what was there to be altered.