The terms neoconservative and paleoconservative were coined by Paul Gottfried in the 1980s,[citation needed] but the term originated following the outbreak of the Vietnam War and a divide in American conservatism between the interventionists and the isolationists. Those in favor of the Vietnam War then became known as the neoconservatives (interventionists), as they marked a decisive split from the nationalist-isolationism that the traditionalist conservatives (isolationists) had subscribed to up until this point.[6][7][8] Paleoconservatives press for restrictions on immigration, a rollback of multicultural programs and large-scale demographic change, the decentralization of federal policy, the restoration of controls upon free trade, a greater emphasis upon economic nationalism and non-interventionism in the conduct of American foreign policy.[9]
Historian George Hawley states that although influenced by paleoconservatism, Donald Trump is not a paleoconservative, but rather a nationalist and a right-wing populist.[10] Hawley also argued in 2017 that paleoconservatism was an exhausted force in American politics,[11] but that for a time it represented the most serious right-wing threat to the mainstream conservative movement.[11] Regardless of how Trump himself is categorized, others regard the movement known as Trumpism as supported by,[12] if not a rebranding of, paleoconservatism. From this view, the followers of the Old Right did not fade away so easily and continue to have significant influence in the Republican Party and the entire country.[13]
Terminology
The prefix paleo derives from the Greek root παλαιός (palaiós), meaning "ancient" or "old". It is somewhat tongue-in-cheek and refers to the paleoconservatives' claim to represent a more historic, authentic conservative tradition than that found in neoconservatism. Adherents of paleoconservatism often describe themselves simply as "paleo". Rich Lowry of National Review claims the prefix "is designed to obscure the fact that it is a recent ideological creation of post-Cold War politics".[14]
Samuel T. Francis, Thomas Fleming, and some other paleoconservatives de-emphasized the conservative part of the paleoconservative label, saying that they do not want the status quo preserved.[15][16] Fleming and Paul Gottfried called such thinking "stupid tenacity" and described it as "a series of trenches dug in defense of last year's revolution".[17] Francis defined authentic conservatism as "the survival and enhancement of a particular people and its institutionalized cultural expressions".[18][19]
Paleoconservatism differs from neoconservatism in opposing free trade and promoting republicanism. Paleoconservatives see neoconservatives as imperialists and themselves as defenders of the republic.[21][22]
Paleoconservatives believe that tradition is a form of reason, rather than a competing force. Mel Bradford wrote that certain questions are settled before any serious deliberation concerning a preferred course of conduct may begin. This ethic is based in a "culture of families, linked by friendship, common enemies, and common projects",[24] so a good conservative keeps "a clear sense of what Southern grandmothers have always meant in admonishing children, 'we don't do that'".[25]
Pat Buchanan argues that a good politician must "defend the moral order rooted in the Old and New Testament and Natural Law"—and that "the deepest problems in our society are not economic or political, but moral".[26]
Southern traditionalism
According to historian Paul V. Murphy, paleoconservatives developed a focus on localism and states' rights. From the mid-1980s onward, Chronicles promoted a Southern traditionalist worldview focused on national identity, regional particularity, and skepticism of abstract theory and centralized power.[27] According to Hague, Beirich, and Sebesta (2009), the antimodernism of the paleoconservative movement defined the neo-Confederate movement of the 1980s and 1990s. During this time, notable paleoconservatives argued that desegregation, welfare, tolerance of gay rights, and church-state separation had been damaging to local communities, and that these issues had been imposed by federal legislation and think tanks. Paleoconservatives also claimed the Southern Agrarians as forebears in this regard.[28]
^Morris, Edwin Kent (December 24, 2018). "Inversion, Paradox, and Liberal Disintegration: Towards a Conceptual Framework of Trumpism". New Political Science. 41 (1): 21. doi:10.1080/07393148.2018.1558037. S2CID149978398.
^Bradford, M. E. (1990). The Reactionary Imperative: Essays Literary and Political. Peru, Illinois: Sherwood Sugden. p. 129. Quoted in Murphy 2001, p. 233.
^Bradford, M. E. (1990). The Reactionary Imperative: Essays Literary and Political. Peru, Illinois: Sherwood Sugden. pp. 119, 121. Quoted in Murphy 2001, p. 233.
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——— (2006). "Paleoconservatism". In Frohnen, Bruce; Beer, Jeremy; Nelson, Jeffrey O. (eds.). American Conservatism: An Encyclopedia. Wilmington, Delaware: ISI Books. pp. 651–652. ISBN978-1-61017-103-8.
Hawley, George (2017). Making Sense of the Alt-Right. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN978-0-231-54600-3.
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Newman, Joshua I.; Giardina, Michael D. (2011). Sport, Spectacle, and NASCAR Nation: Consumption and the Cultural Politics of Neoliberalism. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. doi:10.1057/9780230338081. ISBN978-0-230-33808-1.
Raimondo, Justin (1993). Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement. Burlingame, California: Center for Libertarian Studies. ISBN978-1-883959-00-5.
Röpke, Wilhelm (1998). A Humane Economy: The Social Framework of the Free Market. Wilmington, Delaware: ISI Books.
Schneider, Gregory L. (2009). The Conservative Century: From Reaction to Revolution. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN978-0-7425-4285-3.
Scotchie, Joseph (2004) [2002]. Revolt from the Heartland: The Struggle for an Authentic Conservatism. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Transaction Publishers. ISBN978-1-4128-3324-0.
——— (2017) [1999]. "Introduction: Paleoconservatism as the Opposition Party". In Scotchie, Joseph (ed.). The Paleoconservatives: New Voices of the Old Right. London: Routledge. pp. 1–15. ISBN978-1-351-47773-4.
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