CONSERVATISMS 2013-2014 | 6 ECTS Prof. Doutor João Pereira Coutinho (IEP – UCP)
What do we talk about when we talk about conservatism? A disposition? An ideology? A set of principles and values substantially constant over the course of time, regardless of the historical circumstances that explain the emergence of conservatism as an ideology? The objective of the course is to try to answer some of these questions, taking as the starting point some reference authors within the British, French and North American conservative traditions.
1. Conservatism as a disposition and conservatism as an ideology 2. On British conservatism 2.1. 2.2. 2.3. 2.4. 2.5. 2.6. 2.7.
Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790) Benjamin Disraeli, Vindication of the English Constitution (1835) John Henry Newman, The Idea of a University (1873) Winston Churchill, “Speech on Rebuilding the House of Commons” (1943) Michael Oakeshott, “Rationalism in Politics” (1947) Margaret Thatcher, In Defense of Freedom (1986) Roger Scruton, The Uses of Pessimism and the Dangers of False Hope (2010)
3. On French conservatism 3.1. 3.2. 3.3. 3.4.
Joseph de Maistre, Considerations on France (1797) Benjamin Constant, The Liberty of the Ancients Compared with That of the Moderns (1816) Tocqueville, Alexis de, The Ancien Régime and the Revolution (1856) Bertrand de Jouvenel, On Power (1945)
3.5.
Raymond Aron, The Opium of the Intellectuals (1955)
4. On American Conservatism 4.1. 4.2. 4.3. 4.4. 4.5. 4.6. 4.7.
John Adams, A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America (1787) James Madison, “Federalist No. 10” (1787) and “Federalist No. 49” (1788) Rufus Choate, “The Position and Functions of the American Bar, as an Element of Conservatism in the State” (1845) Irving Babbitt, Democracy and Leadership (1924) Allan Bloom, The Closing of the American Mind (1987) Irving Kristol, Neoconservatism: The Autobiography of an Idea (1995) John Kekes, A Case for Conservatism (1998)
5. Conservatism and its critics
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY: _______
In addition to the specific texts regarding the issues under analysis and which will be provided to the students over the course of the sessions, the following general reference works are also recommended:
Eccleshall, Robert. English Conservatism since the Restoration: An Introduction and Anthology. Londres: Unwin Hyman, 1990. Goodin, Robert E. e Philip Pettit. A Companion to Contemporary Political Philosophy. 7ª ed. Oxford: Blackwell, 1999. Harbour, William R. The Foundations of Conservative Thought: An Anglo-American Tradition in Perspective. Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1982. Hearnshaw, F.J.C. Conservatism in England: An Analytical, Historical, and Political Survey. Londres: Macmillan: 1933. Hirschman, Albert O. The Rhetoric of Reaction: Perversity, Futility, Jeopardy. Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1991. Muller, Jerry Z., org. Conservatism: An Anthology of Social and Political Thought from David Hume to the Present. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997. O’Sullivan, Noël. Conservatism. Londres: J.M. Dent & Sons Ltd., 1976. Quinton, Anthony. The Politics of Imperfection: The religious and secular traditions of conservative thought in England from Hooker to Oakeshott. Londres: Faber and Faber, 1978.
