Compassionate conservatism

Compassionate conservatives aim to apply conservative ideas to issues of poverty - issues most associated with the left but which the left have failed to solve.

There are two complementary sides to compassionate conservatism. There is ‘compassionate conservatism’ where compassion is the modifier of conservatism but there is also ‘conservative compassion’ where conservative is the modifier to compassion...

A different kind of conservatism – compassionate conservatism

This socially just brand has three main characteristics:

(1) A more progressive conservatism that is optimistic about how conservative ideas – like school choice and zero tolerance policing - can advance social justice. This dimension of compassionate conservatism is bold in policy and positive in rhetoric.

(2) It tackles a broader range of issues. In an illustration of the ‘And theory of conservatism’ compassionate conservatives – or ComCons – will examine new social challenges including human trafficking, the HIV/AIDS crisis and child poverty.

(3) Many ComCons have a more positive view of government. At the end of September 1999 George W Bush – the world’s best-known ComCon - suggested that the Republicans in Congress might be attempting to “balance the budget on the backs of the poor”. The White House website defines compassionate conservatism in terms of limited roles for government:

“Government should be focused, effective and close to the people - a government that does a few things, and does them well. Government cannot solve every problem, but it can encourage people and communities to help themselves and one another. The truest kind of compassion is to help citizens build better lives of their own. We do not believe in a sink-or-swim society. The policies of our government must heed the universal call of all faiths to love our neighbors as we would want to be loved ourselves. We are using an active government to promote self-government.”

A conservative brand of compassion – ‘conservative compassion’

Conservative compassion has two main beliefs:

(1) A belief in free charities that eschew models of feed-and-forget welfare dependency because they don’t help people to build independent lives for themselves and their families.

(2) The second key element of conservative compassion is a willingness to see government discriminate in favour of independence-building behaviours. Inspired by the teachings of the 12th century Jewish scholar Moses Maimonides, compassionate conservatives believe that helping someone to stand on their own feet represents the highest form of charity (compassion). Maimonides proposed eight levels of charity - the highest of which is “to strengthen the hand of the poor by giving a loan, or joining in partnership, or training out of the individual’s poverty, to help become independent.” The same belief is summed up more traditionally by the idea that if you give someone a fish they can eat for a day – but if you teach them to fish they can eat for the rest of their days. This belief in building an independent-minded citizenry leads to compassionate conservatism’s most controversial set of beliefs. Compassionate conservatism believes that an economically liberal, small government society depends upon abstinence, strong family structures and zero tolerance of drugs.

Compassionate conservatism’s traditional moral beliefs provoke the ire of right and left-of-centre liberals in equal measure. But only sixties socialists have the moral and intellectual right to oppose social conservatism. The liberal left’s belief in a big welfare state at least means that they are prepared to provide some sort of care – however inadequate - for children in fractured families or for people whose lives have been devastated by drugs. The libertarian right seem prepared to tolerate self-destructive behaviours without providing a safety-net for the victims of those behaviours.

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For a full discussion of compassionate conservatism read The Centre for Social Justice’s Whatever happened to compassionate conservatism?

Comments

[a-tracy]

So is Ken Clarke a compassionate conservative? of the other leadership contenders who is a cc?
Is Anne Widdicombe?

I like the 'give a person a fish and they eat for one day, teach them how to fish and they can eat for the rest of their days' something I agree with as long as there are fish to catch!

but . .

In New Orleans even though people were advised to evacuate the area before the storm hit (swim). Many couldn't because they had nowhere to go, some were worried about leaving their life possessions, and some just physically couldn't manage it and the tv news indicated many were left behind (to sink).

At which point would compassionate conservatives have taken over the ownership of the problem in this Country? How long would local government be left to deal with it before national government would get involved?