The Legacy of Edmund Burke

A man whose influence often precedes his own reputation, Edmund Burke remains one of the most important shapers of modern conservatism.

Although more or less considered a “liberal conservative” in his day, Burke’s legacy still influences the modern right.

Key to his ideology were his views on property.

Property, according to Burke, was absolutely essential to human life.

Burke argued people want to be ruled and controlled and so the division of property remains the basis for social structure becoming a vital unit of control in our property based society.

The division of property, however, also kept the monarch in check, reminding him or her to look after the needs of the lower classes.

Burke reminded his readers that property actually defined the divisions of social class, and as such, was a natural aspect of the greater social agreement that benefited all subjects of the crown.

But Burke also cared about tradition — i.e. the preservation of the ancestral and the immemorial.

Despite Burke’s conservative predilections, Burke cared deeply for the so-called ‘undesirables’ of the British realm — for example Irish Catholics and Indians — and was deeply critical of both British and French Imperialism while also condemning the continental radicalism that manifested itself in the French Revolution

The consequence of Burke’s unique perspective is that he did not entirely fit into either the Conservative or the Liberal camps of the day.

Burke’s contrarian philosophy, however, earned him many admirers even amongst his own political enemies and many men who once criticized him for his stance on the French Revolution came around to writing about him with admiration.

In Burke’s most famous work, Reflections on the Revolution in France, where he argued against the French Revolution, Burke went about establishing a central philosophy towards social change arguing that society should change through renovation rather than through innovation — i.e. through reforms rather than through revolution.

In politics, Burke, thus resembled an architect who wanted to restore an old building rather than tear it down and rebuild it anew.

Reflections on the Revolution in France, however controversial at the time, won him quite the following after his death and has become a touchstone in modern conservative thought.

Burke’s influence is tremendous, and many noteworthy individuals from Karl Marx to Winston Churchill have written on him since.

Marx on one hand referred to him as a “sycophant” who always pursued a solution that put him in the best light, while Churchill more sympathetically cast him as an individual who always fought against tyranny and who desired a careful balance between liberty and authority.

Ironically, Burke laid out the the moral foundations for the British Empire namely the core principal of freedom — a point that would ultimately prove the empire’s undoing as many of the disparate peoples who constituted the empire would eventually seek their own freedom at the greater expense of the British empire’s own existence.

Edmund Burke’s legacy was and remains in his extensive writings spanning letters, pamphlets and books where he expounded upon a vast range of issues covering everything from human nature to the role of political parties.

Burke’s ideas remain controversial and both modern ‘liberals’ and ‘conservatives’ continue to use his ideas for rhetorical purposes.

To perceive his views as being liberal by contemporary standards would be at times a stretch of the imagination.

He supported a gradualist abolition of slavery in line with many of the contemporary slave owning founding fathers in the U.S.

He also despised atheists, all the while being a staunch supporter of a contemporary monarchical power structure, while of course being in favor of curbing royal patronage.

His views on other aspects of the state including parliament, the Anglican church and the nation itself, however, prove all too conservative for the modern conservative party who historically embraced the European Union, and a secular free market ideology.