THE PHILOSOPHY AND POETRY OF PRACTICE - Andrew Sullivan: Intimations Pursued: The Voice of Practice in the Conversation of Michael Oakeshott (Exeter: Imprint Academic, 2007. Pp. xi, 219. $49.90.)

Abstract

process of capital contraction and consolidation to start the economic cycle afresh within the capital-producing economy," 27). Politically, the metaphor of the lion accounts for liberal tendencies, that of the fox for conservative tendencies.To test the utility of the theory, Marshall conducted a very elaborate two-stage study. First, he developed a scale measuring personality traits, using data from questionnaires to undergraduates. Then, after refining the scale, he applied the findings to a questionnaire which he circulated among Labor, Conservative, and Liberal MPs. The scale essentially groups attitudes along a continuum from lion to fox but simultaneously allows for a great deal of differentiation by age, rank, and so on. Drawing upon numerous previous studies, it measures attitudes regarding value relativism, openness, tolerance toward opponents, nonconformism, postmaterialism, caution and innovation, distrust, and sensationseeking. The findings were that "Pareto's model appeared validated by the general contrast found between the risk-averse, uncreative conservative and the risk tolerant innovative liberal" (155). Marshall quickly adds, however, that "a great deal of caution" is advisable in interpreting the findings. For one thing, the student study "disconfirmed" Pareto's idea that force and fraud are alternatives rather than presumably complementary tactics. For another, the findings were also probably influenced by the political fortunes of the various political parties at the time the survey was taken.These meager and hardly counterintuitive results invite more than just caution. Like so many survey questionnaires, those addressed to the politicians often pose vacuous statements open to myriad interpretations. (One example: "Politicians should be motivated by a desire to uphold traditional moral values.") The simple idea that liberals are innovators and conservatives defenders of the status quo is appealing in some respects but hardly in all: liberals sometimes cling to established practices, such as public programs, whereas modern conservatives are all for bold new experiments in privatization. James MacGregor Burns suggested plausibly that FDR was such a successful politician because he combined the traits of lion and fox. Since Marshall teaches at Glasgow University, he will not be altogether shocked to learn that in assessing this effort to show the strength and utility of Pareto's psychology, at least one reader arrives at a Scottish verdict: Not Proven.-Sanford Lakoff

Michael Oakeshott’s political philosophy of civil association and constructivism in International Relations

“… 4. Oakeshott’s interpretation of Hobbes’ conception of political obligation is one of the most significant changes between the two editions of his Introduction to Leviathan (the first published in 1946, the second in 1975). See Tregenza (2003: 96–102). …”