Friday, January 5, 2018

Eric Voegelin and the Liberal's 'Permanent Revolution'

This excerpt from Eric Voegelin's book From Enlightenment to Revolution exposes the 'milder,' liberal counterpart of the fiery impulse of the radical revolutionary. Concerned about the dark 'passions' unleashed by the Jacobin type, PROGRESS must nevertheless be ever on the march, and it is at its most successful when it moves through soft, undulating waves of reform.

This is what characterizes the 'permanent revolution' of liberalism, the work of 'democrats' and 'conservatives' alike to realize the future state of liberty, equality, and fraternity by means of minor increments. This is the meaning behind Chesterton's famous phrase: 'The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected.'

The permanent revolution succeeds where the revolutionary moment fails because the advance of the radical is invariably followed by the return of the reactionary. By foregoing a violent and instant revelation of the progressive destiny, the liberal can avoid the inevitable result of what happens when man goes too far - he ends up somewhere on the other side. By quietly introducing new acts and novel measures, which are cloaked beneath the rational disguise of 'changing with the times,' the liberal can slowly, peaceably undermine the traditions of his oppressor and replace them with the plants of progress, the garden of Eden that will at last erase our political animosity and difference. Then the Revolution will have finally reached its end, and it will have done so not with the sword but with the word.



Thus, Voegelin:

'A first answer to the problem of the crisis is given by the liberals who wish to transform the violent rhythm of Revolution and Restoration into a gentle undulation of progressive reform. This idea was developed in the liberal periodical Le Censeur by its editors Charles Comte and Charles Dunoyer, in 1815. Revolution is recognized as a necessity insofar as it is required by the light of reason, but there are other revolutions which are motivated by pride and ambition. The revolution which resulted in the liberal monarchy of 1791 was commanded by reason while the Republic, the Consulate, as well as the movements which tend to restore the ancient regime, belonged to the second type. 

There are two states which are equally bad for a society: complete stagnation and prolonged, anarchical disorder. "The one clings too strongly even to its most puerile customs, and to its most superstitious practices; the other indulges in the disorderly movement of passions." Besides, the one state produces the other. Anarchical revolution is inevitable when a regime insists on its continuation against reason and history, while the reactionary despotism of a Bonaparte will rise from anarchy. "There is only one means for nations to prevent the great revolutions; that is, to put themselves into a state of permanent and wisely regulated revolution." When a nation is guided intelligently it is protected against all revolution, or rather its revolution is "permanent, but slow and progressive, so that it follows without jolts the progress of reason."

The articles of Charles Comte and Dunoyer have their importance because the Censeur represents the liberal restoration at its intellectual best. We see here developing an attitude toward the crisis which remains typical in later liberalism and we can observe in its origins the growth of an escapist cliché. The rhythm of Revolution and Restoration is considered a stupid exaggeration of the process of social reform, the violent swings of the pendulum ought to be toned down – under the title of “permanent revolution” – to the gentle process that today is called "peaceful change." The problem of the crisis itself disappears and is swallowed up by the category of progress under the guidance of reason. 

We have characterized this attitude as escapist because it skillfully dodges the real issue of the crisis. A society is by definition in a state of crisis when its remedial forces, while perhaps present, are socially ineffective. The social problems which urgently require a solution cannot be solved because the spiritual and moral strength for the task is lacking in the ruling group. In this situation, the counsel to do what is not done because it cannot be done is obviously vain. And the counsel is not only vain, it even adds to the gravity of the crisis because it detracts attention from a true alternative. The progressive counsel of Charles Comte and Dunoyer (and this has remained a constant factor in the aggravation of the Western crisis) poses the alternative of stagnation in the solution of social problems and intelligent gradual reform. This alternative does not exist concretely; the fact of the tardiness in the solution of explosive social problems is proof that on the level of pragmatic politics the alternative of intelligent gradualism does not exist. 

The true alternative would be the restoration of spiritual substance in the ruling groups of a society, with the consequent restoration of the moral strength in creating a just social order. The problem of the crisis must be stated in the Platonic terms of spirit and power. The pragmatic value of this alternative, as experience has shown, is not very high. The appearance of Plato did not change the course of the Hellenic crisis, the case of Nietzsche did not serve as a warning example for Germany nor did the appearance of Dostoievsky make a dent in the tsarist system. Nevertheless, this is the true alternative; and we must be clear on the point that a propaganda for gradualism which ignores and obscures the true issue has become a serious factor in the aggravation of the crisis.

The idea which emerges from the articles of the Censeur is so particularly grave in its consequences because it implies the further fallacy that the abolition of a social injustice will automatically result in a satisfactory stable order. The revolutionary abolition of a regime that is experienced as oppressive by a powerful stratum of society will certainly satisfy the successful revolutionary group, but it is not at all a guarantee that the new group will be more fit than the old one to discharge the obligations of rulership competently. Spiritual disorder is not the privilege of a ruling class; the revolutionary class which displaces it may be quite as deficient in this point, and even more so. The spiritual and moral competence of the bourgeoisie in handling problems posed by the industrial proletariat and the growing lower middle class was certainly a match for the incompetence of the pre-revolutionary aristocracy in handling the problem posed by the rising bourgeoisie. The record of the German lower middle class in the National Socialist revolution is no more edifying. 

The worst problem in the dynamic of the Western crisis is the fact that the resistance of the ruling class of the moment against "peaceful change" can derive a degree of spiritual legitimacy from the qualities of the revolutionary groups. The liberal and progressive idea of the “permanent revolution” of the editors of the Censeur ignores this whole class of problems, and it must ignore them because the spiritual problem of the crisis is obscured for them by the enlightenment cliché of "reason." But the light of reason is a dubious guide in the night of the spirit.'

Eric Voegelin, From Enlightenment to Revolution (Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press 1975), Pp. 179-81



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