Corey Robin - The Reactionary Mind: Conservatism from Edmund Burke to Donald Trump

Praise for The Reactionary Mind

I think that the best model [of conservatism] is... the Corey Robin notion that its about preserving hierarchy.

Paul Krugman, New York Times

The Reactionary Mind has emerged as one of the more influential political works of the last decade....Robin... is a synthesizer and a brilliant and ruthless diviner of the hidden wellsprings of absolutely everything.

The Washington Monthly

When The Reactionary Mind first appeared in 2011, it met with a good deal of critical skepticism.... Six years later, Robin has been vindicated.

Bookforum

I confess to being one of those who likes to divide conservatives into their parts as opposed to treating them as a whole. Robin makes a vigorous case that I am wrong, and I am tempted by his analysis....Robin is an engaging writer, and just the kind of broad-ranging public intellectual all too often missing in academic political science....Robins arguments deserve widespread attention.

The New Republic

The Reactionary Mind certainly cuts hard against the common view that the radical populist conservatism epitomized by Sarah Palin represents a sharp break with the cautious, reasonable, moderate, pragmatic conservatism inaugurated by the 18th-century British statesman Edmund Burke....This counterrevolutionary spirit, Mr. Robin argues, animates every conservative, from the Southern slaveholders to Ayn Rand to Antonin Scalia, to name just a few of the figures he pulls into his often slashing analysis.

New York Times

... ground-breaking book...

Rolling Stone

The common opinion on the Left is that conservatives are fire-breathing idiots, who make up in heat what they lack in light. Robins book is a welcome correction of this simplistic view and puts the debate where it ought to be: on the force and content of conservative ideas.

Dissent

The Reactionary Mind demands to be taken seriously by conservatives, and it helps that its written with panache. The series of scholarly strikes Robin makes against conventional wisdom are often exhilarating.

The Daily

It is a thoughtful, even-tempered sort of book. The old maid tendency that dominates liberal polemic in the U.S.A.the shrieking, clutching at skirts, and jumping up on kitchen chairs that one gets from a Joe Nocera, a Maureen Dowd, or a Keith Olbermannis quite absent.

The American Conservative

This little book will continue to spark controversy, but that is not the reason to read it: it is a witty, erudite and opinionated account of one of the most significant movements of our times.

Times Higher Education

Robin, a New York-based political scientist and regular contributor to publications like The Nation and the London Review of Books, has written an original book with an armful of theses that shed revealing light on the whys and wherefores of right-wing politics in the United States and beyond.

The National

Stemming from a conversation he had with the late William F. Buckley, Robins book provides clear, well-documented insight on how the right came to be what it now is.

Washington Times

Corey Robins extraordinary collection, constantly fresh, continuously sharp, and always clear and eloquent, provides the only satisfactory philosophically coherent account of elite conservatism I have ever read. Then theres this bonus: his remarkably penetrating side inquiry into the notion of national security as a taproot of Americas contemporary abuse of democracy. Its all great, a model in the exercise of humane letters.

Rick Perlstein, author of Nixonland

This book is a fascinating exploration of a central idea: that conservatism is, at its heart, a reaction against democratic challenges, in public and private life, to hierarchies of power and status. Corey Robin leads us through a series of case studies over the last few centuriesfrom Hobbes to Ayn Rand, from Burke to Sarah Palinshowing the power of this idea by illuminating conservatives both sublime and ridiculous.

Kwame Anthony Appiah, Professor of Philosophy, Princeton University

Beautifully written, these essays deepen our understanding of why conservatism remains a powerful force in American politics.

Joyce Appleby, Professor Emerita of History, University of California-Los Angeles, and past president of the American Historical Association

The Reactionary Mind is a wonderfully good read. It combines up-to-the-minute relevance with an eye to the intellectual history of conservatism in all its protean forms, going back as far as Hobbes, and taking in not only restrained and sentimental defenders of tradition such as Burke, but his more violent, proto-fascist contemporary Joseph de Maistre. Some readers will enjoy Corey Robins dismantling of different recent thinkersBarry Goldwater, Antonin Scalia, Irving Kristol; others will enjoy his demolition of Ayn Rands intellectual pretensions. Some will be uncomfortable when they discover that those who too lightly endorse state violence, and even officially sanctioned torture, include some of their friends. That is one of the things that makes this such a good book.

Alan Ryan, Professor of Political Theory, Oxford University

Conservatism from Edmund Burke to Donald Trump

SECOND EDITION

COREY ROBIN

Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the Universitys objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries.

Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America.

Oxford University Press 2018

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above.

You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Robin, Corey, 1967 author.
Title: The reactionary mind : conservatism from Edmund Burke
to Donald Trump / Corey Robin.
Description: Second edition. | New York : Oxford University Press, [2018] |
Previous edition: 2011. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017029793 | ISBN 9780190692001 (bc) |
ISBN 9780190842024 (bb) | ISBN 9780190692018 (updf) |
ISBN 9780190692025 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: ConservatismHistory.
Classification: LCC JC573 .R63 2018 | DDC 320.52dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017029793

For Laura

Like most observers of American politics, I was shocked by Donald Trumps victory in the 2016 presidential election. Unlike most observers of American politics, I was not shocked by Trumps victory in the 2016 Republican Party primary. Somewhere between my surprise over Trumps election and non-surprise over his nomination lies the inspiration for this second edition of