Common Good Conservatism

Is there one common good? Should the state be used to enforce morality?

Catholic integralist and post-liberal Patrick Deneen wrote today on Twitter, “Note that right liberals and progressives agree fervently that our politics cannot, and should not, be built around a conception of the Good. Liberalism is a consistent ethic of self-centeredness.”

This is a perplexing tweet for a number of reasons. First off, it strikes me as odd to accuse progressives of being averse to basing their politics around a conception of the Good. Progressives and leftists in general absolutely have a conception of the Good. They believe that banning people like me from social media, throwing open the borders, and brainwashing children to become transgender are all part of the common good. In other words, they have absolutely no qualms when it comes to whether state power should be used to enforce morality – so long as it’s theirs, and not ours.

He is correct when it comes to right liberals, e.g. some libertarians and conservatives. Many of these types don’t believe that the state can and should be used to enforce morality. Ask a libertarian what they think about porn and you’ll understand this quick enough. Conservatism, it is true, differs in the sense that it seeks to balance individual liberty with social order. Deneen and other post-liberals, to their credit, recognize this – and on this general philosophical question I agree with them. 

The problem, however, is that there isn’t one Good. Here I am not making a philosophical or even metaphysical claim but a sociological one. One can still believe in a moral order to the cosmos while at the same time recognizing that there will be competing attempts to apprehend it. The Logos in Christianity is roughly comparable to the Dharma of Eastern religion – both broadly refer to the divine order – and yet they are not identical. Even within Catholicism exists considerable disagreement regarding political questions. 

As such, one must ask: If the common good is to be enshrined in law, who will get to determine it? The powers that be are already legislating their conception of the Good into law, as perverse and evil as it is. Okay, so what about letting the likes of Patrick Deneen determine the common good? These integralists are devout Christians – that’s a good thing, right? On some level, yes. The problem is that on many issues, including immigration, these guys are more liberal (in the MSNBC sense) than post-liberal. Take Adrian Vermeule, for example. He’s a leading integralist, who has advocated for mass immigration from non-Western Catholic nations. If he had his way, would criticism of the Great Replacement be in violation of the common good? 

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