Something I’ve been thinking a lot about recently is the way we often conflate two very distinct things when we assign political labels. The first is ideology, which describes our vision of a just society. The second is something less discussed but equally important: temperament. It describes how we approach social problems, how fast we think society can change, and how we understand the constraints upon us.
Yuval Levin is the director of Social, Cultural, and Constitutional Studies at the American Enterprise Institute, the editor-in-chief of the public policy journal National Affairs, and the author of the upcoming book A Time to Build. Levin is one of the most thoughtful articulators of both conservative temperament and ideology. And, perhaps for that reason, his is one of the most important criticisms of what the conservative movement has become today.
There’s a lot in this conversation, in part because Levin’s book speaks to mine in interesting ways, but among the topics we discuss are:
- The conservative view of human nature
- Why the conservative temperament is increasingly diverging from the conservative movement
- What theories of American politics get wrong about the reality of American life
- The case Levin makes to socialists
- How economic debates are often moral debates in disguise
- Levin’s rebuttal to my book
- The crucial difference between “formative” and “performative” social institutions
- Why the most fundamental problems in American life are cultural, not economic
- Why Levin thinks the New York Times should not allow its journalists to be on Twitter
- Whether we can restore trust in our institutions without changing the incentives and systems that surround them
There’s a lot Levin and I disagree on, but there are few people I learn as much from in disagreement as I learn from him.
Book recommendations:
Democracy in America by Alexis De Tocqueville
The Quest for Community by Robert Nisbet
Statecraft as Soulcraft by George Will
If you enjoyed this episode, you may also like:
David French on “The Great White Culture War"
George Will makes the conservative case against democracy
My book is available for pre-order! You can find it at www.EzraKlein.com.
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