The Conservative Tradition

INSTRUCTOR: Ruben Garrote

SECTION: U19

SCHEDULE: Tuesday, Thursday, 2:00pm – 3:15pm

This is neither a political science course nor a history course. Rather, the seminar will try to survey the breadth of Conservative thought both in terms of its geographical and cultural differences and in its historical and philosophical developments. This will, of course, involve readings in Conservative political philosophy, but politics is not all that Conservatism encompasses. We will understand Conservatism in its broader sense. It will appear, in this sense, as a number of related tendencies toward a view of the world that has implications beyond the political — though, as one contemporary Conservative thinker put it, these center around essentially political values: “freedom, virtue, safety.” Thus, we will touch on the family and the community, on the importance of place, on art, music and literature, on notions of education and religion, and on the future of human society.