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Philosophers
Alexis de Tocqueville French diplomat and political thinker whose Democracy in America studied how equality shapes liberty, civic associations and the risk of soft despotism. Edmund Burke Anglo-Irish statesman and writer whose Reflections on the Revolution in France made him the most cited philosophical founder of modern conservatism. Eric Voegelin German-American political philosopher who analysed totalitarianism as a political religion and warned against immanentizing the eschaton. Frank Meyer Former communist theorist turned National Review editor, whose fusionism joined libertarian and traditionalist conservatism into one movement. Harry Jaffa Claremont political philosopher and student of Leo Strauss who made Lincoln and the Declaration of Independence central to American conservatism. James Burnham Philosopher and former Trotskyist who wrote The Managerial Revolution and Suicide of the West and was a senior editor of National Review from its start. John Locke English philosopher whose Two Treatises of Government set out natural rights, consent of the governed and limited government. Joseph de Maistre Savoyard diplomat and counter-revolutionary philosopher, a founder of European conservatism with Burke, who defended throne and altar against the Enlightenment. Leo Strauss German-born University of Chicago political philosopher who revived classical political philosophy and taught generations of American political thinkers. Michael Novak Catholic philosopher and diplomat whose The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism argued that free economies rest on moral and religious foundations. Michael Oakeshott English philosopher whose essay On Being Conservative and Rationalism in Politics define conservatism as a disposition, not a programme. Montesquieu French jurist whose Spirit of the Laws argued for separating legislative, executive and judicial powers, an idea built into the U.S. Constitution. Richard Weaver University of Chicago English professor whose Ideas Have Consequences became a founding book of the postwar traditionalist right. Robert Nisbet Sociologist whose The Quest for Community argued that a strong state and weak intermediate institutions threaten freedom, in the line of Burke. Roger Scruton English philosopher and writer who gave modern British conservatism a philosophical voice, writing on beauty, architecture, home and belonging. Willmoore Kendall Yale political theorist and early National Review figure who defended majority rule, a society's orthodoxy and a conservative reading of the American tradition.