Recovering Authentic (Politically Incorrect) Conservatism

A review of Writing on the Southern Front: Authentic Conservatism For Our Times (Routledge, 2017) by Joseph Scotchie

Joe Scotchie’s recently published anthology Writing on the Southern Front: Authentic Conservatism For Our Times made me aware of the task that confronts every serious student of the Right—recovering what otherwise might slip down the Memory Hole. Both the American media and, more generally, American political culture have moved so far away from anything that looks even vaguely non-Left that we may soon need archeologists to rediscover what has been driven underground. American “conservatism” (yes the scare quotes here are very deliberate) is now represented by Jonah Goldberg, telling us how frighteningly homophobic, racist, anti-Semitic and sexist the 1950s were and Rich Lowry calling for the removal of all statues of Robert E. Lee, since they may offend American blacks. It is therefore comforting to read Scotchie’s latest effort to revive and defend an “authentic conservatism.”