Civic Conservatism

Civic conservatism is a form of modern British conservatism developed by the Conservative intellectual David Willetts.

This is the idea of focussing on the institutions between the state and individuals as a policy concern (rather than merely thinking of individuals and the state as the only agencies) and is one of the principles behind the increasing support in the Conservative Party's localist agenda and its emphasis on voluntary organisations.

During an interview with "The Spectator", he was referred to as 'the real father of Cameronism'. [http://www.spectator.co.uk/archive/23081/the-real-father-of-cameronism.thtml]

Fourteen years after the publication of "Civic Conservatism" Willetts gave the inaugural Oakeshott Memorial Lecture to the London School of Economics in which he made an attempt to explain how game theory can be used to help think about how to improve social capital. The lecture [http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/LSEPublicLecturesAndEvents/events/2008/20071128t1633z001.htm] was described by the Times as "an audacious attempt by the Conservative Party's leading intellectual to relate a new Tory narrative" [http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/daniel_finkelstein/article3399671.ece] .

"Civic conservatism, like free market economics, proceeds from deep-seated individual self-interest towards a stable cooperation. It sets the Tories the task not of changing humanity but of designing institutions and arrangements that encourage our natural reciprocal altruism." [http://timesonline.typepad.com/comment/2008/02/civic-conservat.html]