Posted on 07/25/2021 3:55:25 AM PDT by Kaslin
July 28, 2021 will mark the 34th anniversary of the death of James Burnham, one of the great American thinkers of the 20th century — or, for that matter, any century. Burnham was the author of seminal books on global sociopolitical developments, geopolitics, the Cold War, liberalism, and the power relationships that underlay the American republic. He wrote a regular column for National Review from 1955 to 1978, which one admirer called the "best column on international affairs in contemporary English journalism." Unfortunately, Burnham is largely unknown among younger conservatives. That is something that needs to be remedied.
Burnham studied at Princeton (graduating first in his class) and Balliol College, Oxford, and taught at New York University from 1929 to 1954. In the 1930s, he was a member of the Trotskyite Worker's Party and wrote for The Symposium, The New International, and other left-wing and Marxist journals. He broke with Marxism in 1940 and began writing for Partisan Review, a leading journal of the non-communist left.
In the early 1940s, he wrote two major sociopolitical works — The Managerial Revolution (1941) and The Machiavellians (1943). Young conservatives can learn much in both of these books about how oligarchies and ruling classes wield political power in all countries, including the United States. Burnham's description in The Managerial Revolution of the rising "managerial class" of the 1930s and 1940s is eerily similar to today's ruling class of governmental, corporate, scientific, and Big Tech elites. And his crafting of a "science of power" in The Machiavellians will intellectually arm young conservatives to resist centralized power and those political elites who seek to acquire greater power to rule on behalf of the people.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
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He probably used big words and/or long sentences.
My conservative values were formed from reading James Burnham and Russell Kirk. They didn’t use big words, just common sense. You should read them.
“Burnham’s description in The Managerial Revolution of the rising “managerial class” of the 1930s and 1940s is eerily similar to today’s ruling class of governmental, corporate, scientific, and Big Tech elites.”
Very short hop from that to Sam Francis and Paul Gottfried and the Managerial State (The Deep State) as explained in Leviathan and Its Enemies.
Because of his postings there are a number of people, some quite young, who are now aware of Burnham's works and ideas. Some of them are YouTubers who are spreading Burnham's ideas onto the interwebs.
National Review gets a lot of criticism because of the pale imitation that is now NRO. But NR was quite good for some time especially with people like Burnham writing for it.
National Review was quite good at one time. Its usefulness began to expire not long after the Berlin Wall came down. NRO is awful. Their donors should demand a name change.
Burnham was a first-rate intellect. You almost never hear his name mentioned these days.
[edit] 1962: The American Liberals and the Russian Revolution
1965: The New Radicalism in America 1889-1963: The Intellectual As a Social Type
1969: The Agony of the American Left
1973: The World of Nations
1977: Haven in a Heartless World: The Family Besieged
1979: The Culture of Narcissism: American Life in an Age of Diminishing Expectations
1984: The Minimal Self: Psychic Survival in Troubled Times
1991: The True and Only Heaven: Progress and Its Critics
1994: The Revolt of the Elites: And the Betrayal of Democracy
1997: Women and the Common Life: Love, Marriage, and Feminism
ignore: [edit]
Yes...I’ve read Lasch. Very intelligent guy.
And an essay, Suicide of the West, 1961. Must read material.
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