How Does Conservatism Support Pragmatism Over Principle

'Conservatism supports pragmatism over principle.' Discuss
Pragmatism is the belief that behaviour should be shaped in accordance with practical circumstances and goals rather than principles, beliefs or ideology. Pragmatism is a flexible approach to politics. To a large extent it is true that Conservatism supports pragmatism over principle. Conservatism is not a doctrine of ‘no change’ or one that treats its own principles as external and fixed. Conservatism instead has a pragmatic view of politics where politics should be according to Oakeshott, ‘a conversation not an argument’. The belief is that political actions should not come from conflict but instead come from a gentle relationship between the government and the governed. However
They generally portray their ideas not as an ideology, but as common sense based on practical experience. Ian Gilmour once said that ‘The wise conservative travels light’ meaning that important principles held by conservatives would only be protected by taking into account practical circumstances and experiences. Although traditional conservatives believe in conserving what is good they also believe that it is important to reform where necessary. This pragmatic approach is necessary in order to preserve the best traditions and institutions. The basis for this position is the belief that human beings are intellectually limited. The idea that the world is too complicated for human reason to fully grasp led Michael Oakeshott to describe the political world as ‘boundless and bottomless’. He believed politics should not have a fixed goal or specific direction because it had to adapt to the world as it changes and it is not always possible to apply principles from one century to
They have remained influential within conservatism. Thatcherism’s attempts to cut back on government regulation in the 1980s is similar to the US Tea Party’s attack on big government and both believed in the principles of individualism and rejected pragmatic paternalistic state intervention of one nation conservatism. Margaret Thatcher declared ‘there is no such thing as society’ adding ‘there are individual men and women and there are families’. This New Right position is clearly influenced by acceptance of theory and principle over pragmatism. Some have argued that this approach to conservative politics was another form of conservative pragmatism. It was partly motivated by the previous conservative government’s failure to deliver economic growth and was a pragmatic acceptance that change was