Progressive conservatism is a hybrid political ideology that attempts to combineconservative andprogressive policies. While still supportive of amarket economy, it stresses the importance of government intervention to contribute to thecommon good.
Progressive conservatism first arose inGermany and theUnited Kingdom in the 1870s and 1880s under ChancellorOtto von Bismarck and Prime MinisterBenjamin Disraeli respectively. Disraeli's 'One Nation'Toryism has since become the central progressive conservative tradition in the UK.
In the UK, the Prime Ministers Disraeli,Stanley Baldwin,Neville Chamberlain,Winston Churchill,Harold Macmillan,[1]David Cameron andTheresa May have been described as progressive conservatives.[2][3] TheCatholic Church'sRerum Novarum (1891) is said to advocate a progressive conservative doctrine known associal Catholicism.[4]
In theUnited States,Theodore Roosevelt has been the principal figure identified with progressive conservatism as a political tradition. Roosevelt stated that he had "always believed that wise progressivism and wise conservatism go hand in hand".[5] Roosevelt also regarded the Republican Party underAbraham Lincoln as having been a progressive conservative party, declaring in 1908 that his business had been to "take hold of the conservative party and turn it into what it had been under Lincoln, that is, a party of progressive conservatism, or conservative radicalism; for of course wise radicalism and wise conservatism go hand in hand."[6]
Roosevelt's successorWilliam Howard Taft has also been associated with progressive conservatism,[7][8] together with future presidentsDwight David Eisenhower andRichard Nixon.[9][10][11]
AfterWorld War II, Germany adopted itssocial market economy, establishing aregulated market economy different to classicfree market economies. This economic system was implemented under the first post-war chancellorKonrad Adenauer of theChristian Democratic Union (cf.Christian democracy).
Various European leaders such as formerGerman ChancellorAngela Merkel have also aligned themselves with progressive conservative politics.[12] In some countries, such asNew Zealand andSouth Korea, the main conservative camp are more progressive on immigration than the centre-left camp.[13]
In Germany, Chancellor Otto von Bismarck enacted various progressive social welfare programs such as domestic health, accident, and old age insurance, out of conservative motivations to distance workers from the socialist movement and as humane ways to assist in maintaining the industrial revolution.[14]
In the early 20th century, politicians of theFree Conservative Party addressed means of attracting the working class away from social democracy and towards radicalnationalism such as through promoting "patriotic worker" associations. Free Conservative Party memberAdolf Grabowsky advocatedimperialism as a national project to unify Germans and break down internal divisions, and declared that the Free Conservative Party "finally wants to organize itself in a decisive progressive-conservative manner, and hopes thereby to call forth the great new conservative movement which should enable the educated strata to drive once again to the right".[15]
In 1918, when the party was dissolved, moderate Free Conservatives joined theGerman People's Party (DVP), which was itself later dissolved in 1933 followingAdolf Hitler's rise to power. After the Second World War, most members of the German People's Party joined the modernFree Democratic Party.
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From the 1860s to the 1970s, progressive conservative politics were popular within the British Conservative Party.Winston Churchill considered himself a progressive conservative, and once said that a "strong Conservative Party with an overwhelming majority and a moderate even progressive leadership...might well be the fulfillment of all that Dizzy [Disraeli] and my father aimed at".[16] Progressive conservatives succeeded in pressing the Conservative Party to maintain similar social policies to that of the Labour Party, particularly theBow Group that urged the Conservatives to be moderate on social policy and opposed more extreme conservative-minded bodies that disagreed with this moderation. One of the primary British progressive conservative advocates in this time wasRab Butler.[17] Butler was responsible for creatingThe Industrial Charter (1947) that sought to combine support of free enterprise with Tory interventionism that promised security of employment, promotion offull employment, and improvement of incentives to employees to help them develop skills and talents - allowing them to fulfill their full potential as individuals, and enhanced status for all employees regardless of their occupation.The Industrial Charter was criticized by Conservative leader Winston Churchill though he eventually supported it, and more harshly condemned by more right-leaning Conservatives as being a step towards socialism.[18]
Former British Prime MinisterDavid Cameron was described as a progressive conservative. As British Conservative Party leader in 2009, he launched theProgressive Conservatism Project at the Britishthink tankDemos.[2] In his speech, he outlined his vision of a contemporary progressive conservatism:
First, a society that is fair, where we help people out of poverty and help them stay out of it – for life. Second, a society where opportunity is equal where everyone can, in Michael Gove’s brilliant phrase, “write their own life-story”. Third, a society that is greener, where we pass on a planet that is environmentally sustainable, clean and beautiful to future generations. And fourth, a safer society, where people are protected from threat and fear.
— David Cameron
Cameron's political ideology arguably inspired the creation of the progressive conservative think tankBright Blue in 2014.
A variety of Canadian conservative governments have been progressive conservative, with Canada's major conservative party being officially named theProgressive Conservative Party of Canada from 1942 to 2003. Canadian Prime MinistersArthur Meighen,R.B. Bennett,John Diefenbaker,Joe Clark,Brian Mulroney, andKim Campbell led progressive conservative, 'Red Tory' governments.[19]
The Progressive Conservative Party merged with theCanadian Alliance in 2003 to form theConservative Party. However, many of Canada's provinces still have 'Progressive Conservative' parties that continued using the Progressive Conservative name after the 2003 merger:
In the United States, theRepublican Party has historically included progressive conservative factions. At the beginning of the 20th century, progressive conservatives in the GOP included figures such asTheodore Roosevelt andWilliam Howard Taft. As president, Roosevelt formulated theSquare Deal, a domestic program which focused on breaking up monopolies, protecting consumers, and conserving the environment.[20] When Taft assumed the presidency in 1909 after Roosevelt stepped down, he pledged to continue Roosevelt's policies, but was soon criticised by Roosevelt and the rest of the Republican Party's progressive wing for reducing tariffs and for thePinchot-Ballinger affair.[21] Taft was nominated as the Republican Party's presidential nominee at the1912 Republican National Convention despite hard-fought efforts from Roosevelt to prevent this - this led Roosevelt and other progressives to split from the Republican Party and create theProgressive Party, which entered the1912 US presidential election with the aim of denying Taft a second term. Both Taft and Roosevelt were defeated by Democratic nomineeWoodrow Wilson, and the Progressive Party was dissolved in 1920.
Between the 1930s and 1970s, theRockefeller Republicans were very influential in the GOP - they held moderate to conservative views on economics, while also holding liberal or progressive positions on social issues. They supported a modestsocial safety net and were in favor of continuing some of the New Deal programs introduced byFranklin D. Roosevelt. They supported big business but tolerated some economic regulation and were in favor ofpublic-private partnerships.[22] As a faction, the Rockefeller Republicans started going into decline after the nomination ofBarry Goldwater for president in 1964, and by the end of the presidency ofGeorge H.W. Bush, they had become an endangered minority in the party.[23] However, socially progressive Republicans continue to win local and state elections in theNortheastern United States, and have occasionally been referred to by the media as 'Rockefeller-style' Republicans,[24] but this trend was largely absent from the2022 United States gubernatorial elections, where Democratic candidates won the governorships against right-wing Republicans inMaryland andMassachusetts, both of which had moderate Republican incumbents, along with the rightward shift of the party in general.
TheDemocratic Party has also historically included some progressive conservatives, and like their Republican counterparts, they too have become a minority in their party. In the 1930s,Southern Democrats (who made up the majority of the Democratic Party's voter base at the time) supportedFranklin D. Roosevelt's economically progressiveNew Deal programs while remaining socially conservative on topics such as segregation.[25] Many of these Southern Democrats later switched to the Republican Party.[26] SomeConservative Democrats from the South opposed the New Deal and formed theConservative Coalition, an alliance of the conservative wings of both major parties - this alliance lasted until 1994. TheBlue Dog Coalition of the Democratic Party is considered the main successor to the Conservative Coalition. Founded in 1995, the Blue Dog Democrats initially continued promoting the socially conservative policies of its predecessor - today, however, the Blue Dogs promote a mixture of social progressivism and moderate fiscal conservatism, and are generally considered centrist.[27]
Jared Golden, theU.S. representative forMaine's 2nd congressional district since2019, has described his political philosophy as "progressive conservatism".[28]
