This thought was inspired by reading Evan Baehr on compassionate conservatism. It’s clear that the compassionate conservatism of the Bush Presidency has become discredited amongst ‘real’ conservatives, who saw only more Big Government in it.  Evan walks through a history of it, with a look to its future; he concludes:

Conservatives ought to revisit these Tocquevillian truths, adapt them to modern public policies, and develop a powerful brand around them.  While the platform probably cannot be called “compassionate conservatism,” it ought to be based on this set of truths, which are key to sustaining human flourishing.

Which ‘Tocquevillian truths’? It can be found in the American spirit of voluntary civic-mindedness. Evan states: ” we need to learn from and uphold private sector models.  Social entrepreneurs should not be liberal democrats. ” Indeed! He adds:

Conservatives ought to encourage and highlight this incredible social entrepreneurship and even innovative CSR models that effectively use private models to solve public problems.

Compassionate conservatism has been about addressing social problems (poverty, illiteracy etc.) via conservative means.  Conservative (in US terms) means are  freedom-based, Burkean ‘little platoons’ of independent volunteer efforts. If I was to give a correct and proper definition of ‘compassionate conservative’ it would be that: Using private-sector, free and civil society institutions and methods to solve public societal problems.  Private charter and parochial schools, your local Rotary Club, the Salvation Army, those are the ‘little platoons’ of voluntary social charitable action.

As we have seen innovation being used in addressing societal issues, the term ‘social entrepreneurship’ has come about. If, as I defined in a previous blog post, an entrepreneur is an opportunity-seeker who disregards lack of resources, a ‘social entrepreneur’ is one who seeks to improve societal conditions in new ways without regards to resource or other status quo constraints. Break rules to solve society’s problems! Blaze new ways to serve others! The line between entrepreneur and ‘social entrepreneur blurs under this definition, because in effect the only difference is the path to monetizing and paying for whatever valuable social change is created. The social entrepreneur innovates via private-sector means to solve public problems.

The ‘compassionate Conservatism’ of President Bush failed because it became the oxymoronic big-government conservatism where bureaucrats made funding decisions. There is no way for government funding to not be this way. Inevitably, Government is about rules and regulations, and taking from one person by force to give to another,  and those stymie innovation and limit freedom.

Social entrepreneurship is far different, but closer to what conservatives should embrace as an ideal – of not having monolithic central control but a diversity of free institutions making headway and doing good. Lauren Bush’s FEED efforts  is a better example of compassionate conservatism than what her uncle did as Bush43; (yes, she says she is non-political, but she is one of those ‘thousand points of light’ her grandfather Bush41 spoke of). And this quote from the article about her efforts is a good example of why we NEED social entrepreneurs:

“There was just one problem [with a UN program]: Their efforts to get the UN to sell the bag ran into so many legal and logistical snafus that the project nearly collapsed.”

The classic large bureaucratic means for achieving things, including social ‘good’, is often a failed, clumsy, and expensive path to failure. Social entrepreneurs are finding new ways, working around the limits of the status quo and of bureaucracies. Recently, some conservatives have (properly) rallied to defend private equity’s role in our free market system (defending Romney).

Bottom-line: Conservatives should embrace ‘social entrepreneurship’ as strongly as they embrace entrepreneurship – it’s the ideal of ‘compassionate conservatism’ in action.

 

By Patrick