The constrained vision [i.e., conservatism] puts little faith in deliberately designed social processes, since it has little faith that any manageable set of decision-makers could effectively cope with the enormous complexities of designing a whole blueprint for an economic system, a legal system, or a system of morality or politics. The constrained vision relies instead on historically evolved social processes and evaluates them in terms of their systemic characteristics—their incentives and modes of interaction—rather than their goals or intentions.
Language is perhaps the purest example of an evolved social process—a systemic order without a deliberate overall design. Rules of language are indeed written down, but after the fact, codifying existing practices, and most people have begun obeying these rules in early childhood, before being explicitly taught them. Yet languages are extremely complex and subtle, and of course vital to the functioning of a society. Even for small children, language is not so much a matter of parroting what has been explicitly articulated, but rather of inferring complex rules never fully explained.
Language is thus the epitome of an evolved complex order, with its own systemic characteristics, inner logic, and external social consequences—but without having been deliberately designed by any individual or council. Its rationality is systemic, not individual—an evolved pattern rather than an excogitated blueprint.
Language is, in effect, a model for social processes in legal, economic, political, and other systems, as viewed within the constrained vision. It is not that languages cannot be created—Esperanto clearly was—but that they are more effective when evolved, because natural languages draw upon a more vast wealth of experiences over the centuries than will be at the command of any individual or council designing a language. Evolved language also serves a greater multiplicity of purposes than any given individual or council may be able to enumerate, much less weigh.
In much the same way, the complex characteristics of an economic system may be analyzed in skeletal outline, after the fact, but the flesh-and-blood reality has often evolved on its own—and it is considered more efficient when markets have evolved than when "planned" by central authorities. Deliberate action or planning at the individual level is by no means precluded by the constrained vision, just as individuals choose their own words and writing style, within the scope and rules of language. What is rejected in both cases by the constrained vision is individual or intentional planning of the whole system. Man, as conceived in the constrained vision, simply is not capable of such a feat, though he is capable of the hubris of attempting it. Systemic rationality is considered superior to individual or intentional rationality.
The constrained vision is not a static vision of the social process, nor a view that the status quo should not be altered. On the contrary, its central principle is evolution. Language does not remain unchanged, but neither is it replaced according to a new master plan. A given language may evolve over the centuries to something almost wholly different, but as a result of incremental changes, successively validated by the usage of the many rather than the planning of the few. In politics as well, evolution is the keynote of the constrained vision. Burke declared: "A state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation." Yet he would not subject whole political systems to "the mercy of untried speculations." Individual brilliance was no substitute for pragmatic adjustments, even by people of less brilliance:
I have never yet seen any plan which has not been mended by the observations of those who were much inferior in understanding to the person who took the lead in the business. By a slow but well-sustained progress, the effect of each step is watched; the good or ill success of the first gives light to us in the second; and so, from light to light, we are conducted safely through the whole series.
(Thomas Sowell, A Conflict of Visions: Ideological Origins of Political Struggles [New York: Basic Books, 2002], 68-70 [brackets added; italics in original; endnotes omitted])
Note from KBJ: As these paragraphs show, conservatism is an attitude, temper, or method rather than a set of substantive commitments. This is why one can be a conservative (or its opposite, a progressive) in different realms. Sowell mentions the following: social, economic, legal, moral, political, and linguistic. In each case, the conservative resists abrupt, exogenous change, while the progressive welcomes it. Conservatives are not categorically opposed to change; nor are progressives categorically in favor of it. They differ with respect to the pace and origin of change. Conservatives believe that existing rules and practices, especially those of long standing, are at least as rational as anything a progressive could propose to replace them. Conservatives believe that there is a presumption against change (or, to put it differently, that there is a presumption in favor of the status quo). Progressives reject such a presumption. Conservatives view progressives as hubristic, rash, and disrespectful. Progressives view conservatives as reactionary, complacent, and timid. These attitudes will always exist, in each of the aforementioned realms; and it's probably good that they will, for it allows change to be debated and managed. When I "became" a conservative a few years ago, my attitude toward change shifted. I came to see the immanent rationality of conventional rules and practices as well as the folly of trying to change things too quickly or drastically. It was a matter of noticing what had always been before my eyes.
