In the National Interest, English journalist and author Geoffrey Wheatcroft takes a rather dyspeptic look at the political situation on both sides of the Atlantic, coming to the conclusion that Europe’s Political Center Cannot Hold, though he finds a few shreds of hope in the U.K. itself.
“There’s always been a healthy skepticism about parliamentary government in England,” he writes, “exemplified by Lewis Namier’s acidulous remark that ‘men no more dreamt of a seat in the House in order to benefit humanity than a child dreams of a birthday cake that others may eat it.’”
Well, actually, that’s “Sir Lewis” to you, mate, because Namier was knighted in 1952, though citing a statement by Sir Lewis to prove what the English have “always” thought about parliamentary government is a bit of a stretch. Namier, born “Ludwik Niemirowski” in 1888 in what was then Russian-controlled Poland, was a Polish Jew who became a British subject in 1913, serving as a private in World War I. In the 1930s he was perhaps the most influential historian in Great Britain, almost single-handedly overturning the “Whig version of history”, which taught that men like William Pitt and Edmund Burke and Charles James Fox and John Bright and William Gladstone did dream of a seat in the House [of Commons] in order to benefit humanity. After the staggering carnage of World War I, young people wanted to hear something other than what their fathers had been telling them about England’s glorious history, and Namier was just the man to do it.
I’ve read quite a few Namierians—English history is something of a hobby of mine—and it’s surprising to me that none of them seems to have noticed that Namier did little more than apply the “categories” of Max Weber’s political thought to English history, said categories stemming directly from Nietzsche’s “wille zur macht”—“will to power”. Namier tricked out his theory with painstaking research into family connections, club memberships, etc. to “prove” that everyone acted out of self interest, but his analysis is straight out of Weber, who saw British politicians like Gladstone and Disraeli as so many Caesars in mufti, waging their wars with emotions rather than armies. They may have talked of “Empire” or “Home Rule” (for Ireland), but it was all mummery. What they really cared about was getting their old wrinkled arses into No. 10 Downing.
Namier did provide a further turn of the screw by portraying the politicians themselves as mere shadows cast on the wall. What we would call interest groups were the true reality. In another witty aperçu (he worked hard at these), Namier suggested that if MPs were selected on the basis of weight rather than vote-getting ability, national policies would undergo no significant change. The “interests” would see to that—though in fact the careers of such troublemakers as Charles Stewart Parnell demonstrate that Parliament can be the birthplace of interests as well as their plaything.
Unsurprisingly, Namier himself wasn’t quite so wicked as he said everyone else was. He devoted a great deal of his time and effort to the cause of Zionism, seeking to alleviate the suffering of others rather than to exalt himself.
