Conservatism and the Medieval Mind

if some of the more extravagant reviews of Bertrand de Jouvenel’s Sovereignty are to be believed, this book is nothing less than a classic. The London Times Literary Supplement proclaimed it “a remarkable achievement . . . a great work in political philosophy.” Even Denis Brogan, who seemed unwilling to go quite this far, asserted in the New York Times that “every page of this brilliant and successful effort . . . is loaded with ore.”

I do not believe that Jouvenel’s book merits these accolades, but I can think of at least three reasons to account for them. The first is that the concept of sovereignty has for a good many years been relegated to the backwater of political theory. Not since the savage assault on sovereignty in the early books of Harold Laski has anyone working within the liberal tradition attempted to make constructive use of this concept. To have the concept explored anew, and by a man working within what he at least conceives to be the liberal or democratic tradition, is an almost startling event. Whether in point of fact Jouvenel contributes to our understanding of sovereingty, whether he advances his own political theory through its use, is a matter on which I will have something to say a little later.

A second reason for the reception given Jouvenel’s book is that it is one of the few attempts at a systematic treatise in the conservative mood. Because conservatives wish to conserve not all things...