Past Present Future Political Conversions: From Trotskyism to Neoconservatism
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Apr 1, 2026 David Klemperer, political historian who studies Trotskyism and intellectual shifts, explores how once-revolutionary figures migrated toward neoconservative and conservative positions. He traces Burnham’s break with Trotsky, the managerial class theory, links to hawkish foreign policy, and contemporary trajectories from radical oppositional tactics to establishment alignment. Short, sharp stories about ideological U-turns and their cultural ripple effects.
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The Managerial Class Replaces Economic Class Analysis
- Burnham argued a new managerial class—bureaucrats and technocrats—had replaced capitalism across regimes, from Nazi Germany to New Deal America.
- He downplayed ideological labels, emphasizing power-seeking elites and structural control rather than economic motives.
From Revolutionary To Cynical Realist To Conservative
- Burnham moved from Marx to Machiavelli and then Burke, shifting from revolutionary theory to elite circulation and conservative defence.
- Klemperer says Burnham saw power checked by opposing elites, not by a liberatory social project.
Neoconservatism Recasts The Managerial Enemy As Cultural
- Later neoconservatives inherited Burnham's new-class framework but recast the managerial enemy as a liberal managerial class in public sector, universities, NGOs and media.
- This reframing shifted focus from economics to culture as the key battleground.
