Your Email:

Subject:

Message:
Entry: A response to my critics Link: http://www.takimag.com/sniperstower/article/a_response_to_my_critics#26681 Post contents: Thanks, Mr. Bramwell, for this response. For me at least (I'm the guy who objected to "Weberian") it clarified your original post quite a bit. I mistakenly saw inconsistencies where in reality your definition was just more "radically" exclusive than I had thought. Your definition of conservatism is a serious challenge to all of us chirping grasshoppers. I'm still not wholly convinced on the legitimacy thing though. If you define legitimacy empirically (it doesn't matter whether you follow Weber or someone else) but then rule out one type of empirical legitimacy <i>ad hoc</i>, then you've thrown away the coherence of your definition. The door is now open for any chirping grasshopper to jump in and rule out whatever type of "empirical" legitimacy he sees as invalid. Some might exclude from the definition, say, a legal-positivist type of legitimacy on the same grounds, that it's unstable (cf. Carl Schmitt in the Weimar Republic). I thing my basic objection still stands: appeals to "empirical" legitimacy can't make the question of "true" legitimacy go away. Thank you for one of the most interesting and provocative articles I've seen on this site. This kind of reality-based criticism (including the article you wrote for <i>The American Conservative</i>) is important. I hope you'll be writing here often. Sent at: 2008 09 07