Hayek: A Critique

Abstract The “Club de l'Horloge” held its 5th annual meeting October 20–22 1989 in Nice, on “Liberalism at the People's Service.” The general tone was “national liberal” conservative. According to the Club's president, Henry de Lesquen, “there can be no authentic liberal society as long as the concept of man emerging from the Western, humanist and Christian tradition has not prevailed.” The objective was to contrapose two liberal traditions: Locke's vs. Hume's and Burke's, i.e., a “bad liberalism” leading to libertarian or anarcho-capitalist movements, and a “good liberalism” concerned with preserving tradition and thus reconcilable with a “nationalist” perspective. This politically opportunistic approach legitimates itself by appealing to a long gone author: Friedrich A. (von) Hayek.