Left, Right ... or Forward?

The United National Party UNP) was conceived as a liberal-conservative party. Senanayake and his contemporaries articulated a moderate, pragmatic brand of conservatism distinct from today’s mainstream centre-right. Liberal conservatism emphasised the state’s role as an instrument of nation-building while respecting and sustaining cultural traditions and social norms. Intellectually, it drew on Edmund Burke, Alexis de Tocqueville, and the classical economic foundations of Adam Smith, David Ricardo, and John Stuart Mill, figures who tempered markets with moral order, gradual reform, and social stability.

- By KusuM WWJETILLEKE

The recent historical record of the political centre-right is not particularly impressive. To define the centre-right in this contemporary period, it may be distinguished from the traditional conservatism of D. S. Senanayake, whose philosophy more closely resembled Stanley Baldwin's “One Nation” conservatism than the neoliberal turn of his successors.

The United National Party (UNP) was conceived as a liberal-conservative party. Senanayake and his contemporaries articulated a moderate, pragmatic brand of conservatism distinct from today’s mainstream centre-right. Liberal conservatism emphasised the state’s role as an instrument of nation-building while respecting and sustaining cultural traditions and social norms. Intellectually, it drew on Edmund Burke, Alexis de Tocqueville, and the classical economic foundations of Adam Smith, David Ricardo, and John Stuart Mill, figures who tempered markets with moral order, gradual reform, and social stability.

A section of the Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB), now Sri Lanka’s main Liberal party, seems inclined towards a renewal or regeneration of the ‘right-wing’ or ‘centre-right’ of our politics; a “unite the right” movement from within. There is also a broader, external elite-liberal project to launch a joint-venture between the SJB and the UNP aiming for a more cosmopolitan and “business-friendly” party.

This is not an outlandish strategy, to frame the SJB as a centreright antidote to the lacklustre performance of the National People’s Power (NPP) “left-progressive” government. Liberal parties like the SJB typically contain multiple factions: traditionalists, progressives, pro-business lobbies, unions, and activists; all contesting to define an ideological centre from which a politics of some value might emanate.