Tom Griffin, 9 May 2008 

Douglas Murray could justly be described as the enfant terrible of British neoconservatism.  He has been a prominent advocate of the application of neoconservative ideas to Europe.

Influenced by the authoritarian philosophy of Leo Strauss, and the concept of ‘dhimmitude’ put forward by Baat Ye’or, Murray has argued that the ‘innate flaws of liberal democracy’ leave Europe vulnerable to domination by Muslim immigrants.

As head of the Centre for Social Cohesion, he has been a central figure in a wider neoconservative propaganda offensive against Islamist movements in Britain.  He claims to have influenced Government policy, and his ideas have been influential in some NATO circles.

Early career
Murray began his literary career as a 16-year-old Etonian, when he persuaded the Home Office to give him access to papers relating to Lord Alfred Douglas, which had been embargoed until 2043.[1]  He reportedly completed his biography of Douglas, Oscar Wilde’s lover, before progressing to Magdalen College, Oxford where he read English. The book was published to critical acclaim in 2000 when he was still an undergraduate.[2]

Murray also began writing for The Spectator during this period, initially concentrating on reviews related to his literary interests. He has said that the attacks on the World Trade Center, which he visited in 2000, contributed to his increasing political focus.[3] Murray’s strong neo-conservative views became evident in his subsequent early writings as a freelance journalist.

In a September 2002 piece for openDemocracy, he criticised CND and the Stop the War Coalition for organising an anti-war march together with the Muslim Association of Britain, An early example of one of the most persistent themes of British neo-conservatism.[4]

In February 2003, he described the many first-time demonstrators who had joined the anti-war marches as “mainly ignorant (by choice or chance) of the machinations of international weapons inspections, oil and the rest of it”.[5]

Murray spent much of that year attending the Saville Inquiry into the 1972 Bloody Sunday massacre, which had moved to London from Derry to hear the evidence of military witnesses.[6]  He condemned Richard Norton Taylor’s play based on the hearings as ‘no-strings-attached, neatly packaged, moral tourism.’  He intends to publish a book on the inquiry once it reports.[7]

In 2004, Murray attended the Hutton Inquiry into the death of Dr David Kelly. He suggested that a full inquiry into the Iraq War was impossible because it would impinge upon the work of the intelligence services.

The security services are answerable to the government, but they must not be compromised and agents’ lives put at risk to satiate public appetite, nor must they (as I trust the Blair government has now learnt) ever be politicised. National security in Britain, as in all nations, goes beyond today or tomorrow’s government.[8]

Social Affairs Unit
Murray joined the Social Affairs Unit as a regular contributor in 2004.[9]  In 2005, the Unit published his book, Neoconservatism: Why We Need It, which argued for the introduction of neoconservative ideas into British politics.

In October that year, he outlined his philosophy in a talk to the Manhattan Institute

The practice of equivalence in our national politics leads governments not to listen to, but to fear minority opinion, concerned lest anyone get the impression that the government knows what's right for the majority who have elected it. Not only does it make politics a glorified (though not glorious) pursuit of the personal – it makes the notion of fixed or natural right a nonsense. Because of course if everything is equal then everything is right: which means nothing is good or true.[10]

This ambiguous approach to equality may owe something to the authoritarian philosopher Leo Strauss, of whom Murray is a professed admirer.[11]   Strauss’s critics argue that his idea of 'natural right' meant the right of the superior to dominate the inferior.[12]

Murray went on to present a picture of Europe on the verge of being outbred by Muslims, a common neoconservative trope reminiscent of the fears of early Twentieth Century eugenicists.

Europe has used up its peace dividend. The holiday from reality it had for half a century during which it spent money on welfare whilst America protected its security, is now over – comprehensively so. Europe not only has unsustainable demographic issues which – if un-addressed - will eradicate the continent as we know it within three or four generations. It also has security issues, not least those associated with its unameliorated populations and its increasingly inefficient armies.

Murray developed this idea further in a February 2006 speech to the Pim Fortuyn Memorial Conference on Europe and Islam, which embraced Baat Ye’or’s concept of Dhimmitude:

It is late in the day, but Europe still has time to turn around the demographic time-bomb which will soon see a number of our largest cities fall to Muslim majorities. It has to. All immigration into Europe from Muslim countries must stop. In the case of a further genocide such as that in the Balkans, sanctuary would be given on a strictly temporary basis. This should also be enacted retrospectively… Conditions for Muslims in Europe must be made harder across the board: Europe must look like a less attractive proposition.[13]

The Hague speech also revisited Straussian themes:

Our enemies are aware of these weaknesses in our set-up – weaknesses which Leo Strauss, like Tocqueville would have pointed out as among the innate flaws of liberal democracy on which we must keep a concerned and wary eye… We must remind the malignant that this war and this era will be dictated on our terms - on the terms of the strong and the right, not the weak and the wrong.

Murray returned to these twin themes, suspicion of democracy and fear of Muslim population growth, when he and Daniel Pipes debated Ken Livingstone in January 2007:

just a few months ago, the Justice Minister of the Netherlands Piet Hein Donner announced that, when a majority of people wanted it, he was willing to institute Sharia law across the Netherlands. Now, on current demographics, that majority isn’t too far away. What will the Netherlands look like when that happens?[14]

Centre for Social Cohesion

Murray was appointed director the Centre for Social Cohesion when it was founded by the conservative think-tank Civitas in 2007. [15] The centre shares a Westminster building with Policy Exchange, the think-tank accused by the BBC of using fabricated evidence in a report on extremism in British mosques.[16]  The author of that report, Denis MacEoin, is a member of the centre’s advisory council.[17]

Like Policy Exchange, the Centre for Social Cohesion has claimed success in influencing British Government policy towards Muslims.  If anything, its focus has been even more single-minded.   

In July 2007, the Centre issued its first published work, an A-Z of Muslim Organisations in Britain, which claimed to be the fullest analysis yet published of the major Muslim organisations in Britain.[18]

In August 2007 Murray and James Brandon co-authored the Centre's first pamphlet, Hate on the State, How British Libraries Encourage Islamic Extremism.[19]  The Centre later claimed credit when the Prime Minister announced that the "Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport is working with the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council to agree a common approach to deal with the inflammatory and extremist material that some seek to distribute through public libraries, while also of course protecting freedom of speech."[20]  

Murray has been a frequent guest on BBC current affairs programmes such as Hardtalk, Question Time and Newsnight.[21]

NATO

Murray 'assisted in the writing process' for the 2007 pamphlet Towards a Grand Strategy for an Uncertain World: Renewing Transatlantic Partnership.[22]  Written by five former NATO generals, the paper clearly owed much to Murray’s distinctive philosophy:

In every country, and at all times, we like to rely on certainty. Certainty about the past, the present and even the future. Yet certainty is based not on inevitability, but rather on social and intellectual needs. We seek to uphold a common and stable experience, shunning the arbitrary in favour of closure in debate.

The pamphlet proposed a new UN/EU/NATO directorate to 'co-ordinate all co-operation in the transatlantic sphere of interest.’ It suggested that if this prescription were followed ”we might, in the medium to long term, thus be capable of restoring certainty –something which we see as the most important prerequisite for functioning societies.”

The plan was reportedly a topic for discussion at the NATO summit in Bucharest in April 2008.[23]  However, according to one senior NATO figure the paper’s call for the alliance to develop a first-strike nuclear capability had ‘no traction whatsoever.’[24]

 Notes

[1] Amazon.com: Bosie: The Man, The Poet, The Lover of Oscar Wilde: Douglas Murray: Books, accessed 24 March 2008.

[2] Knitting Circle Alfred Douglas, accessed 21 March 2008.

[3] Neoconservatism: why we need it - a talk to the Manhattan Institute by Douglas Murray, Social Affairs Unit, 26 October 2005

[4] An Unholy Alliance, by Douglas Murray, openDemocracy, 22 October 2002.

[5] Marching to hell, by Douglas Murray, openDemocracy 20 February 2003.

[6] Neoconservatism: Why We Need It (Hardcover), Amazon.co.uk, accessed 21 March 2008

[7] Bloody Sunday, or the theatre of moral corruption,by Douglas Murray, openDemocracy, 11 May 2005.

[8] Hutton - the wrong inquiry, by Douglas Murray, openDemocracy, 29 January 2004..

[9] Neoconservatism: Why We Need It (Hardcover), Amazon.co.uk, accessed 21 March 2008.

[10] Neoconservatism: why we need it - a talk to the Manhattan Institute by Douglas Murray, Social Affairs Unit, 26 October 2005

[11] Profound insights of Leo Strauss, Douglas Murray, The Guardian, 30 December 2005.

[12] Leo Strauss' Philosophy of Deception, by Jim Lobe, Alternet, 19 May 2003.

[13] What are we to do about Islam? A speech to the Pim Fortuyn Memorial Conference on Europe and Islam, by Douglas Murray, Social Affairs Unit, 3 March 2006.

[14] Douglas Murray’s speech, Conference: A World Civilization or a Clash of Civilisations, Greater London Authority, 20 January 2007.

[15] Centre for Social Cohesion: Press Release, accessed 22 March 2008.

[16] Clutha House, 10 Storey’s Gate, Westminster, London, SW1, Keningtons Chartered Surveyors, accessed 5 April 2008. BBC News, Talk about Newsnight, BBC Response to Policy Exchange statement, 14 December 2007.

[17] The Centre for Social Cohesion, About Us, accessed 5 April 2008.

[18] Centre for Social Cohesion: Press Release, 1 July 2007, accessed 22 March 2008.

[19] Hate on the State, How British Libraries Encourage Islamic Extremism, Centre for Social Cohesion, August 2007, accessed 22 March 2008

[20] PM uses Centre's 'Hate on the State' report to tackle stocking of pro-jihadist books by libraries, Blog, The Centre for Social Cohesion, 28 November 2007.

[21] BBC search results for “Douglas Murray”, accessed 6 April 2008.

[22] Towards a Grand Strategy for an Uncertain World: Renewing Transatlantic Partnership, Noaber Foundation, 2007

[23] Pre-emptive nuclear strike a key option NATO told, by Ian Traynor, The Guardian, 22 January 2008.

[24] Russia’s problems nudge Afghanistan off the map, by Doug Saunders, Globe and Mail, 2 April 2008.