Max Skjönsberg's informative and engaging new book, The Persistence of Party: Ideas of Harmonious Discord in Eighteenth-Century Britain, addresses the way political thinkers grapple with the perils of partisanship. As Skjönsberg briefly discusses in the conclusion, the threat partisan polarization poses to representative government is a frequent topic of concern today. Skjönsberg returns to the origins of debates about the value and danger of parties in eighteenth century Britain.

Skjönsberg has two broad goals. His primary purpose is to trace the development of political thought about parties up to and including the writings of Edmund Burke, with whom Skjönsberg claims most political theorists begin. The animating question, posed in the Introduction, is “how party, initially seen as pernicious and wholly negative, could become something tolerable and even advantageous, as viewed in the writings of Burke” (6). But Skjönsberg also argues for the centrality of the Tory and Whig parties to the political history of the eighteenth century and seeks to clarify the nature of the party system and party conflict.

The main subjects of The Persistence of Party are heavy-hitting thinkers of the period. Eight of the thirteen chapters are about Burke or David Hume. The other chapters cover figures such as Paul de Rapin-Thoyras; Henry St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke; John Perceval, Earl of Egmont; and John Brown, some of whom are less well known or deeply studied. In keeping with the focus of the series that his book is part of, Skjönsberg also does an excellent job of placing these thinkers and their ideas in context. As a result, he very successfully achieves his primary goal.

Although Skjönsberg emphasizes that there was no single way of thinking about party in the eighteenth century and is very alive to subtle distinctions between different strands of thought, he is most interested in the concept of, as identified in the title, “harmonious discord.” That is, the way that most of these thinkers defended party as a necessary part of a free constitution, while also recognizing the dangers of factionalism and partisan extremism. Skjönsberg argues these concerns were informed by history, especially the history of civil war in ancient Rome and seventeenth-century Britain. Most debates about party in the eighteenth century were about how to rein in parties and mitigate their propensity for violent conflict through moderation and civility.

Skjönsberg identifies three main themes in this quest to achieve harmonious discord. First, starting with Rapin-Thoyras, was the defense of the existence of parties. Often accompanied by an investigation of their origins and ideological composition, most of these thinkers argued that parties represented valuable interests and constitutional principles. In a mixed constitution like Britain's, competition between parties was a healthy way of preserving the balance between monarch and Parliament. Second was the more specific defense of opposition, most prominent in Bolingbroke's defense of the Patriots and Burke's of the Rockingham Whigs. Third was the championing of moderation, which Skjönsberg associates mostly strongly with Hume. This involved both the analysis of parties to identify extreme and moderate elements within them as well as the attempt to present impartially the best traits of both parties to the public.

Skjönsberg also gives very careful consideration to the political context alongside the examination of these major thinkers. He deftly traces the major political developments that shaped these thinkers and their texts, and he discusses some of the wider debates in which they intervened. This is particularly effective in the extended discussions on Hume and Burke, where Skjönsberg connects shifts in their thinking to changes in the prevailing political conditions. As an intellectual history of party in the eighteenth century, therefore, the book is quite satisfying.

As a contribution to the political history of the eighteenth century, the book is less successful. On one hand, Skjönsberg demonstrates the importance of party to the political actors and writers that he discusses. He convincingly argues for the importance of principles or ideology in eighteenth-century politics. In Skjönsberg's account, these principles were primarily constitutional and religious, with debates about foreign policy also emphasized. Insofar as Hume, Burke, and the rest were insightful observers of the party political system, their analysis is compelling evidence for the way that system worked.

On the other hand, Skjönsberg occasionally and unwisely conflates the perspective of these intellectuals with the way the wider public understood parties. This problem is exacerbated by his consistent dismissal of partisan writers of the period, who he frequently labels “hacks” and compares unfavorably to the more impartial writers he focuses on. Even with someone like Burke, who was an active partisan for much of his career, Skjönsberg praises his early and late writings as being “liberated from partisanship” (9). While I am sure the writings of Hume are richer and more nuanced than the scribblings of party hacks, this decision to prioritize impartiality sits oddly with Skjönsberg's larger argument that parties were central to eighteenth century politics. If the goal is to explain the public's perception of parties, then surely the writings of partisans are more representative than these impartial outliers. So, for instance, when Skjönsberg pushes back against recent scholarship that has stressed the importance of political economy in party political dispute by arguing that “[t]his does not appear to have been the way most contemporaries understood party conflict,” it is unclear on what basis this book can rest conclusions about what “most contemporaries” believed (331).

Despite this quibble, there is much to recommend the book. It is clearly organized, and Skjönsberg presents the arguments crisply and directly. The source base is impressive and includes correspondence and papers alongside the published works. At a time when partisan polarization seems more dangerous than ever, this book provides an illuminating look at the origin of those concerns.