Paul Gottfried

Paleoconservative political theorist; Elizabethtown College (emeritus); organizer of the H.L. Mencken Club; coined the term “alternative right” in 2008 — the label Richard Spencer later appropriated as “alt-right”; intellectual patriarch of the paleoconservative-to-alt-right pipeline

Gottfried is the intellectual bridge between the paleoconservative movement of the Buchanan era (Chronicles, Sam Francis, Pat Buchanan) and the alt-right that emerged in the Obama years. He coined “alternative right” in 2008 at his H.L. Mencken Club conference as a label for a conservatism that rejected neoconservative foreign policy, mainstream movement gatekeeping, and the liberal assumptions embedded in “respectable” conservatism. Richard Spencer appropriated the abbreviated “alt-right” for his explicitly white nationalist project.

The H.L. Mencken Club (named for the early twentieth-century American satirist and cultural conservative) became an annual gathering point for paleocons, European New Right thinkers, race realists, and dissident conservatives. Yoram Hazony appeared at the Mencken Club — a connection Field uses to probe NatCon’s proximity to the Hard Right. The Mencken Club’s proximity to white nationalism made it a significant node in the paleocon-to-hard-right transition.

Gottfried’s theoretical work, influenced by the European conservative revolution (Carl Schmitt, Oswald Spengler) and the Frankfurt School critique of liberalism, developed a theory of “liberal managerialism” — the claim that modern liberal states impose ideological conformity through HR bureaucracies, social work, therapeutic institutions, and anti-discrimination law.

Cross-References

• Paleoconservatism — the movement he theorized and helped transmit
• Hard Right — coined “alt-right”; his Mencken Club was the transition point
• Richard Spencer — appropriated the “alt-right” label Gottfried coined
• Yoram Hazony — appeared at Mencken Club; proximity to Hard Right raises questions
• Sam Francis — fellow paleocon intellectual; both developed the counterrevolutionary tradition
• Pat Buchanan — the political figure of the movement Gottfried theorized
• Carl Schmitt — European influence on Gottfried’s political theory