"NEOCON" (noun)

Here we must go beyond the dictionary, which merely notes that the term is a shortening of "neoconservative". "Neocons", as understood in the United States in the last part of the twentieth century, were intellectuals who had started out as liberals in the traditional sense. Some in their youth had been socialists or even communists. However, in the Cold War environment they moved to the right. Initially, this transformation was primarily in the area of foreign and defense policy, but increasingly neocons came to also endorse much of the conservative Republican economic agenda as well. Although small in number, neocons have been highly influential in intellectual and governmental circles, reaching perhaps their greatest influence in the second Bush administration. There is nothing "conservative" in the older sense of the word in their approach to the world. It is rather highly rational (in their belief) and even revolutionary (for example, "foreign relations" is seen in internationalist rather than nationalist terms, so that the concept of an "American Empire" is actually that of creating a new world order, this time around the concept of democracy). Many younger people who never went through the ideological transformations of the older generation, nevertheless have adopted the neocon agenda.

In terms of personalities and history, the best-known origin of this group was a Trotskyist splinter movement led by Max Schachtman. This was one of many "debating societies" of the time, primarily among intellectuals in New York City. In the late fifties, Schachtman decided that contrary to previous thinking, the only hope for the worldwide "socialist movement" was to support the United States in the Cold War. Many persons followed him. (Although as a party, Schachtman's group seemed to disappear, a "political party" in his tradition and calling itself "Social Democrats USA" persisted into the 1980s.) People often given the neocon label in recent years include Irving Kristol and his son William Kristol, Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Pearle.