It is conservative to insist on the importance and relevance of the case for private ownership. But it is also conservative (as opposed to liberal, socialist, or communist) to avoid dogmatic and overarching theories and to see, also, the other cases. Conservatism is uniquely subtle and flexible in this respect; it acknowledges that the question of which of these models is relevant to a particular policy, and to what degree, is one of judgement, the very stuff of good politics.

(Lincoln Allison, Right Principles: A Conservative Philosophy of Politics [Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1984], 113)