A WASTELAND; THE TERRA AFFIRMA

T S Eliot writing in 1938 on the developing culture of the West was convinced (as was Chesterton writing at the same time) that what he termed liberals (left-wing progressives today) were always walking away from something as opposed to building towards an ideal.

"....because liberalism was largely a negative force; Eliot saw that it wasn’t a comprehensive philosophy but a limited movement that defined itself by its rejections. It wasn’t so much going somewhere as not going back to something else. It persuaded itself that it was going forwards—Progress is its motto—but with no defined destination and with only glances backwards to its point of departure to ensure that whatever the direction, at least it was moving reassuringly away from what it condemned. This negativity and the vagaries it generates are liberalism’s main inadequacies". [G Furnell]

He also thought that the logical result of such 'progressive' thinking would tip the culture towards totalitarian rule because the only way to build a Utopian society given the natural obstreperousness of human nature was by manipulation and coercion.

"His prophesy: 'We shall have regimentation and conformity, without respect for the needs of the individual soul; the puritanism of a hygienic morality in the interests of efficiency; uniformity of opinion through propaganda, and art only encouraged when it flatters the official doctrines of the time'"

Gary Funell states it thus:

"Eliot repeated, so we wouldn’t miss the point or the irony, that liberalism would inevitably result in deep and widespread social ills and then it would of necessity become punitive and controlling in a vain attempt to restrict the social mess its own policies had created." 

The entire essay is worth a read. Very important and rather prescient.

http://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2017/12/t-s-eliots-vision-totalitarian-democracy/