The Empire Strikes Back

In the wake of the populist explosion of the last 8 year that has swept the US Democratic, UK Labor and other Social Democratic parties from power, we have seen two different responses from the traditional conservative and neo-liberal elites that have dominated Western politics for the last 40 years, particularly since the fall of Communism. This is perhaps most true of the US and Great Britain.

The conservative elites have embraced rightwing populism and are utilizing its energy to continue to roll back the economic, social and political advances that social democracy achieved in the 20^th Century. They have done this by focusing the legitimate anger of ordinary people on immigrants, terrorism, etc., while enriching their friends at the public trough and through privatization of the commons. And they are winning just about everywhere, but particularly in the US.

Not so the neo-liberal elites. They have not only resisted the populist wave, they continue to urge that the way forward is to move to the center, although in this period the “center” keeps shifting to the right. They do this for several reasons: a sincere, if misguided, belief that by moving to the right they will pick up support from middle forces alienated by the extreme right turn of the conservative parties; a desire to maintain support from wealthy patrons in finance (Wall Street) and in the technology sector (Silicon Valley); and a supposition that the left has no other place to go.

One would think that after a series of disastrous defeats (and long-term decline, as is the case for the Democratic Party in the US and many Socialist and Social Democratic Parties in Europe) they might have reason to question this approach. But, NO, instead they keep doubling down.

Two articles in the New York Times illustrate this refusal by the liberal elite to take seriously the populist explosion and the force behind it – the growth of inequality. The first “John Lennon vs Steve Bannon” by Jochen Bittner (Feb 23, 2017) focuses on cultural and political differences as the source of the deepening rift with American and European societies. According to Bittner, the Lennonists have an internationalist, traditional liberal/libertarian, secular world view often based on identity politics while Bannonism arouse as a critique of the Lennonists and takes a nationalist perspective, is more likely to align with Judeo-Christianity, and rejects the idea that various sectors of society (women, minorities, LGBTQ) are still not treated equality with straight, white males. His conclusion – that the two world views must engage in dialogue from the center, a “third way”, if you like.

Tony Blair (yes, he keeps turning up like a bad penny; reminds me of someone else closer to home) is even more direct in his opinion piece “Against Populism, the Center Must Hold” (March 3, 2017). Blair’s dismissal of “leftist populism” as being unable to compete with rightwing populism shows that he is totally out of touch with what has been happening – both in the US (Sanders campaign) and in Southern Europe. His recipe for the “progressives” is to build from the center by caving to the right on issues like immigration and gender identity (he doesn’t mention racism or sexism, but I’m sure he would include these as issues that the progressives obsess about). Then, we can bring together Silicon Valley (did he forget to mention Wall Street?) and those responsible for public policy and all live happily in our Brave New World.

The problem with all this BS is that it ignores the 8000 pound gorilla in the room. “It’s the economy stupid”, to quote James Carville, campaign strategist for the Bill Clinton campaign. Populist movements do not arise out of thin air; they are a response to something that causes widespread pain. Is it a coincidence that we have seen these movements, both of the right and left, in the wake of the 2008 Great Recession and the lack of a real recovery (forget the great gambling house for the rich, the stock market) for the large majority of the working class in Europe and the US?

Economic inequality has reached an extreme that has not been seen since the Gilded Age and continues to grow. Real economists (like Thomas Piketty and Joseph Stiglitz), not those who are point men for big business, have been pointing this out for several years, but the political elites of the Democratic Party and its counterparts in Europe have turned a blind eye and a deaf ear to the consequences.

Guy Standing, Professor of Economics at the University of London, in his book The Precariat: A Dangerous New Class, has given us some insight into the social and political implications of runaway inequality and they are not pretty. His analysis concludes that members of this new class face a life of insecurity, lacking prospects for long term employment (even m any who are college graduates) and living a precarious life on the edge of poverty and despair. His analysis is that as much as 50% of the population of European countries and the US now belongs to the “precariat”. Its members are susceptible to demagogues, think Trump, unless the progressive left offers clear and palpable alternatives.

The road ahead for progressives in the US must not be to double down on the failed politics of neoliberalism. If we are to resist and overcome the rightwing surge, we must offer something more – a true vision of a society where the government and the economy meet the needs of the many, not the rapacious greed of the few.