Populism At The Crossroads

John writes:

Peter Levine has an interesting article defending Obama against criticism by Paul Krugman. My first reaction was to defend Krugman. Krugman was probably correct about the need for a much larger stimulus early on, and he is also right about Obama having the biggest bully pulpit in town. Obama could have used his office to try to reframe the debate about economics and the role of the Federal government in the same way that Ronald Reagan and FDR did.

However, as Levine points out, there are many factors working against the return of New Deal politics in the United States. A few factors are particularly salient. First, the way Americans live, spread out in enclaves across a huge continent, is not terribly conducive to organized participation in politics. A second factor (which is related to the first) is the decline of grassroots organizations like labor unions and ethnic clubs. Finally, (and this is especially problematic for progressives) the growth of technocratic government itself has arguably replaced the popular organizations that once provided the backbone of the populist movement. Indeed, without organizations like labor unions, farmer’s groups, and third parties (like the original People’s Party), it is questionable whether the New Deal coalition could have been possible at all. Populist forces on the ground pushed the Democratic Party to the Left on economics.

What is disturbing about Levine’s article, however, is the extent to which it really seems like the United States has become ungovernable, outside of governance on behalf of the rich and powerful, with scraps being thrown to everybody else to prevent social chaos. Populists in the United States may need to come to the conclusion that there is little hope in the near future for the return of New Deal-style politics, let alone the transformation of the United States into a full-fledged social democracy.

So what is to be done? For one, American populists should change the way they talk about the Federal government. Spend more time talking about how the plutocracy relies on government policy to maintain their power. This places a spotlight on the reality that Big Government now largely serves the powerful. Think of it as Robin Hood in reverse. You might be able to convert some of your pals on the Right with this strategy.

Populists should also spend much less time on electoral politics and much more time on organizing. Labor unions ought to stop or at least curtail their futile attempts to compete with corporations when it comes to funding political campaigns. Instead, they should put all of their efforts into organizing and developing alternatives to the dying system of business unionism. The United Steelworkers have already reached out to Spain’s Mondragon Corporation, one of the world’s biggest federations of worker cooperatives. Besides labor unions, there are also plenty of other ways in which people can choose to develop their own self-help systems, even if it means just planting vegetable gardens with your neighbors.

Of course, I don’t want to totally dismiss politics. For better or for worse, the State is a powerful actor in our lives. But I am not so sure populists can bring about political change without first developing the kind of grassroots organizations that helped build an alternative to Gilded Age-style politics back in the 19th and 20th centuries. And in any event, there are many reasons to be skeptical about the long-term viability of left-wing politics without a strong system of popular intermediary organizations. At its most extreme, we end up with the kind of corrupt technocracies that existed in the former communist states.

The current economic system is in trouble. While the political class wrestles over which policies will revive our moribund economy, why not take a step back, maybe have a beer or two or three and recognize that there are other ways to move forward. Think about it as Going Galt for the working class.