Why Liberalism Failed

Submitted by Meteor Man on Wed, 02/28/2018 - 1:45pm

I know, I know. Beating a dead horse once again, but the message may finally be reverberating:

Has the Operating System for the Western World Crashed?

On the left, a new generation of radicals, many of whom grew up through Occupy Wall Street or the Bernie Sanders campaign, criticize liberalism for its insufficiency and its legacy of compromises with the evils of capitalism, imperialism, and white supremacy.

That's an encouraging start for a book review:

Perhaps the most influential book to emerge so far from this anti-liberal ferment is Patrick J. Deneen’s Why Liberalism Failed, published in January by Yale University Press. In it, Deneen, a conservative Catholic political scientist at Notre Dame, delivers a scathing condemnation of American political culture, arguing that our current troubles may signal the final collapse of liberalism under the weight of its own contradictions.

Let's throw in a little Death of Empire while we're at it:

The rot is in fact so deep and fundamental, according to Deneen, that “we should rightly wonder whether America is not in the early days of its eternal life but rather approaching the end of the natural cycle of corruption and decay that limits the lifespan of all human creations.”

Nailing the Duopoly:

This conspiracy is one in which both American progressivism and conservatism are implicated. For Deneen, American conservatives, many of whom consider themselves “classical liberals,” prefer a relatively limited state but endorse the scientific conquest of nature and the pursuit of self-interest through the market, both of which act as solvents on the traditional cultures and values they claim to wish to preserve. Progressive liberals, on the other hand, wish to use the state to reduce market-generated inequality — which they recognize can practically limit individuals’ freedom — but vigorously attack pre-liberal cultural norms and institutions, such as organized religion and normative monogamy, that Deneen argues temper inequality and preserve social solidarity. While each apparently fights either the state or the market, they are in reality only two sides of the same liberal coin.

Partisan politics, for Deneen, can thus only serve to further entrench liberalism, deepening the pathologies that are already becoming apparent.

You can't ignore the pathologies of Neoliberalism:

And what are these pathologies? In politics, Deneen charges liberalism with having created, under the guise of representative government, distant, arbitrary, and unresponsive rule by technocrats who despise the ignorant populace and are despised in turn. Culturally, he argues that liberalism has eviscerated actual cultures and replaced them with a pervasive, homogenous “anticulture,” in which identity is reduced to a sort of private, consumer good. And regarding the environment, liberalism’s rejection of external constraints — particularly the constraints of nature — have led it to trash the planet while hoping, delusionally, that future technological advances will put off a reckoning forever.

Perhaps most interesting is his chapter on the new ruling class, the “liberalocracy,” which Deneen accuses of having established itself as a new aristocracy to replace the one it overthrew. Yet because these meritocrats are themselves creatures of liberalism — unattached individuals, defined by education and occupation rather than attachment to place or culture — they have little interest, he claims, in helping the system’s losers, with whom they share
little except nationality.

Giving the Devil his due:

Moreover, anyone sounding the death knell of liberalism has to deal with its unprecedented and ongoing success — a fact that Deneen acknowledges but which can get lost in page after page of articulate despair. The United States is the richest and most powerful country in the history of the world; liberal capitalism and modern science have raised material living standards to a degree unimaginable to premodern humanity; and, despite histories of oppression and persistent inequalities, the liberal nations of the United States and Western Europe have gone farther than any others in advancing the rights of women and racial and sexual minorities. That might not last forever,

This is turning out longer than I expected and I actually skipped some wonkish discussion of the Social Contract Philosophers. Here's the conclusion:

Deneen, to his credit, recognizes this problem. Instead of challenging liberalism directly, he suggests that the best way forward, for those so inclined, is to abandon the culture war and begin the practical work of rebuilding local communities that can embody the connections to people and place that he worries liberalism has eroded, and in which the virtues of self-mastery and self-limitation can be revived within their properly communal context.

It’s not a solution for everyone, but that’s precisely the point. If Deneen’s critique is sound, then maybe such experiments will work, as people respond positively to the draws of non- or post-liberal community. If he’s wrong — if people really do find such arrangements so stultifying that they cannot bear the pressure — then only those who opted in will have been harmed. At a time when ever-larger factions of left and right are fleeing from liberalism, many of them for ominous alternatives, that may be the best we can hope.

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/02/has-the-operating-system-fo...

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#Neoliberalism Is Dead

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Comments

Submitted by Alligator Ed on Wed, 02/28/2018 - 5:49pm

Where to begin? So much to discuss

While this essay opens many provocative ideas about social construction (or deconstruction, however you perceive it) such cannot be easily discussed in one essay, even as good as this one.

For example, it would be like parsing St. Thomas or the Talmud in 200 words or less. Can't be done--but a worthy effort on which to expand.

Starting with the quoted conclusion:

Deneen, to his credit, recognizes this problem. Instead of challenging liberalism directly, he suggests that the best way forward, for those so inclined, is to abandon the culture war and begin the practical work of rebuilding local communities that can embody the connections to people and place that he worries liberalism has eroded, and in which the virtues of self-mastery and self-limitation can be revived within their properly communal context.

One could start with a metaphysical approach, analyzing progressively finer aspects--or the reverse, take a particle physics approach and synthesize to something greater--keeping in mind that the whole is greater than its parts.

Fom tribal strongmen to gang leaders, from knights to lords, from commoner to aristocrat, to our deceptively captive serfdom and psychopathic masters, evolution of social systems is just that. We have to put the whole experiment in a giant petri dish, called the Earth (which is more than just dirt). Into this dish we must put oceans, soil, sunshine, climate, biospheres, population size, genetics, economics of scale.

If there is a spectrum of political ideology, my interpretation would be humanism on one side and individualism on the other side. This conception is not original with me. One of the problems is that either end of the spectrum universalizes what it cherishes to the detriment of considering the opposite spectral end. Black and white thinking. We don't really have to judge in shades of gray because that is too limiting--we should think in terms of rainbows, a broad palette which need not include utopian unicorns of impossible parentage.

The selections quoted in the essay are too much of one and too little of the other, depending upon vantage point and preconceptions.

...a scathing condemnation of American political culture, arguing that our current troubles may signal the final collapse of liberalism under the weight of its own contradictions.

True but an incomplete consideration of possibilities (here's where at least one more essay could arise). Unaltered, I agree with the statement. But is the situation unalterable? I think not--but the actual method of modification eludes me. Maybe it will not elude you. Nihilism gets us nowhere. The trajectory, as far as we can predict it, is destruction and extinction. But nihilism is, by its nature, a non-answer. At c99, many of us struggle for answers.

America is not in the early days of its eternal life but rather approaching the end of the natural cycle of corruption and decay that limits the lifespan of all human creations.

This is for all purposes a tautology. History has proven correct over millennia of recorded history.
So what does this excerpt teach us in a practical sense? Very simply, we must alter the course of our own history--still without providing a clue as to fulfillment of that necessary of societal deflection.

Perhaps most interesting is his chapter on the new ruling class, the “liberalocracy,” which Deneen accuses of having established itself as a new aristocracy to replace the one it overthrew. Yet because these meritocrats are themselves creatures of liberalism — unattached individuals, defined by education and occupation rather than attachment to place or culture — they have little interest, he claims, in helping the system’s losers, with whom they share
little except nationality.

Here is identity politics at its worst. Descriptive labels without definition. Or simply definitions with no fixed meaning, varying over time. Meritocracy to me means that the more talented are recognized and their talents put to appropriate use. But my understanding is not the "current" understanding, in which meritocracy means social and financial "superiority" bestowed on the meritocrats. An example of the distinction here is in order. According to the current neoliberal interpretation, hedge fund owners and managers are meritocrats because they push paper around making money by simply shuffling money about. Is this meritorious. Hedge Funders may be very good at what they do but to my mind their activities are at best useless and worst destructive (and I believe the adjective destructive is fitting).

One final quote here:

Instead of challenging liberalism directly, he suggests that the best way forward, for those so inclined, is to abandon the culture war and begin the practical work of rebuilding local communities that can embody the connections to people and place that he worries liberalism has eroded, and in which the virtues of self-mastery and self-limitation can be revived within their properly communal context.

Liberalism needs to be challenged but, although not having read the book, solely relying on this essay, it seems that Deneen's definition of "liberalism" is really "neoliberalism". And with that assumption in mind, I can more easily accommodate to the quoted material and perhaps the thesis as a whole.

Submitted by Meteor Man on Wed, 02/28/2018 - 6:59pm

A Review of a Book Review

@Alligator Ed
For sure Alligator Ed. We are all still searching for answers to ontological problems as well as political problems. As I said, this is a good start for a book review, which makes my excerpts a review of a book review.

You were correct that Deneen (or the book reviewer?) was using "liberalism" as a substitute for Neoliberalism. I skipped the part where the book reviewer pointed out that conservative intellectuals refer to themselves as "Classical Liberals":

For Deneen, American conservatives, many of whom consider themselves “classical liberals,” prefer a relatively limited state but endorse the scientific conquest of nature and the pursuit of self-interest through the market, both of which act as solvents on the traditional cultures and values they claim to wish to preserve.

I've run across that discussion before and it strikes me as a meaningless descriptive distinction. Free market libertarian would be more accurate than classical liberal. Labels of course can helpful or disruptive.

The conversation about Neoliberalism is not over, but I'm hoping it is getting eclipsed by the reality of it's failed pathology. What comes next is a work in progress.

While this essay opens many provocative ideas about social construction (or deconstruction, however you perceive it) such cannot be easily discussed in one essay, even as good as this one. For example, it would be like parsing St. Thomas or the Talmud in 200 words or less. Can't be done--but a worthy effort on which to expand. Starting with the quoted conclusion: Deneen, to his credit, recognizes this problem. Instead of challenging liberalism directly, he suggests that the best way forward, for those so inclined, is to abandon the culture war and begin the practical work of rebuilding local communities that can embody the connections to people and place that he worries liberalism has eroded, and in which the virtues of self-mastery and self-limitation can be revived within their properly communal context. One could start with a metaphysical approach, analyzing progressively finer aspects--or the reverse, take a particle physics approach and synthesize to something greater--keeping in mind that the whole is greater than its parts. Fom tribal strongmen to gang leaders, from knights to lords, from commoner to aristocrat, to our deceptively captive serfdom and psychopathic masters, evolution of social systems is just that. We have to put the whole experiment in a giant petri dish, called the Earth (which is more than just dirt). Into this dish we must put oceans, soil, sunshine, climate, biospheres, population size, genetics, economics of scale. If there is a spectrum of political ideology, my interpretation would be humanism on one side and individualism on the other side. This conception is not original with me. One of the problems is that either end of the spectrum universalizes what it cherishes to the detriment of considering the opposite spectral end. Black and white thinking. We don't really have to judge in shades of gray because that is too limiting--we should think in terms of rainbows, a broad palette which need not include utopian unicorns of impossible parentage. The selections quoted in the essay are too much of one and too little of the other, depending upon vantage point and preconceptions. ...a scathing condemnation of American political culture, arguing that our current troubles may signal the final collapse of liberalism under the weight of its own contradictions. True but an incomplete consideration of possibilities (here's where at least one more essay could arise). Unaltered, I agree with the statement. But is the situation unalterable? I think not--but the actual method of modification eludes me. Maybe it will not elude you. Nihilism gets us nowhere. The trajectory, as far as we can predict it, is destruction and extinction. But nihilism is, by its nature, a non-answer. At c99, many of us struggle for answers. America is not in the early days of its eternal life but rather approaching the end of the natural cycle of corruption and decay that limits the lifespan of all human creations. This is for all purposes a tautology. History has proven correct over millennia of recorded history. So what does this excerpt teach us in a practical sense? Very simply, we must alter the course of our own history--still without providing a clue as to fulfillment of that necessary of societal deflection. Perhaps most interesting is his chapter on the new ruling class, the “liberalocracy,” which Deneen accuses of having established itself as a new aristocracy to replace the one it overthrew. Yet because these meritocrats are themselves creatures of liberalism — unattached individuals, defined by education and occupation rather than attachment to place or culture — they have little interest, he claims, in helping the system’s losers, with whom they share little except nationality. Here is identity politics at its worst. Descriptive labels without definition. Or simply definitions with no fixed meaning, varying over time. Meritocracy to me means that the more talented are recognized and their talents put to appropriate use. But my understanding is not the "current" understanding, in which meritocracy means social and financial "superiority" bestowed on the meritocrats. An example of the distinction here is in order. According to the current neoliberal interpretation, hedge fund owners and managers are meritocrats because they push paper around making money by simply shuffling money about. Is this meritorious. Hedge Funders may be very good at what they do but to my mind their activities are at best useless and worst destructive (and I believe the adjective destructive is fitting). One final quote here: Instead of challenging liberalism directly, he suggests that the best way forward, for those so inclined, is to abandon the culture war and begin the practical work of rebuilding local communities that can embody the connections to people and place that he worries liberalism has eroded, and in which the virtues of self-mastery and self-limitation can be revived within their properly communal context. Liberalism needs to be challenged but, although not having read the book, solely relying on this essay, it seems that Deneen's definition of "liberalism" is really "neoliberalism". And with that assumption in mind, I can more easily accommodate to the quoted material and perhaps the thesis as a whole.

—

"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn

Submitted by Alligator Ed on Wed, 02/28/2018 - 9:03pm

"Free market Libertarian" fits better as you say.

@Meteor Man My nightmare is that we are all passengers on a train driven by a lunatic, knowingly to his own self-destruction--But also to ours, a destiny about which he cares naught.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vy1V5LHXWbg]