Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
iemanja
iemanja's Journal
iemanja's Journal
May 7, 2017
Mounk sees that political shift as extending beyond French politics. It is demonstrated in Brexit, in differences between Trump on one hand and Obama and Hillary Clinton on the other.
I think we may be seeing elements of that divide within the Democratic party, which may explain how what constitutes right or left is now so contested. Those terms may simply not be relevant to what we are currently experiencing. Perhaps we are witnessing conflicts within the party over nationalism vs. liberal globalism? Could the recent calls for understanding of and alliances with Republican voters that some consider to be the working class be part of that phenomenon? Could we be seeing an implicit understanding that left vs. right matters less than opposition to globalism?
The antipathy toward global economic relations is overt, unapologetic. Yet can a nationalist populist impulse succeed without the corresponding nativism that has undergrid its electoral successes in France, the UK, and with Trump in the US? While we don't see the racism and explicit nativism in the current Democratic party that is evident in the National Front and the movement around Trump, we do see a hierarchy of priorities. The horrifying immigration enforcement by the Trump administration has received limited attention in comparison to some other issues. I'm sure that those who think of themselves as on the other side of the party from me could come up with a host of examples of globalist tendencies they find concerning--TPP, etc. The argument following the election that Clinton lost because of inadequate opposition to TPP may also be part of the political see change that Mounk identified.
Perhaps the Democratic party will never resolve the dispute about left vs. right because the current political fissures relate to something different: nationalism vs. globalism, and closed vs. open societies?
Why right vs. left may be relics of the past
I've been struck in recent years by what I see as reactionary views championed as leftist. What constitutes left vs. right is increasingly contested. Some insist the Democratic Party has moved to the right since the 1990s (not in the 1990s but since). I have even seen some who claim to be on the left insist that Trump champions progressive causes. I have to wonder if disagreements about what constitutes Democratic values or left vs. right point to fundamental changes in politics and ideology.
An NPR interview with French academic Yascha Mounk offers some insights.
SHAPIRO: You write in Slate today that the battles of the future will not be fought between leftists and rightists or liberals and conservatives. Rather, you say they will pit the advocates of an open society against the partisans of a closed society and nationalists. Explain what that re-alignment looks like.
MOUNK: You know, whether you're a Democrat or you're a Republican, whether you in France are for the Parti Socialiste or the UMP or Les Republicains would have been decided by your stance on straightforward economic issues. If you want a slightly bigger welfare state, a little bit more redistribution, then you're on the center-left. If you want, you know, more free enterprise and a smaller welfare state, lower taxes, then you're on the center-right.
Now I think there's really coming to be this quite fundamental clash which is nicely encapsulated by Emmanuel Macron on the one side and Marine Le Pen on the other side, between people who believe that globalization is an opportunity but we need international cooperation in order to solve problems like climate change, that we should be open to the world. And people say no, the most important thing is the nation, and that stands in competition with international organizations. It has to close itself off against the world in order to have real power. It has to embrace an ethnic, cultural majority against others. And so this is what you're seeing now.
I'm a little torn about this because if a main political cleavage is between essentially defenders of liberal democracy in the current world order and ones who really want to dismantle it radically, then eventually they will sometimes win elections, and we will get real moments of turmoil like we're seeing now in the United States.
http://www.npr.org/2017/04/24/525441567/french-presidential-election-serves-as-test-of-liberal-democracy
MOUNK: You know, whether you're a Democrat or you're a Republican, whether you in France are for the Parti Socialiste or the UMP or Les Republicains would have been decided by your stance on straightforward economic issues. If you want a slightly bigger welfare state, a little bit more redistribution, then you're on the center-left. If you want, you know, more free enterprise and a smaller welfare state, lower taxes, then you're on the center-right.
Now I think there's really coming to be this quite fundamental clash which is nicely encapsulated by Emmanuel Macron on the one side and Marine Le Pen on the other side, between people who believe that globalization is an opportunity but we need international cooperation in order to solve problems like climate change, that we should be open to the world. And people say no, the most important thing is the nation, and that stands in competition with international organizations. It has to close itself off against the world in order to have real power. It has to embrace an ethnic, cultural majority against others. And so this is what you're seeing now.
I'm a little torn about this because if a main political cleavage is between essentially defenders of liberal democracy in the current world order and ones who really want to dismantle it radically, then eventually they will sometimes win elections, and we will get real moments of turmoil like we're seeing now in the United States.
http://www.npr.org/2017/04/24/525441567/french-presidential-election-serves-as-test-of-liberal-democracy
Mounk sees that political shift as extending beyond French politics. It is demonstrated in Brexit, in differences between Trump on one hand and Obama and Hillary Clinton on the other.
I think we may be seeing elements of that divide within the Democratic party, which may explain how what constitutes right or left is now so contested. Those terms may simply not be relevant to what we are currently experiencing. Perhaps we are witnessing conflicts within the party over nationalism vs. liberal globalism? Could the recent calls for understanding of and alliances with Republican voters that some consider to be the working class be part of that phenomenon? Could we be seeing an implicit understanding that left vs. right matters less than opposition to globalism?
The antipathy toward global economic relations is overt, unapologetic. Yet can a nationalist populist impulse succeed without the corresponding nativism that has undergrid its electoral successes in France, the UK, and with Trump in the US? While we don't see the racism and explicit nativism in the current Democratic party that is evident in the National Front and the movement around Trump, we do see a hierarchy of priorities. The horrifying immigration enforcement by the Trump administration has received limited attention in comparison to some other issues. I'm sure that those who think of themselves as on the other side of the party from me could come up with a host of examples of globalist tendencies they find concerning--TPP, etc. The argument following the election that Clinton lost because of inadequate opposition to TPP may also be part of the political see change that Mounk identified.
Perhaps the Democratic party will never resolve the dispute about left vs. right because the current political fissures relate to something different: nationalism vs. globalism, and closed vs. open societies?
Profile Information
Gender: Do not displayMember since: Sat Sep 15, 2012, 01:49 PM
Number of posts: 53,026
