Bi-Weekly "Metapolitics" Discussion

This discussion will center around the growing conflict between nationalism & globalism and the way in which this may shift the political alignment of our two major parties. Our main reading will be 2 articles:

1. Michael Lind, "This Is What the Future of America Looks Like"

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/05/2016-election-realignment-partisan-political-party-policy-democrats-republicans-politics-213909

• NOTE: The above article is basically a slightly altered version of an article Michael Lind wrote a month earlier in the NY Times: "Trumpism and Clintonism Are The Future". He predicts the GOP will turn into a right-wing nationalist/populist party with protectionist trade policies & support for social spending restricted to the middle & working classes (not the underclass or non-citizens), and the Democrats will turn into a center-left cosmopolitan party with policies friendly to both international business and a coalition of minorities & immigrants.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/17/opinion/campaign-stops/trumpism-and-clintonismare-the-future.html?_r=0

Lind's latest thesis also seems like a slight modification of his idea from 2014 that social conservativism will fade away and two new political ideologies will emerge in the near future -- the "populiberals" and "liberaltarians". Populiberals are imagined as a populist/communitarian, middle class party based in the exurban, peri-urban & small town regions he calls "Posturbia", while Liberaltarians are a business-friendly, urban elite party with working class supporters based in the urban & inner-ring suburban regions he calls "Densitaria". - http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/journal/past-issues/issue-4/the-coming-realignment

2. Jonathan Haidt, "Nationalism Rising: When and Why Nationalism Beats Globalism"

http://www.the-american-interest.com/2016/07/10/when-and-why-nationalism-beats-globalism/

Haidt's essay shows his sympathy for the alienated white working class that was left behind by globalization and is now backing Trump & Brexit. He feels that this nationalistic backlash is somewhat natural, and he partly blames liberal elites for equating the right-wing's conservativism & nationalism with racism & authoritarianism. He suggests that our political polarization problem is solvable if we can get liberal elites to empathize more with the plight of the white working class.

• NOTE: If you want a condensed version of Haidt's thoughts, you can check out the American Interest podcast interview with him here: http://www.the-american-interest.com/podcast/episode-127-nationalism-globalism-and-the-state-of-scotus/

We will also look at several essays reacting to Lind & Haidt's articles... As usual, I don't expect you to read all of these or any of them. If you just read Lind & Haidt's 2 essays above, that's fine. If you want to tackle some of the essays that are listed below but don't have time for all of them, just read the first 1 or 2 in each section. IMO, Paul Roseberg & Lee Drutman's responses to Lind's thesis are the most thorough & insightful, and the two National Interest essays from Etzioni & Merry are the most meticulous responses to Haidt's thesis.

If you have time to read through all the response article, you'll notice that the reactions to Lind's essay come either from policy wonks who mostly agree with him or from progressives who prefers a more radical "Sandersism" to the center-left "Clintonism". I couldn't find any conservative or libertarian reaction essays to Lind.

The reactions to Haidt's essay comes mostly from either policy wonks who agree with him or center-right conservatives who are struggling to understand how Trump hijacked their party and what Brexit signifies. The last 2 essays are from conservative bloggers who take Haidt's argument that liberal elites are partly to blame for the nationalist uprising and extend it. I couldn't find any liberal/progressive reaction essays to Haidt.

Unfortunately, the fact that the response articles to Lind & Haidt come from only one side of the political spectrum means we're probably dealing with a bit of ideological segregation - i.e. thinkers from opposite ends of the political spectrum aren't reading each other's works or engaging with each others ideas. We'll try to remedy this and construct a more multi-faceted view of Lind & Haidt's theses in our discussion.

REACTIONS TO LIND'S THESIS THAT "TRUMPISM & CLINTONISM ARE THE FUTURE":

1. Paul Rosenberg, "They’re still not telling the real story: Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, and the analysis you won’t hear on cable news"

http://www.salon.com/2016/05/07/theyre_still_not_telling_the_real_story_donald_trump_bernie_sanders_and_the_analysis_you_wont_hear_on_cable_news/

2. Lee Drutman, "Donald Trump's candidacy is going to realign the political parties"

http://www.vox.com/polyarchy/2016/3/1/11139054/trump-party-realignment

3. Ed Kilgore, "Will Trumpism Take Over the GOP?"

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/03/will-trumpism-take-over-the-gop.html

4. T. A. Frank, "Why Democrats Are Becoming The Party of the 1 Percent"

http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/04/why-democrats-are-becoming-the-party-of-the-1-percent

5. Jim Naureckas, "Clintonism the Future? NYT’s Political Science Fiction"

http://fair.org/home/clintonism-the-future-nyts-political-science-fiction/

6. Jonathan Taplin, "Our Shrunken Democratic Party Ambition"

https://medium.com/@jonathantaplin/our-shrunken-democratic-party-ambition-d78435a80616#.rr3pgyurc

REACTIONS TO HAIDT'S "GLOBALISM BREEDS NATIONALISM" THESIS:

1. Amitai Etzioni, "Effective Assimilation Can Thwart Authoritarianism: America is doing better than Europe, but old habits die hard"

http://nationalinterest.org/feature/effective-assimilation-can-thwart-authoritarianism-17134

2. Robert W. Merry, "Trump vs. Hillary Is Nationalism vs. Globalism, 2016"

http://nationalinterest.org/feature/trump-vs-hillary-nationalism-vs-globalism-2016-16041

3. The Economist editorial staff, "Drawbridges up: The new divide in rich countries is not between left and right but between open and closed"

http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21702748-new-divide-rich-countries-not-between-left-and-right-between-open-and

4. David Brooks, "We Take Care of Our Own"

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/15/opinion/we-take-care-of-our-own.html?_r=0

5. The Independent Whig, "Analysts' Attempts to Describe Brexit and Trump Epitomize the Fable of the Blind Men and the Elephant. Here's the True Elephant."

https://theindependentwhig.com/2016/07/15/analysts-attempts-to-describe-brexit-and-trump-epitomize-the-fable-of-the-blind-men-and-the-elephant-heres-the-true-elephant/

6. Christopher Chantril, "Jonathan Haidt's Nationalists and Globalists: Who are the Real Authoritarians?"

http://americanmanifestobook.blogspot.com/2016/07/jonathan-haidrs-nationalists-globalists.html