Is the real threat not open cruelty but a corrosive conviction that rich societies are too broken to solve solvable problems. Dan Davies describes Britain’s anti-immigrant protesters as people...
This is an interesting analysis. However, I'm registering as cautiously hopeful. When I see thousands of people demonstrating in below freezing weather in Minneapolis against the fascist policies of the Trump regime, that makes me hopeful.
In the Sixties, Steppenwolf had a song "Monster", relating to the then current antiwar movements. The refrain was, "America where are you now? Don't you care about your sons and daughters? Don't you know that we need you now? We can't fight alone against the Monster."
The American people are demonstrating, over and over, that we care deeply about democracy, the rule of law, and human rights. My grandsons deserve a country at least as promising as the one we grew up in.
I read Davies' post and your interpretation of it with interest. The selection bias on policy makers that Davies proposes is a plausible and intriguing idea. Nevertheless, I think the overall argument needs work.
I don't believe that your contention "that is a very different configuration of the political psyche than the neofascist one in the minds of us liberals and social democrats" is viable. On the contrary, the competing explanations, such as Snyder's "politics of eternity" or Heath's "rebellion against executive function" do just about as well as Davies' idea as one would expect because they say something similar but with different emphasis; to favour one argument over another one would have to start by identifying material points of difference.
For example, where you and Davies say "policy makers are by hypothesis optimists who believe in their own agency", Heath would say "policy makers are by hypothesis liberals because they are trying to improve matters and improvement requires difficult and unpleasant thinking; the right does not have this problem because they have no need for policy. Their platform is that instinct is correct and fancy theories that override instinct are a trick invented by cognitive elites to hoodwink everyone else. Of course it is easier to convince people that what they believe reflexively is right than to explain some complicated reason why it is wrong." So how would you prove Davies right and Heath wrong?
Over the past 30 years US corporate profits' share of GDI has risen by 4%, even as the share to wages has fallen almost as much. Hopelessness and scapegoating are cultivated for a reason.
Incredible framing of despair as more dangerous than open cruelty. The distinction between protesters denying their country's capacity vs denying refugees humanity shifts the entire lens. I've watched similr dynamics in other contexts where people grant the moral claim but feel powerless to act. The point about policy makers being structuraly blind to this mood explains so much abou current disconnect.
Galbraith was referring to a period and a group who intimately understood the consequences of not facing the solvable problems head on.
Your chaos-monkey moniker is quite apt. Our current GOP leaders are willing to break things that will take decades to rebuild because their experiential base doesn't include their absence.
All changeable of course. That's the tragedy.
Let's hope we can vote our way back into agency building mode before we experience the full consequences of failing to do so.
But the psychic effect is cumulative corrosion of what the psychologists call “agentive optimism”—the belief that effort aimed at the future will pay off.
With some, Dsquared is right. Perhaps his particular xenophobes were a study in hopelessness: "there is not enough to share: world without end." But that's not the main story. The main story involves agency and hope. Let me distill it into a dozen words: "The [elites] are taking your stuff and giving it to the [duskies.]" This is a story of theft, not a story of loss. It contains an element of hope and vengeance: the Donald/Farage/Hitler will make it right.
This post and Davies' put me in mind of the eternally optimistic FDR and his famous line: line "we have nothing to fear but fear itself." Which is an almost naievely optimistic thing to say at the time. His policy was then to shotgun out all sorts of programs just to give the impression that things were being done - whether they worked was secondary.
The flip side is that fear of enemies within and without is the key to getting people to aacquiesce to an authoritarian government - something that Hobbes well understood.
The contrast case, perhaps, is Abe Lincoln who was by nature depressive. But I guess he compensated by being a master of uplifting rhetoric and humor.
Though I should add that FDR did suffer a bout of depression after he contracted polio. Maybe the experience of adversity overcome is the key to believable optimism.
The epic triumph of the right in overturning the New Deal was claiming credit for the fabulously extravagant and wildly successful government economic interventions WHICH WERE IN NO WAY SOCIALISM that created the post-WW II middle class. All it took was a piety spouting simpleton like Reagan to put it over the top. Then they sold the resulting expanding gap between wages and GDP growth as the result of DEI {blacks, women, immigrants, LGBT+} which required an even uglier lie and liar.
This is what happens when a populace has been fed sham for so many decades by their so-called leaders, who do little else but mislead to benefit themselves. I am thinking here of Jules Henry’s essay, William Damhoff’s analysis of policy, Ron Heifetz’s indictment against leadership fluff, and now Peter Turchin’s analyses of secular cycles and our own “End Times.” Two cheers for Galbraith and Davies— reliable, reasoned guide. Thanks!
The current politician who most seems to understand your view is Mamdani. I'm skeptical about his proposed solutions, but if he's flexible enough to find what works and not let his priors get in the way, then a functioning example would be very heartening.
This is an interesting analysis. However, I'm registering as cautiously hopeful. When I see thousands of people demonstrating in below freezing weather in Minneapolis against the fascist policies of the Trump regime, that makes me hopeful.
In the Sixties, Steppenwolf had a song "Monster", relating to the then current antiwar movements. The refrain was, "America where are you now? Don't you care about your sons and daughters? Don't you know that we need you now? We can't fight alone against the Monster."
The American people are demonstrating, over and over, that we care deeply about democracy, the rule of law, and human rights. My grandsons deserve a country at least as promising as the one we grew up in.
I read Davies' post and your interpretation of it with interest. The selection bias on policy makers that Davies proposes is a plausible and intriguing idea. Nevertheless, I think the overall argument needs work.
I don't believe that your contention "that is a very different configuration of the political psyche than the neofascist one in the minds of us liberals and social democrats" is viable. On the contrary, the competing explanations, such as Snyder's "politics of eternity" or Heath's "rebellion against executive function" do just about as well as Davies' idea as one would expect because they say something similar but with different emphasis; to favour one argument over another one would have to start by identifying material points of difference.
For example, where you and Davies say "policy makers are by hypothesis optimists who believe in their own agency", Heath would say "policy makers are by hypothesis liberals because they are trying to improve matters and improvement requires difficult and unpleasant thinking; the right does not have this problem because they have no need for policy. Their platform is that instinct is correct and fancy theories that override instinct are a trick invented by cognitive elites to hoodwink everyone else. Of course it is easier to convince people that what they believe reflexively is right than to explain some complicated reason why it is wrong." So how would you prove Davies right and Heath wrong?
Over the past 30 years US corporate profits' share of GDI has risen by 4%, even as the share to wages has fallen almost as much. Hopelessness and scapegoating are cultivated for a reason.
Incredible framing of despair as more dangerous than open cruelty. The distinction between protesters denying their country's capacity vs denying refugees humanity shifts the entire lens. I've watched similr dynamics in other contexts where people grant the moral claim but feel powerless to act. The point about policy makers being structuraly blind to this mood explains so much abou current disconnect.
Galbraith was referring to a period and a group who intimately understood the consequences of not facing the solvable problems head on.
Your chaos-monkey moniker is quite apt. Our current GOP leaders are willing to break things that will take decades to rebuild because their experiential base doesn't include their absence.
All changeable of course. That's the tragedy.
Let's hope we can vote our way back into agency building mode before we experience the full consequences of failing to do so.
I agree with the always worth my time Sarah Paine: https://youtu.be/yErY3J2hgKs?si=2uZ03sNK3DQ0K8PZ
thx much... - b.
I got here:
But the psychic effect is cumulative corrosion of what the psychologists call “agentive optimism”—the belief that effort aimed at the future will pay off.
And CLANG!!!!!
MINNEAPOLIS!!!
With some, Dsquared is right. Perhaps his particular xenophobes were a study in hopelessness: "there is not enough to share: world without end." But that's not the main story. The main story involves agency and hope. Let me distill it into a dozen words: "The [elites] are taking your stuff and giving it to the [duskies.]" This is a story of theft, not a story of loss. It contains an element of hope and vengeance: the Donald/Farage/Hitler will make it right.
Was informed and agree with your points, but I don't think any discussion is complete without including the role of racism in addition to hopelessness
This post and Davies' put me in mind of the eternally optimistic FDR and his famous line: line "we have nothing to fear but fear itself." Which is an almost naievely optimistic thing to say at the time. His policy was then to shotgun out all sorts of programs just to give the impression that things were being done - whether they worked was secondary.
The flip side is that fear of enemies within and without is the key to getting people to aacquiesce to an authoritarian government - something that Hobbes well understood.
The contrast case, perhaps, is Abe Lincoln who was by nature depressive. But I guess he compensated by being a master of uplifting rhetoric and humor.
Though I should add that FDR did suffer a bout of depression after he contracted polio. Maybe the experience of adversity overcome is the key to believable optimism.
The epic triumph of the right in overturning the New Deal was claiming credit for the fabulously extravagant and wildly successful government economic interventions WHICH WERE IN NO WAY SOCIALISM that created the post-WW II middle class. All it took was a piety spouting simpleton like Reagan to put it over the top. Then they sold the resulting expanding gap between wages and GDP growth as the result of DEI {blacks, women, immigrants, LGBT+} which required an even uglier lie and liar.
This is what happens when a populace has been fed sham for so many decades by their so-called leaders, who do little else but mislead to benefit themselves. I am thinking here of Jules Henry’s essay, William Damhoff’s analysis of policy, Ron Heifetz’s indictment against leadership fluff, and now Peter Turchin’s analyses of secular cycles and our own “End Times.” Two cheers for Galbraith and Davies— reliable, reasoned guide. Thanks!
There do seem to be interests bent on destroying agentive optimism.
The current politician who most seems to understand your view is Mamdani. I'm skeptical about his proposed solutions, but if he's flexible enough to find what works and not let his priors get in the way, then a functioning example would be very heartening.