So, I came across The American Compass's "Five Deadly Sins of the left" and found it to be an interesting article, even if the forum it was posted on did not (most libs and lefties I came across seemed to hate it irrationally). Now, to be fair, looking more into the American Compass, they are a right wing organization, with right wing goals, and taking a quick look at other things they posted, I REALLY don't agree with these people, but as a leftie who is unhappy with the existing left as we know it, I did find this to be worth discussing. So this is going to be one of those "quote what they say and I respond" kind of articles.
After 40 years of decline, perhaps it’s time for the Left to try something new.
After all, capitalism has been underperforming as an engine of prosperity since the latter part of the previous century, in terms of both the rate and distribution of growth. But these many decades of rising inequality do not appear to have benefitted the western Left. Mass publics have not seen what the Left has on offer as a plausible cure for what ails their societies and they have voted accordingly.
Yeah, because the narrative has been controlled by the far right, and the current brand of centrist liberalism is just complicit in allowing the problems that exist to fester. And then many other factions of the left fail to miss the mark for various reasons, which I will be discussing in my response to this article.
It is especially striking that even the Great Financial Crisis of 2008–09 did not spur any realignment of voters toward the Left. In the greatest crisis of capitalism since the 1930s, with widespread suffering and plummeting incomes, forces of the Right benefited the most, particularly Right-populists. Of course, Right-populists are themselves vulnerable, as their significant losses in the 2018 election made clear. In 2020, they face the possible defeat of their standard-bearer, Donald Trump. But such outcomes reflect Trump’s own weaknesses more so than the Left’s ability to govern effectively or sustain a majority coalition over time. On those counts, the record for decades has been poor.
Actually it did. Do they forget that Bernie Sanders existed or that he faced the brunt of blatant media bias and repression to sabotage any such alignment left? I AM a former conservative. The 2008 recession DID shift me left. But, again, the democrats just missed the mark. Their current centrism is problematic, and the other factions often being too far left and dogmatic often fail to miss the mark too. But yes, we almost had a realignment to the left. The problem it was derailed and we ended up with Donald Trump instead, who sucked up all of that populist energy. And the democrats kept their current messaging in opposition to him, which also is extremely dull and boring.
If Bernie won the democratic primary and went on to win the 2016 election, things would be much different now. Although I suspect the left would fall victim to these sins.
The Left has theories about this failure. One is that the true Left has the right formula but has not been able to make its case, thanks to the pernicious influence of neoliberal incrementalism and the craven politicians who espouse it within the Democratic Party. Another is that the globalized capitalist class has become more powerful and, in alliance with a cleverer and better-organized Right, has bent societies and politicians in its direction, despite the Left’s resistance. Still another is that, precisely because of this globalization, national Lefts cannot succeed on the level of the nation-state.
And all of those are accurate.
But there is a simpler theory: The public just isn’t interested in buying what the Left is selling. No matter how loudly the Left hawks its wares or how heroically it organizes, even as America grapples with a pandemic-driven health and economic crisis, it will not succeed. The Left’s internal diagnoses lead it to believe that in picking up the pieces from this global debacle it can finally gain the elusive support it needs. But while it is certainly possible—perhaps probable—that the Left will win some important elections in the near future, durable mass support for the Left and its goals will not emerge unless and until it radically revamps its offering, abandoning the unhealthy and unpopular obsessions that consume its attention and distract from actually solving problems. In particular, it must find the strength to overcome five deadly sins.
Eh, a little of A, a little of B. It's hard to get a consistent constituency when most people are casual observers of politics, and there are powerful forces that dominate and shape the public conscious along certain battle lines.
Quite frankly, the public is ignorant. And I know, a lot of people tend to gasp and drop their monocles when I dare suggest that most people are stupid, but honestly, I kind of think they are. Most are susceptible to mass media campaigns, and literally are as easy to herd as a flock of literal sheep (wake up, sheeple!). And powerful forces bank on this to ensure that the left never really has a breakthrough moment. Even a lot of lefties are complicit, whether by committing these sins, or by being manipulated by corporate media, into sabotaging the left's ascendancy.
But at the same time, many of these sins are legitimate problems with the left, and need to be addressed. And some of them actually are pushed by these corporate sources to keep us distracted from the real issues that we face. Without further ado, let's look at the deadly sins.
The Sin of Identity Politics
Hahaha yeah. I mean, do I really need to say more. I will say more, but yes, identity politics is cancer. The stuff is divisive in the sense that it pits some demographics against other demographics in a zero sum way to inspire tons of outrage and infighting among groups that otherwise probably wouldnt have problems with one another. it's grievance politics, but instead of the grievance being aimed at something legitimate, it's aimed at the rest of society in a circular firing squad kind of way. While we should be healing from the wounds of the past, identity politics sticks the knife into those wounds, constantly reminding us of everything wrong in the world, and pitting people against each other. When we hear people like Andrew Yang talking about how divided we are and how we're barrelling toward civil war, this stuff is a major root cause of that. Because often times these divisions aren't based on ideas, but one's immutable characteristics and their relation to their place within society. The underprivileged despise the privileged, and the privileged dont even see the problems in the first place and seek to protect their advantages. Instead of stopping racism, I'd argue this stuff amplifies it. It's a complete and utter distraction from the real issues in society.
In discussing the role of the neoliberal establishment in democratic politics, identity politics comes off as a form of "babel moment", where "god" (the democratic party) starts making people speak different languages (divides people based on identity characteristics) causing the people to fight each other and stop progress on whatever offends the offending party so deeply. In the bible it was building a tower to heaven, in democratic party politics, it's coming together to solve problems in a universal way. I absolutely agree that this is a sin, and it is one of the big ones the modern left embraces.
The first deadly sin is identity politics. This form of politics originated in the entirely just and necessary 1960s movements that sought to eliminate discrimination against and establish equal treatment and access for women, gays, and racial minorities. In evolving to the present day, the focus has mutated into an attempt to impose a worldview that emphasizes multiple, intersecting levels of oppression (“intersectionality”) based on group identification. In place of promoting universal rights and principles, advocates now police others on the Left to uncritically embrace this intersectional approach, insist on an arcane vocabulary for speaking about these purportedly oppressed groups, and prohibit discourse based on logic and evidence to evaluate the assertions of those who claim to speak on the groups’ behalf.
Yep. To the idea that these ideas started off good and went too far, the idea that we should be thinking more in terms of universal rights and privileges, and that the worldview ultimately rejects reason and evidence and even worse is extremely toxic and militant to those who disagree with it.
Is America really a “white supremacist” society? What does “structural racism” even mean and does it explain all the socioeconomic problems of nonwhites? Is anyone who raises questions about immigration levels a racist? Are personal pronouns necessary and something the Left should seek to popularize? Are transwomen exactly the same as biological women and are those who question such a claim simply “haters” who should be expunged from the Left coalition (as has been advocated in the UK)? This list could go on. What ties the questions together is that they are closely associated with practitioners of identity politics or adherents of the intersectional approach, who deem them not open to debate with the usual tools of logic and evidence. Politically derived answers are simply to be embraced by the Left in the interest of “social justice.”
Yep, and they're really big on censoring those who disagree, which makes them run afoul of my very pro speech and freedom approach to politics.
I mean, I admit I dont see rights the same way the right would, but I do very much have a rule utilitarian perspective that approaches things in that way, and I largely support most rights currently existing in society. Even if some should be curtailed slightly and not treated in such an absolutist way, I honestly do believe we need that approach to politics.
Instead we get this view based on intersectionality, which don't get me wrong, has some value in small doses, but taken to the extremes it is, well, it's extremely toxic.
The Left has paid a considerable price for its increasingly strong linkage to militant identity politics, which brands it as focused on, or at least distracted by, issues of little relevance to most voters’ lives. Worse, the focus has led many working-class voters to believe that, unless they subscribe to this emerging worldview and are willing to speak its language, they will be condemned as reactionary, intolerant, and racist by those who purport to represent their interests. To some extent these voters are right: They really are looked down upon by elements of the Left—typically younger, well-educated, and metropolitan—who embrace identity politics and the intersectional approach. This has contributed to the well-documented rupture in the Democratic Party’s coalition along lines of education and region.
And I know that this comment pissed off quite a few libs on the forum that I mentioned. "What do you mean doesnt impact most voters lives?" And then they cite statistics of how many people it impacts. I mean, cool, but it does exclude large swaths of the population too. And even among different oppressed groups, there's a lot of infighting among various subgroups who subscribe to social justice ideology. Take the 2008 primary where the people pushing black identity politics were calling Hillary supporters racist and the feminists were calling Obama supporters sexist. Or consider how people scream about JK Rowling being a "TERF", and how her identity politics runs afoul of the trans groups. Or how Dave Chapelle, in being accused of transphobia, pushed black identity politics to play a suffering olympics game of who has it worse.
These politics are just hot garbage. They do tend to alienate people not excluded in these groups.
And yes, they basically also attack people in such a way where if you dont preach their views (as I do not, even if I am SOMEWHAT sympathetic to them, sometimes), you are considered in league with fascism. Youre either with them or against them. And as such, I end up being "against them" simply because they dont know when to quit and consider people a casual ally rather than an enemy for not agreeing with them 100%.
And yes, this is why we're seeing a lot of that populist energy that could have supported Sanders, going to Trump. Because there's a lot of common ground between some 2016 populists on the right and left against this stuff, and I've seen a bit of a Bernie to Trump pipeline form in the past few years where a lot of 2016 Bernie or Busters are now Trump supporters. The same thing is, this could have gone differently. But the democrats chose these lines carefully. Again, they're like god with the tower of babel. They chose to disrupt a potentially powerful left wing populist coalition by dividing them with idfentity politics and conquering, which has caused it to fracture every which way since then, with some becoming right wingers, some being absorbed into the democratic party, some becoming increasingly socialist (which we will discuss with the next sin), and others doing things like joining Yang's "Forward" movement (which I was on board with until they abandoned their principles).
What makes this sin so strange, counterproductive, and perhaps unforgivable, is that popular views on basic issues of tolerance and equality have become much more liberal over the years. The very things the Left was originally fighting for have become less controversial and more accepted—from gay marriage to women’s and racial equality to opposition to discrimination. The Left won.
Well, we were winning until 2016. But instead, these kinds of grievance politics can never be satisfied, and just keep the left on a treadmill of never being happy, causing them to fight on new and increasingly unpopular battlegrounds, to the point they run out of popular support. And then the movement on the right that forms in response to them actually backlashes, becomes more extreme, allows their crazies back into their movement giving them mainstream voice, and progress is threatened again.
Which is the threat we now face from the Alt Right. As I said back in 2016, if we didnt feed the troll, the troll would go away. But now the troll is a big existential threat to the left, and actually has power. And this extreme "intersectional" or as I now call it post understanding the times, the "postmodernist" left, isn't in a good shape to combat these threats, because much like the boy who cried wolf too many times, no one takes them seriously. So the more they scream about fascism and the right being an existential threat, the more people become desensitized and don't listen.
Of course, that argument was prosecuted in the familiar language of fairness and civil rights; universal principles that have wide appeal and a deep foundation in the nation’s discourse. The same cannot be said for the boutique, academic-derived ideas and language favored by the identity-politics Left, or for the distinctly illiberal attitudes displayed toward dissent from those ideas or use of dis-approved language. Indeed, such emphasis and behavior is antithetical to the universal political and moral principles that have typically animated the Left and underpinned broad coalitions for social change. So long as the Left appears more interested in finding new enemies than in seeking new friends, it will fail to advance its many important priorities.
Yep, and you know what? It won me over. I never really was racist from the perspective of rights. The left won that in the 1960s before I was born. Gay marriage was won for me, because I stopped caring once I left christianity. I support women's rights, I support minority rights, I support gay rights.
But that's the thing. I DO have that more conservative rights based system. And I justify it under rule utilitarian reasons as "good".
But what I don't support are the modern left's solutions to these issues, or even them being the focus to debate at all. Would anyone doubt that income inequality between races would close under a UBI? Or that universal healthcare would ensure that everyone has healthcare? I'm not saying there arent issues related to certain communities (such as the inner cities) that dont need to be addressed too, but as someone who lives in one of those communities, uh, my ideas would help these areas A LOT.
The Sin of Retro-Socialism
I cant really react to this one until we see their definition, but retro socialism on the surface sounds a lot to me like the left being stuck on old ideas, rather than new ones relative to the times. For example, insisting on this really old antiquated views based on labor politics, rather than the more high tech anti work left I propose. But let's look at what they say about it.
The second deadly sin of the Left is retro-socialism, which demands a complete remaking of the market system to heal the problems of contemporary capitalism. In this view, the ills of the current era are traceable to neoliberalism—faith in the market as the organizing mechanism for society—which compounds underlying problems with the capitalist system itself. The retro-socialists contend that the public is so sick of stagnating living standards, inequality, and periodic crises that it will (eventually) embrace their complete socialist overhaul of the system. This mistakes the public’s genuine discontent with current outcomes for a desire to abandon capitalism entirely. Voters are indeed dissatisfied with the current model of capitalism, but what they want is a different, better capitalism, not “socialism.”
Uh, yeah, this merits some discussion. He seems to be talking more about the Bernie Sanders type left than anything. And I kind of get it. Focusing on the terminology of socialism is alienating. Theres a lot of stigmas there and much of what Bernie proposed wasn't socialism anyway.
On the other hand, in response to the neoliberals organizing to keep the left out of power, a lot of people who otherwise would be unhappy with more gradual changes have hardened to become LITERAL socialists, who believe the system is so corrupt literally the only solution is socialism. This is alienating, even to a passionate critic of the current system like me, who does support reasonable "medium scale change" (to differentiate between large scale change to another economic system a la socialism, and also small scale change that focuses on band aids like the neolibs support). I mean, I might want things, UBI, universal healthcare, free college, but I don't want "socialism." I just want a form of libertarian social democracy that combines traditional social programs like Europe would have with UBI. But this isn't enough for socialists, because "It IsNt SoCiAlIsM". Well, who cares. Screw socialism. It's an extremely overrated goal not worth pursuing. Id rather get changes that impact me positively within the current system.
The American Left is mostly careful to put the qualifier “democratic” in front of “socialism” to distinguish it from the authoritarian, command-economy socialists of yesteryear. And for many who use the term, their idea of socialism seems closer to a traditional social-democratic mixed economy than a radically different system that would somehow do away with profits and markets. So why call it socialism, a term that has all kinds of unpleasant associations and does imply a replacement of capitalism? Why not call it “people’s capitalism” or “democratic capitalism” or “the advanced mixed economy” or whatever?
Yeah this is a branding issue that Bernie had in general. He had good ideas, and didn't support shifting to a form of socialism that's bad, but calling it socialism is alienating. He would have been better off calling it social democracy or cloaking it in FDR's second bill of rights, because that's exactly what it is.
By grasping nostalgically at revolutionary rhetoric, the Left sets the bar high for public embrace of what might otherwise be quite popular policy ideas, from single-payer health insurance to free college to a job guarantee. Generally, it is not a selling point for voters that your policies are a step along the road to socialism. Moreover, belief in the viability of replacing capitalism and the market encourages unrealistic thinking about policies that might work within a market system and misestimation of how quickly they might be adopted. This tendency has not gone unnoticed by voters, who are pragmatically interested in what is feasible and workable and have no ideological commitment to a different system. The socialist label and terminology undercut efforts to persuade voters that the Left’s agenda can work.
Yeah, I actually agree with this. Notice how despite this being a right wing article they're not focusing on the substance, even acknowledging these ideas COULD be popular. They are instead rejecting extremist rhetoric, which has caused some since 2016 to become more extreme, and others to reject Sanders' vision entirely.
I have my own critiques with Sanders himself, which should be known, but I still support most of his ideas. But the "socialism" stuff has cooled on me significantly. I didn't think the branding issue was much of a big deal in 2016, but given how the discourse evolved, it is, and I've shifted away from the "socialist left" as a result, as I clearly have different ideological views than they do.
The Sin of Catastrophism
Here they seem to be focusing on how they use climate change as an existential crisis in order to push a radical agenda. And we actually have studied this relatively recently on this blog as I waded into the climate change issue myself. But it's not just that, it's everything, and how the left are turning into the boy who cried wolf.
The third deadly sin is catastrophism. From the final crisis of capitalism to the inevitabilities of war and fascism, the Left often extends systemic critiques to claims that the Big Meltdown is just around the corner and can be prevented only if the Left comes to power and radically restructures the system. Among many current iterations of this catastrophism, the most prominent one by far concerns climate change.
Yeah, agree on all fronts, and if you notice, i tend to have a lot less of this in my politics. I was largely quiet through the Trump years on the threat Trump posed, only really speaking out when January 6th happened, and I felt a need to actually say something to highly how serious of a threat that this is. And with climate change, yeah, the left does abuse the extent of the issue to promote their agenda, as we'll discuss as this sin is explained further.
There are exceptions of course, but the Left’s dominant strand of thinking sees climate change as a trend that will roast the planet and wipe out human civilization unless drastic action is taken very, very soon. For most on the Left, the apocalyptic pronouncements of Greta Thunberg and Extinction Rebellion are more plausible than arguments that a warming climate is a problem susceptible to reform and better policy, addressable through adaptation and technological innovation. It is assumed that we are headed for, in David Wallace-Wells’ phrase, “the uninhabitable Earth.” When green activists claim we have five or, at most, ten years to solve the problem by achieving net-zero carbon emissions, most on the Left nod in agreement.
....yeah. I mean, don't get me wrong, climate change is a very serious threat, and we are at risk of destroying our civilization long term if we do not act on it, but yeah, the whole "we need this massive bloated green new deal by 2030 or we're doomed" thinking is a bit overblown. This is really an issue that we have to solve over the course of the next several decades. And the consequences won't be fully realized for potentially centuries. While I'm not advocating complacency, the left does use alarmism to push an agenda, as the green new deal is more or less a front for a massive jobs program, as well as radically changing how we live in ways that are out of touch with most Americans. Like, leftists view these really dense green communities where we all take public transportation to work, and it just...ain't...happening. We need to work with what we have, and change more in ways Americans are largely willing to accept. We can accomplish the bulk of the work by say, 2050 if we act diligently, but we dont need to SOLVE the problem completely by 2030, and doing so would be exponentially more expensive and require alternations most Americans wouldn't accept.
Such a rapid transition of global energy systems is a fairy tale, making the situation look hopeless instead of solvable. That is a real liability. Voters want to hear how problems can be solved—not told they’re doomed unless obviously impractical steps are taken. And it doesn’t help that the Left’s version of the steps that must be taken includes a raft of unrelated social programs that would be nice to have but don’t do anything about climate change (see, for instance, the Green New Deal proposed in Congress). Nor does it help that obviously necessary components of a clean energy program like nuclear power are ruled out because, well, people on the Left don’t like nuclear power.
Exactly, longer time scale needed. And for the most part the green new deal is a front for other stuff. And yeah the left is weirdly purist on nuclear power, which would certainly help the issue more than most solutions would. But yeah, given my own brand of left, this article is mostly preaching to the choir. And it should be noted I'm left, but I'm a different kind of left.
None of this makes sense as either a political or policy approach. Climate change is, in fact, a solvable problem, but it will take some time (2050 is a reasonable target for net-zero global emissions) and massive technological innovation rather than a quixotic attempt to remake the global economy in just a few years. In the meantime, adaptations to unavoidable rises in temperature will be necessary, but these do not require turning the world upside down nor will they condemn billions of people to mass migration and death. The Left has plenty to fight for here, but the political support they need will not materialize so long as they continue their embrace of catastrophism.
I agree, and having studied the issue as of late, I think the 2050 timeline is more realistic. And again, notice how this article isn't attacking the left's valid arguments on these causes, mostly focusing on the horrid framing the left does to promote its causes, which tend to alienate people.
The Sin of Growthphobia
Still, I find actual anti growthers to be minorities on the left. Most people on the left are either bog standard neolibs, or if they're more in the left wing sanders camp, they're proponents of MMT, which is very pro growth (and pro labor, part of the reason they oppose UBI is because they dont see it as promoting growth under their own paradigm, instead opting for jobs programs). So this doesn't seem to be a huge issue for me. Still, let's hear what he has to say.
The fourth deadly sin is growthphobia: discarding the goal of faster growth in the rush to address economic inequality. While reducing inequality is a laudable and essential goal, both through market reforms that generate more equal outcomes (“predistribution”) and tax-and-transfer programs (“redistribution”), it is counterproductive to lose sight of the need for faster growth as well. Growth, particularly productivity growth, is what drives rising living standards over time and the Left presumably stands for the fastest possible rise in living standards.
I dont care if we grow a little slower if it means people are better taken care of. Ya know?
Faster growth also makes easier the achievement of the Left’s other goals. Hard economic times typically generate pessimism about the future and fear of change, not broad support for more democracy and social justice. In contrast, when times are good, when the economy is expanding and living standards are steadily rising for most of the population, people see better opportunities for themselves and are more inclined toward social generosity, tolerance, and collective advance.
Some resistance to growth may derive from an assumed growth-equity tradeoff, but evidence has strengthened over time that high inequality regimes (such as the one we live in today) have a negative effect on growth. We have gotten the worst of both worlds: sluggish growth and high inequality. A more equal society is fully compatible with a higher growth society—the proverbial “win-win.”
Income inequality has been so high in the past few decades growth is actually stagnating because people dont have the money to spend. And if people dont have the money to spend, the economy doesn't grow. To be fair, right now our economy is the opposite, with supply chain issues slowing growth and causing high inflation, but under traditional economic times, yes, we've been too inflation conscious at the point it's causing increasing inequality and living standards.
A UBI for example has been considered a form of trickle up economics, where giving people money to spend stimulates demand increasing the economy. And MMT advocates also argue for policies (like a jobs program, ew) to create more stuff and stimulate demand in the same way.
In truth, the Left’s lack of interest in growth reflects not only an understandable and laudable focus on unequal distribution, but also a general suspicion that the fruits of growth are poisoned. Growth encourages the accumulation of unneeded material possessions and a consumerist lifestyle rather than a truly good life, the thinking goes. And, worse, it is literally poisoning the Earth, driving the climate crisis that is hurtling the human race toward doom.
But on the other hand, while we can try to solve climate change within the pro growth paradigm, I have trouble arguing against the left on whether how we're living is sustainable long term. And I honestly also am a critic of the work-consume paradigm, and do believe that a good life would be better had if we moved away from this stuff, if only a little.
of course, that's the difference between me and the leftists in general in this article. The author is pointing to the extremists, whereas I tend to support many of their goals, but in less extreme forms. I support most of Sanders agenda, but I'm not a socialist. I support solving climate change, but not within the green new deal paradigm or its alarmism. I support stopping the far right, but i dont buy into the kneejerk reactionary rhetoric of the far left on that matter. I literally support a shift away from GDP and obsession with growth, and support people working less, but I dont support forcing degrowth or extreme changes on people. I even support some social justice goals, i just think the identity politics crap is crazy and extreme. I've been a critic of this in recent years, all while being on the left.
This has led many on the Left to argue that our capitalist economy based on growth must be replaced with a “degrowth” economy focused on simple, healthy communities; efficient resource use; and the elimination of wasteful consumerism. If that means no or negative economic growth, so be it.
Naomi Klein, author of the hugely influential 2015 book, This Change Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate, advocates in a New Statesman essay for “radical and immediate de-growth strategies in the US, EU and other wealthy nations.” She continues:
[W]e happen to have an economic system that fetishizes GDP growth above all else. . . . The bottom line is that an ecological crisis that has its roots in the overconsumption of natural resources must be addressed not just by improving the efficiency of our economies but by reducing the amount of material stuff we produce and consume.
Current green icon, teenager Greta Thunberg, has joined the degrowth chorus.
I mean, they're not entirely wrong. I mean how does the right tend to combat the idea that we are sowing the seeds of our demise? Our way of life is like a cancer on this planet, and one that if not controlled will metastasize and kill our host. Which will kill us too. How can we support infinite growth on a finite planet? Technology can help, but it only goes so far.
I mean, again, I dont support moving entirely away from growth, I dont wanna return to monke and I tend to crap on "leftists" a lot for being too radical at times.
Degrowth is probably the worst idea on the Left since communism. People want more, not less; they don’t object to growth, they object to where the benefits of growth have mostly gone. In short, they want abundance, not societally-mandated scarcity. And not only will people not accept artificial scarcity, but also the transition to a green economy is really only possible in a high-growth context, where the requisite (and expensive) technological innovation and infrastructure development—as, for example, in a Green New Deal—can be supported.
I do think the left goes wrong in wanting to mandate these things though. Like I ain't a hard core pro growth guy, but my solutions would be more market oriented and voluntary, rather than mandated.
What is true for publics in advanced countries is doubly true for those living in the developing world. The radical drop in extreme poverty worldwide, from 44 percent in 1990 to under 10 percent today, has been widely noted. Less well-known, a Brookings Institution study has shown that the global middle class has doubled in size from about a quarter of the world’s population in 2000 to just over half today. These changes are attributable to economic growth, even if the benefits of economic growth in developing countries, as in developed countries, have been distributed unequally. It is highly implausible that these populations want less growth when they’ve already benefitted so much from the growth they have seen. What they really want is more and more equally-distributed growth and, ultimately, the lives of abundance they see many people around the world already living.
The Sin of Technopessimism
The Left’s final deadly sin is technopessimism. In the 21st century, the Left has become distinctly unenthusiastic about the potential of technology, tending to see it as a dark force to be contained rather than a force for good to be celebrated. This is very odd indeed. Almost everything people like about the modern world, including relatively high living standards, is traceable to technological advances and the knowledge embedded in those advances. From smart phones, flat-screen TVs, and the internet, to air and auto travel, to central heating and air conditioning, to the medical devices and drugs that cure disease and extend life, to electric lights and the mundane flush toilet, technology has dramatically transformed people’s lives for the better. It is difficult to argue that the average person today is not far, far better off than her counterpart in the past. As the Northwestern University economic historian Joel Mokyr puts it, “the good old days were old but not good.”
But yeah, I also agree with him that the left's weird anti tech bend is bizarre to me.
Economists debate endlessly about the exact mechanisms connecting technology to growth, and about the social and institutional conditions that must be met for technology to maximize its effect on growth, but at the end of the day the growth we have seen—and the living standards the mass public enjoys—would simply not have been possible without the massive breakthroughs and continuous improvements we have seen in the technological realm.’
Given all this, one would expect the Left to embrace techno-optimism rather than technopessimism. If the goal is improving people’s lives, rapid technological advance is surely something to promote enthusiastically. But the Left has been lukewarm at best about the possibilities of new and better technologies, leaving techno-optimism to the libertarian-minded denizens of Silicon Valley. As British science journalist Leigh Phillips has observed:
Once upon a time, the Left . . . promised more innovation, faster progress, greater abundance. One of the reasons . . . that the historically fringe ideology of libertarianism is today so surprisingly popular in Silicon Valley and with tech-savvy young people more broadly . . . is that libertarianism is the only extant ideology that so substantially promises a significantly materially better future.
There are two main reasons for the Left’s ambiguous relationship to technology. One is directly related to the sin of growthphobia: The Left tends to underestimate the importance of economic growth, believing incorrectly that its social objectives are achievable with slow or even no growth. That leads naturally to an underestimation of the importance of technological change, since one of its chief attributes is promoting growth.
The left also has a labor boner where the idea of using tech to do away with work forces a complete rethink of their political ideology, as they see their labor power as essential to curb the power of the capitalists, and that if fewer people worked, then we wouldnt be able to push for more equitable distribution of goods. This isnt as big of a problem for me because 1) I recognize the limits of my anti work aspirations and would support rationing work available along the lines of "full employment" among voluntary participants and 2), i largely support using the state to redistribute stuff, rather than union power.
Second, and worse, many on the Left tend to regard technological change with dread rather than hope. They see technology as a force facilitating inequality rather than growth, destroying jobs rather than leading to skilled-job creation, turning consumers into corporate pawns rather than information-savvy citizens, and destroying the planet in the process. We are far, far away from the Left’s traditional attitude, which welcomed technological change as the handmaiden of abundance and increased leisure, or, for that matter, from the liberal optimism that permeated the culture of the 1950s and ‘60s with tantalizing visions of flying cars and obedient robots.
The Left’s technopessimism places yet another obstacle between its vital core message and ordinary voters. Voters know rapid technological change is a central and inevitable part of their world and they greatly enjoy many of the benefits that technological advances produce. Again, what they want is more and better, not a lot of tut-tutting about the dark side of progress and gloom about the future. To disparage technology in today’s world simply robs voters of hope. That is not a position the Left can afford to adopt.
Whose Left?
Not coincidentally, these deadly sins all emerge from a highly educated, intellectually influential part of what economist Thomas Piketty has termed “the Brahmin Left.” These ideas are what these individuals believe, but not what most voters believe, hence the difficulties of forging a mass, durable Left.
Regardless, there is a disconnect between the brahmin left and the populist left, but this article has shown me that both strains of the left have issues. The brahmin left is actually very out of touch, and obsessed on performative politics and not solving problems. But they are pro growth and pro tech. But they're just basically moderate right wingers who only pass as left because of how far the actual right has gotten.
But yes, the more populist left has issues of its own, committing several of the sins above. Heck, most of this article is directed more at the far left than the brahmin left. Still, both have issues.
The solution is obvious: advocate for what most voters want and believe; don’t advocate for what they don’t want or believe. The overwhelming majority of voters oppose discrimination and support universal values of equal opportunity and fair treatment for all. The overwhelming majority of voters believe inequality is too high and that the wealthy have too much power and fail to promote the common good. The overwhelming majority of voters believe a clean energy transition is necessary and want it pursued effectively. The overwhelming majority of voters oppose the way growth has been distributed but want higher living standards and technological progress.
A Left that promotes universal values, a better model of capitalism, practical problem-solving on climate change, and an economy that delivers abundance for all has a great opportunity. But first the Left has to decide if it wants to be popular or Brahmin, only one of which is likely to succeed in a democracy. That is a debate not currently happening.
Still, im not fully "pro growth". Im not "anti growth" either, but I do think growth needs to be balanced with environmental priorities, and with making work more voluntary and achieving better work life balance.
