One reason the 2008 election is vitally important can be summed up in two words: Global warming. Another reason can also be summed up in two words: Supreme Court. I hope to write about global warming as well this weekend, but this diary is about Supreme Court.
Both, however, have the same underlying theme: while winning the 2008 is vitally important, it is necessary, but not sufficient. Indeed, neither global warming nor the Supreme Court should be the real focus of our attention, as they are but the most prominent outer manifestations of larger systemic struggles.
What is really needed is a much more sweeping and fundamental reshaping of our collective thinking--and that can only come about through a reshaping of our public institutions.
I now want to turn my attention to global warming, by way of revisitng a recent, diary from Joe Brewer, of the Rockridge Institute, Why We Are Losing the Global Warming Battle. In it, Joe argues:
Right now, things don't look very promising. It isn't just that we've reached the tipping point, as James Hansen suggests. (warning - large PDF file) It isn't just that the first-ever climate bill is about to arrive DOA on the Senate floor--maybe not such a bad thing since Lieberman-Warner is built on the wrong ideas. The real problem is in the way we think about the problem and, therefore, the solutions.
There are two problems with "the way we think"-the actual lack of a well-developed framework of ideas, and the lack of an institutional framework for propagating the ideas we do have. These are, ever and always, the two sides of what Marxist philosopher Antonio Gramsci described as a "culture war" or "war of position"-a struggle to control the institutions that shape our culture, including not just the ideas we think, but the ideas we can think. In this case, I would argue that the later-the institutional framework- is much more of a problem than the framework ideas itself is.
For example, Joe goes on to say:
Consider this sampling of Big Ideas conservatives have pushed into public discourse:
* Nature is a resource to be exploited.
* Wealth is measured simply by money.
* The economy and environment are distinct and inevitably in conflict with one another.
* Polluting is a right, so companies should be compensated for the cost of clean-up.
* Markets are natural and naturally good.
* Government is distinct from markets and intrudes upon them.
These ideas are at the heart of the climate debate.
It is not hard to think of ideas counter to those. What is hard is to envision powerful organizations engaged in systematically refuting them with a vigour equal to that of conservatives pushing them.
This paper was commissioned by the Frameworks Institute, as part of its Global Interdependence Initiative (GII). Together with another paper written for this initiative, by George Lakoff, it provides a detailed perspective on what Chris called "the cultural gap between wonks and hacks, between insiders and outsiders, and between professionals and the grassroots."
Aubrun and Grady begin by situating their paper within the project it is part of:
If a chief goal of the Global Interdependence Initiative is to move American public opinion in the direction of increased support for cooperative global engagement, then it is essential to take into account both public understandings and expert models of the issues. As this report will show, there are striking differences between the two.
Communications strategies aimed at the public must recognize the gap between the cultural models held by average Americans and the expert models presented in the media - some of which probably correspond more closely to the default understandings among advocates for the Initiative.
It's an important project, but the purpose I'm pursuing is somewhat different, as noted above. Nonetheless, the elite/public divide is extremely salient for the concerns Chris raised, as will be seen below.
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