A Dialogue About Theories of Change

by: Mike Lux

Fri Aug 15, 2008 at 15:45

There are, however, some issues that are big, complicated messes to try to make real change in. Really shrinking the power of our military-industrial complex so that there won't be a constant political pressure for more military adventurism fits in that category. So does fundamentally charging our carbon fuel based economy so that we can truly solve the climate crisis. And restructuring 1/6 of our economy, health care, is going to be incredibly tough as well.

I think we are likely going to have to wait to do much regarding the first of these, the military-industrial complex issues, because while Obama will at least start to move us out of Iraq, he probably won't look to make major change in general on national security policy. The other two issues, though, we have a shot at- Obama says he wants to make them a priority.

Given that, I want to go back to discussion that has graced the pages of OpenLeft from time to time, which is about theories of how you can create change, in this case specifically the kind of big change desperately needed regarding health care and climate change. I want to compare the big theories of change that one hears most often, and start a discussion on how the progressive community should focus its energies.

So if you aren't ready to give up the battle before we even begin, join me in this discussion. Here are the big theories of change:

1. The Obama theory, which is that a combination of inspiring the American people to take action and reaching across the aisle in a bipartisan way will get the job done.

2. The "elect enough Democrats" theory. This is the theory stated by Democratic leadership (and some others) whenever we fail on a major issue: if we just elect more Democrats we can overcome filibusters, overcome Blue Dogs, etc.

3. The "elect more AND better Democrats" theory. This is the theory popular with BlogPAC and other good progressives that the key to big change is to focus on electing more progressive Democrats.

4. The "build a broad powerful coalition" theory. This is the HCAN theory that building a big broad coalition of organizations around bottom line principles is the key to winning.

5. The "strange bedfellows" theory. This is the view, espoused by FamiliesUSA and some other groups on health care, along with Al Gore on climate change, that the key to passing big change is to assemble a strange bedfellows coalition of business and labor, consumers and providers, and relevant industry people, conservatives and moderates and liberals.

6. The more powerful progressive movement theory. This is the theory that says that we can only get big change by building a more powerful and more unified progressive movement.

7. The winning popular opinion theory. This theory ascribes to the idea that if we can just convince broad majorities of the country on our issue, they will demand change and politicians will respond.

Those are the main theories that I hear people espousing, although I would be very interested in hearing any more theories people have regarding getting big change legislation on health care, climate change, or other complicated issues passed. Some points I want to make about this list of change theories:

• First, a point that seems obvious to me, but I want to make it because I find that sometimes people argue that their pet theory is the only way to go: these strategies for change are mostly not mutually exclusive. A President Obama inspiring the masses, electing more Democrats, electing better Democrats, building a big coalition, building a stronger progressive movement- none of those things is in conflict with the other, and all of them help to one extent or the other. Even reaching out to some Republicans and doing the strange bedfellows thing don't have to be bad things, as long as Obama said no to bad ideas coming from those bedfellows that comprised the goals of the reform we are looking for, and as long as theory didn't help legitimize the bad actors like Newt Gingrich per Stoller's post regarding Gore's ad.

  All of us should focus on the strategies we most believe in, even as we debate what combination of them we need to move on to win. We should also all acknowledge there are weaknesses with each theory- big change will not happen easily.

• Second, one thing I am not clear about with the folks pushing for the strongest left position on the big issues, like the single-payer folks on health care, is their theory of change. I would be very interested in having a dialogue about it, because I love the idea of a single-payer system, but have never heard a theory I found reasonable regarding how we actually get one anytime in the next decade or two. If those of you most passionate about single-payer have some thoughts about that, I would love to hear them.

• Part of the question I raised above, and part of the broader discussion about theories of change in general, is related to timing. Keeping in mind that in the long run we really will all be dead; that I have been organizing for universal health care for 30 years and I'm a mere pup compared to some of my senior citizen friends who fought for Medicare and Medicaid in the 1960s, and saw them as the first step toward universal; that Al Gore held the first hearing on global warming in the late 1970s, and that we really don't have a whole lot of time before climate change becomes climate catastrophe: it is important that we start to actually make real progress on these issues. For those folks who lack faith in our current elected officials (quite understandably), and who tend to ascribe primarily to longer-term strategies like electing better Democrats, or fighting for single-payer, I think it's important to give those of us who are more antsy for real progress now a sense of (a) your timeline and (b) how we can get real things done now even as we are waiting for the big break through someday in the future.

My own view is that virtually all the theories I've laid out are deeply flawed on their own. Obama can't inspire enough people on his own, we won't elect enough Democrats anytime soon even in a great cycle, we can't elect enough better Democrats fast enough, our coalitions and broader movement are not strong enough- none of this works by itself. We may be coming to a moment in time when our problems are big enough and a broad majority of Americans recognize it, that all of these theories in combination will create a moment of big change. That's what happened in the 1960s and 1930s, in the turn of the century Progressive era, in the fiery cauldron of the Civil War years. We may be coming to such a moment soon, and in the meantime we progressives should be having honest conversations with each other over what strategies we can be pursuing to best take advantage of it.