This article synthesizes several extant arguments that have appeared on Open Left into a new hypothesis. Despite the consternation that I, and others, have shown over Obama altering the progressive movement to become less partisan, less leftist, more compromising, and more conservative media friendly, Barack Obama is instead an excellent reflection of the current state of the progressive movement. Consider the following:
The Medium is the Movement. Over the past two weeks, I have argued that the expansion of the number of cultural producers and pluralizing of the public sphere that has been brought on by the network neutral Internet is itself the progressive movement. Rather than the progressive netroots being the movement, the progressive netroots is simply a subset of a much larger social reorganization of individual relationships with cultural institutions. That larger re-organization is the contemporary progressive movement, not the more narrowly focused progressive netroots.
Elite netroots demographics. Study after study after study has shown that progressive online political activists are relatively high income, extremely well-educated, intense media consumers, .and highly politically engaged. It is hard to characterize these demographics as anything but “elite,” although I think the notion of elites has gotten a bit of a bad rap in our political discourse lately. As John Stewart said, “not only do I want an elite president, I want someone who’s embarrassingly superior to me.”
Progressivism vs. PopulismIn an excellent essay on Sunday evening, Paul Rosenberg contrasted early twentieth century progressivism with early twentieth century populism, and connected it to Obama. For Paul, the Obama movement is more like the elite, deliberative, goo-goo progressives rather than the common, outraged populists:
(1) Obama’s primary orientation is that of a classic progressive. He seeks prolonged deliberation, and seeks to draw people into that process who are not ordinarily engaged. This is what he did as an organizer, and many people-perhaps including Obama himself-make the mistake of confusing his close contact with those he organized for somehow becoming one with them, rather than a prolonged attempt to make them more like himself. Of course, some of those he organized may have wanted to be more like him, but it is clearly not the case that most people do. Populism is a much more common orientation than progressivism.
(2) Obama’s antipathy to partisanship is strikingly parallel to the classic progressives’ antipathy to populist outrage. It is sharply at odds with the rationalist deliberative model that the classic progressive cherishes. Yet, partisan outrage may be exactly what’s called for at this point in time. It was certainly called for when Sinclair Lewis wrote The Jungle, for example. But the progressives were morally asleep at the time, and it took another two decades for the Great Depression to deliver the opening for the workers Lewis described to get a modicum of the justice they deserved.
(3) Obama’s remarks about “bitterness”-although touching on an important truth-legitimately did serve to crystalize his classic progressive attitudes that are experienced as “attempts at managerial purification [that] are paternalistic.” [From Balkin’s essay.] Paternalism, in turn is taken to mean that one’s concerns are not really taken seriously.
Yet, if the charge of paternalism was true-and I believe it was, however unintended-the second part, about concerns not being taken seriously, does not necessarily follow. Indeed, from the classic progressive’s point of view, managerial purification is necessary in order to get amorphous concerns translated into policy terms as a form of pre-processing before policy deliberation proper can begin. If one truly cares about people’s suffering, and wants to do something actually effective about it, then this is what one does, from the classic progressives’ point of view.
Of course, I am not saying that Obama is identical with the progressives of 100 years, but the parallels are strong, indeed. One thing that is significantly different is the relative numbers involved. A century ago, the middle class progressive leadership was numerically quite small compared to the working class masses they wished to educate and tame. Today’s middle class-economically imperiled though it may be-is dramatically larger, even moreso as a percentage of the electorate.
It is important to remember that while the activist component of Obama’s campaign is impressive in numbers, with over 1.5 million donors and activists, and while it has done an impressive job of increasing voter turnout in Democratic primaries, it is still, ultimately, dominated by a new “mass elite.” That is, barely more than 1% 2.5% of Kerry voters have donated to Obama, and voter turnout in most primary states is still below 50%. While the numbers of highly engaged people have vastly increased over the past decade, the highly engaged still represent a type of “upper middle class,” elite, minority of the overall population.” The ranks of that elite are swelling, but it still isn’t a mass, populist movement (yet).
Much the same can be said about the rapid expansion of cultural producers and the reorganization of the public sphere that has taken place as a result of the net-neutral Internet. While tens of millions of people have had their daily relationship with dominant cultural institutions altered by the net neutral Internet, at this stage in the development of the movement, most Americans, and certainly most people in the world, have not. Right now, it is more like the early twentieth century progressives, rather than the late nineteenth-century populists. The activist portion of the movement, while growing, is still dominated by people who fall into elite demographic categories. Those categories, partly due to the expansion of the middle class and the network-neutral Internet, just have a lot more people than they did at any point in the past.
Synthesis: Obama reflects the contemporary state of the progressive movement. The contemporary progressive movement is steadily swelling its ranks, and continues to reorganize the relationships more and more individuals with dominant cultural institutions. However, at this point in time, the movement still only impacts what can be understood as more “elite” demographics, such as the highly educated, those with higher incomes, and those already highly engaged in both media consumption and political activism. Obama’s anti-partisan message appeals to this grow not despite the implied elitism of the message, but rather because of the elitism of the message. His message reflects the more “elite” concerns of the movement, rather than changing those concerns.
Further support for this thesis can be seen in the demographic breakdown of Obama’s support, which is heavy both on non-partisan self-identifiers, on high-income voters, and on highly educated voters. This elite, anti-partisan message appeals to the growing progressive movement, which is largely de-moored from identification with dominant institutions like the Democratic Party, rather than changes the movement. It is a sort of creative class identity politics, which Obama appeals to both through his life story and his anti-partisan, pro-unity message.
Now, some will object that Howard Dean had a very different message than Obama, at least in terms of partisanship, and still received massive progressive movement support. However, an easy rebuttal is that Dean never received Obama’s level of support from the movement. Also, despite the good doctor’s emphasis on partisanship, Dean also had a profoundly anti-ideological, pro-unity, pro-hope message just like Obama.
Another objection that will be raised to this formulation is that I am characterizing both Obama and the netroots as elitists, which is exactly what Republicans will do. My first response is that well, we kind of are elites, when you look at our demographics. My second response is that 2008 is the first election year where the conservative backlash narrative against “liberal elites” and civil rights will find itself in a minority nationwide. In other words, the era of “liberal elites” as a negative is over in terms of its national political effectiveness. Consider, for example, how Obama has been hit harder with this characterization than even John Kerry or Michael Dukakis, and yet he continues to comfortably lead John McCain and cruise toward the nomination. The changing demographics of the electorate have rendered the “liberal elite” change functionally inert.
Finally, I should note that this conceptualization of Obama reflecting, rather than changing, the progressive movement, is a transitory one. As the network neutral Internet continues to alter the relationship with cultural institutions for an increasingly greater number of people, the demographics and concerns of the movement will also change. In other words, Obama is simply a step along the way, not the endpoint of the contemporary progressive movement. It is particularly important that the most unabashedly progressive part of his policy platform are his transformative telecom proposals, which will continue to foster the changes being brought on by the network-neutral Internet. As the movement continues to grow and spread, it will eventually move beyond Barack Obama, who at some point will come to reflect an outdated, past stage of the movement. Obama reflects where the movement is now, and will help grow the movement, but he is still only a step along the way. No one can say for certain what new developments and changes await the progressive movement in the future, but eventually the movement will leave Obama behind as well.
