Thursday, July 09, 2020

What Theory of Change Will Win the Progressive War?

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by Thomas Neuburger

When the Social contract breaks from above, it breaks from below as well.
     —Yours truly

A "theory of change" in modern progressive parlance is the method by which one gets from A to B, from a world with employer-controlled health care, for example, to Medicare for All, a universal, government-controlled program. It's the nuts and bolts by which the goal is achieved.

One theory of change, if we keep with the Medicare for All example, may be to mobilize grassroots pressure via petitions, letters and demonstrations, then couple that with the election of so many House and Senate progressives that the bill would have to pass. Another theory of change would be to elect a strongly pro-M4A president (a Sanders, say) and let him use the hammer of the Executive Branch to pass the legislation. Or both. A third might be to elect a Medicare For All "practicalist," an Elizabeth Warren, who proposed taking the M4A path in a sequence of chunks, with phase two, the real move, occurring after the midterm congressional election.

But theories of change have to be likely, or at least convincing. For the Medicare for All example, the counter-argument would be that none of the first two methods has worked (witness the Sanders campaign, who lost to Medicare For All opponent Joe Biden), or will work (just how fast to do we have to replace those House members and senators again?). As for the practicalist, you'd have to believe that phase two would actually be likely to occur.

Collapse as a Theory of Change

I recently argued, with respect to global warming, for a theory of change that essentially surrendered the field, admitted that any "practicalist" solution was doomed to fail, and opted instead for that last hope of the desperate — massive, sudden events-driven change, the kind of chaos that, admittedly dangerous, might still open the door to previously locked-out solutions. (See "Poised on the Brink: A Tale of Hope and Change" for that argument.)

Thinking more broadly (as if climate destruction wasn't broad enough), a progressive theory of change would have to be able to head off the kind of electoral revolution that brought Donald Trump to power in 2016, or worse, the kind of extra-electoral revolution that a partial or total meltdown of the economy — with no solution in sight that wasn't pro-corporate — would cause. A real, national, in-the-streets revolt, in other words.

But not a Paris Commune–type revolt with barricades. More like a rolling mashup of George Floyd-Fergusson protests cum national rent–student debt strikes, dogged by police and FBI provocateurs, with a heavy dose of Boogaloo Boy anger and nihilism thrown in. Look again at the graphic at the top and see if you don't see a potential Boogaloo Boy in one of the shots. Those people are angry too, and we're making more of them daily.

What Does the Devil Say?

Horrible to consider such a route, chaos as a theory of change. Yet the "devil's advocate" argument that this is all we have left goes something like this.

The devil asks:

What's the argument that says what progressives are doing now to change Democratic Party leadership is working?

Today we have Pelosi and Schumer. Tomorrow we'll have, post-Pelosi, some corporate vassal running things in the House, and as president (if we're "lucky") an old pro-corporate conservative Party hack, a husk these days, whose policies will be driven by young pro-corporate conservative Party hacks eager to advance their careers "advising" him. 


To make things worse, much of his base will include anti-Trump Republicans, people who actually like him, and who see him as the Jeb! they never got, thus completing the transformation of the Democratic Party into the competent wing of the Republican Party.

On the opposition side, our high-profile progressive champion, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, just bent the knee, calling Pelosi the "mama bear" of the Party, a comment widely noticed by the already disillusioned who had high hopes for her.

Looking at that landscape, where are we winning?


I'm not sure how to answer him. I'm not sure how to say, "It's working this way; it's working because of this."

I don't want to say the situation is hopeless (though others do). I just want to find a way out that actually works. Otherwise, we're left with "hope for sudden change" — a collapse that opens doors for everyone, the best and the worst — and the absolute last choice any sane person would pick as a way to fix the world.
 

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3 Comments:

At 10:21 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Even despite the negative attacks on M4A, in pretty much every exit poll during the presidential primary the question "do you support eliminating private health insurance and replacing it with a public insurance system?" was winning by 60%. This was before COVID-19 really hit. I don't think Sanders lost because of this issue, I think he lost, because corporate media companies and party big-wigs successfully framed the argument as "who is the best candidate to beat Trump?" and elevated Biden by insulating him from any real scrutiny (the Sanders campaign provided a big assist as well by not focusing more on contrasting with Biden -- of course hindsight is what it is).

I'm assuming the Dems pretty much sweep the table in 2020, but I think there's a decent chance in 2022 that instead of a Tea Party 2010 redux, what we may see is a lot more pressure by Dem voters in 2022 primaries.

The big question looming over all of this is the fact that voters don't know what they don't know, and it's very hard to educate people on the issues, when there's a whole industry with vast resources built around lying to people for the benefit of Big Pharma, Hospitals, insurers, etc. There's a second level of support in the form of legalized bribes for politicians who are willing to say "no" to a universal, non-profit driven, health care system. The "system collapse" theory of change is basically in keeping with the old "accelerationist" arguments. It's inherently pretty passive. My view is that it may require a near system collapse to get these things through, but it won't happen without significant organization and education beforehand. Gotta say though that in the near-term my view of the entire situation -- globally and domestically -- is very bleak. I have zero confidence in Biden or the Dem party leadership. The GOP is absolute garbage as well, top to bottom. We've just had trillions of dollars transferred via tax cuts, and COVID-19 stimulus to the rich, which is only going to make change from below harder in the near-term. Sanders theory I think was the correct one if you assume that there is a route through the electoral process. The issue is that it takes a lot of time, and resources, to organize and educate people, and we frankly may be out of time at this point (not just in terms of M4A, but in terms of climate change). Additionally, there are dozens of veto points within the existing political order that are designed to preserve power in the hands of the rich and to insulate the super-wealthy from their failures, while passing the costs and burdens onto the poor. For people with resources, I can definitely see the temptation to just find an exit point and get out of this godforsaken country and declining empire. On the other hand, with something like climate change there may not be anywhere to run to.

 
At 11:30 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Based on their actions, total collapse is the goal of the ghouls whose public face is Trump. So much easier to impose a global dictatorship that way.

 
At 4:53 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Thomas is seeing reality. But is still searching for a magical solution.

"much of (biden's or some biden clone acceptable to the money that owns the democraps) base will include anti-Trump Republicans, people who actually like him, and who see him as the Jeb! they never got, thus completing the transformation of the Democratic Party into the competent wing of the Republican Party."

Actually, that already happened. it was obamanation and the corporations and billionaires, especially wall street, had to change their shorts frequently so pleased were they at being served so well by him and his party.

Then they tried to get the real jeb, but the Nazi party had already changed into the ... Nazi party... and they got trump instead. So next they tried for $hillbillary and then biden... ratfucking/suppressing Bernie twice. Luckily for them, Bernie is a true party hack deep down.

So now we have the democraps, who are equivalent to the proto-Nazi party of W and cheney, absent some of the racism but still possessing a giant yellow streak. similar but ... worse.

And now we also have a purely Nazi party, supported by true Nazis pretty much solely.

And the former is so bad they cannot cajole even half of those who refuse to vote for Nazis... and Nazis who will always have their number remain constant.

each election will be whichever party has proved to be shit... most recently... losing to the other one. And it'll be cyclical.

step on rake, come to... repeat.

That leaves the only theory left that has not already been disproved: "...a theory of change that essentially surrendered the field, admitted that any "practicalist" solution was doomed to fail, and opted instead for that last hope of the desperate — massive, sudden events-driven change (collapse)"

so... there's that.

 

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