Harry R. Targ
The idea of an “ideology” is a complicated one. For
some, ideologies are mere rationalizations of interests and preferences. For
others, ideologies are bundles of false, maybe dumb ideas. They can come from
religion, popular culture, political parties, or simple principles that are
used to explain the universe.
Perhaps the most useful concept of “ideology” is one
that refers to a body of interconnected ideas or a system of thought about how
the world works. These ideas often explain the meaning of life, how and why
society is organized the way it is, and also how it ought to be organized. However,
ideas do not come from the ether. They come from class position and concrete
interests, background, social status, and education by family, schools, peer
groups, and popular culture.
What is important about ideologies goes beyond which
ones are more accurate than others but how ideological clashes might help
explain political conflict. As the long and painful presidential election
season unfolds, it is useful to analyze the three competing ideologies that
dominate current debate. Each has its adherents. Each represents interests.
Each explains how the world works in a different way. And each has a different
vision of a better future.
The dominant ideology in the United States today,
indeed much of the industrial capitalist world, is “neoliberalism.” Neoliberalism
has a long history with roots in the founding of classical capitalist economic
theory. “Neo” refers to the contemporary manifestation of the classic
tradition. Neoliberalism assumes that humankind is comprised of
value-maximizing individuals existing in a competitive, sometimes alien social
world. Society is a constellation of competing economic actors, in our own day
mostly huge corporations and banks. The ideology claims that corporations and
banks engage in economic activity in a market place. Through competition some
grow and contribute to society and others are unable to compete. It is through
market competition of economic actors that individuals sustain themselves and
improve their material conditions.
According to neoliberalism, the fundamental
institutions and processes in society are markets that promote competition. Political
institutions are constructed to protect and enhance market competition. Political
institutions must be limited in power, neoliberalism suggests, such that they
do not interfere with the workings of the market. Since the 1970s, proponents
of neoliberal ideology have advocated downsizing government (except the
military), privatizing public institutions, deregulating how markets work, and liberating
the citizenry from controls, constraints, and safety nets. Neoliberal policies
are usually called austerity policies.
In the end, society is comprised of atomized
individuals and corporate economic actors who pursue their own gain and out of
this pursuit, the collective good will emerge. Neoliberal ideology is shared by
mainstream Democrats and Republicans, professional economists, most of the media,
educational institutions, and popular culture.
A new ideology that has emerged from the recent
presidential debate might be called the “virtues of wealth” ideology. This
perspective suggests that individuals exist in competitive societies and
markets reign supreme. And while this is an historical inevitability and as a
practical matter a pretty good way to organize society, sometimes the
accumulation of wealth fosters greed, avarice, and stupidity. The political
system falls prey to the influence of those with large wealth who seek to buy
elections, bribe politicians, and in other ways influence the political process
by misusing their resources. The ideology about the virtues of wealth suggests
that the corruption of accumulated wealth sometimes leads to the rise of
incompetence in public policy. Unless there are appropriately wise guardians,
accumulated wealth can lead to bad government. During times of extreme misuse
of power, new guardians of the public must emerge to correct the errors of
government and the economy.
The best candidates to reconstruct the state come
from those who are independently wealthy and who do not have to rely on a donor
class to win elections. They are the disinterested wealthy. And in fact they
have the freedom by virtue of their wealth to challenge economic and political
elites who rule because they secured financial support from others and gained
wealth from participating in government. The virtues of wealth ideology allow
its believers to challenge the economic ruling class and political elites in
such a way as to appeal to the majority who have no wealth or power and who
clearly recognize that they are being lied to by the ruling elite. Finally,
deeply embedded in this ideology also is a sense of how wealth proves talent
and virtue. Conversely those without wealth and privilege by definition lack
virtue. In this way, the virtue of wealth ideology is profoundly racist. During
the current two-year presidential race Donald Trump has emerged as the
preeminent expression and promoter of the ideology of the virtuous wealthy.
A third ideology, twenty-first century socialism, emphasizes
that the interconnection of global problems--from environmental devastation, to
class exploitation and growing economic inequality, to racism, sexism, and
homophobia, to authoritarianism, and internal and international violence--are
intimately connected to the development of the capitalist system. Twenty-first
century socialism sees the concentration and centralization of economic power
as the driving force in creating a world order dominated by finance capital, a
few hundred multinational corporations, and imperial states.
The ideology of twenty-first century socialism,
while recognizing the historic rise to power of global capitalism also recognizes
that capitalism generates growing resistance and creates demands for change.
The magnitude of resistance varies from epoch to epoch, but it is clear that
the totality of what is called history is comprised of the drive to hegemony contradicted
by resistance to it. Those who resist engage in education, organization, and
agitation to create human unity.
According to this third ideology, societies are
constituted by communities and the presupposition that being human means being
part of communities of activity. The belief in community is fundamentally
opposed to the neoliberal conceptualization that the basic units of societies,
atomized individuals, can only survive by acting independently of others. The
vision of twenty-first century socialism is based on the proposition that work
should be organized cooperatively and the wealth produced by society should be
shared equitably by everyone who helps produce it. Class exploitation, racism,
sexism, and homophobia are antithetical to the core of this ideology.
The twenty-first century socialist ideology assumes
that building human solidarity, working together to create grassroots forms of
production and distribution, and struggling for the political empowerment of
the people offer the possibility for further human development. Paradoxically more
people in the United States and around the world share the ideology of
twenty-first century socialism than the other two but currently appear to be
the weakest politically of the three ideologies. How to realize the vision
embedded in this ideology is the human project of our time.
