I find Paul Rosenberg’s efforts at intellectualism fascinating in the same way that I find car accidents fascinating. You have to slow down and look carefully to see just how all the damage was created. His post today is almost incoherent, but I particularly like his effort to define modern-day conservatives as the progeny of feudal lords and modern-day liberals as the progeny of the bourgeoisie.
The origins of modern conservatism lie in the European landed aristocracy, descended from a predatory warrior class. Although tens of millions of self-identified conservatives today are culturally, historically, and/or genetically far removed from those origins, there is nonetheless a continuity in the kinds of life activities that such a culture breeds.
Similarly, the origins of modern liberalism lie in the European urban middle class-the burghers, or bourgeoisie, who inhabited a very different life-world, with some very different kinds of activity, much of which centers around the finding of facts, and all manner of intellectual pursuits that flow from or depend on factual knowledge. This includes all manner of occupations dating back centuries, even millennia-from artisans to shopkeepers, traders, lawyers, bankers, doctors and teachers-as well as occupations that scarcely existed as such more than two to five generations ago, such as scientists, technicians, engineers, etc.
Since this is a fundamental error, we need not consider the merits of Rosenberg’s essay beyond this point. It’s not easy to precisely define the term bourgeoisie. It can mean middle class or upper middle class. It can mean the class of people normally called ‘small businessmen or women.’ The rise of large corporations has done damage to the coherency and usefulness of the term by rendering it as somewhat of an anachronism. In Marxist theory, the bourgeoisie were the new ruling class (replacing the aristocracy) and the owners of the means of production.
The bourgeoisie were Republicans in the revolutionary (anti-Monarchial) sense, in that they wanted equal rights, rights of representation, etc. The intellectual basis for the bourgeois ‘Republican’ revolutions in France and America was derived from the Enlightenment philosophers, but the bourgeoisie as a class were not known for their intellectual achievement. They could be considered progressive in the sense that they fought against the privileges of the L’Ancien Régime, but within the new paradigm of Republican government, they were to develop into what we know as The Right.
They owned the mills, the factories, the mines and other going concerns. They were the capitalists and they had an antipathetic relationship with labor from the beginning.
Today’s Republican Party is shrinking rapidly and becoming more heavily influenced by it’s religious wing. But the heart of the Republican Party has always been the class of people that do the hiring. From the top moguls to the common shopkeeper, those that create jobs rather than seek them have been the core of the GOP. That is why the Republican Party has always been business-friendly, anti-union, for lower regulation and less taxation on capital. The chief political challenge of the hiring class has always been their numerical inferiority, which leads them to seek allies from the job-seeking class.
It’s not hard to do the math on the rest of this. Convincing members of the job-seeking class to join you in your hiring-class agenda is not an intellectual exercise but an emotional one. Therefore, the Republican Party’s intellectual apparatus has developed in a way that eschews the rules of academia or even mainstream journalism. They are not ‘reality-based’ because their mission is not to win a debate but to win converts to a cause.
In any case, the modern conservative movement may include the progeny of the old aristocracy (for tax purposes, if nothing else) but it is mainly the party of the bourgeoisie. Contrary to Rosenberg’s contention, the bourgeoisie have never been an engine of intellectualism. As they have evolved in America, they have been the exact opposite.
I think Rosenberg is on to something. Today’s Republicans may be the economic and social descendents of the bourgeoisie, but they are the spiritual heirs of the warrior predator class aristocracy. Just look at the aristocratic pretentions of people like William Buckley, George Will or Conrad Black.
well, to the degree that the bourgeoisie replaced the aristocracy at the top of the social ladder, they came to resemble them. If you are inclined to view capitalism, as practiced over the last 200 years, as a predatory endeavor (of labor or third-world resources, etc.) then you’ll probably see the bourgeoisie in a negative light. On the other hand, if you see the triumph of the bourgeoisie as the main engine of economic growth then you are more likely to focus on their positive accomplishments.
Either way, however, the Right-Wing in this country has been forever associated with the political interests of the bourgeoisie. And I mean that in a purely neutral sense, since shopkeepers and bankers have legitimate interests just like everyone else.
What’s happened recently is that the vehicle of the bourgeoisie (the GOP) has been taken over by their add-ons (religious and cultural conservatives). The lunatics are driving the bus, so to speak. But that’s a result of the basic anti-intellectualism of the bourgeoisie. They have never been able to cobble together a majority based on class or economic interests so they are not dedicated to honest debate about those issues. They use shrewd appeals to patriotism, religiosity, and freedom and add tons and tons of fear, resentment, and anger to get the numbers they need to win elections. It’s all very cynical and it has antecedents in older, monarchial societies. But that means nothing.
Taken as a single article without context, the thesis that Republicans use much more emotional appeals works.
Taken in the broader context of cognitive science, and what pushes the button or pulls the lever in the secret voting booth, not so much.
It’s been known for a loooong time that rational appeals to voters have limited effectiveness. In the last election, I don’t think people voted for rational programs set forth by Democrats.
People voted from revenge against the people who screwed the economy, lost the war, destroyed our prestige, and they voted from Save Us! fear of being thrown out in the street with no job, no car, no medical care.
Note that there is no need for rational programs here.
When progressives and liberals understand that there will never be a majority of citizens voting rationally, they’ll win a lot more elections, and then be in a position to administer those rational programs, and then point with pride at how the fears were allayed.
Politics will always be about emotions, as most decisions are driven by emotions. If that bothers you, maybe you shouldn’t be advising politicians on voting strategy and tactics.
You’re missing my point.
The largest part of any debate is always the facts.
If you have the facts on your side, you always begin with the advantage. It doesn’t guarantee that you will win, but abandoning your advantage is ill-advised.
As a general matter, any group that seeks policies that benefit them at the expense of a larger group is starting out with a factual deficit.
This is the situation our economic elites most commonly find themselves in. It’s true that sometimes our economic elites are right that their preferred policies really will trickle-down and benefit everyone better than the policies preferred by the masses, but that’s the exception to the rule.
Because economic elites face a structural disadvantage in most debates, they systematically devalue factual content, honest debate, scientific evidence, etc. They win by blurring facts and overcoming them with emotional appeals. Over time, this results in a cultural phenomenon where dishonesty is not seen as an evil but as an indispensable tool. And this has a corroding effect on other basic morals.
The intellectual elite of the Right is self-consciously and unapologetically dishonest because they have no other choice.
I’d also add to this that Rosenberg is also self-consciously dishonest.
Because he is mainly concerned in waging a war of definition, he is pretty much constantly trying to move the debate by changing how people think about common definitions. It’s kind of fascinating to watch. It’s not really an appeal to emotion, it’s more an effort to reprogram the collective mind from his laptop.
But isn’t that what the Republicans did? Like trying to make “liberal” a dirty word. Or Ray-gun’s use of “Cadillac driving welfare queens”? or calling Obama a Marxist … Socialist(or whatever)?
I followed your point. I agree that liberal views are more rational, and that if votes in the booth were based on rational evaluation of the facts, liberals would always win.
At the same time, you’re ignoring what I say, and just repeating rationalist arguments, which don’t work.
Your facts are good, you debate well, but the facts don’t stick long enough to affect voting, and in this here democracy, voting determines policy. The old pols know it, which is why they annoy liberal purists so much. They mean to rule liberally, but they have to talk emotionally, which MAY OR MAY NOT coincide with a rationalist message.
I’m not advocating lying. I’m saying that empathy is as important a characteristic of the politician as reason, not sufficient, but necessary.
Rosenberg = Ineffectual Frank Luntz
you’re onto something.
Buckley renounced these views in the 1960’s, but here is what he was saying in the 1950’s.
Forget about the issue of segregation and advanced races. Look at the same statement from the point of view of the employer vs. the employee. A class of people that are definitionally in a permanent minority develops certain undemocratic tendencies. It’s this authoritarian streak that Rosenberg is identifying. But they also tend to prevail because of their money and power even within a democratic system by developing anti-intellectual stratagems. In other words, there is not a distinction between the manor lords and the bourgeoisie in terms of their authoritarianism, their anti-Democratic tendencies, or their anti-intellectualism.
In the very beginning, during the Republican revolutions, there was a distinction to the degree that the bourgeoisie was fighting the old guard and establishing representative government (for the bourgeoisie). But in the context of Republican government, which is 230 years old now, the bourgeoisie is not representative of the liberal/progressive tradition. And that’s why the basic thrust of his essay falls apart at the beginning.
Rosenberg is an embarrassment.
Well I’d say that both groups do have an us v. them mentality, the business owners v. their works for example, and Christianists v. the not-Christianists and a lot of these times the groups over-lap.
The interesting thing to me was the SDO list. Here’s my answers.
1. Some groups of people are simply inferior to other groups.
I think this is accurate but can be changed.
2. In getting what you want, it is sometimes necessary to use force against other groups.
Yes
3. It’s OK if some groups have more of a chance in life than others.
No
4. To get ahead in life, it is sometimes necessary to step on other groups.
5. If certain groups stayed in their place, we would have fewer problems.
Yes — note: But I still don’t think they should stay in their place.
6. It’s probably a good thing that certain groups are at the top and other groups are at the bottom.
No
7. Inferior groups should stay in their place.
Yes, but only as long as they are inferior, and it’s not good or appropriate for the superior to attempt to keep them inferior.
8. Sometimes other groups must be kept in their place.
Yes, until they lose the inferiority status.
9. It would be good if groups could be equal.
Yes
10. Group equality should be our ideal.
Yes
11. All groups should be given an equal chance in life.
Yes
12. We should do what we can to equalize conditions for different groups.
Yes
13. Increased social equality.
Yes
14. We would have fewer problems if we treated people more equally.
Yes, note I do not think this contradicts #5.
15. We should strive to make incomes as equal as possible.
Equal pay for equal work. CEO’s should be paid more than receptionists but not anything close to the huge levels they are currently paid.
16. No group should dominate in society.
I disagree. I think non-racist, science-respecting people should dominate society.
Sigh, and parts of my post are incoherent. Can I get an edit button?
By encouraging such peering among individuals, you work against your own thesis. Try running that whole comment stream with individuals instead of groups.
Balkanization, self-segregation, castes, retribalization — lots of terms for this tendency, which needs no encouragement.
Groups aren’t humans, don’t think with a real brain. You can’t make an Einstein out of two dull normals.
I don’t know what would possess anyone to read Rosenberg (at least anyone who has read one of his pieces before).
Traffic accidents are much more satisfying.
There is something fascinating about it. He’s the “left’s” answer to Jonah Goldberg: a towering pile of self-esteem built over a nearly bottomless pit of ignorance.
well, if you find Rosenberg’s nonsense amusing, have at it. Fine debunking, though personally I’ll stick to not reading his shit at all.
anyone who thinks the expression “bourgeoisie” has any use in describing modern US politics establishes himself as irrelevant.
The “activist” left is almost exclusively drawn from a certain slice of disaffected members of the professional class who, angry at the in-power members of their class, nevertheless cannot conceive that people out of their particular class/social group knowing anything more than them. What drives them mad about Obama is that, combing the Alinsky and Civil Rights movements lessons, Obama builds a coalition around economic interests and ethical principles of working class americans who do not yearn to be lectured on ideology by chuckleheads. They cannot stand to see their self-appointed role as the overthrowers of corporate kleptocracy taken by someone more qualified.
I know what you’re saying but you reach too far in indicting the ‘Activist Left’. What you meant was the ‘aspiring professor left’.
I’m using Al Giordano’s distinction between the “activist” left and the “organizer” left.
But I don’t think it’s been completely characterized.
ah, yes, I am familiar with Al’s terminology. I haven’t adopted it myself.
I gotta say, however, that Rosenberg’s intellectual stylings are particularly amusing because he is such a comprehensive ignoramous.
His latest piece is straight-Mike Gravel lunacy.