The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics
Ratings2
Average rating4.5
15
Ratings2
Average rating4.5
In The Once and Future Liberal, Mark Lilla offers an impassioned, tough-minded, and stinging look at the failure of American liberalism over the past two generations. Although there have been Democrats in the White House, and some notable policy achievements, for nearly forty years the vision that Ronald Reagan offered - small government, lower taxes, and self-reliant individualism - has remained the country's dominant political ideology. And the Democratic Party has offered no convincing competing vision in response. Instead, as Lilla argues, American liberalism fell under the spell of identity politics, with disastrous consequences. Driven originally by a sincere desire to protect the most vulnerable Americans, the left has now unwittingly balkanized the electorate, encouraged self-absorption rather than solidarity, and invested its energies in social movements rather than in party politics. Lilla goes to show how the left's identity-focused individualism insidiously conspired with the amoral economic individiualism of the Reaganite right to shape an electorate with little sense of a shared future and near-contempt for the idea of the common good. In the contest for the American imagination, liberals have abdicated. Now they have an opportunity to reset. The left is motivated, and the Republican Party, led by an unpredictable demagogue, is in ideological disarray. To seize this opportunity, LIlla insists, liberals must concentrate their efforts on recapturing our institutions by winning elections. The time for hectoring is over. It is time to reach out and start convincing people from every walk of life and in every region of the country that liberals will stand up for them. We must appeal to - but also help to rebuild - a sense of common feeling among Americans, and a sense of duty to one another. A fiercely argued, no-nonsense book, enlivened by Lilla's acerbic wit and erudition, The Once and Future Liberal is essential reading for our momentous times. -- from dust jacket.
Reviews with the most likes.
Un livre extrêmement intéressant sur les challenges qui attendent la gauche américaine et qui peut extrêmement bien se transférer en Europe. Au moment où les anciens partis sont détruits par des nouveaux venus, ce livre pointe de façon très juste un des gros écueils de la gauche à travers sa fixation sur les politiques d'identité et la conséquence directe de ces politiques : une absence totale de vision et d'un projet commun. A force de diviser, séparer et surtout juger, toute notion de débat démocratique se perd ainsi que toute capacité à comprendre celui qui a un avis différent du nôtre. Un bel appel aussi à la construction d'une vision nouvelle et unificatrice de la citoyenneté comme pont entre nous. Bref, à mes yeux essentiel pour comprendre les échecs de la gauche, l'avènement de Trump et la victoire de Macron. Et plus sensé, construit, posé et argumenté que “angry white people” ;)
It is nice to read about the change that is happening before our eyes as it relates to how we identify politically. This book addresses quite a few key issues that make the very act of bipartisanship impossible. For a book written in 2017 its material has aged rather well. Many of the logical arguments are important to recognize that they are issues that must be resolved in order to look forward socially rather than politically. I will, however, say that the beginning of the book is a chore to read. While I understand its necessity in laying the groundwork for the upcoming argument, I feel as though it could be shorter as I got the point quite early on.
