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Gemma Mason's avatar

Hm. I like ideas as much as the next person, but there’s an aspect of this piece that niggles at me. I get that the left is usually in favour of movement towards some goal, but I’m uncomfortable with reasoning that starts from “we should be going somewhere” instead of making the case for a specific problem that needs solving. It reminds me of those activists who are always searching for their next cause, out of some psychological need instead of because they are really thinking about the issues.

I suppose you could respond that ideas are precisely what this rootless activist needs, and you’d have a point. But the first question is still whether we need to move, rather than where we need to move to. Do we need ideas on where to move, or are things mostly fine?

Lurking under this debate is the fact that, in America, the right is currently calling for more change than the left. Often, this is framed as a change *back*, but it still creates a situation in which the Democratic Party is in many ways becoming the party of conservatism in a sense. Many people will be voting Democratic, this year, out of fear about possible changes for the worse rather than hope for the better. Perhaps greater ambivalence towards ideas arises partly out of this shift, and partly out of lingering “third way” technocratic centrism. In that case, this argument may fail to persuade, since many on the “left” may fear change more than they seek it.

None of this changes my conviction that we should grapple with tricky questions and engage in free-ranging debates across ideological lines. But I find that this particular argument does not quite ring true to me. Perhaps I am more conservative than I look.

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George Scialabba's avatar

Why the left does not need new ideas:

http://georgescialabba.net/mtgs/1986/11/right-turn-the-decline-of-the/print/

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