The Democrats: Technocrats Rule

Political/Essays

The Democrats: Technocrats Rule
By Wade Lee Hudson

The Democratic Presidential candidates agree. What matters most is Congress and the President; ordinary people merely vote and get others to vote. The government is primary; the people are secondary. The focus is on public policy: How can the government fix a problem? 

At their debates, the Democratic candidates have contrasted their technocratic solutions. Their fine-point distinctions bore most Americans. 

What’s missing is a positive, inspiring vision for the nation as a whole. What kind of community do we seek? What kind of people do we want to be? How do we want to treat each other?

Donald Trump has exposed many of the worst aspects of American culture. This open wound provides an opportunity to highlight, by way of contrast, the best aspects of American culture. Doing so can deepen America’s affirmation of these values. 

The Democratic candidates for President could help with this project. They could encourage Americans to honor everyone’s essential equality, treat each other with respect, and maximize partnerships. In short, they could promote democratic equality throughout society. After all, “equality” is supposedly a bedrock Democratic Party value. But Democrats hardly ever use the word.

After the September 2019 debate, I posted “Elizabeth Anderson: Democratic Equality” a review of “What is the Point of Equality?” by Elizabeth Anderson — who was dubbed “The Philosopher Redefining Equality” by The New Yorker in its lengthy profile of her. In my essay, I wrote:

Anderson wants to end oppression by creating communities “in which people stand in relations of equality” to one another. Her thinking is rooted in numerous grassroots egalitarian movements, such as the civil rights, womens’, and disability rights movements.

Unfortunately, however, most grassroots political movements today don’t clearly reflect those social values. Rather, they focus on material reality. And, as indicated by what they said at the September 2019 debate, neither have the Democratic candidates for President absorbed her insights….

The September 2019 Democratic debate reveals that egalitarian values have not yet seeped into the higher ranks of the Democratic Party (and certainly is not seen in Trumpism). During the course of that nearly three-hour debate, none of the candidates once used the word “equality.” The only use of “equal” was in reference to pay raises for teachers. None affirmed the importance of “equal respect.” 

The same pattern is reflected in the transcript of their October debate. The only reference to equality was during a very brief discussion of income inequality.

Earlier this month, in “A Stump Speech,” I wrote, in part:

I’d love to see a Presidential candidate say, I’m running for President because I want to:

Help empower the American people.

Strengthen patriotism, maintain positive traditions, and change what needs to be changed.

Promote the general welfare as affirmed in the Preamble to the Constitution and treat every American equally as affirmed by the Declaration of Independence.

Create conditions that enable everyone to make ends meet and pursue happiness as they see fit so long as they don’t violate the rights of others.

Protect those who are weaker from being oppressed by those who are stronger. 

Encourage everyone to treat others with respect, work together to improve the world, and refrain from oppressing those who are weaker. 

An effective government is essential, but Americans must also ask what we can do with and for each other to protect freedom throughout society — freedom from and freedom to — freedom from domination and freedom to participate in society as full and equal members…. 

Lord knows, I’m no Ted Sorensen. Any candidate would need a better speechwriter than I am. But that thought experiment presents the gist of my thought, including its concluding ideas about new structures that could enhance democracy.

In “Private Authoritarianism,” I review Anderson’s book, Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives (and Why We Don’t Talk about It). In this work, she argues that the state is merely one form of government, which she defines as any institution that has “the authority to issue orders to others, backed by sanctions, in one or more domains of life.” 

These issues of democratic equality more broadly conceived are addressed in two 90-minute Ezra Klein Show podcasts: An inspiring conversation about democracy — a conversation with Danielle Allen, a political theorist and a philosopher who directs Harvard’s Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics and is the principal investigator of the Democratic Knowledge Project, and; Are bosses dictators? — a conversation with Elizabeth Anderson.

These and other developments provide me with hope, especially as so many young people are advancing horizontal values. Seeds are being sown. Some are flowering already. Maybe soon they will blossom broadly and take root.