The Political Scientist who Predicted Trumpism
A Review of America's Forgotten Majority by Joel Rogers
I got somewhat distracted, but I wanted to write a brief reflection on a book that I regard as prophetic, America’s Forgotten Majority. The book follows a pattern of other books I have reflected on in these posts, such as The Problem of China by Bertrand Russell, that have an analysis that is so fundamentally sound, but lack the imagination to take that analysis to the natural conclusion.
It is worth quoting the conclusion where he discusses the prospects of the Reform Party, an experimental party the current President dabbled in prior to the Election of 2000. If you substitute the Reform Party for Trumpism, the political vacuum prediction following the abandonment of the working class by mainstream parties is eerie, “the forgotten majority voters… may well be attracted again by a movement that ‘tells it like it is’ and speaks directly to their interests.” Keep in mind that the two strategies that brought Trump over the top in battleground states among this demographic was a willingness to challenge political correctness and tell it like it is and, more ominously at the Republican convention, I alone am your voice.
Even more on the nose, he predicts that 21st century politics will be characterized by political insurgencies that topple the establishment, bring an end to “ho-hum partisan competition”. The natural step that Rogers failed to see, partially because low wage competition with China had not yet fully emerged on the scene, is that the political insurgency would tie its message to anti-globalization sentiment as Trump has done by insisting on trade war with China and evoking dark imagery of American carnage. He reveals that he is in fact writing the book in 2000, not 2016, “This prescription—a heavy dose of nativism and protectionism— seems to be out of step with the priorities of the forgotten majority.” Here, he proved to be wrong on how events actually played out, but the fundamental claim on priorities remains true. It is just a matter of one of the major parties capitalizing on the actual priorities of the forgotten majority.
His recommendation for the Democratic Party was rather than go Republican light and chase college educated suburbanites, the most effective political strategy is to return to the New Deal consensus that brings an end to the New Insecurity and the New Austerity. Democratic Party elites, partially because of the bubbles they operate in, had been hoodwinded into believing that the economy had fundamentally transformed into a service sector economy guided by urban professionals and that a political vision must match this new terrain where the working class is nowhere to be seen. In reality, the working class had never disappeared, but they just threw away their hard hats and forklifts for a computer and word processing software, often switching genders in the process. The new working class still has little autonomy, and the Democratic Party’s failure to see that means that most are only marginally attached to politics.
What aspiring future generations of political leaders need to do is convince these voters who have been forgotten that the Democratic Party sees their struggles and is willing to fight for them. First and foremost, this means bringing an end to the New Insecurity where health insurance is tied to employment, and therefore vulnerable to falling between the cracks after traumatic life experiences. Since nobody denies that ending the New Insecurity will be expensive, we must also retreat from a vision of politics constrained by the New Austerity, insisting that expansive fiscal policy can lift all boats by enhancing public trust. Fundamentally, convincing these voters will flip Bernie’s hopes for a political revolution on its head. The goal should not be to create a new vision of progressive politics, fundamentally altering the possibilities for policy at the national and local level. Instead, progressives must follow the example of our neoliberal adversaries who intuitively understood that an assault on organized labor in the form of deunionization would enhance the future prospects of the supply side project because the political capacity to resist would be greatly diminished.
In short, I believe that a policy-focused vision is still the great hope to reviving the egalitarian spirit of this great nation. In spite of Republican efforts to poison that spirit through the politics of xenophobia and division, I believe that is still going strong. But it will require Congressional candidates and the eventual nominee to remain firm in their stance (s) that they are out to provide security for working people so that all people can have their fair shot at the American Dream.