Surely the ethno-sectarian and cultural roots of American progressivism are significant for antiquarian purposes only? These roots tell us nothing about the function the progressives played and still attempt to play.
The progressive movement was an oligarch backed enterprise that aimed to block populists like William Jennings Bryan or, ev…
Surely the ethno-sectarian and cultural roots of American progressivism are significant for antiquarian purposes only? These roots tell us nothing about the function the progressives played and still attempt to play.
The progressive movement was an oligarch backed enterprise that aimed to block populists like William Jennings Bryan or, even worse, European-grade radicals. Progressives by definition work for the system, not against it. Unlike the Left they do not wish to empower the working class. Unlike the Right they do not seek to retain traditions for their own sake.
The original progressives recruited heavily from the ranks of Yankees whose parents and grandparents had won the Civil War and they used rhetoric and ideas drawn from American Protestantism. Later on assimilated Jews joined the movement and wrote themselves into the narrative with a sentimentalized and self-serving take on Jewish tradition that was (and still is) contested by traditional, observant, Jews.
Today's progressives do not face a threat like the populism of Bryan or radicals like the Wobblies. They rule a population that has been politically demobilised for generations and which lacks political agency at any level. The immediate threat they face is the routine corruption and incompetence of the leadership class and the subsequent loss of legitimacy. Progressive politics developed in the era of mass politics and are now archaic. Progressives cannot offer charismatic leadership nor can they offer the wider society meaning or purpose of any kind. At best progressives can play games by importing clients en masse to plague the masses or they can rely upon BioLeninist constituencies like the LGBQTI.
Surely the ethno-sectarian and cultural roots of American progressivism are significant for antiquarian purposes only? These roots tell us nothing about the function the progressives played and still attempt to play.
The progressive movement was an oligarch backed enterprise that aimed to block populists like William Jennings Bryan or, even worse, European-grade radicals. Progressives by definition work for the system, not against it. Unlike the Left they do not wish to empower the working class. Unlike the Right they do not seek to retain traditions for their own sake.
The original progressives recruited heavily from the ranks of Yankees whose parents and grandparents had won the Civil War and they used rhetoric and ideas drawn from American Protestantism. Later on assimilated Jews joined the movement and wrote themselves into the narrative with a sentimentalized and self-serving take on Jewish tradition that was (and still is) contested by traditional, observant, Jews.
Today's progressives do not face a threat like the populism of Bryan or radicals like the Wobblies. They rule a population that has been politically demobilised for generations and which lacks political agency at any level. The immediate threat they face is the routine corruption and incompetence of the leadership class and the subsequent loss of legitimacy. Progressive politics developed in the era of mass politics and are now archaic. Progressives cannot offer charismatic leadership nor can they offer the wider society meaning or purpose of any kind. At best progressives can play games by importing clients en masse to plague the masses or they can rely upon BioLeninist constituencies like the LGBQTI.