Three recent articles in The Economist and Reason suggest that the typical Republican and the typical Democrat hate each other more and more at the same time as they are becoming more and more similar. In the first article, The Economist reports on Pew Research Center surveys revealing that Republicans and Democrats have increasingly demonized individuals of the other group (“How Democrats and Republicans See Each Other,” The Economist, August 17, 2022):
A survey of American adults conducted between June 27th and July 4th by the Pew Research Centre, a think-tank, found that 62% of Republicans have a very unfavourable view of Democrats, up from 21% in 1994. The share of Democrats with similar views of Republicans has increased from 17% to 54% during the same period. …
Americans are increasingly willing to not only express their disapproval of members of the other party, but to assign them negative personality traits. According to Pew, large majorities of Democrats and Republicans now regard those in the opposing party as closed-minded, dishonest and immoral. … Roughly half of each group says that members of the other party are less intelligent.
The second article is an impressive piece by Stephanie Slade, “Both Left and Right Are Converging on Authoritarianism” in the October 2022 issue of Reason. Slade documents how Republicans and Democrats are increasingly converging on the desirability of using the power of the state to intervene in the economy and in individual choices. Just consider that both parties have become more protectionist and more tempted by industrial policy. Or consider how both want to control free speech, the Democrats by pushing social media companies to exert private censorship, the Republicans by preventing them from doing so (Florida governor Ron DeSantis is a beautiful example of Republican attack on free speech). Slade writes:
This is what feels most broken in our politics. It’s not the ways left and right are further apart than ever; it’s the ways they’re closer together.
The third article, in the current issue of The Economist, argues that, as its title indicate, “Republicans Are Falling Out of Love With America Inc.” (issue dated August 25, 2022). A few highlights:
Mr Vance [backed by Trump to replace Ohio Senator Rob Portman] calls big technology firms “enemies of Western civilisation” and casts elite managers as part of “the regime”, with interests anathema to those of America’s heartland. …
Executives and lobbyists interviewed by The Economist, speaking on condition of anonymity, described Republicans as becoming more hostile in both tone and, increasingly, substance. …
Long-held right-of-centre orthodoxies—in favour of free trade and competition, against industrial policy—are in flux. …
[Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL)] has backed the formation of workers’ councils at companies, an alternative to unions. In March Tom Cotton of Arkansas called for Americans to “reject the ideology of globalism” by curbing immigration, banning some American investments in China and suggesting Congress should “punish offshoring to China”. Republicans in Congress have co sponsored several bills with Democrats to rein in big tech. Mr Vance … has proposed raising taxes on companies that move jobs abroad. …
These days, worries a business grandee, both parties see it as “acceptable to use state power to get private entities to conform to their viewpoints”. …
Senator Ted Cruz of Texas has blamed Larry Fink, BlackRock’s boss, for high petrol prices. …
Companies are adjusting to this new, more volatile political reality. Some are creating formal processes for reviewing the risks of speaking out on social issues that may provoke a political backlash, including from Republicans. …
So far this year corporate PACs have funnelled 54% of their campaign donations to Republicans, down from 63% in 2012.
How can the individuals of each party hate their fellow citizens of the other party more and more while the two parties are coming closer ideologically? The reason is that their ideologies are essentially two shades of political authoritarianism. Each group wants to coercively impose its preferences on individuals of the other group, to restrict the latter’s liberty. The main difference is what exactly they want to impose on others. Slade expresses the same idea:
The two camps, of course, have different substantive moral visions for the society they wish to construct. But each views a broad conception of individual liberty as a barrier to achieving that vision.
She also mentions a study that looks more encouraging:
The American Aspirations Index, a study released last year that used survey research to rank Americans’ priorities for the future of the country, tested 55 “national aspirations.” … For all the sense that Americans are further apart than ever, guaranteeing that “people have individual rights” emerged as the No. 1 answer for every demographic group, regardless of age, ethnicity, urbanity, gender, and education level.
Is this optimism justified? Casual observation suggests that when Americans are asked precise questions, instead of being polled on general statements of principle, political authoritarianism shows not far below the surface (although not as much as in some other countries). An Ipsos poll of four years ago asked Americans if “the president should have the authority to close news outlets engaged in bad behavior.” Although a bare majority of 53% of the total sample disagreed, fully 26% agreed—43% among Republicans agree and 12% among Democrats.
Moreover, The Economist shows, perhaps unwittingly, how the Republicans, to start with, were not, or not much, in favor or free markets, where consumers are sovereign and producers, if they want to make money, compete to sell them what they want. What the typical Republican favored were rather corporate interests, which just happened to support the free market when they were not too much protected against domestic or foreign competition. The Economist writes:
In the words of an executive at a big financial firm, “We expect Democrats to hate us.” What is new is disdain from those on the right. There used to be a time, one lobbyist recalls with nostalgia, when “you would walk into a Republican office with a company and the question would be, ‘How can I help you?’”
In sharp contrast to the “road to serfdom” on which both the Republican and Democratic tribes are pushing the country, the (classical) liberal vision and (most of) the libertarian beliefs want each individual to be free to think and live as he wants, within the confines of minimal, general, and impersonal laws that apply equally to everybody (including the politicians and bureaucrats, of course).
READER COMMENTS
Craig
Aug 25 2022 at 10:08am
“Long-held right-of-centre orthodoxies—in favour of free trade and competition, against industrial policy—are in flux. …”
See St Reagan’s VERs and policy on semiconductors.
“But each views a broad conception of individual liberty as a barrier to achieving that vision.”
I’d suggest you have to actually live it. The Republican and Democratic paradigms rest on the premise of a government with relatively broad scope of authority as to the topics the government can address. True, there’s no distinction there. Part of the reason the Republicans have abandoned ‘limited government’ is because that political fight was lost in the New Deal decades ago. They can’t just continually resurrect it. Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid rest on a constitutional usurpation from the New Deal.
The distinction is one of degree. You have to actually live it. I lived it. In blue states, the preferred paradigm is one where the government will be making the majority of economic decisions. They’re not quite there yet, but that’s where they’re headed, a democratic socialist/European style state where government will spend 50%+ of GDP. In the free states, the paradigm is the individual should be making the majority of economic decisions. Its a major distinction.
If I believe in welfare for poor people and the left believes in a welfare state, there is no distinction as to the concept that the government can engage in ‘welfare’, but the distinction as to scope remains a major difference nonetheless.
“But each views a broad conception of individual liberty as a barrier to achieving that vision.”
Move to NJ and then take a trip down I95 to FL and then say that to me with a straight face because you can’t. There’s a major difference between living in NJ and paying $.56 off every dollar earned and living in FL and paying $.35 off every dollar earned.
Know what pays for my homes in FL and TN? The taxes I am NOT paying to NJ.
Pierre Lemieux
Aug 25 2022 at 10:59am
Craig: You have a point, shared by Buchanan, Hayek, and most classical liberals, when you write:
Consider, however, George W. Bush, who said two decades ago, “When somebody hurts, government has got to move.” The GOP was already far down the road to serfdom.
But I would challenge more strongly another of your (wishful?) statements, that is,
As for Democrats, that is the case only if they make economic decisions consistent with what the government wants. Trade is the paradigmatic case. DeSantis, the past-future of the Trumpist party, is a good general example of this.
perfectlyGoodInk
Aug 25 2022 at 12:04pm
Indeed, the two-party system only offers the illusion of choice. A multi-party system via Proportional Representation would provide us choices in the political market on par of the myriad choices we get in economic markets.
Pierre Lemieux
Aug 25 2022 at 3:18pm
perfectlyGoodInk: With respect, this is a tragic illusion. On the market, you decide which car (brand and model) you will drive and I decide which car I will drive. Now imagine an election where the same question would be debated: which car will Americans drive? In a plurality (first-past-the-post) system with two parties, you and I get what the car that the numerical majority of districts choose. In a proportional-representation system, you and I get the car chosen by the apparatchiks of the N parties who bargain to form a coalition (a general one or one on this specific issue: which car will everybody drive?).
vince
Aug 25 2022 at 3:26pm
Yes, we need more than two choices. Everyone seems to agree but no one does anything about it. Simpler than proportional representation is approval voting. At least one can vote for a third party without throwing a vote away.
Pierre Lemieux
Aug 25 2022 at 3:54pm
Vince: An individual vote is always “thrown away” (except in small committees). The proof: if the individual had voted differently in an ordinary election, the result would not have changed. The only individuals who can change the result of an election are those who have, in practice, substantially more than one vote: a politician or a pundit who can influence a lot of voters (or, for that matter, a foreign tyrant who runs a campaign of disinformation); or a government bureaucrat who influences the political agenda. Besides that, the only way a single individual can change the result of an election is if he successfully starts an “information cascade”: for example, he tells his cousin that Trump is an impostor, the cousin repeats it to two persons who trust him, each of the two does the same with two other persons, and so on). However, information cascades are subject to a near infinity of random events; for example, the cousin may add, perhaps as a joke, that “an impostor is what we need because Biden is even more of an impostor and has been seen with Clinton trafficking children in a pizzeria,” and the cascade starts on that foot. Moreover, zillions of people are trying to start information cascades, including professionals in political parties, marketing agencies, PR agencies, trade unions, and corporate associations.
vince
Aug 25 2022 at 4:10pm
We are using different meanings for throwing a vote away. With three candidates, 45% like Republican R most, 45% like Democrate D most, and 50% consider Third Party T an acceptable alternative. Candidate T wins. As a bonus, candidates such as T will be more willing to run. Choices are good.
Craig
Aug 25 2022 at 5:41pm
Perot got 19% of the vote and the Reform Party nationwide got exactly ZERO percent of the political power.
vince
Aug 25 2022 at 6:26pm
If just 24% of the remaining 81% of voters approved of Perot merely as an alternative, he would have been elected instead of Clinton.
vince
Aug 25 2022 at 6:28pm
Just to clarify, that’s an absolute 24%, or 30% of those selecting Bush or Clinton as first choice.
Pierre Lemieux
Aug 28 2022 at 10:11pm
Vince and Craig: You seem to be both assuming that some majority or “the people” should rule. The liberal tradition claims instead that the individual should govern himself and and that elections are only useful to choose a government to do the few things that interindividual exchange cannot do, and to maintain a general context of liberty. My Independent Review article, “The Impossibility of Populism,” presents a more detailed argument against totalitarian democracy.
Reconsider why no electoral system should decide which car “we” should drive, and none would be more efficient (in the sense of satisfying individual preferences at the lowest cost): see “Individual and Collective Choices in Cars,” Econlib, March 22, 2021. The capacity of collective choices is very limited and no electoral system is a panacea.
vince
Aug 30 2022 at 2:17pm
“You seem to be both assuming that some majority or “the people” should rule. ”
How so? I merely suggested that two parties don’t provide enough choices, our voting system entrenches a two party system, and approval voting is a good way out of the debacle.
BS
Aug 25 2022 at 12:14pm
“Republicans and Democrats are increasingly converging on the desirability of using the power of the state to intervene in the economy and in individual choices.”
If one party does something that works, the other party should be expected to eventually do the same. Every norm violation has to have a first mover, and that should be easy to measure.
TMC
Aug 25 2022 at 12:19pm
While I can agree with much of what you have written, I think the criticism of DeSantis is a bit off the mark. Megan McArdle pointed out a few days ago that the wording and logic of DeSantis’ anti woke law is the same of all civil rights laws. I find it hard to believe that restricting a company from restricting its employees’ (not related to work) rights is authoritarian.
Pierre Lemieux
Aug 25 2022 at 3:28pm
TMC: One can find classical liberal theorists who argue that large organizations can legitimately be forbidden from discriminating against persons. You can find such an argument in Hayek’s Law, Legislation, and Liberty. I haven’t read McArdle on that, but I don’t know of any classical liberal theorist (or any defensible argument) for allowing the state to ban or mandate some sorts of speech on the premises of private companies. You may want to look at the instructive “Whole Foods” case: see my Regulation article, “Whole Foods in the Brave New World.”
David Seltzer
Aug 25 2022 at 6:41pm
Pierre: Years ago, in Georgia, a bar owner posted a despicable racial comment about then President-Elect Barack Obama. City officials demanded he take the sign down, but in the end he prevailed as he cited his F.A protections. The community found it so repugnant, many boycotted his establishment. His revenue declined. The sign came down soon after. It seems markets are better at resolving discrimination issues than freedom restricting government mandates.
Mactoul
Aug 26 2022 at 5:23am
Pierre,
Are you in favor of freedom of association?
Would you accept the classical liberal usage of freedom of association?
Would you accept that a business could exist that denies service to particular race or religion?
Pierre Lemieux
Aug 28 2022 at 10:44pm
Mactool: Many arguments exist in favor of the freedom of the individual, and thus associations of individuals, to discriminate. Fortunately, market competition prevents the worse effects of private discrimination. More arguments in my posts “Markets Against the Mob’s Purpose“, February 15, 2020; and “Jim Crow: More Racist than the Railroads,” December 18, 2020.
Richard W Fulmer
Aug 25 2022 at 5:20pm
With the advent of the Internet, journalism has devolved into an outrage machine that stokes fear, anger, and hatred to attract clicks and generate revenue. Is this an example of market failure in which individual journalists’ incentives hurt everyone else? Is there a free market solution?
Maniel
Aug 27 2022 at 3:02pm
Mr. Fulmer,
I like your question regarding market solutions. In consulting this blog and reading your question, I am consuming information disseminated on the Internet. In writing, this response, I am providing additional information to the Internet. As a consumer, I was looking for new information that would enhance my ability to defend my economic and political beliefs; as a provider, I am attempting to make clear my thoughts on the matter, first to myself and then to any reader.
Why this blog? The Libertarian philosophy – partly characterized by free markets and individual liberty which make sense to me – are typically on display here.
Why your post? It challenges me to consider the market of ideas and whether or not it requires a “free market solution” to address a possible “market failure.”
What is my response? As a consumer, I am investing time – I find your question thought-provoking and therefore I consider my time well spent. My answer to your question reflects what I value. This blog has survived because contributors offer posts that interest me and that, in my judgment, are normally fact-based. So, I believe that, at the moment at least, the free market of ideas is already at work for me on the Internet.
Pierre Lemieux
Aug 28 2022 at 10:54pm
Richard: The market is not perfect. In this sense, we will always find “market failures.” But government failures are much worse. In a related post that touches on this topic by analyzing the social consequences of Alex Jones and his ilk, I wrote:
Just think what it would be if Alex Jones or somebody similar had the power to decide who tells the truth or what are the most reliable newspapers.
Richard W Fulmer
Aug 29 2022 at 9:56am
I agree that government “cures” are, more often than not, worse than the disease. But market failures provide incentives for market solutions or, failing that, for voluntary agreements by those involved to come to a modus vivendi.
Comments are closed.