Individualism vs Neo Progressivism

The following is a draft of the introduction on a book I am preparing on Neo-Individualism and Neo-Progressivism. It may be of some interest.

There has been a continuing tension between those who believe in the sanctity of the individual versus those who view the amorphous entity called society as the compelling form of convergence. In a governmental structure we have three elements; the individual, the society, and the state.

The individual is clearly the well defined articulation of each and every person, having certain rights and in turn responsibilities. There is no ambiguity or lack of clarity in determining who or what is an individual. Then there is the society, the social amalgam which makes up the group, oftentimes the majority, and just as oftentimes the minorities, separately or in collusion with one another. The society has fluidity in that it presents the view of the group to all others, and in a democracy or a republic it is often the majority or the ruling party.

The state then is the embodiment of the ruling society formed according to the rules then current. For example it may be the party in power and the President, or Congress, or Prime Minister. The state is the reflection of the society's ruling class. In some cases it may be the minority group which may have attained power through military control. In other cases the state may be a conflicted collection of entities as if found in the US where the element of checks and balances is at play.

We look at two groups of political thinkers, the individualists and the progressives and then we look at their current successors. In simple terms the individualists are those who cherish the individual and the individual rights even to the extent of considering them as natural rights. The second class we call the progressives, and we use that term in the context in which it was used in the late 19th century and early 20th because in many ways the progressives were a societal movement where the individual was subsumed to the group, the society.

The individualists can be viewed simply as a group who firmly believe in the sanctity of the individual, with the extreme being the individual supreme to the group, yet there being a group, and the individual being alone, anonymous if necessary, with the right to be left alone as Brandeis was wont to state in his famous paper on privacy.

In contrast the essence of the progressive movement is that it contains two elements as underpinnings. First, the group, the society as defined by this group, can determine what is the norm for all, and second can then via the power of a central government enforce its will on all. This group centered defining of standards, whether they be how property is handled, how pollution is dealt with, how health care is provided, is the cornerstone of the progressive mindset. The individualist would let the individual make the decision whereas the progressive will have the group, the society in charge, make the decision, and then have the Government enforce it.

There is a conflict of visions on the political front that is driving the economic agenda in the United States which in many ways is a confrontation of two views of the country which have been around for over two centuries. The views are those of the Individualists who were basically the Founders and their followers and the Progressives and their followers. Simply they are visions which on the one hand respect the individual and the individual's rights versus the "community" and its rights. Progressivism was a result of the change in industrial structure as well as an overall economic restructuring following the Civil War.

It was a middle class movement which in many ways paralleled the development of socialist movements which had migrated from Europe. In contrast the Individualists are those who maintain the ideas which led to the original Constitution, a view focused on individualism and the minimalist view of the Federal Government. This paper looks at these two movements, as they were at their conception and now as they seem to be competing with each other in the public market place of political thought.

Individualism

Individualism is the basic belief in the rights, dignity, and social sanctity of the individual per se. That is the individual exists and that any society is nothing more than an amalgam of individuals, that is groups a transient entities assembles for the purpose at hand and generally have little if any sustaining capabilities.

Individualism is built around the Bill of Rights, that portion of the Constitution that expressly states what the individuals rights are at a minimum, and that the Bill of Rights is an open set of individual rights built around an expansive view of the natural law.

Individualism does not deny the existence and benefits of groups or associations.

Individualism is also based upon the concept of contracts, expressed or implied, between individuals or persons through which commitments are made between or amongst individuals for specific purposes with mutual obligations and mutual benefits accruing therefrom.

Individualism is not conservative or libertarian.

Individualism believes that the individual through their efforts can obtain value and that such accrued value is by definition property which the individual can protect, use, and transfer for something of value.

Individualism believes that the purpose of the state, the government, is primarily to protect the rights of the individual in their property and to take all reasonable means as a government to defend the country against any foreign aggressors.

Individualism makes no claims upon any individual in terms of their obligations to other individuals. Such claims may be made in a democratic manner, through personal and individual choice or as a result of some form of religious belief.

Individualism does not consider the existence of any minorities and thus minority rights as compared to majority rights are non-existent. However Individualism believes in individual rights, and every individual having the same set of rights, thus the need for group, minority, protected class, gender, or any other such segmented rights are unnecessary and in fact are conflicting.

Individualism believes that the costs of externalities between individuals based upon actions taken by one party resulting in a cost to a second party can be remedied via remediation via the Coasian method of inter-party litigation, and that it is the duty of the Government to enforce those resulting claims.

Individualism believes in individual responsibility and liability for harm caused by any individual upon others. It is the purpose of the Government to remedy these claims.

Conservatives and Libertarians take these positions and modify, expand, or delimit them. Thus Individualism may find itself in the confines of many camps.

Individualism as we define it herein is not the individualism that Hofstadter applies in his diatribe against Social Darwinismii. It is not a laissez faire view of a society. In fact it is just the opposite. It assumes an equality amongst individuals and a preservation of those individual rights and a process of remediation for any diminution or infringement on those rights. The purpose of the Government in an society of Individualism is to ensure the rights of equality and to take any and all means as may be necessary to protect them on a pari passu basis.

Thus the concerns of Hofstadter would be without merit in a true sense of Individualism. There is no theory of survival of the fittest, no principles of allowing the most aggressive to prevail, and in fact aggressive that in any way delimits individual rights would be dealt with by direct Government intervention. The Government is there to protect the rights of each individual, no interfere with them and not to allow others to do so.

Individualism is not the strict equality of the theory of distributive justice. Individualism admits the differences amongst people but establishes the underpinning of the individual rights, rights that protect individuals from what could be termed unjust expropriation of their rights and property.


Progressivism

Progressivism can be viewed historically and a movement on the later 19th century driven by the excesses of business and the changes occurring in the middle class or as an ongoing movement wherein the role of Government and citizens as a society rather than individuals are what is essential to the people. As Weinstein states(iii):

"Progressives are strongly attached to the government; they tend towards state intervention. Yet, they also believe in citizen participation and grassroots action. Perhaps more than any other political classification, progressives hold onto the ideal of direct democracy. They heartily embrace the tensions between what Isaiah Berlin called negative and positive freedoms, or freedom from and freedom to, respectively. For Berlin, the freedom from hindrance, or “negative” liberty, trumps the freedom to self-actualize, but progressives disagree. Today’s progressives might argue that, while liberty is important, it is incoherent without entitlements. The state must provide social, political, economic, and cultural assistance to those who are denied access to an equal playing field. Progressives claim that one cannot have liberty without cultivating capabilities."

In many ways this is the most telling definition of Progressivism. Nugent gives a simple definition of Progressivism(iv):

"…there were many varieties of Progressivism…they held in common, however, a conviction that society should be fair to its members…that governments had to represent "the people" and to regulate "the interests"… It went without saying that there was such a thing as "society"…Progressives…shared a belief in society, a common good, and social justice, and that society could be changed into a better place."

There are several elements capsulated in the above:

1. There exists a "Society": This was a key element of Progressivism. It was not the individual, it was the society, and the problem was that the society as it was defined was frequently exclusive. It is also not clear what the difference was between society and people. Were they the same or was society a subset of those with interests.

2. Government had to Represent "the people": The Progressives are firm believers that one cannot defend one's own interest but that the role of defender rests solely on the Government. In a sense this would imply that Tort laws would eventually be unnecessary because there would be a Government regulation for everything and a Government agency for everything.

3. Common Good: Progressives believed in the existence of a common good to be sought after by the society for all people. It denies the existence of the individual and the individual good, especially if such a good contradicts what those who have defined the common good have determined.

4. Social Justice: Social justice is the concept of applying justice, in its broadest possible meaning, including the establishment of a level field in socio-economic areas, rather than individual justice. It is justice across a Progressive society not the justice one seeks as an individual in court. It is a justice mandated by Government as a matter of course, not a justice as a result of a remedy. It was part of the Progressive plan supported by Father Ryan and others with the publication of Ryan's book, Distributive Justice. Whereas Social Justice is justice in some manner across society, distributive justice is the same amorphous principle applied across the purely economic realm, namely the assurance of what could be called the equitable distribution of wealth. Ryan focused on the issue of a minimum wage.

We may further clarify Progressivism. Quoting from John Dewey we have(v):

"Liberty in the concrete signifies release from the impact of particular oppressive forces; emancipation from something once taken as a normal part of human life but now experienced as bondage. At one time, liberty signified liberation from chattel slavery; at another time, release of a class from serfdom. During the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries it meant liberation from despotic dynastic rule. A century later it meant release of industrialists from inherited legal customs that hampered the rise of new forces of production. Today it signifies liberation from material insecurity and from the coercions and repressions that prevent multitudes from the participation in the vast cultural resources that are at hand ."

In further clarification, the Center for American Progress ("CAP") states(vi):

"Progressives argued that rigid adherence to past versions of limited government had to be discarded in order to promote genuine liberty and opportunity for people at a time of concentrated economic power. Progressives challenged excessive individualism in social thought and politics, promoted an alternative to laissez-faire economics, and replaced constitutional formalism with a more responsive legal order that expanded American
democracy and superseded the economic status quo with a stronger national framework of regulations and social reforms."

The replacement of "constitutional formalism" is the destruction of individual rights. The Progressives assume that there is a benevolent Government which looks out for the citizens and that the citizens belong in some way to this Governmental society. However is you were to believe differently, if you were to believe in the Constitution, if you were to believe in individual rights, then you would be victimized by those who believe differently.

The CAP further states:

"Progressives sought above all to give real meaning to the promise of the Preamble of the U.S. Constitution—“We the people” working together to build a more perfect union, promote the general welfare, and expand prosperity to all citizens. Drawing on the American nationalist tradition of Alexander Hamilton and Abraham Lincoln, progressives posited that stronger government action was necessary to advance the common good, regulate business interests, promote national economic growth, protect workers and families displaced by modern capitalism, and promote true economic and social opportunity for all people."

To the Progressive, it is the Government which by regulating business will create the common good. But business is in many ways the individual, the entrepreneur who takes risk, creates value, hires people, and creates wealth.

The Progressives reject the Constitution, and they view it at best as a platform upon which to build their world view. As Herbert Croly is quoted in CAP(vii):

Herbert Croly denounced the static, conservative interpretation of the Constitution in Progressive Democracy as retrograde and insufficient for the modern age: “The particular expression of the conservative spirit to which progressivism finds itself opposed is essentially, and, as it seems, necessarily doctrinaire and dogmatic. It is based upon an unqualified affirmation of the necessity of the traditional constitutional system to the political salvation of American democracy.”

The denouncement of the Constitution is an arrogant expression that these "select" people have been granted a vision of what is right and proper. The fundamental flow of the Progressive mantra is that it is the Government which then controls individuals, and the control is based upon some changing philosophy and as the Government changes so too does the philosophy.

Progressivism has morphed into neo-Progressivism. It has kept the essential elements of the Progressivism of a century ago; governmental control, society over individual, social and distributive justice, common good versus individual benefit. Yet now the drivers for this plan are not monopolies but the banks, not the slaughter houses but CO2, not the wealth trust owners but the money hungry Wall Street bankers. It is not the new immigrants in tenements but illegal aliens wandering US cities.

NOTES:

i See http://american.com/archive/2009/october/coase-vs-the-neo-progressives/ they state in this article the following summary of Coase: "Although considered heresy at the time, Coase’s article began a wholesale rethinking of the Progressive paradigm that had dominated political thought since the turn of the century. By the 1980s, Coase’s ideas had gone from radical to mainstream. Free market advocates, then in the ascendancy, embraced such Coasian principles as:

(1) The existence of a market failure or externality does not in and of itself justify government intervention; indeed, government is often the underlying cause of the problem.
(2) Government intervention is seldom either administratively efficient or politically neutral; to the contrary, it often results in what Coase called the “mal-allocation” of resources.
(3) Government control of the economy is a threat to political liberty; for example, government control of the broadcast spectrum has consistently been used to limit free speech."

ii In Hofstadter SD he sets up the straw man of social Darwinism and Darwinian individualism as the example of individualism as he defines it to be the sine qua non of all individualist principles and then proceeds to tear it down.

iii http://www.und.edu/instruct/weinstei/jweinstein%20-%20meaning%20of%20the%20term%20progressive.pdf

iv See Nugent, Progressivism, p. 5.

v John Dewey, “Liberalism and Social Action.” In Jo Ann Boydston, ed., The Later Works of John Dewey, 1925-1953, Volume 11: 1935-1937 [electronic edition] (Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 2003), p. 35-6.

vi See www.americanprogress.org

vii Croly, Progressive Democracy, p. 20.