New institutions.
Chris Hayes and Reihan Salam had a Bloggingheads discussion the other day about their latest articles in Time. Both wrote short essays about an “important trend”: Hayes diagnoses a collapse of authority in our meritocracy and Salam imagines how people will live as our distributive infrastructure starts collapsing. What’s interesting is that the two visions dovetail pretty well, and it’s worth checking out the Bloggingheads video to see that both writers recognize this. They think we’ll see new low-to-the-ground grassroots institutions appearing to replace our beleaguered national systems. And you know what? The most interesting places I’ve lived are towns where life is already starting to look like what Hayes and Salam describe. Also, we get a nice summary slogan for Reihanism: “Keep America Weird.”
Predictions are hard, especially about the future, William. Go with caution after those who think they see the future.Report
Oh, I have no idea what’s going to happen. I’m glad that people are making interesting guesses, though. After the series of bubbles and the financial mess, it’s hard not to worry about the system shaking itself apart, but I think we can patch up our problems for a while yet.Report
Exactly right, Freddie – but I enjoyed Reihan’s piece in the way I enjoy science fiction. And for its optimism if not for its accuracy (though, as you say, who knows?)Report
I like where they are going to. Especially Reihan. Even if it is not where it goes I think it’s where we ought to go.Report
I agree with William that we see much of what Reihan predicts already (depending where we live). What I am unclear about is whether there are particular national policy changes that Reihan wants to effect such that these alternatives become more pervasive, and perhaps a bit less voluntary than they are now for economic reasons. Or if just as pertains to these predictions, he views national economic policy as entirely neutral to the process.Report
This is why I think Chris Hayes’s piece is so important. There must be places where Reihan’s wild innovation is driven by libertarian ideology, but in the places where I’ve lived, the food co-ops, the bike centers, the crop mobs, etc., come from the left, and often have had a socialist-anarchist streak. And they go hand-in-hand with an attempt to make government more democratic. As Hayes says: “All these new institutions are inspired by a desire to democratize old, big oligarchic hierarchies and devolve power downward and outward. That’s our best hope in the decade to come. For at the end of the day, it’s the job of citizens to save élites from themselves.” I hope Chris presses Reihan on this point in their future conversations.Report
Reihan’s piece is a libertarian wet dream. The economic infrastructure collapses, but it’s all good, because the whole country lives well on new-wave technology that apparently doesn’t require a manufacturing base. Fortunately Reihan is nicer than Rand, so we all do well, not just a Galtish few.Report
That’s kind of the more direct way of getting at what I was asking above. Bingo.Report
Again, it’s not so different than many libertarian-ish science fiction futures, except that in much of that literature there is a darker side to the imagined prosperity.Report
So let me see if I understand this…. the elites of our country’s meritocracy start disastrously expensive wars, carry them out with methods that bring international shame and scorn upon us, spend way more than they promised, botch the most expensive disaster recovery operation in U.S. history, go from giant surpluses to giant deficits, AND wreck the world economy…. and the real problem is a lack of trust?
At some point, lack of trust is the only sane option.Report
Jason, “the real problem is a lack of trust” isn’t a fair summary of either piece, or of my description of them. Chris Hayes opens his piece with: “In the past decade, nearly every pillar institution in American society … has revealed itself to be corrupt, incompetent or both.” They’re both clear that people don’t trust élites because élites (planners, captains of industry, Wall Street titans, Presidents) have failed to one degree or another.Report
“Private homes will increasingly give way to cohousing communities, in which singles and nuclear families will build makeshift kinship networks in shared kitchens and common areas and on neighborhood-watch duty.”
I think it’s oddly blinkered for him to imagine such sweeping economic changes while maintaining that the traditional social arrangements will endure.Report