I'm getting to really dislike the term "Progressive"

[liberalpragmatist]

I consider myself a pretty lefty guy. But I'm growing increasingly turned off by the way the term "progressive" has become an exclusionary bludgeon for self-appointed guardians of the leftist candle.

I could buy using the term "progressive" as a stand-in for "liberal," since the term liberal has become (unfortunately) toxic. But instead, "progressive" is used to keep people out. The term progressive has been defined so narrowly as to keep huge chunks of the center-left out of the definition. For people like David Sirota, anybody to the right of them -- anybody who disagrees with them -- is "not a progressive."

I'm sure that if you looked at my policy preferences, they would, for the most part, line up left of established Democratic thought on a lot of issues. Among other things, I believe we ought to end the war on drugs, decriminalize marijuana, eliminate the payroll tax and replace it with a progressive consumption tax, drastically increase government grants for secondary education, free medical education, diplomatic relations with Iran, aggressive support for a Palestinian state, re-regulation of the airline industry, high-speed rail, regulations limiting sprawl, support for public transportation, global nuclear disarmament...

At the same time, it strikes me as, frankly, Leninist, to exclude potential allies because they disagree with you on some key issues. I have no problem admitting that an awful lot of people in the Democratic Party are to the right of me but still well left of center - and if I were to define myself as a "progressive," I see no reason why they couldn't be as well.

These self-appointed progressive champions claim their goal is to grow the American left. If so, defining "progressive" in such a narrow sense seems entirely self-defeating. It not only pushes away potential allies, but concedes the power of persuasion over those you disagree with. Furthermore, it reinforces the meme that this is a "center-right" nation: if only 10% of politicians meet your stringent definitions of what is "progressive," it seems that you're basically conceding the argument.

Of course, I'm also not a big fan of politicians (including one Barack Obama) shying away from labels. Yes, yes, we know that labels "are a distraction" and don't capture the nuances or pragmatism politicians like to pride themselves on. Psssh. Labels *DO* have meaning. There's nothing wrong in acknowledging an ideological worldview and framework. Nor does adherence to a label imply that you have to agree to everything that is stereotypically associated with that label; I don't know anybody who would argue that it does, anymore than belonging to a particular religious group means you ascribe to every theological point. It isn't even true that there's a stereotypically "liberal," "conservative," or "progressive" position on every issue -- there are often enormous disagreements within all camps over exactly what policy constitutes the best means to achieve one's preferences.

But if self-righteous guardians of the left are going to use the term "progressive" as a Leninist bludgeon, then count me out. I'd rather proudly call myself a "liberal." The term has some ambiguity, since Modern American Liberalism(TM) is fairly different from 19th Century classical liberalism or European Liberalism (aka libertarian centrism). But Modern American Liberalism has a very solid grounding in American philosophical and political traditions. At its best it's a very broad, inclusive term that stresses the vision of John Stuart Mill, John Locke, and others. Far from ideological rigidity, it promotes as its ultimate aim the defense of human dignity but is relentlessly pragmatic and empirical in its approach.

That's a term I can get behind. If "progressives" wanted to make a case for that term, they'd be better off not throwing people off their boat.

***

For more on this debate between "liberal" and "progressive" see this article by Michael Lind on Slate, where he argues mid-century American liberalism is a far better fit for the goals of most of today's center and left than "progressive," which in the past has applied to radical New Leftists in the '60s and '70s, far left Stalinists in the '50s, neoliberal centrists in the '90s, and authoritarian, Imperial-Germany-loving technocrats and Social Darwinists who wanted to sterilize the poor in the late 1890s and early 20th Century.

[aquart]

1. liberal, from the Sumerian libis, from the Akkadian libbu

libis: heart, courage, anger, core, family.

[geckosfeet]

2. My personal dislikes are "flotsam" , "bailout" and "necon".

[wyldwolf]

3. Progressive vs. Liberal

Until FDR, "progressive" was actually the most common term used to describe the mainstream of American leftism. In what can be considered an early example of triangulation, FDR instead chose to call himself a "liberal," thereby poaching some of Hoover's turf while also distancing himself from the left-wing label "progressive." FDR thus changed the meaning of both terms in American political discourse, as the "progressive" label was rendered fringe left-wing, and the "liberal" label was tied to the economic policies of the New Deal instead of the laissez-faire and corporatist policies. From what I understand, Hoover was so outraged over FDR calling himself a liberal during the 1932 campaign, that Hoover challenged FDR to a debate entirely over who was the true "liberal" in the race. It is also important to note that when former Vice President Henry Wallace broke from the Democratic Party in 1948, he took up the banner of the "progressive" party. After that debacle, people did not call themselves "progressive" for some time.

The 1990's revival. After nearly fifty years in the post-Wallace wilderness, the term "progressive" saw a revival in our political discourse in the 1990's primarily from two sources. First, "third way" triangulation types such as the DLC took to the term as a means to avoid being labeled as "liberal." Second, left-wing creative class types, at first primarily in the Bay Area, took to the term in order to disassociate themselves with the exiting "liberal" political infrastructure on both ideological and identity-based grounds. It must have been unpalatable for the wildly successful, and generally cutting edge, entrepreneurs of the Bay Area to self-associate with an ideological term that appeared to be old-fashioned and failing.

The New Big-Tent Term. Entering 2007, "progressive" appears to be the new and emerging "big-tent" term for the American center-left. The term is used just as comfortably by New Dem types as it is by the Democratic Party's left-wing. Whether or not this has drained it of any significant meaning is open to debate. Whether or not it still has any significant difference from the term "liberal" is also open to debate. It certainly appears to have morphed into something of an empty vessel term that an increasingly large segment, if not the majority, of the left and center-left political activist community feels comfortable self-identifying with. That is a good thing, because it allows us a sense of unity we lacked when many would call themselves moderate and many would call themselves liberal. However, it is difficult to tell what degree of resonance the term has outside of the universe of political activists. Pollsters like to use the same question for decades, and thus are not ready to start including the term "progressive" in ideological self-identification questions anytime soon.

http://www.mydd.com/story/2007/1/2/12413/90231

and...

Chris' history lesson on the subject is basically sound if a bit incomplete. He's correct in saying that late-nineteenth century Democrats (at least up until the fusion with Populists in 1896) were "liberal" in the European sense of favoring laissez-faire economic policies; there's a good reason that ur-libertarian Ayn Rand regarded Grover Cleveland as the beau ideal of American political history. But they did not always think of themselves as such, given their espousal of states-rights and constitutional strict-construction doctrines; regular southern Democrats in particular called their party "conservative" through most of the nineteenth century.

Likewise, "progressive" was not universally used as the self-identifier of the center-left prior to the New Deal. The term was often used by business interests who thought of advanced capitalism as a historically determined trend. And many Populists, who often argued they were restoring a pre-capitalist Jeffersonian political order, certainly didn't embrace the label of "progressive," either.

Chris is spot-on in noting that "progressive" became tainted by its association with the pro-communist (or at least anti-anti-communist) Left, especially in 1948. And he's also right in acknowledging that the revival of the "progressive" self-identification occurred almost simultaneously in two very different parts of the Democratic Party in the 1990s: the anti-war, anti-corporate, anti-establishment Left, and the New Democrat movement in the center-left.

I have one quibble with Chris' suggestion that New Democrats started using the term "progressive" (most notably with the establishment of the Progressive Policy Institute in 1989) "as a means to avoid being labeled as 'liberal.'" That suggests the terminology was purely cosmetic and non-ideological. In fact, the early New Democrats argued that "liberalism" had become temperamentally reactionary, consumed with defending the dead letter of every single New Deal/Great Society program and policy, while sacrificing the spirit of innovation that made "progressives" progressive. The whole international "Third Way" phenomenon was not designed to produce a moderate middle-point between Left and Right, but instead a reformulation of the progressive mission of the center-left at a time when the Right was successfully battening on popular discontent with outworn social democratic programs. That's why many of us from the New Dem tradition heartily dislike the "centrist" or "moderate" labels, even though they are hard to escape as a short-hand for intra-party politics.

http://newdonkey.blogspot.com/2007/01/progressives-and-liberals.html

[agent007]

4. "ideology" is now a bad word too

Pragmatism (whatever that is)=good
ideology=bad

[leftofthedial]

5. So you're claiming the right to use it as a Goldwaterian bludgeon?

damned right wingers.



;-)

[UTUSN]

6. K&R #2. n/t