@blatham,
blatham wrote:
The political value of a revolutionary narrative is evident not merely in Sanders' run but in Trump/Bannon as well (not to mention the Tea Party and Occupy movements or what's happening in Europe). Leaving aside the very complex questions as to why this is happening, ...
That's precisely your mistake, I would argue. You should study the reasons why this is happening because such an enquiry holds the key to the correct response. Frustration and doubts building up about the efficacy of incremental change, the "Washington is broke" discourse, this is not just an American phenomenon. Western democracy as we know it is increasingly seen as in crisis, in a state of paralysis. I for one believes this observation is correct.
Quote:... we can probably say with a lot of certainty that this is one hell of a dangerous horse to climb up on and Trump proves this warning as well as anything could.
The idea that incremental change is better than wholesale change has a lot of credit and a distinguished philosophical tradition behind it (eg Popper). What this traditional view of democracy boils down to is prudence. Prudence with utopic thinking in particular. We can't blame the West for being afraid of radical change after Stalin and Hitler.
Unforunately, over the years this aversion to radical change has led to paralysis in the face of new challenges: the growth of paid-for politics and science; the progressive bureaucratisation of society; the growth of economic inequalities; the slow fossilisation of labor unions and political parties; the appearance of electronic means of communication and surveillance; etc.
Our democracies has been shaped by these forces, corrupted often, strengthened sometimes. We're in new territory now: a situation where the possibilities for incremental change have been willingly paralysed.
That's why people nowadays have a greater appetite for radical change.
My sense is that we should never have taken radical change off the table. You can't always be a small-risk-small-gain player. Sometimes a society needs to take big risks. It may pay off handsomely to stray outside the beaten path once in a while.
