The discussion in this article, an opinion piece in The L.A. Times by Susan Jacoby, initially struck a chord with me (I think a ringing open G, but I don't have perfect pitch). When I read it a second time, I was somewhat less impressed, but I still think it's an important subject. It's about a growing tendency among Americans to ignore opposing points of view. The article pretty much relies on recognition to make its point, since it doesn't provide any evidence. It also comes from the mindset that everything was better in the past, and hey, isn't it a shame that it isn't so good now? Whether things were better in the past or not, I can't deny that there is a problem now. I was particularly struck by the statement that "[the] spirit of inquiry, which demands firsthand evidence and does not trivialize opposing points of view, is essential to a society's intellectual and political health." I don't see much in the media, from people in my office, or from conversations I hear around me that I would describe as the spirit of inquiry.
I find it unfortuate that Jacoby blames "[a] vast public laziness" for the shoddy reporting, the kind that at best cites the statements of opposing figures in a political argument and calls it a day, without any analysis or discussion. Of course, she's writing in a publication owned by the massive media conglomerate, the Tribune Company, so it's not surprising that she wouldn't find more fault with media entities themselves. Then again, she really does seem to believe that things were different a genearation ago. She pines for the public interest in the Watergate hearings: "I remember those weeks as a period when everyday preoccupations faded into the background and we found time, as a people, to perform our civic duty." Certainly that atmosphere of public inquiry sounds nice, and I don't ultimately doubt that more public interest could lead to a rejuvination of political discussion and better political news, but the presentation here seems to be missing the root of the problem--although I'm not sure what that is myself.
In another article, longer but better and quite worth the time, Steve Fraser writing for tomdispatch describes a different aspect of the widespread lack of interest in significant events. His focus is a second Gilded Age with our huge and growing income inequality and the cronyism seen in every cabinet department (really, every cabinet department, including Labor, HUD, and Treasury--see the first paragraph of the tomdispatcharticle) and all over Congress.
And yet, he points out, despite a similar income disparity and corrupt government, there isn't a cultural and political response anywhere near as deep or loud as there was last time around.
I find it unfortuate that Jacoby blames "[a] vast public laziness" for the shoddy reporting, the kind that at best cites the statements of opposing figures in a political argument and calls it a day, without any analysis or discussion. Of course, she's writing in a publication owned by the massive media conglomerate, the Tribune Company, so it's not surprising that she wouldn't find more fault with media entities themselves. Then again, she really does seem to believe that things were different a genearation ago. She pines for the public interest in the Watergate hearings: "I remember those weeks as a period when everyday preoccupations faded into the background and we found time, as a people, to perform our civic duty." Certainly that atmosphere of public inquiry sounds nice, and I don't ultimately doubt that more public interest could lead to a rejuvination of political discussion and better political news, but the presentation here seems to be missing the root of the problem--although I'm not sure what that is myself.
In another article, longer but better and quite worth the time, Steve Fraser writing for tomdispatch describes a different aspect of the widespread lack of interest in significant events. His focus is a second Gilded Age with our huge and growing income inequality and the cronyism seen in every cabinet department (really, every cabinet department, including Labor, HUD, and Treasury--see the first paragraph of the tomdispatcharticle) and all over Congress.
And yet, he points out, despite a similar income disparity and corrupt government, there isn't a cultural and political response anywhere near as deep or loud as there was last time around.
"Fast-forward to our second Gilded Age and the stage seems bare indeed. No great fears, no great expectations, no looming social apocalypses, no utopias or dystopias -- just a kind of flat-line sense of the end of history. Where are all the roiling insurgencies, the break-away political parties, the waves of strikes and boycotts, the infectious communal upheavals, the chronic sense of enough is enough? Where are the earnest efforts to invoke a new order which, no matter how sketchy and full of unanswered questions, now seem as minutely detailed as the blueprints for a Boeing 747 compared to 'yes we can?'"
Fraser plausibly blames the erosion of the industrial working class and the weak labor movement for the lack of fiery rhetoric, passion, and the political muscle that comes with a unified demographic. There is much more to this article, but man, reading it makes me wish I had a more significant job. How ludicrous is it that I work for a labor union, but I have no role in anything interesting like political action or even arguments with management? Instead I answer phones and process membership forms, call the payroll departments in school districts around the state when I notice that dues payments aren't totaling properly, and mostly, read blogs and news articles, or play freerice, because I don't even have much work most of the time.
Last week, I was given a bouquet on Administrative Professionals Day, and it really hit home: I'm an administrative assistant. I knew this already, but it's safe to say that the bouquet, and the statements of my office's leadership team ("we really appreciate your work, everything you do, great job guys") had the oppposite of their intended effect. What kind of Greg am I?
Fraser plausibly blames the erosion of the industrial working class and the weak labor movement for the lack of fiery rhetoric, passion, and the political muscle that comes with a unified demographic. There is much more to this article, but man, reading it makes me wish I had a more significant job. How ludicrous is it that I work for a labor union, but I have no role in anything interesting like political action or even arguments with management? Instead I answer phones and process membership forms, call the payroll departments in school districts around the state when I notice that dues payments aren't totaling properly, and mostly, read blogs and news articles, or play freerice, because I don't even have much work most of the time.
Last week, I was given a bouquet on Administrative Professionals Day, and it really hit home: I'm an administrative assistant. I knew this already, but it's safe to say that the bouquet, and the statements of my office's leadership team ("we really appreciate your work, everything you do, great job guys") had the oppposite of their intended effect. What kind of Greg am I?
3 comments:
It is important to differentiate between growing the state and attaining a more idealistic set of goals. Unions are pretty self-interested organizations, and public sector unions will increase public employment—but this is not the same thing as "enhancing social democracy." That these two are functionally the same thing is one of the core beliefs of most "progressives" one will talk to, but frankly, some of the impact that teachers unions have poses a big problem for that theory. And prison guard unions, even more so.
I certainly agree that unions are self-interested organizations, but given the difference between a unionized and non-unionized workforce, I don't have many bad things to say about them. Most of them fight for better working conditions, pay, and benefits for their members, all of which are progressive goals. Countries with higher unionized rates tend to have less pay disparity and more leisure time, both of which would be good even if they came at the price of a slow economy--and I've seen it argued that they don't have that price. Unions are also historically and logically linked with social democratic goals like democratic representation, improved public services and the expansion of human rights. The entire idea of workers banding together to represent themselves is progressive, and even if it works imperfectly, it's not a great leap to believe that if more people were allowed to do it, the second guilded age would have its decline.
I don't know anything about prison guard unions, but I know a little about the NEA. It's not clear what you're saying about them here, but I'm a little baffled by your implication that they work against social democracy in some ways. How do they do that? Or is that not what you're saying?
“given the difference between a unionized and non-unionized workforce, I don't have many bad things to say about them.”
I’m talking about the dangers of public sector unions (which, for the record, both AFL President/union pioneer George Meany and FDR were opposed to). Why? “A public sector union would just have too much power. From an economic point of view, all labor unions are engaged in trying to monopolize the supply of labor in their particular industries—in order to increase its price in the form of wages. But a public sector union would be a monopoly on top of a monopoly: Education is a government-provided service. (Indeed, public education is in on top of a third monopoly, because compulsory attendance laws mean that parents have to accept the service whether they like it or not.)” (The latter point is rendered somewhat problematic by home schooling, but home schooling only works if you have the leisure and ‘cultural capital’ to do it. The worst-off indeed have to accept the “gift” of their “public” schools.)
“Unions are also historically and logically linked with social democratic goals like democratic representation, improved public services and the expansion of human rights.”
Well, that’s quite a broad assertion, so let’s talk specifics. The italicized part is demonstrably untrue with regard to teachers unions and the quality of American education, which is mostly what I am getting at. The decline in educational standards has a whole host of factors behind it, including broad cultural trends; a lot of conservatives blame unions for far too much, and I don’t want to do that. But to understand teacher unions accurately and non-ideologically is simply to understand that they pose significant obstacles to improving education in America; to simply identify their goals with those of ‘social democracy,’ on the other hand, is to misunderstand them, and requires leaving out a lot of details that redound to a more jaundiced view.
They fight tooth and nail for state policies that make it extremely difficult to fire a bad teacher, including in some cases even teachers who have been convicted of crimes. They fight for across-the-board salary equality—for gym teachers to make the same amount of money as chemistry teachers—which helps lead to pervasive shortages of qualified teachers in certain subject areas, esp. math, science, and special education. They fight against anything that would help teachers who are smarter, or who work harder, or who achieve better results, make more money than other teachers. They fight against alternative certification programs that help people get into the teaching profession. They fight against policies that would evaluate teachers on anything like clear-cut measures of how much academic progress their students make. (In Illinois, 1 out of 930 teachers gets a negative evaluation. Can they all be doing such a good job?) One could construe these personnel and salary policies as ‘socially democratic’ because they represent a certain leveling spirit, a sort of base equality among teachers. But to the extent that these things contribute to less effective schools, they are clearly working in a deeper and more important sense against any typical notion of ‘progress’ or ‘social democracy.’ We do not have equal opportunity in this country, and some of the things teachers unions do contribute to the perpetuation of that situation.
In 1960, 5 percent of teachers came out of the top 20 percent of colleges and 16 percent of teachers came out of the bottom 20 percent. In 2000, the percentages were 1 and 36 respectively. A lot of this is essentially ‘blowback’ from genuine progress: in 1960, if you were black or female and college-educated, teaching was one of the few things you could do for a living. That’s no longer the case, and this is indisputably a good thing. But what it means is that we need to pay teachers more money overall—including paying some teachers more than others—and we need to find ways to draw talented people into the profession. Unions work against both of these. (It’s worth noting that teacher unions have generally advocated for lowering class sizes as much or more than increasing salaries—and in a world of finite funding, there is a necessary trade-off here. If there were fewer teachers, they could be paid a lot more money—but that would not expand the dues-paying membership of the union!) Institutionally speaking, they seek to preserve a union monopoly on the labor supply and a training monopoly for the (widely and rightly derided) education schools. Neither of these things, I would maintain, is inherently connected to social democracy or progressive goals, esp. when you consider the consequences to which they have contributed.
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