My friend Tracy Sefl makes a compelling argument in the Wall Street Journal that Rahm Emmanuel’s victory in the Chicago mayoral run-off says little about the prospects of the “progressive” forces within the Democratic Party. I’m not so sure.

Sefl argued essentially two things: First, that voters in Chicago didn’t really see it as a choice between the “Wall Street wing” of the Democratic Party (read: the Clintons) and the “Democratic wing of the Democratic Party” (read: Elizabeth Warren). “The mayoral runoff election wasn’t about the future of liberalism in America, as many had speculated. Rather, this vote was about getting things done (a Midwestern ethos), on a huge scale, and at a time of persistent problems,” she wrote. Second, she cited Emmanuel’s record, despite the general view of him as the kind of Democrat who has mortgaged the party’s soul to moneyed interests, on a wide range of liberal accomplishments, such as universal full-day kindergarten, community college scholarships, the minimum wage and immigrant rights. Sefl argued that Emanuel “may serve as a case study of fighting for progressive public policy while remaining conversant with and responsive to the entities and institutions at the heart of economic growth.”

These two arguments are actually inter-related. What I’ve heard from Chicagoans is that the voters did in fact recognize this election as a choice between two very different visions of what it means to be liberal these days. One is precisely the “case study” that Tracy frames – seeing economic growth, and the economically powerful, as important elements of achieving social progress. The other views such an approach as apostasy, a dangerous compromise of principles for short-term, and largely illusory, gains.



Chicago voters chose the “centrist” Democratic road over the “progressive” cause not because Chicagoans are any less “liberal” than Democrats elsewhere, but because the progressive alternative came off in this election as not ready to govern. You can blame that on the particular candidate, or the fact that the side with far more money (because they’re the tools of, in Sefl’s formulation, “[insert evil-sounding entity here]”) can always frame the debate to make the lefty alternative sound simultaneously scary and incompetent. But the fact remains that voters even in heavily Democratic Chicago had serious questions about the progressive movement’s ability to deliver what government is supposed to deliver. And that’s a serious problem for folks who see themselves as the last defenders of activist government.

That raises the questions whether opponents of 21st century capitalism can ever come across as competent – and, in fact, whether they are. Does competent governance essentially require, in Sefl’s phrase, “remaining conversant with and responsive to the entities and institutions at the heart of economic growth” (or, as progressives would put it, selling out the people to the powerful)? Conventional wisdom today would say that any responsible governing platform, no matter how leftist, must accommodate itself to the need to create jobs and wealth – as did, say, former Brazilian president Jose Inacio Lula de Silva – both as a political reality and as part of a more mature recognition of how best to help the disadvantaged.

I think it’s possible, however, to conceive a sophisticated and realistic governing strategy that rejects prevailing power structures and economics to pursue a more radical restructuring. Today’s left, however, just hasn’t done that. And until it does, it cannot expect to be taken seriously by the electorate, no matter who the nominee.

Current progressivism hearkens back to the liberalism of the 1960s. It finds its resonance in concern – in fact, anger – over growing inequality, and its response in the call for renewed, large-scale government action to redress it. That’s just fine for inspiration, but it’s lacking in insight in two ways. Both the economy and the role of government have changed markedly, and irrevocably, since the 1960s. Any real progressivism needs to grapple with both those sets of changes. Otherwise, there’s nothing “progressive” about it at all. It’s just reactionary.



First, the economic reality: Technological advances in the last 50 years have collapsed space and time as economic factors. That means both that billions of workers in countries across the globe can compete with Americans for all sorts of jobs – from manufacturing ours cars to reading our X-rays – and that competition happens instantaneously. Your product or your skill-set can become obsolete overnight rather than over a period of decades. These factors lead directly to much of the growing inequality we see today. Only the very best succeed in this environment, and there is very little left over for the millions who finish second, or worse. As in prior technological revolutions, the institutions previously worked out for mitigating risks and inequities have been marginalized and new ones have not yet emerged.

That brings us to the second reality, which is that the same technological and economic forces are redefining the role of government. The nation-state evolved in the 20th century into the provider of social insurance against the vicissitudes of life in developed economies. Its ability to continue in that role has been undermined by the greater mobility of capital – making it harder for governments to tax and regulate, and thus to redistribute – all of which has further deepened the inequality between those who succeed (and, generally, possess capital) and those who do not. This represents not an inherent flaw in capitalism, though, or a growing deceit at its core that “rigs” the game against the 99 percent – not that there aren’t such problems – but, rather, a reflection of the new material realities of the global economy. Pretending that these inequities would be solved if we could just get back to the politics and government of the 1960s does nothing to address the real problems.