Author: Sam Gindin

The postwar decades continue to be presented as an inspiration for progressives today. The essay challenges how progressive it really was and notes that it was precisely in the Golden Age that the American Empire emerged as the most ambitious neoliberal project in history. This leads to a discussion of how this impacted the Golden Age domestically, and how this globalized neoliberalism both matched and differed from the neoliberalism we speak of today. The conclusion stresses the polarization of options in the present moment and the implications for the politics of the present.

This is not a matter of rejecting electoral politics—winning a majority of citizens to radical change through democratic means is fundamental. But coming to governance without a solid social base while the powerful centrifugal influences of capitalism remain in place leads to the disappointments we and others abroad have repeatedly experienced. Without the ability to monitor, check, support, and pressure governments to stay the course, government promises fade. Elections alone become largely irrelevant. Participation in elections may have a tactical role in reaching people, but building the base for social transformation is what is so overwhelmingly central today. Only that will make elections truly relevant down the road.