Yes, President Obama has disappointed the hopes of progressives that he would lead the country to transformative change. Political theorist Sheldon Wolin shows us why the blame really rests with America's political culture, in his 2008 book, Democracy, Incorporated.

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Hints from Sheldon Wolin's Democracy, Incorporated.

The mounting frustration with Barack Obama now endemic among political progressives can be succinctly expressed in a single question:   How is it possible that the transformative change we expected from him, and in which we all so ardently believed, can have been so quickly overrun by the dismal reassertion of business as usual?  

Obama's election three years ago "fired up" the world with hope and expectation.   The French looked forward to "a less arrogant American foreign policy."   The Germans saw him as "the fall of the Berlin wall times ten."   And in the U.S., then-President Bush himself observed that, in Obama, the people had chosen a president "whose journey represents a triumph of the American story."   In every corner of the globe, the potent symbolism of this black/white man with an international heritage seemed to presage new possibilities for bridging the world's divisions and bringing justice to the deprived and oppressed.

Now, less than three years later, we have learned the harsh lesson again that, as meaningful as such driving dreams may be to the human spirit, they don't easily translate to reality.   In spite of Obama's efforts, or in their absence, there is no more peace in the world than there was under Bush, and justice still takes a back seat to power.   The list of examples is long.  

The killing goes on in Iraq and Afghanistan, Guantanamo is still a going concern, and, with American acquiescence, the West Bank has now become a showcase of apartheid and the Gaza Strip a prison.   America's military budget continues to match the defense spending of all other countries combined, its foreign policy still seeks to dominate other nations, and the reach of its empire remains unbounded.   As before, hundreds of military bases in scores of countries secure American corporate interests worldwide.  

Inside our own shores, corporate greed and sway continue unchecked, and, thanks to the Supreme Court, desired outcomes in federal elections can now be bought more easily than ever before.   Income disparities have reached levels that are both absurd and obscene, even as many millions of Americans look in vain for a job and millions of others have lost their home.   As our infrastructure continues to decay and inhibit our potential for economic growth, we take no steps to mobilize the large numbers of unemployed who could be usefully put to work in its repair.   At the same time, the major efforts needed to develop renewable energy sources and effectively confront global climate change are set back by corporate concern for short-term profits and, among some in Congress, blind disregard of scientific fact and environmental reality.   Discouragingly, too, in spite of a full year of legislative work, the health care reform program was passed only with parliamentary hook and crook and unseemly compromise, and its vital extension of coverage to millions of Americans who are presently uninsured stands at risk of overturn by the courts.  

For political progressives, the reforms called for in our foreign and domestic policies seem obvious and compelling.   We need therefore to ask ourselves this question:   In light of the human and intellectual promise so many of us saw in Obama, why has he failed even to address, much less seek to reform, the country's fundamental problems?   Put another way, why has he chosen to address only peripheral problems with half-measures that are politically safe but leave untried the transformative change essential to a more peaceful world and a fairer, more caring society at home?     For instance:   Why not negotiate immediately with the Taliban in Afghanistan, offering to withdraw all American troops and to provide massive help in rebuilding the country in exchange for a laying down of arms, acceptance of the Afghan constitution, and voluntary integration into the established political order?   Similarly, why not at least try to take the profit motive out of health care insurance once and for all by pursuing first a single-payer public plan?   

A Context for Understanding.     

In my judgment, an excellent source for better understanding both the limitations and possibilities for change in American foreign and domestic policies can be found in the pages of Democracy, Incorporated (Princeton University Press, 2008), a comprehensive study of the American political order by Sheldon Wolin, a retired professor of politics at Princeton and one of the world's leading political theorists.  

While it is admittedly late to call attention to this book now, two reasons may justify doing so.   First, considering its merits, Democracy, Incorporated has been sadly under-reviewed and so far largely overlooked.   More importantly, its analysis, though perhaps more directly pertinent to the mindset and policies of the late Bush administration, sheds important light on the disappointment many progressives feel so acutely now in Barack Obama.   In explaining the limitations on change inherent in the American system, the book shows us why no modern American president, even an idealistic, intelligent and charismatic one with a party majority in both houses of Congress, can by his own powers alone initiate transformative change.   Such change, the author argues, can only originate with the people themselves.  

In the view of Sheldon Wolin, American democracy is now captive to an interdependent "copartnership" of corporation and state, in which the president "is modeled after the corporate CEO.   [He] is neither above politics nor is he a popular tribune ".   Rather his role is, in part, to protect and advance the economic and ideological interests that form the dynamic of [the corporate state]" [102].   If Wolin is right, we can understand why Barack Obama, regardless of his personal qualities or the high hopes invested in him, confronts barriers at every turn to any efforts for meaningful change.   The real hope for change, Wolin suggests, lies in the people themselves.   They must become true participants in the democratic system, understanding the changes that are needed, mobilizing to push for those changes, and demonstrating for them in ways that the political order cannot resist.  

The following paragraphs will offer an overview of Wolin's comprehensive analysis.  

The Anatomy of American Governance.

Wolin's overarching thesis is that America's national political order has evolved into what he calls an inverted totalitarianism.   Unlike the top-down dictatorships of a Stalin or a Hitler, America's form of "totalism" is rooted in an interdependent "copartnership" of corporation and state that, like any individual corporation, is hierarchically structured and headed by a strong executive (the President).   Both the corporate and state components of this amalgamated enterprise are managed by policy-makers and administrators who, in many cases, are the product of privileged backgrounds and a system of elite university training and professional connections that Wolin describes as "self-validating" and "self-perpetuating."  

Wolin identifies this managerial class as "the elites."   They are the proverbial Best and Brightest who shape the decisions and oversee the operations of America's defining institutions: among them, the federal government, business corporations, financial institutions, the mass media, the major political parties, corporate law firms, think tanks, religious organizations, and the various commercial channels of American popular culture.  

It can be inferred from Wolin's text that the elites represent two special challenges for American democracy.   The first is that, because they gain their experience and understanding of life in privileged circumstances and in conjunction with power and influence, they tend to carry out their responsibilities with little or no regard for the concerns and needs of ordinary Americans.   Instead, their focus -- sharpened by the potential for great monetary reward and/or personal prestige -- is fixed on the goals of maximizing the profits and/or influence of their organization, and, in the case of business corporations, of strengthening the power of the state to help them consolidate and expand global markets.

The second challenge presented by the elites is that, although they run pretty much the entire show of American economic and military power, they are largely insulated from popular influence.   One reason for this is the barriers imposed by what Wolin describes as "managed democracy" -- an arrangement -- to be more fully explained in the following section -- in which democracy is systematized in a way that effectively suppresses citizen participation.   Another reason the elites are insulated, in Wolin's view, is that the American public as a whole has little or no awareness of itself as a political counterforce; it appears, instead, to be either oblivious of, or apathetic toward, the distancing of government policy from its own needs and concerns.   We can guess that at least one reason for this is the common popular belief that, despite recurrent historical evidence to the contrary, the complex decision-making required in national governance is best left exclusively to those who have demonstrated their superior capacity by dint of advanced degrees from elite universities.   A major point in Wolin's book is that this perspective must be reversed.   In order to reorient government to a concern for the common good, he believes, ordinary people must organize themselves as a conscious counter-elite that makes its own voice heard.  

Workings of the Corporate/State System.

As a political order, Wolin writes, the inverted totalitarianism of the corporate/state system "works at rationalizing domestic politics so that it serves the needs of both corporate and state interests while defending and projecting those same interests into an increasingly volatile and competitive global environment" [238-39].   The system also "works indirectly" not to destroy, but to neutralize, political opposition and so keep politics "constrained within limits."  

Strictly speaking, Wolin reserves the term "inverted totalitarianism" to define the system's inward projection of power; the outward projection he dubs "Superpower."   Wolin argues that both forms of power reached a zenith in the late Bush administration, whose foreign policy reflected a 2002 document on National Security Strategy that calls for bringing "the hope of democracy, development, free markets, and free trade to every corner of the world" [85].   Starting from this document, and invoking Weapons of Mass Destruction and the War on Terrorism as its nominal justifications, the administration undertook an unnecessary and ideologically-based war in Iraq and concomitantly sought to tighten its control at home with illegal incursions on constitutional rights.  

An additional salient term in Wolin's analysis of the American political order is "managed democracy."   By it, he means a form of democracy that, while it offers voting and other individual rights, is systematized, or controlled, to effectively suppress citizen participation through a weakening of "self-government, the rule of law, egalitarianism, and thoughtful public discussion."   Components of this systemization include "the political role of corporate power, the corruption of the political and representative processes by the lobbying industry, the expansion of executive power at the expense of constitutional limitations, and the degradation of political dialogue promoted by the media "." [287].   Wolin emphasizes that these influences constitute the basics of our managed democracy, "not just excrescences upon it."   They will remain in place, he suggests, regardless of which major political party runs the White House or holds a majority in Congress.

The challenges pursued by our political parties today, Wolin says, have nothing to do with building true democracy -- i.e. with finding ways to amplify the voice of the people in public affairs.   Instead, they are about ways to harness the following dynamics into a single interdependent system: "a military that wants ever more futuristic technology and more deadly weaponry; a corporate economy that is continually searching for new markets and outlets; churches that are on the prowl for converts; news and entertainment media [that are] as eager to expand their market share as they are to pay court to the political establishment; and an intelligentsia avid to secure a measure of status by cozying with executives, politicos, and generals "." [47].

A Cultural Dynamic in the Drive to Empire.

In harnessing military might to the corporate economy, Wolin argues, the state is empowered to continually seek new markets throughout the world, to secure those markets by the threat or use of armed force, to increase its share of existing international markets, and to ensure availability of needed natural resources.  

For Wolin, an important dynamic in America's drive to empire is the role of apocalyptic, evangelical religion.   Entering the third millennium, he observes, Americans were motivated mainly by the expectation of further economic progress and the "rewards due a society devoted to science, technology and capitalism."   Much changed, however, following the attacks of 9/11.   Very quickly, Wolin notes, the country seemed to add the inspiration of "another Great Awakening" to its belief in material progress.   This religious manifestation revealed itself principally as a fundamentalist evangelical faith in the inerrancy and unchanging truths of Scripture, particularly those in the Book of Revelation.    It is in this last book of the Christian bible where one finds, of course, a description of the Apocalypse of the Last Days, when the world as we know it will be destroyed, the forces of evil will be vanquished, and Christ will come down to earth again to reign for a thousand years.  

In assessing the impact of the evangelical movement, Wolin calls attention to the striking fact that the spirit of Revelation showed itself capable of exerting important influence at the highest levels of American politics.   The second President Bush, he reminds us, was a "born-again" believer "whose speeches [were] notable for their biblical allusions" and "who often struck prophetic poses and assumed the role of divine instrument for combating and overcoming evil" [116].   Wolin's point is that the President's belief that he was on God's side in combating evil strengthened his determination to use American military power for apocalyptic ends: to destroy the "evil-doers" in Afghanistan, and, in line with the 2002 National Security Strategy, to impose the blessings of "democracy, development, free markets, and free trade" on Iraq.

Wolin expands on the significance of the evangelical movement by citing it as "one element in a broader ideological matrix," which he calls "archaism."   As it applies to its practice in America, Wolin means by "archaism" a disposition to read the texts of both the Constitution and the Bible as literal, unchanging, and universal truths.   He notes, disapprovingly, that in taking this approach one raises the presumptive authority of archaic sources over the standard of reasoned inquiry based on present knowledge.   Moreover, the fundamentalist approach seems to conflict with the long-held belief that the nation's economic success is based primarily on a practical faith in science, technology, and free enterprise.  

Yet, Wolin says, the two dynamics of archaism and secular faith have an unexpected affinity.   When the archaist unites his reactionary political and religious views with the progressive movements of science and technology, he "enables an ever-receding past somehow to bring the revelation closer" [117].   What Wolin apparently has in mind is that, by their conjunction with technological progress, the archaic texts are kept from drifting further into the past, and, instead, gain currency for actual realization in the world.  

However, Wolin says, such fundamentalist power, wrought by either religious or Constitutional archaists, is potentially catastrophic for democracy.   If the religious archaist had his way, he would impose a civil religion and its regulative principles on the entire society.   And for his part, the Constitutional archaist would interpret American governance in such a way as to make a ruling elite, not the people themselves, responsible for governing.   Worst of all, since such rigid systems would eliminate democratic give and take, but not affect the pace of technological progress, people could no longer look to government for critical help in adapting to a changing life environment.   

Real Democracy.

Wolin makes clear that American democracy has never lent itself easily to influence by the popular will.   From the beginning, the country was conceived as a republic, not as a "democracy" in the classical sense.   The men of property and education who framed our Constitution feared mass movements of the people, viewing them as irrational and disruptive to the proper functions of government -- principally, economic expansion and national security.   The result was a Constitution designed to so filter political power as to make majoritarian rule extremely unlikely and thereby virtually ensure continuing rule by a privileged elite.   A reflection of this bias, according to Wolin, is the critical absence in the Constitution of any provisions for the political rights of women, the abolition of slavery, or even the right to vote for adult males.   As a kind of afterthought to its prescription for elite power, the Constitution was later amended to include a Bill of Rights that guarantees important personal freedoms to all citizens.   One of these, the freedom of speech, allows Americans to criticize their government with an abandon that is perhaps to this day unparalleled in the world.   As one might infer from Wolin's critique, however, what should count in a democracy is not simply the freedom to blow off steam, but the ability to effectively impact the decision-making of government.  

For Wolin, true democracy is plainly not a "managed democracy" reinforced by a restrictive political constitution.   It is instead a politics "that contribute[s] to individual development and, at the same time, promote[s] a greater measure of egalitarianism ".   It would expand the liberal conception [of politics] by assigning first priority to the role of citizens as participants, demoting their role as voters to a secondary priority" [186].   In addition, the structure and processes of the political parties "would be shaped to encourage the citizen-participant to be involved in the party's decision-making practices and to become acquainted with the ways of power.   Party policies and programs would become matters for common discussion and suggestion, not pep rallies for persuading the voter to endorse programs previously decided by the party elite" [186].  

To be fair, Wolin does note that, even in the absence of popular input into policy planning, elite rule in America has not focused exclusively on self-serving objectives of economic and political power.   In the 20th century especially, our national politics were also concerned with what might be called "the common good."   The creation of national parks for public use under Teddy Roosevelt, social security under Franklin Roosevelt, the G.I. Bill of Rights under Truman -- these were all popularly applauded advances in the communal life of the nation.   They were available broadly to all eligible people and readily supported by the entire body of taxpayers.  

Now, however, Wolin laments, such programs aimed at the common good are notably absent from the concerns of Washington politics.   In recent decades, our corporate/state government has focused its attentions almost exclusively on economic expansion to every corner of the globe.   This enterprise proceeds under cover of an ideological commitment to bring free enterprise and "democracy" to developing nations that remain lost in the morass of political tyranny and corruption.   Yet, its unannounced but real purpose, Wolin insists, is to create new markets and/or overseas manufacturing facilities for American corporations.   To secure these new assets, various inducements are advanced, or pressures applied, to ensure that subject governments are willing to cooperate with U.S. interests and accept the protection of American armed might.  

If this description is accurate, America's reach for empire is obviously oppressive to the countries affected.   In Wolin's view, however, it is also devastating to democracy at home, since it deepens inequalities among the citizens and promotes moral decay in politics.   He writes:

"Resources that might be used to improve health care, education, and environmental protection are instead directed to defense spending, which, by far, consumes the largest percentage of the nation's annual budget.   Moreover, the sheer size and complexity of imperial power and the expanded role of the military make it difficult to impose fiscal discipline and accountability.   Corruption becomes endemic, not only abroad but at home.   The most dangerous type of corruption for a democracy is measured not in monetary terms alone but in the kind of ruthless power relations it fosters in domestic politics.   As many observers have noted, politics has become a blood sport with partisanship and ideological fidelity as the hallmarks.   A partisan judiciary is openly declared to be a major priority of a political party; the efforts to consolidate executive power and to relegate Congress to a supporting role are to some important degree the retrojection inwards of the imperial thrust" [245].

Wolin suggests that, with such power realignments now its principal concern, American politics have, for the most part, come to substitute bluster between two corporate parties for intelligent debate over issues that directly affect the well-being of the citizenry.   Campaigns for national office have been largely reduced to spectacle, entertainment and marketing.  

A Democratic Vision for the Future.

Wolin's hope for the future is that, while elite rule may be here to stay, the people themselves can nevertheless take steps to make their own voices heard.   As a first step, he says, we need to roll back developments in our elite politics that have brought us to the stage of inverted totalitarianism.   An agenda for such an undertaking includes:

" " rolling back the empire; rolling back the practices of managed democracy; returning to the idea and practices of international cooperation rather than the dogmas of globalization and preemptive strikes; restoring and strengthening environmental protections; reinvigorating populist politics; undoing the damage to our system of individual rights; restoring the institutions of an independent judiciary, separation of powers, and checks and balances; reinstating the integrity of the independent regulatory agencies and of scientific advisory processes; reviving a representative system responsive to popular needs for health care, education, guaranteed pensions, and an honorable minimum wage; restoring government regulatory authority over the economy; and rolling back the distortions of a tax code that toadies to the wealthy and corporate power" [273-74].

Still, Wolin warns, even if such roll-backs are undertaken and successful, the government institutions affected will not necessarily be democratized.   Only to a limited extent, he says, "can the citizenry itself [in its present form as a collection of individuals] " inject democracy into a political system permeated by corporate power.   It can provide the initial impetus but not the sustained will" [258].  

To make their voices heard in the political process, Wolin proposes, the people must first assume a conscious identity as a demos -- as a political force independent of, and opposed to, the corporate elitist state.   This will not be easy, Wolin writes, as the entire population is now so caught up in the rapid pace of technological, political and cultural change that it is losing the capacity to stand back and reflect on the democratic principles that might be reclaimed from the past.  

Yet, for democracy's sake, Wolin urges, the attempt must be made.   In our time, as in all times, he argues, "We the People" must overcome the natural tendency to cede political power to the Few.   But this time, cut off as we are from the past, the "demos" must create a new democratic vision for the future, conceiving of itself as a political counterforce to its ancient nemesis, elitism.   Moreover, since this popular counter-elite will be by definition outside the elite power system, it must pursue its interests through the practice of a kind of "fugitive democracy" -- through a part-time political activism by various groups that will take many forms at different times in pursuit of both particular and common needs, reforms, and goals.  

Wolin points out that this form of democratic involvement was in fact characteristic of ordinary Americans throughout the 18th century, both before and after the Revolution.   He cites:

" " the extraordinary political activities of working-class members, small farmers, women, slaves, and Indians during the period from roughly 1690 throughout most of the following century.   [Those activities] took several forms: street protests and demonstrations, attacks on official residences, petitions, mass meetings, pamphlets, and newspaper articles.   Virtually without exception the motive animating these actions was to protect or advance interests that the existing system ignored or exploited unfairly ".   Democracy, in this early meaning, stood for a politics of redress, for common action to alleviate the sharp inequalities of wealth and power that enabled the more affluent and educated to monopolize governance.   By it they sought to wrest a place in the political power structure and make it responsive to their own needs" [227].  

Similar popular activism in the 19th and 20th centuries helped bring about further advances in equality and justice.   These included federal offices for ordinary people under Andrew Jackson; the abolition of slavery; women's suffrage; trade unions; control of railroad rates; trust busting; civil rights for African Americans; ending the Vietnam War; women's rights and gay rights; environmental protection; and student power at universities.  

ADVANCING POPULAR DEMOCRACY

BEGINS WITH A PERSONAL TRANSFORMATION.

In Wolin's view, acts of "fugitive democracy," by which the power of the people is mobilized to pursue solutions to real human problems, is a necessary counterbalance to the impersonal gamesmanship of the elite political order.   He writes:  

"Put starkly, the crucial political issue of our times concerns the incompatibility between the culture of everyday reality to which political democracy should be attuned and the culture of virtual reality on which corporate capitalism thrives.   Despite claims that the opportunity to be stakeholders, or to form start-ups, to revel in consumer choices, or just to get rich demonstrates the democratic possibilities of capitalism, there is no political affinity [between political democracy and corporate capitalism], only a disjunction between democracy and a system that assumes inequality among investors and reproduces inequality as a matter of course, depends upon individual self-interest as an incentive, practices a politics of misrepresentation, and hence is inconsistent with such democratic values as sharing, caring, and preserving" [268-9].  

What Wolin addresses here is at bottom a spiritual problem.   How can the compassionate concern of ordinary people over the exploitation and unmet needs of their fellow humans find a way to effective political expression, in the face of an amoral corporate state geared to relentless pursuit of ever-increasing profits, power, and control?  

For Wolin, popular activism seems the only choice in our day for achieving meaningful change, given the unresponsiveness of our managed democracy.   He believes, however, that participants in such a movement must first undergo a personal transformation.   "Democratization is not about being "left alone,'" he notes, "but about becoming a self that sees the values of common involvements and endeavors and finds in them a source of self-fulfillment" [289].   Even at the level of one's own career, Wolin suggests, such a transformation might manifest itself in a commitment to be an ethical lawyer, or even an ethical MBA, putting caring for others ahead of personal ambition or careerism.  

As a next step, Wolin proposes that those committed to a democratic revival start acting collectively by becoming involved in local politics and other forms of institutional decision-making.   By doing so, he believes, ordinary people can help establish such participation as a social norm and open it up to increasing numbers of fellow citizens.   Such openness will also serve to "chasten the actions of those entrusted with power, whether as council members, teachers, business-owners, police, or environmentalists" [289].  

At the same time, local political activists should encourage formation of a counter-elite of public servants at the national level who will also work to defend democratic values.   Already, Wolin points out, counter-elite Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) pursue valuable public-service goals at principally local levels.   Such groups are important not only for the work they do, but because they exemplify for those in the corporate/state system the concrete and practical character of true democracy.   By setting this example, Wolin says, the local counter-elites "can provide a crucial reality check on the conduct of national politics and governance, perhaps even inhibit the elite's temptation to foreign adventures" [291].  

Summing Up.

In Democracy, Incorporated, Sheldon Wolin has drawn on his broad knowledge of American history, capitalism, culture and society, and his expertise in political theory, to argue persuasively that America has lost its way as a model of democratic support for its citizens and a beacon of hope for the world.   Since this trend is systemic and not self-correcting, the people themselves must act as a redemptive counterforce.   While the elite corporate state drives blindly on to the abstract ends of profit, expansion and exploitation, it is left to ordinary citizens to redress, or cause others to redress, the injustices or failures of existing political arrangements.   Wolin would have us take seriously the counsel of none other than Barack Obama himself that good government is built from the bottom up, not from the top down.  

Today, only the people themselves, like the fugitive democrats throughout American history, can join together in unity of conscience and force of numbers to pursue meaningful solutions to the real needs of the human community.   Let all of us who are moved by the moral imperatives of the progressive vision go forward in the spirit of Sheldon Wolin to gain the popular support we need to build a more peaceful world and a more caring community at home.   

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Authors Bio:

In retirement, Bob Anschuetz has applied his long career experience as an industrial writer and copy editor to helping authors meet publishing standards for both online articles and full-length books. In work as a volunteer editor for OpEdNews, he has specialized in helping improve, where needed, the readability of articles submitted by authors for whom English is not their native language. With a background that also includes four years as a college English teacher, Bob points to Henry David Thoreau as a major intellectual influence. He cites Thoreau's many writings promoting conscience-based independent thought and action as instrumental in shaping his own continuing commitment to the progressive social and political values of economic fairness, social justice, non-violent conflict resolution, and global community. Bob also continues to pursue a lifelong love of learning. He has been a regular participant in political-science and philosophy seminars, a volunteer discussion-group leader on a variety of topics, and a literacy tutor. Bob is also a strong supporter of the Network of Spiritual Progressives, associated with Tikkun Magazine, where he served as a volunteer archives editor for two years and published several articles online. His extended Letter to the Editor on the widespread triumphalism in America's response to the killing of Osama bin Laden was included in the Summer 2011 issue of Tikkun.