Where is America going?

Notice of Wednesday, January 13, 2021

Journalist: Joseph E. Stiglitz

01/13/2021

The assault on the U.S. Capitol by supporters of President Donald Trump, instigated by Trump himself, was the predictable result of his four-year assault on democratic institutions, aided and abetted by so many members of the Republican Party.

And no one can say that Trump did not warn us: he was not engaged in a peaceful transition of power. Many of those who profited by cutting taxes on businesses and the wealthy, overturning environmental regulations, and appointing business-friendly judges knew they were making a deal with the devil. Either they thought they could control the extremist forces he had unleashed, or they didn’t care.

Where is America going from here? Is Trump an aberration or a symptom of a deeper national disease? Can we trust the United States? In four years, will the forces that gave birth to Trump and the party that overwhelmingly supported him triumph again? What can be done to prevent this outcome?

Trump is the product of several forces. For at least a quarter of a century, the Republican Party has understood that it can only represent the interests of business elites by adopting anti-democratic measures (including voter suppression and gerrymandering) and allies, including religious fundamentalists, white supremacists and nationalist populists. .

Of course, populism involved policies that were antithetical to business elites. But many business leaders have spent decades mastering the ability to deceive the public. Big Tobacco has spent a lot of money on avocados and fake science to deny the adverse health effects of its products. Big Oil has done the same to deny the contribution of fossil fuels to climate change. They admitted that Trump was one of them.

Then, advancements in technology have provided a tool for the rapid dissemination of disinformation / disinformation, and America’s political system, where money reigns supreme, has freed the emerging tech giants from responsibility. This political system has done another thing: it has generated a set of policies (sometimes called neoliberalism) that have generated massive gains in income and wealth for those at the top, but have almost stagnated everywhere else. Soon, a country at the forefront of scientific advancement was marked by declining life expectancy and growing health disparities.

The neoliberal promise that gains in wealth and income would trickle down to those at the bottom was fundamentally wrong. As massive structural changes deindustrialized large parts of the country, those left behind were largely left behind. As I cautioned in my books The Price of Inequality and People, Power and Profit, this toxic mix provided an inviting opportunity for a potential demagogue.

As we have seen time and time again, the entrepreneurial spirit of Americans, combined with the absence of moral constraints, provides an abundance of potential charlatans, exploiters, and demagogues. Trump, a lying and narcissistic sociopath with no understanding of economics or appreciation of democracy, was the man of the day.

The immediate task is to eliminate the threat that Trump still poses. The House of Representatives should impeach him now, and the Senate should try him some time later, to prevent him from taking federal office again. It should be in the best interests of Republicans, no less than Democrats, to show that no one, not even the President, is above the law. Everyone must understand the imperative to honor elections and ensure a peaceful transition of power.

But we shouldn’t sleep comfortably until the underlying issues are resolved. Many involve great challenges. We need to balance freedom of speech with accountability for the enormous harm that social media can and has caused, from incitement to violence and the promotion of racial and religious hatred to political manipulation.

The United States and other countries have long imposed restrictions on other forms of expression to reflect broader societal concerns: You can’t scream fire in a crowded theater, engage in child pornography, or commit slander and defamation. Certainly, some authoritarian regimes abuse these constraints and compromise fundamental freedoms, but authoritarian regimes will always find justification for doing what they want, regardless of what democratic governments do.

We Americans must reform our political system, both to guarantee the basic right to vote and democratic representation. We need a new law on the right to vote. The old one, adopted in 1965, targeted the South, where the deprivation of rights of African Americans had allowed white elites to remain in power since the end of reconstruction after the Civil War. But now anti-democratic practices are present all over the country.

We must also reduce the influence of money in our politics: no system of checks and balances can be effective in a society with as much inequality as the United States. And any system based on “one dollar, one vote” rather than “one person, one vote” will be vulnerable to populist demagoguery. After all, how can such a system serve the interests of the country as a whole?

Finally, we must address the multiple dimensions of inequality. The stark difference between the treatment of the white insurgents who invaded the Capitol and the peaceful Black Lives Matter protesters this summer has once again shown those around the world the extent of America’s racial injustice.

In addition, the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the extent of the country’s economic and health disparities. As I have said many times, small changes to the system will not be enough to make big forays into the entrenched inequalities in the country.

How America responds to the attack on Capitol Hill will say a lot about where the country is heading. If we not only hold Trump accountable, but also embark on the difficult road of economic and political reform to address the underlying issues that gave rise to his toxic presidency, then there is hope for a better day. Fortunately, Joe Biden will assume the presidency on January 20. But it will take more than one person – and more than one presidential term – to overcome the long-standing challenges of the United States.