Political hobbyism (H) is a crucial topic (flipside of Politics as a Vocation?) that’s gained importance from social media, with its filtering out of substance (280 char limit) in favor of emotion. But this discussion would have benefitted from a clearer definition of H.
Hersh first associates it with those who “have no idea what's going on in the state legislature, or city council” and pay attention to viral videos, i.e., national gossip. But he adds in their lack of strategy.
Mounk then defines H as the “politics of moral gratification” (Weber’s ethics of conviction), in contrast to being strategic.
Hersh redefines Mounk’s distinction as insider v. outsider and disagrees, but then he agrees that strategy is the opposite of H. BLM was strategic; Occupy was a mess. But at the end of the podcast, Hersh returns to his emphasis on local politics to define good (Not H) politics, e.g., organizing their old age home, etc., etc.
I’d say the local/nation distinction is a red herring, and the definition should clarify “strategic” and “emotional/moral” and that the missing piece is the means/ends distinction.
Being in Berkeley from the ‘60s but scientific, my politics was more local than national, but my frustration was always a lack of strategy.
But here’s the podcast’s missing piece:
Yes, BLM’s leadership was strategic and effective. But that’s a statement about means. Regarding their ends (reduced policing), they were moralistic, relied on viral videos, and were horribly wrong. Horribly!
A careful statistical study by a pro-BLM academic, published in a peer-reviewed journal, found that BLM protests before George Floyd caused de-policing that led to 3,000 additional murders (mostly of Black people). The total after that was surely greater. Roland Fryer, the prize-winning Black economist, found similar results (before 2020). The number of Black lives lost to de-policing after Floyd was surely greater.
BLM was strategic (not H) regarding means, but they were ignorant moralistic hobbyists regarding ends. This has been the character of the Black Power/CRT movement since its inception. This is what most needs analysis.
That combination sucks in even strategic thinkers (the Oppenheimers in the ‘30s), including me (I got arrested in ‘68 for advertising a Panther funeral based on a strategic deception). This Strategic/Hobbyist combination is our greatest danger.
I think there's a premise about politics that can be helpful in this discussion but is kind of unspeakable: What if it's OK to view politics or thinking politically as necessary only some of the time? What if people were to understand politics as in the background of their daily lives?
I say the unsayable because I think that is actually how most people do prioritize politics. There are certainly too many political hobbyists (such a wonderful phrase!) who perform politics more than they act politically. That's not helpful and as Prof. Hersch says, we could use a lot less of the former.
I've been thinking a lot about this subject lately (privileges of retirement!) and agree with Benjamin Constant and Robert Michels in particular, whose Iron Law of Oligarchy usually winds up being the foundation of any theory of modern politics I've run across. Given the historically unprecedented number of citizens on the planet, in its nations and states and cities, there couldn't be any other reasonable approach. And these are not just citizens, but citizens entitled to all the burdens and benefits of citizenship; we don't have a slave class or anything like the classes of residents in, say, Ancient Athens or Rome who couldn't even dream of being citizens. Anyone in the US who can dream at all can dream that.
This makes it easy and necessary for most of us to take our Democratic Republic for granted, and as your statistics about the proportion of people who vote suggest, that's what it seems people do.
Which leads to my second unspeakable point: Voting is the very least anyone can do in a democracy. When we are moved to, we have at our disposal our constitutional rights to speak, assemble, petition grievances and in every other peaceable way to let our representatives know that, agree or not, they represent all of us. And thus, that they have an obligation (not always observed) to move slowly, incrementally, in negotiated steps, as Yuval Levin argues very well in his new book.
It is with that understanding that I could not quite agree with the discussion of where political hobbyists might land in insider or outsider politics. The strategic part of politics, whether insider or outsider, falls to the professionals, who I see as our oligarchy. Professional politics is practiced every day by advocates, lobbyists, PR firms and plenty of other professionals. My instinct says that these are the fountainheads or the models for our polarization: Because the media is addicted to these idealistic extremes, they seem to be all that political thinking has to offer, and since we are all used to buying off the rack, whether it's clothing or ideas that don't exactly fit but are close enough, we buy what's on offer or on sale.
Too many of our political fights are over small issues magnified, or non-issues where all we're disagreeing about is the rhetoric. And everyone gets to choose what issues are what size to them. Gay marriage was a very big issue to me, but back in the 70s, it wasn't to most people. Exercising our political rights, lesbians and gay men and our friends, families and so many others made it a big issue so we could now live in a society where it's mostly a small issue. Maybe most issues the professionals are fighting over aren't as big as they look under the magnifying glass that mediates our information, and maybe a lot of people prioritize their time around that. Of the hundreds or thousands of issues any elected representative has to deal with every day, maybe only a couple of them rise to the level of a working mom's attention, and of those, very very few are of enough magnitude to lead her to write a letter, make a phone call, join a march or believe in a revolution.
That may not be the full reality of modern politics in America, but I think it's a better way of thinking about where politics should fit into our lives.
Mr Hersh should hold up a mirror and look carefully. What would he see? A version of Hillary Clinton laughing off the deplorables … Human beings are naturally interested in all things from all angles. That’s a phenomenon for political scientists to study, not to ridicule.
Political hobbyism (H) is a crucial topic (flipside of Politics as a Vocation?) that’s gained importance from social media, with its filtering out of substance (280 char limit) in favor of emotion. But this discussion would have benefitted from a clearer definition of H.
Hersh first associates it with those who “have no idea what's going on in the state legislature, or city council” and pay attention to viral videos, i.e., national gossip. But he adds in their lack of strategy.
Mounk then defines H as the “politics of moral gratification” (Weber’s ethics of conviction), in contrast to being strategic.
Hersh redefines Mounk’s distinction as insider v. outsider and disagrees, but then he agrees that strategy is the opposite of H. BLM was strategic; Occupy was a mess. But at the end of the podcast, Hersh returns to his emphasis on local politics to define good (Not H) politics, e.g., organizing their old age home, etc., etc.
I’d say the local/nation distinction is a red herring, and the definition should clarify “strategic” and “emotional/moral” and that the missing piece is the means/ends distinction.
Being in Berkeley from the ‘60s but scientific, my politics was more local than national, but my frustration was always a lack of strategy.
But here’s the podcast’s missing piece:
Yes, BLM’s leadership was strategic and effective. But that’s a statement about means. Regarding their ends (reduced policing), they were moralistic, relied on viral videos, and were horribly wrong. Horribly!
A careful statistical study by a pro-BLM academic, published in a peer-reviewed journal, found that BLM protests before George Floyd caused de-policing that led to 3,000 additional murders (mostly of Black people). The total after that was surely greater. Roland Fryer, the prize-winning Black economist, found similar results (before 2020). The number of Black lives lost to de-policing after Floyd was surely greater.
BLM was strategic (not H) regarding means, but they were ignorant moralistic hobbyists regarding ends. This has been the character of the Black Power/CRT movement since its inception. This is what most needs analysis.
That combination sucks in even strategic thinkers (the Oppenheimers in the ‘30s), including me (I got arrested in ‘68 for advertising a Panther funeral based on a strategic deception). This Strategic/Hobbyist combination is our greatest danger.
I think there's a premise about politics that can be helpful in this discussion but is kind of unspeakable: What if it's OK to view politics or thinking politically as necessary only some of the time? What if people were to understand politics as in the background of their daily lives?
I say the unsayable because I think that is actually how most people do prioritize politics. There are certainly too many political hobbyists (such a wonderful phrase!) who perform politics more than they act politically. That's not helpful and as Prof. Hersch says, we could use a lot less of the former.
I've been thinking a lot about this subject lately (privileges of retirement!) and agree with Benjamin Constant and Robert Michels in particular, whose Iron Law of Oligarchy usually winds up being the foundation of any theory of modern politics I've run across. Given the historically unprecedented number of citizens on the planet, in its nations and states and cities, there couldn't be any other reasonable approach. And these are not just citizens, but citizens entitled to all the burdens and benefits of citizenship; we don't have a slave class or anything like the classes of residents in, say, Ancient Athens or Rome who couldn't even dream of being citizens. Anyone in the US who can dream at all can dream that.
This makes it easy and necessary for most of us to take our Democratic Republic for granted, and as your statistics about the proportion of people who vote suggest, that's what it seems people do.
Which leads to my second unspeakable point: Voting is the very least anyone can do in a democracy. When we are moved to, we have at our disposal our constitutional rights to speak, assemble, petition grievances and in every other peaceable way to let our representatives know that, agree or not, they represent all of us. And thus, that they have an obligation (not always observed) to move slowly, incrementally, in negotiated steps, as Yuval Levin argues very well in his new book.
It is with that understanding that I could not quite agree with the discussion of where political hobbyists might land in insider or outsider politics. The strategic part of politics, whether insider or outsider, falls to the professionals, who I see as our oligarchy. Professional politics is practiced every day by advocates, lobbyists, PR firms and plenty of other professionals. My instinct says that these are the fountainheads or the models for our polarization: Because the media is addicted to these idealistic extremes, they seem to be all that political thinking has to offer, and since we are all used to buying off the rack, whether it's clothing or ideas that don't exactly fit but are close enough, we buy what's on offer or on sale.
Too many of our political fights are over small issues magnified, or non-issues where all we're disagreeing about is the rhetoric. And everyone gets to choose what issues are what size to them. Gay marriage was a very big issue to me, but back in the 70s, it wasn't to most people. Exercising our political rights, lesbians and gay men and our friends, families and so many others made it a big issue so we could now live in a society where it's mostly a small issue. Maybe most issues the professionals are fighting over aren't as big as they look under the magnifying glass that mediates our information, and maybe a lot of people prioritize their time around that. Of the hundreds or thousands of issues any elected representative has to deal with every day, maybe only a couple of them rise to the level of a working mom's attention, and of those, very very few are of enough magnitude to lead her to write a letter, make a phone call, join a march or believe in a revolution.
That may not be the full reality of modern politics in America, but I think it's a better way of thinking about where politics should fit into our lives.
Mr Hersh should hold up a mirror and look carefully. What would he see? A version of Hillary Clinton laughing off the deplorables … Human beings are naturally interested in all things from all angles. That’s a phenomenon for political scientists to study, not to ridicule.