Packer: The Four Americas

I just heard Hartmann interview Packer on his new book. In this article he lays out the Four Americas. See the link for a detailed, in-depth exploration of each one.

Free America is a libertarian vision of consumer capitalism, of personal freedom over all. To them State's rights are inviolate with very limited federal regulation. Better yet, drown it in a bathtub. The self-made man of Ayn Rand is the standard. It's pretty much today's Repugnacon Party.

Smart America is the upwardly mobile, elite, professional class, the top 10%. They are comfortable and skilled with technology. Novelty, diversity and merit are their key values. Some government interventions are necessary to ensure equal opportunity. But they share with libertarians the emphasis on individual effort as necessary for success and if you don't make it it's your own damned fault. It's pretty much today's Democratic Party.

Real America is the blue-collar, poorly-educated, working class common person who feels betrayed and left behind by the above rigged, expert elitism. It's the home of authoritarian populism with a strong leader supposedly not corrupted by and outside of those classes, a man of the people. They attach to traditional religion and patriotic, white nationalist policy, as well as being threatened by outsiders.

Just America is the home of the social justice movement. It's a rebellion of the slavery at the root of all of the others. It's a never-ending fight to redress all of their wrongs. It's the home of critical theory and identity politics that upends Enlightenment objectivity; it's all about power relations and subjugation. It also repudiates meritocracy since most people are left out of its benefits, though many in this class reap its privileges.

While the article doesn't mention it, Packer talked briefly with Hartmann about Equal America as a solution to the above. He didn't though go into detail about it, I guess as a tease to buy the book. In the above article though he did give an indication of what we should take from each of the Americas in this vision:

"Each offers a value that the others need and lacks ones that the others have. Free America celebrates the energy of the unencumbered individual. Smart America respects intelligence and welcomes change. Real America commits itself to a place and has a sense of limits. Just America demands a confrontation with what the others want to avoid."

In my own terms from this essay I'd say that we need to include and incorporate the healthy elements from each and coordinate them in an overall narrative or paradigm that transcends the limited narrative contexts from which they originated. I called that transcending narrative the collaborative commons.