Is the GOP being run by the descendants of the Southern slave-owning aristocracy?

[LongTomH]

Human beings make models ('hypotheses' in scientific terms) to explain how things work. In science, a hypothesis is judged by its utility in explaining known phenomenon and it's predictive capabilities; that is, how well does it explain new phenomena? Progressive futurist Sara Robinson has offered an interesting hypothesis to explain the behavior and ideology of the Republican party over the last few decades. Conservative Southern Values Revived: How a Brutal Strain of American Aristocrats Have Come to Rule America.

Ms. Robinson sees American politics as an historical struggle between elites:

For most of our history, American economics, culture and politics have been dominated by a New England-based Yankee aristocracy that was rooted in Puritan communitarian values, educated at the Ivies and marinated in an ethic of noblesse oblige (the conviction that those who possess wealth and power are morally bound to use it for the betterment of society). While they've done their share of damage to the notion of democracy in the name of profit (as all financial elites inevitably do), this group has, for the most part, tempered its predatory instincts with a code that valued mass education and human rights; held up public service as both a duty and an honor; and imbued them with the belief that once you made your nut, you had a moral duty to do something positive with it for the betterment of mankind. Your own legacy depended on this.

//snip

Which brings us to that other great historical American nobility -- the plantation aristocracy of the lowland South, which has been notable throughout its 400-year history for its utter lack of civic interest, its hostility to the very ideas of democracy and human rights, its love of hierarchy, its fear of technology and progress, its reliance on brutality and violence to maintain “order,” and its outright celebration of inequality as an order divinely ordained by God.

Ms. Robinson does seem to see rule by elites as inevitable in "a society as complex as ours."

David Hackett Fischer, whose Albion's Seed: Four British Folkways In America informs both Lind's and Woodard's work, described just how deeply undemocratic the Southern aristocracy was, and still is. He documents how these elites have always feared and opposed universal literacy, public schools and libraries, and a free press. (Lind adds that they have historically been profoundly anti-technology as well, far preferring solutions that involve finding more serfs and throwing them at a problem whenever possible. Why buy a bulldozer when 150 convicts on a chain gang can grade your road instead?) Unlike the Puritan elites, who wore their wealth modestly and dedicated themselves to the common good, Southern elites sank their money into ostentatious homes and clothing and the pursuit of pleasure -- including lavish parties, games of fortune, predatory sexual conquests, and blood sports involving ritualized animal abuse spectacles.

But perhaps the most destructive piece of the Southern elites' worldview is the extremely anti-democratic way it defined the very idea of liberty. In Yankee Puritan culture, both liberty and authority resided mostly with the community, and not so much with individuals. Communities had both the freedom and the duty to govern themselves as they wished (through town meetings and so on), to invest in their collective good, and to favor or punish individuals whose behavior enhanced or threatened the whole (historically, through community rewards such as elevation to positions of public authority and trust; or community punishments like shaming, shunning or banishing).

Ms. Robinson devotes considerable time to discussing how these differences in Yankee and Southern definitions of 'liberty' explain much of the Republican disdain for government and public service; when a Southern aristocrat seeks public office it's to further enrich his class, not to serve the 'public' good.

That world view explains a lot about the GOP in recent decades: How they've been able to reconcile the worldview of atheist Ayn Rand with the evangelical Christianity that forms a major backbone of their strength; Rand "updated the ancient slaveholder ethic for the modern age". It also explains why they're able to offer up "someone for president who so brazenly epitomizes the excesses of casino capitalism that have nearly destroyed the economy and overwhelmed our democracy," as Robert Reich has stated in a recent post.

Their disdain for public life even extends to a disdain for 'the D word:' Democracy. Part of the rewriting of history by the Texas State Board of Education is to edit out references to "democratic societies" and "representative democracy" and substitute "republic."

Sara Robinson is a progressive voice in a field usually dominated by conservatives and libertarians. So many of the writers bearing the 'futurist' label spend most of their time 'off in the ozone,' talking about transhumanism and life extension (While the US continues to fall behind the rest of the developed world in life expectancy; Sara Robinson focuses mostly on current trends and their future consequences.

She's currently the editor for AlterNet's Visions, an excellent resource for discussion of futurism from a progressive viewpoint.

[LiberalLoner]

1. Great article, hope many people read it.

[TheWraith]

2. Pretty much, yeah. nt

[Dan]

3. I always felt

that the GOP got in bed with the south (during the Johnson administration) and renewed that relationship with Nixon and Reagan.... and now the GOP is inflected with that southern virus racism.... not sure what the cure is, if any..

Maybe the GOP felt that they could use the southerns while not getting the infection... but anyone with any exposure to that southern virus could have told them the result

[Beartracks]

4. A very intriguing analysis. n/t