It is hard to imagine Steve Bannon–the deposed alt-right White House guru–and Willie Brown–the one-time Democratic power broker of California, as well as San Francisco’s first (and only) black mayor–sharing a view in common. But they are both hard-nosed, even cynical, observers of practical politics and here is what they recently agreed upon:
Bannon, in his notorious interview with The American Prospect, said:
The Democrats . . . the longer they talk about identity politics, I got ’em. I want them to talk about racism every day. If the left is focused on race and identity, and we go with economic nationalism, we can crush the Democrats.
Willie Brown, in his regular weekly column for the San Francisco Chronicle, wrote:
Every time President Trump gets in trouble he falls back on race identity politics, and the Democrats fall for it without fail…. [M]y friend House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi called for the removal of all Confederate-related statues in the halls of Congress, saying they’re “reprehensible.” She’s got a point, but so what? It has nothing to do with the issues that affect people, such as jobs, education and health care. Taking Trump’s bait only reinforces the impression held by too many Americans—that Democrats are all about apologizing for the country’s past attitudes about race.
The Democratic party is arguing these days about the role of identity politics in their campaigns–how much to focus on racism, blacks, Latinos, gays, gender and transgender issues, and so on. In 2016, Clinton tried to rally such groups and their sympathizers into a majority of minorities; it was not enough. Bannon and Brown both say that this is a losing strategy for practical politics (whatever the righteousness of the causes). It is practical politics that wins elections and winning elections is what lets you determine the courts, health policy, air pollution, taxes, child hunger, war and peace, and the fate of the planet.
Numbers
Pragmatic critics of identity-based campaigns hardly deny the social realities that those campaigns combat, be it abuse of women, discrimination against Latinos, stigmatization of gender minorities, or the historical and still-evident racial caste system. (See earlier posts on race here, here, and here.) But does mobilizing members of such groups make for a secure majority? In California, perhaps; nationwide no. Most white women over 30 voted against the woman candidate who would have broken the highest glass ceiling and for the candidate who casually denigrated women.The candidate who gained notoriety by slurring Mexicans and immigrants gained a heavy share of the Latino vote, probably a quarter or more.[1] That same candidate also catered to prejudice against “the blacks” and, while he got only eight percent of the black vote, blacks did not flock to the polls to punish him.
The chart below, from numbers provided by William Frey, shows that the Obama campaigns spurred Latino and especially black turnout, but in 2016 those turnouts dropped back to pre-Obama levels.[2]
Obama’s success made it seem as if a corner had been turned to a post-racial era. We now know better (here and here).
In the long run, the demographics of Latino- and Asian American population growth may, as some observers have predicted for years, depose Republicans or force them to change positions. But, the short run, as whites remain over 70 percent of actual voters, has very serious and lasting consequences–which liberals are learning all too well with every now-reversed Obama regulation and policy. Democrats will need, for decades probably, to make progress in red counties and purple states, especially given the weird system of representation that the Founding Fathers left us.
Messaging
Political commentator Mark Lilla became a focus of controversy by arguing that Democrats need to move away from focusing on identity groups issues–granting that those issues are real and important–and toward broad-based concerns like wages and healthcare. In a recent interview, New Yorker chief editor David Remnick pressed him on this stance, pointing out that the groups whose concerns he wishes to demote can justifiably resent the snubbing. Lilla’s reply was practical politics: “[M]y main point is this: we cannot do anything for these groups we care about if we do not hold power…. Our rhetoric in campaigning must be focused on winning.”
From an historical view, the current quandary of the Democratic party results, in part, from a shift–led by the left–in how the nation has approached the inclusion of minorities (and women). In the 1940s through ‘60s, progressives emphasized commonality, equality, civil rights, and brotherhood (see Selma picture above). “Under the skin, we are all alike” was the rhetoric. Liberals–notably, President Lyndon Johnson–eventually added a claim on behalf of African-Americans to compensation for generations of exploitation (although they avoided the term “reparations,” preferring “affirmative action.”) For various reasons–including court cases, political calculation, community dynamics–by the 1990s, the case for advancing minorities became re-framed as defining and affirming difference, with the goal of promoting diversity. The shift in political rhetoric has had mixed effects, one being the fracturing of a shared agenda into a set of particular ones–the Hillary Clinton shout-out list.
Tied to this development, it appears, was an increasing diversion of left-wing activist attention from instrumental to expressive politics, from party politics to protest politics: “speaking truth to power,” being pure of motive, disdaining any taint of dealing or compromising. The Occupy movement is a prime example of this stance–and of its practical failure. (See posts on Occupy here and here.) The history of the Civil Rights Movement, taken as an exemplar by many now in the streets, refutes this sort of expressive politics. Historians (e.g., Taylor Branch) have shown how shrewdly strategic its leaders were. They focused on specific goals, disciplined members, allied with elements of the establishment, and cut pragmatic deals, be it with local pols or the president of the United States. And they pursued voting rights to win elections.
In the end, elections, as ex-President Obama has said, “have consequences,” while street protests rarely have the consequences the protestors desire and sometimes bring the opposite ones (see: Vietnam War protests). The Tea Party learned that lesson; it segued from shouting at politicians to organizing voters. Maybe with Indivisible and its like, the left will have learned, too.
Mark Lilla also told Davis Remnick, “An election is not about self-expression. It’s not a time to display everything we believe about everything. It’s a contest. And once you hold power, then you can do the things you want to do.” Both Steve Bannon and Willie Brown would surely agree.
NOTES–
[1] There is a debate about what percentage of the Latino vote Trump got. In the end, probably 25 percent, if not more–around what Romney got in 2012–would be a cautious estimate (see here and here).
[2] Looked at another way, the composition of actual voters in 2016 was 1.0 points less black and 0.8 points more Hispanic than in 2012, even though the composition of the people eligible to vote was +0.3 and +1.9 greater black and Hispanic.
