It’s easy to despair the workings of American politics, especially in the midst of crisis or a contentious campaign. But politics itself is not the problem, says Ned O’Gorman. Rather, it’s our views of politics that are often “twisted.” We need more politics, not less, but “authentic politics.” O’Gorman is the author of the recent book “Politics for Everybody” and a communication professor at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He spoke with News Bureau social sciences editor Craig Chamberlain.
This idea of “authentic politics” goes far beyond just politicians, parties and the political contest. Where does it come from?
It comes from Hannah Arendt, the person at the center of my book. Arendt was a German who, because she was Jewish, had to flee the Nazis in 1933 and ended up in the United States, where she devoted her new life to writing about politics, covering topics ranging from totalitarianism to the American Revolution.
Arendt described authentic politics as “different people getting along in the full force of their power.” For me, the key phrase is “different people getting along” – and being empowered to do so, as equals. That, I believe, is the core purpose of the art of politics; it’s what political education should be about.
We live in a time, however, when most people believe that politics is about “us” fighting “them.” Most political education is focused on demographic trends, political organizations and so on.
Such a different approach or attitude from what we’ve grown used to might strike some as unrealistic, even naive. What’s essential to making it work?
I don’t think people getting along is unrealistic. It happens all the time, even today when there is so much vitriol. Where things get tricky is when we face people or parties who are just not interested in the political art of getting along, but instead just want to win, no matter the costs. Politics – true politics – can never be “win at all costs,” because that can only end in people not getting along.
The win-at-all-costs approach is really a form of warfare. To be sure, there are a lot of people today who confuse politics with warfare, but anybody who has lived in both a functioning political society and a war zone knows that there is a big difference. Essential to politics are the arts of compromise, trust-building and communication; essential to warfare are the arts of violence and killing.
One chapter of your book is “Lies, Damn Lies, and Politics,” and the distrust of politicians and media is certainly one reason people cite for losing faith in politics. How should we judge political deception? What’s forgivable and what’s truly dangerous?
The chapter on lying in politics is probably the most popular one in the book, which makes sense given the carelessness with the truth in our current political discourse. I try to demonstrate that there is a big difference between a politician lying in order to save face about an embarrassing matter and a large-scale, coordinated effort by organizations to deceive people – for example, as we are witnessing again with Russian interference in the U.S. election.
Not all lies in politics are created equal. Some really are forgivable. But others are downright destructive. If we fail to see the difference, then we are likely to become quite cynical about politics. And in becoming cynical, we make ourselves more likely to be duped, rather than less so, by those in positions of power.
Making critical distinctions like that between the “one-off lie” and organized propaganda protects us from manipulation. A cynicism that says “they’re all just a bunch of liars” makes us more vulnerable to being duped because it means we’ve stopped thinking about these matters altogether. When we stop thinking about our life together, that’s when things get really dangerous.
You note that Arendt believed politics was made for dealing with crises, yet it’s easy now, in a year of crises, to focus mostly on the political failures. Where do you see bright spots? And how can politics still save us?
Well, yes, there’s been plenty of political failure this year, and in recent years. But whether we are talking about COVID-19 or racism, political failure only exacerbates the problems. As I said before, politics is the art of getting along with others who are different from us. Politics is also an art of deliberation, problem-solving, and ongoing coordination and compromise.
This is exactly what our current crises call for – lots of people coming together to coordinate and compromise so as to address the social and physical ailments that plague us. And we can always do that.
The art of politics builds on our innate human capacities for coordination, compromise and communication. That fact leaves me always feeling like there are bright spots, if for no other reason than there is always the possibility for us to learn and relearn the art of different people getting along in the full force of their power. If we can do that, we will have already gone a long way toward addressing most of our major crises.