Who's More Individualistic?

One of the interesting conundrums of American political life is the different approaches to individuality in relation to group life. The standard formulation is that the right-wing values economic freedom but are more favorable toward government regulation of entertainment and sex. In this sense, conservatives emphasize group standards when it comes to regulating our social behavior.

To the contrary, the left supposedly values freedom in relation to sex, booze, and entertainment but believes in more government regulation of the economy. In other words, the nation or group as a whole should protect individuals from various kinds of economic abuses.

But I don't think that says it all and I'd like to formulate some rough points on the contrasting cultures of right and left here.

One of the things that's interesting to me is that conservatives have long had an edge in group consciousness. In the South especially, white conservatives have a thick knot of group loyalties. Conservatives are highly family conscious, very loyal to their churches, highly motivated to send money to the Jerry Falwells and James Dobsons of the world, and strongly identify themselves as "conservatives" and "Republicans." That's one reason why the Republicans have traditionally had an edge in small donor fund raising than the Democrats (although they started losing that edge in 2004). Everyday conservatives have much more of a group sense of themselves in relation to "conservatism" and the Republican Party.

On the other hand, I've always found white liberals and those on the left to be more individualistic in the sense that they see themselves primarily in terms of their "self" rather than group identity. and have a relatively "thin" and less intense set of group identifications. The main group reference of white liberals tends to be their nuclear families, but even there people on the left don't see "Family" as an group-identifying principle in the same way as conservatives. Generally speaking liberals have fewer religious, community, and other group affiliations and less of a group consciousness about the affiliations they have. For liberals, the primary fact of their group affiliations is their own "choice" rather than their loyalty to the group itself.

Three points.

First, I believe that the individualism of white liberals is one of the most important things that separates them culturally from African-Americans, gays, and union members. The African-American sense of being part of a collective blackness is especially foreign to the white liberal experience. The same thing is the case with gays in relation to heterosexual liberals and union members in relation to white liberal professionals and managerial types. This is one of the reasons why the Democratic common front on racial issues, the war in Iraq, and government involvement in the economy is like an alliance between foreign nations rather than participation in a common group endeavor. The parts of the Democratic coalition more motivated by group consciousness are affiliated with complete different and to some extent opposing groups while most white liberals tend not to affiliate much at all. The fact that the American left contains several different cultures that don't have a common bond has been a debilitating weakness.

Second, the group consciousness of the right gives them a decided edge in terms of small donor fund-raising, volunteering for political campaigns, going to see speakers, and things like that. Being more motivated by a group consciousness of conservatism, people on the right tend to do more for the conservative cause than white liberals especially

Third, there seems to be a shift toward more of a group awareness among white "progressives" as a result of the Iraq War. However, that still strikes me as being pretty weak. The big "netroots" web sites like Daily Kos have some group consciousness but it is also pretty weak and poorly coordinated with blacks, gays, and union members to the extent that it's coordinated at all.

I've posted extensively on what I think is going to be the big Democratic victory in 2008. At the same time though, I think the Democratic coalition would be stronger if white liberals developed more of a group consciousness among themselves and with other elements in the Democratic coalition.