Focus on Coalitions Not Consensus

FF Symposium: Consensus is a political end in tribal societies; it is not and should not be an end in democratic societies. Liberal democracy requires contention, which in turn requires a real deliberation and coalitions that can actually govern.

American public opinion in almost every way we can measure bunches up toward the moderate middle. Yet increasingly the tone of politics seems to invite and reward extremism. Today, FrumForum asks whether it has to be so.

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I've never met a consensus I've liked.  Consensus is a political end in tribal societies; it is not and should not be an end in democratic societies.  Liberal democracy thrives on contention, not loyal jirgas.

But what is contention for? First and foremost, for deliberation: when different ideas and proposals are promoted by different factions, those in government and the public at large are invited to compare them and check their papers, which then gives an incentive to the factions to get their papers straight.  These ideas compete – so to speak. (Those who talk about a "war of ideas" have never held one in their heads).  Real deliberation requires respect and civility, of course, but more importantly it requires attentiveness.  That’s really what we lack today: there can be no deliberation in an endless ping-pong of radio broadcasts, blog posts, and tweets, only je m’en foutisme and demagoguery.

The other function of contention is representational.   Leaving a place for struggle in our politics also leaves space for steam to escape and for attachments to develop.  We join parties (or, alas, RSS feeds), we follow the news (or, alas, YouTube clips), we discover writers (or, alas, bloggers) who express our views and we feel represented.  Some things in society do depend on consensus – “the line forms on the right" – but representation requires, on the contrary, difference and clarity.  A consensus represents no one in particular; that's what makes it a consensus.

But this expressive representation cannot be an end in itself in democratic politics; it is a means for mobilizing opinion, developing programs, gaining office, and making those programs reality so that government policy does represent us, or at least a majority of us. Today we are facing a crisis of representation in this sense; people feel nothing “the government” does represents them.  This has nothing to do with consensus, it has roots in long-term transformations in democratic politics throughout the West, involving the decline of parties and the atomization of opinion, encouraged by new media.  What we lack today are coalitions that can get elected and govern.

That’s why I’m pessimistic about American politics in the short term.  The rancor, the hysteria, the provincialism and flat-out ignorance of our political debates today reflect much deeper problems in our democratic system that no one yet knows how to address.

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