In Search of Progressive America by Michael Kazin

Author:Michael Kazin [Kazin, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Politics
ISBN: 9780812220384
Google: WrPdGGFKgR4C
Goodreads: 4879116
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
Published: 2008-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

When Ideology Impedes Organization

The survey findings suggest that many of the differences in how think tanks approach their missions are closely related to differences that come out of the ideologies they seek to promote. As a practical matter, this conclusion suggests a far bigger problem for liberals than for conservatives in the war of ideas in American politics. To the extent that this war is ongoing and think tanks are important to it, conservatives have the advantage, first, because they have more think tanks that are better funded. And second, because even where they exist and have resources, liberal think tanks are typically not organized to be effective counterweights to conservative organizations in the war of ideas.

Liberals approach think tanks from a century-long tradition of investing in the production of objective policy research. Since the creation of the social science disciplines during the Progressive Era, liberals have been committed to the view that research is essential to an informed policymaking process. Research may lead to ideas—but ideas that are pragmatic and well-reasoned, not value-laden. The tradition for research among liberals is one that “tends to minimize disagreement over political values, and at times seems to ignore underlying values if not wish them away altogether.”7

In this context, liberals are inclined to approach a war of ideas in American politics by, in some sense, denying its very legitimacy. Ideological battle is political nonsense; the results of rigorous, objective research can—and should—best inform the appropriate possibilities for government and society. Politics should not be about winners and losers so much as it should be about building consensus, and research can point the way toward that consensus. To view the role of research—and research organizations—in any other way would be inappropriate. It is the obligation of the disinterested expert to develop optimal policy-based solutions. The findings here lend support to this conclusion. These are attitudes pervasive not just among think tank leaders at the state level, but among those who run national organizations as well. As the president of one national think tank consistently perceived as liberal put it to me:

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