Excerpt from a July 2017 email I sent to the Democratic Town Committee (of which I am a co-chair) follows below. It needs a concluding paragraph. Suggestions welcome.
I believe more than ever that we Democrats need to tell the story of what kind of society we want and how we propose to achieve it. Narrative matters. Vision is more than a bulletized list of policy positions. Bulletized lists are okay as far as they go but they don’t go anywhere near far enough. There needs to be a story, one people believe they are or want to be a part of. Back in 2011 Drew Westen pointed out how Pres. Obama missed a huge opportunity at the start of his presidency to build a narrative. I think Westen was absolutely right and that failure to construct a narrative cost us badly. We need to learn from that and not to repeat the mistake. Towards that end I believe we need to create a Democratic Party Manifesto.
For those who haven’t read it, the UK Labour Party’s Manifesto is pretty good. It lays out policies and political positions from the standpoint of wanting to achieve a fair and just society. It follows from a moral vision not a technocratic one. To borrow a phrase from Dr. King, it follows from a vision of a positive peace, which is the presence of justice, rather than a negative peace, which is the absence of tension. While we found considerable electoral success with the latter approach in ’90s and ’00s it’s limitations as an electoral strategy and, more importantly, as the basis for organizing a society are now apparent.
Back to the specifics of a Democratic Party Manifesto – while I have a notion I have yet to start on specifics. I’ve collected a few essays which address areas where I think as a party we lack a coherent vision:
- Corey Robin, Socialism: Converting Hysterical Misery Into Ordinary Unhappiness
- Gabriel Winant, The New Working Class
- James Kwak, The Importance of Fairness: A New Economic Vision for the Democratic Party
- Jack Meserve, Keep It Simple and Take Credit