Lately I’ve been hearing how the Republicans are going to lose big this election. One explanation for why is because the Republican “brand” has been tarnished.
This is a continuation of the neo-liberal idea of using the market to guide all human activity, including organizing for political power. I claim that the Republican’s most pressing problem is that they consider the Republican Party a brand. As long as they keep doing that, their power will wane. Here’s why.
What’s a brand? It’s the reputation of something you consume. We’ve been conditioned through advertising and public pressure to believe that we are what we buy, what we drive, and what we wear. The key aspect of a brand is that it revolves only around consumption, and not production. That fact is what makes the concept of a brand a poor one for a political party.
Consumer politics is what American politics has generally degenerated into. No longer do people think of working to advance their party. Rather they sit on their couches, consume the advertising in between their favorite TV shows, occasionally lift up the phone receiver to hear the recording of a famous person trying to convince them to vote for a specific candidate. Don’t bother to do any work yourself, or produce any politics yourself, we’ll sell you your politics the same way we sell you dish-washer detergent, adult-diapers and drugs for restless-leg syndrome.
On the other hand, the trend this spring in the Democratic primaries is to use caucuses, rather than primaries. Correct me if I’m wrong, but more states have been doing this. It seemed that only Iowa used caucuses, and every four years the journalists had to explain how this quaint, old-fashioned political mechanism works.
Hillary has been criticizing the caucuses because they are biased against people who don’t have the luxury of a lot of time to spend in the afternoon or evening discussing the candidates, rather than just making a check on a ballot and pulling a lever. But those caucus participants become potential political producers, rather than simply consumers. The parties have their contact information, and can ask them to either call people before the election, or work to get out the vote. Combined with the campaign of Barack Obama tapping into the internet as an organizing tool rather than just a marketing tool, and caucuses become a mobilizing force in the general election.
This is why the Republicans are suffering. They still see politics as something to market from the top, rather than an organization that takes its cues from below. In their model, the elites know what’s best, and then sell it to the masses, or as Noam Chomsky has written, attempt to manufacture consent. In fact, it might be impossible for the Republicans to do it any other way. See Thomas Frank's book, What's the Matter With Kansas.
The opposite end of the spectrum is being suggested by Barack’s campaign, which is why so many progressives have gravitated towards it. While they might not agree completely with all of his policy suggestions, they see the opportunity for more leverage for progressive policies from the grassroots.
The transition to participatory democracy is far from complete, however. The other key component to participatory democracy, rather than consumptive democracy, is public financing of elections. Corporations tend to control the political process now because of the need of lots of money to finance campaigns, mostly through advertising on television. While I doubt that TV ads will disappear from politics in the near future, they are residue of the “brand” style of consumer democracy. As long as we see Republicans speak of their party as a brand, they are still locked into selling ideas to the people, rather than listening to the ideas of the people.
(p.s. The flag pictured above may be purchased at reclaimdemocracy.org)
