Wednesday, January 22, 2025

A New Era Begins

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Patrick J. Deneen from Postliberal Order postliberalorder@substack.com
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A New Era Begins

The German newspaper Die Zeit interviews Patrick Deneen on the collapse of liberalism, and new era that has begun with the Trump/Vance Administration.

Patrick J. Deneen

Jan 22

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As Germany confronts its own failed legacy of liberalism, interest in studying and speaking with postliberal thinkers has increased dramatically in Europe’s major power. Patrick Deneen was recently invited and spoke before an international conference on Postliberal thought, held in Geisa Germany, that drew scholars from around the world. There he met Peter Neumann, a journalist with the influential German newspaper, Die Zeit. In advance of the inauguration, Deneen sat down to speak with Neumann, and a shortened version of a German translation of the interview was published several days ago in the newspaper. Below is the complete original transcript, exclusively for subscribers to Postliberal Order.

DIE ZEIT: Mr. Deneen, Donald Trump is not yet in office, but it seems he is already in power. What can we really expect from January 20th, the day of his inauguration?

Patrick Deneen: We are currently witnessing the reconfiguration of American, and hence, global politics. Specifically, this entails a rejection of the post-World War II U.S.-led liberal internationalist agenda that had become a singular elite project. This project was inspired by the belief expressed by Francis Fukuyama in his 1989 article, “The End of History.” This view – embraced by American and western elites – held that liberalism had emerged from the cauldron of history as the only viable and justified form of political order. In turn, elites across the West advanced an increasingly imperial liberal project led by the United States. This view was embraced by all Western parties at the time. Wherever you looked, there was hardly any difference between Republicans and Democrats, between Tories and Labour, between Christian Democrats and Social Democrats. That is now history.

ZEIT: Do you think the liberal project, the global expansion of freedom and equality, has failed?

Deneen: Undoubtedly, particularly if we are frank that is results have not been freedom or equality. This failure is marked simultaneously by the military defeats – actual or effective – suffered by the United States and Western allies since 1989 (e.g., Iraq and Afghanistan), and the economic dislocation experienced by massive numbers of working-class citizens as a result of neo-liberal economic and immigration policies. We see also the failure of liberalism in an increasingly tyrannical state-corporate nexus that governs every minute aspect of our lives. Instead, we see today the emergence of a political alternative whose purpose is not simply to advance economic and social liberalism at all costs. It was interesting that two days after the election, Fukuyama published an essay in the Financial Times declaring that classical liberalism had been decisively defeated. So the irony is that the end of history lasted, at most, only 35 years.

ZEIT: What does this mean for the USA?

Deneen: Many Americans grew up feeling that if you work hard, follow the rules, get a job, show up on time and do your duty, you can expect a certain level of economic security and social health. This faith did not require admission to top universities or elite programs, but was available as a kind of “public utility,” an implicit contract offered to anyone willing to contribute to the American dream. Trump has appealed especially to more downscale voters who believe that this contract has been broken, and today instead experience profound economic precarity and social insecurity.

Formerly, the Democrats had been the champions of the working class, but over the past fifty years graduatlly abandoned that constituency in favor “identity politics,” forming a coalition of groups that could claim special status due to grievances from past injustices. The former working-class backbone of the Democratic party were relabeled as “deplorables” by Hillary Clinton in 2016, an admission that was widely shared, if unspoken, in the Democratic party. The most recent election has decisively shown that the identity-based politics of the Democrats has no real future, and that instead the working class now increasingly supports the “Grand Old Party” that was historically aligned with business interests and the wealthy. The Republicans increasingly resemble the old Democratic Party. They will be a party that is economically “progressive” (or, more egalitarian), but more socially conservative at the same time. In other words, the old Democratic party from which Joe Biden emerged, but ceased to be recognizable during his years as Vice-President and then President.

ZEIT: And what will become of the Democrats?

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