By the 1980s, America moved to a culture of fragmentation. Americans live in a completely marketized society, and they see themselves as atomized individuals practicing something like a John Wayne-style individualism. Mediating organization like churches, unions, and lodges were losing influence, and the ordinary citizen came more and more under the sway of the market values espoused by corporate America. The focus was not on institutions and community; it was on individuals, contingency, impermanence, acqiring things, greed, and choice. Society became disaggregated, and people thought in terms of the individual and far less about his connection to society.
Given these circumstances, it should not come as a surprise that the Republican narrative became dominant and there was great impatience with talk of social justice and providing for those in need.
A disgust with institutions marks contemporary times. It seems to have begun with the near collapse of the churches in Europe and the serious decline of mainline churches in the United States. The distrust of institutions, coupled with dislike of authority and grand narratives, spread to politics and has produced strong anti-government feelings. The Right skilfully tied Democrats to government and many rejected the Democrats because they disliked government. Of course, they still want the benefits they have coming from Washington.
Significant segments of the American population became depoliticized. They are disgusted, pessimistic, demoralized, and indifferent. Their absence from the process made it possible for the political center to shift to the right. Many of those who became indifferent are working people and poor who feel beaten down by the system and betrayed by the Democrats who too often seemed to let them down.
At the same time,those parts of secondary school and university curricula that passed on the wisdom of the past took a big hit. Literature, philosophy, and languages are history have been seriously downgraded. Though their contents may not have been absolutely perfect, they did sew the seeds of compassion, community spirit, justice, and critical-thinking skills. Economic thought has shifted toward laissez-faire; social bonds have thinned out; and there are very few cohesive sources of meaning. American society has become so fragmented that many become confused about who they are.
There was greater skepticism of grand narratives and more distrust of traditional authority. The first of these tendencies led people to show less interest in asking big questions and challenging things as they are. The results of the second tendency were more complicated. Often authority figures reinforce what is, so ignoring them was not a problem. But some traditional authorities have questioned wars of choice, victimization of the poor, and economic exploitation of workers and consumers. Ignoring these people strengthened a status quo increasingly dictated by corporate power.
On the other hand, these tendencies have enable people to partly liberate themselves from some harmful social conventions. Since the 1960s, people have more freedom in their lifestyles and there has been greater toleration of lifestyles that were once condemned. The same cultural currents same tendencies that have weakened institutions and idea-structures that supported a liberal democracy produced sexual and life-style liberation. They benefited reactionary elements in society by stripping away the support structures for the liberal consensus born in the New Deal; and they also gave reactionaries many fairly trivial things to rail against as a result of sexual liberation movements and increased tolerance.
Sociologists have written tomes about the distinction between Gemeinschaft, the traditional community that facilitates warm and intimate ties between people, and Gesellschaft, the modern society that is impersonal and forbidding. Of course, there was no way of going back to the traditional society, but the New Deal consensus provided ways for the co-existence of community and the greater modern society.
Before these cultural currents took full effect, families were strong; there were strong mediating institutions such as churches, lodges, ethnic societies, and unions. A safety net of sorts existed; economic and labor regulations were in place and enforced, and there was a widespread belief that unmitigated Lockean selfishness was not good for society or the economy. There was a widespread belief that the individual should be seen as an end and not a means. Maybe that was an illusion that was bound to fade. Aristotle and many other thinkers knew, this society inevitably must be grounded in military and economic expediency, and the individual must be seen as a means, not an end.
The youthful counterculture of the 1960s began by championing many communitarian values, but, in the end, it seemed to drive a wedge between generations. Initially, the young people tried to help and enlist the support of the working class, but the latter was put off by what it saw as immorality and a lack of patriotism among the young protesters. In time, the youth saw working Americans as supporters of an unjust war and repression at home. Blue collar workers associated the youth with the new coalition that took over over the Democratic Party. Blue collar Democrats disliked the young people of the counterculture because of their lifestyles and anti-Vietnam War sentiments. Other factions in the coalition that seemed to run the party were intellectuals, blacks, feminists, and gays. The McGovern wing of the party seemed to think it could win elections without the white ethnics. The party paid little attention of the white workers in the decaying Rustbelt cities, and those workers felt they were being taken for granted. Many revolted, becoming “Reagan Democrats.”
The the decline of family and mediating institution, growing distrust of authority,institutions, government,and grand narratives combined with increased fragmentation of society all contributed to the triumph of corporate America. Little remained in place to challenge a harsh and selfish worldview from penetrating the outlooks of growing numbers of Americans.
The weakened worldview of the New Deal remained, but it lost force as many political liberals turned away from the old New Deal narrative, and liberal forces seemed to fragment along racial, gender, and cultural lines. The liberals proved unable to construct another grand narrative to fit the circumstances of the age. Changed economic circumstances,
The people who moved to a worldview that rejected community and exulted the individual wanted to have their cake and to eat it too. They wanted small government in some areas and big, intrusive government in others. But they would never own up to the latter.
They were shocked by many changers in society and they fell back into what scholars call restorationism. They wanted to revert to what they thought were the good, old days, when evangelical Protestantism was supreme. They want legislation against abortion and gays. Catholics, who suffered in the days of evangelical power, joined in through efforts to punish people in their church who want to liberalize it, favor women's rights, or tolerate abortion to the extent that they do not automatically for Republicans. Those traditionalist/restorationist Catholics are so swept up in the panic of the restorationists and revitalizationists that they were willing to scrap all the peace and economic justice teachings that had been the glory of their church. In Rome, like-minded restorationists seemed bent on bringing back the Latin mass and punishing anyone who spoke in favor of considering the ordination of women. The Vatican did not scrap Catholic peace and social teachings, but there were powerful forces there—led by American cardinals-- that wanted to relegate them, along with Vatican II, to the past.
The cultural currents discussed here helped undermine the New Deal Consensus that supported human rights, economic justice, and a safety net for all citizens. But these same currents could not prevent a new meta-narrative from replacing the old one. The new cultural currents was not supposed to make room for meta narratives or “truth,” but the conventional wisdom offered by free marketeers and corporate America seemed to function as a new meta-narrative for people who discarded the New Deal consensus that had reigned until the late 1960s. It also appealed to the contemporary emphasis on individualism and choice. Some would argue that human nature required some contact with the universal and that the free market gospel met this need that so many felt. It also had the virtues of being simple and optimistic.