“Whereas youth on the left came into ascendancy during the 1960s and early 1970s, the other wing of this generation came into prominence during the mid-1970s and 1980s and began to take over the seats of institutional power. The 1960s must be seen, then, within this larger context: not only as fostering protests on the left, but also as nurturing a new generation of leaders on the right. Much of the conservative backlash of the 1970s and 1980s was led by people of the same age as leftist activists, not the older generation.” In A Generation Divided, Rebecca Klatch argues that whereas the story of the New Left has been told many times (though still not adequately), “the untold story of the 1960s is about the New Right.” In order to provide a more balanced perspective, she presents a parallel history of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) and Young Americans for Freedom (YAF), the leading youth organizations of, respectively, the left and the right. Klatch borrows from Karl Mannheim’s essay “The Problem of Generations” to claim that members of the SDS and YAF shared a common generational experience that was worked up differently because of their different social backgrounds. In other words, a generation is composed of “separate and even antagonistic generation-units,” which, importantly, are partially shaped by their orientation toward each other. Klatch’s sociological approach is on rather theoretically dubious grounds when it attempts to reduce politics to the “realization” and “affirmation” of identity. The academic neutrality that makes her project possible is openly a-political, but arguably also anti-political. Despite these and other problems with the book, A Generation Divided offers a helpful history of the conservative organizations and ideologies that have come to dominate the contemporary political landscape. The Cold War was responsible for the founding of YAF. The Soviet launching of sputnik in 1957 led Eisenhower to set up a program that offered loans for science education but also required a controversial loyalty oath. In support of the program, a group of young students on the right formed the National Student Committee for a Loyalty Oath. In 1960, this group organized a conference at the estate of William F. Buckley with the goal of creating a national conservative youth organization. Klatch makes much of the fact that “YAF began in 1960, the same year as Students for a Democratic Society.” Growing quickly after its inaugural 1960 convention, SDS initially focused on civil rights issues. Tom Hayden was put in charge of drafting a statement for the 1962 conference in Port Huron, Michigan, and the result was the famed Port Huron Statement, one of the most widely read documents of the 1960s left. Klatch attempts to position the Sharon Statement as the right’s equivalent to the Port Huron Statement. The Sharon Statement was drafted for the conference as Buckley’s estate in Sharon, Connecticut. The document affirmed “the transcendent values of individual free will and liberty; the inextricable bond between economic and political freedom; the purpose of government as protecting freedom through preservation of internal order, national defense, and the administration of justice; the genius of the Constitution, especially the clause reserving primacy to the states; and the market economy as the single system compatible with freedom. . . . Communism is named as the greatest threat to liberty.” When the statement was read at the conference, it received a standing ovation. Klatch emphasizes SDS was heavily concerned with racial inequality, whereas YAF simply didn’t address it: “While for YAF liberty was of supreme import, for SDS equality was of utmost concern.” But there were similarities between the SDS and YAF in their early years. Both groups “expressed suspicion toward large-scale organization,” and during “these early years SDS even expressed limited support for free enterprise and democratic capitalism.” During the early 1960s, both groups, despite their sense of alienation from the mainstream, “were still oriented toward mainstream politics. . . . each believed in changing society through reforming its institutions.” The right was more willing to recognize these shared traits: “Although certain members of YAF recognized common ground with SDS, all the commentary by SDS members was critical of YAF.” Each group was propelled into “becoming political” by different factors: “For SDS activists, the civil rights movement and the Vietnam War were the primary factors instituting action, while for YAF activists the 1964 Goldwater campaign and anticommunism were the main impetuses to action.” Klatch adds, “Goldwater’s campaign acted as a beacon for young conservatives much in the way the civil rights movement did for young leftists.” Conservatives were excited by Goldwater’s individualism and apparent “challenge to the establishment.” Goldwater’s campaign was central to the building of a national Republican force that would result in victories by Nixon and Reagan. YAF activities included: “anti-Communist action, such as organization of consumer boycotts against corporations selling products to Eastern Europe or in support of ‘captive nations’; activities to support the war in Vietnam including campus demonstrations, shipment of medical supplies and reading material to Vietnam, and education around the war; activities to counter the left on campus, for example, counter-demonstrations, support for ROTC, and recruitment of conservative faculty; involvement in electoral politics including the Goldwater campaign as well as other national and local candidates; and educational activities such as speakers’ bureaus and work on local or national YAF publications.” The traditionalist side of the young conservatives rarely swerved from its political position, and “the ostracism traditionalists increasingly faced as the 1960s progressed merely acted to reaffirm their beliefs, further binding them to the conservative cause.” One YAF member, ignorant of the irony, even compared conservatives to racial minorities: “to be a young conservative in the sixties was to be . . . an untouchable, a pariah, a Jew in Syria, a black in South Africa.” As is well known, the left became increasingly radicalized as the decade went on. More surprisingly, conservative libertarians also became radicalized during the period, leading to a paradoxical convergence of left and right. “This overlap between the left and right speaks to the peculiarities of American political ideology. Specifically, an affinity for values such as individual freedom, the impulse against bureaucracy and big government, the questioning of centralized authority, and the embrace of decentralization and local control are common to both left and right.” Many libertarians became opposed to the draft because it interfered with individual liberty and joined with the left in protesting the Vietnam War. “Although libertarians took a strong stance against the war, unlike their leftist counterparts they believed that both the North and South Vietnamese camps were corrupt.” “Accompanying this turn against government, by the end of the decade over half of libertarians [interviewed by Klatch] shifted their identification, using the term ‘anarchist’ to describe themselves politically.” The counterculture was another issues that split both the SDS and YAF and led to surprising convergences between them. “A portion of activists in both groups rejected the counterculture, dismissing it as self-indulgent and destructive, while another portion in each organization embraced this youth movement. For libertarians in YAF the counterculture offered a means to reformulate beliefs, provoking radicalization that forged further bonds with their counterparts on the left.” Libertarians were open to the counterculture because it “symbolized individual freedom, liberty of the mind and spirit. It also represented a stance against institutions, being critical of the system.” Drug use particularly split the right, with traditionalists condemning it and libertarians arguing it was a matter of individual choice. As is well known, the SDS exploded at its 1969 convention, which gave birth to the Weatherman. The traditionalists and libertarians also broke out into conflict at the 1969 YAF convention. The draft was the dividing issue. The traditionalists adopted Goldwater’s plan for “a volunteer army and the gradual abolition of the draft,” whereas the libertarians supported “active resistance to the draft by legal or illegal evasion.” As the disagreement unfolded, one libertarian burned his draft card on the stage, an act the traditionalists found scandalous and were furious about. Later in the evening, the libertarians that hadn’t already left were driven out when traditionalists began chanting “Kill the libertarians!” The expelled libertarians immediately began to set up contacts with the SDS, creating an organization called the Society for Individual Liberty (SIL). The traditionalists soon after “systematically purged libertarians from YAF” and resolved that anarchism was inconsistent with the Sharon statement. This split in the right gave birth to the libertarian movement, and the Libertarian Party was founded in 1971. During the 1970s, the left, both above ground and underground, continued to operate outside of the mainstream of society and politics. Traditionalists instead “became integrated into mainstream politics. Using the skills and resources they acquired through their activism in YAF, as adults they worked for conservative causes within mainstream institutions.” “While leftists were protesting on the streets, dropping out of school, and stepping off professional career paths, traditionalists were building up their ‘career capital’ by accumulating skills and experience that were stepping stones for employment in mainstream institutions.” The “traditionalists acquired positions of political power during the 1980s and 1990s as the conservative wing of the 1960s generation ascended to power, forming an influential new movement, called the New Right.” “In contrast, the main base for leftists and libertarians has been colleges, universities, and other educational institutions. Their influence comes mainly through teaching and scholarly research, rather than through traditional political means.”
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Rebecca Klatch: A Generation Divided
“Whereas youth on the left came into ascendancy during the 1960s and early 1970s, the other wing of this generation came into prominence during the mid-1970s and 1980s and began to take over the seats of institutional power. The 1960s must be seen, then, within this larger context: not only as fostering protests on the left, but also as nurturing a new generation of leaders on the right. Much of the conservative backlash of the 1970s and 1980s was led by people of the same age as leftist activists, not the older generation.” In A Generation Divided, Rebecca Klatch argues that whereas the story of the New Left has been told many times (though still not adequately), “the untold story of the 1960s is about the New Right.” In order to provide a more balanced perspective, she presents a parallel history of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) and Young Americans for Freedom (YAF), the leading youth organizations of, respectively, the left and the right. Klatch borrows from Karl Mannheim’s essay “The Problem of Generations” to claim that members of the SDS and YAF shared a common generational experience that was worked up differently because of their different social backgrounds. In other words, a generation is composed of “separate and even antagonistic generation-units,” which, importantly, are partially shaped by their orientation toward each other. Klatch’s sociological approach is on rather theoretically dubious grounds when it attempts to reduce politics to the “realization” and “affirmation” of identity. The academic neutrality that makes her project possible is openly a-political, but arguably also anti-political. Despite these and other problems with the book, A Generation Divided offers a helpful history of the conservative organizations and ideologies that have come to dominate the contemporary political landscape. The Cold War was responsible for the founding of YAF. The Soviet launching of sputnik in 1957 led Eisenhower to set up a program that offered loans for science education but also required a controversial loyalty oath. In support of the program, a group of young students on the right formed the National Student Committee for a Loyalty Oath. In 1960, this group organized a conference at the estate of William F. Buckley with the goal of creating a national conservative youth organization. Klatch makes much of the fact that “YAF began in 1960, the same year as Students for a Democratic Society.” Growing quickly after its inaugural 1960 convention, SDS initially focused on civil rights issues. Tom Hayden was put in charge of drafting a statement for the 1962 conference in Port Huron, Michigan, and the result was the famed Port Huron Statement, one of the most widely read documents of the 1960s left. Klatch attempts to position the Sharon Statement as the right’s equivalent to the Port Huron Statement. The Sharon Statement was drafted for the conference as Buckley’s estate in Sharon, Connecticut. The document affirmed “the transcendent values of individual free will and liberty; the inextricable bond between economic and political freedom; the purpose of government as protecting freedom through preservation of internal order, national defense, and the administration of justice; the genius of the Constitution, especially the clause reserving primacy to the states; and the market economy as the single system compatible with freedom. . . . Communism is named as the greatest threat to liberty.” When the statement was read at the conference, it received a standing ovation. Klatch emphasizes SDS was heavily concerned with racial inequality, whereas YAF simply didn’t address it: “While for YAF liberty was of supreme import, for SDS equality was of utmost concern.” But there were similarities between the SDS and YAF in their early years. Both groups “expressed suspicion toward large-scale organization,” and during “these early years SDS even expressed limited support for free enterprise and democratic capitalism.” During the early 1960s, both groups, despite their sense of alienation from the mainstream, “were still oriented toward mainstream politics. . . . each believed in changing society through reforming its institutions.” The right was more willing to recognize these shared traits: “Although certain members of YAF recognized common ground with SDS, all the commentary by SDS members was critical of YAF.” Each group was propelled into “becoming political” by different factors: “For SDS activists, the civil rights movement and the Vietnam War were the primary factors instituting action, while for YAF activists the 1964 Goldwater campaign and anticommunism were the main impetuses to action.” Klatch adds, “Goldwater’s campaign acted as a beacon for young conservatives much in the way the civil rights movement did for young leftists.” Conservatives were excited by Goldwater’s individualism and apparent “challenge to the establishment.” Goldwater’s campaign was central to the building of a national Republican force that would result in victories by Nixon and Reagan. YAF activities included: “anti-Communist action, such as organization of consumer boycotts against corporations selling products to Eastern Europe or in support of ‘captive nations’; activities to support the war in Vietnam including campus demonstrations, shipment of medical supplies and reading material to Vietnam, and education around the war; activities to counter the left on campus, for example, counter-demonstrations, support for ROTC, and recruitment of conservative faculty; involvement in electoral politics including the Goldwater campaign as well as other national and local candidates; and educational activities such as speakers’ bureaus and work on local or national YAF publications.” The traditionalist side of the young conservatives rarely swerved from its political position, and “the ostracism traditionalists increasingly faced as the 1960s progressed merely acted to reaffirm their beliefs, further binding them to the conservative cause.” One YAF member, ignorant of the irony, even compared conservatives to racial minorities: “to be a young conservative in the sixties was to be . . . an untouchable, a pariah, a Jew in Syria, a black in South Africa.” As is well known, the left became increasingly radicalized as the decade went on. More surprisingly, conservative libertarians also became radicalized during the period, leading to a paradoxical convergence of left and right. “This overlap between the left and right speaks to the peculiarities of American political ideology. Specifically, an affinity for values such as individual freedom, the impulse against bureaucracy and big government, the questioning of centralized authority, and the embrace of decentralization and local control are common to both left and right.” Many libertarians became opposed to the draft because it interfered with individual liberty and joined with the left in protesting the Vietnam War. “Although libertarians took a strong stance against the war, unlike their leftist counterparts they believed that both the North and South Vietnamese camps were corrupt.” “Accompanying this turn against government, by the end of the decade over half of libertarians [interviewed by Klatch] shifted their identification, using the term ‘anarchist’ to describe themselves politically.” The counterculture was another issues that split both the SDS and YAF and led to surprising convergences between them. “A portion of activists in both groups rejected the counterculture, dismissing it as self-indulgent and destructive, while another portion in each organization embraced this youth movement. For libertarians in YAF the counterculture offered a means to reformulate beliefs, provoking radicalization that forged further bonds with their counterparts on the left.” Libertarians were open to the counterculture because it “symbolized individual freedom, liberty of the mind and spirit. It also represented a stance against institutions, being critical of the system.” Drug use particularly split the right, with traditionalists condemning it and libertarians arguing it was a matter of individual choice. As is well known, the SDS exploded at its 1969 convention, which gave birth to the Weatherman. The traditionalists and libertarians also broke out into conflict at the 1969 YAF convention. The draft was the dividing issue. The traditionalists adopted Goldwater’s plan for “a volunteer army and the gradual abolition of the draft,” whereas the libertarians supported “active resistance to the draft by legal or illegal evasion.” As the disagreement unfolded, one libertarian burned his draft card on the stage, an act the traditionalists found scandalous and were furious about. Later in the evening, the libertarians that hadn’t already left were driven out when traditionalists began chanting “Kill the libertarians!” The expelled libertarians immediately began to set up contacts with the SDS, creating an organization called the Society for Individual Liberty (SIL). The traditionalists soon after “systematically purged libertarians from YAF” and resolved that anarchism was inconsistent with the Sharon statement. This split in the right gave birth to the libertarian movement, and the Libertarian Party was founded in 1971. During the 1970s, the left, both above ground and underground, continued to operate outside of the mainstream of society and politics. Traditionalists instead “became integrated into mainstream politics. Using the skills and resources they acquired through their activism in YAF, as adults they worked for conservative causes within mainstream institutions.” “While leftists were protesting on the streets, dropping out of school, and stepping off professional career paths, traditionalists were building up their ‘career capital’ by accumulating skills and experience that were stepping stones for employment in mainstream institutions.” The “traditionalists acquired positions of political power during the 1980s and 1990s as the conservative wing of the 1960s generation ascended to power, forming an influential new movement, called the New Right.” “In contrast, the main base for leftists and libertarians has been colleges, universities, and other educational institutions. Their influence comes mainly through teaching and scholarly research, rather than through traditional political means.”
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