William Epstein
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- February 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780190467067
- eISBN:
- 9780190865948
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190467067.001.0001
- Subject:
- Social Work, Social Policy
The Masses Are the Ruling Classes handles a neglected theme: social policy in the United States is determined by mass consent. Contemporary explanations of decision making in the United States ...
More
The Masses Are the Ruling Classes handles a neglected theme: social policy in the United States is determined by mass consent. Contemporary explanations of decision making in the United States typically attribute power over policy making to a variety of hidden forces and illegitimate elites, holding the masses innocent of their own problems. Yet the enormous openness of the society and nearly universal suffrage sustain democratic consent as more plausible than the alternatives (conspiracy, propaganda, usurpation, autonomous government, and imperfect pluralism). Despite the multitude of problems that the nation faces, its citizens are not oppressed. The core problem that blocks the maturation of American society is not democratic participation, but its content; popular preferences are romantic rather than pragmatic. None of these programs achieve their ends of poverty reduction or behavioral change. Rather, they persist as testimonials to America’s romantic preferences. Thus, if the American people are largely responsible for social policy, then they are also responsible for the problems that beset the nation, notably enormous economic and social inequality. If the masses rule policy choice, then the persistence of material and social deprivation that lies easily within the economic capacities of the nation to address suggests that the nation abides its inequalities and suffering. The commitment of American society to policy romanticism and its rejection of pragmatism blocks its social development.Less
The Masses Are the Ruling Classes handles a neglected theme: social policy in the United States is determined by mass consent. Contemporary explanations of decision making in the United States typically attribute power over policy making to a variety of hidden forces and illegitimate elites, holding the masses innocent of their own problems. Yet the enormous openness of the society and nearly universal suffrage sustain democratic consent as more plausible than the alternatives (conspiracy, propaganda, usurpation, autonomous government, and imperfect pluralism). Despite the multitude of problems that the nation faces, its citizens are not oppressed. The core problem that blocks the maturation of American society is not democratic participation, but its content; popular preferences are romantic rather than pragmatic. None of these programs achieve their ends of poverty reduction or behavioral change. Rather, they persist as testimonials to America’s romantic preferences. Thus, if the American people are largely responsible for social policy, then they are also responsible for the problems that beset the nation, notably enormous economic and social inequality. If the masses rule policy choice, then the persistence of material and social deprivation that lies easily within the economic capacities of the nation to address suggests that the nation abides its inequalities and suffering. The commitment of American society to policy romanticism and its rejection of pragmatism blocks its social development.
William M. Epstein
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- February 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780190467067
- eISBN:
- 9780190865948
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190467067.003.0011
- Subject:
- Social Work, Social Policy
The Conclusion argues that the nation’s attachment to policy romanticism prevents its social maturation. Incorporating freely chosen, widely cherished values, policy romanticism remains antagonistic ...
More
The Conclusion argues that the nation’s attachment to policy romanticism prevents its social maturation. Incorporating freely chosen, widely cherished values, policy romanticism remains antagonistic to liberal democracy, or at least to the Enlightenment hopes for social progress. Americans are not innocent of American problems. The nation’s problems are created as the effects of consensual, embedded norms. In contrast, the control of social policy making by illegitimate elites is so improbable that mass preference and mass consent would seem to be a logical default position. Mass consent should be specifically refuted with hard evidence of conspiracies of one sort or another before considering other explanations. The political passivity of Americans signaling contentment or at least acceptance is a more reasonable surmise than the success of hidden evil forces in pacifying the population through a narcosis of liquor, drugs, and the nearly infinite diversions of numbing entertainment.Less
The Conclusion argues that the nation’s attachment to policy romanticism prevents its social maturation. Incorporating freely chosen, widely cherished values, policy romanticism remains antagonistic to liberal democracy, or at least to the Enlightenment hopes for social progress. Americans are not innocent of American problems. The nation’s problems are created as the effects of consensual, embedded norms. In contrast, the control of social policy making by illegitimate elites is so improbable that mass preference and mass consent would seem to be a logical default position. Mass consent should be specifically refuted with hard evidence of conspiracies of one sort or another before considering other explanations. The political passivity of Americans signaling contentment or at least acceptance is a more reasonable surmise than the success of hidden evil forces in pacifying the population through a narcosis of liquor, drugs, and the nearly infinite diversions of numbing entertainment.
William M. Epstein
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- February 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780190467067
- eISBN:
- 9780190865948
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190467067.003.0009
- Subject:
- Social Work, Social Policy
Chapter 8 describes and evaluates the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP (food stamps). It demonstrates its serious shortcomings and interprets the program as an expression of mass ...
More
Chapter 8 describes and evaluates the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP (food stamps). It demonstrates its serious shortcomings and interprets the program as an expression of mass values. The food stamp program in the United States remains as it always was: convoluted, inadequate, and frequently unfair, even after more than half a century of priority concern from a number of presidents, as well as congressional attention recorded in thousands of pages of panels, investigations, hearings, and reports. For all its wealth, it is not clear that the United States has ensured access for its citizens to “a nutritionally adequate low-cost diet.” Yet its design embodies the assumptions of policy romanticism unreasonably insisting on self-reliance.Less
Chapter 8 describes and evaluates the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP (food stamps). It demonstrates its serious shortcomings and interprets the program as an expression of mass values. The food stamp program in the United States remains as it always was: convoluted, inadequate, and frequently unfair, even after more than half a century of priority concern from a number of presidents, as well as congressional attention recorded in thousands of pages of panels, investigations, hearings, and reports. For all its wealth, it is not clear that the United States has ensured access for its citizens to “a nutritionally adequate low-cost diet.” Yet its design embodies the assumptions of policy romanticism unreasonably insisting on self-reliance.
William M. Epstein
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- February 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780190467067
- eISBN:
- 9780190865948
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190467067.003.0010
- Subject:
- Social Work, Social Policy
Chapter 9 describes the food stamp program as inseparable from the romantic certainties that gave rise to the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunities Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA). It ...
More
Chapter 9 describes the food stamp program as inseparable from the romantic certainties that gave rise to the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunities Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA). It focuses on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). The characteristics of food stamp recipients and welfare recipients generally and the performance of welfare programs—objective social need and response—are less germane to the American people than their beliefs in virtue. Those beliefs are sustained by faith in an imagined tradition more than by social reality or even the effects that those beliefs have on the conditions of need. Food stamp benefits, taken together with all means-tested welfare programs, are inadequate to routinely raise recipients out of poverty. Serious deprivation remains widespread. Rather than relieve poverty, these public welfare programs ceremonialize the tenets of policy romanticism.Less
Chapter 9 describes the food stamp program as inseparable from the romantic certainties that gave rise to the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunities Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA). It focuses on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). The characteristics of food stamp recipients and welfare recipients generally and the performance of welfare programs—objective social need and response—are less germane to the American people than their beliefs in virtue. Those beliefs are sustained by faith in an imagined tradition more than by social reality or even the effects that those beliefs have on the conditions of need. Food stamp benefits, taken together with all means-tested welfare programs, are inadequate to routinely raise recipients out of poverty. Serious deprivation remains widespread. Rather than relieve poverty, these public welfare programs ceremonialize the tenets of policy romanticism.