When we talk about where people stand on the political spectrum, our long-standing practice has been to describe them in terms of being “left” and “right.”
But do those terms even make sense any more?
Since New Deal days, our habit in America has been to say that Republicans are generally on the right, while Democrats are said to occupy the left. Extreme conservatives are characterized as “right wingers,” while ultra-liberals are called “lefties.”
So where do these terms come from, anyway? Well, the roots of the practice go back to the French Revolution, when, in the parliament of 1791, politicians who supported the monarchy (“Feuillants”) sat on the right hand side of the chamber, while those favoring radical change (“Montagnards”) clustered on the left.
That may have made some sense then. But like many things that are more than 200 years old, this habit of thought has become both rigid and sloppy – and increasingly inaccurate. I’m beginning to think a far better way of looking at today’s political and policy differences is along past-oriented vs. future-oriented lines.
For example, take the labor movement — or some parts of it, anyway. Traditionally, organized labor has been clumped on the left, along with liberals, Democrats and other such. Management has been placed on the right, along with conservatives. But then take a careful look at the way unions and management often behave. Too often, both sides are working to try and preserve work rules and compensation structures of the past, often embalmed in a written contract. This has direct relevance to the ongoing problems of the domestic auto makers. While it would be too simplistic to blame all the auto industry’s problems on this type of thinking, it is true that labor and management have been historically reluctant to change the way the industry has been organized and run since the 1940s.
That attitude was on sad display last month, when the nation was treated to the sad spectacle of the leaders of the Detroit Three and the United Auto Workers union being pilloried before the Congress as out of touch and unwilling to change. But big auto is far from the only example. Others include:
Beer and Wine: The fight to protect an old monopoly.
For many years, the Michigan Beer and Wine Wholesalers Association has been among the most powerful lobbies in Lansing. Powered by those who own beer and wine distribution companies, the association has worked to preserve the “three tier” system governing the way beer and wine is sold.
That is a formula that was introduced in the 1930’s. Basically, it gave the distributors a monopoly on the distribution and sale of beer and wine – a monopoly they have fiercely defended over the years.
Yet they began to run into trouble in 2005 and thereafter, when federal courts repeatedly slapped down as unconstitutional the Michigan law protecting this monopoly. Out-of-state wineries and retailers began shipping wine into the state and to individual consumers, though shipments were few and far between and almost entirely of high-end wines to connoisseurs.
Last month, however, the beer and wine lobby reacted, slipping through a House committee a bill that would bar out of state retailers – but not wineries – from shipping wine and liquor into Michigan.
The Michigan Liquor Control Commission joined in, fearful of losing its profitable monopoly on selling booze – a monopoly that has resulted in our prices being far higher than those in, for example, Chicago.
According to a report from the Michigan Bureau of Elections, the Michigan Beer & Wine Wholesalers Association political action committee has received contributions of at least $345,951 this year. That’s a lot of dough to spread around, especially to protect the past in the form of a long-standing monopoly that reduces consumer choice and drives up prices.
Great Lakes Shipping: New ways to prevent Great Lakes pollution.
Ever since the St. Lawrence Seaway opened the Great Lakes to trans-Atlantic shipping in 1959, there have been repeated instances of seagoing ships dumping th eir ballast into our lakes as they take on cargo. In the ballast water were various critters that originate elsewhere — Zebra Mussels, Spiny Water Fleas, and Round-headed Gobies, among others.
Here, they have rushed into what must be paradise for them; a new Great Lakes environment with no predators. For us, not so much. They’re called exotic invasives, and best estimate is that a new one gets established in our lakes ever six months. The damage has been enormous, and the problem threatens the ecology of the entire Great Lakes system.
Nevertheless, spearheaded by the United States Great Lakes Shipping Association, the industry has fought for years against any attempt to force ships either to dump their ballast at sea or to treat it, so as to kill any organisms that had hitched a ride into our lakes.
What this means is that the shippers have fought for years to preserve their profits while polluting a lake system that represents some 20 percent of all the earth’s surface drinkable fresh water.
Earlier this fall, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Michigan’s ballast water statute that obliges ships to obtain state permits and, if the ships discharge water, to treat the water to prevent introduction of invasives. The explicit purpose of the Michigan statute was to protect the Great Lakes for the future.
These two brief examples, neither corresponding to the standard right-left characterization of politics and policy, offer insight into how we might get a better understanding of policy disputes by changing our habits in describing them.
Once we do that, maybe we can then start to actually do something about our problems.
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Editor’s Note: Former newspaper publisher and University of Michigan Regent Phil Power is a longtime observer of Michigan politics and economics, and a former chairman of the Michigan chapter of the Nature Conservancy. He is also the founder and president of The Center for Michigan, a centrist think-and-do tank which publishes the Michigan Scorecard. The opinions expressed here are Power’s own and do not represent the official views of The Center. He welcomes your comments at ppower@thecenterformichigan.net.
