“文化战争”如何破坏民主
作者：扎克·斯坦顿 05/20/2021
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/05/20/culture-war-politics-2021-democracy-analysis-489900?
三十年前，社会学家詹姆斯·戴维森·亨特普及了文化战争的概念。 如今，他看到一场文化战争变得更加严重，这给美国实验的未来带来了麻烦。
抗议者举着跨性别权利、病毒规则抗议和反堕胎标语的插图
扎克·斯坦顿 (Zack Stanton) 是《POLITICO Playbook》的副主编。
1991 年，美国陷入了日益自由的世俗社会（推动变革）与保守的反对派（将其世界观植根于神圣经文）之间的斗争，詹姆斯·戴维森·亨特 (James Davison Hunter) 写了一本书，并用一个短语来描述他所看到的情况。 美国围绕堕胎、同性恋权利、公立学校宗教等问题的斗争：“文化战争”。
亨特是一名 30 多岁的弗吉尼亚大学社会学家，他并没有发明这个词，但他的书让这个词进入了公众的讨论，几年之内，它就被用作具有政治影响的文化热点的速记。 他希望通过引起人们对这一动态的关注，帮助美国“接受正在展开的冲突”，或许还能化解他所看到的一些正在酝酿的紧张局势。
相反，30年后，亨特认为美国在“战争”方面加倍努力——文化战争从宗教和家庭文化问题扩展到几乎完全接管政治，造成一种赢家通吃冲突的危险感觉 关乎国家的未来。
“在我看来，民主是一种协议，即我们不会因为分歧而互相残杀，而是通过对话解决这些分歧。 令人不安的部分原因在于，我开始看到暴力正当性的迹象，”亨特说道，他指出了 1 月 6 日的叛乱，当时唐纳德·特朗普的一群极端主义支持者冲进了美国国会大厦，试图推翻美国政府。 2020 年选举结果。 “文化战争总是先于激烈的战争。 它们不一定会导致一场枪战，但如果没有文化战争，就永远不会发生枪战，因为文化为暴力提供了理由。”
发生了什么变化？ 现任弗吉尼亚大学文化高级研究所所长的亨特表示，20 世纪下半叶的文化战争在某种程度上是一场“主要发生在白人中产阶级内部的文化冲突”。 但是，今天，随着冲突的加剧，“现在不仅仅是文化战争，而是一种阶级文化冲突”，这种冲突已经超越了宗教信仰的简单界限。
“早期的文化战争实际上是关于世俗化，立场与神学联系在一起，并在神学的基础上证明其合理性，”亨特说。 “现在情况不再是这样了。 你很少看到右翼人士将自己的立场植根于圣经神学或教会传统。 [现在]这种立场主要源于对灭绝的恐惧。”
1991 年，政治似乎仍然是我们解决有分歧的文化问题的工具； 现在，政治主要是由这些问题上的分歧推动的，领导人通过煽动对戴口罩、跨性别学生参加体育比赛、或援引“取消文化”的不满情绪，或是否可以教授许多建国之初的知识来获得权力。 父亲们有种族主义信仰。 而文化战争已经殖民美国政治这一现实令人不安，正是因为亨特在 1991 年对政治问题和文化战争之间的差异进行了观察：“在政治问题上，人们可以妥协；在政治问题上，人们可以妥协；在政治问题上，人们可以妥协。” 在终极道德真理的问题上，人们不能。”
那我们会怎样呢？ 这对未来几十年预示着什么？ 有没有办法弥合这些文化僵局？ 在这一切之中，还有乐观的理由吗？
为了理清这一切，《政治》杂志上周晚些时候与亨特通了电话。 下面是该对话的简明记录，为长度和清晰度进行了编辑。
问：让我们从一个基本问题开始：无论我们现在谈论的是 2021 年，还是 1991 年，当你的书《文化战争》出版时，我们所说的“文化战争”一词是什么意思？
詹姆斯·戴维森·亨特：嗯，在一个一切都政治化的世界里，人们有一种感觉，政治既是我们面临的问题的根源，也是最终的解决方案。 但我提出的更大的论点是，政治是文化的产物。 这是一种反思：文化支撑着我们的政治。
当谈到“文化战争”时，有两种思考方式。
“政治是文化的产物。 这是一种反思：文化支撑着我们的政治。”
一种——可能是最普遍的方式——是将其视为针对某些文化问题的政治斗争，例如堕胎、性、家庭价值观、政教问题等。 因此，“文化战争”实际上是围绕文化问题上的某些立场动员政治资源——人民、选票和政党。 从这个意义上说，“文化战争”实际上是关于政治的。
但更大的故事是关于支撑我们政治的文化，以及我们的政治如何成为更深层次文化倾向（而不仅仅是态度和价值观）的反映，而这些文化倾向超出了我们推理的能力。
当我们谈论“文化战争”时，实际上是指两件事。
简而言之，我会区分天气和气候。 几乎所有记者和大多数学者都关注天气变化：“今天，天气很冷。 明天，天气会很暖和。 第二天，会下雨。” 我发现正在发生的气候变化更有趣。 正是这些真正激发了我们的政治和两极分化，激发了民主内部的活力。
你在《文化战争》中看到的变化大部分发生在 30 年前——基本上是从 20 世纪 60 年代初开始，伴随着民权运动、性革命、同性恋权利运动、妇女解放运动以及随之而来的强烈抵制。 那本书出版至今已有 30 年了。 那时的文化战争发生了怎样的变化？
[近几十年来]发生了重要的人口和体制结构转变。 现代高等教育一直是启蒙运动的载体，从这个意义上来说，也是世俗化的载体。 二战后时期发生的是高等教育和知识经济的大规模扩张。 随之而来的是更大的文化转变：曾经是知识分子的领域现在变成了任何有机会接受高等教育的人的领域，高等教育成为进入中产阶级或中上层阶级生活的大门之一 被制作了。
随之而来的是深刻的文化变革。 六十年代的革命以及当时的政治、文化和性抗议基本上已经制度化，它挑战了正确、体面、善良、公平等基本概念。 在某种程度上，从 20 世纪 70 年代末到 80 年代和 90 年代，我们所面临的就是对结构性变革所带来的挑战的反应。 保守派——尤其是保守的基督徒，无论是天主教徒还是新教徒——发现自己对家庭结构、“家庭价值观”、性取向等进步观念持防御态度； 堕胎是一个——或者也许是——关键问题。
来自芝加哥的教会历史学家马丁·E·马蒂曾经说过，在《沃尔斯特德法案》和《斯科普斯审判》之后，福音派新教徒成为认知少数派——知识领域的少数派——但仍然是社会和行为上的多数派——他们基本上拥有美国中部。 此后我们看到的是这些结构性变化的延续。 启蒙运动和后启蒙运动文化由大学和其他重要文化机构承载，而这些文化机构由绝大多数进步人士主导。
“保守派认为这是一种生存威胁。 这是一个重要的短语：他们认为这是对他们的生活方式和他们视为神圣的事物的生存威胁。”
保守派认为这是一种生存威胁。 这是一个重要的短语：他们认为这是对他们的生活方式和他们认为神圣的事物的生存威胁。 因此，虽然早期的文化战争实际上是关于世俗化，而且立场与神学联系在一起，并在神学的基础上证明其合理性，但现在情况已不再如此。 你很少看到右翼人士将自己的立场植根于圣经神学或教会传统。 [现在]这种立场主要源于对灭绝的恐惧。
现在“文化战争”的分界线与 30 年前相比是否有所不同？
我认为，堕胎对于 70 年代、80 年代和 90 年代甚至更久远的[文化战争]来说意味着什么，当时它确实是一个关键问题，但我认为现在它已经被种族所取代。 早期的文化战争是主要发生在白人中产阶级内部的文化冲突。 这并不是说少数群体在这些问题上没有立场或者没有分裂，但种族从来都不是这场冲突的一个非常突出的部分。 我认为它重新出现的部分原因是，正如文化战争的早期表现最终是一场定义美国意义的斗争一样，这也是如此。 这些斗争中潜藏着关于美国意义的冲突。
“我认为，堕胎对于 70 年代、80 年代和 90 年代甚至更久远的[文化战争]来说意味着什么，当时它确实是一个关键问题，但我认为现在它已经被种族所取代。”
2008 年是非常重要的一年，因为大衰退凸显了白人中产阶级的一个重要区别。 它在中下层或工人阶级与训练有素、受过专业教育的经理、技术官僚和知识分子之间造成了隔阂——基本上是在顶层 20% 和底层 80% 之间。 这意味着现在存在着一些文化差异之上的阶级差异。 在我们在弗吉尼亚大学高级文化研究所进行的调查中，我们对此进行了跟踪。 2016年，决定特朗普投票的最重要因素是没有大学学位。
所以现在，不仅仅是文化战争，还存在一种阶级文化冲突。 由于我们感觉自己在全球经济及其动态中处于失败的一方，我认为这种怨恨情绪正在加深。 在特朗普执政的四年里，这一点变得越来越明显，特朗普自己的部分天才在于理解作为全球资本主义失败一方的怨恨。
我认为这也反映在进步人士谈论受压迫者的方式上：大多数时候，它是在种族和民族、移民等方面； 这本身与穷人无关。 我认为这是左派自我理解的一个相当重大的转变。
您认为这种转变背后的原因是什么？
好吧，如果你成为工人阶级的拥护者，你就会成为很多特朗普选民的拥护者。 再说一遍，我认为存在阶级文化鸿沟：阶级元素覆盖了文化鸿沟。 他们[未受过大学教育的白人选民]集体投票支持特朗普。 我认为这是其中的一个要素。 他们也是[一些左派]所认为的种族主义、厌恶女性主义、性别歧视的理解和生活方式的携带者。 这是我的猜测。
直截了当的唯物主义社会科学会说，人们一直在为自己的经济利益投票。 但他们没有。 人们投票反对自己的经济利益这一看似矛盾的现象只凸显了这一点：在许多方面，我们作为个人、社区和国家的自我理解胜过所有这些事情。
沿着这些思路，可能会出现一种倾向，特别是在政治左派中，将“文化战争”问题视为“干扰”，提出这些问题是为了分裂人们，否则这些人可能会在共同的经济利益上找到共同目标 。 您如何看待这种观点？
我们是由我们讲述的关于自己的故事构成的。 生命意义和目的的本质是由我们个人和集体的自我理解构成的。 我无法理解这是如何“分散注意力”的。
你知道，人们会为了一个想法、为了一个理想而战斗到底。 我在 90 年代初因使用“战争”一词（“文化战争”一词）而受到批评。 但我接受过现象学方面的培训，其中教导你要注意人们自己使用的词语。 在我对那些处于“文化战争”斗争前线的人进行的采访中，人们会说，“你知道，这感觉就像一场战争”——即使是左翼人士。
“我们是由我们讲述的关于自己的故事构成的。 ……我不明白这怎么会是一种‘干扰’。”
我谈论的是这种为自己的生存、生活方式而奋斗的感觉。 这正是左派也使用的语言，但以一种更具治疗性的方式。 例如，当你听到人们说保守派在大学校园中的存在“对我作为跨性别者或同性恋者的存在构成威胁”时，对他们来说，赌注似乎是终极的。
问题是：是什么激发了我们的热情？ 我不知道人们怎么能把个人和集体的身份——以及那些让生活变得有意义和有目的的东西——想象成某种外围的或“干扰”。
您 30 年前写过的一段话似乎与这一点相关：“我们巧妙地陷入了将争论本质上视为政治而非文化的争论。 在政治上，可以妥协；在政治上，可以妥协；在政治上，可以妥协。 在终极道德真理的问题上，人们不能。 这就是为什么今天的一系列问题似乎没完没了。”
我有点喜欢这句话。 [笑]我会这样说：文化就其本质而言，是霸权的。 它寻求殖民； 它试图包容其整体。 “文化”一词的词根是拉丁语：“cultus”。 这是关于我们神圣的事情。 对我们来说神圣的东西往往是普遍化的。 神圣的本质就在于它的特殊性。 这是无法提出的。
“我认为，堕胎对于 70 年代、80 年代和 90 年代甚至更久远的[文化战争]来说意味着什么，当时它确实是一个关键问题，但我认为现在它已经被种族所取代。”
2008 年是非常重要的一年，因为大衰退凸显了白人中产阶级的一个重要区别。 它在中下层或工人阶级与训练有素、受过专业教育的经理、技术官僚和知识分子之间造成了隔阂——基本上是在顶层 20% 和底层 80% 之间。 这意味着现在存在着一些文化差异之上的阶级差异。 在我们在弗吉尼亚大学高级文化研究所进行的调查中，我们对此进行了跟踪。 2016年，决定特朗普投票的最重要因素是没有大学学位。
所以现在，不仅仅是文化战争，还存在一种阶级文化冲突。 由于我们感觉自己在全球经济及其动态中处于失败的一方，我认为这种怨恨情绪正在加深。 在特朗普执政的四年里，这一点变得越来越明显，特朗普自己的部分天才在于理解作为全球资本主义失败一方的怨恨。
我认为这也反映在进步人士谈论受压迫者的方式上：大多数时候，它是在种族和民族、移民等方面； 这本身与穷人无关。 我认为这是左派自我理解的一个相当重大的转变。
您认为这种转变背后的原因是什么？
好吧，如果你成为工人阶级的拥护者，你就会成为很多特朗普选民的拥护者。 再说一遍，我认为存在阶级文化鸿沟：阶级元素覆盖了文化鸿沟。 他们[未受过大学教育的白人选民]集体投票支持特朗普。 我认为这是其中的一个要素。 他们也是[一些左派]所认为的种族主义、厌恶女性主义、性别歧视的理解和生活方式的携带者。 这是我的猜测。
直截了当的唯物主义社会科学会说，人们一直在为自己的经济利益投票。 但他们没有。 人们投票反对自己的经济利益这一看似矛盾的现象只凸显了这一点：在许多方面，我们作为个人、社区和国家的自我理解胜过所有这些事情。
沿着这些思路，可能会出现一种倾向，特别是在政治左派中，将“文化战争”问题视为“干扰”，提出这些问题是为了分裂人们，否则这些人可能会在共同的经济利益上找到共同目标 。 您如何看待这种观点？
我们是由我们讲述的关于自己的故事构成的。 生命意义和目的的本质是由我们个人和集体的自我理解构成的。 我无法理解这是如何“分散注意力”的。
你知道，人们会为了一个想法、为了一个理想而战斗到底。 我在 90 年代初因使用“战争”一词（“文化战争”一词）而受到批评。 但我接受过现象学方面的培训，其中教导你要注意人们自己使用的词语。 在我对那些处于“文化战争”斗争前线的人进行的采访中，人们会说，“你知道，这感觉就像一场战争”——即使是左翼人士。
“我们是由我们讲述的关于自己的故事构成的。 ……我不明白这怎么会是一种‘干扰’。”
我谈论的是这种为自己的生存、生活方式而奋斗的感觉。 这正是左派也使用的语言，但以一种更具治疗性的方式。 例如，当你听到人们说保守派在大学校园中的存在“对我作为跨性别者或同性恋者的存在构成威胁”时，对他们来说，赌注似乎是终极的。
问题是：是什么激发了我们的热情？ 我不知道人们怎么能把个人和集体的身份——以及那些让生活变得有意义和有目的的东西——想象成某种外围的或“干扰”。
您 30 年前写过的一段话似乎与这一点相关：“我们巧妙地陷入了将争论本质上视为政治而非文化的争论。 在政治上，可以妥协；在政治上，可以妥协；在政治上，可以妥协。 在终极道德真理的问题上，人们不能。 这就是为什么今天的一系列问题似乎没完没了。”
我有点喜欢这句话。 [笑]我会这样说：文化就其本质而言，是霸权的。 它寻求殖民； 它试图包容其整体。 “文化”一词的词根是拉丁语：“cultus”。 这是关于我们神圣的事情。 对我们来说神圣的东西往往是普遍化的。 神圣的本质就在于它的特殊性。 这是无法提出的。
换句话说，种族正义因成功而失败。 国际奴隶贸易于 1808 年结束。它产生了一种自满感：“哦，我们已经解决了这个问题。” 然而，在接下来的 50 年里，奴隶贸易和奴隶数量呈天文数字增长。 然后内战爆发并获胜：“哦，我们已经解决了这个问题。 现在我们可以继续前进了。” 它造成了自满情绪。 我认为这就是民权运动和[马丁·路德牧师]·金殉难之后发生的事情：这在某种程度上取得了巨大的成功，但造成了自满，尤其是在白人中——“我们已经解决了这个问题。 我们不需要再处理这个问题了”——事实上，持续的歧视仍在发生。 它再次代表了通过政治手段产生某种文化共识的尝试。 但这似乎不起作用。
从文化角度来说，真正考虑这个问题会是什么样子？
好吧，我在这里听起来真的很老套，但我认为这项工作需要很长时间而且很困难。 我认为你谈论了冲突。 不要忽视他们； 不要假装它们不存在。 无论你做什么，都不要简单地将你的观点强加给别人。 你必须和他们谈谈。 这是一项长期而艰苦的教育工作。
从社会学的层面来看，公民社会的全部意义在于提供介于个人与国家、或个人与经济之间的中介机构。 当他们这样做时，他们处于最佳状态：他们在调解，他们在教育。 我知道这种争论是“旧的”自由主义共识观点、“旧的”公共话语规则的一部分。 但替代方案是暴力。 我认为我们已经达到了这一点。
“文化战争总是先于激烈的战争。 它们不一定会导致一场枪战，但如果没有文化战争，就永远不会发生枪战，因为文化为暴力提供了理由。”
我继《文化战争》之后读的书名叫《开枪之前：在美国文化战争中寻找民主》。 我提出的论点是，文化战争总是先于激烈的战争。 它们不一定会导致一场枪战，但如果没有文化战争，就永远不会发生枪战，因为文化为暴力提供了理由。 我认为这就是我们现在的处境。 气候迹象非常令人担忧。
鉴于此，在这个“文化战争”不断、很大程度上由互联网推动的时代，您对美国的前景感到乐观吗？
看：在我看来，不抱希望——屈服于绝望——从来都不是一个选择。 我认为这是一个人必须采取的道德立场。 但我也不认为你告诉病人他们得了重感冒，而实际上他们患有危及生命的疾病。
在这种非常强大的机构和非常强大的文化逻辑之间的纠缠中，存在着根深蒂固的严重问题。 西欧和北美伟大的民主革命植根于启蒙运动的思想和文化革命； 启蒙运动为这些政治变革提供了保障。 如果美国的混合启蒙运动支撑了美国自由民主的诞生，那么现在是什么支撑了它呢？
“21世纪的自由民主将由什么支撑？ 对我来说，这并不明显。”
21世纪的自由民主将由什么支撑？ 对我来说，这并不明显。 这就是我现在正在解决的大难题。 但这与文化战争问题有关，因为如果我们没有任何共同点——如果我们没有共享的混合启蒙——那么我们可以利用什么资源来走到一起并找到任何形式的团结？
就好像没有统一的民族神话一样。 那些曾经在美国生活中占有一席之地的人现在却受到争论和文化战争的影响。
完全正确。 似乎确实存在的神话主要是技术官僚和反乌托邦的。 所以……我认为我们有麻烦了。 但我不确定你是否应该以此结束。
好吧，那么我就这样结束吧：美国是否有什么独特之处使其特别容易发生文化战争，或者这是理所当然的吗？
导致这一问题在美国尤为严重的部分原因是非营利性特殊利益集团的激增。 在欧洲你看不到这一点； 你在英国或德国找不到它。 这些政权更加集权，对非营利领域拥有更大的控制权。 [而在美国] 选边站队的特殊利益集团不断增多。 我们的很多慈善资金——与其他国家相比是一个巨大的数额——是通过这些奉行不留任何俘虏政策的慈善组织来输送的； 定义了敌人，定义了魔鬼，定义了某些方面的过犯。
他们都在战斗。 这又是您之前描述的一部分：它只是更广泛。 文化战争的范围似乎是无所不包的。
我有一个老式的观点，即我们应该做的是在采取行动之前先了解情况，而智慧取决于了解。 这基本上使我今天成为一个保守派，但按照保守派的标准，这也使我成为一个进步派。
How the 'Culture War' Could Break Democracy
By ZACK STANTON
Thirty years ago, sociologist James Davison Hunter popularized the concept of culture war. Today, he sees a culture war that’s gotten worse—and that spells trouble for the future of the American experiment.
Zack Stanton is deputy editor of POLITICO Playbook.
In 1991, with America gripped by a struggle between an increasingly liberal secular society that pushed for change and a conservative opposition that rooted its worldview in divine scripture, James Davison Hunter wrote a book and titled it with a phrase for what he saw playing out in America’s fights over abortion, gay rights, religion in public schools and the like: “Culture Wars.”
Hunter, a 30-something sociologist at the University of Virginia, didn’t invent the term, but his book vaulted it into the public conversation, and within a few years it was being used as shorthand for cultural flashpoints with political ramifications. He hoped that by calling attention to the dynamic, he’d help America “come to terms with the unfolding conflict” and, perhaps, defuse some of the tensions he saw bubbling.
Instead, 30 years later, Hunter sees America as having doubled down on the “war” part—with the culture wars expanding from issues of religion and family culture to take over politics almost totally, creating a dangerous sense of winner-take-all conflict over the future of the country.
“Democracy, in my view, is an agreement that we will not kill each other over our differences, but instead we’ll talk through those differences. And part of what’s troubling is that I’m beginning to see signs of the justification for violence,” says Hunter, noting the insurrection on January 6, when a mob of extremist supporters of Donald Trump stormed the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to overthrow the results of the 2020 election. “Culture wars always precede shooting wars. They don’t necessarily lead to a shooting war, but you never have a shooting war without a culture war prior to it, because culture provides the justifications for violence.”
What changed? In the latter half of the 20th century, the culture war was, on some level, a “cultural conflict that took place primarily within the white middle class,” says Hunter, who now leads the University of Virginia’s Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture. But, today, as that conflict has grown, “instead of just culture wars, there’s now a kind of class-culture conflict” that has moved beyond the simple boundaries of religiosity.
“The earlier culture war really was about secularization, and positions were tied to theologies and justified on the basis of theologies,” says Hunter. “That’s no longer the case. You rarely see people on the right rooting their positions within a biblical theology or ecclesiastical tradition. [Nowadays,] it is a position that is mainly rooted in fear of extinction.”
In 1991, politics still seemed like a vehicle through which we might resolve divisive cultural issues; now, politics is primarily fueled by division on those issues, with leaders gaining power by inflaming resentments on mask-wearing, or transgender students competing in athletics, or invocations of “cancel culture,” or whether it’s OK to teach that many of the Founding Fathers had racist beliefs. And this reality—that the culture war has colonized American politics—is troubling precisely because of an observation Hunter made in 1991 about the difference he saw between political issues and culture war fights: “On political matters, one can compromise; on matters of ultimate moral truth, one cannot.”
Where does that leave us? What does it portend for the decades to come? Is there a way to bridge these cultural impasses? And, amid all of this, is there a source for optimism?
To sort through it all, POLITICO Magazine spoke with Hunter on the phone late last week. A condensed transcript of that conversation is below, edited for length and clarity.
Q: Let’s start with a basic question: Whether we’re talking about 2021 or back in 1991, when your book, “Culture Wars,” came out, what is it that we mean by the term “culture war”?
James Davison Hunter: Well, in a world that has politicized everything, there’s a sense that politics is both the root cause of the problems we face and, ultimately, the solution. But the larger argument that I make is that politics is an artifact of culture. It’s a reflection: Culture underwrites our politics.
When it comes to “culture war,” there are two ways of thinking about it.
One — probably the most prevalent way—is to think of it as a political battle over certain kinds of cultural issues, like abortion, sexuality, family values, church-state issues, and so on. And therefore, the “culture war” is really about the mobilization of political resources —of people and votes and parties—around certain positions on cultural issues. In that sense, a “culture war” is really about politics.
But the bigger story is about the cultures that underwrite our politics, and the ways in which our politics become reflections of deeper cultural dispositions—not just attitudes and values—that go beyond our ability to reason about them.
When we talk about “culture war,” it’s really about both things.
In simpler terms, I would make the distinction between the weather and the climate. Almost all journalists and most academics focus on what’s happening in the weather: “Today, it’s cold. Tomorrow, it’s going to be warm. The next day, it’s going to rain.” I find the climatological changes that are taking place to be much more interesting. And it’s those that are really animating our politics and polarization, animating dynamics within democracy right now.
The changes you looked at in “Culture Wars” had largely happened over the 30 years prior—basically since the early 1960s, with the civil rights movement, sexual revolution, the gay rights movement, women’s lib and the backlashes that followed. It’s now 30 years since that book came out. How has the culture war changed in that time?
An important demographic and institutional structural shift took place [in recent decades]. Modern higher education has always been a carrier of the Enlightenment, and, in that sense, a carrier of secularization. What happened in the post-World War II period was a massive expansion of higher education and the knowledge-based economy. And with that came a larger cultural shift: What used to be the province of intellectuals now became the province of anyone who had access to higher education, and higher education became one of the gates through which the move to middle class or upper middle class life was made.
With that came profound cultural change. The ’60s revolution and the political, cultural and sexual protests at the time essentially became institutionalized, and it challenged fundamental notions of what was right, decent, good, fair and so on. And in a way, what you had in the late 1970s into the ’80s and ’90s was a reaction against the challenge represented by that structural change. Conservatives—especially conservative Christians, whether Catholic or Protestant—found themselves on the defensive against progressive notions of family structure, “family values,” sexuality; abortion was a—or maybe the—critical issue.
Martin E. Marty, the church historian from Chicago, once said that after the Volstead Act and the Scopes trial, evangelical Protestants became a cognitive minority—a minority within intellectual realms—but remained a social and behavioral majority—they basically owned middle America. What we have seen since is a continuation of those structural changes. The Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment culture got carried by universities [and] other important cultural institutions, and these cultural institutions are dominated by supermajorities of progressives.
Are the dividing lines of the “culture war” different now than they were, say, 30 years ago?
I would argue that what abortion was to [culture wars in] the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s and maybe even beyond, when it was really the critical issue, I think that’s now being replaced by race. The earlier culture wars were a cultural conflict that took place primarily within the white middle class. It’s not that minorities didn’t have positions [on those issues] or weren’t divided themselves, but race was never a very prominent part of that conflict. And I think it has reemerged in part because just as the earlier manifestations of the culture war were ultimately a struggle to define the meaning of America, this is also. Latent within these struggles is a conflict over the meaning of America.
So now, instead of just culture wars, there’s now a kind of class-culture conflict. With a sense of being on the losing side of our global economy and its dynamics, I think that the resentments have just deepened. That became obvious, more and more, over the four years of Trump, and part of Trump’s own genius was understanding the resentments of coming out on the losing side of global capitalism.
And I think this is reflected, too, in the ways in which progressives speak about the downtrodden: Most of the time, it is in terms of race and ethnicity, immigration and the like; it is not about the poor, per se. I think that’s a pretty significant shift in the left’s self-understanding.
What do you think is behind that shift?
Well, if you became an advocate for the working class, you’d be an advocate for a lot of Trump voters. Again, I think there’s a class-culture divide: a class element that overlays the cultural divide. And they [white non-college-educated voters] voted en masse for Trump. And I think that’s an element of it. They’re also the carriers of what [some on the left] perceive to be racist and misogynist, sexist understandings and ways of life. That’s my guess.
Straightforward, materialist social science would say that people are voting their economic interests all the time. But they don’t. The seeming contradiction of people voting against their economic interests only highlights that point: That, in many respects, our self-understanding as individuals, as communities and as a nation trumps all of those things.
Along those lines, there can be a tendency, especially on the political left, to talk about “culture war” issues as being “distractions” that are raised in order to divide people who might otherwise find common cause around, say, shared economic interests. What do you make of that view?
We are constituted as human beings by the stories we tell about ourselves. The very nature of meaning and purpose in life are constituted by our individual and collective self-understandings. How that is a “distraction” is beyond me.
You know, people will fight to the death for an idea, for an ideal. I was criticized in the early ’90s for using the word “war” [in the term “culture war”]. But I was trained in phenomenology, in which you are taught to pay attention to the words that people themselves use. And in interviews I did [with those on the front lines of “culture war” fights], people would say, “you know, it feels like a war”—even on the left.
I talk about this sense of a struggle for one’s very existence, for a way of life; this is exactly the language that is also used on the left, but in a much more therapeutic way. When you hear people say that, for instance, conservatives’ very existence on this college campus is “a threat to my existence” as a trans person or gay person, the stakes — for them — seem ultimate.
The question is: What is it that animates our passions? I don’t know how one can imagine individual and collective identity—and the things that make life meaningful and purposeful—as somehow peripheral or as “distractions.”
There’s a passage you wrote 30 years ago that seems relevant to this point: “We subtly slip into thinking of the controversies debated as political rather than cultural in nature. On political matters, one can compromise; on matters of ultimate moral truth, one cannot. This is why the full range of issues today seems interminable.”
I kind of like that sentence. [Laughs] I would put it this way: Culture, by its very nature, is hegemonic. It seeks to colonize; it seeks to envelop in its totality. The root of the word “culture” is Latin: “cultus.” It’s about what is sacred to us. And what is sacred to us tends to be universalizing. The very nature of the sacred is that it is special; it can’t be broached.
Culture, in one respect, is about that which is pure and that which is polluted; it is about the boundaries that are often transgressed, and what we do about that. And part of the culture war—one way to see the culture war—is that each has an idea of what is transgressive, of what is a violation of the sacred, and the fears and resentments that go along with that.
Every culture has its view of sin. It’s an old-fashioned word, but it [refers to that which] is, ultimately, profane and cannot be permitted, must not be allowed. Understanding those things that underwrite politics helps us understand why this persists the way it does, why it inflames the passions that we see.
It feels like the universe of things that might be considered part of the “culture war” has grown considerably over the past 30 years, such that it seems to now envelop most of politics. In that situation, how does democracy work? Because when the stakes are existential, it would seem like compromise is impossible. Can you have a stable democracy without compromise?
No, I don’t think you can. Part of our problem is that we have politicized everything. And yet politics becomes a proxy for cultural positions that simply won’t brook any kind of dissent or argument.
You hear this all the time. The very idea of treating your opponents with civility is a betrayal. How can you be civil to people who threaten your very existence? It highlights the point that culture is hegemonic: You can compromise with politics and policy, but if politics and policy are a proxy for culture, there’s just no way.
In the original book, I had a short chapter about the technologies of communication and discourse, and the ways they’ve accentuated polarization. I argued that because of these technologies, our public culture is more polarized than we, as a people, are. And the technology I was talking about is just going to sound really funny nowadays: It was direct mail. This was [1991], before social media.
So, take the role of some of the extraordinary advances in social media and the ways in which these multiply the anonymity, the extremism of rhetoric, the absence of any kind of accountability in our public speech. They take what is already a shallow discourse—you know, the trading of slogans, and the like—and make it even more difficult to find any kind of depth.
How do you compromise when that becomes the dominant form of discourse? I think that there are ways in which serious and substantive democratic discourse is made difficult, if not impossible, by the democratization and proliferation of free speech. That seems like a strange thing to say, but ...
On that front, I think one of the difficulties is that there is sometimes a very clear calculation made on the part of people involved in politics that conflict leads to attention, and media attention leads to political power. That feels like a cycle difficult to break out of.
Democracy, in my view, is an agreement that we will not kill each other over our differences, but instead we’ll talk through those differences. And part of what’s troubling is that I’m beginning to see signs of the justification for violence on both sides. Obviously, on January 6, we not only saw an act of violence—I mean, talk about a transgression—but one that the people who were involved were capable of justifying. That’s an extraordinary thing.
If I could draw a parallel, it’s not unlike the Civil War. There was a culture war for 30 years prior to the Civil War. The Civil War was—without question—about slavery and the status of Black men and women, and, yes, the good guys won [the Civil War]—at the cost of 4 out of 10 Southern males dying and 1 out of 10 Northern males dying. But think about what happened: Dred Scott was an attempt to impose a consensus by law; it took the Civil War and the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments to overturn Dred Scott. And yet that was also an imposition of solidarity by law and by force. The failures of Reconstruction and the emergence of Jim Crow and “Black Codes” and all of that was proof that politics couldn’t solve culture; it couldn’t solve the cultural tensions, and so what you end up with is a struggle for civil rights.
My view is that the reason why we’re continuing to see this press toward racial reckoning is because it’s never been addressed culturally.
In other words, racial justice failed by succeeding. The international slave trade ended in 1808. And it created this sense of complacency: “Oh, we’ve dealt with that.” Yet the slave trade and number of slaves grew astronomically over the next 50 years. Then the Civil War was fought and won: “Oh, we’ve dealt with that. Now we can move on.” It created complacency. I think that’s what happened after the civil rights movement and [the Rev. Martin Luther] King’s martyrdom: It was a tremendous success at one level, but created complacency, especially among whites—“We’ve dealt with that. We don’t need to deal with this anymore”—when, in fact, ongoing discrimination is still happening. It represents, again, the attempt to generate a kind of cultural consensus through political means. And that doesn’t seem to work.
What would it look like to actually reckon with that issue, culturally?
Well, I’m going to sound really old-fashioned here, but I think that this work takes a long time and it’s hard. I think you talk through the conflicts. Don’t ignore them; don’t pretend that they don’t exist. And whatever you do, don’t just simply impose your view on anyone else. You have to talk them through. It’s the long, hard work of education.
The whole point of civil society, at a sociological level, is to provide mediating institutions to stand between the individual and the state, or the individual and the economy. They’re at their best when they are doing just that: They are mediating, they are educating. I know that argument is part of the “old” liberal consensus view, the “old” rules of public discourse. But the alternatives are violence. And I think we are getting to that point.
The book that I followed “Culture Wars” with was called “Before the Shooting Begins: Searching for Democracy in America’s Culture War.” And the argument I made was that culture wars always precede shooting wars. They don’t necessarily lead to a shooting war, but you never have a shooting war without a culture war prior to it, because culture provides the justifications for violence. And I think that’s where we are. The climatological indications are pretty worrisome.
Given that, do you feel optimistic about the outlook for things in the United States in this era of constant “culture war,” with so much of it being fed by the Internet?
Look: Not to hope—to give in to despair—is never an option, in my opinion. That’s an ethical position I think one has to take. But I also don’t think that you tell a patient that they have a bad cold when, in fact, they have a life-threatening disease.
In this tangle between very powerful institutions and very powerful cultural logics, there are serious problems that are deeply rooted. The great democratic revolutions of Western Europe and North America were rooted in the intellectual and cultural revolution of Enlightenment; the Enlightenment underwrote those political transformations. If America’s hybrid Enlightenment underwrote the birth of liberal democracy in the United States, what underwrites it now?
What is going to underwrite liberal democracy in the 21st century? To me, it’s not obvious. That’s the big puzzle I’m working through right now. But it bears on this issue of culture wars, because if there’s nothing that we share in common—if there is no hybrid enlightenment that we share—then what are the sources we can draw upon to come together and find any kind of solidarity?
It’s as though there are no unifying national myths. And those that once occupied that place in American life are now subject to debate and the culture war.
That’s exactly right. And the myths that do seem to exist are mainly technocratic and dystopian. So … I think we’re in trouble. But I’m not sure you should end with that.
Well, I’ll end with this, then: Is there something unique about America that makes it especially prone to culture war, or is this kind of par for the course?
Part of what has made it especially acute in the United States is the proliferation of nonprofit special-interest groups. You don’t find that in Europe; you don’t find it in England or Germany. Those are more statist regimes, and have much greater control over the nonprofit space. [Whereas, in the U.S.] you have the proliferation of special-interest groups that take sides. And a lot of our charitable money—which is a massive amount compared to other countries—gets channeled through these charitable organizations that exist with a take-no-prisoners policy; that define the enemy, that define a devil, that define transgressions in certain ways.
They’re all in battle. And it’s, again, part of what you described earlier: It’s just more expansive. The range of the culture war seems to be all-encompassing.
I have this old-fashioned view that what we’re supposed to do is to understand before we take action, and that wisdom depends upon understanding. That basically makes me a conservative today—but it also makes me a progressive by conservative standards.
