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Passage V
Woodrow Wilson was referring to the liberal idea of the economic market when he said that the free enterprise system is the most efficient economic system. Maximum freedom means maximum productiveness: our 'openness' is to be the measure of our stability. Fascination with this ideal has made Americans defy the 'Old World' categories of settled possessiveness versus unsettling deprivation; the cupidity of retention versus the cupidity of seizure, a 'status quo' defended or attacked.
The United States, it was believed, had no status quo ante. Our only 'station' was the turning of a stationary wheel, spinning faster and faster. We did not base our system on property but opportunity—which meant we based it not on stability but on mobility. The more things changed, that is, the more rapidly the wheel turned, the steadier we would be. The conventional picture of class politics is com posed of the Haves, who want a stability to keep what they have, and the Have-Nots who want a touch of instability and change; in which to scramble for the things they have not. But Americans imagined a condition in which speculators, self-makers, runners are always using the new opportunities given by our land. These economic leaders (front-runners) would thus be mainly agents of change.
The non-starters were considered the ones who wanted stability, a strong referee to give them some position in the race, a regulative hand to calm manic speculation; and authority that can call things to a halt, begin things again from compensatorily staggered 'starting lines.' 'Reform' in America has been sterile because it can imagine no change except through the extension of this metaphor of a race, wider inclusion of competitors, 'a piece of the action,' as it were, for the disenfranchised.
There is no attempt to call off the race. Since our only stability is change, America seem s not to honour the quiet work that achieves social interdependence and stability. There is, in our legends, no heroism of the office clerk; no stable industrial work force of the people who actually make the system work. There is no pride in being an employee; Wilson asked for a return to the time when everyone was an employee.
There has been no boasting about our social workers— they are merely signs of the system's failure, of opportunity denied or not taken, of things to be eliminated. We have no pride in our growing interdependence, in the fact that our system can serve others, that we are able to help those in need; empty boasts from the past make us ashamed of our present achievements, make us try to forget or deny them, move away from them. There is no honour but in the Wonderland race, we must all run, all trying to win, none winning in the end (for there is no end).
Woodrow Wilson was referring to the liberal idea of the economic market when he said that the free enterprise system is the most efficient economic system. Maximum freedom means maximum productiveness: our 'openness' is to be the measure of our stability. Fascination with this ideal has made Americans defy the 'Old World' categories of settled possessiveness versus unsettling deprivation; the cupidity of retention versus the cupidity of seizure, a 'status quo' defended or attacked.
The United States, it was believed, had no status quo ante. Our only 'station' was the turning of a stationary wheel, spinning faster and faster. We did not base our system on property but opportunity—which meant we based it not on stability but on mobility. The more things changed, that is, the more rapidly the wheel turned, the steadier we would be. The conventional picture of class politics is com posed of the Haves, who want a stability to keep what they have, and the Have-Nots who want a touch of instability and change; in which to scramble for the things they have not. But Americans imagined a condition in which speculators, self-makers, runners are always using the new opportunities given by our land. These economic leaders (front-runners) would thus be mainly agents of change.
The non-starters were considered the ones who wanted stability, a strong referee to give them some position in the race, a regulative hand to calm manic speculation; and authority that can call things to a halt, begin things again from compensatorily staggered 'starting lines.' 'Reform' in America has been sterile because it can imagine no change except through the extension of this metaphor of a race, wider inclusion of competitors, 'a piece of the action,' as it were, for the disenfranchised.
There is no attempt to call off the race. Since our only stability is change, America seem s not to honour the quiet work that achieves social interdependence and stability. There is, in our legends, no heroism of the office clerk; no stable industrial work force of the people who actually make the system work. There is no pride in being an employee; Wilson asked for a return to the time when everyone was an employee.
There has been no boasting about our social workers— they are merely signs of the system's failure, of opportunity denied or not taken, of things to be eliminated. We have no pride in our growing interdependence, in the fact that our system can serve others, that we are able to help those in need; empty boasts from the past make us ashamed of our present achievements, make us try to forget or deny them, move away from them. There is no honour but in the Wonderland race, we must all run, all trying to win, none winning in the end (for there is no end).
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