The latest episode of econtalk. Recommended. A snippet:
We don’t think enough about how unusually cohesive and consolidated America was coming out of the Second World War, after the experience of the Depression; but even more than that, half a century of industrialization, of mass media, of progressive politics left American life intensely cohesive and consolidated and focused on national unity, on solidarity above individual identity and individualism generally. And what’s happened since that time is the breakdown of that consolidated culture–the liberalization, we would say in a positive sense, or the breakdown in a negative sense–the culture has become much more fragmented
This reminds me a bit of Brink Lindsey’s The Age of Abundance.
Recall my review of Levin’s book.
I’ve not yet heard the econtalk episode, but I just read the your book review.
I enjoyed Brink’s book very much. It would be interesting to hear Lindsey and Levin discuss their views together. If I recall Lindsey’s book correctly, I suspect that he might disagree with Levin’s view of the 1950s as being an age of consolidation. I think Lindsey’s point was that, contrary to the popular belief that the 1950s was about conformity, this was the decade when the diffusion began.
Having listened to a good bit of Yuval Levin’s appearances and read much of his writing, it does seem that he has not yet come to grips with the difference between individuality and individualism, the latter being the expression of the former in a social context.
Accordingly, what he observes, or at least comments on, is individualism in that context without consideration that it may represent individual reactions *to* a social context that has been “reconstructed” by things like “public policies,” centralized decisions, interpositions between, and disruptions of, direct relationships amongst individuals.
Individuality reacting to social constraints (derived from experiences of interactions) will differ from reaction to other forms of coercive constraints, particularly those requiring affirmative actions of compliance.
When thinking about history, it is best assume the immediate post-WW2 as being the historical outlier how consolidated the US society was unlike today or most of the pre-WW2 period. The more I read about the period, the more I assume that:
1) The economy was more evenly distributed in the US because the developed world had a huge labor shortage shock between WW2 causalities (think Europe here), Cold War, and enforced job sex discrimination norms. In reality the 1950s was not fast growing GDP wise and despite anti-union Taft-Hartley in 1947, unions had their most successful decade in the 1950s. The economy in the 1950s and 1960s, there was a lot truth to GMs comment of what is good for America is good for the United States.
2) Although I am pro-immigration, it should be noted that the post WW1 European immigration slowdowns, general assimilation and the realities of WW2, European communities were no longer dominate. Irish-, German, Swedish, and Italian-American communities were breaking up.
3) It is easy to forget with radio a generation before and TV, the 1950s had truly national (and increased international) news and interactions. Just think how the internet changed the interaction of people globally in the 1990s and early 2000s, the 1950s generation had a similar experience. Compare how much quickly everybody knew of the Kennedy assassination versus say the McKinley assassination.