Organizations In Defense of Freedom

Chip Berlet cberlet at igc.org
Thu Sep 27 10:51:38 PDT 2001


Hi,

I have done a thorough reading of Goodwyn, and like many other of his critics, I see his work on populism to be a good half of a story.


:-)

That is, he only tells the good half of the story.

There are dozens of more recent books on populism in general, and a few that cover the late nineteenth century movement.

I suggest two that are critical of Goodwyn:

Canovan, Margaret. (1981). Populism. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.

Kazin, Michael. (1995). The Populist Persuasion: An American History. New York: Basic Books.

As Margaret Canovan observed in her book, Populism, "like its [earlier] rivals, Goodwyn's interpretation has a political ax to grind."

This is not a matter of me not doing enough reading, it is a disagreemnt over what populism is.

I do not believe it is an ideology. I agree with Kazin that it is a "style" of organizing.

See: http://www.publiceye.org/tooclose/populism.htm

To make this argument, I co-wrote a whole 499-page book.

Chip Berlet & Matthew N. Lyons Right-Wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort New York: Guilford Press, 2000 http://www.publiceye.org/tooclose/more.htm

So you can just imagine how--frustrating--it is to be constantly told that if I only read Goodwyn I would understand my mistake; or how--annoying--it is to be told my anaylsis is "silly."


:-(

-Chip Berlet

----- Original Message ----- From: "Mark Rickling" <rickling at softhome.net> To: <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Sent: Thursday, September 27, 2001 1:29 PM Subject: Re: Organizations In Defense of Freedom


> From: "Chip Berlet" <cberlet at igc.org>
>
> > I have NEVER, not once, criticized populism for being "less than
> revolutionary."
> > I have criticized it for individualizing what are primarily systemic and
> > institutional problems. I have said that it lacks ANY structural analysis,
> be it
> > Marxist, feminist, critical race theory, Queer theory, ANY structural
> theory
> > whether reform oriented or revolutionary. It is simply anti-elite--which
> is
> > insufficient.
>
> Exactly how do you conceptualize the relationship between what you call
> populism, and concrete historical movements, such as the America agrarian
> insurgency of the late 19th century? For instance, it's silly to imply, as
> you do above, that the historical populists had no structural analysis and
> were "simply anti-elite." A cursory rereading of Goodwyn should immediately
> disabuse you of this mistaken notion. While one can find fault with the
> Greenback critique of 19th century finance and capitalism, it's undoubtedly
> one of the most radical economic analyses proffered by a mass social
> movement in American history. The historical populists also knew a thing or
> two about democracy.
>
> A suggestion for the future: perhaps you should stop referring to the
> phenomena you've identified as populism, and adopt the handy neologism I've
> coined for you: "people-ism." While undoubtedly lacking the cachet and
> marketability of populism, "people-ism" will help you to avoid making the
> kind of errors as above.
>
> Exactly how "people-ist" were the historical populists? :)
>
>
> mark
>



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