亚洲AV

Lessons from The Gilded Age to Guide a Return to Equality in America

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Consistently, across dozens of different measures, including social and economic equality, political division, and other indications of individualism versus collectivism, the United States experienced growing social connections that reached a peak in the 1960s, and then declined to reach record lows today. In spite of the dismal state of division we are experiencing now, there is reason for hope.

Robert Putnam displays data.
Author Robert Putnam explains data.

That was the message from Robert Putnam and Shaylyn Romney Garrett, coauthors of The Upswing: How America Came Together A Century Ago, and How We Can Do it Again, in a webinar conducted by 亚洲AV. The November 17 presentation was sponsored by the School of Business鈥 Business for a Better World Center, the Schar School of Public Policy and Government, the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution, and the College of Humanities and Social Sciences.

鈥淭he School of Business and Business for a Better World Center and our colleagues across campus sponsored this event to make sure that we are working together to build a better world,鈥 said School of Business Dean Maury Peiperl.

The more than 400 students, faculty, and members of the community who registered for the event learned how America has been there before, found its way out, only to fall to a new nadir today. Deep and accelerating inequality; unprecedented political polarization; vitriolic public discourse; a fraying social fabric; public and private narcissism鈥擜mericans today seem to agree on only one thing: This is the worst of times.

During the Gilded Age of the late 1800s, Putnam described, America was similarly individualistic, starkly unequal, fiercely polarized, and deeply fragmented, just as it is today. However, as the 20th century opened, America became鈥攕lowly, unevenly, but steadily鈥攎ore egalitarian, more cooperative, more generous; a society on the upswing, more focused on our responsibilities to one another and less focused on our narrower self- interest. Sometime during the 1960s, however, these trends reversed, leaving us in today鈥檚 disarray.

鈥淎lmost nobody in America thinks we鈥檙e in great shape now,鈥 said Putnam. 鈥淲e鈥檝e reached historic levels of political polarization. Rarely, if ever, has America been as politically polarized as we are right now. The only close call, actually, is the civil war. 鈥

Putnam examined 20 to 30 independent measures and they all tell remarkably in same story鈥攚hat he calls that the 鈥淚鈥揥e鈥揑鈥 curve.

Shaylyn Romney Garrett explains the upswing.
Author Shaylyn Romney Garrett explains the upswing.

鈥淎t no period during the 20th century and beyond have we gotten anywhere close to full equality between Black and White Americans,鈥 said Garrett. 鈥淗owever, you鈥檒l notice that the majority of the that was made took place before the civil rights movement. We鈥檙e talking about things like life expectancy, infant mortality, high school access, high school completion, and college congratulations rates, earnings per worker, and household wealth.鈥 During the 鈥60s and 鈥70s, she noted, what happened in many cases was stagnation and in some cases reversal of progress.

鈥淥ne of the tragic but nonetheless simple answers is White backlash,鈥 she said. 鈥淲hite Americans were [in] support of the civil rights act in principle, but when it came time to implement measures to create an equal playing field for Blacks and Whites in America, they were not so enthusiastic.鈥

The part of the last century that is more instructive to returning to a 鈥渨e鈥 society, said Garrett, is the Gilded Age in the late 1800s and the early part of the 20th century. 鈥淚t appears that Americans began to turn away from narcissism and toward egalitarianism,鈥 she said.

鈥淚t was a time when America had shifted away from living in small towns and farms and into living in isolated, busy, commerce-oriented cities,鈥 said Garrett. 鈥淧eople were lonely, much as we are today, and they realized they needed to come up with new ways of bringing people together. If we want to see another upswing today, we鈥檙e going to have to ask our fellow Americans to change from the hyperindividualistic culture of today and into something that has more of a 鈥榳e鈥 ethos. We鈥檙e going to have to see a lot more activism of youth. We鈥檙e seeing that already around climate change, in the Black Lives Matter movement, and the anti-gun movement. Full inclusion can鈥檛 be something that we kick down the road again. Too often the needs of the people of color have been sacrificed on the altar of progress and we cannot make that mistake again.鈥

鈥淭his is not just an academic study,鈥 said Putnam. 鈥淲e try to be, as I try to be in all my work, a good social scientist, but I want to change the country. I鈥檓 not here just to describe it. We feel an obligation as citizens to try to see if we can put America on a better path to the future.鈥

鈥淭his book really has a strong connection to our campus,鈥 said 亚洲AV President Gregory Washington. 鈥淚t embodies a good bit of what we鈥檝e encountered on our campus in terms of what we have to do going forward and in terms of where we are as a campus today. This whole idea of creating a community that values the contributions of all, that limits opportunities to none, and offers prosperity without prejudice. I believe that that鈥檚 going to be the lasting definition of the American democracy. I also believe that that is going to be the lasting definition of 亚洲AV.鈥