The Big Sort dealt with the lack of political diveristy in communities. But it didn't look at the lack of political diversity in institutions, the places we work.
I was thinking of the John Rawls "original position" thought experiment and how people might want to design the ideological diversity of our country's most powerful institutions. Should we tweak things so there is more diversity of thought, or keep it status quo, with certain institutions dominated by certain ideology?
Liberal ideology dominates the media and education. Opening up discussion to different thought risks losing domination of these industries, so I can understand the (Robin DiAngelo voice) fragility among journalists and professors to ideological diversity. However, I'm sure liberals would agree that the military and police force could benefit from ideological diversity since they are dominated by conservatives.
Conservatives might be okay with collateral damage, waterboarding, and "leaning forward" because the ends justify the means when it comes to war. Liberals in the military would push back against this, and I think that is a good thing, but would people be willing to make these trade offs to achieve ideological equilibrium?
I tried to think of institutions lacking ideological diversity and this is what I came up with:
Liberal leaning
- media/journalism
- higher education
- elementary/secondary education
- Hollywood/art
- military
- police
- Wall Street
- entrepreneurs
My gut instinct is that the tech sector leans left. While it is a business, Google's reaction to the James Damore memo suggests that liberal ideology is the dominant view. But maybe they're an outlier.
II.
So back to the Rawls experiment. If you could design a world, would you want ideological equality in all major institutions or would you keep them the way they are, assuming that you would be born into this world with a predetermined, unfixed ideology that you do not choose. You might be a liberal police chief or a conservative humanities professor, surrounded by people who oppose your beliefs.
A good argument in favor of the status quo is that there already is an ideological equilibrium. Institutions can be dominated by ideology, as long as there is a balance among the institutions rather than within the institutions. So if you have conservatives in the military, police, and on Wall Street, they are balanced by liberals in universities, major news organizations, and in the classroom.
A good argument against that idea is that not all major institutions are the same. In fact, I'd say that the military and police and quite powerful, as they possess the threat of force. Wall Street is exceptionally strong as well, as we saw during the 2008 financial crisis.
While the media is powerful, it's becoming more diffuse and could never match the threat of a rogue police state. So while the number of major industries might be in balance, I think the power leans in the direction of conservatives.
Also, a lot of the recent research I read shows that echo chambers breed extremism. These institutions become feedback loops where the more orthodox they get, the more hostile they become to outside points of view, which leads the few dissenters leaving, which leads to more orthodoxy. So keeping things status quo means that these institutions are going to get more extreme and dangerous.
III.
So if I had to choose, I would want ideological equilibrium.( I don't have skin in the game, since my views of rationalism and constitutional localism are not at risk of losing any power. We don't have any. We are minorities in all institutions.) But I think putting a check on power is something we can all agree on.
As much as I preach for ideological diversity in higher education, after working on this post I have come to have my doubts. If I'm a liberal, I'm not sure I would give up my dominance without assurance that there was more ideological diversity in the military (technically, all you need is a liberal in the White House, as they command the military).
But we don't have to operate in Rawls' hypothetical world-building. We can build a system based on the critical-theory left's ideas of equity. It involves a level of coercion I am not comfortable with, and it seems like it would be unpopular, but if you framed it in terms of a tit-for-tat trade, you might have something.
In a previous post, I argued that voting for extreme candidates ensures gridlock and pushes power to the local level. But there is another type of gridlock. It isn't just extreme left vs. extreme right. There can also be extreme left vs. moderate left, and extreme right vs. moderate right.
I think that's what we used to have and it seems like more got done. If this holds true for the private sector, then ideological diversity within institutions is a more efficient system.
