Death of the Liberal Class
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4.0 • 3 Ratings
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Chris Hedges makes a forceful case that liberal institutions have failed Americans by ceding power to self-serving and elitist corporations
“Uncompromising. . . . Hedges indicts the press, the Church, the arts, labor unions, universities, and the Democratic Party for failing to protect the middle and lower classes.” —The New Yorker
For decades, the liberal class defended against the worst excesses of power. But the pillars of the American liberal class—the press, universities, the labor movement, the Democratic Party, and religious institutions—have collapsed. In their absence, the working and middle classes no longer have a champion.
In this devastating critique, Chris Hedges charges American liberal establishments with surrendering their core beliefs and no longer providing an institutional check against unfettered capitalism, the national security state, corporate influence, and staggering income inequalities. The death of the liberal class, Hedges argues, has created a profound vacuum at the heart of American political life. And now, speculators, war profiteers, and demagogues are filling the void.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this tsunami of terrifying revelations, juxtaposed truths, and demonstrated facts, Hedges (War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning) argues that the traditional beacons of the liberal class the universities, media, church, labor unions, and arts have sacrificed themselves completely to the dominance of corporate greed and unbounded capitalism. We are all to blame and everything moral about our democracy stands to be lost is indeed already vanishing, in Hedges's view and those who draw attention to it are banished and booed. While every page erupts with calamities of the human spirit worthy of their own irate broadcasts and bull-horned fury, Hedges is at his best when he unpacks the density of his polemic and embraces the power of his narrative. Regardless of form, however, his most interesting theses include the parallel between the current domestic climate and the fall of Weimar Germany and the conclusion that "Everything formed by violence is senseless and useless. It exists without a future. It leaves behind nothing but death, grief, and destruction." These insights come not just as warning, but as witness.
