The Right's Moral Trouble

Over the last few weeks, the Bush Administration's escalating threats against Iraq have pushed corporate scandals out of the headlines. This could well be deliberate, because the crisis in corporate America has the potential to shift the basic parameters of political debate in the United States. Ever since the late 1970s, a powerful alliance of economic and religious conservatives has set the political agenda. The views shared by the Christian Coalition and the Chamber of Commerce have dominated policy debates, even during Clinton's two terms in the White House. But if we can avert a unilateral attack on Iraq and refocus the public's attention on the corporate scandals, liberals and progressives might finally break the right's dominance.

Seizing this opportunity requires that people on the left overcome their hesitancy to think and talk about morality. We often confuse morality with moralism and assume that they are both wholly owned subsidiaries of right-wing televangelists and ayatollahs. But morality is the very stuff of politics; it is how insurgent groups justify their demands. Both the right's historical successes and its current vulnerabilities have much to do with moral categories and moral narratives. To end the right's dominance, we have to learn to mobilize our own moral language and moral narratives.

Subscriber Login

User Name

Password

Subscribe Now!

The only way to read this article and the full contents of each week's issue of The Nation online is by subscribing to the magazine. Subscribe now and read this article -- and every article published since for the past five years -- right now.

There's no obligation -- try The Nation for four weeks free.

• Get The Nation at home (and online!) for 68 cents a week!
• If you like this article, consider making a donation to The Nation.
• Reprint this article. Click here for rights and information.