The End of Ideology

It's probably plagiarism even to entitle this blog "The End of Ideology," because Daniel Bell wrote a terrific work by that name that my dad read during his graduate studies, and remained relevant for forty years so that it was assigned to Knute at CU. I own it, and like to talk about its content, but I won't say I've read it.
What I will say is that in many other countries in the world, there are representative and senators who belong to the "socialist" party, or even the "communist" party. These people draw from Marx, or Lenin, or Trotsky, or from libraries of literature of theory and thought on how government could be run, who then go to work each day and represent "socialism" or "communism."
I don't know what that means in 2008, in a world that has such established and interconnected global networks of capitalist trade. Advocating for communism seems to be akin to "jumping off the bandwagon." But then I think of ways that certain programs in the US, or even specific politicians, are called "socially conscious," or "progressive." I am thinking of things such as welfare, affirmative action, or universal health care. Honestly, these things go against the grain of fundamentalist capitalism, yet no politician is comfortable labeling it "socialist" or declaring themselves members of a "Socialist Party."
One might say that there is no Socialist Party because our system encourages a two-party system and that has played itself out in order to whittle us down to the Dems and Reps, but Daniel Bell says differently (I bet). The fact is that after WWII and the creation of the USSR, we had to define ourselves as something else. It is the classic example of using an "other" to create "self." They were the Reds, the Commies, the Socialists. So we, by default, became not these things. McCarthy worked on this in an ostentacious way, but at the same time the American people worked on it in a slower and more subtle way. They must have. For now we have no room even in our vocabulary for these words. Even at "liberal" universities, there is no Association of Socialist Students. No one says, "We should change our economic system." Within the debates that we do have, one thing is accepted by all: the capitalist system is working and generating everything. From that foundation, we debate on social programming or the exclusion of such.
My dad explains very well how it is a myth that we live in a free market. With subsidies and other government deals, the economy the free market that we think it is. And I don't think it is working perfectly. Our economy functions on the need for constant growth. I see growth as more use of natural resources and the generation of more waste. I want a system based on no growth. I want us to look at possibilities of different systems, and not to be scared of names or labels. We cleansed ourselves of "the Reds" in the 50's, but that only succeeds in limiting our possibilities.