Days and Works

The Politics of Hope

Whittaker Chambers once remarked that for Communists the present was terrible but always held out the prospect of hope, while for the Free World the present was decent but without any ultimate hope. Actually it is true that not only Communists but all other varieties of progressive have raised hope as the flag around which their supporters rally, the flag sometimes bedecked with a streamer specifying the next instalment of hope: the New Deal, the Fair Deal, the New Society, the Great Society, the People’s Democracy, the New Democracy. This “principle of hope” (Ernst Bloch) centers wholly on the future, a future of expected political perfection, to be attained by revolution, gradualist legislation, administrative devices, or even automatic motion advancing not merely forward but also upward.

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About the Author

Gerhart Niemeyer

The Politics of Hope

Whittaker Chambers once remarked that for Communists the present was terrible but always held out the prospect of hope, while for the Free World the present was decent but without any ultimate hope. Actually it is true that not only Communists but all other varieties of progressive have raised hope as the flag around which their supporters rally, the flag sometimes bedecked with a streamer specifying the next instalment of hope: the New Deal, the Fair Deal, the New Society, the Great Society, the People’s Democracy, the New Democracy. This “principle of hope” (Ernst Bloch) centers wholly on the future, a future of expected political perfection, to be attained by revolution, gradualist legislation, administrative devices, or even automatic motion advancing not merely forward but also upward.