The New Right and the New Pluralism

To the religio-political extremists who exerted unprecedented influence at the 1984 Republican convention, ‘traditional values’ is a code word for restoring an idealized vision of a long-gone America before women’s rights, before desegregation, before labor unions, and before the full acceptance of religious pluralism.” That, to Anthony T. Podesta, executive director of People for the American Way, is the New Right, the Religious Right, the enemy. Podesta is an activist and a partisan. But his view of the New Right, the socialconservative coalition, or whatever you choose to call it, may be the most common one outside the circle of the movement itself. The New Right’s concern with the social issues has caused even some other conservatives to worry that New Rightists might really want what their worst enemies accuse them of wanting: to establish a social uniformity so strict that it would be, in American terms, revolutionary.

The New Right, on the other hand, tends to see itself as simply reacting against cultural aggression from liberals, including Mr. Podesta’s boss, the influential television producer Norman Lear. The movement’s opponents charge that it is a threat to pluralism. But New Right leaders argue that the pluralism the Left has in mind excludes anyone who takes seriously religious belief or traditional moral norms. Even Mr. Podesta seems to acknowledge— notice the word “restoring”—the possibility that the New Right is a defensive, not offensive, movement.

DW

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David Wagner

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To the religio-political extremists who exerted unprecedented influence at the 1984 Republican convention, ‘traditional values’ is a code word for restoring an idealized vision of a long-gone America before women’s rights, before desegregation, before labor unions, and before the full acceptance of religious pluralism.” That, to Anthony T. Podesta, executive director of People for the American Way, is the New Right, the Religious Right, the enemy. Podesta is an activist and a partisan. But his view of the New Right, the socialconservative coalition, or whatever you choose to call it, may be the most common one outside the circle of the movement itself. The New Right’s concern with the social issues has caused even some other conservatives to worry that New Rightists might really want what their worst enemies accuse them of wanting: to establish a social uniformity so strict that it would be, in American terms, revolutionary.

The New Right, on the other hand, tends to see itself as simply reacting against cultural aggression from liberals, including Mr. Podesta’s boss, the influential television producer Norman Lear. The movement’s opponents charge that it is a threat to pluralism. But New Right leaders argue that the pluralism the Left has in mind excludes anyone who takes seriously religious belief or traditional moral norms. Even Mr. Podesta seems to acknowledge— notice the word “restoring”—the possibility that the New Right is a defensive, not offensive, movement.