Going Big: FDR's Legacy, Biden's New Deal, and the Struggle to Save Democracy

by Robert Kuttner, Joseph E. Stiglitz (Foreword by)

Overview

With history and the extraordinary parallels between Biden and FDR as his guide, the veteran political analyst diagnoses what’s at stake for America in 2022 and beyond

Joe Biden has found his way back to Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal. After four decades of diminishing prospects for ordinary people, the public likes what Biden is offering. Yet American democracy is in dire peril as Republicans, increasingly the national minority, try to destroy democracy in order to cling to power. It is the best of times and the worst of times. In Going Big, bestselling author and political journalist Robert Kuttner assesses the promise and peril of this critical juncture.

Biden, like FDR in his time, faces multiple challenges. Roosevelt had to make terrible compromises with racist legislators to win enactment of his program. Biden, to achieve the necessary governing coalition, needs to achieve durable multiracial coalitions. Roosevelt had to conquer fascism in Europe; Biden must defeat it at home. And after four decades of neoliberal policy disasters reflecting Wall Street’s political influence, Biden needs to go beyond what even FDR achieved, to restore a democratic economy of broad possibility.

From a writer with an unparalleled understanding of the history and politics that have made this moment possible, this book is the essential guide to what is at stake for Joe Biden, for America, and for our democracy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781620977279
Publisher:	New Press, The
Publication date:	04/26/2022
Pages:	192
Product dimensions:	8.80(w) x 5.60(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Robert Kuttner is co-founder and co-editor of The American Prospect and the Economic Policy Institute and former columnist for both Business Week and the Boston Globe. The author of Can Democracy Survive Global Capitalism? and Going Big (The New Press), he holds the Ida and Meyer Kirstein Chair at Brandeis Universityand lives in Boston.

Table of Contents

Foreword Joseph E. Stiglitz ix

1 The Improbable Progressive 1

2 Roosevelt's Fragile Revolution 26

3 The New Deal's Long Half-Life 48

4 LBJ's Tragedy and Ours 69

5 The Great Reversal 90

6 Bad Economics, Worse Politics 111

7 Obama's Missed Moment 133

8 America's Last Chance 165

Acknowledgments 195

Notes 199

Index 209

Editorial Reviews

02/14/2022

Kuttner (Can Democracy Survive Global Capitalism?), cofounder of The American Prospect, underwhelms in this cursory attempt to place in historical context the challenges President Biden has faced in enacting his domestic agenda. Contending that “Biden’s presidency will be either a historic pivot back to New Deal economics and forward to energized democracy, or a heartbreaking interregnum between two bouts of deepening American fascism,” Kuttner details how past progressive policies, most notably FDR’s New Deal and LBJ’s Great Society, changed millions of lives for the better and harshly criticizes Jimmy Carter and other Democrats for “abandoning the party’s liberal wing” and embracing Republican policies on deregulation, tax cuts, and military spending. Though Kuttner makes a convincing case that bold policies are needed to address the country’s ills, he doesn’t fully reckon with the electoral challenges Democrats face, and he fails to offer plausible hope that their razor-thin Senate majority will allow for passage of New Deal–type legislation. Elsewhere, Kuttner insists that Democrats should make the 2022 midterms a “referendum” on Donald Trump, without seriously considering the arguments against such an approach, and pays only minimal attention to electoral reform. This progressive rallying cry falls short. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

Praise for Going Big:
“A lively mélange of history, politics and progressive playbook.”
—The New York Times Book Review

“A cogent reminder of the importance of federal policy, presidential leadership, and the elusiveness of economic justice.”
—Kirkus Reviews

“Kuttner makes a convincing case that bold policies are needed to address the country’s ills.”
—Publishers Weekly

“The latest from one of the most tenacious and principled journalists in American politics has arrived at just the right moment. This should be required reading among Democrats in Washington and across the country. ”
—Heather McGhee, New York Time bestselling author of The Sum of Us

“As Joe Biden might put it, Going Big is a BFD—one with an urgent, essential, and ultimately hopeful message. If I could convince the president to read just one book at this perilous moment, this would be it. ”
—Jacob S. Hacker, Stanley Resor Professor of Political Science, Yale University, and co-author of Let Them Eat Tweets

“Robert Kuttner is a modern Tom Paine who explains brilliantly the frightening crisis we face and then offers a remarkable, bracing, impassioned prescription for salvation and, indeed, renewal. Spreading the word about Going Big is absolutely imperative. ”
—Randall Kennedy, Michael R. Klein Professor, Harvard Law School, and author of New York Times 2021 Notable Book Say It Loud

“Can Joe Biden and the Democrats take a page from Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal to ‘go big’ and thereby reconstruct America and its politics? Robert Kuttner, the nation’s most perceptive critic of the predatory capitalism that so bedevils us, answers with a resounding and insightful YES!”
—Nelson Lichtenstein, Distinguished Professor, University of California, Santa Barbara, and author of State of the Union

From the Publisher

2022-01-22
A political autopsy describing how Democratic presidents abandoned the progressive legacy of Franklin Roosevelt and allowed economic inequality to deepen.

Kuttner, co-founder of Economic Policy Institute and The American Prospect, opens with an urgent assessment of our current political landscape: “Joe Biden’s presidency will be either a historic pivot back to New Deal economics and forward to energized democracy, or a heartbreaking interregnum between two bouts of deepening American fascism. We are facing the most momentous threat to the American republic since the Civil War.” The touchstone for his sharp analysis is the New Deal, “a model of progressive policy and politics” that was committed to economic justice. While Harry Truman left FDR’s legacy intact and Lyndon Johnson expanded it with his war on poverty and civil rights legislation that attended to issues FDR had ignored, Jimmy Carter initiated a retreat that has continued for four decades. A quarter-century of prosperity had ended, and the Democratic Party tacked to the right. Following Carter, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama championed economic growth, Wall Street prosperity, and global trade, catering to college-educated workers and the wealthy rather than addressing racial and economic equality for the working class. Once again, economic policy was delegated to Wall Street insiders. Given this historical context and Biden’s centrist credentials, his progressivism came as a surprise, and an expansive legislative agenda and revival of the New Deal coalition of labor, the poor, and racial minorities have resurrected values neglected by previous Democratic administrations. Kuttner sees “grounds for hope” that Biden’s presidency can reverse “the hyper-concentration of capital and…the steady weakening of labor” and enable progressivism to triumph. It will do so, however, only when Democrats occupy the White House, gain majorities in Congress, and tightly regulate finance capitalism. Some readers may wish for more discussion of progressivism from below: grassroots organizations, state and local governments, and democratic socialist political movements.

A cogent reminder of the importance of federal policy, presidential leadership, and the elusiveness of economic justice.

Kirkus Reviews