(This post was inspired in some ways by Damon Linker's insightful writing about the current US political scene and in other ways by Edward Luce).
Most of my political and economic ideas and ideals line up with the progressive movement in the Democratic Party; that's to say, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, My Revolution and its offshoots. But lately I've been wondering: why is there no strong potential centrist candidate in the Democratic Party? Such a candidate could pick progressive ideas like free college and single-payer healthcare that have widespread public support, while rejecting the anti-capitalism, anti-globalization narrative that remains prominent in the progressive movement (actually that's the part I'm also wary of). So,free trade and free college-why not?
The answer, I reckon, is as follows. Centrism is the last stand as it were of the Democratic party machine-an establishment that is widely, and with much justification, seen as corrupt, cronyist, and still suspiciously Clintonite. Yet there is no real intellectual reason why someone with a centrist platform on social and economic issues couldn't adopt the stance of progressives in regard to the Democratic establishment. In other words, clean anti-establishment centrist Democratic politics.
To be credible, such a candidate would have to commit firmly and early on to the main elements of party and electoral reform proposed by the anti-establishment progressives, such as abolishing superdelegates and getting rid of preregistration requirements that may exist for primaries, and addressing big money in politics. The candidate would need to pledge to receive the bulk of their campaign funding in the Bernie Sanders way, through relatively modest contributions, and outside the usual big corporate donor DNC-type channels.
Can anti-establishment centrist Democratic politics work in America? While the left likes to think that France's Emmanuel Macron and En Marche (his new party) are just the old neoliberal elites in redone packaging, I'm doubtful that's the whole story. Macron responded to a situation where the established political parties were decrepit, lacking in energy and ideas, whether on the right, left or in the center. His anti-establishment thrust was arguably even good for the progressives, for the sense of opening things up probably helped to coalesce a new hard-left party, France insoumise.
But Macron's very example raises the issue of whether the kind of anti-establishment centrist I have in mind should run within the Democratic Party at all. It's a tough question. Appealing to discontented centrist Republicans (assuming centrist Republicans still exist) might be easier through a third-party or independent run. One thing I'm sure of, though, is that if the Democratic Party is going to govern again, its best chance is a flexible open alliance between the progressive movement and a new force for centrist Democratic politics, which repudiates the party machine of the last decades.
