the postwar period was one of high ideological left–right tensions,
with the global confrontation between capitalism and socialism
threatening the very fate of the earth, while the rise of an assertive
and critical global South challenged the world’s core structures of
power.
As explained in Chapters6 and 7, in the 1980s this tensed but
apparently unsurpassable world order collapsed, to give place to an era
dominated by market democracy and defined by a hegemonic neoliberal
ideology, which reinstated the right’s priorities in both domestic and
internationalpolitics. Inthe Southaswell asintheNorth, the left seemed
in disarray, at best able to maintain the institutions and policies that
it had fought to impose in the previous decades. Eventually, however,
at the end of the 1990s, a new left emerged that accepted some of
the tenets of neoliberalism and integrated them into a vision, which was
in turn presented as a Third Way or as a new development consensus.
The left remained the left, however, and the right was still the right.
The debate between the two sides continued, not only over equality
and development but, as we point out in Chapter8, also over issues
having to do with identity, terrorism, and the environment. Whatever
the question, the main political actors interpreted it in the well-
established language of left and right. Surprisingly perhaps, given the
power of this ideological cleavage, political scientists remained reluc-
tant to use the distinction as an analytical tool and, even more so, to
apply it to their own debates and divergences. A fear of losing object-
ivity may explain this reluctance. Yet the social sciences are always,
by necessity, involved in political debates, and the best we can hope
for is probably to be transparent about this social implication, which
can in fact also be a source of pride.
The late Michael Harrington was a rare species in American life.
A committed social-democrat in a nation where the term “liberal” –
which in Europe refers to people on the center-right – was used to
paint those on the left-of-center as extremists, he denounced poverty
and injustice, and fought for a country more preoccupied by equality
and human emancipation than by economic growth and consumer-
ism. Working in this rather hostile political environment, Harrington
became acutely aware of the wide gap between the ideological uni-
verses of the left and of the right. Yet, beyond the differences, he also
saw a structured and reasoned conversation. “Every serious social
Conclusion 233