AMERICAS

Is the Democratic Party truly progressive?

The recent US elections reignited the eternal debate: Does the Democratic Party wear progressivism as a mask? .

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris

With the results of the presidential elections, the doubt resurfaces whether the Democratic party is really a progressive party. / Photo: democrats.org

LatinAmerican Post | Ariel Cipolla

Listen to this article

Leer en español: ¿Es el Partido Demócrata verdaderamente progresista?

The victory of the Democrats in the elections caused many supporters to take to the streets of the United States to celebrate, according to the Cinco País website. It is, a priori, a paradigm shift, after a government strongly associated with the right, as was the case with Donald Trump.

La Vanguardia explains that the electoral system in the United States is bipartisan. In this sense, Republicans, with Donald Trump as the main reference, are considered the force most associated with the right and conservatism

Therefore, the Democrats appear to be aligned much more with progressivism. However, to what extent is it this way? Let's see, then, what is the relationship that the Democratic Party has with progressivism and the left.

Democrats and progressivism

The first thing we must do is analyze it at the local juncture, that is, from the US perspective itself. From the BBC they wonder "what it really means to be progressive in the United States", since several important personalities of the party, such as Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton, or Joe Biden, tend to divide the waters based on their thinking.

Being a party strongly influenced by bipartisanship, it is clear that there are different opinions regarding progressive policies within the Democrats. However, that does not mean that the general structure of the Democratic Party upholds the same values as some of the figures that comprise it, but rather, it seems to be the opposite.

Also read: What are Biden's main promises to Latinos?

Precisely, from El País they wonder if the Democratic Party is "socialist or center-right." That is to say, the formation of Joe Biden shelters different ideological souls that may not necessarily be associated with equity in economic terms.

For example, from the BBC they mention that, in the case of health, there are cases of "exorbitant charges" in hospitals. While emergency services can save lives, they are also likely to ruin bank accounts.

The issue seems to be much more associated with the "progress" of social visions, many of them represented in real problems, but which do not necessarily solve those underlying problems that an authentic left should imply. For example, from Gaceta they indicate that the Democrats appropriated the Black Lives Matter, although it is a structural problem that is not necessarily associated with the Republicans.

That is, although the problem exists, the fact that the Democrats appear on the side of the "progressives" who denounce these issues only when it occurs with the opposition, implies that they are taken as a force against conservatism, which seeks to maintain peace, although this may not necessarily be true.

For example, in Punto Rojo they consider the Democrats to be a "bloody party of imperialism, war and oppression", since their roots are far from being progressive. In other words, it continues to be a wing of a capitalist party that provoked, throughout its history, hundreds of wars, as with Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan or Libya.

This even clashes with what El Mundo mentions when it says that Trump is the "first president of the United States since 1980 who does not start a war in his first term," in contrast to the values that the Democrats attribute to him. While this does not mean that Democrats do not believe in social causes, such as abortion, anti-discrimination or gender varieties, they sometimes appear to be "masks" hiding structural problems.

 

Related Articles

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Back to top button