Toward a Federal Populism: From the Writings of Paul Piccone (Part 2)

"The main implication of all theories of the New Class is the displacement of economic conflicts between labor and capital as the deus ex machine of social dynamics, in favor of political conflicts between those possessing a “cultural capital” redeemable as social and political power and those with mere “cultural liabilities.” In a context where all economic relations are mediated by political arrangements, this means that the struggle for power—including economic power as a special case—no longer defines politics in terms of a Left that favors egalitarian redistributive policies and a Right committed to defending existing privileges and social inequalities, but in terms of control of institutions allocating a substantial segment of the collective social product appropriated through fiscal means. Thus the main new political division now obtains between centralizers committed to an extension of the state redistributive apparatus allegedly meant to solve all social problems (hence “victimology” as the New Class’s favorite mode of ideological self-legitimation) and populists committed to local autonomy, fiscal austerity and participatory forms of democracy.” (From "Confronting the Crisis," pp. 273-74)