It’s a great feeling to be casually strolling through a yard sale, thrift store, or a flea market and unexpectedly discover a hidden gem of a book like Gardens Of Democracy: A New American Story Of Citizenship, The Economy And The Role Of Government. Why this necessary, refreshing approach to economic affairs, politics and society has remained under-the-radar is hard to imagine. The authors Eric Liu and Nick Hanauer are among the few voices that have a calm, rational approach to what has been ailing our economic and political discourse for decades.
Through their book they have provided a simple yet common sense metaphor to guide the reader through a better understanding of how complex economic and social systems operate – and how to improve them to work for everyone. The immediate, overbearing issue that Liu and Hanauer quickly point out is that our country has been stuck in what they call “Machinebrain” mode for much too long. This static mentality is locked into a system where everything should be homogenized and operate according to timetables and interconnecting machinery processes, harnessed by rigid regulations.
These authors believe that “Gardenbrain” is an entirely new, refreshing mode for what ails us. They view this as a “new mode of public imagination” in which our democracy and economy are more accurately viewed as an ecosystem. Just as a garden needs to be planted, watered, tended, and cared for on a continual basis, our economic system also needs to be cared for and nurtured – not left on autopilot or to run riot.
The continuous, tiresome control of our economy by a small clique of oligarchs at the top of the heap is an integral part of the Machinebrain which Liu and Hanauer have described spot on (and this is directly quoted from page 11) “Machinebrain treats people as cogs: votes to be collected by political machines; consumers to be manipulated by marketing machines; employees to be plugged into industrial machines. It is a static mindset of control and fixity, and is the basis of most of our inherited institutions, from schools to corporations to prisons.” (Bold print mine)
Along with this, our current election season of nasty, shrill rhetoric and the endless bombardment of political attack ads on tv certainly bears out how Americans are cogs in a wheel, pawns on a stage to be used relentlessly for the self-serving interests, and egos of the powers that be. On a more positive track, though Gardenbrain is about give and leeway. This system understands that change in how our economic system operates should be normal and create more opportunities for as many people as possible.
As Gardens Of Democracy sees it, the rigid ideologies of both the left and the right do not serve the best interests of our society. Those on the right do not want any government interference in how our economy operates and the left wants too much of it – and both sides left to their own devices are a stranglehold on everyone, locked in a relentless, selfish death-struggle for dominance. This lack of balance and moderation, the extreme self-interest of both sides is exactly what Gardens Of Democracy argues against.
The view that cooperation and compromise are scorned as weakness and defeat are even more intense among the economic/political factions of both the left and the right than they were when this book was first published eleven years ago. Gardens points out that civilizations start resting on their laurels after attaining a high degree of economic and technological success by following a “proven” formula where cooperation with give and take are often shunted aside. Becoming set in our ways by doing things the same old way every time eventually leads to decline. This has happened over and over again to great nations and empires throughout history.
Gardenbrain is about learning to adapt and adjust to circumstances because nothing ever remains the same as Machinebrain with its stubborn inflexibility would have us believe. Gardenbrain realizes that we are flawed, emotional humans, not industrial machines. We need to face up to our mistakes and the consequences of our actions. It takes into account (which should be obvious) that as humans we are inherently social and thus are all interconnected and interdependent. The better we work together by finding some common ground, the healthier we would all be economically and socially. Relentless competition harms everyone.
It is also high time to end the failures caused by the top-down problem solving of these overly competitive and selfish special interests regardless of what ideology they represent. The writers of Gardens Of Democracy offer us the best approach to tending capitalism as a garden we care about and devote attention to, so that it thrives and serves the needs and best interests of everyone.
Eric Liu studied history at Yale University, graduated Harvard Law School, is CEO of non-profit Citizen University. Nick Hanauer is a co-founder of the progressive think tank True Patriot from ideas that he and Liu created in a previous book The True Patriot about patriotism and progressivism from 2007.
