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PARTISAN REVIEW
Peter Steinfels concluded by mentioning that the two major
contemporary issues are democracy and equality. He is quite right. He
has pointed out the ways in which equality has been helped by
government transfer payments, second wage earners, and public em–
ployment. I would add that it has also been helped, decisively, by a
(until recently) growing economy. A zero-growth society is a society
that will not only condemn all of us
to
suffer a bit, it will condemn the
weakest among us, the least advantaged, the poor, the blacks, to suffer
the most. Businessmen must be encouraged to invest. But there are
important limits as to the appropriate form of the encouragement.
Indeed, the whole relationship between neoconservatism and the
business establishment is an uneasy one. I don't feel very comfortable
before business audiences because I know that in many ways they are
part of the problem. Given a large government they will attempt to
seize control of some of its parts to use for their own advantage. One of
the arguments for a modest government with modest ambition is that it
provides fewer points at which any interest group-political or eco–
nomic or Ralph Nader-can seize control of some bureau and turn it
to
its own advantage.
The other issue is democracy. Democracy is not an end in itself,
but a means to an end. The ends to which it is a means are listed in the
preamble to the Constitution. There are six of them, and they involve
domestic tranquility, justice, liberty, and the national defense. This
view shou ld guide us as we judge democracy as the principle for
governance for any institution: the university, the corporation, or the
labor union. The question is not whether democracy should exist in
order to "achieve democracy, " but rather, what iOlernal arrangements
are best suited to the nature of an institution so that it can perform its
proper social function and serve its highest purposes. Sometimes the
answer is democracy , almost always in voluOlary associations, and
sometimes it is not. But you 'd never know this if you read the
statements that have been made by many anti-big business groups . Of
all of the criticisms of big businesses that can be made, and I have made
many, the notion that the corporation is insufficiently democratic
strikes me as one that is least helpful and flows most clearly form an
a
priori
political position which has not been tested either by popular
concerns or by the facts.
William Phillips:
I 'm puzzled by two statements that James Wilson
made. One is that he seems to assume that there is no obligation on
the part of neoconservatives to offer any program or any type of
