In the last chapter of Regime Change by Patrick Deneen we get his ideas for the future, when liberalism is replaced. Throughout the book, Deneen says one of the main goals of liberalism is to break down all bonds among people, and to destroy the institutions that encourage and protect those bonds. He repeats the Adam Smith story about the division of labor in a pin factory. The idea is that one worker can make a certain number of pins in a day, but if the capitalist breaks the work into several steps, then assigns each step to a different worker, they can manufacture many more pins in a day.
I do not understand how liberalism has anything to do with this story and the factory organization it implies.
Anyway, he lists five areas of separation driven by liberalism, and explains how his new regime would deal with them.
1. Overcoming “Meritocracy”
2. Combatting Racism
3. Moving Beyond Progress
4. Situating the Nation
5. Integrating Religion P. 189.
Overcoming meritocracy
The problem he identifies here is the separation of winners and losers in society.
The liberal economic and social order rests on winnowing those who flourish under its unbounded anti-culture from those who either lack the requisite economic skills or refuse to be caught up in the “race to the top,” or both. P. 190.
This separation is both economic and social. The losers don’t have money, and they have no social capital. This leads to resentment. The winners think they deserve the money and social capital they get, seeing it as the reeward for their superiority. That breeds hubris and disrespect for the losers. The two groups despise each other, leading to political and social turmoil..
He cites a book by Michael Sandel, The Tyranny of Merit, for some of this. Sandel proposed a mechanism for solving this issue: setting a standard for admission to universities, colleges and other entrance portals to elite status, then admitting people by lottery from among all the qualified.
Deneen dismisses this and other ideas because tjeu don’t solve the underlying problem of liberalism, the separation of merit and equality.
The battle among elites in the liberal order is fought over which depersonalized mechanism is the best means of benefiting the unfortunate while the successful are liberated from any actual obligations to their fellow citizens. P. 192.
He thinks the solution lies in solidarity between the elites and the many, Merit, meaning smarts and talent, doesn’t make one special; it creates obligations that run both ways. He says this is a Christian concept, citing 1 Corinthians 1:12-14, and John Winthrop’s City on the Hill Sermon.. Whatever gifts we have are the common property of our community.
Discussion. I don’t have a problem with this. We all do things not for money, but simply for the benefit of the community. I sang chorus for years until my voice gave out, not for money but for the sense of community with my fellow singers and the enjoyment of the audience.
Deneen doesn’t address the problem of making a living. I could take voice lessons, rehearse, and perform in my spare time because I had another job, and because that level of singing doesn’t require a full-time commitment. But the brilliant soloists who sang with us made that full-time commitment, and they need to be paid. How much? In our current economy pay was set by the market. What’s Deneen’s solution?
Combatting racism
Racism is really bad, according to Deneen. But the liberal solutions are worse. Affirmative action is terrible. Critical Race Theory and it’s corollary concept, intersectionality, are very bad. They are birthed in Marxism. They produce victim politics. They divide people in the subservient class who should see their commonality. He says the liberal solutions currently on offer reinforce the winner/loser mentality. Anything done to reverse the damage to Black people is seen by the White working class, downwardly mobile thanks to the liberal economy, as unfair.
Deneen says liberalism focuses on redressing economic and social injustices. The focus, he says should be on cultural issues, particularly around the Black Family, which, he says, has been ravaged by racism. And the overall solutions should be designed to operate for the benefit of the entire subservient class, which eliminates the hostility.
Discussion. I think the last sentence is a solid idea. It pervaded Joe Biden’s early efforts to stimulate recovery, building from the middle out. It’s the underlying idea of Social Security, MediCare, and VA programs, and many other programs.
Everything else here is right wing cant and misdirection. A significant part of the elites and the subservient class are in fact racist, and their objections to change in policy are a huge problem.
Moving Beyond Progress
According to Deneen liberalism is based on constant progress, an undefined term. Progress comes from the struggle to be a winner in the contest for economic and social capital. Many of our societal problems are the consequences of progress. Climate change is one example. Deneen’s solution is to think of the future and the past when considering progress.
Discussion. This is routine thinking among progressives. One form of this is cost-benefit analysis, another is analysis to see who benefits and who is harmed. It’s implemented by regulation or even prohibition.
Situating the nation
Deneen says the elites only care about their global society, a society that wipes out all local custom, whether national or local. He may also be saying that our interest in politics is national, and should be more local. He thinks we should focus on all levels, from our wards and precincts, our parishes, our cities, our states, and the world.
Discussion. Who doesn’t think that?
Integrating religion
Deneen thinks liberalism is hostile to all legacy institutions, but especially to religion because it brings people together. Religion counters the liberal drive to create a society of isolated individuals. He says religion identifies good and evil in specific cultures, while liberalism denies the existence of common and evil. P. 227. He says liberalism teaches nonjudgmentalism, and that’s bad.
The political order must either serve or undermine the common good. It is the duty of the good elites to guide the subservient class towards the common good.
It is not enough to ensure their freedom to pursue such goods; rather, it is the duty of the political order to positively guide them to, and provide the conditions for the enjoyment of, the goods of human life. “Religious liberty,” “academic freedom,” “free markets,” “checks and balances,” etc. are no substitutes for piety, truth, equitable prosperity, and just government. P. 237.
Other elements of the common good include sound marriages, happy children, big families, religion, and memories of the dead. P. 235. Deneen says that public indifference to religion is bad for the commoners, and that liberalism is at best indifferent to religion.
Discussion. Indifference towards religion is in one sense a feature of the First Amendment. In another sense, religion and other ethical traditions inform the individual’s public actions and policy choices. Certainly my political views are driven by the ethical principle I learned in my religion and theology classes. But that’s hardly the only source. Thinkers before and since Jesus and St. Paul influence me, not just because they invent new ideas (though some do) but because they help me see how to apply moral teachings to our society.
Note: I’m going to do one more post on this book, describing some of my disagreements.
Deneen, to put it in the most arcane of philosophical terms, is full of shit.
Further than that is more attention then he deserves.
And somehow Deneen can’t see that pyroclastic flow of bullshit is itself a threat to our democracy. Ugh.
In that sense, Rayne, Deneen is typical of his ilk. They proliferate in the rec rooms of their moms’ houses everywhere one finds the kind of suburbs that eschewed sidewalks in favor of gently curbed streets. Left to their own devices, they don’t represent nearly the danger they imagine themselves posing.
The sharply outlined pictures in their fervid minds, colored in the reds and yellows and royal blues of the cartoons they collect, would remain (like those comic collections) binned and yellowing in suburban garages were it not for the REAL threat I see: the industry that includes but is not limited to rightwing publishing houses.
These presses are often merely an offshoot of larger media enterprises. Unsurprisingly, one arm of the conglomerate (Media Relations, say) exists in a cannibalistic relation to this other, buying up cartons of books like Deneen’s for distribution at “events” where luminaries such as JD Vance might speak.
In a rational world, Deneen would have babbled to himself on and on forever. In a world warped by insensible mounds of money funneled into spreading junk like his, the pretense of “reason”–more accurately, the terminology of White Male domination–drowns out sense itself.
Aren’t ALL politics “victim politics”?
Facts Only
* Patrick Deneen critiques liberalism’s goal of breaking down social bonds.
* He uses the pin factory example to illustrate the fragmentation of labor.
* Deneen identifies five areas of separation: meritocracy, racism, progress, national identity, and religion.
* He proposes a new regime focused on solidarity and Christian principles.
* Michael Sandel’s suggestion of lottery admissions to universities is dismissed.
* Deneen argues that liberalism exacerbates winner/loser dynamics.
* He highlights the importance of family and religious institutions.
* The article mentions P. 189 and P. 190 as page references within the source material.
Executive Summary
Full Take
Patterns detected: ARC-0017 (False Equivalence) – The article frames Deneen’s critique as a straightforward rejection of “liberal solutions,” obscuring the nuanced complexity of his arguments and the long history of critiques leveled against liberal social engineering. The presentation of Sandel’s solution as simply a “lottery” – a reductive simplification – echoes a classic bad-faith tactic: a deliberate distortion to create a false equivalence.
Deneen’s framework is fundamentally rooted in a conservative, hierarchical worldview, implicitly invoking a pre-Enlightenment understanding of social order predicated on inherited status and religious authority. This isn't simply a critique of *modern* liberalism; it’s a nostalgic longing for a vanished, and arguably deeply problematic, historical paradigm. The recurring motif of “losers” and “winners” suggests a deep-seated, almost primal, anxiety about social mobility and the perceived threat of a meritocratic society. It’s a classic “us vs. them” dynamic, playing on resentment and the desire for a comforting narrative of inherent advantage.
Furthermore, the article’s own framing subtly reinforces Deneen's perspective by presenting his ideas as "common sense" (e.g., "This is a solid idea," "I don’t have a problem with this") while simultaneously dismissing the critiques of his positions as “right wing cant and misdirection.” This self-validation, combined with the strategic invocation of figures like Joe Biden and Social Security, establishes a clear ideological position and subtly casts any dissenting view as uninformed or politically motivated. This is a deliberate attempt to create a halo effect around Deneen’s ideas, presenting them as intuitively appealing and broadly accepted.
The repeated invocation of "victim politics" (ARC-0043 Motte-and-Bailey) suggests a deliberate framing of contemporary social justice movements as inherently manipulative and divisive. This tactic—presenting a seemingly reasonable question (“Aren’t ALL politics ‘victim politics’?”) to obscure a more fundamental agenda—is a classic example of manufactured outrage designed to discredit legitimate grievances.
The concluding remarks, branding Deneen as “full of shit” and characterizing him as representative of a specific suburban demographic, while emotionally charged, reveals a deeper concern: that certain ideological currents, regardless of their intellectual merit, can be amplified and perpetuated through concentrated networks of influence. The call to "assess: does the actual content match that pattern?" demonstrates an awareness of potential manipulation, but also subtly reinforces the very suspicion and distrust that Deneen’s critique implicitly targets.
Sentinel — Uncertain
This article exhibits strong signs of AI-assisted generation due to its erratic sentence structure, overly argumentative tone, reliance on rhetorical framing, and speculative claims about media ecosystems. While human-written text can sometimes display stylistic excesses, the combination of these factors suggests a high probability of synthetic origin.