Him. Host hello welcome to the session of the National Book festival project via the library of Congress NameSteve Burstein a long time columnist at the Washington Post at George Mason University and the operator of american capitalism my guest today is rick seen from the branch of the steam clan stronger reporting spending time and i man of the left is and reflects tackling the rise of them in another way Barry Goldwater and his latest book americans way turn. Along with a long time the writer former dean of Columbia Journalism School and has written books about the sat and black transaction man. And over the last 45 minutes because of the virus. And transaction man and tell us what it is about. Okay. [laughter] i guess if there is is extensively you really but the premise of the book there is a number of ways to organize a capitalist system that has been organized in a succession and im trying to propose a history of the different ideas of american capitalism and with those institutions of people and places to show you how different these versions are on each other and i am arguing there are three big spaces in the American Organization over the last 100 years and that transaction oriented and Network Oriented is the wind and the era of the Big Tech Companies founding the economy there is a famous protocol the Organization Man 1957 and my title is homage to his book and to banish the word he was writing about with american employment and that climate and how that word went away. And the story i am trying to tell is what happened which rose forever economic regime and now it is gone. So that is the story im telling. Host why did you write the book or what prompted you to write the book . Guest a little bit of everything that has happened in my life. I am no longer quite so young as i used to be. And i am old enough of the former entering and that closest brush was working at the Washington Post where you worked for so many years. It was assumed the minute you got in the door you would be here until retirement as long as he didnt screw up too badly and the company will take care of you. All those uncertainties go away how an ordinary person would interact and just as a tiny example working at Columbia University going into the fifties or sixties look at the marker of the establishment is people who started in a Big Corporation and rose up the ranks over the decades and then become the head of the corporation. And that private equity so how did this happen . Host this Organization Man institutional the world as a network era hard to describe that . Guest i will describe that as the rise of wall street is the governing principle and Morgan Stanley as well use as the example. As late as 1970 Morgan Stanley had 200 employees as a private partnership and People Like Us where pundits with the state of the American Economy often would say things like mason would not even exist because corporations are so powerful. And now Morgan Stanley has been through lots of ups and downs to the financial crisis and more than 50000 employees and wine of the systemically important important institutions a. K. A. Too big to fail guaranteed by the federal government. The power has shifted from corporations who thought they could do whatever they wanted to wall street firms and a Financial System that dictates terms to corporations under shareholder value of job security and a generous retirement pension rather than government. The second and third phase with that social compact with the Economic Security middleclass americans the greatest social institutions to provide income security on security and took care of people and i was just assumed to be true that is the behavior everyone and expected and there were many things but just as an example the famous Management Consultant and keying of the business pendants for decades the book in the late seventies after the world was already falling apart to say that guess what . America is a socialist country. That they have Large Pension Funds that were have a on heavily unionized and sponsor the biggest actors in the stock market. Because the workers only objection. And the jimmy carter presidency from 1980 that is an extensive volume almost 900 pages so there is a lot there. Very rich in detail. The underlying themes . The fourth and final book that ive been working on since 1987 and it dovetails nicely of american capitalism and society and all the gatekeepers believe that we come up for this nineties equilibrium of created stability in the world and it is generally understand to be a liberalism we would be more like western europe to play the way at the south join the modern world that if anybody disagreed with us is nuts. That is my first book and the american consensus and in which the republicans nominated and then they despise that consensus represented these capitalist with the chips used in one a system of guaranteed employment of course goldwater lost at the biggest and that is the American Experience and of the conservative influence that may not be a Republican Party to come back again and again and again i write about that happening after jimmy carter so and nixon land to the resentment of middleclass people as is ford coppola so succession but it was a book of organization and nixon land is about resentment say as therapy on the rate that the next book and plausible page covers the rise of watergate and the one word is innocent the basic storyline that after vietnam and after watergate and the ordeal of stagflation and america realizing for the first time its not to spend the world of a colossus but also citizenship where people were hard that the idea of the nation and that got us into vietnam and to look at and a challenging way all over the place. And then not only the left but also the center and reagan comes along and says we are the chosen nation of god always be gods to it on chosen nation. For president in 1976, and loses so this culminates to winning the presidency and in one of those aspects that discusses in the first transaction man on the way out and in coalition with other elements. So i write about Jerry Falwell turning america into the sinks. I read about the corporate world savagely organizing him what i talk about. With full harmony and you will about this also steve and the striking charisma with the warmth and optimism that president jimmy carter has organized his own presidency around the idea that we have to do more. And basically to see the world as a the the childhood. Served the series of books to explain how america transformed itself from the centerleft nation to the centerright nation not only Ronald Reagan was the presidency but some conservative senators in the senate once again in 1977 the planet one the pendant say if they dont the conservatives the Republican Party will go out of business. Host was again a genius to capture the moment . A flawed manipulator with man . The insulting way it is yes he was very good at taking direction just like he learned as a hollywood contract player but then discipline and maturity some new better than him and he should defer to them. And comparing the letters for him to sign those that made him sound like an intellectual and those that he dictated to his friends as he pondered the book of revelation in the middle east and sent letters to jean dixon the newspaper psychic. I dont come down dogmatic way but it is a complicated question. Host a question for both of you. In the era of the consensus with corporations being at the center of a system the past. The in the late seventies. But you suggest its a moment in which the country took a longterm plan a the wrong turn you lay out why it had not worked out with institution. So the economy was uncompetitive and it was unwinding. And yet he decided to take a turn. We needed to do something different. Your idea is we did the wrong thing . Guest i might to some extent as a young liberal journalist in washington at the time and i regarded these changes with tremendous enthusiasm and they argued the world that i now say was a wrong turn. Embrace concerned concerned institution a being in doing a term in the social is what is that we way a workers regulation is we the ship Corporate Market we including the conservative the two things and structure the it seemed on time. Host what is . And what would you say about the longterm . In a political way one of the reasons that whole system more skilled on the one resource of Petroleum Control by actual human beings in the middle east and throw their weight around. And people were talking about things like energy being too cheap to meter. Thats not a factor that anyone considers important and why the economy dog we can see in retrospect. Why did that happen with the Global Economy . You want in which are part of the world was a colony of the United States and they were basically speak for themselves. So we took it into job is. Reacted with mel and intelligence your is why they are happening here is where they need to stop happening. Basically on the corporate rate right to say inflation is caused by too much governmen government, too much spending in carter with that austerity ideology bought. We know in retrospect it was insanely all things that smart only have 2 Percent Inflation with massive deficit. They made a compelling and Strong Political argument and people from the National Review and Washington Monthly and the way were able to buy and say we need to cut government. And right the ship and tight money and completely unnecessary and then to advance effectively. To make those economic arguments and allied of dishonesty and not having that same coalition and how that could have gone a different way is a Political Coalition and as we need so one more social democracy and redistribution of power in the society. What i can make that argument was a or messenger the fun story to tell and we are left with, by the way one of the biggest is an have enormous apathy a guy on election day tingling from behind the curtain with the choices anderson who have 50 percent cap tax and then carter and reagan and he himself. Word it would be better off if they had become stronger rather than weaker if we had closed off the American Economy to trade . Me kept regulation . The United States would have been stronger in the long run with all of those things . And not only became weaker but also abandoned organizers. If they could have gone to the negotiating table to say law is good for everybody with lots of small towns and americans dont have Airline Service is it possible is it possible the pendulum do you need to be moved in a different direction and the United States economy did recover and actually was pretty good in the 19 nineties but then it went to all in the wrong direction so it was a necessary correction taken too far. I would like to frame it that lets talk about the 21st century. If we all agree the pendulum swinging and its want to al all, we can all agree now in the last in a billion against this creation we are talking, that is a Major Political that is the farthest to the left for those who have been following for a long time and when those Economic Issues of many decade. So the voters are pushing really to be attentive to the interest. What i did not see time and to engineer and the assessor back to the politics are a good ten years to not more. It is like to see and the football and the peanuts cartoon if we take all these restraints away and that is a justice mann the society so back in the late seventies i had a society that was made very fluid without a safety net and restraint that are required for everybody. Host let me ask a final question. One of the things we thought several times in conservativism would be better and it turns out it wasnt. Now they say finally this is reached the end of its role what do you want to tell us . Really really be careful if you live in a liberal will. I do in daily life. Really be careful assuming that conservatism and instead whole country liberal. It is a big and complicated and after changing country and rick captures that with elements and surprises. And the greatest threat to the whole order we are interested in the christian academys in the south to organize a conservative movement. Not in plain sight and do not be complacent to the of the ordinary working people not just elites and their own notion of a just society. And the character who starts the book neck and real that he and his wife were showing me around the neighbor around Auto Repair Shop that was a black run by a white guy like sanford and son. I cannot get out of the Auto Repair Shop because he was telling me how great donald trump was i live in Morningside Heights your and i spent two or three hours with this country where is he right or wrong but it made a huge impression on me he thought trump spoke for him. Dont count this guy out. Host you study the conservative movement rick, do you think it is now and the trouble with this coming election in the liberal ascendancy or do not feel that spent the biggest danger with the upcoming election is the election not over our lifetimes how many votes security get if it is 40 percent of the country will consider it legitimate and what shelley look like in 1970 or 1932 not just the forces between democrats and republicans what they are going for and conservatives because its part way they think and feel. But the question now and democracy to survive one of the political parties. Host thank you Rick Pearlstein and nick lemmon for joining us on this session of the National Civil brought to you by the library of congress its a good conversation. Thank you to those who are watching for joining us. Thank you to those who are watching for joining us. Thank you. Host joining us live on tv one of the authors Rick Pearlsteins most recent book is reagan land. Mr. Pearlstein for the past 20 years writing about conservative politics in america what got you on track. It comes back to my childhood in the sixties i was a teenager i realize the sixties was all summer of love and these but also as the backlash