The following article, “Seven Principles for a 21st Century Left” by Ruy Teixeira, politics editor of The Liberal Patriot newsletter, senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and author of major works of political analysis, is cross-posted from The Liberal Patriot:

Recently I argued that the left’s 21st century project has failed. After the era of social democracy sputtered out at the end of the 20^th century, the left embarked on a new project they hoped would remedy the weaknesses evident at century’s end and inaugurate a new era of political and governance success. We are now a quarter of the way through the 21^st century, which has witnessed both a genuine “crisis of capitalism” (the Great Recession of 2007-09) and the systemic breakdown of the COVID era (2020-22). Enough time has gone by to render a judgement: despite ample opportunity to advance their cause, the left’s 21^st century project has failed and failed badly.

Consider:

• It has failed to stop the rise of right populism.
• It has failed to create durable electoral majorities.
• It has failed to achieve broad social hegemony.
• It has failed to retain its working-class base.
• It has failed to promote social order.
• It has failed to practice effective governance.
• It has failed to jump-start rapid economic growth.
• It has failed to generate optimism about the future.

Of course, the project hasn’t been a complete failure. Left parties, including the Democratic Party, have succeeded in building strong bases among the educated and professional classes and, if they have lacked broad social hegemony, they have generally controlled the commanding heights of cultural production. As a result they have mostly set the terms of “respectable” discourse in elite circles.

But that’s pretty weak beer compared to all those massive failures and the heady aspirations of those who presume to be on “the right side of history.” Most on the left would prefer to believe that the left’s 21^st century project is basically sound and just needs a few tweaks. This is whistling past the graveyard. After a quarter century, it is time to face the facts: the project is simply not fit for purpose and needs to be jettisoned.

By that I don’t mean that parties of the left cannot win elections. They have, and they will! Already, Democrats look well-positioned to take back the House in 2026, and they even have an outside shot at taking the Senate. And if the unpopularity and poor results of the Trump administration continue into 2028, they’ll certainly have a solid chance of recapturing the presidency three years from now.

But a continuation of the electoral see-saw between Democrats and Republicans is not what the left should have in mind. It has been and would be little more than a holding action against right populism. Taking advantage of the thermostatic reactionagainst your opponents’ overreach and failure to manage the economy effectively is a very low bar—especially given how egregiously flawed that opponent is. It would hardly indicate a revival of the left and a new political project to replace the one that has limped along for a quarter of a century. Rebuilding the left’s base among the working class and forging a durable majority coalition will require a genuinely new project based on core principles that break with the failures of the past.

Those principles should be based on the fundamental fact that the left has lost touch with baseline realities of how to reach ordinary working-class voters, what policies could actually deliver what these voters want, and what kind of politics accords with these voters’ common sense rather than the biases of their own base. The left needs to course-correct toward realism to give themselves a serious chance of decisively defeating right populism and achieving the good society they claim they are committed to.

With that in mind, here are seven core principles a serious 21^st century left must embrace for long-term success.

Energy realism. This is an important one. As I have noted, the left has spent the first quarter of the 21^st century obsessed with the threat of climate change and the need to rapidly replace fossil fuels with renewables (wind and solar) to stave off the apocalypse. In their quest to meet arbitrary net zero targets, they have made this transition a central policy goal and structured much of their economic program around this.

A dubious crusade to begin with, albeit much beloved among their Brahmin left base, the wheels are now coming off the bus. A recent article by Tom Fairless and Max Colchester in the Wall Street Journal summarized the European situation:

European politicians pitched the continent’s green transition to voters as a win-win: Citizens would benefit from green jobs and cheap, abundant solar and wind energy alongside a sharp reduction in carbon emissions.

Nearly two decades on, the promise has largely proved costly for consumers and damaging for the economy.

Europe has succeeded in slashing carbon emissions more than any other region—by 30 percent from 2005 levels, compared with a 17 percent drop for the U.S. But along the way, the rush to renewables has helped drive up electricity prices in much of the continent.

Germany now has the highest domestic electricity prices in the developed world, while the U.K. has the highest industrial electricity rates, according to a basket of 28 major economies analyzed by the International Energy Agency. Italy isn’t far behind. Average electricity prices for heavy industries in the European Union remain roughly twice those in the U.S. and 50 percent above China. Energy prices have also grown more volatile as the share of renewables increased.

It is crippling industry and hobbling Europe’s ability to attract key economic drivers like artificial intelligence, which requires cheap and abundant electricity. The shift is also adding to a cost-of-living shock for consumers that is fueling support for antiestablishment parties, which portray the green transition as an elite project that harms workers, most consumers and regions.

Such have been the wages of the green transition. No wonder countries around the world are increasingly reluctant to sign on to getting rid of fossil fuels, as shown by results of the recent COP30 deliberations. Projections from McKinsey, the International Energy Agency, and so on now see strong fossil fuel demand through 2050, with these energy sources not zeroed out but rather providing close to or an outright majority of the world’s primary energy consumption. Indeed, based on recent trends, these projections are, if anything, too optimistic about how fast the fossil fuel share will decline from its current 81 percent level.

These realities, plus awareness of the importance of development to poor countries, have led even erstwhile climate warrior Bill Gates to remark:

[C]limate change…will not lead to humanity’s demise. People will…thrive in most places on Earth for the foreseeable future….[F]or the vast majority of [poor people in the world] it will not be the only or even the biggest threat to their lives and welfare. The biggest problems are poverty and disease, just as they always have been.

When Bill Gates starts sounding like Bjorn Lomborg, you know things are really changing!

Here in the United States the relative strength and copious energy resources of our economy, plus somewhat more modest policies, have spared us from the worst that has befallen Europe. But the direction of change is clear. Even during the green-oriented Biden administration, domestic oil and gas production hit record levels. It is unlikely with AI data centers juicing energy demand that this upward trend will be reversed.

Meanwhile, Trump has gotten rid of subsidies for renewable energy and electric vehicles, which were never popular, and a pragmatic public simply does not care. They have always favored an all-of-the-above energy policy, very much including fossil fuels, and do not see climate change as the existential, overriding issue that has preoccupied the activist left.

What they do care about is cheap, abundant, reliable energy, and the same could be said about American industry. The recent vogue for “affordability” rather than strenuous climate change rhetoric among Democrats indicates that the left is starting to wake up on this issue. But name-checking affordability falls far short of fully embracing energy realism and all that would entail.

That means acknowledging that, no, climate change is not an “emergency” and does not justify an impractical rapid transition to wind and solar. And that, yes, fossil fuels, especially natural gas and oil, will be a big part of the energy mix for many, many years to come. The left must make it clear that they have a realistic understanding of the complexity and centrality of the energy system and will jettison any and all dogmas that interfere with meeting the country’s energy needs and keeping prices low for consumers and industry. That does not mean solar and wind will not play a role in doing so, but so will other energy sources like natural gas and oil, the revived nuclear industry, which was frozen in amber for decades in no small part due to left opposition, and emerging sources deserving of government support like geothermal. The future mix of energy types and policies should be determined by a zealous commitment to energy realism.

If that means we don’t hit “net zero” by 2050, so be it. Truth be told, that was always a “delusional” goal, as Vaclav Smil has pointed out.

Growth realism. As I have noted, the left in the 21^st century hasn’t been terribly interested in the issue of overall economic growth. That goal has taken a back seat to others deemed more important, like fighting climate change, reducing inequality, pursuing procedural justice, and advocating for immigrants and identity groups. The invaluable “Deciding to Win” report analyzed word frequency in Democratic Party platforms since 2012 and found a 32 percent decline in the appearance of the word “growth” compared to a 150 percent increase in the word “climate,” a 1,044 percent increase in “LGBT/LGBTQI+,” a 766 percent increase in “equity,” an 828 percent increase in “white/black/Latino/Latina,” and a 333 percent increase in “environmental justice.”

But the key to substantially rising living standards for the working class is precisely more economic growth, especially higher productivity growth. You cannot make up for that by redistribution nor by simply spending more money on government programs. A fast-growth economy provides more opportunities for upward mobility, generates better-paying jobs, creates fiscal space for priorities like infrastructure projects, and, as Benjamin Friedman has argued, has positive “moral consequences” by orienting citizens toward generosity, tolerance, and collective advance. Slow growth has the opposite effects.

It is therefore completely unrealistic for the left to think they can accomplish their goals and build support without centering the goal of economic growth. Attempts to elide this problem result in heavy reliance on chimerical projects like a rapid green transition (see above), which do not and cannot deliver the benefits of overall growth. Or, as in the Biden administration, just spending money on various party priorities and hoping for the best. (Make Spending Money Great Again?) That did not work either.

The left must learn to love economic growth instead of downgrading it. In particular, they should be racking their brains on how to create the best possible environment for productivity growth. That’s not easy and takes them out of their comfort zone, but do it they must. They must ask: how can technological change be harnessed for the maximum effect on productivity growth and a much richer society?

The question is sharpened by the meteoric rise of AI. Of course, there’s a certain amount of dreamy hand-waving about all the wonderful transformations AI will bring to the economy and society. But AI boosters are not wrong that the potential is immense if AI is, in fact, a new general-purpose technology (GPT). If so, the effects on productivity growth could be game-changing and era-defining.

Democrats, however, who have long had a streak of techno-pessimism, are not reacting terribly positively to this development and its enormous growth potential. Indeed, the evolving reaction seems to be downright negative. Senator Chris Murphy, a reliable barometer of party trends, had this to say:

The cultural and economic impact of AI is going to be the biggest issue in politics over the next decade…There is going to be a growing appetite from voters to support candidates that are going to help them manage the potential coming disaster as AI poisons our kids and destroys all of our jobs.

Ok then! Doesn’t sound like he’s thinking too hard about productivity growth dividends. Or economic growth period. That’s a big, big problem for a party that must start embracing growth realism to be successful.

Governance realism. There’s getting elected and then there’s…governing. You’ve got to run the government well and get things done voters care about if you want those voters to stick with you. And that’s where the left has been running into problems—big problems. Commonly, ideological commitments and interest group ties have outweighed the simple, inescapable realities of good governance. Voters just don’t care about the supposedly noble motivations that lead the left to ignore these realities.

Think about it. If you wanted safe streets and public order would your first impulse be to turn to…the left? Or if you wanted a secure, actually-enforced border? How about efficient, effective delivery of public services? Or rapid completion of public projects and infrastructure? Or nonideological public administration?

I don’t think on any of these fronts the reaction of a typical voter would be: “The left! Of course, I need the left to do all these things because they’re so good at them!” On the contrary, it seems like over time the left and their party, the Democrats—both nationally and in many localities where they dominate—have become worse and worse at delivering in these areas. That’s a huge problem because why should voters take left plans to improve their lives seriously if Democrats persist in running government so poorly? Left governance is their advertising and the advertising makes the Democratic “product” look pretty bad. So voters don’t want to buy it.

After a quarter of a century, it’s apparent that the left’s prioritization of social and procedural justice over good governance has been a huge mistake. The left must unreservedly commit to good, efficient governance and social order over its various ideological commitments and NGO ties or voters will not take them seriously going forward. Governance realism is not an option; it’s a necessity.

Immigration realism. Nowhere has the left’s lack of political and policy realism been more obvious—and more toxic—that on the issue of immigration. Across the Western world and here in the United States, encouragement of mass immigration through lax border and interior enforcement and porous asylum systems have effectively legalized illegal immigration and made a mockery of controlled, legal immigration. The results have been predictably disastrous, opening a gaping hole in the left’s working class support in country after country. These policies have ignored the following realities:

1. Many more people want to come to a rich country like the United States than an orderly immigration system can allow.
2. Therefore, many people are willing to break the laws of our country to gain entry.
3. If you do not enforce the law, you will get more law-breakers and therefore more illegal immigrants.
4. If you provide procedural loopholes to gain entry into the country (e.g., by claiming asylum), many people will abuse these loopholes.
5. Once these illegal and irregular immigrants gain entry to the country, they will seek to stay indefinitely regardless of their immigration status.
6. If interior immigration enforcement is lax, such that these illegal and irregular immigrants do mostly get to stay forever, that provides a tremendous incentive for others to try to gain entry to the country via the same means.
7. If you provide benefits and dispensations to all immigrants in the country, regardless of their immigration status, this further incentivizes aspiring immigrants to gain entry to the country by any means necessary.
8. Tolerance of flagrant law-breaking on a mass scale contributes to a sense of social disorder and loss of control among a country’s citizens, who believe a nation’s borders are meaningful and that the welfare of a nation’s citizens should come first.
9. There is, in fact, such a thing as too much immigration, particularly low-skill immigration, and negative effects on communities and workers are real, not just in the imaginations of xenophobes. As Josh Barro observes:

Democrats…need to get back in touch with the reasons that both uncontrolled migration and excessive volumes of migration really are problems…[I]llegal and irregular migration reflect a failure of our civic institutions, a misuse of the social safety net, and a breakdown of the rule of law, and…all of that is actually bad…

Illegal immigration, and other forms of irregular migration that happen with the authorization of the executive branch, really do hurt Americans by putting strain on public resources, imposing costs on taxpayers, and undermining social cohesion.

10. If more immigration is desired by parties or policymakers, from whichever countries and at whatever skill levels, that immigration should be regular, legal immigration and approved by the American people through the democratic process. Backdooring mass immigration over the wishes of voters because it is “kind” or “reflects our values” or is deemed “economically necessary” leads inevitably to backlash. Wheelbarrows full of econometric studies on immigration’s aggregate benefits will not save you.

These are the realities of the immigration issue and each and every one of them has been ignored by the left during the first quarter of the 21^st century. Going forward, the left must show voters they understand these realities and are willing to dramatically change the incentive structure for illegal and irregular immigration. That means strict border enforcement, elimination or radical restriction of immigration loopholes and a credible interior enforcement regime that recognizes illegal immigrants, even if they stay out of trouble, are still illegal and therefore susceptible to deportation. Otherwise illegal immigrants who manage to enter the country will quite reasonably assume that they can stay here forever which of course is a massive incentive for more illegal immigration.

If the left wishes to legalize certain classes of illegal immigrants (e.g., long-time residents) so they are not susceptible to deportation and/or increase legal immigration levels, that case must be sold to the American public. That will only be possible if voters believe Democrats actually understand and embrace the baseline realities of immigration outlined above. Democrats are still far, far away from convincing voters of that. Really, the only thing clear about Democrats’ current immigration policy is that they oppose Trump’s immigration policy. That only works—can only work—as short-term politics.

The back door for mass immigration is closing; only an immigration realist left can be successful in the second quarter of the 21^st century.

Merit realism. The quintessential moral commitment of the 20^th century left was to make American society truly colorblind. It was unfair and egregious that racial discrimination could truncate the life chances of black people and visit misery upon them. Therefore, the left advocated and marched for ending discrimination and unequal opportunity. They won the argument, in the process pulling the entire Democratic Party in their direction. Not only was legislation passed to make such discrimination illegal but anti-discrimination and equal opportunity became as close to consensual beliefs as you can get in America.

Americans today believe, with Martin Luther King Jr., that people should “not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” In a 2022 University of Southern California Dornsife survey, this classic statement of colorblind equality was posed to respondents: “Our goal as a society should be to treat all people the same without regard to the color of their skin.” That view elicited sky-high (92 percent) agreement from the public.

Similarly, a 2023 Public Agenda Hidden Common Ground survey found 91 percent agreement with the statement: “All people deserve an equal opportunity to succeed, no matter their race or ethnicity.” This is what Americans deeply believe in: equal opportunity not, it should be noted, equal outcomes.

This is what the left used to believe in—indeed, mounted the barricades for. But a funny thing happened on the way to the 21^st century. Instead of treating the colorblind society as a noble ideal that should be striven for even if its perfect attainment is impossible, the left lost faith in the ideal because racial disparities did not immediately disappear. Instead, they began to favor color-conscious remedies like affirmative action that went far beyond anti-discrimination and equal opportunity and to oppose colorblind policies if they did not produce desired outcomes by race.

More here.