Integral Politics for the Mainstream Media

My book covers a lot of subjects, and prior to its publication I was not sure which aspect of it would receive the most attention. However, it appears that my interpretation of integral politics has struck a chord because What Is Enlightenment? Magazine is about to release their September issue, which features an interview of me entitled “Integral Politics Comes of Age.” Moreover, my publicists feel that politics is the best angle to use to pitch the integral worldview to the media. They thus asked me to write a press release that explained integral politics in one page. Well, this is a tall order, and I thought it best to avoid bringing up world federalism at this point and rather focus on how the integral perspective can raise consciousness and help people “move up” from wherever they are. So here is my one-page description of integral politics for digestion by the mainstream media:

Integral Politics Press Release

The newly released book, Integral Consciousness and the Future of Evolution, is garnering considerable attention for its fresh take on politics. As author Steve McIntosh explains, “The integral approach to politics effectively transcends the entrenched positions of left and right; it overcomes the culture war by showing why we need the values and solutions of both ends of the political spectrum.” The integral perspective actually rejects the left-right conception of politics, seeing the American political landscape as consisting of three groups rather than two. These three main demographic groups cohere around the values-based worldviews known as: traditional, modernist, and postmodern.

The traditional worldview is the oldest and accounts for about 25% of the American population. Traditionalists value personal responsibility, decency and honesty, law and order, piety and reverence for their belief system, and respect for traditions and conservative mores. Modernists, who make up 50% of the American body politic, value achievement and personal excellence, science and technology, status, wealth, and prosperity, liberty and individual freedom, higher education, and material and economic progress. And in contrast, countercultural postmodernists (who represent close to 25% of Americans) value sustainability over progress, inclusivity over hierarchy; they value alternative medicine, alternative spirituality and personal growth, and they place increased value on the environment and all things natural.

But unlike these older worldviews, which tend to see each other primarily for their pathologies, the integral worldview more clearly recognizes the enduring contributions of each of these previous perspectives, while also seeing their blind spots and shortcomings. Integralists understand that each of these stages of history offer solutions to different sets of life conditions, so the integral perspective can use the best of each of these worldviews in dealing with the myriad problems faced by our civilization here at the beginning of the 21st century.

Integralists do not advocate a centrist position, their agenda involves the cultural project of getting everyone to “move up” from where they are. But this doesn’t imply that the U.S. simply becomes more left leaning. By showing the evolutionary necessity of the values of each of these previous worldviews, the integral perspective helps postmodernists become more sympathetic to the values of modernists and traditionalists, and vice versa. The integral worldview thus serves to translate and mediate between these significant demographic segments of the American population, which over time diminishes the defensiveness that produces many of the conflicts of the culture war.

Ultimately, America’s best defense is a more moral foreign policy. And in order for America to again become a moral leader in the world, it will require that we skillfully uphold and apply the enduring values of traditionalism, modernism, and postmodernism simultaneously. In other words, the solutions offered by all three of these major worldviews apply to different sets of political conditions. So when we are able to use all of these approaches in “life condition appropriate proportion,” when we are no longer limited to one ideology or one set of values, it gives us a significant strategic advantage. The integral approach can use the inclusive, worldcentric values of postmodernism in a way that is still informed by considerations of our national self-interest, and also balanced with our de facto role as the defender of global modernism. So a more moral foreign policy means not just eliminating torture and foreign prisons like Guantanamo, it also means that we become more proactive in helping to heal the history of colonialism and the abuses of the cold war, in which America was complicit. Integral politics involves working to change hearts and minds here at home in a way that makes it easier for us to change hearts and minds in the Middle East and in Europe.

Because of its enlarged understanding of values and cultural evolution, the integral approach to politics can thus make America safer by helping us be more skillful and effective at dealing with the cultural issues that are at the heart of most of our problems, both domestically and internationally.