PostModern Progressives

Last fall I volunteered for the Minnesota Peace Team at the Republican National Convention in St Paul, Minnesota. I saw the peace team as another indication of a new consciousness being born into the world. The members of the peace team were able to maintain a peaceful presence in the middle of the turmoil and help the demonstrators, the police, and the Republican delegates as needed without undue internal conflict. I believe they were able to do this because they framed the experience using an enlarged and peaceful perspective.
Politically, I would call this new consciousness Postmodern Progressivism.
The Progressive Movement during the industrial age saw the interconnectivity of the human community. They succeeded in creating child labor laws, better and safer working conditions, labor unions, and women's suffrage.
Postmodern Progressives must deal with the problems of the information age. They emphasize the cultural context in which individual experience takes place because they understand that cultural constructs can limit or expand personal experience.
Postmodernists understand that human perception and interpretation constructs theories about reality that frames our experience. At some level we co-create our experience of reality and this created context provides a useful and meaningful perspective in which we all live and act. Postmodern Progressives see that meaning depends on perspective and that all perspectives contain some truth, so they don"t restrict themselves to one narrow perspective, they are able to take multiple perspectives.
Progressives believe that we are all in this together and therefore creating meaningful constructs should be done by all for all and should not be left to the privileged elite.
Postmodern Progressives see the limitations in both liberal and conservative thinking and yet can include the truths contained in both perspectives. From the conservative perspective it takes individual initiative and innovation, fiscal responsibility, and the honoring of tradition, culture, experience, and expertise. Postmodern Progressives understand that not all perspectives are equal - the wider and more inclusive the perspective, the more truth it contains. Therefore, from the liberal perspective they take the equality, inclusiveness, and mutuality of the pluralistic community, as well as the global perspective.
The Conservatives are fighting to maintain their power as if their life depends
on it because it does.The conservative perspective is fading because of the new consciousness that is emerging globally. This does not mean that the truths contained in that perspective cannot be preserved and used when appropriate.
Liberals also must give up the idea that their perspective is always correct.
Postmodern Progressivism is beyond the two-dimensional mindset - left, right, center. It is a multi-dimensional perspective that transcends and includes many political viewpoints.
The global problems facing us are immense. Einstein said that problems cannot be solved with the same mindset that created them. We need to allow and cultivate the new consciousness I saw in the Minnesota Peace Team at the RNC.