It’s never been sensible to believe that the center of civilization is 312 W. Whitewater Street, with people and events beyond shrinking markedly in significance as one gets farther from that supposed center. Under that theory, by the time one reaches Palmyra, one might as well be in the unexplored Amazon.
Exaggerating the significance of local – becoming obsessively hyper-local – exaggerates the near and unreasonably diminishes the far. It elevates local customs no matter how backward, and denies a fair consideration of beneficial practices that could be adopted from across the state or country.
I’d say it’s Gov. Walker, of all people, how has made the hyper-local in Wisconsin politically impossible. By raising the ideological stakes between left and right – as matter of state policy that alters former legal, political, and economic relationships within small communities – Walker has made state politics more important. He has simultaneously and necessarily (in this case) made local politics less important.
In effect, he’s Wisconsinized politics away from cities and towns through sweeping legislation from Madison. (The irony is that he’s of a political party that insists it stands for local control.)
Although I’m not a Republican, it’s one of the consequences of his policies that I think is beneficial: one is more powerfully confronted with the question of where one stands. As I’ve always favored an approach that produces local policies only after considering state and national trends, a political approach that looks beyond the town line isn’t a bad idea.
Gov. Walker’s not looking in a libertarian direction (not at all), but he is looking past the idea that only what’s within a hundred yards is what matters.
Hyper-local approaches would have faded anyway, as new media have made connecting to national news and trends as easy – or easier – than walking across the street.
Yet, Walker’s ideological zeal has accelerated the decline of local. It’s a more divided state, no doubt, but at least it’s one that cannot credibly pretend that a city or town is an island. More than ever, state government influences local policy.
The statewide fight over alternative courses of action is worth waging, in itself and for its broadened horizon.
One should use the best ingredients from across all America; anything less is a recipe for mediocrity.
Looking at state (and federal) actions, and shaping local policy only after that examination, is all too the good.
We’ll have a better, less provincial, politics.