ABSTRACT
This chapter explores history as one possibility among others for escaping the narrow ideological confines of formal democracy assumed by traditional liberals, libertarians, neoliberals, and neoconservatives alike. It examines neoconservatism. The chapter also examines neoliberal schooling. While many nations have secured the conditions for democracy, and some have succeeded in advancing their democracy within the narrow confines of its founding ideology, none seem able to explore conceptions of democracy beyond the purely formal and institutional. While neoliberalism is the immediate, pressing, and most publicly visible political force in transforming democracy in the United States, the rising influence of neoconservatism is potentially the most devastating. Neither neoliberals nor neoconservatives embrace expansive, pluralistic community. Those influenced by postmodernism tend to reject all forms of liberalism or conservatism. The chapter concludes by returning to the ideal of spiritual democracy as an example of communities of diversity and transformation capable of overcoming nihilism and ontological rootlessness without yielding to monism or stagnation.
