The American dream has played a major role in shaping America’s development and the way millions of American lives are lived. It has helped fuel the aspirations and behaviour that have energised America’s emergence as the world’s largest capitalist economy by cultivating an insatiable consumer society.
Yet the dream both inspires and feeds a culture of consumer entitlement that no longer serves America’s future, or anyone else’s. Tackling the world’s major problems calls for working on globally shared interests across national boundaries. Looking at the threats and turmoil around the world in the pursuit of common interests is where the greatest self-interest lies.
There is a danger that many Americans and others in western societies ignore this seemingly paradoxical reality. Given America’s hugely influential and continuing role as a model for pursuing material wellbeing across the world, it’s time for America to dream a new dream.
The American dream: unfettered opportunity and individual liberty
The American dream resonates with the principles that the founding fathers enshrined in the constitution. Within the USA’s brand proposition, the dream is the marketing proposition that captures American notions of unfettered opportunity and individual liberty. These notions shaped the American psyche at the country’s formation and have since been absorbed by millions of immigrants over the centuries who fled oppression and persecution to start new lives in ‘the land of the free’.
For immigrants to the USA, past and present, the dream has become a shorthand for unrestrained ambition, self-determination and unlimited reward for all. But in the world we have created, this license has become increasingly dubious. The best of intentions has been subverted by the law of unintended consequences.
Individual choice and consumerism at the heart of being American
The potential of a ‘new’ land, rich in both resources and opportunity, coupled with pursuit of individual freedom, underpinned the dream. America was, and still sees itself as, the land of bounty with plenty for everyone. Unrestrained desire, unlimited individual choice and the right to consume now sit at the heart of being American.
If America’s desires or needs weren’t satisfied from within, it looked at how to secure them from elsewhere. Commercial colonialism has fed America’s apparently insatiable appetite for more ‘stuff’ and produced it more cheaply than it could itself while compounding the consumer’s sense of material entitlement.
The cultural corollary is that, given there’s no limit on reward or resources, then ‘if you don’t have what you want, either you don’t want it enough or don’t work hard enough to buy it’. You have only yourself to blame. In consequence, the pursuit of shared interests through federal or state intervention is regarded with deep suspicion, to be avoided at all costs.
The frequently expressed fears about ‘socialism’, in response to the measures that followed the banking crisis and in relation to Barack Obama’s health service reforms, reveal a strong aversion to ideas of common interest in some quarters of American society. Initiatives intended to safeguard the greater good were described as un-American, a loaded phrase which goes back to 1938 and the House un-American Activities Committee.
A marketing story that offers more than it can deliver
Only seven years before ‘un-American’ activity was being purged, the American dream, capturing what it was to be American, was formalised by James Truslow Adams. In his conception, it was not principally about material wellbeing. Truslow’s original Dream embodied notions of self-fulfilment, reward through hard work, realising potential and happiness. He also foresaw the danger of pursuing self-interest over the general good.
From 1938 onwards communism became an anathema in America and a quintessentially un-American activity. When communism as practised by Russia collapsed in the late 1980s, capitalism declared itself the ideological victor and took as its prize the unquestioned practice of free market capitalism. The illusion of that success remained intact until late 2007, when the underlying causes of the credit crunch emerged and the flaws of unregulated capitalism were exposed.
The beauty and the peril of the original American dream as a marketing story is that it’s adaptable, capable of different manifestations depending on the dreamer. But the most prevalent, contemporary versions of the dream have prioritised material reward – ‘living the dream’ usually means having lots of acclaim and money, rather than a state of wellbeing.
Americanisms reveal a culture of acquisitive consumerism
Colloquial American is an acquisitive, consumerist language that reveals the deep-seated cultural disposition of wanting and acquiring. Consider:
- ‘Can I get a nose job / mega skinny latte duo with marshmallow and maple syrup?’ The ‘get’ implies buying something is an entitlement, to be handed over without question.
- ‘I’m gonna grab me …’ This language of aggressive acquisition covers everything from ‘a piece of the action’ to ‘a piece of ass’.
- ‘I’d like to have you… do something for me … / relate to me differently … / behave in a way I prefer…’ These are demands dressed up as requests. The message is ‘You’re obliged to meet my expectations – if only because they’re mine’.
- ‘Why don’t we take in a movie / a ball game / an opera / a mug and his money?’ Everything from cupcakes to culture can be devoured.
We have adopted such language in the UK – ‘Can I get…’ when ordering food, or ‘I’ll have a piece of that [financially rewarding opportunity]’ – showing evidence of how the American dream takes root in other cultures and places.
A myth exploited by advertising and propped up by celebrities
Commercial interests have been relentless in exploiting material aspiration endorsed by the America Dream. Advertising messages are unequivocal: ‘You are entitled to it’, ‘You deserve it’, ‘You devalue yourself by going without it’. These messages are exported through global advertising. Whatever entitlements Americans are being sold today, we all feel entitled to by 9am tomorrow.
Celebrity culture meanwhile helped prop up the myth that untold riches are available to everyone. The dream is reinforced by the bling and glamour of some hugely remunerated individuals who appeared to come from nowhere, some undoubtedly talented but others not – the ‘not’ grouping in particular, helping to keep the dream in play.
Re-imagining the American dream
As the world’s resources are eroded and demand for them increases, the America Dream is less credible not only for America itself but everyone else. Given the problems of climate change, water scarcity, food security and peak oil, ‘having it all’ is no longer a tenable or ethically supportable dream. Continued pursuit of material wellbeing as a manifestation of the dream represents a failure of much-needed imagination.
A new version of the dream could restore some of its original intention but be more explicit about collective wellbeing, enhanced life experience and respect for the world and all the inhabitants who share it.
It could be a more expansive, generous and inspiring dream than its predecessor has come to mean. It should also reflect the need for participation and collaboration that human beings in their various groupings need to incorporate in their own future dreams. While the American dream exerts a powerful influence over global attitudes and aspirations, it does not absolve everyone else from thinking imaginatively and dreaming a better dream. This imperative is not born of an ideological fad but pragmatic self-interest.
An inspiring example for the world
It could be a dream that nations and organisations worldwide shared too. Given the American genius for appealing to cultures far and wide, it could be an inspiring example of global leadership. A new American dream could be an even better dream than the current one – a richer, ultimately more fulfilling and rewarding dream. It could stimulate a new language and notions of success that reflect values other than narcissism, consumerism and acquisition.
It is, of course, the exact opposite of Donald Trump’s destructive zero-sum game ‘winner takes all’ view of the world. But the more we see how that doesn’t work, the greater is the need and appeal for an alternative. America could return to a much-needed position of global leadership based on enlightened values and not on ‘us first’ political thuggery and civic destruction. That would work better for America and the world.
The choice is ultimately America’s. The rest of the world will move on without America, if necessary. In abandoning that role, America chooses the end, not the restoration, of its world leadership.
