The Philosopher Who Could Be President - What Would It Mean for Us?
Dr. Cornel West has put his name into contention as a candidate for the presidency of the United States in 2024. While it’s a long shot for an academic and former Harvard professor like West, it’s not without precedent.
Among the most recent professional scholars to have run is Jerome Segal, author of books on philosophical economics and moral theory, who ran for president in 2020 as a socialist and who’s now a candidate for the United States Senate. Woodrow Wilson taught jurisprudence at Princeton University before serving as the school’s president and later ascending to the U.S. presidency. And we all know Barack Obama started out teaching constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School.
West is currently a professor of philosophy, religion, and African American thought at Union Theological Seminary in New York, where he holds the chair named for Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the heroic anti-Nazi Protestant pastor and activist murdered in a concentration camp in 1945.
Brother West speaks truth to power
West has become a regularly featured commentator in a variety of media outlets, with his uncompromising, unapologetic, and highly quotable statements calling out racism and all other forms of bigotry, and proclaiming the centrality of ethics, equity, and fairness if we are ever going to make a better world. Even in arguments with ideological enemies, he does them the courtesy of calling them “Brother,” as he himself is affectionately known as “Brother West” to his many fans in and outside academia.
As a reviewer put it in describing his 2009 memoir Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud, the man is “a progressive cultural icon.” He has taken the fight to the elite by refusing to accept second-class treatment for marginalized people, and refusing to allow those in control of resources to put the blame for the country’s economic woes on the poor. His whole brand is anchored in speaking truth to power.
Solving the party problem
When West originally announced his candidacy in early June 2023, he was running as a standard-bearer for the People’s Party. That organization—whose full name is Movement for a People’s Party, or MPP—was founded in 2017 by a group of pro-Bernie Sanders activists angered by the Democratic Party’s treatment of Sanders during the 2016 campaign.
All this might sound idealistic, but critics of the MPP note a variety of scandals that have tarnished the upstart party’s image. These include, in the words of Jeet Heer writing in The Nation, “fringe” policies and supporters and a “ramshackle” organization. While Heer’s piece describes West’s candidacy as an “otherwise credible” progressive challenge to Joe Biden, the candidate’s choice of this particular party has left most pundits scratching their heads.
Many think West should have announced his candidacy for the Democratic Party nomination, rather than at the front of a party with exactly zero realistic chance of appearing on most ballots, or of getting him into the White House. If it’s influence for his ideas that West wants, it’s also notable that third-party candidates typically struggle to achieve that. Jill Stein’s 2016 Green Party candidacy did little to push front-runner Hillary Clinton further to the left, and in the opinion of many pundits helped Donald Trump win that election by drawing off votes from Clinton.
West, for his part, has stated his involvement with the People’s Party has been largely advisory, and admitted that the multiple serious problems within it deserve serious scrutiny. But his choice of party still raises questions about his political judgment.
Even if he wanted to work through a third-party group, critics point out, he could have run under the banner of the Green Party, which at least has significant ballot access and organizational strength.
Well, that happened: Having already announced with the People’s Party, after a few weeks West was already moving into position as a Green Party candidate, with the assistance of Jill Stein herself. Stein told media on June 22 that she would serve as “transition coordinator” to move West and his campaign infrastructure over to the Green Party, where she would help him roll out a “people-powered” campaign.
A man who can elevate the tone
We do need, in the words of John Lennon and James Brown, “Power to the People.” And using the Green Party’s infrastructure better positions West to deliver it, at least in ways that inform the public about systemic issues like climate change, racism, and poverty.
What would Cornel West bring to the presidency, in the unlikely event he were to be elected? What are the causes most affecting our lives that he especially champions?
Even if he never becomes the second Black U.S. president, West’s comprehensive intellect, activism, and passionate commitment to helping lift up ordinary, struggling people, can’t help but influence the tone of the national campaign. His in-depth understanding of the historical and current effects of structural racism and classism could bring these issues into sharper relief on a broader national stage.
And his philosophy, based as much in the tenets of a tolerant Christian morality as Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s were, might just help relieve some of the bitter rancor and ugly personal attacks that pass for political discussion in our times.