Essay collection edited by CU Boulder anthropologists explores expanded notions of corruption in the Trump era
Corruption in the political arena has commonly, if narrowly, been understood as exploitation of political, social or economic power for illicit financial gain, including bribery, extortion, influence peddling, graft and embezzlement.
âContemporary tales of corruption in the United States have most often centered on how the wealthy exploit corporate power and tax regimes or how powerful politicians use their offices to retain power and secure private monetary rewards,â write University of Colorado Boulder scholars Donna M. Goldstein and Kristen Drybread, editors of a new anthology, (Routledge).
But Goldstein, professor of anthropology at the University of Colorado Boulder, and Drybread, a long-time lecturer in anthropology, present an array of 15 essays that expand notions of corruption to include a wide array of political abuses of power, from illiberalism to the obliteration of norms, stacking courts, repression of opponents, police brutality, persistent racial inequities and a âcorrosion of characterâ that prizes âavarice, individualism and short-term gain above collective well-being, and the future.â
âWeâre trying to apply a taboo word, in many ways a strange word for some academics,â says Goldstein. âPeople in our volume redefine and expand the definition and try to overturn various background ideas about what corruption is.â
At the top of the page: Donald J. Trump is the focus of a new anthology edited by two anthropology professors (Trump White House Archive/).ÌęAbove:ÌęÌęis out now.
Corruption is endemic to the United States, the editors argue.
âElite avarice and country-club cronyism are nothing new. Todayâs Wall Street profiteers, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, Big Pharma families and millionaire politicians arguably have much in common with Reconstruction-era robber barons whose inconceivable fortunes were matched only by their disregard for the law and their greed,â Goldstein and Drybread write.
At the same time, the volume wrestles with questions of whether corruption has accelerated or morphed into something more virulent in the âTrump eraââthe 2016 campaign, administration and post-2020-election behavior of former President Donald J. Trumpâand whether he is sui generis in American politics.
But while taking seriously arguments that the âTrump era has not created anything new in the world of corruption,â Drybread and Goldstein lean toward the argument that âsomething is different here.â
âI think we never really have had a president with so many ongoing businesses and conflicts of interests before,â Drybread says.
The 15 essays, written in language accessible to lay readers, address five broad areas: âthe Misappropriation of Societal Values,â âDeliberate Cruelty,â âExplaining Trump Abroad,â âThe Language, Semiotics, and Grammars of Trump Powerâ and âTrump Era Lack of Concern for Well-Being.â
That frame includes anthropologistsâ efforts to examine corruption âin geographical areas that global powers and agencies have traditionally critiqued as corrupt,â particularly in Latin America and Africa, accusations that have âinvited imperial and colonial intrusions.â Despite its propensity to lecture or excoriate other nations on matters of corruption, the United States is, as Goldstein says, ânot something special.â
âWe are bringing corruption home, talking about it here to undo the gaze on other countries ⊠(and) this idea of looking down our nose and declaring that they canât govern themselves,â Goldstein says.
Drybread and Goldstein say they are pleased that the essays and even their introduction offer a spectrum of views on the idea of corruption.
âThis differs from other Trump books,â Drybread says. âWe look at the complexity of corruption from a multiplicity of interpretations. The perspectives are in conversation with one another, and donât necessarily agree. Readers will come out with multiple new viewpoints.â
In his essay, âOn Calling Donald Trump âCorruptâ,â cultural anthropologist Aaron Ansell argues that Trumpâs supporters view politics as a âManichean holy warâ and cautions against playing into that narrative and even questions the use of the word around which the collection is built.
âDonald Trump is no Robin Hood, but he styles himself one. And if we call him corrupt, we unwittingly retell the story he tells about himself: the story of how his corruption is the revolutionary antidote to our corruption,â he writes. âWe reinforce his supportersâ sense that there is an inverted hyperreality to the world, visible only to the spiritual eye of the evangelical or the apophenic ear of the -±đ°ù.â
Other essays plumb the depths of everything from Trumpâs transgressive nature to the cult of celebrity, masculinity, the power of online communities, misinformation, the COVID-19 pandemic, misogyny and beyond.
(PhDAnthâ14), assistant professor of anthropology at the University of South Carolina, has worked extensively in Kazakhstan. Her essay explores similarities in the ways Trump and Russian leader Vladimir Putin use what she labels âmanipulative statecraft.â
âBoth leaders have followed the strongmanâs playbook: they have demonized large segments of society, conducted disinformation campaigns to forward their own agendas, and under color of law, used police and the courts to punish the opposition,â she writes.
We are bringing corruption home, talking about it here to undo the gaze on other countries ⊠(and) this idea of looking down our nose and declaring that they canât govern themselvesâ.
Drybread examines Trumpâs friendship with the late convicted sex criminal and billionaire Jeffrey Epstein as an example of the former presidentâs âability to convert moral and legal transgressions into political capital.â
âIt is important to remember that corruption is more than just illicit financial or political gain. It is the corrosion of moral principles and ethical standards and their replacement by cruder motives,â she writes. âAs Jeffrey Epsteinâs case patently demonstrates, this practice entails inflicting pain on people whose lives are not valued, and whose suffering is evidence of charismatic authority wielded.âÌę
Daniel Jordan Smith, professor of international studies and anthropology at Brown University, examines why Trump is held in high repute by many members of the Igbo ethnic group in Nigeria, a nation he reportedly described as a âshithole.â
âIgbosâ shared sense that politics as usual leads to elite corruption with impunityâand the idea that even though everyone knows whatâs going on nothing is ever done to change the situationâmakes Trumpâs disdain for accepted truths popular,â writes Smith, who has done extensive work in Nigeria.
But he also notes that the Igbos and middle-class American men who support Trump are ârelatively advantaged groups anxious because they see their status slipping away.â
âPerhaps it should not be surprising that Trumpâs messages, primarily derived from and designed to assuage his narcissistic insecurity, are especially popular among relatively advantaged groups anxious about their collective social standing,â he concludes.
The entire collection, the editors argue, explores âthe nexus of corruption, late capitalism and illiberal politics in the Trump era.â
âWe look at what is different here when we think of politics, money and sex scandals, and what is similar, through the comparative frame our discipline offers,â Goldstein says.
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