|
46. A Return To The Past Faced with rapid change and the fear and uncertainty1 that go with it, individuals as well as nations sometimes seek to return to the ways of the past as a solution. In the early 1980s the idea of returning to the ways of the past had a strong appeal2 to many Americans who increasingly viewed their past as being better than their future . Two famous experts have observed that until the 1970 s Americans generally believed that the present was a better time for their country than the past and that the future would be better than the present; by 1978, however, public opinion polls3 showed that many Americans had come to believe that just the opposite 4 was true: the past had been better for the country than the present, and the present was better than the future would be. The popular appeal of returning to the ways of the past as a solution to the problems of the 1980s was demonstrated when Ronald Reagan5 was elected President of the United States in 1980 . Time magazine chose President Reagan as its man of the year and said of him, intellectually, emotionally, Reagan lives in the past. One of President Reagan s basic beliefs is that the United States should return as much as possible to its pre-19307 ways. In those times business institutions were strong and government institutions were weak. Reagan believes that the American values of individual freedom and competition are strengthened by business and weakened by government. Therefore, his programs as President have been designed to greatly strengthen business and reduce the size and power of the national government. By moving in this way toward the practices of the past, President Reagan believed that the standard of living of Americans would begin to improve once more in the 1980s as it had done throughout most of the nation s history. | 
