A Crucial Element of Democracy

This is a blog by Robert Gutierrez ...
While often taken for granted, civics education plays a crucial role in a democracy like ours. This Blog is dedicated to enticing its readers into taking an active role in the formulation of the civics curriculum found in their local schools. In order to do this, the Blog is offering a newer way to look at civics education, a newer construct - liberated federalism or federation theory. Daniel Elazar defines federalism as "the mode of political organization that unites separate polities within an overarching political system by distributing power among general and constituent governments in a manner designed to protect the existence and authority of both." It depends on its citizens acting in certain ways which Elazar calls federalism's processes. Federation theory, as applied to civics curriculum, has a set of aims. They are:
*Teach a view of government as a supra federated institution of society in which collective interests of the commonwealth are protected and advanced.
*Teach the philosophical basis of government's role as guardian of the grand partnership of citizens at both levels of individuals and associations of political and social intercourse.
*Convey the need of government to engender levels of support promoting a general sense of obligation and duty toward agreed upon goals and processes aimed at advancing the common betterment.
*Establish and justify a political morality which includes a process to assess whether that morality meets the needs of changing times while holding true to federalist values.
*Emphasize the integrity of the individual both in terms of liberty and equity in which each citizen is a member of a compacted arrangement and whose role is legally, politically, and socially congruent with the spirit of the Bill of Rights.
*Find a balance between a respect for national expertise and an encouragement of local, unsophisticated participation in policy decision-making and implementation.
Your input, as to the content of this Blog, is encouraged through this Blog directly or the Blog's email address: gravitascivics@gmail.com .
NOTE: This blog has led to the publication of a book. The title of that book is TOWARD A FEDERATED NATION: IMPLEMENTING NATIONAL CIVICS STANDARDS and it is available through Amazon in both ebook and paperback versions.

Tuesday, March 26, 2019

EXCITEMENT OR DRUDGERY?


What constitutes bad behavior?  Can one point to some sort of behavior and say, yes, people should not behave that way?  How about violence?  Is violence immoral, per se?  The biologist, Robert Sapolski,[1] cites violence as an example of a behavior one thinks as immoral, but upon reflection, recognizes that people pay to see it – prize fighting, cage fighting, American style football, etc. – and judge it to be not only good, but a source of honor.
          Yes, there is, along with good violence, bad violence.  Generally, the bad type includes those instances when violent acts, outside competitive arenas, hurt other people.  Even there, there are exceptions – violence conducted in self-defense – but such violent acts should be avoided. There are various social theories or models that claim humans are prone to violence.  Even Sigmund Freud, in his model, states violence or aggression to be a basic human drive.  Sapolski is interested in the biology involved with this behavior, suggesting there is a natural angle to violence.
          He supports that claim; that there is a natural basis for human violence, aggression, and competition.  Of course, any cursory review of history would find recurring instances of violence.  The wars, the violent crimes, the domestic abuse, and the school yard bullying seem to plague generation after generation.  There is no hope that a future will find the way to avoid such events.
          Another writer, Jonah Goldberg,[2] makes the argument that this bent toward violence and aggression is the natural disposition people have for each other, particularly if the perpetrator sees the victim as being a “them,” a member of another group.  That other group can be another family, another neighborhood, another state, another country, another race, another class, another religion, on and on.  He attributes the establishment of institutional peace as “The Miracle;” the miracle emanating from the development of capitalism – it allowed for win-win interactions between and among humans.
          One person has an apple and wants money; another person has money and wants an apple.  Capitalism allows an exchange – win-win – instead of either party – usually the bigger party – slapping the other to attain either the money or the apple wanted – win-lose.  That institutional means – which usually takes on a much more complex form – was extensively developed in the 1700s.  Yes, there was trade before, but during that century trade, production, and distribution took on its modern form and that form is known as capitalism.
But there is another side to that coin.  People hurt one another, but they also care for one another and that care need not be based on a person being part of the “us.”  And writers from the same 1700s, such as Francis Hutchinson and Thomas Reid, saw this inclination as also being natural.  Original versions of natural rights or natural liberty were based on an ability or freedom to pursue this “natural” disposition. 
Helping others was/is recognized as causing good feelings.  Hence, and from another eighteenth century writer, John Locke, one can determine people will seek that pleasure, since all behavior is motivated by the seeking of pleasure.  One can postulate, that more “friendly” disposition leads to the civility or, at least, civic behavior that allows markets to exist and flourish.
This writer is a former faculty member at a state university.  That tenure had the opportunity of hearing the then provost of the university, a natural scientist by training, say that the social sciences should count more on natural science literature.  He reported on just reading some social science study that made some claim that was standard fare in the biological field.  His point:  any cursory review of that biological literature would have already made the point being “discovered” in the study.
Well, this writer has taken the bait and his biological guru – given his interests – is Sapolski.  And what does that biologist have to convey given the above topic?  Here is a sampling:
[Y]ou can’t begin to understand things like aggression, competition, cooperation, and empathy without biology … But just as important, second, you’re just as much up the creek if you rely only on biology … [T]hird point … it actually makes no sense to distinguish between aspects of a behavior that are “biological” and those that would be described as, say, “psychological” or “cultural.”  Utterly interwind … [H]uman behavior … is indeed a mess, a subject involving brain chemistry, hormones, sensory cues, prenatal environment, early experience, genes, both biological and cultural evolution, and ecological pressures, among other things.[3]
Yes, a mess indeed, but one that needs to be studied.  For some, this is not a drudgery, but an exciting adventure.  Civics’ teacher-preparation programs should ask of those who are about to enter the profession of teaching secondary students such concerns:  Does this stuff excite you?



[2] Jonah Goldberg, Suicide of the West:  How the Rebirth of Tribalism, Populism, Nationalism, and Identity Politics Is Destroying American Democracy (New York, NY:  Crown Forum, 2018).

[3] Robert M. Sapolsky, Behave:  The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst, 4-5 (Kindle edition).  Emphasis in the original.

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