THE FACTORS OF “ME” POLITICS

 

This blog is in the midst of describing the theory that guides its efforts.  Since this blogger wishes to prescribe what he believes would be a better way to approach civics education, the subject would best originate in political science.  And as sciences do, it describes and explains the relationships that its practitioners highlight in their research, i.e., how relevant variables relate with each other if at all.

          The last posting left the reader with what Daniel Elazar claims are the two central variables that political scientists should study.  They are power and justice.  The first, according to Harold Lasswell, is about who gets what, when, and how (this blogger flippantly adds “and how much”), and Elazar states that justice is about who should get what, when, and how – and why.[1]  And to add a wrinkle, unlike other variables that political scientists measure and analyze such as voting, justice demands normative theorizing.

          This blog incorporates the normative theory of federalism as it applies to education and in that, this blogger uses the term federation theory and prescribes its use as the central theoretical basis for the teaching of governance and politics in the nation’s civics’ classrooms.  It does so because the alternative perspectives, according to Elazar, either do not relate to the rule of the many (what the US has) or have not provided suitable “guidelines for using power in order to live well.”[2]

          This blogger has argued that in the US there currently is the natural rights theory predominantly serving as the basis for what is taught in government or civics courses at the secondary level.  This other view, based on the legal concepts of the natural law philosophy, has experienced change since the beginning of the nation.  And within its current rendition, the perspective is not so much a legal idea but a cultural one.

          Basically, it is defined as the notion that one is allowed to engage in any activity as long as one does not interfere with the rights of others.  This, among many Americans, has become the belief to the degree that not even this last qualifier pertains.  But at any level, it generally does not impose any responsibilities and duties on people beyond obeying the law, i.e., laws not offensive to natural laws.

          What those rights are is an open question.  They definitely include the enumerated rights contained in the Bill of Rights but are not limited by them.[3]  This perspective dovetails nicely with an individualistic political culture that is prevalent today.[4]

          On the other hand, a federalist paradigm or theory can generally be described as a view that society is based on a partnership among citizens, imposing the responsibilities such an arrangement entails.[5]  Needless to say, the adherents of each perspective – natural rights and federalist rights – find themselves at odds with each other as issues such as, for example, censorship arise in the national media. 

Usually, the respective feelings are ill-defined because, as is often the case with cultural beliefs, the acquisition of the perspectives is through experiences in which respective values are treated as assumptions, providing an implied or hidden element.  Back in 1996, Michael Sandel, using the label – the liberal political philosophy – for the natural rights perspective, describes it as follows:

 

The political philosophy by which we live is a certain version of liberal political theory.  Its central idea is that government should be neutral toward the moral and religious views its citizens espouse.  Since people disagree about the best way to live, government should not affirm in law any particular vision of the good life.  Instead, it should provide a framework of rights that respects persons as free and independent selves, capable of choosing their own values and ends. Since this liberalism asserts the priority of fair procedures over particular ends, the public life it informs might be called the procedural republic.[6]

 

This perspective is the prevailing political theory to which this nation adheres.[7]

          Its adopted lessons – its ideals and ideas – are accumulated through life and are supported in schools, leaving a strong influence on the individual.  Sandel continues:

So familiar is this vision of freedom that it seems a permanent feature of the American political and constitutional tradition.  But Americans have not always understood freedom in this way.  As a reigning public philosophy, the vision of liberalism that informs our present debates is a recent arrival, a development of the last forty or fifty years [of this writing in 1996].  Its distinctive character can best be seen by contrast with a rival public philosophy that it gradually displaced.  This rival public philosophy is a version of republican political theory.[8]

 

Again, the terminology is different, but “republican political theory” is the broader category and federalism is a type of that theory.  And more specifically, Sandel is expressing federalist propositions when he points out that this philosophy emphasizes self-government that presupposes an active and intra-active citizenry.

This form of republican rule is concerned beyond ends and addresses the prerequisites for meaningful self-rule.  “It means deliberating with fellow citizens about the common good and helping to shape the destiny of the political community [which] requires a knowledge of public affairs, and also a sense of belonging, a concern for the whole, a moral bond with the community whose fate is at stake.”[9]

This sense has spurred reaction.  Currently, there are movements attempting to inform and promote a more communal view of governance and politics.  The next posting will report on them but before becoming aware of those efforts, the reader might consider what the implications of a polity guided by excessive individual thought causes.  One can make the argument that the current polarized political landscape is a direct result of adopting the natural rights view as the nation’s prominent view of governance and politics.

---

[1] Daniel J. Elazar, “Federal Models of (Civil) Authority,” Journal of Church and State, 33 (Spring, 1991), 231-254.

[2] Ibid., 231.

[3] Randy E. Barnett, “Ninth Amendment” in The Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States, edited by Kermit L. Hall (New York, NY:  Oxford University Press, 1991), 589-592 AND “Ninth Amendment,” The Annenberg Guide to the United States Constitution (n.d.), accessed November 24, 2021, https://www.annenbergclassroom.org/ninth-amendment/ . 

[4] Michael J. Sandel, Democracy’s Discontent:  America in Search of a Public Philosophy (Cambridge, MA:  The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1996) AND Ava Rosenbaum, “Personal Space and American Individualism, Brown Political Review (October 31, 2018), accessed November 24, 2021, https://brownpoliticalreview.org/2018/10/personal-space-american-individualism/ .

[5] Daniel J. Elazar, “How Federal Is the Constitution?  Thoroughly!” Elazar, D. J. (1994). How federal is the Constitution? Thoroughly. In a booklet of readings, Readings for Classes Taught by Professor Elazar (1994), prepared for a National Endowment for the Humanities Institute. Conducted in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, 1-30.

[6] Sandel, Democracy’s Discontent, 4.

[7] Daniel J. Elazar, American Federalism: A View from the States, (New York, NY: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1966) AND Sandel, Democracy’s Discontent AND Seymour Martin Lipset, American Exceptionalism:  A Double-Edged Sword (New York, NY:  W. W. Norton and Company, 1996).

[8] Sandel, Democracy’s Discontent, 5.

[9] Ibid.

ONE HAS TO HAVE A THEORY

 

Back in the 1960s, two often cited social studies educators were Maurice P. Hunt and Lawrence E. Metcalf.  Here is a quote from their work:  “education is regarded as the transmission from one generation to another of that part of the culture which is considered of ongoing value.”[1].  If one accepts this truism, then the study of American government and politics should encompass the educational transmission of those political and civic values and knowledge which are central to the nation’s basic conception of its democratic life.

          That charge should be carried out in such a way that the current relevant needs of the society are addressed.  This blog sets out to present a theory from political science to serve as the preferred, unifying construct for that study in secondary social studies so as to bolster the probability of a continued and even heightened civil society.  Regular readers of this blog are well aware of this aim, but what follows might take on a different angle.

          The choice of this blog’s preferred view is of course made from “what’s available” in political science literature.  In turn, at this theoretical level, one can trace the different types of constructs to the classical divisions that Aristotle bequeathed to the generations that have followed.  According to that Greek philosopher, there exists three possible constitutions.[2]  They are the rule of the one, the rule of the few, and the rule of the many. 

Each, in order to be successful, must be supported by belief systems that are shared by sufficient numbers of citizens living under the authority established by these constitutions. In the case of the rule of the many, there are two supportive perspectives.  They are the federalist perspective and a natural rights perspective. 

A federalist perspective, which will be more fully developed below, refers to a view that a legitimate government is one in which the constituency (be it individuals or previously existing entities such as clans) has bonded to create a polity to achieve mutually defined goals in a perpetual union.  This union imposes on the creators and its posterity moral obligations for the maintenance and success of the resulting union. 

A natural rights perspective, on the other hand, is a view that a legitimate government has the limited responsibility to insure the protection of the citizens’ rights.  Those resulting polities define rights on an individual basis.  An individual citizen’s responsibilities are limited to not interfering with the rights of others.

Since the US’ constitution is of the “rule of the many” category, the choice for it is either the natural rights or federalist perspective.  In order to be successfully sustained, that is, for the constitution to be maintained and enjoyed at least to minimal levels of domestic harmony, the citizens of the US must favor, in the main, either a natural rights or federalist perspective.

Why?  Perspectives have their own internal logic.  While a nation might have within its borders more than one perspective among its citizenry, one will dominate since its assumptions and expectations can, and oftentimes do, contradict each other.  For the system to work, the general populous needs to assume that one view prevails as it goes about its political and even its social intercourse.

The United States today has the natural rights perspective as the dominant view.  Here, Elazar shares more descriptive information of what that means,

 

The United States as a whole shares a general political culture.  This American political culture is rooted in two contrasting conceptions of American political order, both of which can be traced back to the earliest settlement of the country.  In the first [referred to here as the natural rights view], the political order is conceived as a marketplace in which the primary public relationships are products of bargaining among individuals and groups acting out of self-interest.  In the second [referred to here as the federalist view], the political order is conceived to be a commonweal – a state in which the whole people have an undivided interest – in which the citizens cooperate in an effort to create and maintain the best government in order to implement certain shared moral principles.  These two conceptions have exercised an influence on government and politics throughout American history, sometimes in conflict and sometimes by complementing one another.[3]

 

          In order to socialize young American students to the prevailing political culture, American schools, in their government and civics instruction, should be based on one of these two perspectives.  Yes, both can be identified and explained, but one should guide the efforts of what happens within the curriculum that a school adopts.

          The position advocated in this blog is that the federalist perspective should be adopted.  That theory, federalism, is the more substantive normative option.[4]  Elliot Eisner makes the distinction between normative and descriptive theory.  Descriptive theory, usually associated with the sciences, attempts to explain some phenomena to the point of allowing one to predict what will happen if certain conditions exist.  On the other hand, normative theory expresses values and states what should happen or be the condition in place.[5]

          In this blog, the theory proposed is of the latter type.  That theory is value-laden in that it presupposes certain societal expectations about the kind of society – in fairly substantive ways – that is desired.  “In an abstract sense, an appropriate education depends upon what kind of society is desired in the future.”[6]  Therefore, this blog is based on the incorporation of a political science theory which has a significant normative component.

          This posting ends with the ideas of Elazar,

Politics has two faces.  One is the face of power, the other is the face of justice.  Politics, as the pursuit and organization of power, is concerned (in the words of Harold Lasswell) with “who gets what, when, and how.”  However, politics is equally a matter of justice, or the determination of who should get what, when, and how – and why.  Power is the means by which people organize themselves and shape their environment in order to live.  Justice offers the guidelines for using power in order to live well.[7]

 

With that sense of direction, this blog will continue, in the next posting, to further describe its theoretical base.

---

[1] Maurice P. Hunt and Lawrence E. Metcalf, Teaching High School Social Studies:  Problems in Reflective Thinking and Social Understanding (New York, NY:  Harper and Row, 1968), 95.

[2] Daniel J. Elazar, “Federal Models of (Civil) Authority,” Journal of Church and State, 33 (Spring, 1991), 231-254.

[3] Daniel J. Elazar, American Federalism: A View from the States, (New York, NY: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1966), 85-86.

[4] Proponents of the natural rights view claim their perspective is normative.  And technically it is.  To say all people have the right to choose their moral position and to further hold that the state – either directly or through the instructional efforts of the state’s schools – has no role in promoting any moral position; that is a moral position.

[5] Elliot W. Eisner, The Educational Imagination:  On the Design and Evaluation of School Programs (New York, NY:  MacMillan Publishing Company, 1985).

[6] Hunt and Metcalf, Teaching High School Social Studies, 23.

[7] Elazar, “Federal Models of (Civil) Authority,” Journal of Church and State, 231 (emphases in the original).