PHASE TWO IN ACTION

 

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Recently, this blog referred to an individual developmental model credited to the philosopher, Hegel.[1]  The reader is invited to look up that posting, “Introducing Maturation as a Factor,” October 9, 2020.  That model identifies three phases that a person goes through as he/she “grows up.”  This present posting aims to operationalize phase two; the phase that, for the most part, corresponds to the adolescent years.

          The only other developmental condition this review wishes to point out that occurs during phase one is what the psychologist, Steven Pinker, points out; i.e., how even young children have significant abilities to think abstractly.  But all agree that that ability increases significantly during phase two.

          And that increased ability usually seems to be targeted at certain aspects of life.  One of them is how issues of freedom relate to these young people’s more intense self-consciousness and their feelings concerning how their social arrangements place limitations on that freedom.  Often, this tension deals with issues regarding their lifelong goals and what they perceive as obstacles to those goals.

          This tension can and usually does become intense and, according to Philip Selznick, leads to a good deal of unhappiness – a prevailing emotional state during adolescence.  Fundamentally, the young person faces what he/she sees as unjustified constraints, albeit the constraints are generally seen as reasonable by the authorities who impose them.

          What saves the day, unfortunately, is repeated experiences of frustrating results and the mind seeking answers to what ails these youngsters.  That is the capacity to reason “sneaks” back into their calculations and they figure out that “liberation” can be achieved by what Jonathan Haidt suggests:  there must be a better way and that includes being reasonable.  By its nature, reasonableness calls for one to see how others see things.  This opens up for the individual the ability to appreciate communal realities.

          And this realization, both by the youngsters and with those who work with them, leads one to see a development within this development:  the progression of motivations from reciprocity to sentiment to self-fulfillment.  That is,

·       first, one tends to be motivated to reciprocate either positive or negative interactions with others;

·       second, one tends to develop corresponding feelings – liking those who offer positive interactions and disliking those who don’t; and

·       third, one understands his/her advancement toward self-defined aims and goals is enhanced by positive relationships that provide resources and assets.[2]

And as phenomenological research points out, these developments have certain consequences.  One, young people can reconcile their recurring subjective perceptions and the opposing objective realities around them since they are more apt to accept reality – their newly found reasoning demands they do so.  And with this change, they begin to feel less tension and a growing sense that they are at home in their surroundings.[3]   This general development opens people to feel federated with their fellow citizens.

          One should not consider these developments as natural.  There are certain aspects of the natural that support these phases – one does naturally want to get along and help others – but there are also aspects of people’s natures that oppose these developments – one naturally tends to limit one’s altruistic sense to people they see as Us as opposed to Them.  The point is, social environments go a long way toward determining whether this phase of maturing takes place and, if it does, how it takes place.  One such place is school and, in a more targeted sense, civics classrooms.

          Of course, this potential is just that, a potential.  It might not happen, and immaturity can well survive high school, college, even all of adulthood.  There is an ample number of immature adults walking around.  They increase the likelihood that negative interactions take place.  They, in seeking their “liberty,” are likely to enhance obstacles for themselves and others to maturing.  These people can be affected, but not necessarily, by dysfunctional psychological afflictions such as social psychotic maladies.  A lack of empathy, for example, can be detrimental.

          Despite that, this blog seriously and consistently calls for a proactive posture by civics educators to assist in their charges in advancing through the maturing process.  Knowing its various aspects can only be helpful.  Hopefully, what this blog shares, assists those educators in developing those lessons, questions, and materials that instruct students as to the nature of what they find as challenging in their everyday lives.

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[1] Philip Selznick, The Moral Commonwealth:  Social Theory and the Promise of Community (Berkeley, CA:  University of California Press, 1992).

[2] See Richard Dagger, Civic Virtue:  Rights, Citizenship, and Republican Liberalism (New York, NY:  Oxford, 1997).

[3] Selznick, The Moral Commonwealth, 66.

A TIME OF TURMOIL

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Change marks most of life, but adolescence is noted for it.  Central to that change is the individual coming to terms with what he/she wants as opposed to what his/her various social arrangements demand.  Another term one might use to describe this push and pull could be politics in its broadest sense; after all, politics is a process by which who gets what, where, and when is decided.

          It, politics, is ubiquitous and a young person’s proclivity to fall prey to faulty modeling, described in the previous posting, promises to cause recurring disappointments.  Of course, a formal arena where such conflicts occur is the government.  And a good part of civics education is meant to introduce young people to this institutionalized process. 

If nothing else, civics can be a means to teach young ones they are not the only ones who fall short of having their desires being satisfied.  But more practically, it serves to point out those agencies they are apt to encounter (e.g., the DMV) or duties they will be called upon to serve (e.g., jury duty, paying taxes).  Of course, this is presented by describing the basic structures, processes, and functions of the various parts of the political system including the agencies of government but also those established entities that vie for public assets such as interest groups.

One way to approach this instruction is to spotlight the tension between liberals and conservatives.  And a distinction one can make between these two camps is the way conservatives tend to rely on a more behavioralist mode of analysis and view most political activity as the product of calculating participants as they weigh anticipated rewards and punishments.  These are what are at stake in a given competition over some public policy – such as where a highway will go. 

This view limits itself to the immediate conditions and the terms under consideration.  Along with these considerations, the center of concern is the individual political entity be it a person, an organization, or a political jurisdiction.  In other words, it’s a self-centered view and, as such, matches the thrust of the natural rights construct.

          According to psychological research, these characteristics match the way in which most humans tend to think about political matters; they are mostly reactive to political challenges or opportunities with little reflection.  And boiling down these concerns to merely rewards and punishments, one is not bogged down with more far reaching consequences – which might or might not be known.

          But surely, there are those who take a more complex view and some of them are conservatives (by the way, there are liberals who also tend to simplify matters).  And complexity usually means nuance and a holistic way of thinking.  This includes thinking about and considering each participant’s intuitive and emotional disposition relating to what is at stake.  When one thinks or observes politics with this more encompassing perception, a multitude of factors comes into play.  As one adds factors, one approaches reality.

          One should not lose sight that where all this is occurring is a political arena and these arenas are known for the participation of less than honest agents.  Without prejudging any participant, history is replete with actors who not only act with less than honest claims but also are quite artful in how they practice their dishonesty or duplicity. 

In any civics course, therefore, part of instruction should include the study of rhetoric that points out the use of illogical and misleading argumentation.  For example, the use of the illogical argument, “cum hoc ergo propter hoc,” should be looked at.  That is when someone says something causes something else because the something took place just before the result in question.  This example is pointed out since it occurs all too often.

This whole account questions how a simplistic view can even provide an adequate description or explanation of how politics occurs, especially if the intent is to arrive at a functional understanding by typical citizens.  Simplified, civics is about informing students as to what characterizes the government and those who interact with it in more or less formal grounds.  But that view would miss out – and often does – about how immaturity can and does affect governmental processes, decisions, and the consequences policy decisions have.

Helping one take on a more complex approach is to take into account various psychological factors and, in that, phenomenology is helpful.  It emphasizes the holistic nature of life, including politics, and how one should take on its study.  This “third way” approach (opposed to behavioral and cognitive psychologies) relies on holistic accounts.

These accounts are derived from participants telling their stories in all their complexities.  These stories turn out to be the main data source for phenomenological studies in which people are encouraged to reveal, through their language, their whole relevant self and their whole environments – i.e., his/her lifeworld.  But the emphasis is not on them as self-centered actors but as interactive agents in various social arrangements or settings.

INTRODUCING MATURATION AS A FACTOR

 

[Note:  From time to time, this blog issues a set of postings that summarize what the blog has been emphasizing in its previous postings.  Of late, the blog has been looking at various obstacles civics educators face in teaching their subject.  It’s time to post a series of such summary accounts.  The advantage of such summaries is to introduce new readers to the blog and to provide a different context by which to review the blog’s various claims and arguments.  This and upcoming summary postings will be preceded by this message.]

This blog, regarding the effects of the natural rights view has on civics education, first focuses on the tensions associated with maturation.  More specifically, it highlights the psychological factors one finds when young people are exposed to the self-centered messaging one associates with that process.  That includes the resulting consciousness that finds itself having to balance drives to further self-centered desires and the expectations of any social arrangement from family to school to the community. 

Featuring phenomenology, a psychological approach, one can approach this topic by providing a mode of studying the development of consciousness through a holistic view of a student’s lifeworld.  Using language as a main tool, self-definitions become of central concern among those who work with these students.  Do they express themselves, for example, as doers or as victims?  With such expressions, educators garner crucial clues as to what concerns students face as they progress toward maturity. 

In this effort, one model that is helpful is that offered by Wilhem Fredrich Hegel.  The nineteenth century philosopher identifies a usable maturing process:  first, a child accepts what he/she is told to be real; second, during adolescent years, he/she questions authority and strives for freedom; and third, becomes a mature person by coming to terms with authority and  understands his/her freedom is helped by communal assets.  Obviously, the emphasis here is on the second stage – a trying time for just about everyone.

Contextually, that period has meaningful physical developments associated with puberty.  One readily links awkwardness with this time in life.  The main aim is for the young person to develop a conscious balance between the recurring turmoil of stunted desires and those experiences that show the way to more liberating experiences.  The process is fairly recognized as it enjoys recurring references in popular media as evidenced by Michelle Obama’s book, Becoming, and an often-used theme in a multitude of sitcoms.

To understand this phase of life, one good place to start is with biological studies.  It turns out that the maturing process can be detected physically by how the brain develops.  And this adds to an understanding of how physically based, bodily changes, including those of the brain, encourage young people to engage in risk-taking behaviors.  Advances in these studies give one more of a foundation to judge psychological models that depict the maturing process. 

In turn, those models originate with various psychologists.  Along with the above cited (non-psychological) Hegel model, one can look at the work of Jean Piaget, Lev Vygotski, and Jerome Bruner along with cognitive development studies. 

Of importance here is these works’ emphasis on young people’s growing ability to think abstractly.  This ability among the young has both positive and negative effects.  Abstract thinking is necessary to handle a complex world but, at the same time, it opens the possibility of young people understanding and accepting disreputable explanations of social realities. 

In an age of social media with its plethora of unfounded explanations and descriptions, young people are easily disposed to accept prevailing messaging that goes counter to communal or collaborative beliefs and hype self-centered images that cater more readily to their immature dispositions.  They are apt to formulate reinforcing mental models that flesh out those explanations – as unsophisticated as they might be (more on modeling below).

This psychological ability to think abstractly counts on deductive reasoning.  On the positive side, the young people have a higher ability to foresee the future and to plan for it.  With that, they can also form their own reasoned arguments and, given their self-centeredness, are apt to advance their perceived desires.  They also acquire subtle language skills such as uttering puns and other analogies to further this general proclivity.

But of course, their lack of experience proves to be a great hindrance in achieving an effective, independent posture.  And without those experiences, developed limited beliefs and conclusions over life’s challenges take root.  Even if dysfunctional, the beliefs tend to be protected as they help or hurt young people’s approach to defining who they are.  A helpful exercise during these years is hypothetical thinking and that can be nourished by educational experiences that have them hypothesize over social conditions and problems – especially useful when this exercise is applied to what they see as relevant in their lives.

Or stated another way, if/then questioning helps a person to model reality.  By a young person expressing that modeling, a parent or a teacher can detect mental shortcuts such as a time when the adolescent might prejudge conditions or people.  If predominately motivated by enhancing oneself or one’s desires, such prejudging easily succumbs to natural tendencies such as viewing the social world in Us/Them terms. 

In addition, the young person is likely to feel kinship with whatever those beliefs are.  What is known is that people left to their own devises tend to grow a sense of loyalty to their own initial views, regardless of how poorly they’re grounded.  Or they want to believe their beliefs, and in turn, these beliefs manage what is perceived in the future or what is accepted as reality. 

This naturally often leads to problems in that it interferes with prudent decision-making.  Not accepting or knowing reality has a way of getting people into trouble.  And one should not just attribute this problem to young people.  For example, the sciences, both natural and social sciences, concern themselves over self-deception and, therefore, institute extensive protocols to guard against it.

          St. B. T. Evans provides a relevant model about how people generally develop models.[1]  The model provides three principles.  One, people rely on epistemic or validating models based on singular experiences.  Two, these models serve as preconscious situational frames of mind that a person utilizes by evaluating them against the perceived needs at given point in time so as to arrive at desired outcomes. 

These constructed models take on their own value as their “parent” or creator feels a paternal affinity for them.  Of course, such ownership does not dismiss subsequent consequences and, if the consequences are strong enough, they force an evaluation of the model’s functionality however painful that might be.

          And three, a person, as result of any sufficiently negative consequence, might reject his/her model.  If so, this rejection serves the individual to help him/her overcome an immature trait or belief.  Here, instructional experiences in the classroom can assist the eventuality of this process.  And Evans’ model suggests the instructional steps relevant lessons could take.

           On the positive side, this proclivity to form models supplies a necessary function, they serve as “advance organizers.”  As such they allow the mind to proceed more efficiently by categorizing and prioritizing all that a mind perceives.  That is, it allows one to assume, a necessary mental process that allows it to function.  Without it, the amount of incoming data would overwhelm a person rendering him/her incapable of doing even the rudimentary things of life.

          Next posting will pick up on how maturation proceeds.

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[1] Jonathan St. B. T. Evans, “The Heuristic-Analytic Theory of Reasoning:  Extension and Evaluation,”  Psychonomic Bulletin and Review, 13, 2006, 378-395, abstract accessed January 9, 2020, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/6746428_The_Heuristic-Analytic_Theory_of_Reasoning_Extension_and_Evaluation .

SOME FOUNDATIONAL INFORMATION

 

[Note:  From time to time, this blog issues a set of postings that summarize what the blog has been emphasizing in its previous postings.  Of late, the blog has been looking at various obstacles civics educators face in teaching their subject.  It’s time to post a series of such summary accounts.  The advantage of such summaries is to introduce new readers to the blog and to provide a different context by which to review the blog’s various claims and arguments.  This and upcoming summary postings will be preceded by this message.]

This blog has provided a bit of information on the origins of the natural rights view.  It has attributed John Locke as its main author.[1]  But he did not hit upon his ideas in a vacuum.  It turns out that two influences, that were having their effects on European thinking during Locke’s time, more than likely had their effects on him.  The two were the Enlightenment and the work of Niccole Machiavelli.

          The Enlightenment, a philosophic development, took place in Europe from 1685 to 1815.  It affected the politics, science, and communications of that continent.  Reflecting on its main effect, it was also known as the “Age of Reason,” since it questioned the foundational ideas and ideals that propped up the monarchial rule that prevailed at the time.  As such, it is credited with ideations that lay down the basic rationale for democratic rule. 

But before one totally attributes these democratizing developments to the Enlightenment, one should remember the ideals of democracy predate the 1700s by centuries in that the beginnings of those beliefs in European thought stretch back to ancient Greece.  Looking at ancient Athens, not only can one find the attributes of a “choice” polity (using Madison’s terminology) but can even find the expression of federalist values within the discourse of that city-state. 

Many of those norms were later picked up by the Romans especially during their “republic” years.  One should not mistakenly attribute full fledged allegiance to democracy or federalism to these earlier examples of governance, but the ideals can be detected by their rhetoric and even in the governmental structures they set up.

But the development of these views, ideas, ideals, and practices was not a straight line from the Greeks till the outbreak of the Enlightenment.  Instead they went into dormancy first with the fall of the Roman Republic and then, further, with the fall of Rome.  Eventually, in Europe, there arose the dominance of the Roman Catholic Church in Western Europe which held onto a theological view that was mostly antagonistic to democracy and, in many ways, to reason.

A more favorable outlook had to wait till the beginnings of the Renaissance in the 14^th century which lasted till the 17^th century.  The Renaissance served as a precursor, in some ways, to the Enlightenment.  Specifically, it reintroduced a priority or importance on reason and logic.  A lot of that shift flew in the face of the authority of the Roman Church and its foundational support of the various feudalistic monarchies in the various European nations.[2]

More specifically, the Church was most concerned with the Renaissance’s belittlement of otherworldly forces that were credited with determining what happened on earth.  Later, instead of inspiration, the Enlightenment promoted the sciences – experimentation and objective observation – to determine the attributes of reality in the physical world.  Originally, this newer emphasis was targeted on the study of physical forces and states of being but eventually spilled over to the study of human behavior.

As for the influence of Machiavelli’s work, his main contribution was his demystifying what was considered the bases of a ruler’s powers.  While not directly claiming that God has no role on who rules, his description of “good” leadership portrays prudent exercises in power as just an expression of promoting the self-interest of a leader.  He goes on to state that politics is amoral, a far cry from ironically the philosophical standards such writers as Aristotle had established.

The combination of the Enlightenment and Machiavelli’s work helped to establish how contemporary views of governance and politics are held.  It particularly has been instrumental in the development of the natural rights view.  Specifically, by placing politics as just another way to pursue personal goals, one almost has the justification for leaders – and one can extend to anyone – to be as selfish and narcissistic as one wishes to be.  Unfortunately, examples of this are too common in the current environment.

It also lends to an understanding of political behavior that is amenable to what has evolved in the study of political science.  That would be behaviorism, the prominent form of study that discipline uses.  To a large degree, behaviorism assumes this sort of reward/punishment calculations to political machinations.  Any reliance on self-sacrifice for the common purpose or good is seen as mostly naive to expect or upon which to rely.

But before leaving this subject, it should be emphasized that this is not the only way to interpret what the Enlightenment or even Machiavelli had to offer.  That is, what has just been described is really a set of assumptions held by those who adhere to the natural rights view.  When questioned they are apt to cite those sources (the Enlightenment and/or Machiavelli) as justification, either directly or by application of their reasoning.  Surely the reader has heard the natural rights view expressed by the complaint, “be real, politicians are just a bunch of crooks.”

But other views can also cite these sources with alternate, even opposing, adaptations or interpretations.  The Enlightenment’s call for reason and logic can also justify the need for policies that stray away from self-centeredness.  They can express that nations need to promote and sustain community and collaboration.  

In general, one can sense that the natural rights view approaches these sources on a very short-term basis – that is, the set of immediate conditions at a given time that face a person or group.  But if one uses a more long-term basis, and considers such factors as reciprocity, sentiment, and self-fulfillment, for example, one might more likely appreciate a nuanced application of these cited sources. 

These other factors tend to have their effects over longer time intervals.  If one affects another by some action, reciprocity might have to wait for the right conditions to administer either a targeted reward or punishment.  Sentiments – especially those relating to liking or disliking; loving or hating others – do not occur immediately but over time.  And self-fulfillment takes a lifetime to even appreciate.  And yet they have their effects day in and day out as one goes through the various challenges of life.

For a teacher adhering to the federation theory construct, the obvious connections to the Enlightenment can more easily be made than any connection to Machiavelli.  For that theory, citing Aristotle is more fruitful, but here are some thoughts in favor of Machiavelli.  First, one should remember that he was reacting to what existed during his time.  And that environment ascribed unjustified legitimacy, authority, and power to supernatural forces – basically the world that existed was attributed to the ongoing authorship of God.

The result of that connection was the readily available rationale for horrendous policies that promulgated unjust policy choices on the populations of European nations.  While Machiavelli does not directly question this connection, his work undermines it.  By casting as prudent the commission of selfish acts by a prince, he undermines the theology upon which that leadership depended.  That would be the Christian doctrines based on the teachings of Jesus Christ.  Here is a good example of how the espoused theories of a social entity make a difference.[3]

To be sure, one can readily cite abuses of that doctrine, but ultimately it served to legitimize these rulers’ power.  If one debases that foundation, which Machiavelli does, ultimately their rule and the power upon which it is based comes into more and more degradation within the minds of the governed.  Eventually, as it happened, that authority vanishes. 

One, under such a development, leaves behind a rationale for an “accidental” polity (based on nobility) and moves toward a “choice” polity (based on the establishment “of, by, and for” a people).  Hence, all this supports the foundation and maintenance of, for example, a federated union like that of the United States.

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[1] For example, see “Piracy of the Highest Order,” June 4, 2019.

[2] An entertaining account of this history can be observed in the animation entitled The Greeks:  Chasing Greatness.  See The Greeks:  Chasing Greatness, Public Broadcasting System, Public Broadcasting System, season 1, episode 3 (2016), accessed April 9, 2020, https://www.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/thegreeks_ep3_full/thegreeks_ep3_full/ . 

[3] See Chris Argyris and Donald A. Shon, “Evaluating Theories in Action,” in The Planning of Change, Fourth Edition, eds. Warren G. Bennis, Kenneth D. Benne, and Robert Chin (New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1985), 108-117.

BELIEVING WHAT ONE WANTS, PART II

 

[Note:  From time to time, this blog issues a set of postings that summarize what the blog has been emphasizing in its previous postings.  Of late, the blog has been looking at various obstacles civics educators face in teaching their subject.  It’s time to post a series of such summary accounts.  The advantage of such summaries is to introduce new readers to the blog and to provide a different context by which to review the blog’s various claims and arguments.  This and upcoming summary postings will be preceded by this message.  As for this posting, the reader is strongly encouraged, if he/she has not done so, to read the preceding posting, “Part I.”]

 

In the last posting, this blog quotes a portion of the character’s, Howard Roark (of The Fountainhead[1]), defense.  He was accused and admitted to bombing a building project he designed.  He was betrayed in that his design, contrary to his agreement with the architect of record, was abandoned and the buildings that were being constructed would be quite different from what he had in mind. 

This abandonment of his ideas, he claims, did offense to his personhood, his creativity, and his self-centered interests.  His speech delegitimizes the notion of altruism.  The movie version of the story coincides with the ascendency of the natural rights view of governance and politics and probably plays its modest role in that shift.  As such, this defense draws out the essence of Roark’s civic morality.  

It goes a long way in determining how natural rights advocates judge most public issues by focusing on the value of liberty.  They can also hold other values, such as equality, but if they do, they are secondary at best.  Often, with those who hold this value strongly, this sense serves to belittle other perspectives – altruism, communality, collaboration, teamwork, etc.  In an age of polarization (the current state of American politics), the likelihood of encountering arguments reflecting the prominence of liberty becomes greater and such encounters are more likely to be intense.

Can one see the same sort of encounters with those who hold equality – e.g., believers in critical theory[2] – as the ultimate value?  Yes, but given the current nature of American politics, the incidence of encountering such advocates is less likely.  As this blog points out, that side of political thought with its corresponding political party, the Democratic Party, has much more diversity among its advocates.  Therefore, their politics demands greater compromise and softer messaging.

Of course, the average person does not give this question – what is my political moral position? – much conscious thought.  One seems to adopt, without much formal thinking, what one grows up to accept.  Also, as this blog explains in a previous posting, such factors as maturity have their effects. 

What one is likely to do in growing up, if so inclined, is to see what people generally hold to be the acceptable way to see and feel about such moral concerns in one’s social circles – especially in one’s family.  It probably has to do with where and with whom that socializing takes place.  But once in place, those beliefs and feelings tend to be ensconced within one’s personal psychology.  People are not generally disposed to having these basic biases change.

Historically, there have been elections in which one has seen vast shifts in how people vote and express their values.  FDR’s first victory at the presidential level seems to indicate such an election.  If one reflects on what was going on, that demonstrates how extreme conditions need to be in order to see ample numbers of people changing how they would have voted otherwise.  In that case, a global depression triggered such a change in 1932.

And this reluctance to change one’s basic moral sense in politics or any aspect of life reflects how values and beliefs can be self-defining in their role of how one sees oneself.  And the evidence shows that it not only goes a long way in determining current behavior but also what is accepted as truth.  Here’s what an article in Psychology Today has to say:

Why do people so easily believe false things?

There are probably as many answers to this question as there are people who have ever believed falsehoods. Nonetheless, psychologists have shown that a relatively small set of cognitive biases or mental shortcuts can explain a lot about how false notions take root. One of the most agreed-upon ideas in the field of psychology is that people routinely use mental shortcuts to understand what happens around them. All kinds of things occur in the world around us, and we don't always have the time or energy to sit down and carefully examine all of them. So, we tend to use quick and largely unconscious rules-of-thumb to determine what we should believe—and these shortcuts sometimes steer us in the wrong direction.[3] 

These “rules-of-thumbs” are generally called heuristics.

          And one source for heuristics is a person’s emotions or, as it applies here, what a person wants to be true.  What happens usually among people instead of their reason and logic guiding what they want, what they want drives their reason and logic.  And unfortunately, this stream of thoughts and feelings applies to the way people see or “discover” political reality.  Known as “emotional reasoning,” it leads people/voters astray without them ever knowing it. 

To complete the thought, this affects personal matters as well.  This can range from health concerns to how one interacts with one’s family members.  So, the detrimental effects are not just fodder for yelling sessions at the news broadcasts, but in how one interacts with those one encounters daily. 

And all of this reminds the writer of the distinction Plato made centuries ago.  And that is of the differences distinguishing knowledge, beliefs, and ignorance.  Knowledge is what one knows is true, belief is what one thinks is true, and ignorance is what one does not know.  Of course, according to Donald Rumsfeld, there is also what one does not know he/she does not know.

Surely, the message can’t be that because one has moral positions with accompanying emotional feelings, one cannot see politics objectively so as to form positions aligned with reality.  No, instead the message is, especially to civics teachers, this potential problem needs to be recognized and instruction should be designed and administered to address it. 

This is seen as a major problem in an age of polarization since by its nature, these times tend to heavily energize one’s emotions and, in turn, strain people’s ability to detect reality.  So, while people treat certain beliefs as knowledge, these beliefs are not and that leads to dysfunctional decision-making in politics or in the other aspects of life.

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[1] Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead (Indianapolis, IN:  Bobbs-Merrill, 1943) AND King Vidor (director), The Fountainhead (the film), Warner Brothers, 1949 AND “Howard Roark’s Courtroom Speech,” Work the System, n.d., accessed September 29, 2020, https://www.workthesystem.com/getting-it/howard-roarks-courtroom-speech/ .

[2] That is, those who adhere to this construct see this nation’s – or, for that matter, the Western world’s – social/economic/political arrangement as being in the grip of an economic, exploitive class.  They, critical theorists, favor collectivist solutions to the problems of inequality.

[3] David B. Feldman, “Why Do People Believe Things That Aren’t True?”  Psychology Today, May 12, 2017, accessed September 27, 2020, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/supersurvivors/201705/why-do-people-believe-things-aren-t-true .

BELIEVING WHAT ONE WANTS, PART I

 

[Note:  From time to time, this blog issues a set of postings that summarize what the blog has been emphasizing in its previous postings.  Of late, the blog has been looking at various obstacles civics educators face in teaching their subject.  It’s time to post a series of such summary accounts.  The advantage of such summaries is to introduce new readers to the blog and to provide a different context by which to review the blog’s various claims and arguments.  This and upcoming summary postings will be preceded by this message.]

 

This blogger, before addressing the general challenges civics teachers face regarding political values and how they play out in the classroom, wishes to remind the reader what this blog’s goal is in the current set of postings.  That goal is to provide an explanation of how a natural rights political culture affects federalist aims a teacher might hold. 

So, this posting in a summary way, reviews some of the basic moral claims that a natural rights political culture promotes.  To begin, part and parcel of a dominant political view is to identify what it holds to be moral when it comes to political calculations.  This is especially important when the issues at hand are not so easily discerned as to what people should do on a moral basis.  Those types of concerns pop up all the time and not just politicians or elected officials need to address them, but the average citizen needs to do so as well.

          And when it comes to the typical situations that Americans face, two political values tend to be paramount in such calculations.  That is the values of liberty and equality.  It seems that these two concerns come to the fore most often among the array of issues that policy makers consider.  And usually a good deal of contention characterizes those deliberations.

For example, policies over welfare or health care illustrate the point.  People who support government involvement tend to cite equality as their relevant concern; while those who oppose government action look to liberty to bolster their claims.  And one can divide these fights, to some degree, between those who hold natural rights positions – as in everyone is responsible for his/her own fate – and those who hold onto more communal responses that seem to count on federalist values – as in “we’re all in this together.”

Natural rights’ rationales advocate against communal responses especially, if by communal, one means government action – along with its coercive abilities.  After all, government can put people in jail.  They support their contentions with the belief that counts on people being responsible for their own fates and any reliance on government, among other negative consequences, undermines people meeting their responsibilities. 

Another important example in which natural rights advocates repeatedly express their concerns is over government regulations of businesses.  They generally argue that such government interference only hurts economic growth and, therefore, hurts everyone.  This is claimed despite evidence to the contrary assuming regulations are within reasonable boundaries.[1]

On an emotional-moral level, what advocates seem to stress is the near sanctity of the individual.  It is he/she whose sense of worth motivates him/her to accomplish good or even great things.  One is reminded of the novel or movie, The Fountainhead,[2] originally written by Ayn Rand.  In that story, the main character, Howard Roark, is brought to trial for dynamiting a building project that he designed as its architect.  This designing was done surreptitiously, and the project went astray from his design.  At trial, in his only statement of defense, he states he was deprived of his agreed upon basis for doing the project – that his design not be changed.

In his speech he gives probably the most cogent rationale for the natural rights view.  Here is a taste of that testimony:

The basic need of the second-hander is to secure his ties with men in order to be fed.  He places relations first.  He declares that man exists in order to serve others.  He preaches altruism.

          Altruism is the doctrine which demands that man live for others and place others above self.

No man can live for another.  He cannot share his spirit just as he cannot share his body.  But the second-hander has used altruism as a weapon of exploitation and versed the base of mankind’s moral principles.  Men have taught every precept that destroys the creator.  Men have been taught dependence as a virtue.

The man who attempts to live for others is a dependent.  He is a parasite in motive and makes parasites of those he serves.  The relationship produces nothing but mutual corruption.  It is impossible in concept.  The nearest approach to it in reality – the man who lives to serve others – is the slave.  If physical slavery is repulsive, how much more repulsive is the concept of servility of the spirit?  The conquered slave has a vestige of honor.  He has the merit of having resisted and of considering his condition evil.  But the man who enslaves himself voluntarily in the name of love is the basest of creatures.  He degrades the dignity of man and he degrades the conception of love.  But this is essence of altruism.[3]

But as for this view as an overall bias, the point to draw is that it holds a particular sense of liberty or, as it is called, natural liberty.  Succinctly, that form of liberty holds that people has the right to determine one’s values and beliefs and to be able to behave accordingly (short of interfering with others to do likewise).  A “true believer” of this construct holds natural liberty as his/her ultimate or trump value.  Or stated another way, for him/her, he/she could claim:  “Give me liberty or give me death.” 

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[1]See Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo, Good Economics for Hard Times (New York, NY:  Public Affairs, 2019).

[2] Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead (Indianapolis, IN:  Bobbs-Merrill, 1943) AND King Vidor (director), The Fountainhead (the film), Warner Brothers, 1949.

[3] “Howard Roark’s Courtroom Speech,” Work the System, n.d., accessed September 29, 2020, https://www.workthesystem.com/getting-it/howard-roarks-courtroom-speech/ .

REGARDING JUSTICE AND CIVIL SOCIETY

 

[Note:  From time to time, this blog issues a set of postings that summarize what the blog has been emphasizing in its previous postings.  Of late, the blog has been looking at various obstacles civics educators face in teaching their subject.  It’s time to post a series of such summary accounts.  The advantage of such summaries is to introduce new readers to the blog and to provide a different context by which to review the blog’s various claims and arguments.  This and upcoming summary postings will be preceded by this message.]

 

This blog makes a distinction between how civics’ subject matter is presented in American classrooms and how it should be presented.  How it is presented reflects the guidance that the natural rights perspective promotes.  This blog, on the other hand, promotes the guidance that federation theory provides. 

Naturally, federation theory promotes a federalist view about how reality relating to governance and politics should be conceptualized.  If utilized, lessons would take on a different look from what is common today.  For example, educators might take on the following processes:

·       superimpose a different substantive structure on the subject matter (e.g., place more emphasis on local governance),

·       identify conducive instructional approaches (e.g., have students investigate or be told about local political activities), and

·       place in priority what federalism highlights (e.g., the promotion of civil qualities within local environments such as the school site). 

Overall, federation theory attempts to assist educators in their efforts to promote good citizenship in ways that reflect its ideals.

          But in terms of guiding the work of political scientists, there is apart from the pedagogical view of federation theory another related construct, federal theory.  And to see what distinguishes the two, one might consider the basic aims of political scientists.  To that end, Daniel Elazar identifies three reasons for why political scientists do what they do. 

The purposes or aims of those academics are to pursue the quality of justice, to discover generalizable factors that correlate with various political actions, and to promote a civil society.  Elazar points out that meeting the first two aims helps meet the third.  He relates federalism to “choice” polities by offering it a special character. [1]  That is a character reflecting the qualities of collaboration, community, and mutuality.

          To look at the distinction between the guidance of federal theory and that of the natural rights theory, the former does not look at only the ubiquitous transactional nature of politics.  It extends the interest of researchers to those factors that advance or strengthens normative factors which support a federated partnership that is characterized by the above qualities. 

And this distinction does not look at only what aspects of political reality should be studied, but also the methods used in that study.  Given the almost exclusive transactional lenses political scientists of the natural rights school use, their attention is primarily fixed on the behaviors of political actors.  It is behaviors that have the highest range of observable “choices” upon which political actors act.  Therefore, those researchers mostly “count” on behavioral studies that, it turns out, rely heavily on statistical analysis.

While this more restricted view of political science is prevalent in academia, the fact remains that the American political system is still foundationally based on a compact-al agreement or agreements if one also includes the constitutions of the various states.  And these agreements entail factors that are not always, at least directly or satisfactorily, analyzed through the measurements of behaviors.  For example, this blog’s treatment of the holistic nature of maturation points out that shortcoming.[2]

Research, that sets out to approach the aims Elazar points out, needs to address more than self-defined ambitions.  Substantively, such research needs to look beyond reductionist factors, but seeks methods that address broad, holistic conditions.  And this demands methods that take on broader landscapes than targeted cause and effect relationships.  Yes, those relationships, when proved to be powerful, are important and should be discovered, but more is involved.  Federal theory assists political scientists who wish to pursue grander questions over justice and civility.

One would expect, in a polity where these basic federalist characteristics are well ensconced, that the characteristics or attributes would be part and parcel of the nation’s cultural norms.  As a consequence, the resulting legislated laws of such a system would be ideally well-thought out so as to not jeopardize or undermine the integrity of each partner.  But more is involved. 

A federated arrangement insists that there exists an expectation that citizens take on a proactive posture in the polity’s governance.  This, in other words, would become (and was according to Tocqueville the case in the US of the 1830s) integral to its political culture.  And to the extent it is not, that would indicate how out of favor federalist thinking has become.

On the surface, a federalist mode of behavior and behavior guided by the natural rights view might very well appear the same.  In each, citizens can go about their business basically doing what they want.  But upon a closer look, federated activity seeks to advance the interests of the commonwealth since the citizenry is more apt to seek those ends – at least in the ideal and to a meaningful degree in how those citizens actually act. 

For that to be the case, those citizens need to be disposed to options that consider other than their self-defined interests.  This might very well result in government policies imposing costs on the citizenry, often in the form of higher taxes or other obligations.  And to boot, fulfillment of such support will be more efficient since voluntary compliance would usually be more “normal” and of less cost. 

But as repeatedly noted in this blog, Americans do not primarily ascribe to federation theory.  Instead they predominately hold unto the natural rights perspective.  Consequently, for example, counting on citizens to wear masks during a pandemic becomes problematic.  And that reality affects how Americans define their public morality.  Accordingly, this blog will in the next posting look into the natural rights view of good and bad, right or wrong.   

Why is this a concern?  Since the natural rights view leaves moral questions to the individual – except for its insistence in promoting and protecting the value of natural liberty – that construct maintains a neutrality to almost all other moral precepts.  As such, especially in terms of civics education and its aim to promote good citizenship, how this “sovereign” individual views moral concerns becomes an important aspect of that rubric, good citizenship.

Interested parties might ask of a natural rights guided, civics curriculum:  can one observe where those schools operate, trends in how people make moral choices?  Do the ways people make those choices affect the common welfare?  Do those civics classrooms even address moral questions and, if they do, what strategies do they employ?  Questions such as these will guide what follows in subsequent postings.

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[1] Daniel J. Elazar, Exploring Federalism (Tuscaloosa, AL:  The University of Alabama Press, 1987).

[2] See Philip Selznick’s treatment of Hegal’s ideas concerning maturation.  Selznick, Philip, The Moral Commonwealth:  Social Theory and the Promise of Community (Berkeley, CA:  University of California Press, 1992).