VIABILITY OF THE LIBERATED FEDERALISM, VIII

Using Eugene Meehan’s criteria for judging social science theory and models[1] – its mental constructs – this blog, over its last seven postings, has provided the bulk of its viability statement regarding the model, liberated federalism.  While such a review is helpful to civics teachers, it does not directly address pedagogic concerns that civics educators have in their day-to-day responsibilities. 

This posting rectifies this – to a degree – by adding to Meehan’s list of criteria two more areas of concern, abstract level, and motivation.  This blogger believes these two concerns, while separate, are highly related and that relationship is highlighted below.  To begin with, both reflect mental qualities that affect how people learn.

Their meanings are fairly straightforward.  Abstract level refers to how much the construct's information or images contain elements of reality which constitute the phenomena it describes or explains.  Any representation, by necessity, has to strip elements of reality from it and, therefore, be abstract to some degree. 

For example, if someone asks how a person’s day was, that person would only be able to convey very little of that day.  If the person had gone to a movie, the person would very likely not relate the color of the person’s seat or whether it was cushy or not.  The more one leaves out, the more abstract the information is.  As for scientific research, it is known for its abstraction as a scientist tries to distill the causal factors that account for some occurrence or condition.[2]

As for the motivational quality, it simply refers to the potential a body of information has in soliciting interest on the part of an observer, consumer, or, in this case, learner.  Of course, the motivational quality of any material varies among the people who are exposed to it.  What's interesting to this blogger might be downright boring to a reader of this blog. 

But there are certain general aspects about motivation that one can abstract that helps one explain why some presentations tend to be more motivating than others.  Such characteristics as relevance, understandability, entertainment, curiosity, challenge, etc. are some of those aspects.  These are generally seen as qualities that enhance the motivational quality of information or other symbolic presentations. 

The connection between abstraction and motivation, how they relate, zeroes in on the quality of understandability.  It is hard to see any presentation or activity being motivational unless it is at least understandable to the learner or consumer of the content to some minimal degree.  Whether the presentation or activity meets this minimal degree reflects on the sophistication of the person consuming the information.  Sophistication in each area, in turn, reflects the level of abstraction the consumer can handle in dealing with the content in question.

There have been two theorists whose ideas help us see this relation between sophistication and abstraction and are highlighted here and in the next posting.  They both understood that the abstract level of information is dependent on the media in which the information is presented.  Some modes of presentation, by their very nature, contain more or less the reality contained in the situations or conditions described or explained. 

Before identifying these pioneers, let this blogger make the central point of this posting.  For presentation media or instructional activity to be motivating, the presentation of the content must employ an instructional effort that suitably matches the sophistication level of the student vis-a-vis the content being taught.  This is done by employing appropriate levels of abstraction or lack of abstraction in the media employed. 

Some media, simply due to the nature of the media, will contain, to various degrees, elements of the reality being addressed.  The general trend is that the less sophistication the student has, the less abstract the media needs to be.  Conversely, the more sophisticated the student is, in relation to specific content, the more abstract the media can be and probably should be to sustain the student’s interest.

That is, while for the lesser sophisticated students, to be successful, lower abstraction media can be considered necessary, for higher sophisticated students, higher abstraction media can be considered preferable.  This is because such instruction takes less time to implement and is likely to maintain the interest of such students.  Low abstraction material can easily turn out to be boring for the more knowledgeable students. 

The other factors affecting media choices are availability of material options, time availability, and technological options.  Material options are affected by the financial resources of the purchasers of the materials and access to material markets.  Time availability refers to the amount of time the instructor can dedicate to any lesson or set of lessons. 

As indicated, in general, instruction that is less abstract takes more time to use – if for no other reason due to the amount of reality it contains – and the more abstract material takes less time, assuming students are sophisticated enough to understand and appreciate its educational value.  In addition, technological availability is a concern.  Technological options refer to the media hardware and software the instructor or instructional institution can secure, and the instructional staff can proficiently use.

The two theorists referred to above are Jerome S. Bruner[3] and Edgar Dale.[4]  Both of these educational academics provided relevant insights to this topic in the 1960s.  This posting will stop here and promise that the next one will delve into the work of Bruner and Dale which this blogger believes is still powerful today.

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[1] For readers wishing to read the previous postings relating to these viability claims that the blog is making, they can read the last seven postings found in the online site http://gravitascivics.blogspot.com/.  As for Meehan’s criteria, see Eugene J. Meehan, Contemporary Political Thought:  A Critical Study (Homewood, IL:  Dorsey Press, 1967).  To date, the blog has reviewed comprehensiveness, power, precision, consistency/reliability, isomorphism, compatibility, predictability, and control.

[2]This could be, for example, information relating to what causes water to freeze.  A scientist observes water in a variety of environmental conditions and might eventually abstract the varying temperatures in which water is found and detect a pattern between lower temperatures and the freezing of water.  The abstracted bits of information would be the falling temperature of the water's environment, the changing temperature of the water, and the degree to which the water hardens into ice.

[3]See Saul McIeod, “Jerome Bruner’s Theory of Learning and Cognitive Development” (June 14, 2023), accessed August 31, 2023, Jerome Bruner's Theory of Learning And Cognitive Development - Simply Psychology.  The issue was how the material was presented.  And one of the factors determining success was the nature of the media used to present the information.  To this blogger’s understanding, Bruner was not arguing that young students had to mature to learn complicated material.  He was of the mind that any content could be taught to any student regardless of his/her sophistication.  The issue is how the material is presented.

[4] “Edgar Dale,” Wikipedia (n.d.), accessed September 1, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Dale.

VIABILITY OF THE LIBERATED FEDERALISM, VII

 

With this posting, this blog continues to make its viability statement regarding the mental construct, liberated federalism.  The construct is proposed by this blogger to guide the efforts of civics educators in selecting the content they present to secondary students in American classrooms.  To date, the blog has described how the construct measures up to Eugene Meehan’s criteria[1] – the criteria’s first six concerns – and this posting will address the seventh, predictability, and eight, control.

            The criterion, predictability, asks:  Does a construct predict conditions associated with the phenomena in question?  There are two key predictive statements that can be made regarding the use of the liberated federalism model.  One, effective political behavior is conducted by associations, not individuals.[2]  Two, that dysfunctional social behavior will be lessened by shifting from an individual to communal political culture orientation.[3] 

          As this blog has related in its historical account of past and present political views (an account that starts with its posting, “Parochial’s Comprehensiveness,” April 1, 2022), the American society has moved from a more communally oriented perspective of the parochial/traditional federalism view to the individualistic, natural rights perspective, and consequently has experienced a drift to a more crime-ridden and uncivil society.[4]

          The model presented here is a compromise between the older versions of responsible citizenship and the liberated individualism the nation has adopted as its prominent political view.  Yes, this synthesis also includes ideas from critical theory – mainly its concerns for the underprivileged – but in the main, liberated federalism incorporates the communal concerns federalism promotes and the de-parochialism natural rights favors.

          And this posting has room for the last of Meehan’s criteria, that being control.  That criterion asks:  Does a construct imply ways to control the phenomena in question?  That is, does it have purpose?  The presented model identifies the relevant variables affecting both the communal harmony and the moral decision-making as pursuant to the analysis Philip Selznick[5] provides and is congruent with the ideas advanced by Amitai Etzioni,[6] Daniel Elazar,[7] Donald S. Lutz,[8] Robert D. Putnam,[9] and Michael J. Sandel.[10]

          In general, these writers provide ideas about how a communally strong, federally organized, functional society operates and maintains itself.  Insofar as their ideas are contained in the presented model and are true to their purpose, the model presented implies ways of controlling the phenomena in question:  through effective and moral political behavior.  This is placed in priority since, as often claimed in this blog, in the long run societal survival depends upon these qualities.

          The next posting will add two criteria to Meehan’s list.  They are the criteria, abstract level, and motivation.  These last two more directly address the concerns of teachers.

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[1] For readers wishing to read the previous postings relating these viability claims that the blog is making, they can read the last six postings found in the online site http://gravitascivics.blogspot.com/.  As for Meehan’s criteria, see Eugene J. Meehan, Contemporary Political Thought:  A Critical Study (Homewood, IL:  Dorsey Press, 1967).  To date, the blog has reviewed comprehensiveness, power, precision, consistency/reliability, isomorphism, and compatibility.

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

[3] Michael Walzer, On Toleration (New Haven, CT:  Yale University Press, 1997).  The predictions this model would make are qualitative because the model does not provide quantitative values to variables it identifies.

[4] As for individualistic view being dominant, see Jean M. Twenge, Generations:  The Real Differences between Gen Z, Millennials, Gen X, Boomers, and Silents – and What They Mean for America’s Future (New York, NY:  Atria Books, 2023).

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

[6] Amitai Etzioni, The Spirit of Community:  Rights, Responsibilities, and the Communitarian Agenda (New York, NY:  Crown Publisher, 1993)

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

[8] Donald S. Lutz, The Origins of American Constitutionalism (Baton Rouge, LA:  Louisiana State University Press, 1988).

[9] Robert D. Putnam, Bowling Alone:  The Collapse and Revival of American Community (New York, NY:  Simon and Schuster, 2000).

[10] Michael J. Sandel, Democracy’s Discontent:  America in Search of a Public Philosophy (Cambridge, MA:  The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1996).

VIABILITY OF THE LIBERATED FEDERALISM, VI

 

This posting will address another concern of Eugene Meehan’s criteria as they are applied to the social construct, the liberated federalism model.[1]  This blog has been applying that criteria to describe the viability of that construct.  The sixth Meehan criterion asks:  does the construct align with other responsible models explaining the same phenomena?  That is, does it have compatibility? 

There is nothing in this proposed model that either contradicts the parochial/traditional federalism model or the political systems model and its offshoot models that have, to some degree, been previously reviewed in this blog.  What follows is a description of how liberated federalism is compatible.

          From this perspective, the model offered here can be seen as an open-ended one in which all of these models and theories are called into play by the activities of the deliberative process which the model in question highlights.  The federalist model of government is a more encompassing one.  These other models – those that have emanated from the political systems model – are mid-range models that describe and attempt to explain how political actors work their processes for a given context. 

As such, the mid-range models are useful in understanding political conditions, given specific political challenges, and in devising effective strategies.  As stated in an earlier posting, the model that has the closest overlapping content to liberated federalism is group theory.  Roy C. Macridis writes:

 

… [T]hey [group theorists] tell us that in order to understand how groups behave and how they interact, we must study the political system, the overall behavior patterns, the values and beliefs held by the actors, the formal organization of authority, the degree of legitimacy, etc., etc.  Without realizing it, they reverse their theoretical position.  They start with groups only to admit the primacy of the political phenomenon and suggest that in order to explain group behavior we must start with what group behavior purported to explain – the political system![2]

 

In a similar way, if the liberated federalism model were presented for purposes of generating hypotheses which would lead to empirical studies, this criticism would similarly be a serious one in terms of the model’s usefulness.  But that is not its purpose.

          The model is presented as a foundational construct for the study of American government and civics and, therefore, the Macridis statement is seen as having a functional quality because these are exactly the types of concerns that one wants secondary students to tackle in their study of government and civics.

          The literature about groups has been concerned mostly with the actions of interest groups, i.e., groups that have the on-going role of bringing demands to the political perspective of group behavior.[3]  While this type of group concern is not excluded from the liberated federalism model, it, liberated federalism, is not limited to that concern.  Besides, the emphasis is not limited to questions of effectiveness, although also included, but the emphasis is also heavily concerned with the communal interaction of entities with arrangements/associations and the moral quality of their actions.

          Therefore, the judgment here is that for pedagogical reasons, liberated federalism is not only compatible but also solicits a functional role for systems-based models in guiding civics instruction at the secondary level.  The next criterion to be addressed is predictability.

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[1] That is, this posting continues the blog’s review of Eugene Meehan’s criteria by which to evaluate social science theories and models.  For readers wishing to read the previous postings relating these viability claims that the blog is making, they can read the last five postings found in the online site http://gravitascivics.blogspot.com/.  As for Meehan’s criteria, see Eugene J. Meehan, Contemporary Political Thought:  A Critical Study (Homewood, IL:  Dorsey Press, 1967).  To date the blog has reviewed comprehensiveness, power, precision, consistency/reliability, and isomorphism.

[2] Roy C. Macridis, “Groups and Group Theory” in Comparative Politics:  Notes and Readings, edited by Roy C. Macridis and Bernard E. Brown (Chicago, IL:  The Dorsey Press, 1986), 281-287, 286.

[3] Current academic political thinking concerning group theory has a mixed opinion as to its viability.  See “Political Group Analysis,” Encyclopedia.com (n.d.), accessed August 23, 2023, https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/applied-and-social-sciences-magazines/political-group-analysis AND for a more positive view, see Robert A. Heineman, Steven A. Peterson, and Thomas H. Rasmussen, American Government (New York, NY:  McGraw-Hill, Inc., 1995).

VIABILITY OF THE LIBERATED FEDERALISM, V

 

After presenting and describing the application of Eugene Meehan’s criteria for appraising social science theories and models,[1] the last posting addressed the challenge of diversity and how it affects the isomorphism of the liberated federalism model.  For readers who want to read those accounts, they are directed to the online site, http://gravitascivics.blogspot.com/,[2] and review the last four postings.

          Given the complexity that the last posting reported, it does not complete this account’s comments concerning diversity and isomorphism.  In addition, there is the need to describe how excessive individualism, an ongoing malady of American life, [3] influences the diversity issue and demands yet another type of toleration within the nation’s collective social make-up.

 

This country is not only a pluralism of groups but also a pluralism of individuals, its regime of toleration is focused, as we have seen on personal choices and lifestyles rather than on common ways of life.  It is perhaps the most individualist society in human history … “we are free to do our own thing.”[4]

 

But “doing your own thing” takes financial resources which many immigrant groups, in many cases, have in short supply.

          The poorer groups often lead the nation to be the noisiest – in most cases, legitimately so – about maintaining their cultural identity by engaging in political processes.  As the groups establish themselves, they become Americanized because the political processes have their effects.  The debate in the nation is whether to insist on a single, nativist approach (“Make America Great Again”), one in which a hegemony of dominant culture prevails, or one that tolerates or even encourages diverse cultural lifestyles.

Walzer gives one element of this debate a positive spin, he writes:

 

… [D]emocratic politics itself, where all the members of all the groups are (in principle) equal citizens who have not only to argue with one another but they also somehow, to come to an agreement.  What they learn in the course of the necessary negotiations and compromises is probably more important than anything they might get from studying the canon.  We need to think about how this practical, democratic learning can be advanced.[5]

 

In the process of learning the lessons, great benefits are gained by immigrants belonging to associations:  “Individuals are stronger, more confident, more savvy, when they are participants in a common life, when they are responsible to and for other people.”[6] 

In so claiming, Walzer agrees with one of the main points of this account, that federating themselves with others, in the long run, benefits these people’s interests by doing so.  That is, communal allegiances in associations and neighborhoods would do much to stem the tide of divorces, single parent homes, child abuse, abandonment, decline in membership in unions, homelessness and increase the future fates of churches, parent-teacher organizations, and philanthropic societies.

A federalist model, then, has a definite correspondence to these segments of reality.  The judgment here is that that demonstrates how granular the model can be and, therefore, demonstrates its isomorphism.  The next posting will address the model’s compatibility.

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[1] Namely by reviewing comprehensiveness, power, precision, and reliability.  See Eugene J. Meehan, Contemporary Political Thought:  A Critical Study (Homewood, IL:  Dorsey Press, 1967).

[2] Use the archives feature.  If readers want to read the blog’s presentation of the liberated federalism model, they should start with the posting, “From Natural Rights to Liberated Federalism” (June 2, 2023).

[3] Jean M. Twenge, Generations:  The Real Differences between Gen Z, Millennials, Gen X, Boomers, and Silents – and What They Mean for America’s Future (New York, NY:  Atria Books, 2023).  It should be noted that individualism is not all bad.  It has its positive elements, but here the concern is with excessive individualism.

[4] Michael Walzer, On Toleration (New Haven, CT:  Yale University Press, 1997), 100.

[5] Ibid., 97.

[6] Ibid., 97.

VIABILITY OF THE LIBERATED FEDERALISM, IV

 

To date this blog has, in its viability statement concerning the construct, liberated federalism, reviewed four of Eugene Meehan’s criteria by which to determine the usefulness of social science models or theories.  The four are comprehensiveness, power, precision, and reliability.  For readers who want to read those accounts, they are directed to the online site, http://gravitascivics.blogspot.com/[1] and review the last three postings.

          This posting addresses the next Meehan criterion, isomorphism.  It asks:  does a construct contain a one-to-one correspondence with that portion of reality it is trying to describe and explain?  One can view the liberated federalism model as a problem-solving, decision-making model applicable to a political event or situation.  In Robert L. Solso’s 1995 edition of his book, Cognitive Psychology, one finds the following:

 

Studies of decision making show that problem solutions are influenced by memory factors (availability hypothesis), reference frames that affect problem formulation, failure to consider how similar an event is to its population, and underestimating the mathematical significance of a possible event …

Cross-cultural differences have been observed in syllogistic reasoning, with people from highly industrialized countries proving arguments in terms of representational propositions, and people from less industrialized countries basing proofs more on sensory impressions.[2]

         

As for the liberated federalism model, memory and other reference frames are accounted for in the model at the individual (entity) level by reference to knowledge resources.  At the arrangement/association level, the deliberative process refers to a review of held collective ideals and political and other theoretical knowledge or beliefs.  What scientific inquiry might investigate are the processes of congealing opposing commitments to diverse ideals and theoretical knowledge or biases by different entity members, especially among leaders.

It is surely an area that should be of prime concern when formulating compact-al agreements.  Parties cannot always foresee these types of basic disagreements, but looking for them in advance can ease their appearance and their resolution in a productive fashion.  A good review of personality and other distinctive characterizations of themselves and others so involved can prove to be beneficial in the long run.  One can think of this as akin to choosing a marital partner and is surely highlighted by the liberated federalism model.

In terms of cross-cultural differences – an issue of vibrant concern in diverse population societies – conscious awareness of differences in reasoning patterns among minority or immigrant groups can again ease the accommodations of their differences.  One should not underestimate the challenges such differences cause.[3]  Michael Walzer writes about different pluralistic models which characterize the various nations and empires that have had to deal with diversity.

The United States began with what Walzer calls a consociation arrangement among the several states.  A consociation is an arrangement of several communities through negotiations, a constitutional arrangement or union between or among themselves.

Diversity was based on geographic and economic factors and the nation’s compact originally was designed to federally unite this level of diversity.  A civil war and the nationalization that has occurred via common struggles, such as the development of a national economy, two world wars, a cold war, and a pervasive national media, have changed the nature of the nation’s diversity.[4]

The current, rising diversity is more a result of having an array of ethnic representation within the population.  This type of pluralist model Walzer calls immigrant societies.  Since this type of diversity is not segregated to the degree that various areas of the nation sustained (up to the civil rights movement in the twentieth century), the nation’s view of how to establish a federalist union needed changing – a process still in progress.

This does not mean that geographic and even accompanying cultural distinctions no longer exist in the United States; they do exist and enjoy a level of multiculturalism which has been culturally established in recent decades.  But to add to the complexity within the diverse geographic regions of the nation, there is diversity within and among the nation’s separate ethnic groups, according to Walzer.  For example, there is much diversity among the Latin groups as immigrants from various Latin countries have increased.

How this diversity matches up with liberated federalism’s elements – its isomorphism – will be addressed in the next posting.  Obviously, this question of how the model matches on a one-to-one basis with the realities of American society is a bit complex and deserves a more extended treatment.

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[1] Use the archives feature.  If readers want to read the blog’s presentation of the liberated federalism model, they should start with the posting, “From Natural Rights to Liberated Federalism” (June 2, 2023).

[2] Robert L. Solso, Cognitive Psychology (Boston, MA:  Allyn and Bacon, 1995), 437.

[3] Dwitio Prayoto, “Public Administration and the Challenges of Managing Diversity,” Linked In (May 1, 2023), accessed August 16, 2023, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/public-administration-challenges-managing-diversity-dwitio-prayoto#:~:text=One%20of%20the%20most%20significant%20challenges%20of%20managing%20diversity%20is,with%20individuals%20from%20different%20cultures AND Michael Walzer, On Toleration (New Haven, CT:  Yale University Press, 1997).

[4] Juliana Menasce Horrowitz, “Americans See Advantages and Challenges in Country’s Growing Racial and Ethnic Diversity,” Pew Research Center (May 8, 2019), accessed August 16, 2023, https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2019/05/08/americans-see-advantages-and-challenges-in-countrys-growing-racial-and-ethnic-diversity/.

VIABILITY OF THE LIBERATED FEDERALISM, III

 

Continuing this blog’s viability statement regarding the construct, liberated federalism, this posting will review Eugene Meehan’s[1] third criterion, precision, and the fourth criterion, reliability.  The blog has already addressed Meehan’s concern for comprehensiveness and power (see the two previous postings at http://gravitascivics.blogspot.com/[2]).  Precision is a criterion that asks:  does a construct specifically and precisely treat its concepts, making them clear in their use?  The concern is whether a construct is clearly usable in its uses.

          As applied to liberated federalism, this blog, preceding the actual description of the model with a presentation of its elements, presented the model’s key concepts.  They were identified and explained as to their meaning and significance.  In addition to the explanation of the individual concepts, the relations among them were explored.  This was carried through in the description of the model itself.

          Certain concepts, such as equality, were introduced more than once since they have significance within the different components of the model.  For example, equality is important within the relation between entities outside the domain of the arrangement as well as within it.  These distinctions were added to the description in the attempt to be as clear as possible.

          So, carrying this example further, if the concern of a study is how cohesion among members of a minority group and members of that group who hold positions within a government bureaucracy, such a condition would be addressed if that condition affects the concern under study.  This sort of clarity is carried forth with all its elements – its concepts and claims.

          The fourth Meehan criterion is reliability or consistency and asks:  does a construct explain its components and their relationships the same way time after time?  Can it be used reliably across various studies or different elements of a particular study?  The proposed model attempts to generalize the factors that are present in any moral, political decision-making, but maintain their meaning in its different applications.

          Not every important decision-making event in politics and government is moral or effective.  If one accepts the stated assumption that only moral decision-making furthers, in the long term, the self-interests of all parties involved, then the model serves as an ideal standard by which all political and governmental decisions can be analyzed and even judged.

          It also serves to identify the viable factors involved with such decision-making and can, therefore, provide a springboard for asking insightful questions of any similar or related activity within and without government.  As a standard, the relationship between or among the factors can be judged to be reliable in all political situations. 

As a model that designates the factors necessary for effective decision making for a given association, the primary emphasis is that they be coordinated and contextualized as communal efforts, i.e., federalist unions are best equipped to gain political objectives, particularly in the long run.  As with the previous notes on the other Meehan criteria, use of the model will serve to see if these claims are in effect true.

The following posting will address the next Meehan criterion, isomorphism.

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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] Use the archives feature.  If readers want to read the blog’s presentation of the liberated federalism model, they should start with the posting, “From Natural Rights to Liberated Federalism” (June 2, 2023).