“Man’s capacity for justice makes democracy possible, but man’s inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.”
–Reinhold Niebuhr
Tag Archives: what is freedom
For myself, alone…
“It is not for me to judge another man’s life. I must judge, I must choose, I must spurn, purely for myself. For myself, alone.”
–Hermann Hesse
Finding Our Strength
The choice is ours. We can acknowledge our differences, address one another with dignity, and unite in our communities to address local needs and resolve local problems. Or, we can accept a world of hostility, disorder, and ultimate collapse as our children’s inheritance – and let the vision and the treasure of the American idea slip away.
Some may say that it is too late. Or, that their principles are too important to be compromised.
I say that the United States was conceived in controversy and that the powerful vision of the founders came with recognition that strength in unity can only be founded upon diversity.
Indeed, it will be argued here that diversity is the foundation for strength, and that the United States Constitution is a visionary assertion of this belief. They gave us structure. It is our responsibility to give it character.
Given our great diversity, what exactly does it mean to be an American? The answer that we choose as a nation will determine the shape of our future. We will be returning to this question again and again throughout the forthcoming book.
We find ourselves confronted today by one of the great tests of history, a direct challenge to both the intent enshrined in the Constitution and the coherence of the American vision that has been gradually maturing for more than two hundred years.
Perhaps we have lost our way for periods of time, stumbled, gotten sloppy. But now it is time to pull together. And, in all practicality this can only take place in the context of our local communities – the home of democracy and seat of civil order.
In a free society, stability cannot be imposed from above. The kind of strength we seek is grounded in trust, and the dependability of personal relationships.
I am not writing about a “recovery” from crisis in the normal sense. Rather, I submit that we stand at the threshold of an unprecedented turning point, one that offers us a window of opportunity to reaffirm and assert our exceptional and multifaceted identity.
In considering our approach to new and unexpected challenges in a rapidly changing world, we are positioned to make positive changes, both pragmatic and ethical, that would have been impossible otherwise. I believe a creative process is now underway that would not otherwise have been possible.
A tough lesson like this can correct weaknesses and imbalances that have led to these crises, but success can only be built on the time-tested principles that have made America an attractive model for the world.
We will go on to consider the foresight of the Constitutional Convention of 1787 that led to the system of protections, the checks and balances that makes this nation what it is. First, however, let’s examine the reasons that diversity has ensured American strength – not as a nice idea, but as a pragmatic necessity.
When, as individuals or groups, we address a problem or plan a project, the more varied the perspective and experience that is brought to bear, the more creative and effective will be the solutions found. This is an irrefutable truism.
In many institutions, and particularly in government, people are often afflicted with a condition called ‘group-think’. Everyone thinks the same way and listens only to those they most respect or fear. Consequently, groups often ignore obvious fallacies and misperceptions. Not only that, they tend to scorn perceptive critics as trouble-makers.
Our resistance to accepting diversity is often based in our discomfort with those we perceive as “outsiders”, who look or think differently than we do, or who come from unfamiliar cultural backgrounds. Yet, differences constitute the essence of diversity, and they can sometimes stimulate our thinking in ways we can ill afford to live without.
Why are we afraid of new and different ways of thinking? No one is asking us to change our minds.
Aristotle said that “it is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.”
The opportunity to explore the world through the eyes of other people is a blessing and a gift. A life filled with diversity is an adventure that never stops giving.
Tom
Next week: Unexpected Wisdom
Good Neighbors Are Earned
Where to begin? If local communities are to serve as the foundation for healing the American spirit and reclaiming our sense of purpose, we must learn to make them strong – dependable, trustworthy, and resilient.
Many of us are not well acquainted with our immediate neighbors, much less those around the corner or down the road. If we want good people to depend on in a serious crisis, this has to change. Many problems are more easily resolved when we team up with others. Think food security, or friends we can trust when the banks close or the power goes out.
I have shared my concerns with you about the critical role of local communities. I have explained why I believe local communities and networks of communities will become the essential platform on which Americans reorganize themselves to identify common values, plan a common future, and forge a common purpose.
Building on the solid ground we foster in neighborly relationships, community is the only place in these extreme days where we have both the ability and the opportunity to control our destiny.
As each of us looks around and assesses our circumstances, how can we begin?
Those of you who are naturally outgoing will find this discussion simplistic. But for others the challenge of reaching out to strangers and proposing a common endeavor will be imposing.
There are several kinds of challenges to consider. These include: 1) getting acquainted with strangers and developing friendships, 2) explaining our motives honestly and our ideas effectively, 3) cooperation in addressing local needs, and 4) proposing more ambitious endeavors.
Community-wide efforts can include a wide array of possibilities. For example, these might include local security considerations, growing and preserving food, educating children, initiating small business enterprises, and troubleshooting technical problems that require creative thinking or specialized skills, such as electrical power, safe drinking water, and waste disposal.
All these possibilities can be placed on the table when we are first getting acquainted. Hearing a range of possible benefits for engaging in mutual assistance can jump-start resistant minds.
However, it is probably best not to try to fix all the ills of the world on the first visit. Unless you already know someone well, the first step will be to get acquainted and to find reasons to spend more time together. A warm, friendly first visit can be the basis for later, more substantive engagement.
Always begin interactions by inviting people to share their feelings and views before you do. This will provide you with a basis for effective engagement, and it will make them more receptive to you. Do not pry or press. But, if you can get another person talking, you will find them far more open to hearing from you.
Once new acquaintances begin to warm to you, invite them to think with you about ways the community can be improved. Invite ideas, and then suggest some of your own. If you find an opening, share your hope.
Try to avoid or downplay the more serious political or emotional issues, if possible, until you have secured a stronger positive connection.
If you meet unreceptive people, don’t push. Be friendly, stay in touch, and make yourself useful. As time passes, watch for ways to demonstrate the practical benefits of a mutually supportive community.
Soon we can begin to introduce people to each other. Small social gatherings can help people get acquainted. While remaining informal, we can introduce ideas by floating questions. What problems or unmet needs do we know of? Who has skills? What skills would be we like to learn? How can we assist one another?
As we come to know one another better, we can begin to discuss our willingness to rise above our differences when needs are great or the stakes are high.
First we are human, then we are neighbors, and, finally, we are Americans who care. As individuals we can be none of these things in isolation.
The future is of immense importance – but reality begins at home.
Tom
Next week: Finding our strengths.
The Forward Edge of History
The unprecedented vision that came into being with the birth of the United States is today impaired by increasingly bitter and antagonistic rhetoric that precludes dialog. If Americans care to participate in a constructive process leading to renewal, we must navigate carefully through the currents of instability.
Violence begets violence in a downward spiral, rhetorical or otherwise. Words can ignite fierce, uncontrollable fires.
When the financial world came unraveled in 2007-08, Americans discovered that startling failures of foresight, responsibility, and common sense involved the very people and institutions we most depended on.
We were stunned by the foolishness that came to light in the very places where we were most vulnerable. Suddenly we recognized a profound disregard for the interests of both citizens and nation – by the same institutions we had previously regarded as models of dependability.
In retrospect, however, we can see that this crisis had long been coming, and that it revealed far more than political and financial irresponsibility.
We have seen the broad social deterioration that comes with unethical behavior and the loss of principled values. Respected national leaders have stained themselves. We have even seen immoral and deeply hurtful actions committed by religious leaders and clergy, the supposed exemplars of integrity.
Where will it stop? In addition to the material damage done to our lives, the rampant failure of responsibility appearing at the core of our society is demoralizing. Indeed, it strikes at the foundations of civilization.
It is easy to get caught up in our feelings at a time like this. It will be necessary to modulate our speech and better manage our emotions if we wish to reaffirm the ultimate purpose of this great nation. Times of peril require that we communicate carefully and avoid contributing to inflamed passions, however offended we may be.
Hurled accusations and inflamed rhetoric make it impossible to hear potentially valid reasoning behind the anger.
The trouble with blame is, first, that it tends to be indiscriminate. It blinds us to the plural identities of those who disagree with us, or who have just made some bad mistakes. We can sometimes fail to see that we share similar values and commitments with those who anger us.
Secondly, blaming will block our ability to respond to looming perils that endanger us all. A fierce storm has come upon us. We need to take responsibility for addressing immediate circumstances.
Make no mistake: A great storm like this will alter everyone’s perspective. So, let’s start with priorities we know to be essential, to ensure the safety and security of our communities. We will build from there.
In so doing we will learn much of what the future will require of us. It is essential that we transcend personal fear, resisting its attendant passions, and learn to work with those around us. Otherwise it will be impossible to respond effectively to the complex challenges of a rapidly changing world.
Some of you have expressed serious doubts that this is possible.
I never said it would be easy; I said we have no choice. If we are unable to confront crises shoulder-to-shoulder as loyal countrymen, freedom will be lost in the chaos of a deepening storm.
It will be helpful if we can see the end in the beginning – the vision of a civil society where respectfulness, fairness, and moral responsibility prevail and freedom of expression is nurtured and defended.
This is a vision and purpose that might just be worth our learning to get along, even for the most doubtful among us. And, it is something we can work on in our own communities.
Patience, composure, steadfast determination, and, most of all, the American generosity of spirit are among the virtues that will be called upon again and again in this day.
We will not escape this great turning point in human affairs. It will inflict tests upon us whether or not we respond with dignity and compassion, whether or not we take our rightful places at the forward edge of history.
Tom
Next week: Where to begin.
A note to new readers: Several chapter drafts for the forthcoming book are posted on this site. See especially Chapter Six: The Ground of Freedom, and Chapter Nine: The Individual in Society.
Morally Responsible
“I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.”
–Robert A. Heinlein
The Truth Is One
“Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain’t goin’ away.”
–Elvis Presley
“The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is.”
–Winston Churchill
“Facts are many, but the truth is one.”
–Rabindranath Tagore
No Easy Walk to Freedom
“There is no easy walk to freedom anywhere, and many of us will have to pass through the valley of the shadow of death again and again before we reach the mountaintop….”
Nelson Mandela
Seeking Freedom In Oneself
“None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.”
Goethe
“Seek freedom and become captive of your desires. Seek discipline and find your liberty.”
Frank Herbert
“We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”
E. M. Forster
“Freedom is what you do with what’s been done to you.”
Sartre
Citizen Initiative, Civil Society
Whatever happened to the creative power of American civil society? What is the consequence of this loss?
Tocqueville reported in 1840 that Americans overcame constraints on their freedom through their own initiative and sense of community. But, 174 years later, action has been replaced by inaction. A once spirited culture of engagement, built on committed interpersonal relationships, has been replaced by an increasingly self-centered attitude, the loss of community, and the isolating influences of the automobile, television, and the digital age.
Is it these technologies that have isolated us from one another? Niall Ferguson argues no. Rather he suggests that it is “not technology, but the state – with its seductive promise of ‘security from the cradle to the grave’ – [which is] the real enemy of civil society.” And he cites the astonishingly prophetic vision of Tocqueville, who imagined a future America in which the spirit of community has been co-opted and neutered by government:
“I see an innumerable crowd of like and equal men who revolve on themselves without repose, procuring the small and vulgar pleasures with which they fill their souls. Each of them, withdrawn and apart, is like a stranger to the destiny of all the others: his children and his particular friends form the whole human species for him; as for dwelling with his fellow citizens, he is beside them, but he does not see them; he touches them and does not feel them; he exists only in himself and for himself alone….
“Above these an immense tutelary power is elevated, which alone takes charge of assuring their enjoyments and watching over their fate. It is absolute, detailed, regular, far-seeing, and mild. It would resemble paternal power if, like that, it had for its object to prepare men for manhood; but on the contrary, it seeks only to keep them fixed irrevocably in childhood….
“Thus, …the sovereign extends its arms over society as a whole; it covers its surface with a network of small, complicated, painstaking, uniform rules through which the most original minds and the most vigorous souls cannot clear a way to surpass the crowd; it does not break wills, but it softens them, bends them, and directs them; it rarely forces one to act, but it constantly opposes itself to one’s acting; it does not destroy, it prevents things from being born; it does not tyrannize, it hinders, compromises, enervates, extinguishes, dazes, and finally reduces each nation to being nothing more than a herd of timid and industrious animals of which the government is the shepherd.”
Elsewhere Tocqueville added an explicit warning:
“But what political power would ever be in a state to suffice for the innumerable multitude of small undertakings that American citizens execute every day with the aid of association?…
“The morality and intelligence of a democratic people would risk no fewer dangers than its business and industry if government came to take the place of associations everywhere.
“Sentiments and ideas renew themselves, the heart is enlarged, and the human mind is developed only by the reciprocal action of men upon one another.”
I agree that government has had a part in the demise of the American soul. But, I do not think we can attribute the present condition solely to government. I believe the degeneration of attitudes and behavior cannot be divorced from the isolating influences of corporate culture, the dispersion of communities by the automobile, or the superficiality of a digital society.
Telecommunications and travel by air brought the world together on a macro level, but they also disinclined us to engage with our neighbors. I believe the long slide to isolation is the consequence of social forces that have tracked the trajectory of human progress since the founding of the Republic, and which we can only fault ourselves for accepting without question.
Our government is, after all, a creature of our own invention, served by people who have been subject to the same deterioration of values and responsibility as the nation as a whole.
Tom
The Creative Power of American Civil Society
We face a turning point as a nation that is quite challenging. Yet, it is also an opportunity; a rare moment in history that calls us to clarify our purpose and correct the manner of thinking that brought us to this place. It will require that we keep our minds open and remain objective as we address some tough questions. The effort may not be comfortable, but it is essential if we are to regain our balance and rebuild our resolve.
In his recent book, The Great Degeneration, economic historian Niall Ferguson has provided us with a compelling review of what has come to pass. He considers four areas in which the degeneration of values and social stability in the United States has had devastating consequences. These are, to use my own words, 1) the role of responsibility in the structure of the social order, 2) the disintegration of the market economy, 3) the fundamental role of the rule of law, and 4) the essential qualities of civil society.
Looking back, Dr. Ferguson reminds us of the vigorous civil and cultural life of nineteenth century America: “I want to ask,” he writes, “how far it is possible for a truly free nation to flourish in the absence of the kind of vibrant civil society we used to take for granted? I want to suggest that the opposite of civil society is uncivil society, where even the problem of anti-social behavior becomes a problem for the state.” (2013)
He goes on to cite Alexis de Tocqueville from the first volume of his famous commentary, Democracy in America, which was published in 1840:
“America is, among the countries of the world, the one where they have taken most advantage of association and where they have applied that powerful mode of action to a greater diversity of objects.
“Independent of the permanent associations created by law under the names of townships, cities and counties, there is a multitude of others that owe their birth and development only to the individual will.
“The inhabitant of the United States learns from birth that he must rely on himself to struggle against the evils and obstacles of life; he has only a defiant and restive regard for social authority and he appeals to its authority only when he cannot do without it…. In the United States, they associate for the goals of public security, of commerce and industry, of morality and religion. There is nothing the human will despairs of attaining by the free action of the collective power of individuals.”
Dr. Ferguson writes that “Tocqueville saw America’s political associations as an indispensable counterweight to the tyranny of the majority in modern democracy. But it was the non-political associations that really fascinated him”:
“Americans of all ages, all conditions, all minds constantly unite. Not only do they have commercial and industrial associations in which all take part, but they also have a thousand other kinds: religious, moral, grave, futile, very general and very particular, immense and very small; Americans use associations to give fêtes, to found seminaries, to build inns, to raise churches, to distribute books…; in this manner they create hospitals, prisons, schools. Finally, if it is a question of bringing to light a truth or developing a sentiment with the support of great example, they associate.”
What happened to the creative power of American civil society? And, what is the consequence of this loss? As Tocqueville reports so well, Americans succeeded in overcoming constraints on their freedom through their own initiative and sense of community.
Unfortunately, action has been replaced by inaction. A once spirited culture of engagement, based on committed interpersonal relationships, has been replaced by a self-centered attitude, the loss of community, and the isolating influences of the automobile, television, and the digital age.
Surely it is time to restore what we once did so well, and then, with renewed strength, to address the great challenges ahead.
Liberty and the American Idea 