Copyright © 2001 - 2004
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I tolerate this century, but I don't enjoy it.
All of the ephemera that is far too trivial to be bothered with elsewhere on this site. This ephemera includes, but is not limited to, British politics, art and literature. My politics can be described as liberal/libertarian, a description I admit to being uniquely unhelpful, though this manifesto may prove more so. To view the title of any pages linked to, place your mouse over the link.
Saturday, March 27, 2004
One of the things I've noticed recently is that a term like 'meme' appears to have developed the connotation of 'conformist subjugation to certain social practices.' A meme is something one is never infected with oneself and is never used to describe anything of any note (though in theory the entire history of most academic disciplines could be described as memetic in much the same way as Kuhn described science as operating through paradigm shifts). To remind us before going anything further, here's a definition of the term 'meme:'
"A contagious information pattern that replicates by symbiotically infecting human minds and altering their behavior, causing them to propagate the pattern. (Term coined by Dawkins, by analogy with "gene".) Individual slogans, catch-phrases, melodies, icons, inventions, and fashions are typical memes. An idea or information pattern is not a meme until it causes someone to replicate it, to repeat it to someone else. All transmitted knowledge is memetic. (Wheelis, quoted in Hofstadter.)"
If you accept the idea of memetics (the concept seems to me to essentially be beyond verification so I'm not sure I do) then behaviour is either determined in memetic terms or in the kind of genetic terms familiar from evolutionary psychology. In either case notions of free will or volition outside of either concept would, according to these theories at least, seem an unlikely concept. More to the point, I've always been puzzled by the memetics of individualism in our society (the meme that allows one exemption from the conformist memes of others); non-conformism is deemed valuable and rebellion is aestheticised, but this is always conducted within terms that can only be described as collectivist i.e. the uniform-like dress codes routinely adopted by sub-cultures, as much a guesture of affiliation as of alienation. Such lifestyles inevitably became mainstream to such an extent that I would expect tweed jackets and pipes to have now become the only such means of expressing non-conformism. Ironically enough, the punk slogans of rebellion and con-comformism were to essentially become the Thatcherite credo for the following decade. In political terms, the conservative preference for individualism (as in recent posts on the consumer versus the citizen) and the awkward argument that "there is no such thing as society" suffered from similar problems; namely that much of their policies assumed a collective set of social values. On the left, the notion of individualism was less of concern that diversity and multiculturalism, but even there policy frequently assumes a collective set of values that are not necessarily compatible with either notion.
All of this isn't to say that I consider individualism to not be valuable as an idea (on the whole, I think I'd personally prefer to leave memes out of it) but I would certainly admit that I am never sure what it really means in practice. There are a great many people I can think of who might view themselves as individualists and non-conformists; in one of those cases would I say that such an ascribed image matches my own perception of them.
posted by Richard R 4:40 PM
One of the things I've noticed recently is that a term like 'meme' appears to have developed the connotation of 'conformist subjugation to certain social practices.' A meme is something one is never infected with oneself and is never used to describe anything of any note (though in theory the entire history of most academic disciplines could be described as memetic in much the same way as Kuhn described science as operating through paradigm shifts). To remind us before going anything further, here's a definition of the term 'meme:'
"A contagious information pattern that replicates by symbiotically infecting human minds and altering their behavior, causing them to propagate the pattern. (Term coined by Dawkins, by analogy with "gene".) Individual slogans, catch-phrases, melodies, icons, inventions, and fashions are typical memes. An idea or information pattern is not a meme until it causes someone to replicate it, to repeat it to someone else. All transmitted knowledge is memetic. (Wheelis, quoted in Hofstadter.)"
If you accept the idea of memetics (the concept seems to me to essentially be beyond verification so I'm not sure I do) then behaviour is either determined in memetic terms or in the kind of genetic terms familiar from evolutionary psychology. In either case notions of free will or volition outside of either concept would, according to these theories at least, seem an unlikely concept. More to the point, I've always been puzzled by the memetics of individualism in our society (the meme that allows one exemption from the conformist memes of others); non-conformism is deemed valuable and rebellion is aestheticised, but this is always conducted within terms that can only be described as collectivist i.e. the uniform-like dress codes routinely adopted by sub-cultures, as much a guesture of affiliation as of alienation. Such lifestyles inevitably became mainstream to such an extent that I would expect tweed jackets and pipes to have now become the only such means of expressing non-conformism. Ironically enough, the punk slogans of rebellion and con-comformism were to essentially become the Thatcherite credo for the following decade. In political terms, the conservative preference for individualism (as in recent posts on the consumer versus the citizen) and the awkward argument that "there is no such thing as society" suffered from similar problems; namely that much of their policies assumed a collective set of social values. On the left, the notion of individualism was less of concern that diversity and multiculturalism, but even there policy frequently assumes a collective set of values that are not necessarily compatible with either notion.
All of this isn't to say that I consider individualism to not be valuable as an idea (on the whole, I think I'd personally prefer to leave memes out of it) but I would certainly admit that I am never sure what it really means in practice. There are a great many people I can think of who might view themselves as individualists and non-conformists; in one of those cases would I say that such an ascribed image matches my own perception of them.
posted by Richard R 4:40 PM
Friday, March 26, 2004
Of late, articles about the distinction between European and American worldviews have become decidedly common; the latest to come along is this review by William Pfaff:
"Globalization in its essence means global interdependence," Brzezinski writes. Therefore the American choice today is between attempting to create "a new global system based on shared interests," or attempting to "use its sovereign global power primarily to entrench its own security." ... America's principal allies no longer believe its national "story." They are struck by how impervious Americans seem to be to the notion that our September 11 was not the defining event of the age, after which "nothing could be the same." They are inclined to think that the international condition, like the human condition, is in fact very much the same as it has always been. It is the United States that has changed."
I'm not entirely convinced by Pfaff's argument, if only because recent events in Madrid would seem to have gone along way towards validating the American view. While I think historical European experiences of terrorism did lead to increased scepticism as to whether anything had changed, the difference between the recent bombing and anything perpetrated by ETA should give pause for thought on that score. On the other hand, Pfaff is on safer ground in noting the instability frequently produced by American intervention and European perceptions of that. Accordingly, think the differences between European society and politics and those of the United States are worth looking at in more detail. To take domestic policies first, the United States is presently characterised by what could be termed right-wing populism in opposition to a narrative of liberal elitism;
"Markets give us what we want; markets overthrow the old regime; markets empower the little guy. And since markets are just the people working things out in their own inscrutable way, any attempt to regulate or otherwise interfere with markets is, by definition, nothing but arrogance... One populism rails against liberals for eating sushi and getting pierced; the other celebrates those who eat sushi and get pierced as edgy entrepreneurs or as consumers just trying to be themselves. One despises Hollywood for pushing bad values; the other celebrates Hollywood for its creativity and declares that Hollywood merely gives the people what they want."
Where Europeans view redistribution as a means of aiding the disadvantaged, Americans view it as placing a ceiling on their aspirations (A product of not having an aristocratic hierarchy to start with; social mobility becomes more important that the more socialist convention of equality. Tocqueville saw the American idea of equality in relation to measures designed to prevent the formation of an aristocracy). The extent of inequality in American society is such that any other state (or at least any European one) would have produced much more left-wing governance over time. But with some exceptions like the New Deal, there's little sign of it in the United States. By the same token, most European nations have become progressively more and more secular over the last half-century, where the US would seem to have become more religiose. Accordingly, attempts by conservatives in Britain to stress family values and to denounce Westminster elitist liberals faltered where the same attempts in the United States thrived. President Bush seeks to criminalise same-sex civil partnerships, Michael Howards supports them.
Translating this into foreign policy terms, the result is that much of Europe tends to view American policy as irrationally moralistic and becomes sceptical as to whether American religious fundamentalism is a proper response to Islamic religious fundamentalism. Equally, the American national narrative has become increasingly tarnished due to the gap between said narrative and actual levels of social mobility; its ability to offer a compelling vision to its allies accordingly suffers (typically at the same time as lambasting said allies for being overly concerned with equality at the expense of economic growth). Turning to foreign policy alone, the United States tends to view national interest and sovereignty as paramount concerns. Conversely, European experience during the second world war has left them wary of national interest as the sole consideration, while European colonial experience had left them sceptical as to whether framing the conflict in military terms is an appropriate response. It would be too easy to slip into a distinction between post-historical Europe and America here, but it should be observed that 'post-national' Europe is in most regards essentially pursuing national interest by other means. Where the United States administration has shown little interest in using international law and trans-national co-operations as a means of addressing terrorism, the Madrid bombings appear to have produced the opposite response in Europe, using trans-national integration as a means of reinforcing national security.
Of course, all such broad distinctions run the risk of falling into caricature. The US critique of post-nationalism as leading to removal of democratic accountability and increased powers for national executives at the expense of legislative branches is a powerful one. Equally, the American critique of international law as giving an essentially equal weighting to dictatorships and democracies is not easy to dismiss. But if nothing else, it does suggest that Europe has a valid alternative view of such matters; something that seems important to me when considering the charges that the change in Spain's government amounted at appeasement. Undeniably, that is how it may be seen by both the United States and Islamic terrorists. But it seems equally possible to me to construe the Spanish election as a protest against how attempts to deal with terrorism have been conducted, against the view that the American approach to such matters is the only possible one.
posted by Richard R 3:27 PM
Of late, articles about the distinction between European and American worldviews have become decidedly common; the latest to come along is this review by William Pfaff:
"Globalization in its essence means global interdependence," Brzezinski writes. Therefore the American choice today is between attempting to create "a new global system based on shared interests," or attempting to "use its sovereign global power primarily to entrench its own security." ... America's principal allies no longer believe its national "story." They are struck by how impervious Americans seem to be to the notion that our September 11 was not the defining event of the age, after which "nothing could be the same." They are inclined to think that the international condition, like the human condition, is in fact very much the same as it has always been. It is the United States that has changed."
I'm not entirely convinced by Pfaff's argument, if only because recent events in Madrid would seem to have gone along way towards validating the American view. While I think historical European experiences of terrorism did lead to increased scepticism as to whether anything had changed, the difference between the recent bombing and anything perpetrated by ETA should give pause for thought on that score. On the other hand, Pfaff is on safer ground in noting the instability frequently produced by American intervention and European perceptions of that. Accordingly, think the differences between European society and politics and those of the United States are worth looking at in more detail. To take domestic policies first, the United States is presently characterised by what could be termed right-wing populism in opposition to a narrative of liberal elitism;
"Markets give us what we want; markets overthrow the old regime; markets empower the little guy. And since markets are just the people working things out in their own inscrutable way, any attempt to regulate or otherwise interfere with markets is, by definition, nothing but arrogance... One populism rails against liberals for eating sushi and getting pierced; the other celebrates those who eat sushi and get pierced as edgy entrepreneurs or as consumers just trying to be themselves. One despises Hollywood for pushing bad values; the other celebrates Hollywood for its creativity and declares that Hollywood merely gives the people what they want."
Where Europeans view redistribution as a means of aiding the disadvantaged, Americans view it as placing a ceiling on their aspirations (A product of not having an aristocratic hierarchy to start with; social mobility becomes more important that the more socialist convention of equality. Tocqueville saw the American idea of equality in relation to measures designed to prevent the formation of an aristocracy). The extent of inequality in American society is such that any other state (or at least any European one) would have produced much more left-wing governance over time. But with some exceptions like the New Deal, there's little sign of it in the United States. By the same token, most European nations have become progressively more and more secular over the last half-century, where the US would seem to have become more religiose. Accordingly, attempts by conservatives in Britain to stress family values and to denounce Westminster elitist liberals faltered where the same attempts in the United States thrived. President Bush seeks to criminalise same-sex civil partnerships, Michael Howards supports them.
Translating this into foreign policy terms, the result is that much of Europe tends to view American policy as irrationally moralistic and becomes sceptical as to whether American religious fundamentalism is a proper response to Islamic religious fundamentalism. Equally, the American national narrative has become increasingly tarnished due to the gap between said narrative and actual levels of social mobility; its ability to offer a compelling vision to its allies accordingly suffers (typically at the same time as lambasting said allies for being overly concerned with equality at the expense of economic growth). Turning to foreign policy alone, the United States tends to view national interest and sovereignty as paramount concerns. Conversely, European experience during the second world war has left them wary of national interest as the sole consideration, while European colonial experience had left them sceptical as to whether framing the conflict in military terms is an appropriate response. It would be too easy to slip into a distinction between post-historical Europe and America here, but it should be observed that 'post-national' Europe is in most regards essentially pursuing national interest by other means. Where the United States administration has shown little interest in using international law and trans-national co-operations as a means of addressing terrorism, the Madrid bombings appear to have produced the opposite response in Europe, using trans-national integration as a means of reinforcing national security.
Of course, all such broad distinctions run the risk of falling into caricature. The US critique of post-nationalism as leading to removal of democratic accountability and increased powers for national executives at the expense of legislative branches is a powerful one. Equally, the American critique of international law as giving an essentially equal weighting to dictatorships and democracies is not easy to dismiss. But if nothing else, it does suggest that Europe has a valid alternative view of such matters; something that seems important to me when considering the charges that the change in Spain's government amounted at appeasement. Undeniably, that is how it may be seen by both the United States and Islamic terrorists. But it seems equally possible to me to construe the Spanish election as a protest against how attempts to deal with terrorism have been conducted, against the view that the American approach to such matters is the only possible one.
posted by Richard R 3:27 PM
Tuesday, March 23, 2004
I was rather taken aback to come across this phrase in a piece describing the new Tory marketing strategy:
"We are looking at voters as consumers; they are the same people who buy sofas or cans of fizzy drink... The Tories' switch to the sort of advertising employed by high street retailers and consumer brands breaks with party political advertising tradition."
The parallel is presumably an exact one, given that most cans of fizzy drinks are every bit as homogenous and indistinguishable as political parties. Cynicism aside, the replacement of the idea of the citizen with the idea of the consumer seems imprecise to me; particulary given that much of Tory policy has encouraged that idea on the one hand (in particular the concept of applying consumer choice to the provision of public services, for example hospital league tables, school vouchers) and demanded notions of citizenship on the other (the defence of tradition, promulgation of family values and so on). The problem is that while it isn't necessarily true that the role of consumer and citizen are opposed, nor is it true that they are necessarily identical. There is a difference between a market state and a nation state and it might be as well for all concerned to make a choice between two not especially compatible models.
posted by Richard R 12:14 PM
I was rather taken aback to come across this phrase in a piece describing the new Tory marketing strategy:
"We are looking at voters as consumers; they are the same people who buy sofas or cans of fizzy drink... The Tories' switch to the sort of advertising employed by high street retailers and consumer brands breaks with party political advertising tradition."
The parallel is presumably an exact one, given that most cans of fizzy drinks are every bit as homogenous and indistinguishable as political parties. Cynicism aside, the replacement of the idea of the citizen with the idea of the consumer seems imprecise to me; particulary given that much of Tory policy has encouraged that idea on the one hand (in particular the concept of applying consumer choice to the provision of public services, for example hospital league tables, school vouchers) and demanded notions of citizenship on the other (the defence of tradition, promulgation of family values and so on). The problem is that while it isn't necessarily true that the role of consumer and citizen are opposed, nor is it true that they are necessarily identical. There is a difference between a market state and a nation state and it might be as well for all concerned to make a choice between two not especially compatible models.
posted by Richard R 12:14 PM
Sunday, February 29, 2004
An interesting paper from Bruce Alexander, ostensibly on the subject of addiction but with wider implications for capitalist society:
"Psychosocial integration is essential for every person in every type of society-it makes life bearable, even joyful at its peaks... Insufficient psychosocial integration can be called "dislocation." Although any person in any society can become dislocated, modern western societies dislocate all their members to a greater or lesser degree because all members must participate in "free markets" that control labour, land, money and consumer goods. Free markets require that participants take the role of individual economic actors, unencumbered by family and friendship obligations, clan loyalties, community responsibilities, charitable feelings, the values or their religion, ethnic group, or nation... People who persistently fail to achieve genuine psychosocial integration eventually construct lifestyles that substitute for it."
It's an interesting argument (if a rather psychoanalytic interpretation of Marx, though Marx was unlikely to have been so nostalgic for 'clan loyalties'), largely because it's one that has always seemed to carry a great deal of truth to it (and is certainly more convincing than the conservative view of social dislocation being attributable to the permissive society and moral decline). That said, the particular point of interest for me is comparison with Anthony Giddens and his views of post-traditional identity, wherein the decline of imposed social roles necessitates the creation of more diverse lifestyles. Always odd how completely opposed interpretations can be derived from the same set of premises.
posted by Richard R 1:08 PM
An interesting paper from Bruce Alexander, ostensibly on the subject of addiction but with wider implications for capitalist society:
"Psychosocial integration is essential for every person in every type of society-it makes life bearable, even joyful at its peaks... Insufficient psychosocial integration can be called "dislocation." Although any person in any society can become dislocated, modern western societies dislocate all their members to a greater or lesser degree because all members must participate in "free markets" that control labour, land, money and consumer goods. Free markets require that participants take the role of individual economic actors, unencumbered by family and friendship obligations, clan loyalties, community responsibilities, charitable feelings, the values or their religion, ethnic group, or nation... People who persistently fail to achieve genuine psychosocial integration eventually construct lifestyles that substitute for it."
It's an interesting argument (if a rather psychoanalytic interpretation of Marx, though Marx was unlikely to have been so nostalgic for 'clan loyalties'), largely because it's one that has always seemed to carry a great deal of truth to it (and is certainly more convincing than the conservative view of social dislocation being attributable to the permissive society and moral decline). That said, the particular point of interest for me is comparison with Anthony Giddens and his views of post-traditional identity, wherein the decline of imposed social roles necessitates the creation of more diverse lifestyles. Always odd how completely opposed interpretations can be derived from the same set of premises.
posted by Richard R 1:08 PM
Thursday, February 26, 2004
The BBC has commissioned an interesting survey on levels of religious affiliation in differing countries. Many of the results are interesting, but to my mind the most surprising was that only 29% of the UK population said they thought the world would be a more peaceful place without religion. In fairness, the issue is not clearcut; as this article suggests there is usually a continuum of causes, wherein religion simply serves as another marker of otherness:
"Alice Lakwena, the leader of the Holy Spirit Movement, claimed that God had commanded her to seize the Ugandan capital and I and other journalists found and interviewed her in a banana grove about 100 kilometres (60 miles) short of Kampala. Superstition played a large part in the progress her ragtag band of followers had made. They smeared themselves with a potion they were told would protect them against the army's bullets. But this bizarre campaign has also fed on northern political grievances in Uganda."
That said, there are much more unambiguous instances from history where persecution was conducted with only religious difference being the cause and without ethnic difference or forms of economic or social grievance. In this sense, religion does serve as a prototype for a form of absolute ideology that must be imposed in a way that has rarely been true for other ideologies (interesting to note that most religions tend to meet most of Eco's characteristics of ur-fascism). An obvious exception is communism, but in many respects it can be argued that religion served as the prototype here. As an acquaintance of mine once wrote in comparing christianity and communism:
"Neither has much use for the criticisms of philosophy, which they both distrust because they cannot control it... One joins them only by publicly endorsing their doctrines, and advances by being perceived by one’s superiors as passionately conforming to them. The laity of each lack the power to dictate the course of church-state actions; power issues from the apex - the crowned head of the controlling minority of the ideological elite.
Dissent is either treasonous (contra people) or blasphemous (contra God); one punishes it directly in this life, one indirectly through disposition of a believed-in next. To join either is to forfeit it your rights. One is world negating the other is other-than-world negating. Each asserts that the only way to be truly human is to embrace its faith... Both have a person to worship and a book to read, and both have trained experts to communicate the orthodox meaning of each to the mass herds, and to denounce forbidden concepts and conceivers. The masses of each are constrained to take their words at face value, the words of ideologues commissioned to propagate the Faith."
In both cases, a certain set of concepts is promulgated which are essentially incompatible with the liberal ideas of the nation state that developed in opposition to them. Neither can claim exclusive preserve over such concepts but neither are easily separated from them.
posted by Richard R 9:37 PM
The BBC has commissioned an interesting survey on levels of religious affiliation in differing countries. Many of the results are interesting, but to my mind the most surprising was that only 29% of the UK population said they thought the world would be a more peaceful place without religion. In fairness, the issue is not clearcut; as this article suggests there is usually a continuum of causes, wherein religion simply serves as another marker of otherness:
"Alice Lakwena, the leader of the Holy Spirit Movement, claimed that God had commanded her to seize the Ugandan capital and I and other journalists found and interviewed her in a banana grove about 100 kilometres (60 miles) short of Kampala. Superstition played a large part in the progress her ragtag band of followers had made. They smeared themselves with a potion they were told would protect them against the army's bullets. But this bizarre campaign has also fed on northern political grievances in Uganda."
That said, there are much more unambiguous instances from history where persecution was conducted with only religious difference being the cause and without ethnic difference or forms of economic or social grievance. In this sense, religion does serve as a prototype for a form of absolute ideology that must be imposed in a way that has rarely been true for other ideologies (interesting to note that most religions tend to meet most of Eco's characteristics of ur-fascism). An obvious exception is communism, but in many respects it can be argued that religion served as the prototype here. As an acquaintance of mine once wrote in comparing christianity and communism:
"Neither has much use for the criticisms of philosophy, which they both distrust because they cannot control it... One joins them only by publicly endorsing their doctrines, and advances by being perceived by one’s superiors as passionately conforming to them. The laity of each lack the power to dictate the course of church-state actions; power issues from the apex - the crowned head of the controlling minority of the ideological elite.
Dissent is either treasonous (contra people) or blasphemous (contra God); one punishes it directly in this life, one indirectly through disposition of a believed-in next. To join either is to forfeit it your rights. One is world negating the other is other-than-world negating. Each asserts that the only way to be truly human is to embrace its faith... Both have a person to worship and a book to read, and both have trained experts to communicate the orthodox meaning of each to the mass herds, and to denounce forbidden concepts and conceivers. The masses of each are constrained to take their words at face value, the words of ideologues commissioned to propagate the Faith."
In both cases, a certain set of concepts is promulgated which are essentially incompatible with the liberal ideas of the nation state that developed in opposition to them. Neither can claim exclusive preserve over such concepts but neither are easily separated from them.
posted by Richard R 9:37 PM
For the most part I've been in favour of the idea of using such techniques as citizenship ceremonies to reinforce ideas of common identity; the problem, as I see it, isn't so much with the means as with the end. The most glaring example of this is the monarchy; those swearing the oath of loyalty in this ceremony are doing so to a monarch whose position is contested by around twenty percent of the population (and where names like 'citizenship ceremony' disregard the fact that citizenship is not a meaningful term in the UK, where the population are subjects of the crown). Beyond that, the adaptation of the ceremony according to UK region seems an odd approach to reinforcing common values and suggests an inability to define a consensus as to what common values the ceremony is intended to inculcate. It seems difficult to avoid concluding, as Spiked Online would seem to have, that "Trying to teach new immigrants how to be British is becoming an uncomfortable demonstration of the fact that we don't know ourselves." Much of my current interest in this stems from this Prospect article I read a few weeks ago:
"Fifty years of peace, wealth and mobility have allowed a greater diversity in lifestyles and values. To this "value diversity" has been added ethnic diversity... This is America versus Sweden. You can have a Swedish welfare state provided that you are a homogeneous society with intensely shared values. In the US you have a very diverse, individualistic society where people feel fewer obligations to fellow citizens. Progressives want diversity but they thereby undermine part of the moral consensus on which a large welfare state rests."
It's a difficult argument, particularly since it can be argued that the role of government to create common values through its institutions becomes rather more pressing in a more diverse context (much the same as the role the article allocates to the BBC), not to mention increasingly negative views of the welfare state followed political reform of the welfare state, rather than preceding it. Furthermore, it assumes that the welfare state is an instrument of social solidarity and not of economic security. Nonetheless, greater diversity in terms of ethnicity and values remains a fact (not just in Britain, but in Europe generally, recalling Pim Fortuyn's critique of illiberal views held in immigrant communities) and it seems to me that there is limited scope for attempting to forge a common identity forged on structures that were created for more homogenous ages (the idea of a state church is an obvious example) and that some attempt to create the type of national narrative used by France and the US as a means to resolve the tension between liberalism and pluralism.
posted by Richard R 8:41 PM
Wednesday, February 18, 2004
I've never been particularly convinced by Jim Bennett's idea of the Anglosphere. It seemed to me that by concentrating on shared traditions it neglected other aspectcs; for example, the World Value Survey usually tends to show Britain where most of us expected it to be; poised between Europe and America rather than alongside the other Anglosphere states. In particular, Britain usually tends to be closest to Austria and about as close to the United States as we are to Uruguay. Accordingly, I was rather cynical when I read this but was interested to find some validation for my view of how Europe may develop:
"The Industrial Revolution made continent-spanning nation-states possible. The Information Revolution offers the possibility that civil societies may link themselves on a globe-spanning-although not universally inclusive-scale. Such is the network civilization... This facilitates the movement of people, goods and services across borders, forming and strengthening shared cultures (both elite and popular) and experiences-for example, common publications read by the publics of all of the nations of a particular network civilization."
I should mention that in spite of a shared view regarding the development of transnational ties my cynicism hasn't entirely abated; the idea that Britain is better placed to gain economic success from technological innovation than Europe should be easily dismissed by this which places the UK beneath every other European nation and just above Israel in a ranking of how countries have used information technology to boost economic growth. Similarly, his insistence on civil society being central to stability and prosperity belies the extent to which modern states achieved those goals by aggressive centralisation of power at the expense of civil society. Finally, I'm somewhat cynical about his view that this transformation will necessarily be channelled by shared traditions (since that depends on the Anglosphere analysis being correct and I don't happen to think it is) or that any notion of the social-democratic state should be discarded (the movement of valye to countries with a comparative advantage founded on cost, if taken to such an extent that Western economies are left largely based on consumption rather than production, creates exactly the conditions where social democracy is most needed).
posted by Richard R 9:09 PM
I've never been particularly convinced by Jim Bennett's idea of the Anglosphere. It seemed to me that by concentrating on shared traditions it neglected other aspectcs; for example, the World Value Survey usually tends to show Britain where most of us expected it to be; poised between Europe and America rather than alongside the other Anglosphere states. In particular, Britain usually tends to be closest to Austria and about as close to the United States as we are to Uruguay. Accordingly, I was rather cynical when I read this but was interested to find some validation for my view of how Europe may develop:
"The Industrial Revolution made continent-spanning nation-states possible. The Information Revolution offers the possibility that civil societies may link themselves on a globe-spanning-although not universally inclusive-scale. Such is the network civilization... This facilitates the movement of people, goods and services across borders, forming and strengthening shared cultures (both elite and popular) and experiences-for example, common publications read by the publics of all of the nations of a particular network civilization."
I should mention that in spite of a shared view regarding the development of transnational ties my cynicism hasn't entirely abated; the idea that Britain is better placed to gain economic success from technological innovation than Europe should be easily dismissed by this which places the UK beneath every other European nation and just above Israel in a ranking of how countries have used information technology to boost economic growth. Similarly, his insistence on civil society being central to stability and prosperity belies the extent to which modern states achieved those goals by aggressive centralisation of power at the expense of civil society. Finally, I'm somewhat cynical about his view that this transformation will necessarily be channelled by shared traditions (since that depends on the Anglosphere analysis being correct and I don't happen to think it is) or that any notion of the social-democratic state should be discarded (the movement of valye to countries with a comparative advantage founded on cost, if taken to such an extent that Western economies are left largely based on consumption rather than production, creates exactly the conditions where social democracy is most needed).
posted by Richard R 9:09 PM
Continuing to follow the hijab ban issue, I can't honestly say that I've seen a great deal to change my view (namely that the ban is counterproductive but that hardly leaves me obliged to view hijab as a benign piece of cultural ephemera). One particular problem has been the advancement of a certain argument regarding the nature of liberty and freedom. In essence, the argument runs, the western permissiveness towards revealing clothing has the effect of turning women into sexual commodities, from subject into object. It seems an odd argument, not least because of the long history of coercion associated with the wearing of hijab (Self determination is of course a vulgar irrelevance when set alongside the need to 'protect' women - from themselves if necessary). I first encountered the argument a few years ago in an article by the former Liberal Democrat MP Jackie Ballard:
"I asked the young women why they chose to cover themselves. The answer came as a surprise to someone who has read The Female Eunuch and Betty Friedan. They said it made them feel liberated. With the chador, they felt they were judged as the hospital administrator or the school secretary doing a professional job, not as attractive or unattractive women, as sex objects or harridans."
I should observe from that start that this is an argument I find especially odious; not dissimilar to the argument from certain Western liberals that Salman Rushdie was guilty of cultural insensitivity (that is, it ignores the struggle by women against relgious codes for control over their bodies). The most obvious reply is to ask why similar liberating notions were not embraced by men. Unless, of course, desire was viewed as a concept that only applied to one gender* and where it was not that same gender that were held responsible for anything that followed from that desire. It seems rather difficult to describe the veil as anything other than a symbolic representation of inequality when one considers that history of coercion and the status of women in Islam (to quote from the Koran "And women shall have rights similar to the rights against them, according to what is equitable; but men have a degree (of advantage) over them;" the grounds for inmposing the veil essentially serve to make women responsible for their own rape); in short, the equivalent of the dalit black headband (or a homosexual proudly wearing a 'God Hates Fags' T-shirt). But what then of the notion of liberty that Ballard suggests?
It seems to me that the answer to Ballard lies with Sartre's dictum that "Hell is other people;" in which case the purest freedom lies in isolation. Other individuals are of necessity a constraint upon our personal liberty in a whole host of ways (by the same token, this is why the idea that there is an analogy between peer pressure and advertising on the one hand and social coercion on the other is a very poor one indeed). Nonetheless, we generally continue to conceive of freedom as the ability to function as an autonomous individual regardless rather than retreating into a form of positive liberty or protection, no matter how liberating that retreat might seem; attempting to be subject not object is a poor ground for being. In conclusion, to those that claim that the pressure to wear hijab is equivalent to the pressure to wear high heels, I might be tempted to quote this summary of Anthony Giddens' ideas on identity:
"In modern societies - by which we mean not 'societies today' but 'societies where modernity is well developed' - self-identity becomes an inescapable issue. Even those who would say that they have never given any thought to questions or anxieties about their own identity will inevitably have been compelled to make significant choices throughout their lives, from everyday questions about clothing, appearance and leisure to high-impact decisions about relationships, beliefs and occupations. Whilst earlier societies with a social order based firmly in tradition would provide individuals with (more or less) clearly defined roles, in post-traditional societies we have to work out our roles for ourselves."
* Such asymmetry is precisely why feminist notions of the oppressive nature of the male gaze have always seemed bankrupt to me; the same argument could not be extended to the female gaze (and is even less applicable to a same-sex context).
Update: An interesting piece on this subject from Open Democracy:
"Either we left the situation as it was, and thus supported a situation that denied freedom of choice to those – the very large majority – who do not want to wear the headscarf; or we endorsed a law that removed freedom of choice from those who do want to wear it.... it has become clear that in schools where some Muslim girls do wear the headscarf and others do not, there is strong pressure on the latter to "conform". This daily pressure takes different forms, from insults to violence. In the view of the (mostly male) aggressors, these girls are "bad Muslims", "whores", who should follow the example of their sisters who respect Koranic prescriptions"
I should say this is an interesting piece, but avoiding the draconian implications of the ban by observing the alternative of religious schools, an alternative that would surely cut students off from mainstream society more than the veil ever would have, seems a little feeble to me.
posted by Richard R 8:46 PM
Thursday, February 12, 2004
My own view on the issue of the French ban on religious symbols in public bodies has long been that the measure seems to me to be both disturbingly draconian and likely to be counterproductive (in terms of alienating religious communities from the rest of society). However, the coverage of the issue from the UK can only be described as being condescending at best, complacent at worst:
"Foreign Office Minister Mike O'Brien said the British government supported the right of all people to display religious symbols. In Britain we are comfortable with the expression of religion, Mr O'Brien said in a statement. Integration does not require assimilation.... Religion has always been part of the school day. We don't have the French problem of the revolution, which brought about conflict between the Church and the state. "
Reading such journalism, one might think that the large number of French muslims who support the ban as a measure likely to encourage greater integration don't exist. Beyond that though, the idea that a country that has always been deeply uncomfortable about the very notion of religious enthusiasm has apparently undergone a Damascean conversion on that score is amusing, there is little else to commend it. The British policy has always been to promote an officially sanctioned religion through the state (prayer in school assemblies being the case par excellence). Since that religion has declined to the status of a minority sect (oddly enough, there seems to be little demand for a religion purged of all spirituality) inertia more than anything else has conferred the same privileges on other religions. The problem with this should be fairly obvious, as Jacques Chirac put it "It is the neutrality of the public sphere which enables the harmonious existence side by side of different religions." The segregation of schooling endorsed by the current faith schools policy is a clear example of this, as was shown in the riots and subsequent BNP election victories of a few years ago. In short, whatever the merits or demerits of the French policy, the French have nothing to learn from the British in this regard.
Incidentally, if Britain does ever decide to attempt to repair the damage being wrought by its dubious eduction policies, it could do a great deal worse than adopting this as a national holiday. In a similar vein, it would do well to consider abolishing religious education altogether (politics and philosophy would be a suitable replacement, or even economics) rather than compounding the error and adding atheism to the curriculum.
posted by Richard R 5:48 PM
My own view on the issue of the French ban on religious symbols in public bodies has long been that the measure seems to me to be both disturbingly draconian and likely to be counterproductive (in terms of alienating religious communities from the rest of society). However, the coverage of the issue from the UK can only be described as being condescending at best, complacent at worst:
"Foreign Office Minister Mike O'Brien said the British government supported the right of all people to display religious symbols. In Britain we are comfortable with the expression of religion, Mr O'Brien said in a statement. Integration does not require assimilation.... Religion has always been part of the school day. We don't have the French problem of the revolution, which brought about conflict between the Church and the state. "
Reading such journalism, one might think that the large number of French muslims who support the ban as a measure likely to encourage greater integration don't exist. Beyond that though, the idea that a country that has always been deeply uncomfortable about the very notion of religious enthusiasm has apparently undergone a Damascean conversion on that score is amusing, there is little else to commend it. The British policy has always been to promote an officially sanctioned religion through the state (prayer in school assemblies being the case par excellence). Since that religion has declined to the status of a minority sect (oddly enough, there seems to be little demand for a religion purged of all spirituality) inertia more than anything else has conferred the same privileges on other religions. The problem with this should be fairly obvious, as Jacques Chirac put it "It is the neutrality of the public sphere which enables the harmonious existence side by side of different religions." The segregation of schooling endorsed by the current faith schools policy is a clear example of this, as was shown in the riots and subsequent BNP election victories of a few years ago. In short, whatever the merits or demerits of the French policy, the French have nothing to learn from the British in this regard.
Incidentally, if Britain does ever decide to attempt to repair the damage being wrought by its dubious eduction policies, it could do a great deal worse than adopting this as a national holiday. In a similar vein, it would do well to consider abolishing religious education altogether (politics and philosophy would be a suitable replacement, or even economics) rather than compounding the error and adding atheism to the curriculum.
posted by Richard R 5:48 PM
Saturday, January 24, 2004
I wrote a while back of how I felt that the possibility of two-speed Europe was less likely than the prospect of a multi-centered Europe and have just come across an article arguing from essentially the same point of view:
"They might... demand a stiff price for approving such a divisions of the EU into fast and slow lanes. They could demand an end to the EU's costly and controversial Common Agricultural Program (which France stoutly defends), freedom from the more intrusive EU regulations and an end to the EU's monopoly on all its members' trade negotiations. This would allow the more open economies like Britain to explore joining the North American Free Trade Agreement with the United States, Canada and Mexico, while also taking advantage of continued free access to EU markets. In short, they could demand that the price of a Franco-German core Europe would be to allow the slow-speed members to scale back their version of Europe into a free trade zone far more open to the rest of world and bound together by the traditional NATO security system. "
I should quickly observe that much of the piece strikes me as rather fanciful in tone (for example, to the best of my knowledge Swedish and Danish politicians are hardly as Eurosceptic as the article implies at one point. Equally, the point about such a vision being more agreeable to Washington than seeing central Europe becomes Franco-German vassal states brings out the cynic in me and leads me to wonder what is marvellous about being a US vassal state), but I think it has some points to commend it.
Firstly, the expansion of executive power in Europe and the expense of legislative bodies seems an unwelcome development to me (qualified majority voting and consent of the governed exist in a rather more adversarial relationship than such developments would appear to take account of). A period where centralisation was held in abeyance until EU institutions had adapted to the imminent expansion, possibly a period where states could develop stronger ties at the level of individual nation states, would not seem a bad idea to me.
Secondly, the prospect of greater NAFTA integration also has some appealing elements (though I have in the past been suspcious of conservatives who were precious over sovereignty as far as the EU was concerned but never so when the prospect of NAFTA membership was raised), if only because in an age of globalisation the concept of trade blocs seems a little redundant (though it should be observed that it would be considerably better if such integration were done by the EU as a whole).
All of which leaves the question; how likely is such a multi-centered Europe? As matters stand, France and Germany will lack the voting weight to continue to be the engine of European integration and have therefore turned to Britain. All I can say of this idea is that the words 'instability pact' spring to mind; the UK has in recent years been allied more closely to Spain and Italy and has never shared the same vision for Europe as France and Germany. Given that, the case for a multi-center Europe would seem a little stronger; as I see it, the main sticking point is likely to be Poland. There are quite a number of policy areas where it is far from difficult to imagine Poland making common cause with France and Germany. In which case, the prospect for a two-speed Europe would seem a little stronger.
Update: Hearing of the summit between the putative European directorate of Britain, France and Germany I was momentarily concerned that my prediction that such a concept amounted to an instability pact might be in danger. Then I read this:
"The talks will focus on progress on the target agreed at Lisbon in 2000 of making the EU the world's most competitive high skill economy by 2010. Mr Blair said Europe had to make sure its rules would "help companies prosper rather than hold them back", saying some regulations needed to be examined. "
From what I recall of the progress made in the years since the Lisbon summit by France and Germany I think I was worrying needlessly. My prediction stands.
posted by Richard R 3:54 PM
I wrote a while back of how I felt that the possibility of two-speed Europe was less likely than the prospect of a multi-centered Europe and have just come across an article arguing from essentially the same point of view:
"They might... demand a stiff price for approving such a divisions of the EU into fast and slow lanes. They could demand an end to the EU's costly and controversial Common Agricultural Program (which France stoutly defends), freedom from the more intrusive EU regulations and an end to the EU's monopoly on all its members' trade negotiations. This would allow the more open economies like Britain to explore joining the North American Free Trade Agreement with the United States, Canada and Mexico, while also taking advantage of continued free access to EU markets. In short, they could demand that the price of a Franco-German core Europe would be to allow the slow-speed members to scale back their version of Europe into a free trade zone far more open to the rest of world and bound together by the traditional NATO security system. "
I should quickly observe that much of the piece strikes me as rather fanciful in tone (for example, to the best of my knowledge Swedish and Danish politicians are hardly as Eurosceptic as the article implies at one point. Equally, the point about such a vision being more agreeable to Washington than seeing central Europe becomes Franco-German vassal states brings out the cynic in me and leads me to wonder what is marvellous about being a US vassal state), but I think it has some points to commend it.
Firstly, the expansion of executive power in Europe and the expense of legislative bodies seems an unwelcome development to me (qualified majority voting and consent of the governed exist in a rather more adversarial relationship than such developments would appear to take account of). A period where centralisation was held in abeyance until EU institutions had adapted to the imminent expansion, possibly a period where states could develop stronger ties at the level of individual nation states, would not seem a bad idea to me.
Secondly, the prospect of greater NAFTA integration also has some appealing elements (though I have in the past been suspcious of conservatives who were precious over sovereignty as far as the EU was concerned but never so when the prospect of NAFTA membership was raised), if only because in an age of globalisation the concept of trade blocs seems a little redundant (though it should be observed that it would be considerably better if such integration were done by the EU as a whole).
All of which leaves the question; how likely is such a multi-centered Europe? As matters stand, France and Germany will lack the voting weight to continue to be the engine of European integration and have therefore turned to Britain. All I can say of this idea is that the words 'instability pact' spring to mind; the UK has in recent years been allied more closely to Spain and Italy and has never shared the same vision for Europe as France and Germany. Given that, the case for a multi-center Europe would seem a little stronger; as I see it, the main sticking point is likely to be Poland. There are quite a number of policy areas where it is far from difficult to imagine Poland making common cause with France and Germany. In which case, the prospect for a two-speed Europe would seem a little stronger.
Update: Hearing of the summit between the putative European directorate of Britain, France and Germany I was momentarily concerned that my prediction that such a concept amounted to an instability pact might be in danger. Then I read this:
"The talks will focus on progress on the target agreed at Lisbon in 2000 of making the EU the world's most competitive high skill economy by 2010. Mr Blair said Europe had to make sure its rules would "help companies prosper rather than hold them back", saying some regulations needed to be examined. "
From what I recall of the progress made in the years since the Lisbon summit by France and Germany I think I was worrying needlessly. My prediction stands.
posted by Richard R 3:54 PM
Tuesday, January 20, 2004
A rather odd article from Elaine Showalter, reviewing Terry Eagleton's latest cultural theory treatise;
"Eagleton linked the rise of theory to revolutionary social change, political militancy, and global struggle... Doing cultural theory (using politics, culture, philosophy, and psychoanalysis in equal measure)... [But] Even Eagleton, in the preface to the second edition of Literary Theory in 1996, conceded that with the collapse of communism in the late 1980s, and the revelations of the Yale deconstructionist Paul de Man's hidden Nazi collaborationist past, the wind had gone out of theory's radical sails."
It's an odd criticism. The term theory covers a multitude of sins; reception theory, feminism, psychoanalysis, deconstruction, post-structuralism and Marxism, to name some of the principal components. It is the last of these that largely describes Eagleton's position and it is certainly true that his work has increasingly suffered from what William Gibson described as the predicament where "everything capitalism said about communism was true. As was everything communism said about capitalism." But that is hardly unique to literary theory and it seems a little unfair to single Eagleton out for criticism on that score.
The greater difficulty was always that Marxism had a rather uneasy relationship with the other components mentioned above. Deconstruction of a text can produce meanings amenable to conservative viewpoints as easily as it can produce meanings amenable to the feminist and Marxist critics that flirted with deconstruction. Eagleton himself furnishes a further example, that Lyotard's postmodernist conception of meta-narratives invalidates the Marxist progressive emancipation. Showalter herself furnishes further examples; that Lacanian and Freudian psychoanalysis are implicated in the kinds of ideologies deplored by feminism. This rather uncertain ground led onwards to other problems; in particular, the encroachment of cultural theory into the territory of more established and formalised disciplines such as sociology (or for that matter, philosophy or political theory), where its assumption that cultural artefacts were both entirely representative of their culture and indeed deterministic of it seemed more than a little uncertain.
The great shame is that theory did perform a valuable function. The earlier new criticism had treated literature as if it were contained within a hermetically sealed environment, dealing only with the text and the language in it. The result was that literature failed to connect with anything, becoming a set of arid exercises, such as Empson's Seven Types of Ambiguity. If nothing else, theory did re-connect literature with something else, allowing rich new meanings to be seen within works of literature (albeit through a feminist or marxist lens). The regret is that theory was never formalised (reception theory in particular was something that could have been studied in much more scientific terms) into something that was either more closely imbricated with philosophy or history and instead sought to change itself into something that foolishly tried to compete with other disciplines instead.
posted by Richard R 10:37 PM
A rather odd article from Elaine Showalter, reviewing Terry Eagleton's latest cultural theory treatise;
"Eagleton linked the rise of theory to revolutionary social change, political militancy, and global struggle... Doing cultural theory (using politics, culture, philosophy, and psychoanalysis in equal measure)... [But] Even Eagleton, in the preface to the second edition of Literary Theory in 1996, conceded that with the collapse of communism in the late 1980s, and the revelations of the Yale deconstructionist Paul de Man's hidden Nazi collaborationist past, the wind had gone out of theory's radical sails."
It's an odd criticism. The term theory covers a multitude of sins; reception theory, feminism, psychoanalysis, deconstruction, post-structuralism and Marxism, to name some of the principal components. It is the last of these that largely describes Eagleton's position and it is certainly true that his work has increasingly suffered from what William Gibson described as the predicament where "everything capitalism said about communism was true. As was everything communism said about capitalism." But that is hardly unique to literary theory and it seems a little unfair to single Eagleton out for criticism on that score.
The greater difficulty was always that Marxism had a rather uneasy relationship with the other components mentioned above. Deconstruction of a text can produce meanings amenable to conservative viewpoints as easily as it can produce meanings amenable to the feminist and Marxist critics that flirted with deconstruction. Eagleton himself furnishes a further example, that Lyotard's postmodernist conception of meta-narratives invalidates the Marxist progressive emancipation. Showalter herself furnishes further examples; that Lacanian and Freudian psychoanalysis are implicated in the kinds of ideologies deplored by feminism. This rather uncertain ground led onwards to other problems; in particular, the encroachment of cultural theory into the territory of more established and formalised disciplines such as sociology (or for that matter, philosophy or political theory), where its assumption that cultural artefacts were both entirely representative of their culture and indeed deterministic of it seemed more than a little uncertain.
The great shame is that theory did perform a valuable function. The earlier new criticism had treated literature as if it were contained within a hermetically sealed environment, dealing only with the text and the language in it. The result was that literature failed to connect with anything, becoming a set of arid exercises, such as Empson's Seven Types of Ambiguity. If nothing else, theory did re-connect literature with something else, allowing rich new meanings to be seen within works of literature (albeit through a feminist or marxist lens). The regret is that theory was never formalised (reception theory in particular was something that could have been studied in much more scientific terms) into something that was either more closely imbricated with philosophy or history and instead sought to change itself into something that foolishly tried to compete with other disciplines instead.
posted by Richard R 10:37 PM
Thursday, January 15, 2004
In the midst of the current controversy over Robert Kilroy Silk, one thought kept on coming back to me; whatever happened to the addage that "I detest what you have said but I would die for your right to say it?" Generally speaking, my view on such matters is Millite; rights in such matters should not be constrained where no harm is being caused (e.g. libel, incitement to violence; cases of harm rather than offense). Beyond that, the problem with constraining freedom of speech is twofold. Firstly, there is no clear means of defining how speech should be constrained. When sex was the principal taboo it proved impossible to define what a tendency to deprave and corrupt amounted to. Now that race has eclipsed sex in that capacity, the matter is no clearer. In this case it seems inconclusive whether Kilroy-Silk was referring to Arabs or Arab states; words are notoriously slippery things and interpretation in such affairs is subjective at best, arbitrary at worst. Secondly, constraining speech on grounds of offence rather than harm may well lead to silencing of unpopular views and allow sores to fester. If Kilroy-Silk was referring to Arabs then it becomes important to contest such statements. If he was referring to Arab states, it becomes important to allow such views to be heard.
posted by Richard R 10:15 PM
In the midst of the current controversy over Robert Kilroy Silk, one thought kept on coming back to me; whatever happened to the addage that "I detest what you have said but I would die for your right to say it?" Generally speaking, my view on such matters is Millite; rights in such matters should not be constrained where no harm is being caused (e.g. libel, incitement to violence; cases of harm rather than offense). Beyond that, the problem with constraining freedom of speech is twofold. Firstly, there is no clear means of defining how speech should be constrained. When sex was the principal taboo it proved impossible to define what a tendency to deprave and corrupt amounted to. Now that race has eclipsed sex in that capacity, the matter is no clearer. In this case it seems inconclusive whether Kilroy-Silk was referring to Arabs or Arab states; words are notoriously slippery things and interpretation in such affairs is subjective at best, arbitrary at worst. Secondly, constraining speech on grounds of offence rather than harm may well lead to silencing of unpopular views and allow sores to fester. If Kilroy-Silk was referring to Arabs then it becomes important to contest such statements. If he was referring to Arab states, it becomes important to allow such views to be heard.
posted by Richard R 10:15 PM
Virginia Postrel has written a surprisingly interesting introduction to Friedrich Hayek. This part, in particular, struck me:
"Because he emphasized the pluralism of values, the limits of knowledge, and the totalitarian side of "rationalist" (or, as he would put it, "scientistic") control, some have claimed Hayek as a precursor to postmodernism. Indeed, toward the end of his life, postmodernist philosopher Michel Foucault gave lectures on Hayek's work.
Nick Gillespie, editor-in-chief of the libertarian magazine Reason, says that in a broad sense Hayek anticipated many postmodern critiques. "Hayekian liberalism and postmodernism alike are not interested in total knowledge, or in the total institutions necessary to maintain such a vision," says Gillespie, who holds a doctorate in literary studies. "For Hayek, the very essence of liberalism properly understood is that it replaces the ideal of social uniformity with one of competing difference." That's why Foucault, though no Hayekian liberal, "recognized that Hayek's formulation of a private sphere was a meaningful hedge against the worst excesses of state power."
Leaving aside the imprecise use of terms like post-modernism (which I doubt Postrel has ever come across in any context other than as a term of abuse), I'm rather pleasantly surprised that my own thoughts on this matter have some precedent. For instance, Richard Rorty holds that since no interpretation of phenomena can lay claim to certain universality, a democracy accompanied by freedoms of speech is the most sensible approach. Both Hayek and Popper criticised the predictive capability of economics (given the claim of Marxism to be scientific in particular), the latter taking the view that since events could not be predicted the only sensible approach is to proceed through continual scrutiny; to Popper the notions of democracy and rights can almost be considered as being analagous to peer review. All of which tends to leave me rather puzzled why those that currently claim Hayek's mantle so frequently prove to be considerably more dogmatic than their mentor ever was. One other passage struck me from the piece:
"l;This analysis, which applies as much to culture as to economics, informs Hayek's best-known work, "The Road to Serfdom," which he wrote as a wartime warning to a popular audience. Published in 1944 and dedicated "to the socialists of all parties," the book argued that the logic of socialist central planning implied the erosion of personal freedoms. Britain's well-intended socialists were headed down the same path as the National Socialists whose rise Hayek had witnessed in Austria... Even today, the book's thesis is often misstated as what Caldwell calls "the inevitability thesis -- that if you start down the road to intervention in the economy, you're automatically going to end up in a totalitarian state." But Hayek spent much of his career arguing against the then-popular idea of historical laws. Nor did he oppose an economic safety net; a wealthy society, he believed, could provide a basic income for the poor."
Again, as Postrel is entirely correct to point out, Hayek was far from being dogmatic on such matters. However, the problem is that as a historical account of the rise of fascism in Germany, The Road to Serfdom is rather poor; state control of the economy in pre-WW2 Germany is probably better described as a product of fascism than as a causal factor.
posted by Richard R 9:28 PM
Thursday, January 08, 2004
Having noted that Fistful of Euros has recently rearranged its blogroll, and has assigned this site to the right-wing category (not unreasonably given some of my flippant and now hastily revised descriptions), I've been pondering the continued relevance of left/right labels. For example, while I've used the 'libertarian' label in the past, it suffers from a number of problems; a failure to address issues of inequaliy and a certain ahistorical character. Equally, one of the problems of a left-wing description is that such classifications equally seem to lack a notion of progress and seeks to exist to a large extent in opposition to the more dominant right-wing conceptions. Which leaves the diffuse middle-ground of liberal and even third-way politics. So, for what it's worth, here's my thinking on where to stand in that middle-ground.
Since communism was essentially unable to create equality on any basis other than universal penury (largely, in this context, since it failed to take account of the need for incentives and rewards for individual abilities), equality of outcomes can be judged to be less reliable than equality of opportunity. Conversely, one of the reasons communism (and the considerable volume of related nineteenth century ideas) evolved was simply that inequality and poverty had risen to such levels as to make that basis of social organisation essentially unsustainable. States that were sufficiently advanced and wealthy to do so created welfare systems and began to guarantee certain postive rights; as a result of that, said states were able to avoid the fate that awaited less-developed Russia. In which case, I'm not entirely sure equality of outcomes is something that can be entirely neglected. After all, although their relationship has always been adversarial, it is arguable that neither liberty nor equality can entirely replace the other. For example, Locke was extremely unwilling to reduce the entire basis of social relations to market relations (that being the essential gist of the possessive individualism theory you are advancing) and to entirely disregard earlier conceptions of natural law. A market society generates class differentiation in effective rights and rationality, yet requires for its justification a postulate of equal natural rights and rationality; in practice, liberty and equality have always been traded-off against each other (consider Tocqueville's account of draconian US inheritance laws for example).
Given that, I suspect the best trade-off we can arrive at is the difference principle advocated by John Rawls, which suggests that inequality is justified to the extent it is of benefit to society as a whole and the worse off in particular (for example, that recent years have seen overall standard of living rising precisely at the same time that social inequality).
posted by Richard R 2:03 PM
Having noted that Fistful of Euros has recently rearranged its blogroll, and has assigned this site to the right-wing category (not unreasonably given some of my flippant and now hastily revised descriptions), I've been pondering the continued relevance of left/right labels. For example, while I've used the 'libertarian' label in the past, it suffers from a number of problems; a failure to address issues of inequaliy and a certain ahistorical character. Equally, one of the problems of a left-wing description is that such classifications equally seem to lack a notion of progress and seeks to exist to a large extent in opposition to the more dominant right-wing conceptions. Which leaves the diffuse middle-ground of liberal and even third-way politics. So, for what it's worth, here's my thinking on where to stand in that middle-ground.
Since communism was essentially unable to create equality on any basis other than universal penury (largely, in this context, since it failed to take account of the need for incentives and rewards for individual abilities), equality of outcomes can be judged to be less reliable than equality of opportunity. Conversely, one of the reasons communism (and the considerable volume of related nineteenth century ideas) evolved was simply that inequality and poverty had risen to such levels as to make that basis of social organisation essentially unsustainable. States that were sufficiently advanced and wealthy to do so created welfare systems and began to guarantee certain postive rights; as a result of that, said states were able to avoid the fate that awaited less-developed Russia. In which case, I'm not entirely sure equality of outcomes is something that can be entirely neglected. After all, although their relationship has always been adversarial, it is arguable that neither liberty nor equality can entirely replace the other. For example, Locke was extremely unwilling to reduce the entire basis of social relations to market relations (that being the essential gist of the possessive individualism theory you are advancing) and to entirely disregard earlier conceptions of natural law. A market society generates class differentiation in effective rights and rationality, yet requires for its justification a postulate of equal natural rights and rationality; in practice, liberty and equality have always been traded-off against each other (consider Tocqueville's account of draconian US inheritance laws for example).
Given that, I suspect the best trade-off we can arrive at is the difference principle advocated by John Rawls, which suggests that inequality is justified to the extent it is of benefit to society as a whole and the worse off in particular (for example, that recent years have seen overall standard of living rising precisely at the same time that social inequality).
posted by Richard R 2:03 PM
Monday, December 15, 2003
I've long felt that the idea of an unwritted constitution has allowed the current administration to undermine much of Britain's basic political structure with what can only be described as casual disregard. Interesting to note that this is now starting to feature elsewhere:
"In the past, said Lord Woolf, he had believed that "our unwritten constitution, supported by conventions and checks and balances, provided all the protection which the judiciary, and therefore the citizen, required to uphold the proper administration of justice". Though the Lord Chief Justice had previously preferred the flexibility of an unwritten constitution, he no longer saw "a written constitution containing entrenched provisions like the other EU states as not being on the agenda". Lord Woolf believed his Israeli counterpart, Aharon Barak, had been right to say that no democracy, old or new, could take it for granted that the institutions protecting our freedoms were inviolate. "We, the judiciary, do have to strive to protect our constitutions," he added."
posted by Richard R 9:24 PM
I've long felt that the idea of an unwritted constitution has allowed the current administration to undermine much of Britain's basic political structure with what can only be described as casual disregard. Interesting to note that this is now starting to feature elsewhere:
"In the past, said Lord Woolf, he had believed that "our unwritten constitution, supported by conventions and checks and balances, provided all the protection which the judiciary, and therefore the citizen, required to uphold the proper administration of justice". Though the Lord Chief Justice had previously preferred the flexibility of an unwritten constitution, he no longer saw "a written constitution containing entrenched provisions like the other EU states as not being on the agenda". Lord Woolf believed his Israeli counterpart, Aharon Barak, had been right to say that no democracy, old or new, could take it for granted that the institutions protecting our freedoms were inviolate. "We, the judiciary, do have to strive to protect our constitutions," he added."
posted by Richard R 9:24 PM
The most obvious comment to be made about the collapse of the EU Constitution talks is simply that the balance of power. Historically, France and Germany have been the engine of European integration but in recent years Britain, Spain and Italy have challenged that position, with the entry of certain countries (the Czech Republic and Poland in particular) being likely to continue that trend. To a certain extent then, the recent arguments are an attempt by France and Germany to retain their central position (though attempts to ennoble the equally Machiavellian actions of 'plucky' Poland and Spain are frankly beneath contempt, though it has been increasingly clear that the trend towards unpopular concessions in the name of integration were proving increasinly untenable; failed referenda in Sweden and Ireland being rather more of a case in point than this). As such, the result of all this is an impasse; further integration being difficult with the existing membership and seemingly impossible with the expanded membership.
My own feelings towards the constitution were somewhat mixed and the trend towards centralisation as one I felt to be worrying from the outset. This became increasingly the case when the UK Labour party representative to the constitutional convention called for a referendum and complained that the representatives had never considered whether deeper integration was either sustainable or desirable (or indeed democratic; "You and the British may not accept this yet, but you will in a few years' time"); a statement that was credible from Gisela Stewart in a way in which they would not have been from her Tory counterpart, David Heathcoat-Amory. As such, I had a similar reaction to, of all people, Max Hastings:
"It seems self-evident that the rush towards integration, towards Brussels hegemony, is moving far faster than the plausibility of European institutions is growing... Unlike the Eurosceptics, I feel no principled fear about losing national sovereignty, which has become an almost meaningless concept. If, over half a century or so, it becomes plain that Europe's institutions - above all, its parliament - have evolved to a point at which they can take the strain, well and good... Yet today, it is not remotely credible that the European parliament can provide a democratic check upon the doings of the European executive, or that it is progressing towards doing so. Between 1979 and 1999, voting in European elections fell from 63% to 49%, despite compulsory participation in three countries. "
To which one might add, that if the architect of the constitution claims that Turkish membership would mean the end of the Union, one began to suspect that his plans were somewhat lacking in robustness (this leaves out even such basic matters). Proposals to centralise power on a number of new policy areas always seemed a somewhat bizaree response to the expansion of the EU (and in that sense the failure of this current round of talks is not necessarily the crisis it is made out to be). I also think Hastings is right to dismiss the concept of sovereignty; advocates of greater integration with the US typically neglect to observe the loss of sovereignty NAFTA membership would entail. On the whole; it seems to me that democracy is far more of an issue than sovereignty; the constitution would have extended power to the EU Parliament, created some basis for subsidiarity as well as voter's initiatives (if memory serves), all of which were welcome. However, the centralisation of power from national Parliaments, the creation of an EU President and the extension of QMV would have effectively meant a considerable increase in executive power for the Council of Ministers, a body that conducts government in the manner that treaties were traditionally conducted. To my mind addressing the EU democratic defecit was an important pre-requisite to integration.
Looking forward, in the event that the constitution cannot be agreed upon prior to the entry of the candidate countries, it is far from impossible that Hastings may get his way. Poland and the other states will enter the EU under the terms dictated by the Treaty of Nice, which is likely to cause Germany and France to lose influence as Poland and Spain will get the voting weights they want by default (though my earlier prediction was that Poland was likely to ally itself with countries like France on such issues as agriculture). The possibility of a 'two-speed' Europe is not a bad one in my view but it is one that assumes the presence of only one centre; in practice a more diverse structure evolving seems a more likely prospect; I only hope that some of the more sensible measures from the constitution are not lost.
posted by Richard R 7:32 PM
Thursday, December 11, 2003
Some background first. As regular readers will know, one of the ongoing themes of this weblog has been that of the increasing irrelevance of the right/left divide. Looking back, it was this Observer article that first set me thinking along these lines:
"Will Protestant and Catholic abortion clinic bombers soon be comrades-in-arms of Greenpeace activists who destroy genetically modified crops? The fundamentalist-green alliance against technology and scientific research is not surprising. For the past quarter-century, Darwinian sociobiology has been attacked by the Left, which believes human nature is infinitely malleable, and by the Religious Right, which believes the Hebrew Creation myth. Both the Religious Right and a large part of the romantic Left share an Arcadian vision, similar to that of secular fascists and Muslim conservatives, of a premodern, rural community of spiritual people who have not been alienated by secularism and capitalism from nature and God. "
In both cases, what is lacking is any notion of progress, and the lack of this is one reason why I have moved towards a more libertarian position. I am reluctant to be precise with such descriptions, since I also see myself as remaining broadly sympathetic to social democracy on a great many issues, but my views have nonetheless shifted somewhat. Accordingly, I have found myself increasingly reading Spiked probably the only UK publication to have addressed these issues being tied to neither the right nor the left. With the background over, I come to the point, and an unpleasant point it is too, namely George Monbiot, the left-wing mirror image of Roger Scruton:
"One of strangest aspects of modern politics is the dominance of former left-wingers who have swung to the right. The "neo-cons" pretty well run the White House and the Pentagon, the Labour party and key departments of the British government. But there is a group which has travelled even further, from the most distant fringes of the left to the extremities of the pro-corporate libertarian right."
To be blunt, Monbiot's article is both hysterical (The Institute of Ideas and Spiked are a minority voice in Britain that have virtually no influence when set against the main think tanks. More to the point are we really supposed to believe 'in favour of global warming' as a fair and balanced description of Spiked's views) and censorious, while much of it seems to be an exercise in guilt by association or at least guilt by six degrees of separation. However, it is significant for one reason in that it suggests the far left feels that it is losing its privileged status, something the right has already had to become more accustomed to. I hold no particular brief for Spiked and I do not agree with everything it publishes. But in having taken the ideological straightjacket off it is nonetheless fulfilling an important role and should be supported for that reason alone.
posted by Richard R 9:25 PM
Some background first. As regular readers will know, one of the ongoing themes of this weblog has been that of the increasing irrelevance of the right/left divide. Looking back, it was this Observer article that first set me thinking along these lines:
"Will Protestant and Catholic abortion clinic bombers soon be comrades-in-arms of Greenpeace activists who destroy genetically modified crops? The fundamentalist-green alliance against technology and scientific research is not surprising. For the past quarter-century, Darwinian sociobiology has been attacked by the Left, which believes human nature is infinitely malleable, and by the Religious Right, which believes the Hebrew Creation myth. Both the Religious Right and a large part of the romantic Left share an Arcadian vision, similar to that of secular fascists and Muslim conservatives, of a premodern, rural community of spiritual people who have not been alienated by secularism and capitalism from nature and God. "
In both cases, what is lacking is any notion of progress, and the lack of this is one reason why I have moved towards a more libertarian position. I am reluctant to be precise with such descriptions, since I also see myself as remaining broadly sympathetic to social democracy on a great many issues, but my views have nonetheless shifted somewhat. Accordingly, I have found myself increasingly reading Spiked probably the only UK publication to have addressed these issues being tied to neither the right nor the left. With the background over, I come to the point, and an unpleasant point it is too, namely George Monbiot, the left-wing mirror image of Roger Scruton:
"One of strangest aspects of modern politics is the dominance of former left-wingers who have swung to the right. The "neo-cons" pretty well run the White House and the Pentagon, the Labour party and key departments of the British government. But there is a group which has travelled even further, from the most distant fringes of the left to the extremities of the pro-corporate libertarian right."
To be blunt, Monbiot's article is both hysterical (The Institute of Ideas and Spiked are a minority voice in Britain that have virtually no influence when set against the main think tanks. More to the point are we really supposed to believe 'in favour of global warming' as a fair and balanced description of Spiked's views) and censorious, while much of it seems to be an exercise in guilt by association or at least guilt by six degrees of separation. However, it is significant for one reason in that it suggests the far left feels that it is losing its privileged status, something the right has already had to become more accustomed to. I hold no particular brief for Spiked and I do not agree with everything it publishes. But in having taken the ideological straightjacket off it is nonetheless fulfilling an important role and should be supported for that reason alone.
posted by Richard R 9:25 PM
When I last wrote on the issue of France and Germany banning wearing of religious clothing (with particular reference to le foulard islamique) I took the view that such moves ran the risk of being counter-productive, having the effect of alienating muslims from the rest of society and thereby increasing fundamentalism. It's difficult to predict the effects of such bans (which do not appear to have had the same effect in, for example, Turkey) but on the whole the measure still seems problematic and illiberal to me. However, I've been rather horrified by the tone of the coverage the UK has given this issue; it seems to me that President Chirac was certainly correct to say that the veil is aggressive, being symbolic of conformity to a rigidly defined tradition and therefore representing a means of social control. To blithely dismiss this as a Gallic idiosyncrasy seems somewhat complacent to me. This Guardian article puts it well:
"Muslims must understand that secularism is a chance for Islam," Mr Stasi said. "Secularism is the separation of church and state, but it is also the respect of differences..." On a case-by-case basis, however, headteachers can suspend or expel pupils wearing "ostentatious" religious signs that "constitute an act of pressure, provocation, proselytism or propaganda. "
posted by Richard R 8:50 PM
Thursday, November 27, 2003
The latest Queen's Speech was a puzzling affair. Having failed to improve public services through higher expenditure and centralised objectives, attempts to reverse course by creating devolved service administration and payments (foundation hospitals, tuition fees; payment for school buses as well, though I do wonder what impact that will have on their transport policy and the bill to cut congestion) seem set to be either diluted or defeated through backbench opposition (and objections at localised payments on top of higher taxation rates). In the absence of any clear direction available to the government this speech had a particularly fragmented quality to it. A particularly high number of the bills seems ill thought out; a necessary civil contingencies bill undermined by a typically all-encompassing definition of what the government can regard as an emergency, an ID card bill that may never come to anything and whose purpose has never been defined, reform of the House of Lords that creates a move from hereditary privilege to patronage by committee, an inhumane asylum bill that shows the government determined to remain within the letter of its UN treaty obligations but not the spirit, and so on. In fairness, there are some welcome measures; the creation of a supreme court, the partnerships bill and the gambling bill.
posted by Richard R 4:04 PM
The latest Queen's Speech was a puzzling affair. Having failed to improve public services through higher expenditure and centralised objectives, attempts to reverse course by creating devolved service administration and payments (foundation hospitals, tuition fees; payment for school buses as well, though I do wonder what impact that will have on their transport policy and the bill to cut congestion) seem set to be either diluted or defeated through backbench opposition (and objections at localised payments on top of higher taxation rates). In the absence of any clear direction available to the government this speech had a particularly fragmented quality to it. A particularly high number of the bills seems ill thought out; a necessary civil contingencies bill undermined by a typically all-encompassing definition of what the government can regard as an emergency, an ID card bill that may never come to anything and whose purpose has never been defined, reform of the House of Lords that creates a move from hereditary privilege to patronage by committee, an inhumane asylum bill that shows the government determined to remain within the letter of its UN treaty obligations but not the spirit, and so on. In fairness, there are some welcome measures; the creation of a supreme court, the partnerships bill and the gambling bill.
posted by Richard R 4:04 PM
As far as 'conspicuous consumption' is concerned, I am perhaps not the best person to talk on the subject. I tend not to link consumption and status to any significant degree so many of my purchases tend to be functional for the same type of product that would be seen by others as aspirational. On the other hand, I do tend to like buying items like books and music and tend to resent being made guilty for it, whether that comes from religious frugality or left wing asceticism, when such purchases are essentially concerned with pleasure:
"The use of luxury is close to the use of sacred objects, namely, a way to make distinctions not just between and among other objects but between parts of experience. Consuming tells you not just who you are but where you are ... Materialism is not the opposite of spiritualism. Materialism is what you spiritualize when you have plenty of stuff."
posted by Richard R 3:21 PM
Thursday, November 20, 2003
One of the more interesting recent debates has been the extent to which one could speak of some form of shared European identity, as opposed to a need to distance Europe from the United States. Some of the values that are commonly cited are in a certain sense self-selecting; to cite multilateralism as a shared trait within a multi-national body seems a trifle odd (particularly given the extent to which multilateralism is arguably a continuation of national, unilateral, interest by other means). A commonly cited trait is secularism, where countries like France, Belgium and Germany explicitly separate church and state and Britain lacks political parties that explicitly cite a religious heritage, unlike Germany's christian democrats. However, the same does not apply to countries like Malta or Ireland, and in a certain sense countries like Poland where national identity and religion are closely intertwined are more alien than a country with a secular constitution such as Turkey.
Other traits, such as social democracy, are more difficult. There is certainly a greater consensus in Europe on this than in the United States, but states like Britain have tended to have limited regulation, lower taxation and a greater commitment to free markets, while much current deregulation in Germany would seem to suggest difficult times for the social market economy. Although, much of the tone of EU policy (the constitution is explicitly social democratic and makes no reference to enterprise or free markets) appears concerned with taming capitalism through regulation much of the reality is one of expanded markets (hence Swedish concern at the prospect of the EU destabilising the Swedish welfare state). As the Czech President has commented, the tone of much EU policy is post-historical; "Europeans have not yet faced up to such "serious underlying issues," Mr. Klaus said, because "they are still in the dream world of welfare, long vacations, guaranteed high pensions and cradle-to-grave social security;" " at a time when most EU states are cutting back on this and remain mired in historical realities (in this context, increasing benefits at a time when China and India are eroding European competitiveness).
posted by Richard R 2:54 PM
One of the more interesting recent debates has been the extent to which one could speak of some form of shared European identity, as opposed to a need to distance Europe from the United States. Some of the values that are commonly cited are in a certain sense self-selecting; to cite multilateralism as a shared trait within a multi-national body seems a trifle odd (particularly given the extent to which multilateralism is arguably a continuation of national, unilateral, interest by other means). A commonly cited trait is secularism, where countries like France, Belgium and Germany explicitly separate church and state and Britain lacks political parties that explicitly cite a religious heritage, unlike Germany's christian democrats. However, the same does not apply to countries like Malta or Ireland, and in a certain sense countries like Poland where national identity and religion are closely intertwined are more alien than a country with a secular constitution such as Turkey.
Other traits, such as social democracy, are more difficult. There is certainly a greater consensus in Europe on this than in the United States, but states like Britain have tended to have limited regulation, lower taxation and a greater commitment to free markets, while much current deregulation in Germany would seem to suggest difficult times for the social market economy. Although, much of the tone of EU policy (the constitution is explicitly social democratic and makes no reference to enterprise or free markets) appears concerned with taming capitalism through regulation much of the reality is one of expanded markets (hence Swedish concern at the prospect of the EU destabilising the Swedish welfare state). As the Czech President has commented, the tone of much EU policy is post-historical; "Europeans have not yet faced up to such "serious underlying issues," Mr. Klaus said, because "they are still in the dream world of welfare, long vacations, guaranteed high pensions and cradle-to-grave social security;" " at a time when most EU states are cutting back on this and remain mired in historical realities (in this context, increasing benefits at a time when China and India are eroding European competitiveness).
posted by Richard R 2:54 PM
Monday, November 17, 2003
Regular readers may be aware that I am a Republican but for what are perhaps not the most common reasons. In his treatise on the English Constitution Walter Bagehot argued that England is essentially a quasi-republic where all governance was separated from the monarchy, the ceremonial aspect of which served as a receptacle of popular awe and reverence. The combination of the two ensured the continuity and stability of government. This is not historically accurate (since the monarchy has certainly been given to interfering in politics; one need only look at the period before the second World War to see that. Nonetheless, my view is simply that this has collapsed and that the current monarchy is essentially a form of celebrity; the receptacle of purierence alone. On the occasions when the monarchy appears to be doing well, as with the Jubilee celebrations, it remains subject to the vicissitudes of celebrity, where the public are every bit as interested in its misfortunes as in its successes. The result is that the monarchy will perpetually be subject to the kind of rumours that surround it at present and the functions of the establishment and celebrity will remain irrevocably divorced.
I have often been surprised that this argument is not one that has occurred to more conservatives and I have finally found one example of it having done so. However, the argument here is an odd one; that since the monarchy has ceased to fulfill its role, the people who have prevented it from doing so are depraved and clearly unworthy of it; accordingly, the British people shouldsummon up what shreds of decency remain to them and abdicate at the first opportunity:
"The Prince attracts this kind of malicious character-assassination because he is heir to the throne, symbol of our national loyalty and endowed with all the dignities of office. He is, in so far as such a thing is possible in the modern world, surrounded by a small measure of sacred awe. Ordinary people of my parents’ generation were aware of this, since they had been through the experience of war, had understood how precious national loyalty is, and had recognised how effectively it had been sustained and renewed by the glamour and the pathos of the Crown. New Britons are not like that. If they encounter something sacred, their first instinct is to desecrate."
Much of what Scruton (for it is he) here regards as the demoralisation of the British can be more accurately described as the combined loss of reverence and deference; neither of which are likely to be particularly missed. Our culture has simply become much more egalitarian. Scruton correctly observes that the quasi-religious feelings previously invested in church and crown do not disappear but are instead reinvested elsewhere; "celebrity cults which mirror the cults of local saints and local gods. You will discover gods who have died and been resurrected like Elvis. You will uncover acts of ritual sacrifice, in which the celebrity is murdered like John Lennon." It's interesting to note that both of these are demotic figures and that for the most part there is little expectation of reverence towards celebrities who are as likely to be famed for their misdemeanours as for anything else.
posted by Richard R 10:14 AM
Regular readers may be aware that I am a Republican but for what are perhaps not the most common reasons. In his treatise on the English Constitution Walter Bagehot argued that England is essentially a quasi-republic where all governance was separated from the monarchy, the ceremonial aspect of which served as a receptacle of popular awe and reverence. The combination of the two ensured the continuity and stability of government. This is not historically accurate (since the monarchy has certainly been given to interfering in politics; one need only look at the period before the second World War to see that. Nonetheless, my view is simply that this has collapsed and that the current monarchy is essentially a form of celebrity; the receptacle of purierence alone. On the occasions when the monarchy appears to be doing well, as with the Jubilee celebrations, it remains subject to the vicissitudes of celebrity, where the public are every bit as interested in its misfortunes as in its successes. The result is that the monarchy will perpetually be subject to the kind of rumours that surround it at present and the functions of the establishment and celebrity will remain irrevocably divorced.
I have often been surprised that this argument is not one that has occurred to more conservatives and I have finally found one example of it having done so. However, the argument here is an odd one; that since the monarchy has ceased to fulfill its role, the people who have prevented it from doing so are depraved and clearly unworthy of it; accordingly, the British people shouldsummon up what shreds of decency remain to them and abdicate at the first opportunity:
"The Prince attracts this kind of malicious character-assassination because he is heir to the throne, symbol of our national loyalty and endowed with all the dignities of office. He is, in so far as such a thing is possible in the modern world, surrounded by a small measure of sacred awe. Ordinary people of my parents’ generation were aware of this, since they had been through the experience of war, had understood how precious national loyalty is, and had recognised how effectively it had been sustained and renewed by the glamour and the pathos of the Crown. New Britons are not like that. If they encounter something sacred, their first instinct is to desecrate."
Much of what Scruton (for it is he) here regards as the demoralisation of the British can be more accurately described as the combined loss of reverence and deference; neither of which are likely to be particularly missed. Our culture has simply become much more egalitarian. Scruton correctly observes that the quasi-religious feelings previously invested in church and crown do not disappear but are instead reinvested elsewhere; "celebrity cults which mirror the cults of local saints and local gods. You will discover gods who have died and been resurrected like Elvis. You will uncover acts of ritual sacrifice, in which the celebrity is murdered like John Lennon." It's interesting to note that both of these are demotic figures and that for the most part there is little expectation of reverence towards celebrities who are as likely to be famed for their misdemeanours as for anything else.
posted by Richard R 10:14 AM
Thursday, October 30, 2003
Not for the first time, I must admit to being mystified by recent events in the Tory party. The precise reason Michael Howard was not elected to the leadership before was that he was perceived as embodying all that Theresa May characterised as 'the nasty party;' social conservatism mixed with moral authoritarianism. The talk of more experienced politicians at present disregards the previous talk that this experience was precisely what they could do without. In short, the next New Labour election strategy will certainly involve repeating the phrase 'there is something of the night about him' a great deal...
posted by Richard R 4:01 PM
Not for the first time, I must admit to being mystified by recent events in the Tory party. The precise reason Michael Howard was not elected to the leadership before was that he was perceived as embodying all that Theresa May characterised as 'the nasty party;' social conservatism mixed with moral authoritarianism. The talk of more experienced politicians at present disregards the previous talk that this experience was precisely what they could do without. In short, the next New Labour election strategy will certainly involve repeating the phrase 'there is something of the night about him' a great deal...
posted by Richard R 4:01 PM
Saturday, October 25, 2003
The Age had a somewhat interesting discussion of rights recently, written from a hostile communitarian and christian perspective:
"Society is more than a collection of individuals. The atomistic view cannot survive the important and pervasive distinction between matters that are "for me and for you", on one hand, and those that are "for us" on the other... The atomistic tendency is so strong we may want to put it in individual mind states: now I know he is attending and he knows I am attending, and he knows I know, and so on. But just adding these individual states doesn't get us to the shared condition where we in fact are... Liberalism can give only a reductionist account for this because the state is merely an aggregation of individuals who must preserve their autonomy against threatened encroachments... Someone living utterly alone has no need of rights; it is in society that rights become important.
Alasdair MacIntyre, who has done much to restore the idea of virtue as central to ethics, objects on Aristotelian grounds. He thinks rights discourse is not really a moral language at all, but an ideological club wielded to defend self-interest and secure concession. In After Virtue, he writes: "There are no (natural) rights, and belief in them is one with belief in witches and unicorns" - and for the same reason, every attempt to give good reasons for believing there are such rights has failed. Though not a relativist, MacIntyre sees morality as a "practice" learnt in a community with a tradition. The idea of universal rights ignores these historical and communal dimensions and relies again on the Hobbsian pre-social isolated individual. It leads to an individualistic understanding of morality. Another philosophical school identifies a different problem with the dominance of rights talk: often it is simply inadequate to capture what is at stake. French thinker Simone Weil, who described rights as a mediocre concept, said such talk made it difficult to see the real problem. "If you say to someone who has ears to hear: 'What you are doing to me is not just', you may touch and awaken at its source the spirit of attention and love." But words such as "I have a right to" awaken the spirit of contention. Putting rights at the centre of social conflict inhibits any possible impulse of charity on both sides. "
As it happens I'm not averse to the idea that there is no such thing as a natural right. Hobbes described only one natural right, that of self defence, since it was the only form of right that would not be alienated in a state of nature (and although the idea of such a body as a government having it within its power to bestow or deprive populaces of rights may be unpalatable, the fact is that they do indeed have this capability). By the same token, association of the term natural rights with Locke is somewhat awkward, since Locke assumes that the subject of said rights is not in a state of nature, but rather that concepts such as property exist and that this creates a requirement for some form of reciprocal contract. This is why much of Locke's theories are analogous to an idea of market exchange (i.e. freedom from any relations other than those one enters with a view to her or his own interest. Society is a series of relations between proprietors. Political society is a contractual device for the protection of proprietors and the orderly regulation of their relations.)
Equally, there are certainly a set of rights that have been established by tradition, but in practice these vary considerably between states, which makes it rather difficult to speak of them as being 'natural.' The most glaring example if one alluded to above; that the US constitution in permitting the formation of militias has led to the notion of a right to bear arms, a right few (or none even?) other states happen to recognise. As such, it seems difficult to avoid the conclusion that rights are established by popular sovereignty; it seems equally difficult to avoid the conclusion that this does indeed run the risk of tyranny of the majority or of the state. But the possibility of tyranny of the majority is precisely why the christian and communitarian critique fails; for example, it cannot account for such bodies as the inquisition, and assumes that society is essentially benign in character. There may be no such thing as natural rights but there are certainly necessary rights. To illustrate this, the most obvious example would be Isaiah Berlin's distinction between positive and negative rights:
"Rousseau does not mean by liberty the ‘negative’ freedom of the individual not to be interfered with within a defined area, but the possession by all, and not merely by some, of the fully qualified members of a society of a share in the public power which is entitled to interfere with every aspect of every citizen’s life. The liberals of the first half of the nineteenth century correctly foresaw that liberty in this ‘positive’ sense could easily destroy too many of the ‘negative’ liberties that they held sacred."
While I am not quite as sceptical about positive rights as Berlin (or for that matter Hayek), it is difficult to deny some of the implications of this, particularly when we consider the Uk government policy of conditionality; tenants in council houses being evicted if they are convicted of anti-social behaviour when they supposedly had a right to housing, patients being charged for missing appointments and so on. Positive rights do seem to have a habit of being inverted (and as the article notes are frequently asymmetrical; "Though more government money goes to business than to people on the dole, no enforceable obligations are set for business, yet individuals face harsh penalties.") and becoming demands, a form of coercion.
Finally, the point in the article I am least impressed by is that rights tend to conflict. One might argue that is what they are there for; to contend between competing claims. In that sense they are certainly not a substitute for forms of trust but nopr are they to blame for the decay of trust, something Onora O'Neill observed in her Reith lectures:
"One standard contemporary answer is that the political conditions for placing trust must be achieved, and that these include human rights and democracy... human rights and democracy are not the basis of trust: on the contrary, trust is the basis for human rights and democracy. "
posted by Richard R 4:18 PM
The Age had a somewhat interesting discussion of rights recently, written from a hostile communitarian and christian perspective:
"Society is more than a collection of individuals. The atomistic view cannot survive the important and pervasive distinction between matters that are "for me and for you", on one hand, and those that are "for us" on the other... The atomistic tendency is so strong we may want to put it in individual mind states: now I know he is attending and he knows I am attending, and he knows I know, and so on. But just adding these individual states doesn't get us to the shared condition where we in fact are... Liberalism can give only a reductionist account for this because the state is merely an aggregation of individuals who must preserve their autonomy against threatened encroachments... Someone living utterly alone has no need of rights; it is in society that rights become important.
Alasdair MacIntyre, who has done much to restore the idea of virtue as central to ethics, objects on Aristotelian grounds. He thinks rights discourse is not really a moral language at all, but an ideological club wielded to defend self-interest and secure concession. In After Virtue, he writes: "There are no (natural) rights, and belief in them is one with belief in witches and unicorns" - and for the same reason, every attempt to give good reasons for believing there are such rights has failed. Though not a relativist, MacIntyre sees morality as a "practice" learnt in a community with a tradition. The idea of universal rights ignores these historical and communal dimensions and relies again on the Hobbsian pre-social isolated individual. It leads to an individualistic understanding of morality. Another philosophical school identifies a different problem with the dominance of rights talk: often it is simply inadequate to capture what is at stake. French thinker Simone Weil, who described rights as a mediocre concept, said such talk made it difficult to see the real problem. "If you say to someone who has ears to hear: 'What you are doing to me is not just', you may touch and awaken at its source the spirit of attention and love." But words such as "I have a right to" awaken the spirit of contention. Putting rights at the centre of social conflict inhibits any possible impulse of charity on both sides. "
As it happens I'm not averse to the idea that there is no such thing as a natural right. Hobbes described only one natural right, that of self defence, since it was the only form of right that would not be alienated in a state of nature (and although the idea of such a body as a government having it within its power to bestow or deprive populaces of rights may be unpalatable, the fact is that they do indeed have this capability). By the same token, association of the term natural rights with Locke is somewhat awkward, since Locke assumes that the subject of said rights is not in a state of nature, but rather that concepts such as property exist and that this creates a requirement for some form of reciprocal contract. This is why much of Locke's theories are analogous to an idea of market exchange (i.e. freedom from any relations other than those one enters with a view to her or his own interest. Society is a series of relations between proprietors. Political society is a contractual device for the protection of proprietors and the orderly regulation of their relations.)
Equally, there are certainly a set of rights that have been established by tradition, but in practice these vary considerably between states, which makes it rather difficult to speak of them as being 'natural.' The most glaring example if one alluded to above; that the US constitution in permitting the formation of militias has led to the notion of a right to bear arms, a right few (or none even?) other states happen to recognise. As such, it seems difficult to avoid the conclusion that rights are established by popular sovereignty; it seems equally difficult to avoid the conclusion that this does indeed run the risk of tyranny of the majority or of the state. But the possibility of tyranny of the majority is precisely why the christian and communitarian critique fails; for example, it cannot account for such bodies as the inquisition, and assumes that society is essentially benign in character. There may be no such thing as natural rights but there are certainly necessary rights. To illustrate this, the most obvious example would be Isaiah Berlin's distinction between positive and negative rights:
"Rousseau does not mean by liberty the ‘negative’ freedom of the individual not to be interfered with within a defined area, but the possession by all, and not merely by some, of the fully qualified members of a society of a share in the public power which is entitled to interfere with every aspect of every citizen’s life. The liberals of the first half of the nineteenth century correctly foresaw that liberty in this ‘positive’ sense could easily destroy too many of the ‘negative’ liberties that they held sacred."
While I am not quite as sceptical about positive rights as Berlin (or for that matter Hayek), it is difficult to deny some of the implications of this, particularly when we consider the Uk government policy of conditionality; tenants in council houses being evicted if they are convicted of anti-social behaviour when they supposedly had a right to housing, patients being charged for missing appointments and so on. Positive rights do seem to have a habit of being inverted (and as the article notes are frequently asymmetrical; "Though more government money goes to business than to people on the dole, no enforceable obligations are set for business, yet individuals face harsh penalties.") and becoming demands, a form of coercion.
Finally, the point in the article I am least impressed by is that rights tend to conflict. One might argue that is what they are there for; to contend between competing claims. In that sense they are certainly not a substitute for forms of trust but nopr are they to blame for the decay of trust, something Onora O'Neill observed in her Reith lectures:
"One standard contemporary answer is that the political conditions for placing trust must be achieved, and that these include human rights and democracy... human rights and democracy are not the basis of trust: on the contrary, trust is the basis for human rights and democracy. "
posted by Richard R 4:18 PM
Friday, October 24, 2003
I've noticed of late two articles in the Hudson Review concerning the establishment of a form of Darwinian literary criticism, a prospect that has me less than enthused.
The general problem with much literary theory is that for something concerned with cultural studies it runs the risk of being overwhelmingly concerned cultural production rather than how a culture actually manifests itself. In other words, concerning oneself with whether the theme of the interconnection of organisms in Victorian literature is to be primarily understood in Marxist or Darwinian terms is perhaps simply not very interesting in either case. Similarly, whether sexual dynamics within a novel are understood in feminist, Freudian or Darwinian terms is also not especially interesting (largely because the answer to these can essentially be summarised as 'choose your favourite prejudice' since it is by definition impossible to falsify any thesis here). In any of these cases, the theoretical perspective brought to bear changes the terms in which literature was produced but says rather less about the nature of the text itself. The essay discussing Pinker brings most of these concerns to light:
"He corrects Virginia Woolf’s jocular remark that human nature (actually, she wrote “human character”) changed in 1910 by explaining that “Modernism certainly proceeded as if human nature had changed. All the tricks that artists had used for millennia to please the human palate were cast aside."
I recall EM Forster commenting that whether human nature changed or not was largely unimportant in comparison to whether how we view human nature had changed or not. In this case, artistic representation of human nature tends to be response to how the culture of the time views it. Medieval artists saw human nature in terms of a set of social and religious typologies. Eighteenth century novelists often as human nature in the same terms as Locke, that of the blank slate. It's difficult to conceive of any of these conforming to what Pinker would deem acceptable.
More to the point, if the acme of artistic achievement is "pleasing the human palate" then Pinker has advanced a view that would displace most of the artistic canon. In particular the idea that modernism created a form of elitism in contrast to previous popular notions of art is somewhat misconceived. From Maecenas to Kreutzer, patrons have been needed to fund artists whose works did not please the human palate as much as their now forgotten contemporaries. The problem of defining artistic value is that definitions are either too vague to exclude works that aren't part of the canon or too narrow to include works that are: Pinker is to be congratulated for forming a definition that would be likely to exclude much of the canon. Which begs the question of what a Pinker canon would comprise. For example;
"We know that late Beethoven, late Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky, Picasso, some of James Joyce and T. S. Eliot, etc., were at first regarded as “ugly” and now are so naturalized as to present few problems. What hasn’t been assimilated—Finnegans Wake, Moses und Aron—may be the sort of artifacts that affirm Pinker’s judgment."
Possibly. But why stop there? Eliot, Picasso and Stravinsky were equally controversial in their own time and had no more interest in pleasing the human palate than Joyce did. Frankly, having an erroneous conception of human nature is perhaps rather less the point in those cases than deliberately setting out to create something in opposition to perceived norms.
Regarding the critique of post-structuralism referred to in the second of these articles, I would be interested to know what this actually consists of. The difficulty is likely to be that post-structuralism and evolutionary psychology are not especially likely to actually 'speak' with regard to each other. The former is concerned with how the characteristics of language manifest themselves, the latter is concerned with how the origins of language manifest themselves. I'm not sure that those two really have much in common and are as likely to be compatible as incompatible.
posted by Richard R 11:36 AM
I've noticed of late two articles in the Hudson Review concerning the establishment of a form of Darwinian literary criticism, a prospect that has me less than enthused.
The general problem with much literary theory is that for something concerned with cultural studies it runs the risk of being overwhelmingly concerned cultural production rather than how a culture actually manifests itself. In other words, concerning oneself with whether the theme of the interconnection of organisms in Victorian literature is to be primarily understood in Marxist or Darwinian terms is perhaps simply not very interesting in either case. Similarly, whether sexual dynamics within a novel are understood in feminist, Freudian or Darwinian terms is also not especially interesting (largely because the answer to these can essentially be summarised as 'choose your favourite prejudice' since it is by definition impossible to falsify any thesis here). In any of these cases, the theoretical perspective brought to bear changes the terms in which literature was produced but says rather less about the nature of the text itself. The essay discussing Pinker brings most of these concerns to light:
"He corrects Virginia Woolf’s jocular remark that human nature (actually, she wrote “human character”) changed in 1910 by explaining that “Modernism certainly proceeded as if human nature had changed. All the tricks that artists had used for millennia to please the human palate were cast aside."
I recall EM Forster commenting that whether human nature changed or not was largely unimportant in comparison to whether how we view human nature had changed or not. In this case, artistic representation of human nature tends to be response to how the culture of the time views it. Medieval artists saw human nature in terms of a set of social and religious typologies. Eighteenth century novelists often as human nature in the same terms as Locke, that of the blank slate. It's difficult to conceive of any of these conforming to what Pinker would deem acceptable.
More to the point, if the acme of artistic achievement is "pleasing the human palate" then Pinker has advanced a view that would displace most of the artistic canon. In particular the idea that modernism created a form of elitism in contrast to previous popular notions of art is somewhat misconceived. From Maecenas to Kreutzer, patrons have been needed to fund artists whose works did not please the human palate as much as their now forgotten contemporaries. The problem of defining artistic value is that definitions are either too vague to exclude works that aren't part of the canon or too narrow to include works that are: Pinker is to be congratulated for forming a definition that would be likely to exclude much of the canon. Which begs the question of what a Pinker canon would comprise. For example;
"We know that late Beethoven, late Wagner, Mahler, Stravinsky, Picasso, some of James Joyce and T. S. Eliot, etc., were at first regarded as “ugly” and now are so naturalized as to present few problems. What hasn’t been assimilated—Finnegans Wake, Moses und Aron—may be the sort of artifacts that affirm Pinker’s judgment."
Possibly. But why stop there? Eliot, Picasso and Stravinsky were equally controversial in their own time and had no more interest in pleasing the human palate than Joyce did. Frankly, having an erroneous conception of human nature is perhaps rather less the point in those cases than deliberately setting out to create something in opposition to perceived norms.
Regarding the critique of post-structuralism referred to in the second of these articles, I would be interested to know what this actually consists of. The difficulty is likely to be that post-structuralism and evolutionary psychology are not especially likely to actually 'speak' with regard to each other. The former is concerned with how the characteristics of language manifest themselves, the latter is concerned with how the origins of language manifest themselves. I'm not sure that those two really have much in common and are as likely to be compatible as incompatible.
posted by Richard R 11:36 AM
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