Thursday, October 21, 2010

Rationality and political argument

I was given a link to a fascinating piece called "The Values of Everything" by George Monbiot the other day. I mostly disagree with Monbiot but I admire him because he is more honest than most. He is willing to admit, for example, when guys on his side of the debate were caught lying and also willing to admit when his side has lost and that is a rare commodity on any side of any political debate.

I also don't, as a rule, pick fights with idiots because I don't think we have anything to gain from picking fights with idiots. You can take it as read that I respect George Monbiot even if I disagree with him.

With that said, let's have a look at some of Monbiot's assessment of the reasons why progressives are currently losing the debate and what they can do to change.

First, he tells us what progressives have done wrong. citing a report by Tom Crompton he says:
Progressives, he shows, have been suckers for a myth of human cognition he labels the Enlightenment model. This holds that people make rational decisions by assessing facts. All that has to be done to persuade people is to lay out the data: they will then use it to decide which options best support their interests and desires.
A lot could be said here but the basic point is that this is factually wrong.  Progressives have always accused their opponents of making naked appeals to their self interest and desires. They themselves have typically argued in moral terms. The whole point of replacing classic liberalism with progressivism was to move away from rational self interest.

And you can verify that for yourself by thinking back to the last presidential election, for example. What part of "hope and change" was supposed to be a naked appeal to people's hard-nosed rational calculations of self interest? That campaign ran on pure idealism not self interest. Jimmy Carter ran on trust. LBJ promised a great society.

Clinton ran on self interest with "it's the economy stupid" but he balanced that with "I feel your pain". And we might note that Clinton is the only Democrat to win two terms since, cough, Harry Truman. And that record that is looking safer every day so we might ask if maybe a little more appeal to naked self-interest might not help.

Okay, let's leave that and move on. If the way for progressives to reach people is not through self interest,  what other sort of considerations should they take into account?

This is where it gets interesting and familiar. The other issues all have to do with our identity. (Crompton/Monbiot actually say our "social identity", to which my response is, "Is there some other kind of identity?") There are two types of values that drive our sense of identity.

There are extrinsic values:
People with a strong set of extrinsic values fixate on how others see them. They cherish financial success, image and fame.
And there are intrinsic values:
Intrinsic values concern relationships with friends, family and community, and self-acceptance.
Now the first question we have to ask ourselves here is whether Monbiot isn't fibbing to himself a bit here. Not about the distinction, I think he has that right, but about the words he uses to describe the values that go with each. For he has begun to load the second with the sort of value terms he likes and the first with the sort of value terms he doesn't like. Read the whole thing and you'll see that the loading gets progressively (if you'll allow the pun) more weighted as he goes along.

And readers of this blog may find the split familiar. Extrinsic values is just another way of describing our old friends the honour-shame values and intrinsic values are just another way of describing sin-redemption values. And Monbiot acknowledges the claim that I have made and that is that no one is all one or all the other.

But, and this is the crucial move, Monbiot believes that conservatism is all about extrinsic values (or honour-shame) and progressivism is all about intrinsic values or (sin-redemption). And here things really start to fall apart on him. Read the following two paragraphs and ask yourself does paragraph "2" follow from paragraph "1"?  As you do so pay special attention to the value words Monbiot treats as the exclusive property of progressive values  (I have highlighted them to make it easier) in paragraph 2:
  1.  Conservatives in the United States generally avoid debating facts and figures. Instead they frame issues in ways that both appeal to and reinforce extrinsic values. 
  2. Ed Miliband appears to understands this need. He told the Labour conference that he “wants to change our society so that it values community and family, not just work” and “wants to change our foreign policy so that it’s always based on values, not just alliances … We must shed old thinking and stand up for those who believe there is more to life than the bottom line.” But there’s a paradox here, which means that we cannot rely on politicians to drive these changes. Those who succeed in politics are, by definition, people who prioritise extrinsic values. Their ambition must supplant peace of mind, family life, friendship - even brotherly love.
Look, someone might argue that conservatives perception of intrinsic issues is wrong but you simply cannot do what Monbiot has done here and argue they don't care about these things. If someone to do a poll asking people which ideology they most associate with those value terms with, the blunt truth is that conservatives would win and they'd win by a large margin.

I think Monbiot has made a good start here but he still needs to put a lot more thought into it.

10 comments:

  1. I agree with your analysis as far as it goes. You draw a distinction between classic liberalism and progressives, I've never made that distinction, I've always considered Progressive a synonym for Liberal. I don't know whether Monbiot is doing that or not, but I'd appreciate it if you could explain what the difference is.

    Regarding Monbiot's use of the term "social identity" I think he's referring to that identity that derives from the social class one sees oneself in or aspires to (as opposed to ethnic identity, religious identity, or sexual identity).

    I agree with your points about rational self-interest to a point. I don't know what kind of words the actual psychological studies he cites ascribed to extrinsic and intrinsic values so I can only take what he says at face value. Monbiot's flaw as I see it is that if Progressives can persuade people to be kind and compassionate rather than selfish and cruel we will have a better society. But only if one already believes that can that strategy work, because it is a very irrational philosophy. Jesus tried it and look what happened to him.

    You are right when you say that the Obama campaign ran on pure idealism not self-interest but he won, so people responded to it. And I don't see much substantive difference between
    "hope and change" and "The Great Society" or "The New Frontier" or "The New Deal" for that matter. Roosevelt was elected four times. Both JFK and LBJ won their elections. That they were both only elected once was due to Viet Nam in both cases (see "JFK and the Unspeakable: How He Died and Why It Matters" which I've referenced earlier on this blog). If it had not been for Viet Nam, neither Robert Kennedy nor Eugene McCarthy would have mounted primary challenges against LBJ in 1968, he would have been the Democratic nominee and won a 2nd elected term. In addition, in that scenario it is highly unlikely that Nixon would have chosen to enter the race for the Republican nomination. My point is that JFK was a popular President, and so was LBJ until Viet Nam got out of control, which is a whole other story.

    I agree with you that Clinton's appeal to peoples' self-interest got him elected to two terms. However, I have to say I don't consider him a progressive or even a liberal in the classic sense, and I do believe that the actions of his administration did more damage to the US than any other 20thC. President. Bill Clinton said he "stood" for things that Progressives liked, but in fact was only interested in advancing the financial and political ambitions of himself and his wife. He did the opposite of what he said behind closed doors, and I'm not just talking about Monica Lewinsky, but also with people like Summers, and Geithner and Rubin (read The Great American Stick-Up.") Today he is a very wealthy man while the American economy languishes, largely because of actions of his administration which were engineered by him and the aforementioned trio. Yet he is beloved of the average liberal/progressive working class person, and even the hoity-toity intellectuals.

    I don't know if I agree with you that if a poll were taken in the US most people would associate intrinsic values as they are described by Monbiot with Conservatives, many polls suggest otherwise. Perhaps on some of the hot button social-issues--abortion and same-sex marriage when they are put in the context of "family values"--that might be the case.

    Bottom line as I see it, its all show-biz, and that's what Monbiot in his naivete misses. It doesn't matter what Progressives do if the Conservatives put on a good show. Ronald Reagan--an actor by trade--is the prime example of that.

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  2. The word "liberal" has evolved a fair amount over the years. Originally it meant a laissez-faire approach to economics combined with a relatively libertarian approach to laws governing personal conduct and a very strong defense of free speech. That is what I, and others, mean when we say "classical liberal".

    A good example of just how much the term has changed is to consider John Stuart Mill. mill was an early advocate of equal rights for women, for example, but he only believed in removing laws that restricted what women could do. He would have considered affirmative action an abomination.

    Similarly, Mill supported government sponsored relief for the poor but believed that anyone receiving welfare payments should forfeit the right to vote because this might create a situation wherein an unemployed majority might keep forcing the employed minority to keep supporting them. As you can see, that is quite a distance from what the word liberal means today.

    I might also note that if 19th century liberals knew that a "liberal" television network would do what NPR has just done to Juan Williams they would have wept.

    In the late 19th century (beginning around 1870), a new movement responding to criticism from conservatives on one side and socialists on the other came up with a form of government wherein the government would play a much larger role in helping people succeed. The first progressive actually elected to power in the US was Woodrow Wilson.

    That is a tiny bit of the philosophical background. As to partisan issues, I try to stay clear of those. There are already more than enough blogs out there dealing with that.

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  3. I agree with you about Juan Williams. I believe NPR acted in haste and should have at least given him a choice (which is also the opinion of the NPR listener ombudsman). But it underscores how "news" and "commentary" have become increasingly blurred over the years, and maybe this goes back to Edward R. Murrow. He went from being a journalist to a commentator with his reports on the plight of migrant farm workers among other things, and his attack of Sen. McCarthy. He used his credentials and reputation as a journalist when he became a commentator, and no one back then could see where it would lead. Also, the journalists who cover the political conventions and national elections have increasingly become commentators on them in the course of their coverage. Maybe there needs to be a more clearly defined line of demarcation between the two. But again Jules, this is all about money, no matter how much anyone wants to sugar-coat it with phrases like "journalistic integrity" or "conflicts of interest."

    Thank you for explaining your use of the words liberal and progressive, and for refreshing my memory, its been several decades since I read John Stuart Mill. You are correct of course, but what this says is that our notions of what progressive means have evolved over time. While Mill was in favor of removing laws restricting what women could do, did that extend as far as women's suffrage? Presumably it would. In Mill's time there wasn't a "problem" with Negroes, so what would he have said about that? We can only speculate.

    Since you brought up affirmative action, I will tell you that I am ambivalent about it. Since the end of the Civil War, corporations and schools had the opportunity to incorporate black people into their ranks and steadfastly refused to do so. LBJ's original intention of affirmative action applied only to blacks--primarily black men--because of the past injustice that had been done, which I believe is legitimate. This injustice was not only symbolic but had real economic consequences. The problem I have with affirmative action as it evolved is that it was extended to women and every person who was non-white and the adoption of a quota system, which was never LBJ's intent. White women of priveledge were protected by EEOC, as well as Hispanics regardless of where they came from or their economic circumstances. This resulted in what amounted to legalized reverse discrimination against white men, which had a direct affect on me personally on more than one occasion. This goes back more than 25 years, but I know for a fact because I was told by the people responsible at the time that because of the quota system that they were compelled to use I did not get at least three jobs that I had applied for. But even because of that, I cannot say that I am in favor of dismantling affirmative action because it now includes and protects people with disabilities, who comprise a substantial portion of the population I work with. And without the force of law and the mandate to make "reasonable accommodation" corporations would not do it. And everyone loses, not just those who are denied access but society as well because it loses the contribution they can make. And that is true of any policy--written or unwritten--or personal biases that exclude people based on factors unrelated to the matter at hand. Until more people begin to acquire the instrinsic values that Monbiot speaks of, affirmative action--imperfect and unfair as it might be--will be necessary, and I say this as a white male.

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  4. BTW, I knew and agree that Woodrow Wilson was the first Progressive President of the United States. His League of Nations was vilified and failed at the time, but it did provide the framework for the United Nations which was championed by later Progressives.

    Going back to Monbiot, while I agree that self-interest is rational and caring about others is totally irrational, what about the "common good?" That's a strong part of the Church's teaching on Social Justice, yet that seems to have fallen out of favor nowadays too. Maybe because it requires self-sacrifice, the kind we saw during WWII, and acting in other than one's own immediate interests, and nobody wants to do that.

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  5. "Common good" certainly does require self-sacrifice or at least it did once upon a time. I think what has happened nowadays is that a bloated and complacent bureaucracy and associates special interests have gotten so good at exploiting the idea of the common good to guarantee their own power and job security that people have risen up in protest against this.

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  6. I agree that a complacent bureaucracy has exploited the idea of the common good simply to guarantee their own job security, absolutely, no doubt about it. I see this in spades with the State agencies here in CT, and the lifetime pensions State employees receive which, in many cases, are higher than their base salaries when they were working. This is true in NYC, and as I understand it, was at least part of the reason Greece was in so much trouble financially earlier this year. However, while there is a lot of voter anger out there, I don't think most people have connected the dots yet.

    I took one Sociology course as an undergraduate, taught by an older professor who was considered very liberal. He said back then that the Social Worker's job was to ensure his or her own job security, not to assist the clients they are paid to help, and he meant it as a criticism of the system. I thought that was a cynical statement then, but it didn't take me long in the real world to realize that he was right.

    Nonetheless, while I often wish they would close all the State agencies here and start all over again, I realize that would be throwing the baby out with the bath water. There has been some progress though. For the last at least 10 yrs. the Federal government is requiring states to funnel more of the money allocated for services to people with develomental disabilities to the clients themselves or their guardians so that they can purchase the services directly. This cuts down on the number of State employees needed to administer their programs and saves taxpayer $$$. Not a panacaea by any means, but a start in the right direction.

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  7. "The word 'liberal' has evolved a fair amount over the years. Originally it meant a laissez-faire approach to economics combined with a relatively libertarian approach to laws governing personal conduct and a very strong defense of free speech. That is what I, and others, mean when we say "'classical liberal'".

    I re-read that this morning, this describes today's "Conservative" as I'm sure you are aware. Its been a long time since I studied this as an undergraduate, while it wasn't my major I've always considered myself somewhat of a student of American and World History. I guess I have two questions. First, if classic liberal was as you described it above prior to the rise of the Progressive movement in the late 19th C., what did the opposing faction stand for at that time? The other thing that struck me reading this today is that the late 19th C. also saw the publication of Leo XIII's Rerum Novarum, which strongly cautioned against--if not condemned--laissez-faire capitalism. So my 2nd question is to what degree if any do you think that influenced the Progressive movement or was part of it?

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  8. Driving this afternoon admiring the Fall foliage, it occurred to me that the CT State Budget became bloated under the last 3 Governors from 1991 to the present who have all been Republicans if you count Lowell Weicker who had been a Republican elected to Congress and then the U.S. Senate, but ran for Governor as an Independent. There is also quite a lot of graft and corruption in the State agencies from the top down which everyone knows about, and every once in a while it makes the papers. So people took the notion of "common good" and exploited it to their own advantage. I don't know how to stop that since both parties are guilty. Maybe its just part of human nature since it apparently has nothing to do with political philosophy.

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  9. You're right in saying that conservatism has a lot in common with classical liberalism. However, conservatives show a lot of enthusiasm for families, marriage and tradition and that was not the case with classical liberalism.

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  10. "conservatives show a lot of enthusiasm for families, marriage and tradition and that was not the case with classical liberalism."

    So even back in the late 19thC.? Yet Rerum Novarum says specifically that "capital should be in the service of the family and not the other way around." It also affirmed the rights of workers to organize, time off from work to spend time with families, a living wage with which to support families, health care for families. Basically all the things that liberals or progressives today stand for, except that today's definition of family would be different than Leo's to include single parents and families headed by interracial and gay couples.

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