Thursday, October 01, 2009

Nick Clegg: there is no common good

Nick Clegg, leader of the Liberal Democrats in the UK, has published an essay titled "The Liberal Moment". He believes the time is ripe for the Liberal Democrats to take over leadership of the left from the Labour Party.

According to Clegg, both the Conservatives and the Labour Party are living in the past. They are both too wedded to the nation and the nation state. Clegg believes that people have become liberated from membership of nations, through such things as technology and immigration. Therefore, what matters is a flow of power upward to global governance and downward to individuals. The new ideal is the empowered, transnational individual and the global state:

We live in a more atomised society where people are no longer rigidly defined by class or place. Our society is no longer trapped by a culture of diffidence and hierarchy.

The capacity of the nation state to act for its citizens has been dramatically diluted as globalisation has undermined its powers. The increasing accessibility of international air travel and new technologies like the internet have radically stretched people’s physical and conceptual horizons. New forms of religious and ethnic identity have dissolved the traditional glue that held the identity of nations together. In short, we live in a more fluid, less deferential world ...

This is Clegg's criticism of the Labour Party:

Labour has lost its ideological way ... They are unsure how to deal with a globalised world in which the nation state is no longer the correct locus of power. They are unsure how to react to the way people have been empowered by technology, travel and prosperity and are no longer willing to subordinate themselves to a collective whole in the name of a supposed ‘common good’ ...

"We live in a more atomised society" begins Clegg. You might think that he would take this as a negative feature of modernity and suggest a remedy. Instead, he thinks of it positively as a form of individual emancipation.

There's a logic to this. If you are a liberal like Clegg you'll believe that self-determination is the highest, overriding good. This means that we cannot be defined by anything that we can't immediately choose for ourselves. We can't be defined by anything that is traditional or biological or even, as it seems, social. If we are defined in some way by the particular society we live in, then we have been "trapped" or "rigidly defined" by the place we inhabit.

An atomised individual is not defined by his relationship to others in a society, nor by an attachment to a particular community. He is a kind of blank slate, an empty canvas ready to be self-authored. He fits in better with the liberal ideal than someone who takes part of his identity from the particular society he lives in.

So for Clegg, the modern atomised individual is escaping "subordination" to a collective whole.

Is such an individual free? What is there left for him to choose to be? He has to keep himself radically unsituated in any place or society, otherwise he is being other defined rather than self-determined. He is free to be not much at all.

It's better to take what is best and deepest in our constituted selves with us, so that we get to be free as men and women, as Swedes or Japanese, as Richardsons or McGregors.

Then there is Clegg's attitude to the common good. For Clegg, there is only a 'supposed "common good"'. He is clearly sceptical that it's possible to speak of a common good at all.

But again he is following a tradition within classical liberalism here. John Stuart Mill, for instance, once wrote that:

The only freedom which deserves the name is that of pursuing our own good in our own way.

There is no recognition here that at least some of our purposes in life are rightly directed toward a common good, such as the improvement and perpetuation of our own particular community, society, civilisation or tradition.

Steven Kautz is an American academic who writes in defence of classical liberalism. Here is how he describes the rejection by classical liberals of a common good:

It should not be surprising, even to partisans of liberalism, that a world dominated by liberal individualism has given rise to longings for lost community. Classical liberalism is a doctrine of acquisitive individualism, and teaches that man is by nature solitary and selfish, not political or even social: the most powerful natural passions and needs of human beings are private. Human beings are not friends by nature.

This harsh moral psychology is, at any rate, the fundamental teaching of classical liberalism. As a result, the idea of community is always somewhat suspect for thoughtful liberals. Liberals are inclined to view partisans of community as either romantic utopians or dangerous authoritarians.

If there is no natural common good, beyond peace and security, then invocations of the spirit of community are either foolish or fraudulent, impossible dreams ...

But without recognising a common good, how can we set out to maintain the communities and traditions we identify with? It can't be done in principle (as I explain further here).

16 comments:

  1. Clegg's scepticism over the common good, sounds a bit ironic, considering that putting the common good first was one of key principles of the SDP, which was one of the parties from which the Lib Dems were formed.

    The SDP party believed Britain's economic problems in the early 80s were primarily caused by factional fighting between the unions and big business, and that the country needed to pull together to succeed.

    However it now seems like the liberal individualist side of the Lib Dems has completely taken over from the populist/commumitarian side.

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  2. Great post.

    Off topic but have a look how 'liberals' treat a gay AIDs researcher who adopted two black children and raped them.

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  3. Sorry here's the link.

    http://www.remnantnewspaper.com/Archives/2009-0815-laughable_double_standard.htm

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  4. If we are defined in some way by the particular society we live in, then we have been "trapped" or "rigidly defined" by the place we inhabit.

    So, your version of conservatism is saying we have no choice over certain aspects of our being because we have no control over them. On that basis there'd be certain criminals who couldn't help but be criminals because of the community they were born into? Should we treat them differently to other criminals convicted of the same crime? People can't be held responsible for their own decisions or actions because factors beyond their control caused them to act that way?

    If people have the ability within themselves to make moral decisions, how can they not have the ability to define themselves? Or does conservatism claim we are born with an inherent morality we can't change?

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  5. Rather too large a topic for a blog comment, but I find this opposition of the individual vs community as contrived and simplistic. You could, for example, pit liberals, existentialists and anti-communists on one side, versus Marxists, the Catholic church and the KKK on the other.

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  6. your version of conservatism is saying we have no choice over certain aspects of our being because we have no control over them.

    It's not just my version of conservatism, it's reality. We don't get to choose our sex, our ethny etc.

    What's more important here is that most people in most cultures don't think of this as a problem. For most people, their sex identity, their ethnic identity and so on are positive and inseparable aspects of who they are.

    So we have to understand why modern liberals wage war on such aspects of existence. And this is where the liberal insistence on self-determination comes in.

    On that basis there'd be certain criminals who couldn't help but be criminals because of the community they were born into?

    Is this a likely scenario? Do people inherit a criminal identity from the criminal community they belong to? Usually criminals are rogue outsiders to the community they live in (you do occasionally get a "crime family" but that seems to be about as far as it goes).

    Anyway, I have not made an argument against free will. If people really want to toss over their own ethnic or national tradition, then they have the free will to do so. The question is why liberals think it is moral to do so, when for most people such a communal identity is important in their lives.

    If people have the ability within themselves to make moral decisions, how can they not have the ability to define themselves?

    The point I have made is that some of the most important aspects of our self-identity are not self-chosen (e.g. sex, ethny).

    The fact that they are not self-chosen doesn't mean that there are limitations on making moral decisions.

    Again, most people would not ordinarily categorise their own sex or ethnic identity as immoral - they only do so under the influence of a reductive political theory, liberalism.

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  7. I find this opposition of the individual vs community as contrived and simplistic.

    But it's a critically important debate to be had. If there are liberals who think of community negatively, or who limit the idea of community to bureaucratic efforts to equalise autonomy, then we are not going to be able to defend our own communal traditions.

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  8. Mr. Sutcliffe said,

    If people have the ability within themselves to make moral decisions, how can they not have the ability to define themselves? Or does conservatism claim we are born with an inherent morality we can't change?


    Moral decisions are "do I or do I not conform to this or that moral standard?" They are not, "how do I define morality?" which is more like unto playing at being a god.

    Self-definition is closely tied with defining your own right and wrong, as Mr. Sutcliffe subtly shows.

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  9. Jaz, I think that's a little simplistic. Morality is more than just following orders. In fact, someone who does not question for themselves whether what they are doing is right or wrong, and just conforms to the popular code, is arguably immoral. Where does your morality come from that you do or do not conform to?

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  10. Which one? And which interpretation of his teachings?

    You and I need to get along in this world in the here and now. Since any teachings from a 'god' need to be taken on faith, I wouldn't say there's enough justification to use them as a basis for a moral system that can be extrapolated into workable law. You can justify any arbitrary position on a basis of faith, and if you look over all the religions of the world pretty much every position has been justified on the basis of faith. And guess what, they contradict each other! Frankly, I don't share your faith. We need a basis applicable to the real world, not your supernatural one, if we're going to move forward and establish any sort of enlightened society.

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  11. "that a world dominated by liberal individualism has given rise to longings for lost community"

    Contrary to the idea of isolated individuals I find these liberals or the people who would vote for the lib dems to be very strong on community. Your average liberal voter will probably have a very active social life with lots of friends. They'll eat asian cusine and maybe do buddism or buddism lite. They'll bicycle to work. They'll recycle like crazy and try to reduce their environmental footprint. Recycling is the new morality.

    They'll want to do everything with their herd and live in something like a little "village". They are so strong on community that when I hear the word I want to barf.

    I think they are making a new community so to speak. Its just an awful one.

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  12. "Contrary to the idea of isolated individuals I find these liberals or the people who would vote for the lib dems to be very strong on community. Your average liberal voter will probably have a very active social life with lots of friends. They'll eat asian cusine and maybe do buddism or buddism lite. They'll bicycle to work. They'll recycle like crazy and try to reduce their environmental footprint. Recycling is the new morality."

    True, left liberals tend to be a lot more community orietated that right liberals, who are the more classic individualists.

    The farce of left liberal individualism can be seen in those semi-bohemian teenagers who express their 'individualism' by hanging around with other individuals with exactly the same views and appearances as themselves.

    However, the type of community these left liberals celebrate is always a self-chosen type of community. Communities like nations, ethnicities and traditional churches, which aren't self-chosen are looked down upon or dismissed.

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  13. True. Everything that smacks too much of the old is frowned upon.

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  14. I wouldn't take him seriously if I were you. There's nothing concerning about someone's mediocre brain espousing gnosticism and historicism - even the leader of an irrelevant political party. Anyone that stupid has no idea what is going on. Moreover, it's likely they don't possess the intellectuality ability to ever know.

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  15. We're all basically familiar with the problems when society degenerates to communities and individuals or in other words there is no common good or recognition of a common good. Self interest and distrust dominates peoples perceptions. Only trust your own. Society is tribal. Expect the worst from others. Power is used more nakedly and people follow more begrudgingly. Thats when it works when it doesn't its:

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
    Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world"

    In the workplace I'm sure you're familiar with CYA (cover your ass). In principle it sounds good enough, do what you're required to and you won't get in trouble. In practise it can be, screw you lot as long as I'm ok everything’s fine. It goes hand in hand with, if there's a problem someone must be made to pay. I find this thinking highly unhelpful for a larger work ethic where people must work together and are reliant on each other for the best results. It demonstrates a complete lack of an appreciation for the common good.

    Doctors practise defensive medicine and we're told this costs society a lot. People go to work and practise defensive work. There is no great identification with the organisation, trust for colleagues or superiors (unless they're in your tribe) or appreciation for group goals. This I find a highly demoralising state of affairs.

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