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"To sustain the moral posture that democracy demands, we must refuse to see partisan affiliation as the defining trait of our fellow citizens," argues Robert Talisse.
Democracy demands moral citizenship. Is it too much for us?
Jan 03 2020
Talisse is a philosophy professor at Vanderbilt University.
Democracy is hard work. If it is to function well, citizens must do a lot of thinking and talking about politics. But democracy is demanding in another way as well. It requires us to maintain a peculiar moral posture toward our fellow citizens. We must acknowledge that they're our equals and thus entitled to an equal say, even when their views are severely misguided. It seems a lot to ask.
To appreciate the demand's weight, consider that a citizen's duty is to promote justice. Accordingly, we tend to regard our political opposition as being not merely on the wrong side of the issues, but on an unjust side. Citizens of a democracy must pursue justice while also affirming that their fellow citizens are entitled to equal power even when they favor injustice. What's more, citizens are obligated to acknowledge that, under certain conditions, it is right for government to enact their opposition's will. This looks like a requirement to be complicit with injustice. That's quite a burden.
<p>To be sure, the demand is not altogether unconstrained. For one thing, citizens need not respect every kind of political opponent. Although the boundaries are contested, there are limits to what counts as a valid political opinion. For example, citizens aren't required to respect those who call for the absolute subordination of one portion of the citizenry to another. Furthermore, no citizen is ever required simply to submit to the popular will. In the wake of electoral defeat, we need not quietly resign; we are constitutionally entitled to criticize and protest the outcome.</p>
<p>Although these consolations may make the moral demand of citizenship more bearable, it remains onerous. When it comes to debates over crucial matters like health care, taxation and immigration, there are several valid yet opposed opinions, many of which will strike some citizens as unacceptable. When such views prevail, government is right to implement them, despite the fact that many citizens assess them as unjust. Democracy gives an equal voice even to citizens who favor injustice, even after an electoral or policy defeat.</p>
<p>Put simply, it is not easy to regard those who promote injustice as one's equals, rather than as obstacles to nullify. However, this awkward posture is fundamental to the democratic enterprise. If we give it up, we cede the idea of self-government among equals to a view of politics as, at best, a cold civil war.</p>
<p>Perhaps democracy simply asks too much of us. Though tempting, this conclusion is hasty. To see how we can meet democracy's demand, we can look to the widespread practice of religious toleration.</p>
<p>Many religious believers embrace the following posture. They hold that salvation is the highest goal of life and is available only to those within their own faith community; they additionally recognize an obligation to assist others in achieving salvation. Yet they also hold that matters of conviction must be left to the individual. This means that it would be wrong to force others to perform the correct religious observances or to forbid improper religiosity. Thus a conflict: Despite taking salvation to be paramount, the tolerant believer leaves others to their own spiritual devices even though this may result in their ruin.</p>
<p>This conflict is eased by an underlying conception of conscience. Tolerant believers see religious conviction as an exercise of the human conscience. Accordingly, they can regard those who hold opposing religious views as more than their erroneous convictions. Despite their grave theological errors, they, too, endeavor to live according to their best judgment. Tolerant believers hence see even in the heretic something that they also see in themselves — a common aspiration to live well. In this they find a basis for toleration.</p>
<p>The key is the refusal to regard religious conviction as the entirety of a person's identity. For the tolerant believer, the quest for salvation is pursued within the common horizon of human conscience. It is not easy, but religious toleration is nevertheless widely practiced and wholeheartedly embraced.</p>
<p>The lesson for citizens is clear. To sustain the moral posture that democracy demands, we must refuse to see partisan affiliation as the defining trait of our fellow citizens. Alas, this is easier said than done. As I document in "<a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/overdoing-democracy-9780190924195?cc=us&lang=en&" target="_blank">Overdoing Democracy</a>," politics has infiltrated the whole of social life. Not only do we increasingly interact only with those who share our politics, we also have become more prone to take those who are politically unlike ourselves to be irredeemably depraved, benighted and dangerous. By placing our partisan identities at the center of nearly everything we do, we have eroded the conditions under which we can regard our fellow citizens as our equals. As a result, democracy is swiftly devolving.</p>
<p>The proper response is to participate in cooperative endeavors in which partisan identity is irrelevant. Activities of this kind are needed, not because we must be perpetually reaching across our political divides, but rather because if we are to perform well as democratic citizens, we need to see in our fellow citizens something beyond partisan affiliation, something like a common quest to live a valuable life.</p>
<p>In short, democracy needs us to acknowledge that there's more to our shared life than politics. This acknowledgement does not neutralize the conflict at the heart of democratic citizenship — we still must bear the burden of our fellow citizens' equality. But it does help us to navigate that conflict in a way that is consistent with a commitment to a robustly democratic society.</p>
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"Thanksgiving provides a setting in which we can do more than struggle to suppress our political differences," argues Robert Talisse.
Civility & Thanksgiving Part 1: Why you should leave politics off the menu
Nov 27 2019
Talisse is a philosophy professor at Vanderbilt University.
An internet search for "surviving Thanksgiving politics" returns more than 10 million results. The major news venues have run autumn columns on navigating political debate over Thanksgiving dinner for several years running. The advice offered is sensible: Remain calm, listen respectfully, seek common ground and so on.
But many of the most recent columns offer an additional tip. Noting that Donald Trump's presidency might have made Thanksgiving civility impossible, they suggest skipping the holiday altogether.
Something strange is afoot when America turns to journalists for advice in surviving a holiday devoted nearly entirely to eating good food. Politics has rendered Thanksgiving something to be dreaded. Given the purpose of the holiday, this is tragic. Can anything be done to save Thanksgiving from our partisan divisions?
<p>One strategy is to adopt the adage instructing us to avoid discussing politics over dinner. This rule is rooted in the observation that differences of political opinion quickly escalate into hostility. Better, then, that they be suppressed. </p>
<p><p style="text-align: center;" id="sufn"><a style="font-weight: bold;margin:40px auto;font-size:2rem" href="https://thefulcrum.us/st/newsletters">Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter </a></p></p><p>There is much to recommend this policy. Yet not everyone holds to the view that politeness outranks the business of democratic citizenship. Some relatives might feel strongly that democracy is a full-time endeavor and so the struggle for decent politics must override traditional manners. According to them, however valuable a congenial holiday might be, justice is a far more important goal.</p>
<p>If instituted strictly for the sake of ensuring peace, the "no politics over dinner" policy compels only those who see peace as especially valuable. When Thanksgiving also involves relatives who regard politics as more important than familial harmony, the policy amounts to unilateral disarmament. That typically means that your drunk uncle gets to hold forth unopposed. One might just as well cancel.</p>
<p>Thus, whatever its merits may be, the "no politics over dinner" policy requires backup from considerations weightier than the desirability of a placid holiday feast. </p>
<p>Such considerations are found in the ideal of democracy itself. Democracy is many things, but it is centrally the ideal of self-government among political equals. The key to the democratic ideal is that citizens are empowered to hold their government and their fellow citizens accountable. This supplies an explanation of why political disputes escalate so frequently: There will always be disagreements among equal citizens. When interacting in the role of citizen, no one is another's subordinate or supervisor. Consequently, no one gets to declare for oneself the last word.</p>
<p>However, we do not live together solely as citizens. We are also one another's spouses, siblings, parents, friends, neighbors and co-workers. These nonpolitical relationships carry their own responsibilities and expectations. What is more, they are not always equal. In particular, families, workplaces and congregations are notorious for being hierarchically organized. When these hierarchies are nonetheless consistent with participants' status as equal citizens, they are generally unobjectionable.</p>
<p>Therein lies the rub. Under certain circumstances the dynamics governing our nonpolitical relationships obstruct our ability to interact as equal citizens. More specifically, there are settings where the relationships among family members preclude the kind of engagement in which all participants have equal standing. In that case the kind of discussion that is appropriate among democratic citizens cannot be enacted.</p>
<p>Hence the "no politics over dinner" policy finds a democratic rationale. Gatherings of extended family invoke complex relations, some of which involve forms of dependency and deference that run counter to our standing as equal citizens. When political debate is initiated under such conditions, it fails to be properly democratic because it fails to be debate among political equals. Put otherwise, in a democracy, political discussion should be engaged in spaces where participants can interact as equals. But Thanksgiving is a setting for interacting in our roles as relatives. The dynamics associated with familial relations frequently overcome the norms appropriate for individuals interacting as citizens. Consequently, even if we regard the pursuit of a more perfect democracy as imperative, we nonetheless should avoid political debate over Thanksgiving dinner. This is not simply for the sake of politeness, but also because Thanksgiving dinner is not a setting for properly democratic debate to begin with.</p>
<p>My new book,<a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/overdoing-democracy-9780190924195?cc=us&lang=en&" target="_blank"> "Overdoing Democracy: Why We Must Put Politics in its Place</a>," argues it is crucial — even as we ardently strive for a more perfect democracy — for us not to lose sight of the proper place of politics in our lives. To put the point crudely, when all of our social interactions are organized around political allegiances, we erode the capacities we need to perform well as democratic citizens. It might sound paradoxical, but if we want to improve democracy, we sometimes need to attend to other things. Overdoing democracy is democracy's undoing.</p>
<p>I mention this because none of the columns devoted to surviving Thanksgiving politics that I've seen makes the suggestion that political debate should be avoided because the dinner serves a social purpose more important than the travails of contemporary politics. This is notable because, after all, the whole point of democracy is to enable us to live lives devoted to things other than politics. Indeed, the promise of lives dedicated to projects other than democracy itself is what makes democracy so precious. Thanksgiving provides a setting in which we can do more than struggle to suppress our political differences. We can rise above them. </p>
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"To keep American democracy healthy, people all across the country will have to do more than engage with different ideas online," writes Robert B. Talisse.
Partisan divide creates different Americas, separate lives
Sep 23 2019
Talisse is a philosophy professor at Vanderbilt University.
When people try to explain why the United States is so politically polarized now, they frequently refer to the concept of "echo chambers."
That's the idea that people on social media interact only with like-minded people, reinforcing each other's beliefs. When people don't encounter competing ideas, the argument goes, they become less willing to cooperate with political opponents.
The problem goes beyond the online world. In my new book, " Overdoing Democracy: Why We Must Put Politics in its Place," I explain that in the United States, liberals and conservatives do not only differ politically.
They also live separate lives in the physical world.
<p>
This phenomenon was first documented in journalist Bill Bishop's 2004 book "
<a href="http://www.thebigsort.com/home" target="_blank">The Big Sort</a>." Scholars have found it <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/24694452.2016.1191991" target="_blank">has persisted into more recent years</a> as well.
</p><p>
It turns out that people's physical communities, surroundings and lifestyles can be their own form of an echo chamber. This separation is so complete that it includes not only the communities and neighborhoods where people live, but also where people shop and what brands they buy, what sort of work they do, where they worship, what sorts of vacations they take and even how they decorate their homes.
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It's common knowledge that liberals and conservatives live in different places. After all, the idea of
<a href="https://blogs.cfainstitute.org/investor/2018/03/13/red-states-blue-states-two-economies-one-nation/" target="_blank">"red states" and "blue states"</a> is based in reality. But preferences are much more local than that.
</p><p>
Liberals and conservatives in the U.S. systematically favor different kinds of
<a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1532673X08318589" target="_blank">physical environments</a>. Even when they live in regions that might overall appear more politically mixed, <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/06/13/big-houses-art-museums-and-in-laws-how-the-most-ideologically-polarized-americans-live-different-lives/" target="_blank">liberals prefer walkable and ethnically diverse communities</a>, while conservatives gravitate toward <a href="https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/republicans-democrats-cities/" target="_blank">areas with larger houses and more private land</a>.
</p><p>
Different preferences govern the most personal surroundings: One study shows that liberals and conservatives
<a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/20447169?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents" target="_blank">decorate their homes differently</a>. Clocks and flags for conservatives, art and maps for liberals. According to the same research, they also fashion different workspaces. Conservatives favor neater and more orderly spaces, while liberals tend to work in offices that are less organized and more colorful.
</p><p>
When it comes to commerce, the contrasting stereotypes are familiar: Walmart or Target? Starbucks or Dunkin? Hybrid or pickup? Football or fútbol? Whole Foods or Kroger? Beyoncé or Toby Keith? A broad body of research suggests that these references to consumer habits are effective representatives of political views.
</p><p>
Political opponents tend to
<a href="https://morningconsult.com/2018/01/25/walmart-vs-target-a-political-divide-among-shoppers/" target="_blank">shop at different stores</a>, with conservatives at Walmart and liberals at Target. Shoppers favor <a href="https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/11/02/brands-preferred-democrats-republicans-221912" target="_blank">different brands</a> of home coffeemaker, pet food and jeans depending on their political preferences.Liberals and conservatives even view the very act of shopping differently. One experiment found that conservatives <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jcr/ucy004" target="_blank">seek to purchase items that signal their status</a> within a social hierarchy, such as luxury and success, while liberals seek out purchases that will establish their individuality and distinctness.
</p><p>
Similar dynamics appear in other spheres of Americans' daily lives. Over the past two decades, the American workplace, once heralded as a
<a href="http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2508.2006.00376.x" target="_blank">site of cross-partisan cooperation</a>, has become more politically homogeneous.
</p><p>
<a href="https://academic.oup.com/jla/article/8/2/277/2502548" target="_blank">Certain professions</a> now tend to skew decidedly left or right. Lawyers, journalists and professors tend to skew liberal, whereas conservatives are prevalent in finance and medicine.
</p><p>
Liberals and conservatives live in
<a href="https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/698929?mobileUi=0&" target="_blank">different kinds of family groups</a>. Liberals get <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1995822" target="_blank">married later in life and have fewer children</a>. Data even show that people tend to be more <a href="https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/faculty-research/publications/political-homophily-social-relationships-evidence-online-dating" target="_blank">romantically interested in those who share their political affliation</a>, rather than people who don't. In fact, Americans are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/poq/nfs038" target="_blank">more disapproving of cross-partisan relationships</a> than they are of interracial ones.
</p><p>
Liberals and conservatives worship in
<a href="https://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/political-ideology/" target="_blank">different congregations</a>; conservatives tend toward evangelical Christianity, while liberals are more diverse in their faith. And they take <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/meet-the-press/liberals-conservatives-even-vacation-differently-n1027161" target="_blank">different kinds of vacations</a>. Liberals more often vacation abroad and spend more time at beaches than conservatives, who tend to travel by car to spots where they can fish and play golf.
</p><p>
In ways that are not always conscious, more and more personal choices and characteristics are regarded by citizens as
<a href="https://pcl.stanford.edu/research/2015/iyengar-ajps-group-polarization.pdf" target="_blank">expressing partisan allegiances</a>. Carrying a tote bag, wearing yoga pants, shopping at Walmart, driving a pickup truck are all ways of signaling one's political affiliation. This in turn reinforces the fact that liberals and conservatives inhabit different social worlds, each becoming at once <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12487" target="_blank">increasingly homogeneous within their groups and more intensely hostile toward the other</a>.
</p><p>
Finding common ground in such a divided country will require more than one commonly offered solution, that people
<a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/independentminds/long-reads/matthew-syed-book-review-rebel-ideas-social-networks-a9097246.html" target="_blank">diversify their news sources</a>. With political disputes magnified and amplified by disparate, even opposing, ways of life, it's harder to see political rivals as fellow citizens.
</p><p>
Rather, they appear to be
<a href="https://www.people-press.org/2016/06/22/partisanship-and-political-animosity-in-2016/" target="_blank">obstacles and threats</a>. Encounters with these opposing forces breed <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1804840115" target="_blank">fear and hostility</a>, not comfort and familiarity.
</p><p>
With citizens sorted into physical and digital partisan enclaves, the Democratic and Republican parties find it rewarding to accentuate their differences from each other. Unwillingness to compromise or cooperate with the other side becomes a sign of integrity, leaving the business of politics undone.
</p><p>
To keep American democracy healthy, people all across the country will have to do more than engage with different ideas online. They'll need to find shared interests and goals despite their persistent, and often deep, differences. The solution, it seems to me, is to find things to do together that are in no way political. But in a world where nearly everything – even carrying tote bag or driving a pickup – is an expression of one's politics, that may be easier said than done.
</p><p>
This article is republished from <a href="http://theconversation.com/" target="_blank">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. <a href="https://theconversation.com/partisan-divide-creates-different-americas-separate-lives-122925" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Read the original article.</a>
</p><p>
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