The Communitarian Model of Citizenship

1
The Communitarian Model of Citizenship
2
Any questions about the last lecture?
3
Quiz

• Etzioni wants to restore balance between what two
  things?

4
Recall week 2

• What are the three characteristics of social
  liberalism that I suggested would be the target
  of criticism by other schools of thought?
• passive approach to citizenship as status
• relative emphasis on state welfare
• aligns autonomy with individualism

5
Communitarians will target

• all three characteristics, especially 3 and 1!

6
Beyond Left and Right

• Etzioni (1996, 7) push contemporary political
  debates about citizenship and social provisioning
  beyond the intellectual shackles of the
  left/right ideological divide.
• Who does this sound like?

7
Individualists vs. Order enforcers

• 1996, 7
• Individualists
• libertarians,
• liberals,
• laissez-faire conservatives, and
• civil libertarians
• All focus on the need for autonomy

8
Individualists vs. Order enforcers

• 1996, 7
• Order enforcers
• Social conservatives
• Relatively less concerned with autonomy,
  focusing more on the need to shore up the moral
  order and use the state to do so if necessary.

9
Relatively new term but long history

• Communitarianism draws on the ideas of
• Aristotle,
• Thomas Aquinas,
• St. Augustine,
• Burke and
• Hegel,
• Etzioni 1996, 39 reasserts communitarian ideas
  and ideals that have been part of our
  intellectual heritage for a long time, but which
  have been overshadowed by the rise of egoist
  aspirations.

10
Common denominator

• a strong opposition to the assumptions about
  autonomy present in social liberalism.

11
Recall Rawlss assumption of mutual disinterest

• Rawls 13, 127
• Negotiators have no relations premised (at least
  in part) on affection or other sentiments that
  may motivate individuals to prioritize
  satisfaction of the pursuits of others on par, if
  not above, their own.
• Implication?
• The autonomous agent in the original position is
  an entirely self-sufficient, rights-claiming
  individual.

12
Communitarian Punch line

• Social liberals and others neglect the social
  nature of individual agency.
• They fail to acknowledge adequately the
  interdependence that underpins individual
  autonomy.
• ? whereas social liberalism advances the politics
  of rights, communitarianism responds by urging
  renewed interest in the politics of the common
  good.

13
Communitarianism is reactionary

• Etzioni (1996, 40) reacts to the excesses of
  egoism and the evolution of the so-called me
  generation that is allegedly less mindful of
  moral order, social tradition and custom.
• Laments a generation that espouses commitments to
  dutiless rights.

14
A corrective to excessive individualism (1996,
40).

• The correction does not pose a challenge to
  specific entitlements or to the idea of rights
  more generally.
• Rather communitarianism seeks to restore balance
  to an era of overheated individualism.

15
Etzionis remedy

• 1996, 42
• a temporary moratorium on the minting of new
  rights in order to restore balance between
  individual autonomy and obligation to communal
  order, rather than maximize one over the other.

16
Not just re-emphasizing paid work duties

• Balance demands far more.
• Requires renewed commitment by every citizen to
  nurture the social preconditions for individual
  rights.
• Etzioni (1996, 43)
• paying taxes
• serving in neighbourhood crime watches
• attending to their children
• caring for their elders.
• No government alone can provide the needed
  services.

17
What does the communitarian mean about social
preconditions for autonomy?

• Wasnt that precisely what social liberals were
  on about in the first place in talking about
  social citizenship?
• What our working definition of social
  citizenship?
• Dont Rawls and Marshall already have that
  covered?

18
Communitarians want to go deeper when
investigating social preconditions

• They want to query liberal assumptions about the
  relationship between autonomy and atomism
• Enter Charles Taylor (1992) first published in
  1979
• FYI Taylor resists the term communitarianism

19
Atomism

• Taylor used term loosely to characterize theories
  that
• employ a vision of society as in some sense
  constituted by individuals for the fulfilment of
  ends which were primarily individual (29).
• assert the primacy of individual rights (30).
• affirm the self-sufficiency of man sic alone,
  outside of a polis/community (32).
• synonym for individualism?

20
Assert primacy of rights if

• Taylor, 30
• take as the fundamental principle of their
  political theory the ascription of certain rights
  to individuals unconditionally
• But deny the same status to a principle of
  belonging or obligation.

21
What is a principle of belonging?

• Taylor, 30
• one that states our obligation as men sic
• to belong to a society of a certain type, or
• to obey authority a certain type.

22
Treating individual rights as starting point for
theory has tremendous appeal today

• Taylor, 31
• But it was not always so
• The very idea of starting an argument shoe
  foundation was the rights of the individual would
  have been strange and puzzlingabout as puzzling
  as if I were to start with the premiss that the
  Queen rules by divine right.

23
Why does the primacy of rights assumption hold
such appeal?

• Taylor, 31
• Because of the hold that atomism has on all of us.

24
Communitarian response

• Taylors punch line, p. 32
• Human beings are social animals to borrow a
  phrase from Aristotle.
• Man is a social animal, indeed a political
  animal, because he is not self-sufficient alone,
  and in an important sense is not self sufficient
  outside a polis.

25
Taylor step 1.

• 34 Take individualist theories on their own
  terms
• these theories give absolutely central
  importance to the freedom to choose ones own
  mode of life, when defining what is properly
  human.

26
Taylor step 2.

• 35 Highlight implication of individualist
  theories primary commitment
• By exalting choice or self-determining freedom
  as the defining human capacity, the theories
• demand that we become beings capable of choice,
• that we rise to the level of
  self-consciousness and autonomy where we can
  exercise choice.
• that we not be fettered by fear, sloth,
  ignorance, or superstition in some code imposed
  by tradition, society, or fate which tells us
  what choices we should make.

27
Taylor step 3.

• 35 highlight second implication the doctrine
  of the primacy of rights has to be concerned with
  the human social condition because.
• It is possible to imagine that human beings may
  not be self-sufficient in terms of their ability
  to develop the capacity for meaningful choice of
  the sort that individualists prescribe.
• The doctrine is at risk if it can be shown that
  human beings cannot develop their potential for
  choice outside of certain kinds of societies.

28
Taylor step 4 the social thesis.

• 35 state intent to develop argument that shows
  individuals cannot develop their potential for
  meaningful choice outside of certain societies.
• Make explicit if he can convince us of this,
  then he supplies proof that we ought to belong to
  or sustain society of this kind.
• ? shows us that we are implicitly committed to
  a an obligation to belong, one that is as
  fundamental as our assertion of rights.

29
Taylor step 5.

• 35 tell us why
• if he can convince us of this argument, then he
  supplies proof that we ought to belong to or
  sustain society of the kind that is necessary to
  cultivate the capacity for meaningful choice.
• ? shows us that those who value freedom of
  choice are implicitly committed to a an
  obligation to belong, one that is as fundamental
  as our assertion of rights.

30
Taylor step 6.

• 39 identify key assumption in his argt. that
  individuals cannot develop their potential for
  choice outside of a polis
• Our theory is prioritizing something about human
  nature of which we are assured by simply being
  alive.
• -the characteristic has to be developed and
  can fail to be developed!

31
Taylor step 7.

• 39-40 acknowledge not everyone has thought this
• Hobbes defined individuals as human beings that
  desire, that feel pain and pleasure.

32
Taylor step 8.

• 40 identify implication of Hobbess assumption
• for beings that desire, feel pain and pleasure,
  the most important rights are
• right to life
• right to desire-fulfillment
• right to freedom from pain

33
Taylor step 9.

• 40 assert these really arent the rights that
  most interest those who assert the primacy of
  rights
• They are more interested in asserting the right
  of freedom to
• choose, rather than accept, life plans
• dispose of possessions according to values that
  are not imposed
• form ones own convictions
• act on those convictions, within reason
• And these are capacities that we must develop
  and we can only do so in societies of a certain
  kind

34
Taylor step 10.

• 42 tell us what he doesnt mean
• He isnt just saying that we need to grow up in
  families
• that we need to be nurtured as children
• that we flourish as adults only in relationships
  with others
• This is all true but has nothing to do with the
  obligation to belong in a political society.

35
Taylor step 11.

• 43 point out to us that
• the ability to conceive of alternatives,
  determine what we want from evaluating between
  alternatives, and selecting what values will
  command our allegiance is not available to
  someone
• Whose life horizons are so narrow that he can
  conceive only one way of life.
• Who is riveted by fear of the unknown to one
  familiar life-form.
• Who has been so formed in suspicion and hate of
  outsiders that he can never put himself in their
  place.
• .

36
Taylor step 12.

• 43-44 point out to us that
• individuals surely learn about some life course
  options in our own single family
• But it takes an entire civilization to articulate
  a really rich range of options, that include art,
  philosophy, theology, science, commerce, social
  organizations, etc.

37
Taylor step 13.

• 44 argue that not just any civilization will
  do.
• We live in a world in which there is public
  debate about moral and political questions and
  other basic issues. We constantly forget how
  remarkable that is, how it did not have to be so,
  and may one day no longer be so.
• What would happen to our capacity to be free
  agents if this debate should die away?

38
Taylor step 14.

• 44-46 be explicit about what kind of
  civilization is required.
• liberal civilization of the sort we identify
  imperfectly with modern democracies

39
Taylor step 15.

• 47 state his conclusion, part a)
• since the free individual can only maintain his
  identity within a society/culture of a certain
  kind, he has to be concerned about the shape of
  this society/culture as a whole.
• ie. Whether s/he acknowledges it or not, it is
  important to the individual that certain
  activities and institutions flourish in society.
  
• ? S/he has an obligation to contribute to the
  ongoing success of these activities/institutions
  an obligation to belong.

40
Taylor step 16.

• 47 state his conclusion, part b)
• We exercise a fuller freedom if we can help
  determine the shape of this society and culture
  through discharging our obligations to nurture
  the institutions/activities necessary for freedom.

41
Bitter pill for Social Liberals to swallow

• The communitarian critique charges that social
  liberals fail to fully contemplate the
  preconditions for liberty, despite the fact that
  they prioritize these conditions in their own
  work on social citizenship.

42
Full membership means?

• Whereas the American Express model emphasizes
  access to the range of community entitlements as
  the condition for full membership status
• the communitarian adds that full membership
  demands specific activities on the part of the
  citizen.
• We are full members of a society only if we
  discharge sufficiently the social obligations
  necessary to sustain the community structures,
  values and social attachments that make possible
  our liberty.

43
Voluntary order Etzioni 1996, 12-13

• Ideally, citizens would voluntarily perform the
  general duty of care they owe society.
• We can sustain voluntary compliance through
  normative means, such as moral education that
  will engender a shared set of core values.
• This education ? the tension between ones
  preferences and ones social commitments can be
  reduced by increasing the realm of duties one
  affirms as moral responsibilitiesnot the realm
  of duties that are forcibly imposed but the realm
  of responsibilities one believes one should
  discharge and that one believes one is fairly
  called upon to assume (ibid., 12).

44
Use state power to enforce/entice order when
necessary Etzioni 1993, 82-85

• Etzioni agrees that it may be insufficient to
  express unequivocally societys moral opinion.
• Recommends economic sanctions to require citizens
  to discharge responsibilities
• exact financial penalty if fail to pay child
  support
• offer incentives that would make staying married
  and attending to ones children more attractive.

45
Small group discussions

• What do you make of Taylors social thesis the
  claim that those who prioritize freedom have an
  obligation to belong and sustain the
  institutions/activities necessary for freedom?

46
Change in Office hours

• Thursdays
• No longer 1-2.
• Now 3-4 on Thurs.
• Still have Monday for the hour following class.
  Plus by appointment, especially Mon, Wed and
  Thurs.