Discussion Group Report

With the approach of a new presidential election, Americans remain frustrated with politics and unhappy with the alternatives the parties have to offer. "Our public life is rife with discontent," says Michael J. Sandel, author of "America's Search for a New Public Philosophy," in the March Atlantic Monthly. Democrats say this situation is due to the insecurity of jobs in the global economy, and Republicans respond that it is a result of unhappiness with big government. But the debate does not speak to the two concerns at the heart of our discontent. One is the fear that, individually and collectively, we are losing control of the forces that govern our lives; and the other is the sense that, from family to neighborhood to nation, the moral fabric of community is unraveling all around us.

The central idea of the public philosophy by which we live is that freedom consists in our capacity to choose our ends for ourselves. Government should not affirm any particular conception of the good life; instead it should provide a neutral framework of rights within which people can choose their own values and ends. This liberal vision of freedom, having arrived on the scene only during the past half-century, has replaced the previously prevalent one, the republican political theory, the idea that liberty depends on sharing self-government. The republican theory involves deliberating with fellow citizens about the common good and helping shape the destiny of the political community. But such deliberation requires more than the capacity to choose one's ends and to respect others' rights to do the same; it requires that citizens possess certain civic virtues such as a knowledge of public affairs, a sense of belonging, a concern for the whole, a moral bond with the community. It means that politics cannot be neutral towards the values and ends its citizens espouse. It requires a formative politics that cultivates the qualities of character that self-government requires.

Both these understandings of freedom have been present throughout American political life, but in changing measure and relative importance. The decline in interest in cultivating civic virtues sheds light on our present discontent. Despite its appeal, the liberal vision lacks the civic resources to sustain self-government. Our present public philosophy "cannot secure the liberty it promises because it cannot inspire the sense of community and civic engagement that liberty requires."

Where political discourse lacks moral resonance, the yearning for a public life of larger meaning finds undesirable expression. The Christian Coalition and similar groups seek to clothe the naked public square with narrow, intolerant moralisms. Fundamentalists rush in where liberals fear to tread. Despite the expansion of rights in recent decades, Americans find to their frustration that they are losing control of the forces that govern their lives. Even as we think and act as freely choosing, independent selves, we confront a world governed by impersonal structures of power that defy our understanding and control.

Self-government today requires a multiplicity of settings, from neighborhoods, to nations, to the world as a whole. It requires citizens who can abide the ambiguity associated with divided sovereignty, who can think and act as multiple situated selves. The civic resources we need to master these forces are still to be found in the places and stories, memories and meanings, incidents, and identities, that situate us in the world and give our lives their moral particularity. The task now is to cultivate these resources, to repair the civic life on which democracy depends.

It is impossible to do justice in a brief summary to the insightful comments I hear in our study group discussions. Some conclusions of the group at this month's session follow: Humanists don't feel as much difficulty relative to the current political dissatisfaction as some others because in their world view they relate to all human beings. Perhaps some common goals and values such as honesty, justice, and compassion would be helpful if they are viewed in a framework of situational ethics. If people are to have enough muscle to fight back against the vast power structures that threaten self-governance, they will need to do more reading and thinking to get informed and then vote. Also, we are asking the wrong questions.

The main problems in the controversy in the Utah legislature this year over support groups for homosexuals in the public schools were ignorance and too much focus on getting to the Celestial Kingdom. Nevertheless, it did help build awareness of the need to show understanding towards groups that are different from the majority. The newly organized Seagull Forum can help counteract the intolerance promoted by the Eagle Forum.