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A Communitarian Letter #6 In this Letter: Happy Christmas? How Patriotic is the Patriot Act? Sovereignty as Responsibility I Found a Voice How We Die Feedback from A Communitarian Letter #5 Communitarian Calendar
Don’t Neuter Christmas For once the Christian Right has come up with a good idea: let’s put Christ back into Christmas! If this happens, though Jewish, I will be all too happy to honor the day (although not celebrate it myself, of course), salute those who do, and strongly support their right to celebrate this noble occasion in the public spaces. (Assuming that when Hanukah comes, and other major religions’ holy days, they will get the same consideration.) Indeed, I fully appreciate the dismay of those who find a neutered Christmas offensive. Thus renaming Christmas trees “holiday trees” and changing Santa Claus to Father Snow is plain silly. These multi-culturally correct names, in effect have root in no culture, and fool no one. A nativity scene is a Christian display, even if you call it “historical dramatization” and a star that crowns a Christmas tree is not a mere ornament, whatever its artistic merit. I see no reason to try to empty these symbols of their religious content. Why cannot I (and other non-Christians) fully respect the holi-days of other people? You may say that by putting these displays in public spaces makes it seem as if we are all worshipping at their feet. But this is hardly so. It merely shows that this time of the year is a major part of the community’s turn to express itself in the public realm. Those who wish to visit, admire, contribute or sing along are welcome, as are those who plan to stay home. Nor is it necessary to display at the same time all other religious symbols and icons, so that town halls and public squares will look like some mindless cafeteria of holidays. Each can have their turn. Thus, instead of neutralizing Christmas, we can help revitalize all major holidays. (I say major, because another way of pushing this whole matter ad absurdum, is to claim that if we display a nativity scene, a Menorah, Koranic calligraphy, and a Buddha, we must also show respect to the symbols of all other religions from fire Zoroastrians to those of satanic cults). Just as we do not feel compelled to allow every small splinter group a place in our elected bodies, so we can put some reasonable limit on the number of people who must adhere to a given body of belief before it gains a claim on public space and attention. Even secularists can get their day, as they do, for instance, on May 1st. But--and this a big But--to put Christ back into Christmas will take much more than calling the Christmas tree by the name it acquired many centuries ago, when the tradition was adopted from pagans; singing Silent Night and so on and so on. (I do have a hard time only with the demand of Bill O’Reilly of Fox TV, who demands that we stop wishing people ‘Happy Holidays’ and instead address them with ‘Merry Christmas.’ That, however, does cross a line. On one side there is the showing of respect and allowing full room to those whose turn has come to worship their way—the other, pretending that we are all of one faith. Anyhow, this is no way to greet my Rabbi.) What this would take, which none of the right wingers I tracked as much as mentioned this year, is throwing the money exchangers out of the temple, or to put it less metaphorically, de-commercializing Christmas. I, most sincerely, respect the Prince of Peace, for his non-violent teachings (and am happy at least for this time of the year to overlook other texts such as, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.”). In the same vein, I have the highest possible regard for the Christ who delivered the Sermon on the Mount; the one who bleeds for the dispossessed and the oppressed; and to whom giving means reaching out to the poor—not those with deep pockets giving to each other cashmere sweaters, golden tie clips and plasma TVs. And I do not see that Christ is celebrated by people who feel they must shop until they drop, max out their credit cards, and outdo each other with lavish feasts whose preparations exhaust them and leave little patience or energy for their family get-togethers. These kinds of celebrations are about as relevant to the true meaning of this holi-day as spending a day on the beach is to the 4th of July or picnicking is to Memorial Day. Holidays are the days we recommit ourselves to our values. However, just as we do not expect everyone to have the same beliefs (although we are keen to have some shared ones, including—mutual tolerance) we should not demand holidays so bleached that everyone can participate in everyone of them in the same manner. Some celebrations are those in which we stress that which joins us (e.g. national holidays such as Independence Day); others—what distinguishes us. Let the Christians have a true Christmas. For more discussion see Amitai Etzioni , We Are What We Celebrate (NYU University Press, 2005). How Patriotic Is the Patriot Act? Although there is a tendency to condemn the Patriot Act as a violation of civil rights or proclaim it essential to national security, our analysis shows that its various clauses differ a great deal from both viewpoints. Some parts are essential and quite mindful of civil rights (and not contested by anyone!) while others may well not be needed and are highly intrusive. For a detailed analysis, see our book How Patriotic is the Patriot Act?: Freedom Versus Security in the Age of Terrorism (available at 40% discount from our website). The book also provides a historical perspective on how liberty was lost in other democracies. To learn more about the book and order your discounted copy please click here.
Sovereignty as Responsibility
A new idea concerning the global community will hearten the friends of the United Nations; it already has made its way from intellectual and academic circles to those of heads of states, and it has been warmly shared by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan. Indeed it is referred to in the Outcome Document of the UN at the 2005 World Summit. The idea calls for a radical change in the way sovereignty has been perceived since the signing of the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648. Instead of viewing nations as independent agents, immune to interference in their internal affairs, the new definition of sovereignty treats it as conditional: a nation can maintain its sovereignty only if it meets its responsibilities to its citizens and the international community. Thus, a government that does not protect its people from ethnic cleansing, of the kind that occurred in Kosovo and Rwanda, or from mass starvation as found in Niger, would be considered a government that has forfeited its right to avoid intervention. The UN would be fully entitled to intervene in the internal affairs of that nation, a major departure from the UN Charter, which declares, “Nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorize the United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within the jurisdiction of any state.”
The idea that sovereignty should be treated henceforth as a responsibility rather than a right has been advanced not by some maverick pundit but by Annan’s commissioned high-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change. Furthermore, the new approach reflects an accumulation of profound changes in transnational moral precepts that started when, in response to the Holocaust, world leaders signed a convention in 1948 that legalized intervention to stop genocide. The grounds for intervention were further expanded when public opinion supported NATO’s interference in Serbia’s internal affairs to stop ethnic cleansing in Kosovo and when moral outrage followed the UN’s failures to stop the genocide in Rwanda and most recently, in Sudan. As a result, humanitarian interventions have become quite common, even when the genocide standard has not been met (e.g., Haiti, Liberia and the Congo). However, they have lacked an overarching legal doctrine that would justify them. Hence the current interest in sovereignty as responsibility. Whether the UN General Assembly will now support this new definition of sovereignty depends largely on whether three questions can be answered. First, how low should the threshold for intervention be set? Some diplomats, such as Francis Deng, a former representative of the secretary-general, favor intervention whenever states fail to ensure the security and “general welfare” of their citizens. Critics fear that such vague criteria could be used to justify intervention in practically all nations, at any given time. Second, who will decide that the time has come to interfere and provide the needed troops? The Security Council is well known for its unrepresentative composition and veto-carrying members, which leads it to favor humanitarian intervention in some countries, but not in others that act equally irresponsibly. Finally, a 2004 proposal in Foreign Affairs by Lee Feinstein and Anne-Marie Slaughter adds building or acquiring weapons of mass destruction to the list of irresponsible state behaviors. This would create a whole new set of conditions that justify intervention—a position that has been rejected by numerous nations. Unless these heavy matters are resolved, the idea of treating sovereignty as a responsibility rather than a near absolute right is likely to languish. This would be highly regrettable as the basic idea that nations ought to be good citizens of the international community and not just free agents is one whose time has come. The difficulties in working out the smaller print of the sovereignty as responsibility precept are precisely those that must be resolved if ‘international community’ is to turn from a vague catch phrase into a new global reality. Note: A longer version of this essay is being published in the Winter 2006 edition of Orbis. You can download the PDF of that version by clicking HERE. I found a voice
AE: In the last newsletter, issued on November 22 2005, I wrote that “You do not have to be a liberal, a progressive, or anything in particular to feel outrage about the fact that people who worked all their lives, paid taxes, did volunteer work, raised their children—in short, who are good, upstanding members of the community—get shafted once they retire.” I asked “where is the voice” that will cry out on behalf of American workers? Now for the good of the workers, we need to strengthen the rules governing private pensions, as well. You know, most Americans work for private companies that offer traditional pensions. And most companies, like this one, are fulfilling their obligations to their employees and their retirees. But too many companies are not putting away the cash they need to fund the retirement promises they're making to their employees. In other words, they're saying, we'll make sure you got a retirement system, but they're not funding it. Therefore, when -- if the company were to get into financial trouble and go bankrupt, their failure to live up to their promises, their failure to fund their pensions will leave retirees with pension checks that have been slashed. Now, the federal government insures these pensions, and that means that if more and more companies fail to meet their responsibilities, the federal government might have to step in and bail them out. In that case, it would not only be the retirees who are harmed by the companies not fulfilling their obligations, but it can mean the taxpayers, as well. Every American has an interest in seeing to it that this system gets fixed. So whether you're a worker at a company with an under-funded pension, or a taxpayer, it's what I want you to understand. In our society, we've had some companies -- big companies go bankrupt, and workers at those companies know what I'm talking about. And so my message to corporate America is: You need to fulfill your promises. When you say to a worker, this is what they're going to get when they retire, you better put enough money in the account to make sure the worker gets that which you said. The government's current pension rules are confusing and misleading -- they allow companies to technically play by the rules and yet still not fund the promises they've made to their employees. And so Congress needs to straighten up these rules so that there's no confusion, so that everybody understands what I just said. I said, if you make a promise to a worker, you put enough money in the account to fulfill that promise. So we proposed reforms to the pension rules that say this, that say that companies must accurately measure and report the financial status of their pension plans to make sure they're fulfilling the promises they make. This reform plan would give companies that under- fund their pensions seven years to catch up. That seems reasonable to me. We're going to give you a little time to do what you said you're going to do, but you're going to do what you said you're going to do. But some in Congress have said this reform is too tough, or some may be on the outskirts of Congress who have said the reform is too tough. And not only that, they want to weaken the current law even further. I believe that if you put in your hours, your pension should be there for you when you retire. Our workers need reform that significantly improves funding for these private pension plans, not a piece of legislation that weakens it. And I'm not going to sign a bill that weakens pension funding for the American workers. AE: These words were spoken by President Bush on December 5, 2005 at a speech in North Carolina. Frankly, I expected these statements to come from people who usually claim that they speak for and care for the American workers.
How We Die
When my mother-in-law could not take it any more (her cancer had turned her leg into one huge sore, and her pain was unbearable), my wife reluctantly called in a physician who was also a family friend. Dr. L. explained that it was against the law for him to help my mother-in-law, who had battled melanoma for 13 months with a quiet dignity, to end her life. He could, though, leave in her room a syringe filled with a sizable dosage of morphine and teach her how to inject herself. His only request was that one of us would remove the syringe after her death and before we called the funeral home, which was sure to ask the police to certify that the death was due to natural causes.
Feedback from A Communitarian Letter #5
Rick Lempert of the University of Michigan wrote in response to my following commment:
AE: Moreover, most red people have some blue views and beliefs, and most blue people are far from fully blue. Elections, which force them to reduce all subtleties and nuances to one vote, make them look like one-dimensional creatures. RL: Exactly right on diversity within states, even the reddest and bluest have substantial numbers of people of the opposite political persuasion. Problems become serious, however, when our electoral institutions, gerrymandering, and party discipline mean that those elected from these states do not represent the diversity of views within their states or districts and seek intermediate positions, but instead move to the extremes, as was recently seen in the Republican move to force a vote on an immediate pullout from Iraq in response to a far more nuanced proposal from a Democrat and the in the bitterness on both sides of the ensuing debate. Hardly any voice represented the diversity of views among those they nominally represented. AE: In recent years various international powers have been trying to force people of different ethnic backgrounds to live together as one nation—including people who would rather kill and be killed than live with people whom they detest. This is the case in Bosnia and Kosovo. Despite huge expenditures, international pressure and commitment of troops, the efforts to make these countries into a community of communities is a screaming failure. One cannot but wonder if in these cases a negotiated ethnic divorce is not to be preferred? Moreover, one cannot help but wonder if perhaps three Iraqs would be better than one? RL: These points are worth considering; contrast the situation of the Czech Republic and Slovakia with the situation in Iraq, the Balkans or some African countries. Problems seem especially likely when national boundaries were artificially imposed by outsiders and maintained for most of their existence by the colonial presence rather than indigenous ties. On the other hand, don't forget that Sarajevo was a multi-ethnic city during the time of the Yugoslav Republic in which people lived in peace with each other, worked together and intermarried before the law. That too may have been a forced union but it was one which worked very well. Closer to home the forcible racial integration of the armed forces not only worked well but worked better than integration in some settings where it was much harder to force it. I have no solutions but think it important to point out that it requires more than natural divisions to create a society so divided that one cannot imagine it coming together. Diversity is not enough to create implacable hostility and perhaps we (meaning mainly affected peoples) can do something even in situations like the Balkans or Iraq to keep peace without fragmentation.
AE: ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, is much more effective largely because it is a supranational body. Decisions are made on the merit of the case by a board that is not composed of national representatives and largely driven by the true needs of the Internet. RL: Sounds good perhaps, but would we be saying the same thing had the Chinese controlled the internet with all domain names in Chinese characters or even if the French controlled the internet and domain names were all in French? Groups don't have to be motivated by anti-Americanism to think that a basic international infrastructure should be managed internationally. Suppose we recognized that the French could run the domain name system somewhat better than we come (after all the French care more about language) would we be willing to sacrifice some efficiency to be part of the managers and to have a system ore accountable to our interest? Would it mean we were anti-French if we sought to be part of the governance board? Also, calling the U.N. one of the most corrupt bodies in the world is extreme to say the least. We have often depended on its auspices and from the start have used it as an instrument of our foreign policy, and the U.N. has many important accomplishments to its name. We seem to complain of corruption only when we don't like directions in which it heads. Also, if the U.N. could regularly count on us paying our full dues on time maybe it would be easier for it to deal more effectively with its sometimes severe management problems. And regarding our continuing debate on Intelligent Design: RL: And why not teach the debate between astrology and astronomy on how the stars got where they are and their influence on our universe, or the debate on cold versus hot fusion. The reason is that these are not debates. One can teach about the debate in a civics class, maybe a religion class and certainly a course on modern culture because the existence of the debate speaks to issues important in all three subject matter areas, but there is simply no debate within science, except in the sense that a few people who call themselves scientists take a faith-based position on the issue and come up with a few arguments that 98% of scientists reject. ….The Rev. Tape writes of "brain washing." This is a pejorative for which one could easily substitute the word "instructing," for that is what is going on. And telling students the way the world works is what education is all about. It is not brain washing to explain that chemicals bond in a certain way … or to give a student who provides an answer different than the one taught a failing grade. It is the same for teaching that man evolved from other creatures; it is a scientific teaching - the best conclusion that those who have studied the issue scientifically can reach - and students taking science should know this. They also can question it, but within science, and if someone could show by advancing and testing alternative hypotheses to evolution, she would certainly be a Nobel prize winner.
On diversity within unity:
AE: Communitarians, at least this one, do not need to hold that a society must be homogeneous, that all its members must have the same ethnic origin, one set of values, etc. Societies can be, indeed many are, communities of communities. As long as loyalty to the overarching community (often the nation) trumps the loyalty to member communities on several key issues, such diversity within unity provides a very valid societal model. For more discussion see, of this, see our Diversity Within Unity Platform
However, all rules have some exceptions. In recent years various international powers have been trying to force people of difference ethnic backgrounds to live together as one nation, including people who rather kill and be killed than live with people who they detest. This is the case in Bosnia and Kosovo. Despite huge expenditures, international pressure and commitment of troops, the efforts to make these countries into community of communities is a screaming failure. One cannot be wonder if in these cases a negotiated ethnic divorce is not to be preferred? Moreover, one cannot help but wonder if perhaps three Iraqs would be better than one?
Harry Arye Shamir, President of R&DA Co. in Plymouth, Massachusetts writes: Our society is based on the idea that we are an assemblage of individuals, that we join forces with another to create the core family, and that everything else (extended family, ethnic group, religious group, social group, neighborhood, town, state, region, country) takes sequential place in the pyramid of loyalties. Not so other societies. On that I expect we agree. Will we Americanize the world and force it to adopt this pyramidal value system? Its roots are in Medieval northern Europe, not anywhere else. Most of the rest of the world adopted the Tribal system. Young societies stemming from this environment may still be in the "extended family" = "clan" phase, not yet tribal (e.g. the so-called "Palestinians", organized along "'Hamulah" lines). Ethnic nation-states are nothing but Tribes writ large. Can we, should we, dismantle this system that has worked since humanity began? I think not - neither can nor should. Even Africa should be given the chance of redefining its States and borders on the basis of ethnicity, were it possible to do so peacefully (dream on!). However impossible in general, certainly mutually agreeable territorial redistributions could be worked out. The same for such cases as the potential Kurdistan. Which brings up Iraq. As presently constituted it is a product of English imperialism. There is no need to adhere to that format unless in the interest of the populace of Iraq. As the Kurds and Shyia of north and south would be better off with semi-independence, the question is what value could the oil-less Sunni center contribute to the Iraqi commonwealth? At present the belligerents' reply is "nothing", so they try to grab a slice of the oil pie by force. Other than being quite unintelligent (force does not work in the long run, unless it is totally overwhelming), it is also counterproductive - the bitterness it sows will reap instability for generations to come. Can we, America, contribute by creating for the Sunnis an opportunity to represent a value to the Kurds and Shyia they cannot live without? Though nice a dream, I do not believe this is possible - they need to create that on their own. As long as America is in place the pain will continue and development stifled. Surgery might give the patient a fighting chance. Yes, American departure will engender an all out tri-cantonal war and physical separation of ethnicities with the India-Pakistan split as the model. However, beyond that things will stabilize, must stabilize if only due to the survivors' desire to continue living. For the US this generates the problem of where to relocate our armed forces, to continue "defending" our oil interests, having in 2002-3 decided to accede to Bin Laden's demand to evacuate Saudya and thereafter having relocated our army into the former Saddamland. May I suggest leasing the Sinai from Egypt? It might even alleviate the economic stress on both Gaza and Egypt. Another instance of ethnicities being central to a positive change could be in Israel-Palestine. I believe the areas of Gaza + West Bank (WeBaG) are simply too tiny to feed and keep the several million Palestinians there. Hence the area will for the rest of the foreseeable future be in constant strife, the Palestinian population pressure creating eruptions of incessant though perhaps sporadic violence. However, there is a solution: integration of WeBaG into Jordan (Hashemite or not), being as it is mostly Palestinian as well. Given economic development of the Jordanian East (depends on availability of water - a technical question that CAN be solved), it would draw from the overpopulation of WeBaG and create a situation amenable to management and control.
Sean Moore, public policy adviser for Gowling Lafleur Henderson LLP Ontario, writes: My compliments on another excellent letter. I so wish there was regular discourse like this in the Canadian context. Though many of the issues about which you and others write in the Communitarian Network Update have considerable relevance here, there are other issues (Canadian aboriginal policy, health care reform involving our single-payer system) that, I believe, would benefit from discussion applying communitarian sensibilities. Our discussions in this country are increasingly being hobbled and distorted by the sort of "wedge issue" tactics and "bumper--sticker" political discourse that our parties have so enthusiastically imported from the US. To the best of your knowledge, has there been a Canadian subset community of the Communitarian movement established? I'm not sure our American cousins would be all that interested in hearing the details of endless debate about this very favored country's relatively benign problems, so a Canadian sub-network might be an option to pursue, contributing as appropriate to your Communitarian Update. Communitarian Calendar SASE 2006: Constituting Globalization: Actors, Arenas and Outcomes Communitarian Workshop at SASE June 30, 9:00 AM– 12:00 PM. University of Trier, Germany Additional details will soon be posted at our Conferences and Events webpage [[INSERT LINK http://www.gwu.edu/~ccps/conferences.html]] Deadline for papers is January 15, 2005: to submit, click here [[INSERT LINK http://www.sase.org/conf2006/callforpapers/callforpapers.html]] The Communitarian Network will conduct a workshop on communitarian economics on June 30, just before the SASE meetings start. For more information, please visit www.communitariannetwork.org. The Moral Consequences of Economic Growth A Joint Center Event at the American Enterprise Institute Discussion with Benjamin Freidman (Harvard), Amitai Etzioni and Christopher DeMuth (AEI) Monday, January 9, 2005 Noon – 1:45 p.m. Wohlstetter Conference Center, Twelfth Floor, AEI 1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036
We welcome your thoughts and feedback to comnet@gwu.edu.
Sincerely, Amitai Etzioni
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