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Notes
from the Sixth Meeting: Reconsidering the Universalist
Message of the Enlightenment - 4 April 1998
Section
1 | Section 2
| Section
3 | Section
4
III.
Facets of Progress and Change Since the 18th Century
The
global society now stands at a junction of vast changes.
The nation-state system is fading as regionalism and
globalization emerge in the wake of dramatic waves of
economic liberalization and technological advances in
transportation and in electronic communications networks.
At the same time, there are many environmental threats
to human survival. The natural environment is under
siege as the world's pressure on natural resources mounts
to meet the demands of billions of people aspiring to
material well-being. In the light of these growing concerns,
as well as, a growing economic and cultural malaise
there is cause, as there was in the 17th century, to
re-examine the philosophical and theoretical foundations,
east and west, of modern society, economy, and government.
The process is perhaps more complex than it was for
the Enlightenment philosophers of centuries past.
Today,
in addition to government power, and some spiritual
power in terms of influence of churches, there is also
a very strong third power -- that of the private sector,
above all the productive and service industries, in
particular in finance and the media for information
dissemination. The nature and strength of this third
power were virtually unknown and unpredictable at the
time of the Enlightenment. Moreover, contemporary thinkers
must consider the world as a planetary whole, and they
are dealing with principles and concepts that are time-honored
and remain valid in their own psyches and that of the
modern world.
The
Enlightenment faith in progress, reason, and individualism
may have lost some of its persuasive power in the modern
West, but it remains a standard of inspiration for intellectual
and spiritual leaders throughout the world. It is inconceivable
that any modern project, including those in ecological
sciences, does not subscribe to the theses that the
human condition is improvable, that it is desirable
to find rational means to solve the world=s problems,
and that the dignity of each person as an individual
ought to be respected. Enlightenment as human awakening,
as the discovery of the human potential for global transformation,
and as the realization of the human desire to become
the measure and master of all things is still the most
influential moral discourse in the political culture
of the modern age; over decades it has been the unquestioned
assumption of the ruling minorities and cultural elites
of the developing countries, as well as the highly industrialized
nations. T.W.
While
the values of liberty, progress, and reason remain sacrosanct,
seeking to enrich the Enlightenment legacy prompts a
reexamination of the essence of its concepts in terms
of their ethical and spiritual contents. Many contemporary
applications and ideological appropriations of Enlightenment
ideas have serious flaws. The flaws make it difficult
to secure an all-embracing sense of social justice and
obstruct the adaptation of necessary measures to protect
the environment and insure a sustainable future for
all forms of good life. The task of reconsidering the
contemporary content and implications of these values
includes (1) reinterpretation, adaptation, or modification
of their political and economic applications for the
greater good of humanity, and (2) determining what values,
principles, and ideas need to be substantively augmented
or added in order to realize a fuller potential of the
philosophical promises of Enlightenment and of the human
spirit.
A
caveat to this endeavor is the recognition that most
of the frequently used concepts in our discourse of
the human condition are intrinsically abstract and thus
subject to a variety of interpretations B progress,
individualism, community, development, and the art of
living being some examples. Enlightenment mentality
is another example. The usefulness of these concepts
lies, however, not in the discovery of a singular "right
interpretation", but in the discussions and controversies
they provoke, leading to new insights and perspectives.
Gifts
of the Western Enlightenment
....the python of human forward motion and progress
was fed a pig in the 17th and 18th centuries in Europe.
The python has been spending the last three hundred
years metabolizing the pig. Most of us only know human
experience in this shape, a long thin part, a large
item in the middle, and the rest of the python. We have
been raised and educated to see the pig and the python
as the python.... Most of us as we teach and learn and
go about modern society almost do not look at the animal
because we know its shape. ...We may need to look at
the python again. ... At the present time, if we actually
looked at the python, we would see a more sleek animal,
stronger for having metabolized that pig. ... Modern
life is dramatically stronger for all of us because
of the Enlightenment. The wonderful moment we are at
right now is the moment of the python stronger and healthier
for having devoured the pig. We must notice what can
be done now that the python and the pig are one healthier
item. C.G.
The
metaphor of the python and the pig represents human
progress and achievement thanks to the revolution in
human thinking that was fostered by circumstances and
inspired by the ideas of certain 17th and 18th century
philosophers in Western Europe. The systematizing, rationalizing,
efficiency optimizing structures of modern times are
gifts of the Enlightenment.
The
scientific spirit that promoted the elimination of political,
moral, and legal injustices and the absurdities of earlier
ages inspired the notion of progress in almost every
sector of human life. This approach to human nature
and human affairs has been extraordinarily successful.
Throughout the world, though obviously more in some
regions than in others, human beings of all races and
genders have gained in autonomy and comfort. Societies
have become more complex, more open, more prosperous,
and better equipped with all sorts of tools, techniques
and machinery with which to broaden their choices and
experiences of human life. Ignorance and illiteracy
have recessed. Infant mortality has been dramatically
reduced and large numbers of comparable indicators are
available to prove that progress has been achieved in
terms of material comfort, individual autonomy, and
the mastering of technical knowledge.
Particularly
successful has been the instrumental rationality, symbolized
by the laboratory and the factory. The work on lens
grinding enabled the Dutch to place their ships in distant
harbors; often, faster, and more efficiently than the
British, Spanish, and Portuguese ships leaving Europe.
Lens grinding was perfected by the Dutch and then moved
into the hands of Descartes who had earlier announced
in a French gazette that these items would permit
humankind to look infinitely out into the universe and
infinitely into matter. Now we have reached a point
of being able to look into the human genome to find
that human beings share a huge percentage of DNA. This
field of scientific progress has given each human being
to the other as brothers and sisters in a way that was
scientifically negated for the last three hundred years
because of inadequate understanding and knowledge over
which humankind has now gained mastery.
Beyond
material progress: other dimensions of the Western Enlightenment
legacy
But is there more than scientific, technological and
economic progress to show as the heritage of the Enlightenment?
The answer is complex and in dispute. The philosophers
and scholars collectively credited for the Enlightenment
in the 17th and 18th centuries were realizing and adapting
to changes and possibilities facilitated by discoveries
in natural science and by the rise of an educated middle
class. Concomitantly, they were reacting to limitations
on individuals imposed during earlier periods of absolutism
and ignorance. They never claimed to have discovered
a coherent system of ultimate truth. The following questions
remained open: How is social progress to be defined?
Is it simply more things such as automobiles and electronic
gadgets? Or is there something else to it? A humanist
dimension — something deeper for which to use technology,
insight, and philosophy?
The
first secular critic of the Enlightenment, George Haman,
a contemporary and friend of Emmanuel Kant, expressed
fundamental concerns about the writings of his enlightened
peers. He saw the basic weakness of the Enlightenment
philosophy as its singular basis in science, reason,
and analysis. For Haman, this emphasis was an abstraction
from a much broader reality. For him, all abstractions
are, and must be in the end, arbitrary. Abstract reason
and science thus offer only a truncated view of human
possibilities. Moreover, they reduce the rich variety
of the universe to a bleak uniformity, "which itself
is a form of not facing reality, attempting to imprison
the universe in some prefabricated logical envelope
- an insult to creation." Subsequent scholars have
found the Enlightenment legacy just that: "an abstraction
from a much broader reality."
In
addition, notice should be taken of the social conditions
under which the Enlightenment occurred:
It should be stressed that the period of Enlightenment
was characterized by the presence of enlightened authoritarian
leaders who provided the means whereby it was possible
for true artists to carry on their creative activities
and for culture to be developed on a non-commercial
basis. Frederick the Great, for example, brought several
talented people to the court including Mozart and Bach
who wrote the theme for the huge fugue cycle that represents
still today the highest achievement of musical literature.
The work of these artists perhaps is the only living
legacy of that period. Art and culture are the monuments
which human civilization has left. I think now especially
of my children's culture. The absence of truly aristocratic
social groups with a tradition for supporting the arts
and culture will be a problem for the 21st century.
While it is imperative to fight hunger and poverty,
one should also be aware that when poverty is destroyed,
there is also the danger that wealth is destroyed. If
culture will be ruled by the common taste, then it will
decline. This century may bear this statement out, judging
from the vast amount of material dominating the television
screens today, and even the cinema. J. J.
Whether
the Enlightenment legacy has a singular rational/reason
dimension focused on the world as human sense perceives
it or whether it also has moral and spiritual dimensions
is unclear. As the legacy passed down through the centuries
via interpretation and omission into various ideological
embodiments, it is the instrumental rationality or pragmatic
dimension that gave expression to what most people understand
the Enlightenment to represent. Certainly other dimensions
influenced and were evident in the writings of many
of its original philosophers including Voltaire, Locke
and Smith.
Close
readings of the original writings provoke others to
suggest that the Enlightenment writings have indeed
many dimensions that have not been developed. The following
comments are illustrative:
For future security and well being, society must go
beyond instrumental rationality and into the philosophical
and spiritual aspects of the Enlightenment. Philosophy
of the Enlightenment, that which we would call right
reason cannot exist in this world without the instrumental
rationality aspect of the Enlightenment. Unfortunately,
the philosophical or right reason side of the Enlightenment
is being eclipsed by the globalization of production
and distribution which was the other aspect of the Enlightenment.
The good life now is an extension of the material component
of the Enlightenment and is defined by the production
of goods and services. That peculiar word commonly called
development has come to mean the spread of material
prosperity at the expense of the spiritual dimension.
Even in the United States, competition from forces that
are part of this globalization are cutting down on the
dialogue, the philosophical dimension, and the right
reason that accompanied the Enlightenment itself. D.P.
...the
last three hundred years of progress can be likened
to a beautiful bird; think of an eagle, with one good
wing and that wing of rationalizing, systematizing,
efficiency optimizing structures of modernism which
we have worked on assiduously, trained hard, redesigned
the feathers, that wing is working but when the bird
tries to fly with one good wing, it runs around in a
circle....The crippled wing is the wing of the human
spirit and is not graspable by the rationalizing, systematizing,
efficiency optimizing structures. It is the wing that
is responsible for the virtue of humankind, and the
protection of other forms of life and the physical environment.
It is that wing that must be strengthened, brought out
into the open to be seen as a functioning part of what
constitutes the spirit of humanity. With both wings
human progress will soar to its great potential giving
meaning and quality to human life that exceeds physical
comfort and well being. C.G.
If,
indeed, the Enlightenment had two wings, it is necessary
to understand what happened to cause the second wing
to atrophy. The second wing was inherent in humanism,
the overall movement to which the Enlightenment became
the center piece. The Enlightenment linked science and
the concept of individualism to the overall movement.
The great father of humanism was Erasmus, who when asked
what was the purpose of life, simply responded; "to
serve God." In so doing, according to Erasmus,
one is happy. For this humanist, the need was to integrate
the knowledge offered by the natural scientists, notably
Galileo, with whom he agreed spiritually, into the overall
scheme of meaning. He also stressed the importance of
freedom for the individual. It is later in the actual
processes of political liberation and the Industrial
Revolution that the vertical dimension, humankind's
relation to a higher power outside of itself, i.e.,
the power of the second wing, seems to have been gradually
forgotten or even deliberately abandoned.
Darker
sides of Western led progress
Although there have been efforts to use the other wing,
these have not been very successful. They translated
themselves into nationalism, backwardness, or the wrong
way of being religious. At the end of the day, society
has said it is better to be rational and focus on material
progress - money and economic efficiency. Progress is
what you can quantify in only those terms and all other
things are subordinate. The results have not been an
unmitigated victory for rationalism. In summary, the
basic strengths of the Enlightenment, to free people
from religion and to separate state and church, and
to believe in the strengths of individualism are so
positive and so strong that the other wing really could
not develop. R.L.
Just
after the Berlin Wall came down a businessman tells
of going over to East Germany to talk about capitalism,
which had been very successful and so on. He felt a
certain dilemma because he perceived that in some ways
he was preaching greed whereas communism in a sense
had been about sharing. The source of his dilemma went
back to this sense of moral and spiritual values. What
I came to realize is that capitalism works well when
it has a moral basis; you have to have that involved
in making agreements and in considering what business
is all about. Capitalism in its worse forms, which you
often see in Latin America and Eastern Europe, has become
a rapacious thing. The absence of this moral dimension
really worries me. I think when we say the world is
really better, it is on one dimension, but worse on
the other. F.A.
The
full realization of the potential of the Enlightenment
ideas as either a unidimensional or multidimensional
philosophy is far from complete. There are still great
inequalities, violence, and poverty. The material benefits
of progress remain inaccessible to billions of people.
A great deal of data for the last twenty years on African
countries show that about half of these countries experienced
an overall decline in Gross Domestic Product per capita.
Even by conventional Enlightenment definitions of progress
these countries do not measure up. To be kept in mind
is that a good portion of the world is not making progress
of any kind. D.P.
Many
thinkers who have been promoting progress through the
fuller realization of the human spirit have often been
marginalized and dismissed as irrationalists and romantics.
Without question, some of the most powerful work that
advanced the Enlightenment was done on behalf of capitalism,
not on behalf of philosophy. It should not be forgotten
that much of what people talk about when they praise
progress over the last 300 years is largely based on
evidence from industrial countries. While things have
gotten better in industrial countries, a neo-imperialist
argument could be made that it is the rest of the world
that is supporting the industrialized societies in the
style to which they have become accustomed.
In
the evolution of "enlightened societies" reason
and rationality alone have been unable to eradicate
racism, intolerance, and contempt for the other from
the human psyche. Entire communities and cultures have
been destroyed through various forms of colonialism,
imperialism and mercantilism. The legacy of colonialism
is still fresh in the minds of many Third World countries.
It manifests itself in such expressions of hostility
and frustration: "You were exploiting us and are
now exploiting us and you will always exploit us."
In talking about declarations, such as the Earth Charter,
and their intended responsibilities, people especially
in the southern part of the world have a lot of mistrust
and say, "this is nice, this work belongs to the
rich man club, when I get rich you can come back."
Any
number of reactionary movements have colored the view
of whatever the Enlightenment represents. For many people
in non-western societies, Enlightenment is synonymous
with the "west" and "western hegemony."
There is even danger that some anti-western reaction
will lead to "the baby being thrown out with the
bath water." The good of the Enlightenment is the
baby being jettisoned as evidence of western imperialism.
And, this occurs despite the sure gains to be made out
of what Enlightenment movement brought in freeing human
ingenuity and self-expression. In the Middle East this
has occurred. The Enlightenment of the West has been
thrown out in some societies because it represents ideas
that powerful Muslim factions do not claim as their
own and for which many people were made to suffer in
earlier eras. Here women conforming to a certain dress
code are not only identifying themselves with their
own religion but also identifying themselves with what
are their unique values.
In
the United States, there are young kids who kill each
other for sneakers, not because of hunger or because
they do not have money, but because they simply want
the sneakers at that second. There are people who will
kill their parents, their teachers, and their peers,
and show no remorse. There is something happening in
affluent societies along with progress which gives indications
of a collapse of vestiges of moral and spiritual dimensions
which confounds modern societies. So yes, cars run better
and women are healthier after birth and so on and so
forth, but what kind of life will there be if there
is no human regard for each other? There remains only
a minimum of trust in societies between the rich and
the poor and even between people in the same class.
How does a government promote trust? There is really
no clear answer. It will take time, humility, patience
as well as listening to the other. In this situation,
the public intellectual also has a strong role to play.
Progress
cannot be stopped but it can be controlled by the knowledge
of where it is leading and by analyzing what steps need
to be taken to influence it. The question is which is
it more important to have, material power or moral influence?
While material power may be preferred by many, "influence"
is really the stronger, because it leads to a more tremendous
power that can permanently change trends. Material power
is imported from without. Progress cannot be stopped,
what matters is how to assimilate it and adapt to it
without losing the moral values in existing cultures.
A
summary: observations of John Kenneth Galbraith
Over the last three hundred years, over the span of
time that we associate with the Enlightenment, we have
of course had an extraordinary change in the economic
situation and there can be no doubt that [a combination
of] economics, economic institutions, and economic aspiration
has been the driving force for change. But, there is
a great deal of debate as to what those forces really
are.
Is it capitalism? The pursuit of self interest? Education?
Is there a role of the state that has been important
here? If I express my own feelings, it is that very
much has been accomplished by the simple release of
human beings to there own pursuit of happiness, contentment,
and well-being. We should remind ourselves that until
about three centuries ago there had been very little
change, ever, in the human condition, and much of that
stagnation had been related to the fact that only a
small minority of the people were able to express their
own aspiration in life.
Institutional
restraints, serfdom and slavery, and the stalwart control
of custom had kept the great majority of people under
some kind of restraint. And, this is not ancient history;
some of it comes to our own time. I was born closer
to the Civil War and the struggle over slavery in this
country then we are now to World War II. And, the stamp
of restraint imposed by a slave structure is something
that is still visible in some parts of this republic.
But then, however it has come about, we have had this
enormous improvement in what is called well-being.
We
have come, and I think to the dissatisfaction of quite
a few here today, to think of well being as the measure
of civilized change. It isn't. One can hardly deny its
importance. One can hardly deny the commitment that
many people have to it. But I hope, as an economist,
that we are not too captured by the economic measure
of success which is before us every day in the newspapers,
on the television and wherever.
There
are aspects of this well being which cannot give us
satisfaction. There is first the enormous inequality
which is increasing. Everybody here — I urge to
be aware of the very unequal conditions that exist,
particularly here in the United States. There can be
no pride in the fact that we are the worst case.
There
is next the fact that, with increasing general well
being, there is clearly a strong change in public attitudes.
People increasingly, as they acquire a certain measure
of income and wealth, attribute that to themselves and
to their own qualities in life and are, therefore, less
inclined to be sympathetic to the people who are not
part of that well being. It is quite wonderful, if you
are well off, to attribute that to your own intelligence,
or in some cases, perhaps, to your own personal beauty,
and say that those who are less-well off and those who
are poor are the righteous victims of their own inadequacy.
This is an attitude which I cannot but think has been
increasingly important in modern times and increasingly
a factor here in the United States, in our politics
and elsewhere in the fortunate countries. The possibility
exists that it may be better to be poor in a poor country
than to be poor in a rich country.
The
other two facts associated with this are first, the
continuation of the disgraceful poverty in our great
cities: poverty that is insufficiently on our conscience,
insufficiently a concern, insufficiently an obligation
of the state. Think how much better our cities would
be if everyone had a basic safety net; if there were
no struggles against starvation and, if there were help
and care for the children. Is there any reason why a
rich country cannot provide such a safety net? There
is no such reason.
The
second and final thing is the fact that, in national
terms, this well-being is very badly distributed. There
are fortunate countries and regions: here in North America,
in Europe, and to some extent elsewhere. But, in much
of the world, there is still gross and nearly universal
poverty. We are insufficiently aware that human beings,
whether in Central Africa or Fifth Avenue, are still
human beings and that our obligation to all those human
beings is not less.
There
are problems that cannot be doubted as to what we can
do. I came back from years of government service of
one sort or another after WWII to find we had a large
number of students here at Harvard from the poor countries
and they were studying the sophisticated models of a
rich country. And, I initiated, at that time, what was
among the first courses in economic development anywhere
in the country, and I've been with that problem ever
since.
It
is an incredibly difficult problem. We still do not
have good answers. Some of the problems I used to think
lie with the governments of the less fortunate countries.
The essence of economic development, as I have already
indicated, is that individuals be free and protected
in their pursuit of their own well being. That is something
that, for example in much of Africa, just does not exist...and
in some parts of Asia. So, when we take satisfaction
in our well being and when we follow the example of
my profession in measuring well-being by the increase
in Gross Domestic Product or, God forbid, by what is
happening on the stock exchange, I hope that you will
all have a deep innate suspicion of economic ideas as
being not the last word in human aspirations.
Continue
to Section 3
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| "The
natural environment is under siege as the world's
pressure on natural resources mounts to meet the
demands of billions of people aspiring to material
well-being." |
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