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Communitarianism is a philosophy that emphasizes the connection between the individual and
the community.
Its overriding philosophy is based upon the belief that a person's social identity and
personality are largely molded by community relationships, with a smaller degree of development
being placed on individualism.
Although the community might be a family unit, communitarianism usually is understood, in
the wider, philosophical sense, as a collection of interactions, among a community of people
in a given place (geographical location), or among a community who share an interest
or who share a history.
Terminology: The philosophy of communitarianism originated
in the 20th century, but the term "communitarian" was coined in 1841, by John Goodwyn Barmby,
a leader of the British Chartist movement, who used it in referring to utopian socialists,
and other idealists, who experimented with communal styles of life.
However, it was not until the 1980s that the term "communitarianism" gained currency through
association with the work of a small group of political philosophers.
Their application of the label "communitarian" was controversial, even among communitarians,
because, in the West, the term "communitarian" evokes associations with the ideologies of
socialism and collectivism; so, public leaders—and some of the academics who champion this school
of thought—usually avoid the term "communitarian", while still advocating and advancing the ideas
of communitarianism.
The term is primarily used in two senses: Philosophical communitarianism considers
classical liberalism to be ontologically and epistemologically incoherent, and opposes
it on those grounds.
Unlike classical liberalism, which construes communities as originating from the voluntary
acts of pre-community individuals, it emphasizes the role of the community in defining and
shaping individuals.
Communitarians believe that the value of community is not sufficiently recognized in liberal
theories of justice.
Ideological communitarianism is characterized as a radical centrist ideology that is sometimes
marked by leftism on economic issues and centrism on social issues.
This usage was coined recently.
When the term is capitalized, it usually refers to the Responsive Communitarian movement of
Amitai Etzioni and other philosophers.
Origins: While the term communitarian was coined only
in the mid-nineteenth century, ideas that are communitarian in nature appear much earlier.
They are found in some classical socialist doctrine (e.g. writings about the early commune
and about workers' solidarity), and further back in the New Testament.
Communitarianism has been traced back to early monasticism, but in the twentieth century
began to be formulated as a philosophy by Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker movement.
In an early article the Catholic Worker clarified the dogma of the Mystical Body of Christ as
the basis for the movement's communitarianism.
Communitarianism is also related to the personalist philosophy of Emmanuel Mounier.
A number of early sociologists had strongly communitarian elements in their work, such
as Ferdinand Tönnies in his comparison of Gemeinschaft (oppressive but nurturing communities)
and Gesellschaft (liberating but impersonal societies), and Emile Durkheim's concerns
about the integrating role of social values and the relations between the individual and
society.
Both authors warned of the dangers of anomie (normlessness) and alienation in modern societies
composed of atomized individuals who had gained their liberty but lost their social moorings.
Modern sociologists saw the rise of a mass society and the decline of communal bonds
and respect for traditional values and authority in the United States as of the 1960s.
Among those who raised these issues were Robert Nisbet (Twilight of Authority), Robert Bellah
(Habits of the Heart), and Alan Ehrenhalt (The Lost City: The Forgotten Virtues Of Community
In America).
In his book Bowling Alone (2000), Robert Putnam documented the decline of "social capital"
and stressed the importance of "bridging social capital," in which bonds of connectedness
are formed across diverse social groups.
Responding to criticism that the term 'community' is too vague or cannot be defined, Amitai
Etzioni, one of the leaders of the American communitarian movement, pointed out that communities
can be defined with reasonable precision as having two characteristics: first, a web of
affect-laden relationships among a group of individuals, relationships that often crisscross
and reinforce one another (as opposed to one-on-one or chain-like individual relationships); and
second, a measure of commitment to a set of shared values, norms, and meanings, and a
shared history and identity – in short, a particular culture.
Further, author David E. Pearson argued that "o earn the appellation 'community,' it seems
to me, groups must be able to exert moral suasion and extract a measure of compliance
from their members.
That is, communities are necessarily, indeed, by definition, coercive as well as moral,
threatening their members with the stick of sanctions if they stray, offering them the
carrot of certainty and stability if they don't."
What is specifically meant by "community" in the context of communitarianism can vary
greatly between authors and time periods.
Historically, communities have been small and localized.
However, as the reach of economic and technological forces extended, more-expansive communities
became necessary in order to provide effective normative and political guidance to these
forces, prompting the rise of national communities in Europe in the 17th century.
Since the late 20th century there has been some growing recognition that the scope of
even these communities is too limited, as many challenges that people now face, such
as the threat of nuclear war and that of global environmental degradation and economic crises,
cannot be handled on a national basis.
This has led to the quest for more-encompassing communities, such as the European Union.
Whether truly supra-national communities can be developed is far from clear.
More modern communities can take many different forms, but are often limited in scope and
reach.
For example, members of one residential community are often also members of other communities
– such as work, ethnic, or religious ones.
As a result, modern community members have multiple sources of attachments, and if one
threatens to become overwhelming, individuals will often pull back and turn to another community
for their attachments.
Communitarian philosophy: In moral and political philosophy, communitarians
are best known for their critiques of John Rawls' political liberalism, detailed at length
in his book A Theory of Justice.
Communitarians criticize the image Rawls presents of humans as atomistic individuals, and stress
that individuals who are well-integrated into communities are better able to reason and
act in responsible ways than isolated individuals, but add that if social pressure to conform
rises to high levels, it will undermine the individual self.
Communitarians uphold the importance of the social realm, and communities in particular,
though they differ in the extent to which their conceptions are attentive to liberty
and individual rights.
Even with these general similarities, communitarians, like members of many other schools of thought,
differ considerably from one another.
There are several distinct (and at times wildly divergent) schools of communitarian thought.
The following authors have communitarian tendencies in the philosophical sense, but have all taken
pains to distance themselves from the political ideology known as communitarianism, which
is discussed further below: Alasdair MacIntyre – After Virtue
Michael Sandel – Liberalism and the Limits of Justice
Charles Taylor – Sources of the Self Michael Walzer – Spheres of Justice
Academic communitarianism: Whereas the classical liberalism of the Enlightenment
can be viewed as a reaction to centuries of authoritarianism, oppressive government, overbearing
communities, and rigid dogma, modern communitarianism can be considered a reaction to excessive
individualism, understood as an undue emphasis on individual rights, leading people to become
selfish or egocentric.
The close relation between the individual and the community was discussed on a theoretical
level by Michael Sandel and Charles Taylor, among other academic communitarians, in their
criticisms of philosophical liberalism, especially the work of the American liberal theorist
John Rawls and that of the German Enlightenment philosopher Immanuel Kant.
They argued that contemporary liberalism failed to account for the complex set of social relations
that all individuals in the modern world are a part of.
Liberalism is rooted in an untenable ontology that posits the existence of generic individuals
and fails to account for social embeddeddness.
To the contrary, they argued, there are no generic individuals but rather only Germans
or Russians, Berliners or Muscovites, or members of some other particularistic community.
Because individual identity is partly constructed by culture and social relations, there is
no coherent way of formulating individual rights or interests in abstraction from social
contexts.
Thus, according to these communitarians, there is no point in attempting to found a theory
of justice on principles decided behind Rawls' veil of ignorance, because individuals cannot
exist in such an abstracted state, even in principle.
Academic communitarians also contend that the nature of the political community is misunderstood
by liberalism.
Where liberal philosophers described the polity as a neutral framework of rules within which
a multiplicity of commitments to moral values can coexist, academic communitarians argue
that such a thin conception of political community was both empirically misleading and normatively
dangerous.
Good societies, these authors believe, rest on much more than neutral rules and procedures—they
rely on a shared moral culture.
Some academic communitarians argued even more strongly on behalf of such particularistic
values, suggesting that these were the only kind of values which matter and that it is
a philosophical error to posit any truly universal moral values.
In addition to Charles Taylor and Michael Sandel, other thinkers sometimes associated
with academic communitarianism include Michael Walzer, Alasdair MacIntyre, Seyla Benhabib,
and Shlomo Avineri.
Social capital: Beginning in the late 20th century, many authors
began to observe a deterioration in the social networks of the United States.
In the book Bowling Alone, Robert Putnam observed that nearly every form of civic organization
has undergone drops in membership exemplified by the fact that, while more people are bowling
than in the 1950s, there are fewer bowling leagues.
This results in a decline in "social capital", described by Putnam as "the collective value
of all 'social networks' and the inclinations that arise from these networks to do things
for each other".
According to Putnam and his followers, social capital is a key component to building and
maintaining democracy.
Communitarians seek to bolster social capital and the institutions of civil society.
The Responsive Communitarian Platform described it thus:
"Many social goals ... require partnership between public and private groups.
Though government should not seek to replace local communities, it may need to empower
them by strategies of support, including revenue-sharing and technical assistance.
There is a great need for study and experimentation with creative use of the structures of civil
society, and public-private cooperation, especially where the delivery of health, educational
and social services are concerned."
Positive rights: Important to some supporters of communitarian
philosophy is the concept of positive rights, which are rights or guarantees to certain
things.
These may include state-subsidized education, state-subsidized housing, a safe and clean
environment, universal health care, and even the right to a job with the concomitant obligation
of the government or individuals to provide one.
To this end, communitarians generally support social security programs, public works programs,
and laws limiting such things as pollution.
A common objection is that by providing such rights, communitarians violate the negative
rights of the citizens; rights to not have something done for you.
For example, taxation to pay for such programs as described above dispossesses individuals
of property.
Proponents of positive rights, by attributing the protection of negative rights to the society
rather than the government, respond that individuals would not have any rights in the absence of
societies—a central tenet of communitarianism—and thus have a personal responsibility to give
something back to it.
Some have viewed this as a negation of natural rights.
However, what is or is not a "natural right" is a source of contention in modern politics,
as well as historically; for example, whether or not universal health care, private property
or protection from polluters can be considered a birthright.
Alternatively, some agree that negative rights may be violated by a government action, but
argue that it is justifiable if the positive rights protected outweigh the negative rights
lost.
In the same vein, supporters of positive rights further argue that negative rights are irrelevant
in their absence.
Moreover, some communitarians "experience this less as a case of being used for others'
ends and more as a way of contributing to the purposes of a community I regard as my
own".
Still other communitarians question the very idea of natural rights and their place in
a properly functioning community.
They claim that instead, claims of rights and entitlements creates a society unable
to form cultural institutions and grounded social norms based on shared values.
Rather, the liberalist claim to individual rights leads to a morality centered on individual
emotivism, as ethical issues can no longer be solved by working through common understandings
of the good.
The worry here is that not only is society individualized, but so are moral claims.
Comparison to other political philosophies: Communitarianism cannot be classified as being
wholly left or right, and many theorists claim to represent a sort of centrist position or
even radical center.
Progressives in the American sense, social democrats or democratic socialists in the
European sense, generally share the communitarian position on issues relating to the economy
and government intervention and market control, such as the need for environmental protection
through regulation and public education, but not on cultural issues.
Communitarians and social conservatives or moderate conservatives generally loosely align
on cultural issues, such as support for character education programs, but communitarians do
not support the capitalism generally embraced by American conservatives.
For the communitarian, leftist ideology fails to understand the importance of local tradition,
identity, and core cultural values that define different communities by taking power away
from such local communities and handing it to centralized bureaucratic structures which
lack the sensitivity to understand such values and local issues which may thereby arise.
Furthermore, the focus of the modern liberal welfare state on positive individual rights
and entitlements has also eroded many of the traditional family bonds that united people
as well as responsibilities to the community that used to exist.
Communitarians also critique the classical liberal and libertarian commitment to free
markets and a laissez-faire economic system, which they argue pressure communities into
atomizing, thus undermining traditional ties among members of a given community, such as
within a family.
Responsive communitarianism movement: In the early 1990s, in response to the perceived
breakdown in the moral fabric of society engendered by excessive individualism, Amitai Etzioni
and William A. Galston began to organize working meetings to think through communitarian approaches
to key societal issues.
This ultimately took the communitarian philosophy from a small academic group, introduced it
into public life, and recast its philosophical content.
Deeming themselves "responsive communitarians" in order to distinguish the movement from
authoritarian communitarians, Etzioni and Galston, along with a varied group of academics
(including Mary Ann Glendon, Thomas A. Spragens, James Fishkin, Benjamin Barber, Hans Joas,
Philip Selznick, and Robert Bellah, among others) drafted and published The Responsive
Communitarian Platform based on their shared political principles, and the ideas in it
were eventually elaborated in academic and popular books and periodicals, gaining thereby
a measure of political currency in the West.
Etzioni later formed the Communitarian Network to study and promote communitarian approaches
to social issues and began publishing a quarterly journal, The Responsive Community.
The main thesis of responsive communitarianism is that people face two major sources of normativity:
that of the common good and that of autonomy and rights, neither of which in principle
should take precedence over the other.
This can be contrasted with other political and social philosophies which derive their
core assumptions from one overarching principle (such as liberty/autonomy for libertarianism).
It further posits that a good society is based on a carefully crafted balance between liberty
and social order, between individual rights and social responsibilities, and between pluralistic
and socially established values.
Responsive communitarianism stresses the importance of society and its institutions above and
beyond that of the state and the market, which are often the focus of other political philosophies.
It also emphasizes the key role played by socialization, moral culture, and informal
social controls rather than state coercion or market pressures.
It provides an alternative to liberal individualism and a major counterpoint to authoritarian
communitarianism by stressing that strong rights presume strong responsibilities and
that one should not be neglected in the name of the other.
Following standing sociological positions, communitarians assume that the moral character
of individuals tends to degrade over time unless that character is continually and communally
reinforced.
They contend that a major function of the community, as a building block of moral infrastructure,
is to reinforce the character of its members through the community's "moral voice," defined
as the informal sanction of others, built into a web of informal affect-laden relationships,
which communities provide.
Influence: Responsive communitarians have been playing
a considerable public role, presenting themselves as the founders of a different kind of environmental
movement, one dedicated to shoring up society (as opposed to the state) rather than nature.
Like environmentalism, communitarianism appeals to audiences across the political spectrum,
although it has found greater acceptance with some groups than others.
Although communitarianism is a small philosophical school, it has had considerable influence
on public dialogues and politics.
There are strong similarities between communitarian thinking and the Third Way, the political
thinking of centrist Democrats in the United States, and the Neue Mitte in Germany.
Communitarianism played a key role in Tony Blair's remaking of the British socialist
Labour Party into "New Labour" and a smaller role in President Bill Clinton's campaigns.
Other politicians have echoed key communitarian themes, such as Hillary Clinton, who has long
held that to raise a child takes not just parents, family, friends and neighbors, but
a whole village.
It has also been suggested that the "compassionate conservatism" espoused by President Bush during
his 2000 presidential campaign was a form of conservative communitarian thinking, though
he too did not implement it in his policy program.
Cited policies have included economic and rhetorical support for education, volunteerism,
and community programs, as well as a social emphasis on promoting families, character
education, traditional values, and faith-based projects.
President Barack Obama gave voice to communitarian ideas and ideals in his book The Audacity
of Hope, and during the 2008 presidential election campaign he repeatedly called upon
Americans to "ground our politics in the notion of a common good," for an "age of responsibility,"
and for foregoing identity politics in favor of community-wide unity building.
However, for many in the West, the term communitarian conjures up authoritarian and collectivist
associations, so many public leaders – and even several academics considered champions
of this school – avoid the term while embracing and advancing its ideas.
Reflecting the dominance of liberal and conservative politics in the United States, no major party
and few elected officials openly advocate communitarianism.
Thus there is no consensus on individual policies, but some that most communitarians endorse
have been enacted.
Nonetheless, there is a small faction of communitarians within the Democratic Party; prominent communitarians
include Bob Casey Jr., Joe Donnelly, and Claire McCaskill.
Many communitarian Democrats are part of the Blue Dog Coalition.
A small communitarian faction within the Republican Party also exists.
Rick Santorum is an example of a communitarian Republican.
It is quite possible that the United States' right-libertarian ideological underpinnings
have suppressed major communitarian factions from emerging.
Dana Milbank, writing in the Washington Post, remarked of modern communitarians, "There
is still no such thing as a card-carrying communitarian, and therefore no consensus
on policies.
Some, such as John DiIulio and outside Bush adviser Marvin Olasky, favor religious solutions
for communities, while others, like Etzioni and Galston, prefer secular approaches."
In August 2011, the right-libertarian Reason Magazine worked with the Rupe organization
to survey 1,200 Americans by telephone.
The Reason-Rupe poll found that "Americans cannot easily be bundled into either the 'liberal'
or 'conservative' groups".
Specifically, 28% expressed conservative views, 24% expressed libertarian views, 20% expressed
communitarian views, and 28% expressed liberal views.
The margin of error was ±3.
A similar Gallup survey in 2011 included possible centrist/moderate responses.
That poll reported that 17% expressed conservative views, 22% expressed libertarian views, 20%
expressed communitarian views, 17% expressed centrist views, and 24% expressed liberal
views.
The organization used the terminology "the bigger the better" to describe communitarianism.
The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, founded and led by Imran Khan, is considered the first
political party in the world which has declared Communitarianism as one of their official
ideologies.
Comparison to other political philosophies: Early communitarians were charged with being,
in effect, social conservatives.
However, many contemporary communitarians, especially those who define themselves as
responsive communitarians, fully realize and often stress that they do not seek to return
to traditional communities, with their authoritarian power structure, rigid stratification, and
discriminatory practices against minorities and women.
Responsive communitarians seek to build communities based on open participation, dialogue, and
truly shared values.
Linda McClain, a critic of communitarians, recognizes this feature of the responsive
communitarians, writing that some communitarians do "recognize the need for careful evaluation
of what is good and bad about [any specific] tradition and the possibility of severing
certain features . . . from others."
And R. Bruce Douglass writes, "Unlike conservatives, communitarians are aware that the days when
the issues we face as a society could be settled on the basis of the beliefs of a privileged
segment of the population have long since passed."
One major way the communitarian position differs from the social conservative one is that although
communitarianism's ideal "good society" "reaches into the private realm, it seeks to cultivate
only a limited set of core virtues through an organically developed set of values rather
than having an expansive or holistically normative agenda given by the state.
For example, American society favors being religious over being atheist, but is rather
neutral with regard to which particular religion a person should follow.
There are no state-prescribed dress codes, "correct" number of children to have, or places
one is expected to live, etc.
In short, a key defining characteristic of the ideal communitarian society is that in
contrast to a liberal state, it creates shared formulations of the good, but the scope of
this good is much smaller than that advanced by authoritarian societies."
Authoritarian governments often embrace extremist ideologies and rule with brute force, accompanied
with severe restrictions on personal freedom, political and civil rights.
Authoritarian governments are overt about the role of the government as director and
commander.
Civil society and democracy are not generally characteristic of authoritarian regimes.
Criticisms: Liberal theorists such as Simon Caney disagree
that philosophical communitarianism has any interesting criticisms to make of liberalism.
They reject the communitarian charges that liberalism neglects the value of community,
and holds an "atomized" or asocial view of the self.
According to Peter Sutch the principal criticisms of communitarianism are:
1.
that communitarianism leads necessarily to moral relativism,
2.
that this relativism leads necessarily to a re-endorsement of the status quo in international
politics, and 3.
that such a position relies upon a discredited ontological argument that posits the foundational
status of the community or state.
However, he goes on to show that such arguments cannot be leveled against the particular communitarian
theories of Michael Walzer and Mervyn Frost.
Other critics emphasize close relation of communitarianism to neoliberalism and new
policies of dismantling the welfare state institutions through development of the third
sector.
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