How morality works and why it fails: On political philosophy and moral consensus

Journal of Social Philosophy

Volumn 28, Issue 3, 1997, Pages 43-70

  Gomberg, Paul ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 79956589038     PISSN: 00472786     EISSN: 14679833     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9833.1997.tb00387.x     Document Type: Article

References (80)

1. This conception of morality is grounded in the sociological tradition; see, for example, the essays on social control by William Sumner, Emile Durkheim, George Herbert Mead, and Jean Piaget in Lewis Coser and Bernard Rosenberg, eds., Sociological Theory 4th ed. (New York: Macmillan, 1976). I will often use 'morality' in the singular; this usage should not be understood to imply a kind of moral realism entailing One True Morality. When used in the singular, 'morality' will refer indifferently to any system of decentralized socia 1 control. This is a narrow conception of morality, excluding talk of a personal morality (at one extreme) and of morality as an ideal code.
2. 'Enforce' and its cognates might properly be in scarequotes since force is rarely necessary in decentralized enforcement of norms. Unfortunately, English seems to have no substitute. David Shwayder, The Stratification of Behavior (New York: The Humanities Press, 1965) develops a conception of conformative behavior as behavior based on reasons derived from the expectations of others (he is explicating the idea of conforming to a social rule or norm).
3. The differences and similarities between his account of conformative behavior and David Lewis's notion of a convention are discussed in Lewis, Convention (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1969), pp. 107-118.
4. The crucial difference is that Shwayder defines conformative behavior as behavior that answers to the expectations of others, while Lewis adds the condition that my conformity is conditional on my expectation that others will conform. The analysis here is closer to Shwayder's: because social norms may create different roles for us, Lewis's game theoretic approach seems out of place; that is, I may not expect you to conform to the same rules as I, for you may have a different role in society from mine. Philip Pertit, "Virtus Normativa: Rational Choice Perspectives," Ethics 100 (1990): 725-55
5. gives an account of the development of norms based on the attitudes of others which is more akin to the approach taken here. Allan Gibbard's Wise Choices, Apt Feelings (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1990) gives a naturalistic account of morality as part of the social life of an evolved species. Chapters 10-13 in particular deal with agreement and disagreement about norms, but he analyzes from the individual out toward the group while I start with the small group.
6. The connection between morality and universalizability is made by Kant in Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals in Ethical Philosophy (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1983).
7. In the aftermath of World War II this element of moral thinking was emphasized by philosophers such as Hare in explaining why Nazi racism was immoral. See R. M. Hare, Freedom and Reason (London: Oxford University Press, 1963). See also note 14 below. In subsection 3c below I will develop more arguments like the one of this paragraph. In developing a conception of morality as decentralized social control and defending it to philosophers, I will try to show how it explains why some philosophical portrayals of morality are accurate.
8. Compare Katherine S. Newman, Law and Economic Organization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), chap. 2.
9. The argument of the first two subsections can be considered as a comment on John Rawls's distinction between the reasonable and the rational: the reasonable is concerned with terms of cooperation that could be agreeable to all; the rational is concerned with individual or subgroup interest. I am trying to show how these converge in moral communities. Another way of putting the argument is that convergence of the rational and the reasonable is achieved through the social construction of identity within a social group. See the literature cited in note 7 below. Rawls's distinction is appropriate more to pluralist, particularly individualist, societies, a point with which he would likely agree. See John Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993) pp. 48-54,85, n. 33 (hereafter PL).
10. On early hominid social life see Richard Leakey and Roger Lewin, Origins (New York: Dutton, 1977), p. 117;
11. Donald Johanson and Maitland Edey, Lucy (New York: Warner, 1981), pp. 309-340;
12. C. O. Lovejoy, "The Origin of Man," Science 211 (1981): 341-50;
13. and Bernard Campbell, Humankind Emerging 4th ed. (Boston: Little, Brown, 1985), pp. 215-50;
14. for archaeological evidence that Homo habilis shared food, pp. 229-32.
15. This conception of the development of individual personality and conception of self in relation to our social interaction with others is suggested by Herbert Mead, Mind, Self, and Society (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1934).
16. See especially part 3. An early attempt to develop the conception of individual identity formation through internalization of norms is Muzafer Sherif, The Psychology of Social Norms (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1936), especially chapter 9.
17. In the 1970s European social psychologists, preeminently Henri Tajfel, developed social identity theory, linking one's conception of self and of self-interest to group identity. See Tajfel, Human Groups and Social Categories (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981), especially part 4;
18. also John C. Turner et al., Rediscovering the Social Group: A Self-Categorization Theory (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1987).
19. See Richard Lee, The IKung San: Men, Women, and Work in a Foraging Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979)
20. and Lorna Marshall, The !Kung of Nyae Nyae (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1976).
21. My account is also based on the Mbuti, whom I will not discuss explicitly. An excellent brief popular ethnography of the Mbuti is Colin Turnbull, The Forest People (New York: Anchor, 1962).
22. His more formal ethnography is Wayward Servants (New York: Natural History Press, 1965).
23. Eleanor Leacock and Richard Lee, "Introduction," in Leacock and Lee, eds., Politics and History in Band Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), p. 9.
24. The conception of egalitarian communities as ones with unlimited positions of high status or prestige is taken from Morton Fried, The Evolution of Political Society (New York: Random House: 1967), p. 30. The suggestion that we think of moral communities as egalitarian in this sense is my own. Jane Mansbridge has pointed out to me in conversation that not all moral communities are egalitarian in this sense: in traditional Hindu morality high moral status is not available to low-caste individuals. I here use "high social esteem," "prestige," and "high status" as synonyms. The use of the term "social esteem" for "prestige" is intended to emphasize the motivational importance of being thought well of by others.
25. For the idea that self-esteem is essential to the energetic pursuit of life's tasks see John Rawls, A Theory of justice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971), section 67 (hereafter TJ)
26. and especially John Deigh, "Shame and Self-Esteem: A Critique," Ethics 93: 225-45.
27. What I am calling here an unfortunately alienated individual may in fact be a limiting case, an individual whose socialization depends not on being deeply bound to a group of intimates, but on being weakly bound to a variety of others. Rawls, following Kohlberg, takes the ability to transcend the morality of one's community to represent a higher stage of moral development. The observations made here suggest a different interpretation. See John Rawls, TJ, especially pp. 473-74. In fairness to Rawls, his ideal individual has both strong and weak ties and is committed both to justice and to a morality and ideal of life shared by intimates.
28. See Christine M. Korsgaard, "Kant's Analysis of Obligation: The Argument of Foundations I," The Monist 72 (1989): 311-40, for a useful account of this argument in Kant. My differences from Kant are a result of my trying to turn Kant's idealizations of morality into a more naturalistic account of when people can be relied upon to follow norms. Kant's idealizations mask the difficulty of our moral situation, where communities of intimates and consensus on norms have weakened. Thus Kant sanctifies morality in a situation where morality is questionable. Being bound by common general norms implies impartiality between persons. If, during a drought, I take long showers and defend my action on the ground that my behavior, by itself, has no significant effect, then I make myself an exception to the norm (conserve water) and show greater regard for my own needs than I am willing should be shown for others'. We shall see in subsection 6a that there is a distinct, more reflective, requirement that the norms themselves show equal respect for persons.
29. Hobbesian contractualism is exemplified by David Gauthier, Morals by Agreement (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986)
30. and by Gregory Kavka, Hobbesian Moral and Political Theory (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986).
31. The distinction between Hobbesian and Kantian contractualism and the associated conception of the person is developed by Samuel Freeman, "Reason and Agreement in Social Contract Views," Philosophy and Public Affairs 19 (1990): 122-57
32. and especially by Gerald Doppelt, "Is Rawls's Kantian Liberalism Coherent and Defensible?" Ethics 99 (1989): 815-51.
33. For an anthropologically sophisticated presentation of this argument see Michael Taylor, Community, Anarchy, and Liberty (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), pp. 129-39. Taylor argues that large size defeats decentralized enforcement of norms, so the argument below is directly relevant to his.
34. The discussion of legal centralization without a state is based especially on R. F. Barton's account of the Ifugao monkalun (go-between) in The Half-Way Sun (New York: Brewer and Warren, 1930)
35. This is only one particular system, but one may also compare with the Kapauku tonowi (big man), who often imposes more formal sanctions; see Leopold Posposil, Kapauku Papuans and their Law (Yale University Publications in Anthropology, No. 54; New Haven: Yale University Dept. of Anthropology, 1958)
36. and Anthropo/ogy of Law (New York: Harper and Row, 1971), chap. 3.
37. See also E. Adamson Hoebel, The Law of Primitive Man (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1954); Newman (cited in note 4);
38. Paul Bohannon, ed., Law and Warfare (New York: Natural History Press, 1967)
39. especially the articles by K. O. L. Burridge and James L. Gibbs; and M. Fortes, and E. E. Evans Pritchard, eds., African Political Systems (London: Oxford University Press, 1940), especially the essays by Fortes and Evans-Pritchard.
40. Marshall Sahlins, Stone Age Economics (New York: Aldine, 1972), p. 205. The argument of this section also relies on Sahlins.
41. Marvin Harris, Cultural Anthropology (New York: Harper and Row, 1983), p. 79; Sahlins, p. 257.
42. I have telescoped an argument here. Household production without daily sharing out-side the household means that social bonds between households are weaker. The desire for social esteem will make us aspire to wealth, but the requirement of generosity will make us resent having to be generous to the extent that generosity diminishes our wealth and hence the social esteem derived from wealth. Household production and esteeming wealth combine to produce a potential for strong conflicts between households competing for wealth. Despite the social costs of esteeming wealth, it has given incentive to intensify production and hence has enabled population growth, particularly when combined with the requirement to share. Sahlins discusses resentment of sharing, particularly pp. 123-30, as does Elizabeth Colson, Tradition and Contract (Chicago: Aldine, 1974), pp. 47-51. Neither analyzes it as I have here.
43. See Rose Coser, "The Complexity of Roles as Seedbed of Individual Autonomy" in L. Coser, ed., The Idea of Social Structure: Essays in Honor of Robert Merton (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1975).
44. For a discussion of personalities that are not immersed in communities, preeminently academics, see Milton Gordon, Assimilation in American Life (New York: Oxford University Press, 1964), pp. 224-32.
45. Sociologists have noted that the development of such networks of relationships and of weak ties as well as strong ties (that is, acquaintanceships as well as close friendships) is important to maintaining social integration. See Mark Granovetter, "The Strength of Weak Ties," American Journal of Sociology 78 (1973): 1360-80
46. and "The Strength of Weak Ties: A Network Theory Revisited," in Randall Collins ed., Sociological Theory 1983 (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1983), pp. 201-233.
47. See also Peter Blau, "Parameters of Social Structure," American Sociological Review 39 (1974): 615-35.
48. On Peru, China, and Mesoamerica see Jonathan Haas, The Evolution of the Prehistoric State (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982), pp. 107-111.
49. On Mesopotamia see Robert McC. Adams, The Evolution of Urban Society (Chicago: Aldine, 1966), p. 98.
50. On the Mississippian city at Cahokia see John E. Pfeiffer, "Indian City on the Mississippi," (Collinsville, IL: Cahokia Mounds Museum Society, n.d., repr. from Time-Life Nature/ Science Annual 1974).
51. Of course, the threat to social order posed by this alienation can be reduced by networks and weak ties connecting rich and poor. In the U.S. trade unions seem to perform this function: rank and file workers have ties with their leaders, who in turn have ties with management. The Democratic Party in the U.S. may work similarly. For the theory see articles cited in note 23. Weak ties among the dispossessed can hasten the spread of effective alienation. As workers are bound to one another by large networks, once alienation develops it can spread among a very large group. For how this worked in Petrograd in 1917 see Michael M. Boll, The Petrograd Armed Workers Movement in the February Revolution (February-July, 1917) (Washington, DC: University Press of America, 1979)
52. and Alexander Rabinowitch, The Bolsheviks Come to Power (New York: Norton, 1976).
53. Ronald Cohen has developed the idea that the ability of a society to fission is central to determining whether a society is at the state level of organization. See his "Introduction," in R. Cohen and E. R. Service, eds., The Origins of the State: the Anthropology of Political Evolution (Philadelphia: Institute for the study of Human Issues, 1978). Cohen's views about fissioning are developed further by Michael Taylor, who argues that large population makes decentralized control break down and endorses Robert Carneiro's theory of state formation, as the effect of geographical or other circumscription combined with population pressure. See Taylor, chap. 3 (cited in note 16), and Robert L. Carneiro, "A Theory of the Origin of the State," Science 169 (1970): 733-38. I find large size, of itself, an inadequate account of the reason for the development of the state, given the effectiveness of systems of authority. Carneiro's theory confuses a condition of the effectiveness of state power-that the population is circumscribed and cannot escape by moving away-with the causes of state formation. This is not the appropriate place for developing these ideas on state formation.
54. Anthropologists are often struck by the difference in the tenor of human relations in societies without states, that people decide for themselves how their lives are to be lived day to day, no one being able to command another. In contrast, in our society, doing what one is told in fear of the consequences of disobedience is organized into the fabric of our lives from childhood. See, for example, Marvin Harris, Cannibals and Kings (New York: Random House, 1977), pp. 69-70. Of course, in state-level societies people are asked to agree that they should be commanded, and many do. Paul's letter to the Ephesians made the subordination of women to men and servants to masters a Christian duty.
55. See William T. Sanders, "Chiefdom to State: Political Evolution at Kaminaljuyu, Guatemala," in Reconstructing Complex Societies: An Archaeological Colloquium, ed. Charlotte B. Moore, Supplement to the Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 20 (1974): 97-116
56. especially p. 109 cited in Kent V. Flannery and Joyce Marcus, "Editor's Introduction" (to chap. 4, The Origins of the State in Oaxaca) in Flannery and Marcus, eds., The Cloud People: Divergent Evolution of the Zapotee and Mixtee Civilizations (New York: Academic Press, 1983), p. 80.
57. See Haas, pp. 123-29 (cited in note 24). This book is a development and defense of the views of Morton Fried (see note 11) and a reply to Ellman Service, The Origin of the State and Civilization (New York: Norton, 1975).
58. See K. C. Chang, Early Chinese Civilization: Anthropological Perspectives (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1976), pp. 56-57.
59. On the Black Rebellions see E. P. Thompson, Whigs and Hunters (New York: Pantheon, 1975)
60. On the grain seizures in France see Charles Tilley, The Contentious French (Cambridge, MA: Belnap-Harvard, 1986).
61. On English grain riots see John Walter, "Grain riots and Popular Attitudes to the Law: Maldon and the Crisis of 1629" in John Brewer and John Styles, eds., An Ungovernable People (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1980), pp. 47-84.
62. Charles Tilley, in "Collective Violence in European Perspective," in Hugh Davis Graham and Ted Robert Gurr, eds., Violence in America: Historical and Comparative Perspectives (Beverly Hills: Sage Publications, 1979), pp. 83-118, develops the contrast between reactionary and modern rebellions, although, as he admits in his 1979 postscript (the essay was originally written in the late 1960s), many modern rebellions are also reactionary. He also classifies rebellions such as grain seizures, food riots, and the eighteenth-century English black rebellions as communal because they are based in traditional rural communities.
63. The following quotes are from participants in the Watts and Detroit rebellions. "I'm throwing rocks because I'm tired of a white man misusing me." "Like why, man, should I got [sic] home? These-cops have been pushin' me 'round all my life. Kickin' my and things like that. Whitey ain't no good. He talked 'bout law and order, it's his law and his order it ain't mine." "I'm not crazy-I'm not crazy to be killed. I'm just gettin' even for what they did to us." "Man, they killed Malcolm X just like that. So I'm gonna take a few of them with me. They may get me later on, but somebody else will take my place-just like that." See Richard Hofstadter and Michael Wallace, eds., American Violence (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1971), pp. 264, 268.
64. See also David Boesel and Peter H. Rossi, eds., Cities under Siege: An Anatomy of the Ghetto Riots, 1964-1968 (New York: Basic Books, 1971).
65. On the Pullman Strike see Stanley Buder, Pullman (New York: Oxford University Press, 1967).
66. On South Africa see James North, Freedom Rising (New York: New American Library, 1986) especially pp. 62-3
67. and David Mermelstein, ed., The Anti-Apartheid Reader (New York: Grove Press, 1987).
68. For a pro-Palestinian account of the history of Israel and Palestinian grievances see Ralph Schoenman, The Hidden History of Zionism (Santa Barbara, California: Veritas Press, 1988).
69. On the effect of race and income on beliefs about government job guarantees see James R. Kluegel and Eliot R. Smith, Beliefs about Inequality (New York: Aldine de Gruyter, 1986), p. 159. The actions of the dispossessed are not always directed only at official state agencies. In the New York Draft Riot of 1863 the anger of dispossessed Irish against their disproportionate representation among Civil War conscripts was directed against black people, who were even more dispossessed.
70. Obviously there are degrees of alienation and different forms of resistance. Rebels represent the extreme of mass, open hostility. Short of this degree of alienation are alienated youth and subgroups that put loyalty to kin ahead of more general social norms. There is considerable urban ethnographic literature about urban youth gangs. See for example, Sally Engle Merry, Urban Danger (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1981)
71. and Jay MacLeod, Ain't No Makin' It (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1987)
72. For indirect resistance under slavery see Eugene Genovese, Roll, Jordan, Roll (New York: Vintage, 1976).
73. For peasant resistance and a discussion of the relationship between day-to-day resistance and revolution see James C. Scott, Weapons of the Weak (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1985).
74. See Amartya Sen, Inequality Reexamined (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992), pp. 12-13, emphasis in original.
75. For the libertarian view see, for example, Chiaki Nishiyama and Kurt R. Leube, eds., The Essence of Hayek (Stanford: Hoover Institution, 1984), pp. 141,331-32. For more conventional egalitarian views see Sen and citations to essays by Ronald Dworkin, Richard Arneson, and G. A. Cohen.
76. On Richard Davis see Herbert Gutman, "The Negro and the United Mine Workers of America," in Gutman, Work, Culture, and Society in Industrializing America (New York: Knopf, 1976), pp. 121-208.
77. On the efforts of the Communist Party in the 1930s to forge multiracial unity see Nell Irvin Painter, The Narrative of Hosea Hudson (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1979);
78. Robin D. G. Kelley, Hammer and Hoe (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1990), (both about communists in Alabama);
79. and Mark Naison, Communists in Harlem during the Depression (New York: Grove Press, 1985).
80. On the transition from ethnic and racial to class consciousness in Chicago see Lizabeth Cohen, Making a New Deal (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990).