Liberal Contradictions

Liberal academics are fond of castigating capitalism as riven with contradictions. They tell us that market-based economies must inevitably fail because they are prey to inconsistencies that will ultimately lead to their downfall.
They say, for instance, that capitalism is based upon greed. Avaricious business people presumably create economic growth because they hunger after wealth, but once they obtain it they will wallow in luxury thereby undercutting their motivation to keep the pie expanding.
Progressive liberalism is thought to be free of such self-defeating baggage. Its goal of universal equality is regarded as pure and unproblematic. And yet liberalism too is subject to inconsistencies. In fact, its internal conflicts are currently more on display than those of conservatives. Capitalism, after all, has continued to grow despite having generated more affluence than any other system in history.
Meanwhile, liberals are fond of styling themselves as “social democrats.” They seek to separate themselves from communists by emphasizing their dedication to democratic principles. While they too want to bring complete parity between the rich and poor, they intend to do so while upholding republican institutions.
Nevertheless, this is not what we witnessed in the recent election. To quote our president, his party got “shellacked,” but not because it ignored the will of the American people. Instead of acknowledging ample evidence that a majority of the electorate was opposed to Obamacare and cap-and-trade, he refused to admit that he, Nancy, and Harry had pushed their extreme agenda via every dirty trick in the book.
But this performance was a function of a deeply held liberal conviction. Liberals believe they are smarter and nicer than most people. Self-described as “the best and brightest,” they are convinced they alone know what is in the national interest. As a result, they are not democratic. To the contrary, they are committed elitists.
The evidence for this is conclusive. Consider the electoral map after November 2nd. It was almost entirely red, except for thin strips along the West Coast and the Northeast. One might suppose that this to due to salt water poisoning, but no: it is a consequence of the intellectual pretensions of the cultural leaders clustered in these areas. Amazingly, they approved of the administration’s programs.
So assured are these folks of their moral supremacy that in San Francisco the city fathers effectively banned MacDonald Happy Meals. Determined to keep children from consuming empty calories, they decided to compel parents to purchase only foods the elite thought best.
Likewise, so assured are liberals of their own preeminence that they attributed their electoral defeat to “a failure to communicate.” Despite their control of the mainstream media and numerous speeches in defense of their policies, they were apparently unsuccessful in getting their message across.
But why was this so? The answer can only be that the people at large were not intelligent enough to appreciate their own interests. Liberals sought to protect them from their own foolishness, but they could not be made to see what was before their eyes.
In other words, liberals believe that ordinary people are too dim to govern themselves. What, however, is this other than anti-democratic? Liberals say they love common people, nonetheless they intend to lead them where they ought to go.
In fact, liberals are in deep denial. They are utterly oblivious of the fact that it was their policies, not their words, which turned off the voters. It was Obamacare and a stimulus package that failed to stimulate that left people desiring a change.
Even more importantly, liberals are in deep denial about their anti-democratic impulses. They do not realize that their intellectual pretensions are grounded in a belief in their inherent superiority. Nor do they recognize that their political domination comes at the expense of the less powerful.
All this contradicts the Liberal Creed. It is an inconsistency at the heart of the liberal message that dooms its long-term prospects. –How about this for an unexpected irony?
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University

A Neo-conservative Sociology

A Crisis in Sociology
The heroin epidemic was in full sway. Tens of thousands of New Yorkers were hopelessly enthralled by an illegal substance that transformed them into slobbering zombies. It had taken a while for the community to respond to this emergency, but the city eventually opened a chain of methadone clinics intended to rescue these casualties from their fate. I was part of the process. Employed as an addiction counselor on the Gold Star Mother ferryboat, my responsibility was to advise our clients on how to reintegrate into normal society. The problem was that I was not sure of the best means. Never having been an addict myself, when those on my caseload protested that I did not understand what they were up against, it seemed to me that they might be right.
Determined to be the most competent professional of whom I was capable, I consequently began to explore various educational options. The most obvious was to seek an advanced degree in psychology, but this did not appeal to me. After several years working as a counselor I was proud of my interpersonal skills and unwilling to expose myself to the redundancy of being instructed on how to listen to people. Nor did I believe that I needed to learn about psychological theory. Having also spent several years in psychotherapy and in an active bibliotherapy, I considered myself familiar with the central ideas of psychoanalysis. No, what I really needed was a greater knowledge of the lives of my potential clients. What were the social pressures with which they had to contend and what were the actual opportunities available to them? My growing up in a parochial Brooklyn Jewish family had had its advantages, but a sophisticated cosmopolitanism was not one of them.
When the idea of sociology first presented itself, the notion started out hazy. As an undergraduate, the discipline was not one of my favorites. The single introductory course I had taken was taught by a hippie-in-training and her irrepressible naiveté imbued the subject with an impractical obviousness. Having barely escaped the tedium of this experience with a grade of C, it was not something to which I voluntarily expected to return. And yet the study of society seemed the best way to understand how people different from me lived their lives. Generations of research by social scientists, hopefully with abilities greater than those my former instructor, must have eventuated in a body of wisdom worthy of investigating.
I began the process of examining this possibility by enrolling in two graduate courses in sociology, one in the sociology of mental illness and the other in the sociology of work. Both were a revelation. Thus, for the first time I learned something about the “meaning” of professionalism. Despite having always assumed that I would some day be a professional, I was startled to discover that I had never really understood what this entailed. Before long I decided that if this was that sort of insight the discipline could provide, that it was indeed what I was looking for. A Ph.D. in the field might well furnish the knowledge and the occupational status to do the kind of work I wanted to with society’s downtrodden.
Nevertheless a congenital caution prevailed and I sought information about the job potential available in the area. To this end I approached one of my professors and asked what she thought. Her response was unequivocal. Sociology was growing faster than any other social science and hence presented unlimited horizons. Even the government had become aware of the understandings it contained and was utilizing it to design programs for the poor. As a result, were I to obtain an advanced degree, prospective employers would surely be lining up at my door. Added to this, her emphatic offer to write a favorable letter of recommendation sealed the deal.
What neither of us realized, however, was that sociology’s bubble had already burst. Although its founder, August Comte, had hailed his creation as “the queen of the social sciences,” few until recently had taken this seriously. But the Democratic politics of the 1960s had altered all this. First the War on Poverty and then the Great Society placed a premium on social engineering. Sociologists might have had little influence in launching these crusades; nevertheless their theories about how they might be conducted quickly rose to prominence. With a confidence born out of years of speculation, specialists in the field declared that they understood the means necessary to win these battles and queued up to design the requisite policies. Falling into place immediately behind them were legions of college students eager to participate in making history. They too wanted to devise innovative plans of social reform, or at least to help implement these. The problem was that by the mid-70s it had become evident that poverty was still with us and was likely to remain so for the indefinite future. Moreover, the excesses of the 60s had blown up in people’s faces and a new generation of students was ready to be more practical.
The impact on academic sociology was dramatic. Almost overnight enrollments were cut in half. Where before an aura of romance surrounded its classes, now they seemed strident and out-of-touch. Even the quality of students entering the field fell precipitously. To the great chagrin of its practitioners, it was not long until surveys revealed that sociology majors were among the least competent. Similar surveys also disclosed that these undergraduates were among the most liberal in their political orientation. Apparently those who remained loyal to sociology were deeply committed to social transformations and perceived a “progressive” agenda as the best way to proceed. This per se did not distress professionals already in the field. Most were also on the left and believed this a logical deduction from social facts.
Although many sociologists protested against what they characterized as a pervasive confusion between sociology and socialism, the truth was that a large percentage of them were sympathetic to socialism. Thus, when the focus on poverty began to wane, they retained their hostility toward capitalism. In part, this derived from a belief that greed and individualism were inherent in the free market and that these were inimical to interpersonal solidarity and social justice. This, nonetheless, became increasingly difficult openly to advocate in an environment where economic growth was still broadly supported. Moving to the fore, therefore, were the issues of gender and race. Also rooted in the social currents of the 60s, feminism and civil rights seemed to bespeak a quest for democracy and fairness. Sociologists might be aware of the Marxist origins of these movements, but these could be easily disguised for public consumption. One could instead insist, for instance, upon the “oppressive” aspects of the marketplace, especially for protected “minorities,” and then use this disparity to promote “diversity” rather than collectivism.
And yet many sociologists became uneasy. With an ever-greater insistence, proclamations of a “crisis” appeared in their professional literature. Even after enrollments began to revive in the late 1980s, forecasts of doom continued to gather. Particularly after several prominent universities dropped their departments of sociology, influential figures started to ask what was wrong. Why was the field subject to such disrespect and why had its impact failed to recover to prior levels? Economists, political scientists, and psychologists plainly retained a hold on the public imagination, but fewer people were reading sociological tracts and even fewer were seeking sociological advice on reorganizing social arrangements. Grumbling abounded about how other disciplines were stealing sociology’s thunder, but few workable suggestions emerged.
Many commentators pointed to the ideological morass in which the field seemed mired. Instead of being resolutely scientific, large numbers of sociologists clearly specialized in moralistic critiques of society. Rather than engaging in empirical studies, they relied on an ironclad faith in a limited range of explanations. Worse still, what really mattered to them were their preconceptions of how social problems ought to be solved. Among their peers, at least, they candidly admitted they their concern was not with truth, but with being socially persuasive. This, they insisted, was all that was possible and all that was moral. The favored ideologies, of course, tended to be leftward leaning. Studies repeatedly showed that 70% to 85% of sociologists identified themselves as liberal or radical. In this they competed with anthropologists and English professors for the honor of being the most extreme academics.
Another cluster of observers, however, identified an inappropriate scientism as the chief source of trouble. They argued that many of their colleagues were infatuated with the mechanics of social research. In an effort to be as precise as the physical sciences, these investigators had mistakenly resorted to a caricature of empiricism. Relying on survey techniques and advanced statistics to tease out causal connections, they regularly stumbled over the obvious or the irrelevant. Rather than ask questions that people cared about, they pursued only such information as their instruments allowed them to explore. In a sense, they were like the proverbial drunk who was searching for his lost pocket change under a streetlamp, not because he dropped it there, but because the light was better. They might derive a measure of prestige from the sophistication of their methods, but were unlikely to expand our store of useful information.
Despite this division of opinions, almost all of the pundits agreed that sociology was seriously deficient in accumulating a body of settled facts. Unlike the other established sciences, it did not seem to build upon a foundation of recognized truths. There was nothing comparable to an atomic theory, or a theory of plate tectonics, or even an evolutionary theory. On the contrary, disputes between conflict theorists, structural-functionalists, and symbolic interactionists smacked more of philosophical posturing than scientific progress. As significantly, few palpable contributions to human betterment were attributable to sociology. It partisans might make extravagant claims, but almost two centuries of effort had produced nothing on a par with the development of electric appliances, antibiotics, or the atomic bomb. Even psychology, had more to show for its exertions. Psychological testing and psychotherapy might still be immature contributions, but they had more effect on people’s everyday lives than did sociology’s grand pronouncements.
Most non-sociologists had discovered that when they sought sociological answers, the response was predictable. They were apt to be told that the “root cause” of whatever problem they faced could be found in social inequality. Some elite—the rich, the white, and/or the male—had taken advantage of its unearned power to exploit an “innocent minority.” Furthermore, this oppression was intolerable and needed to be corrected by vigorous governmental action. An enormous program had to be devised and/or funded by the federal authorities as expeditiously as possible. Values, of course, were all relative. They were obviously social constructed, and therefore diversity needed to be encouraged. Nevertheless, although no one’s opinions were more correct than anyone else’s, potential oppressors had to be defeated. A massive and immediate transfer of wealth and power from conservative troglodytes to enlightened liberals must be implemented to even the playing field. This, together with increased social sensitivity, should produce a more democratic and more just community.
Remarkably, this sort of attitude can be traced back to the very beginnings of sociology as an identifiable enterprise. Two to three hundred years ago, as the industrial revolution began to impose unexpected dislocations on what had been a feudalistic society, a profound discomfort in what was new and poorly understood became widespread. People in all stations of life found themselves confused and uncertain about how to proceed. Peasants displaced from the soil and aristocrats jostled aside by ambitious merchants alike discovered a need for security. Rummaging about in search of a satisfying explanation of their plight—one that would also point the way to an acceptable solution—two major worldviews suggested themselves. Beckoning from one direction were collectivist answers and from another libertarian remedies. The first group emphasized the necessity of returning to small tight-knit communities in which everyone knew everyone else and where everyone cared about everyone else. The model for this vision was the loving family. Romanticized accounts of tribal societies stressed how like extended households these were and how in accord with nature they could be. Even when dealing with large modern nations fictionalized speculations about an original social compact or an on-going “general will” enabled analysts to treat these entities in which most people were strangers to on another as if they were all closely related. The libertarians, in contrast, concentrated on the individual. Instead of perceiving people as inherently social, they were conceived of as independent atoms. Each one seemed to float in a bubble of inalienable rights, separately responsible for their personal decisions and with discrete sovereignties ending at the tip of the other fellow’s nose. The guiding image here was of complete freedom, with the untrammeled selfishness of each person integrated as by an invisible hand into a whole that in the end would benefit all. This model fascinated economists in particular. They formulated a myriad of hypotheses about how the rational choices of discrete economic entities consummated in the maximization of their utility schedules.
Sociologists, of course, were in the former camp. Claude Henri de Rouvroy, comte de Saint-Simon, one of the first of this breed, was a minor aristocrat dislocated by the French Revolution. Although an ardent promoter of industrialization, he nevertheless championed small utopian communities in which the members resided together in a harmonious brotherhood. On a national scale he advocated an incipient version of scientific socialism, but, in fact, gathered around him a small coteries of disciples whom he insisted live by their espoused principles. This included such small details as requiring them to wear similar yellow smocks that buttoned up in the back. This last feature was intended to force each person to rely on others for even so simple an activity as getting dressed in the morning. In other words, they would reside in interdependence, even if this did not arise spontaneously. Incidentally, but not irrelevantly, the academic regalia of American sociologists still incorporate the color yellow in tribute to Saint-Simon’s innovation.
Following in the footsteps of his mentor, August Comte likewise accentuated the importance of community. Never able to find a comfortable niche in the new-fangled society emerging around him, after first writing about how civilization evolved from a reliance on religion and metaphysics to a dependence on science, he devoted his latter years to organizing a cult of science. Not to put to fine a point on the matter, the man who coined the term Sociology was a peculiar outcast who was given to intellectual rationalizations and mystical bonds. The same, strange to say, applies to the towering personage of Karl Marx. From the modern perspective, Comte may appear to be a quaint historical oddity that can be safely neglected, but this decidedly does not pertain to Marx. Although the two were almost peers, the latter’s ideas are so integral to current conceptual systems that it is difficult to realize how different his world was from our own.
In pictures of him, one is transfixed by Marx’s fierce eyes, full beard, and shock of unruly hair. He looks wild, but his visage is so familiar he seems either the devil incarnate or a benevolent old man, depending upon one’s political leanings. Few know much about the man himself, about how he resided unbathed in a tiny London apartment, a tyrant to his wife and daughters, and a mendicant dependent upon alms of his friend Fredrich Engles. Yet he was undeniably a charismatic presence in the vineyards of European socialism. Outraged by a social order that refused to honor the intellectual gifts of a scion of mercantile Jewry, he rejected the burgeoning bourgeois world surrounding him with a passion that bespoke a deep personal wound. Given this tendency, it should come as no surprising that, like his immediate sociological predecessors, he perceived in social science an alternative, and superior, form of community. Addicted to what was often a very high level of scholarship, he predicted the momentary emergence of a scientific socialism that would supercede the contradictions intrinsic to capitalism. The logic of class conflict, he argued, must inevitably eventuate in the emergence of a dictatorship of the proletariat. Since social conditions were destined to further deteriorate, poor men and women must one day recognize how badly they were exploited, then band together to overthrow their tormenters. In their place, they would surely erect a civilization in which the dictum “from each according to his ability; to each according to his need” would become a living reality. With property thereby abolished, human selfishness would also disappear. Very much in mode of an updated Rousseau, Marx believed that the rise of communism would return people to a compassionate state of nature. The government would inevitably wither away and this would herald the arrival of a cooperative collectivity that embraced all of humanity for the rest of history.
Lest it need be pointed out, the problem with this prediction was that it did not come to fruition. If science is about testing one’s hypotheses against reality, Marx was no more scientific than the utopians he railed against. Yet his system has had an enduring appeal. Twenty-first century Americans may not share his reasons for rejecting their heritage, but many of them are evidently so uncomfortable with their circumstances that they welcome the prospect of a world based on universal love and collaboration. This may account, to some degree, for the eclipse of an empirically grounded sociology. Marx as we will shortly see, has indeed become a dominant presence in contemporary academic circles—so dominant that his portrait of society has come to define social science for many mainstream practitioners. Amazingly, figures as important to the history of sociology as Herbert Spencer, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber, are almost unrecognizable outside the discipline. In their time, and in their unique ways, each of these was an advocate of social progress, but they have nevertheless been relegated to an esoteric status. Apparently responsible for this is the fact that even though their visions were often as grand as that of Marx, unlike him they were not radical activists. More truly committed to a scientific perspective, they were prepared to surrender their personal values on an alter of disconfirmable truth. Weber probably said it best when he urged his colleagues to seek “value neutrality.” As importantly, he was prepared to live by this standard. Thus, in his political career he might be an architect of Germany’s Weimar constitution dedicated to crafting as democratic a blueprint as feasible, but in his sociological incarnation he sought accuracy, even when this was personally painful.
Across the great pond in America, a scientific mentality was also dominant during the latter part of the nineteenth century and well past the midpoint of the twentieth. With few exceptions, those who teamed up to establish sociology on the country’s college campuses perceived themselves as progressive. Whether at Harvard, Yale, the University of Chicago, or Berkeley, most were sympathetic toward socialism. Even Talcott Parsons, who is often characterized as a reactionary force, began his career harboring radical aspirations. Nevertheless, he, Robert Park, and Robert Merton were all dedicated to promoting a rigorous, non-moralistic discipline. Despite their desire to reform society, the primary allegiance was to creating a theoretical superstructure that dispassionately explained our social arrangements. Park, for instance, was instrumental in denying Jane Addams a faculty position at Chicago because she was insufficiently scientific. Their underlying liberalism, however, often exhibited itself in their scholarship. To illustrate, Merton, in analyzing the relationship between prejudice and discrimination, labeled those who were unprejudiced nondiscriminators as “all-weather liberals” whereas their opposites he called “active bigots.” The unmistakable impression was thus that bigotry and conservativism were synonymous.
And yet by the 1960s a critical mass of sociologists found this mix of scholarship and liberalism unacceptable. Their forerunners now came to be typified as close-minded reactionaries. Parsons was especially vilified. His role as the dean of American sociology made him too a tempting a target to be treated fairly. Within a very short period, he went from being venerated to being castigated as the enemy of social change. This accusation, although unfounded, became the opening wedge for dismissing the functionalism he represented. It also became the cornerstone of the orthodoxy that was to supplant his. This was none other than “conflict theory.” In a nation that has only recently endured the paroxysms of McCarthyism, too candid an espousal of Marxism would have been unthinkable. The result was a pale euphemism that deceived only those not familiar with what these thinkers really advocated.
Since then this neo-Marxism has splintered into a plethora of contending factions, each of which portrays itself as the one true faith. Most have also adopted designations that conceal their radical origins. Yet whether they go by the name of postmodernism, critical theory, or civil rights, they share a collectivist mentality and revolutionary predilections. With the demise of the Soviet Union admitting to communist sympathies has become less fashionable than ever, but by using such stalking horses as gender, race, and social justice, the same underlying objectives can be pursued with a vigor, that if anything, has increased. Concepts such as democracy and equality are contorted out of all recognition to make it appear that the goals sought are parallel to those sponsored by the founding fathers, when, in fact, the objectives are closer to what Joseph Stalin and Mao Tse-Tung had in mind. That these aims have no foundation in science is deemed irrelevant, and even as prestigious a publication as Contemporary Sociology, the flagship journal or reviews of the American Sociological Association (ASA), can unabashedly devote an entire issue to “utopian” solutions for the twenty-first century.
Several years ago the same study that revealed most sociologists identify themselves on the left also disclosed that only four percent classify themselves as conservative. The extent of this disjunction is vividly on display in the discipline’s publications and texts. Thus when Norval Glenn reviewed the books used to teach courses on the family, he found them overwhelmingly hostile to the institution. Ironically, most were enthusiastic about what they termed diversity or the non-traditional family. What this amounted to was a ringing endorsement of single parent households and same gender couples—in essence what has historically been considered antithetical to the family. Evidence that divorce and illegitimacy undermine the life-chances of children is routinely discounted in the face of mounting indicators to the contrary. Even more telling was the professional response to Glenn’s critique. Footnotes, the ASA’s principal newsletter, published several pages of missives decrying him as a near traitor. Especially illuminating was the circumstance that his only defender was a non-sociologist. A similar tale is told by a perusal of the texts used to teach introductory sociology and social problems. These too are so routinely anti the status quo and pro radical equality that students who have not been indoctrinated into the prevailing conventions find them laughable. What these tomes do not contain is any hint of a conservative standpoint. To judge from their tone, such a point of view is so illegitimate that it does not even merit refutation.
Enter Neoconservatism
The contrast is startling and unexpected. With more and more adults returning to college to obtain a degree, many undergraduate classes are filled with both traditional and non-traditional students. Of the two, it is overwhelmingly the non-traditionals who find sociology rewarding. Teenagers fresh out of high school generally assume that the social world is an easy place to understand. Having endured more than a decade in which their heads were crammed with idealistic depictions of how things work, they assume these to be valid. Even the junior cynics among them believe the basic tenets of what they were taught; which is nowadays mostly a liberal pastiche. As a consequence, they don’t pay close attention to what is being said. Nor do they credit that which conflicts with their prior commitments. Convinced they have nothing to learn about such obvious particulars, they do not take the trouble to delve into matters of which they actually have little first hand experience. Similarly unable to place themselves imaginatively into the unfamiliar situations, they instead cleave to a store of oft-repeated platitudes.
Most non-traditional students, in contrast, have had to bear a series of disillusioning catastrophes. The upshot is that when told the world is not what they were led to believe, the most frequent response is a weary, but knowing, nod. Moreover, because unanticipated failures have left a residue of unsolved mysteries, they are alert to new perspectives. Numerous encounters with a variety of social situations have also provided them a store of concrete instances with which to make sense of what they are hearing. In short, painfully aware of their ignorance, for them sociology is a meaningful enterprise. As a subject with the potential to supply useful, but non-obvious, information, against all odds they are less skeptical than their younger peers.
The surprising fact is that most people are sociologically illiterate; including many professional sociologists. A majority may be eager to participate in efforts at social reform, but have only the vaguest idea of how to proceed. Worse still, because their notions about what is wrong, or how it can be fixed, are based on naïve caricatures of reality, their energies are regularly frustrated. A levelheaded, science based sociology might be of inestimable assistance, but given that most of that to which they have been exposed, whether in school or via the media, is an ideological pastiche of collectivism, they rightly intuit that it is a waste of time. They are also correct to be suspicious of easy answers. One of the first lessons of a sound sociology is certainly that our world is hedged in with a myriad of limits. Thus among the dumbest pieces of advice given today’s children is that they can do anything they want. “If you can imagine it, then you can achieve it.” —Including, one may suppose, flying to the moon by flapping one’s arms? No, to paraphrase Dirty Harry, a person must know his or her limitations. Only then is it possible to live up to one’s potential. Like it or not, many of the barriers that frustrate us turn out to be social. Because we human beings are a particular sort of animal that interacts with our associates in bounded sorts of ways some of our plans can succeed, but others cannot. This means that any reform that requires people to become saintly is destined to disappoint. Hence those who seek genuine improvements must separate fantasy from science. To do less, is to invite disaster.
Enter now neoconservatism. It, as opposed to both the collectivist and liberal traditions, endeavors to recognize the restrictions set by the real world. More an attitude and an orientation than an ideology, it is based on three central points of reference. The first is realism. A neocon is a person who wants to remain in touch with reality. No matter how disappointing the facts, he agrees with John Adams that they are “stubborn things,” which if neglected tend to rear up and bite one in the butt. The second commitment is to pragmatism. Neocons want to know what works. When they settle on a goal, they wish to adopt policies that help achieve it. Mere good intentions they find inadequate and empty. The third orientation is meliorism. A neocon does not expect instant salvation. Understanding that actual improvements tend to come slowly and partially, he is prepared to be patient and to accept what the world has to offer. The last thing he desires is to make the “perfect” the enemy of the “good.”
One of the best thumbnail sketches of what this entails comes form David Horowitz. Noting that neoconservatism does not have a “party line,” he insists that it is more a philosophical stance than an ideological faith. Neocons, he explains, “are only able to endorse specific institutions as prudential guides….” Acutely aware of life’s uncertainties and unintended consequences “unlike radicals, they do not pretend to be able to shape the social future by bending it to their will.” Specifically, “the first principles’ of conservatism…are propositions about the existing social contract, about the nature of human beings in a social context, as established by human experience. They are propositions about limits, and what limits make possible.” “This attention to practical experience…[also] explains why conservatives can be…tolerant toward their opponents in ways that progressives cannot.” James Q. Wilson elaborates upon this outline by asserting that, “Neoconservatism is an awkward…name for an attitude that holds social reality to be complex and change difficult. If there is any article of faith common to almost every adherent, it is the Law of Unintended Consequences. Things never work out quite as you hope; in particular, government programs often do not achieve their objectives or do achieve them with high or unexpected costs. A true conservative may oppose change because it upsets the accumulated wisdom of tradition or the legacy of history; a neoconservative questions change because, though present circumstances are bad and something ought to be done, it is necessary to do that something cautiously, experimentally, and with a minimum of bureaucratic authority.”
Neoconservativism thus differs from the beliefs of an Edmund Burke or a Freidrich von Hayek. These icons of conventional conservatism, to varying degrees, venerated tradition for its own sake. Burke, of course, placed his trust in the discoveries made by our ancestors, whereas Hayek emphasized the complicated, and often enigmatic, ways in which historic truths are amassed. The neocon would agree that much wisdom does derive from the past, but is less reverential toward it. This detail makes a lesson routinely transmitted to generations of high school students thoroughly obsolete. Whereas it was once said that conservatives want things to remain the same, that liberals want them to change gradually, and that radicals seek rapid transformations, this is no longer the case. If anything, the attitudes these varying political orientations take toward change have become so jumbled that they are difficult to untangle. Most neocons not only welcome appropriate change, but those of their ilk are probably responsible for more enduring advances than their rivals. The historian, Gertrude Himmelfarb provides an excellent example. As she points out, the invention of the bicycle probably did more to liberate women than all the innovations of recent feminists combined. The mobility supplied by this technological development was concrete and palpable as opposed to the warm fuzziness of denouncing male hegemony. The latter, despite claims to the contrary, has not been responsible for expanding the role of women in the marketplace, whereas the bicycle was. And who are the people responsible for spreading such technological innovations if not “conservatively-minded” businesspersons?
Paradoxically liberals nowadays are often radical or reactionary in their bearing. Feminists, for instance, have advocated the complete abolition of gender roles and sometimes of the family. What is this, if not a radical leap of faith? Equally dramatic and risky is the wholesale redistribution of power advocated by some partisans of civil rights. Yet many so-called liberals gaze in an opposite direction. They hope to lead us back to a simpler form of life. Thus many environmentalists attached to the Sierra Club aim to halt what they deride as suburban sprawl and encourage people to return to the central cities. Isn’t this a reactionary objective? And what of those ecologists who aspire to protecting animals and plants by forbidding road construction on government land? Isn’t it also fair to say that they are opposed to change? Nor is it correct to depict liberals as the champions of freedom. Conservatives are often accused of being fascists, but this label better characterizes contemporary some leftists. Almost a half-century ago Joseph McCarthy and his right wing cronies sought to intimidate their opponents by adopting bullying tactics not unlike those of an Adolf Hitler. But in today’s environment it is the supporters of political correctness who are more apt to resort to coercive methods. They are the ones who, like the brown shirts of yore, storm into college classrooms to threaten those who do not agree with their position on affirmative action. They are the ones who, like the nazi book burners, confiscate college newspapers when these print opinions at odds with theirs. The nineteenth century philosophers who gave liberalism its name were indeed guardians of personal liberty, but their current namesakes are more inclined to favor a powerful government than private initiative. Only if one assumes that a dominant state apparatus is the best guarantee of individual freedom does it make sense to think of them as defenders of liberty.
In many ways neoconservatism is a reaction to this transformation in liberalism. Most of those who self-consciously launched the movement began their careers as liberals, or even socialists. But disillusioned with the heavy-handed orthodoxies propounded by their one-time allies, they sought a more congenial approach. It has been said that those who are not socialists when they are twenty have no hearts, but that those who remain socialists at forty have no heads. Leftists not unnaturally take offense at the self-righteousness of this portrayal, but it incorporates a grain of truth. Those who, in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s, reluctantly made the trek to more moderate positions did so as adults. Bitter experience had convinced them that their former allegiance to collectivism had led them down a dead end. Like their forerunners whose dismay at Russia’s Stalinist excesses persuaded them that communism was a false God, they came to the conclusion that the immoderation of feminism, civil rights, and political correctness merited a similar dismissal. Much to their astonishment, the more they compared these trends with the competition, the better the accomplishments of representative democracy and a market economy appeared. Movement leaders such as Irving Kristol and Norman Podhoretz had long been anti-communist, but they now recognized that the failures of the soviets might be connected with the nature of their aspirations and not merely errors in administration. They then had the courage to take the next step, which was to perceive that when equivalent aspirations were applied to the United States they could be expected to undermine the nation’s remarkable accomplishments.
David Horowitz is an especially good case in point of how wrenching such a realization can be. The son of members of the American Communist party, he grew up an avowed red diaper baby. Long committed to promoting left wing causes, he rose to be co-editor of the influential Ramparts magazine. An agitator by nature, he reveled in theatrical attacks on the establishment. And yet as time passed by, he grew uneasy with what he saw. Genuinely intent on sponsoring a rebirth in freedom, he looked askance when colleagues lionized common criminals merely because they claimed to have been oppressed. What finally tipped the balance, however, were his dealings with the Black Panthers. At first fascinated by the charisma of Huey Newton, he worked diligently to raise money for the school supported by his organization. Despite signs that this project was intended more for public relations than authentic education, he assumed that this was due to inexperience and could be corrected. In particular, he agreed to assist the Panthers in straightening out their finances by recommending one of his own employees to help them with their accounting. When this idealistic woman, who was white, uncovered irregularities and attempted to remedy them, she was threatened and then brutally murdered. Horowitz’ initial reaction to these events was disbelief, but the more he investigated the matter, the more convinced he became that the Panthers had been responsible. As the scales began to fall from his eyes, he also realized that violence was their habitual, and unprovoked, pattern. Now fearing for his own safety, he was to discover that most of his colleagues refused to believe his warnings. Instead, in issuing them, he became a pariah. His idealistic comrades did not seem to want the truth and blamed him for bearing unwelcome messages. In time, Horowitz’ isolation became so excruciating that he was forced to reconsider his opinions. Slowly, he came to the conclusion that his former enemies had been accurate in their alarms regarding collectivism. Nevertheless it took decades before he could admit to himself that he had become a conservative. His emotional conviction that “progressives” were the friends of ordinary people, whereas conservatives were greedy plutocrats bent on exploiting the weak was such that to join them felt like becoming a traitor to all that was good and holy. This sentiment was reinforced by the censure of his former collaborators. One thing that they all would have agreed upon is that George W. Bush’s battle cry of “compassionate conservatism” was a contradiction in terms.
I too have experienced the torment of ideological conversion. Never the radical that Horowitz was, I was nevertheless a convinced socialist in my youth. Almost all of the Brooklyn Jews with whom I was familiar, including members of my own family, implicitly assumed that the emergence of a universal community was the sole way that the world could become fair to minorities. Acutely aware of the oppressions meted out to their ancestors, they clung to an under-dog mentality, even as their economic and political prospects brightened. Only when everyone was committed to justice within a framework in which equality was the central concern would they feel safe. This seemed to me no more than common sense. People should care for one another. They should be selfless enough to share with those who are less well off. If they did, all sources of conflict would be eliminated and no one would have to worry about being attacked by those who lusted after illegitimate supremacy.
It was not until I had completed my undergraduate degree that this faith was called into question. Like my two closest friends, Walter Block and Benjamin Klein, I had been a Philosophy major. They, however, were undergoing a metamorphosis. When the three of us agreed to share an apartment to save expenses, they were well on the way to becoming economists. Worse than this, they were flirting with libertarianism. For a full year this became a source of contention. Both day and night, often until six o’clock in the morning, we argued the merits of socialism versus capitalism. To begin with I was dumbfounded that these decent guys, with the same background as myself, could abandon the truth for a mess of potage. This was insane and it was treacherous. But they would not relent. They even recommended books such as Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom for my perusal. Until this moment, I had taken it for granted that conservatives were uneducated boobs, while liberals were natural intellectuals with a monopoly on sound arguments.
One of our recurring points of dispute was rent control. New York City had instituted caps on what landlords could charge during World War II. This had been intended as a temporary hedge against profiteering. Nevertheless two decades later it was still in place and most renters clung to it as a shield against the voracity property-owners. They all knew that these capitalists would extract every unearned penny they could from hapless tenants. Amazingly, in the face of this unified judgment both Walt and Ben asserted that rent control ought to be abolished. In their estimation it was destroying the housing stock of the community. Patiently they would explain that if landlords could not raise rents, all too soon they would not possess the resources to maintain their properties. These would then deteriorate and become unlivable. If they were then legally compelled to invest in maintenance, this would not be a solution. In this case, they would have to abandon their properties rather than endure a perpetual loss. Besides, in the long run competition in the marketplace was sufficient to keep profits within bounds. Those landlords who were too ravenous would drive away their own tenants and wind up with less money than those who were more reasonable.
As hard as I tried, I could not refute the logic of these arguments. There had to be a flaw in their reasoning, but I could not find it. Eventually life itself would convince this was because there was none. As it happened, within a few years I was working for the city’s department of welfare in the south Bronx and each day taking the elevated train through many square miles of devastated territory. Hundreds and perhaps thousands of acres of tenements and apartment buildings stood empty, many of them literally bulldozed into rubble. The scene looked like Berlin after years of allied bombing, yet as I could longer deny, the culprit was rent control. The predicted landlord abandonments had occurred and the remaining hulks had been stripped of anything valuable by the derelicts and drug addicts who wandered through the debris. Nonetheless the policy remained sacrosanct. Despite the evidence of their senses, the voters refused to repeal this failed strategy. The effect of their attempt to guard their pocketbooks was denied and the blame heaped upon proprietors who refused to live up to their responsibilities. Years down the road, price controls would also be imposed by the Nixon and Carter administrations. These too would fail, nevertheless new price caps would be proposed every time there was a spike in energy or food costs. Conservative economists regularly denounced these practices, but they would be shouted down by concerned citizens who bemoaned the insatiability of the big oil companies and the greed of the multi-national agribusinesses.
My schooling in the limitations of liberal policy was also accelerated in other ways by my welfare experience. As an employee of an agency with the stated goal of helping the poor, I was confronted with reams of evidence that its programs were self-defeating. Those of us with our eyes open could not help but notice how putting people on our rolls robbed them of their independence. Merely giving them money evidently did not prepare people to take charge of their own lives; it merely primed them to make greater demands. The powers that ran the agency, however, had no interest in acknowledging these realities. They would not even admit that many of our clients were cheating the system. We caseworkers would cynically chuckle as we witnessed streams of cabs drive up to the welfare center on check days, but our bosses were adamant that no more than 2% were cheaters. It would be decades before more careful studies demonstrated that between a quarter and a half of the clients were dishonest. Only then were genuine efforts at reform attempted.
Particularly revealing for me was an incident that occurred while I was working as an employment counselor. It demonstrated how even the best-intended plans could go awry. The proposal was simple; so simple it seemed obvious. The department would sponsor a cohort of AFDC mothers who had dropped out of high school in obtaining their GEDs. If they succeeded in this, they would then be given the financing to seek a college degree. If this too were a success, they would be hired as paraprofessionals by the department itself. We counselors thought this a marvelously practical proposal. Eager to participate in implementing it, we immediately gathered to discuss its nuts and bolts. Much to our amazement, however, our office clerks glared at us in hostile disapproval. At a loss to comprehend their displeasure, we inquired into its source. They then explained that the clients we proposed to help were their peers. They had gone to high school together, but whereas these others had dropped out and had children out of wedlock, they had been more conscientious and completed their studies. They had also gone on to marry and when these unions fell apart, instead of seeking a public handout, had taken jobs to support their families. Now those who had been less responsible would be given an opportunity to get the college education they too coveted. Worse yet, these slackers would ultimately be made their superiors. How fair was this? Here then was an instance of the Law of Unintended Consequences with a vengeance.
This sort of experience was to be repeated ad nauseum. Programs whose benefits I had taken for granted turned out to be wasteful and sometimes harmful. Almost two decades of working in the helping professions convinced me that the government is not a neutral benefactor. Whatever the hopes of those who expected state-sponsored remedies to improve society, the bureaucracies needed to implement them were human structures with all the flaws this implies. Nor have my years as an academic persuaded me that my idealistic colleagues can be trusted to solve social problems. Even in so straightforward a matter as academic freedom, their ideological commitments corrupt their vision. Like my old welfare superiors, many literally refuse to perceive how political correctness stifles dissenting opinions. Freedom of speech, as they interpret it, means freedom for them to speak and for their opponents to listen. How else can one explain the assertion of a Brown University professor that when campus radicals expropriated student newspapers they found offensive, they had not engaged in theft because it was not possible to steal what was free?
My neoconservatism has thus been forged in the fires of disenchantment. Policies that I had sincerely hoped would benefit humankind have proven a grave disappointment. Like Horowitz, I too have had to endure the scoffing of colleagues who interpret these insights as a species of betrayal. Lest there be any doubt, both helping professionals and academics are overwhelmingly liberal. They, together with the media and entertainment industry, are the bastions of political correctness, temperamentally hostile to free enterprise and to personal responsibility. In this they have remained oblivious to the contributions of neoconservatism. Having refused to scrutinize what this orientation has to offer, they do not realize that its realism, pragmatism, and meliorism hold the possibility of genuine, and not fantasy, improvements.
Academic sociology has been especially resistant to any form of conservatism. Its practitioners habitually assume that any perspective that approves of capitalism must be hostile to social solidarity. The truth may be profoundly otherwise, but they have blinders on. Ironically the willingness of neoconservatism to accept social complexities equips it to salvage sociology from itself. Recall Horowitz’ counsel that modern conservatism is grounded in an understanding of “the existing social contract”; that it seeks to apply information “about the nature of human beings in social context, as established by historical experience.” Shouldn’t a discipline that defines itself as the study of social arrangements be dedicated to understanding this social contract? Shouldn’t it, above all else, seek to determine the nature of human beings in social context? And why shouldn’t our historical experience be illuminated by a conscious exploration of what is, or is not, socially possible? Is this no more that shining a light on the path we propose to walk?
A Neoconservative Manifesto
Over the years I have come to the conclusion that sociology has a great deal to say about how society operates and about the sorts of modification that are feasible. The ideological mindset of many of its adherents has systematically obscured the complexities and limitations already discovered, but a clear-eyed examination of these can still retrieve them. What I propose to do in this section is to list a series of propositions I take to be central to a neoconservative sociology. These are not set in stone and are subject to empirical modification, but nevertheless represent what I believe would be a consensus among those sociologists who consider themselves neocons. Drawn from my personal experience, they epitomize what I take to be the core of the matter. As should also be apparent, these points have a multitude of policy implications, but these will be spelled out later.
Before I go on, however, it should be noted that this perspective represents an alternative to both collectivism and libertarianism. As is so often the case, the truth frequently combines multiple trends. In this instance, the best way to characterize human society is as encompassing an “embedded individualism.” People are separate from one another and therefore capable of making independent decisions, yet their fates are at the same time inextricably linked. Not only are we inherently social creatures, but our very personalities are also a product of interactions with others. On the one hand, society is not the harmonious family envisioned by many collectivists. Our unavoidably selfish interests dictate that there will always be conflicts between individuals. On the other, contrary to the libertarians, our personal achievements can never be completely separated from the contributions of others. The bubbles in which we are encapsulated, as it were, overlap. This means that more often than not, even when we believe we are operating independently, we are actually responding to external stimuli.
Here then is my neoconservative manifesto with the principal ideas that I take to be essential to understanding how society works.
I. Society is enormously complex. The way people relate to one another is far more complicated than generally imagined. Many more things are going on than we typically grasp; so many that we never fully appreciate them. This means that grand theories never accurately reflect social realities. Sociologists, like most human beings, are ill at ease with uncertainty. They want unequivocal answers and have not been hesitant in proposing them. The problem is that these tend to be too simple. This makes them effortless to grasp, but also ensures that they will promote error. As a case in point, Karl Marx attempted to explain most social phenomena in terms of historically evolving social class conflicts. A strident materialist, he insisted that economics was central to all human activities, hence his certainty that a competition over control of the means of production would inevitably result in a dictatorship of the proletariat. In this he was not entirely wrong. Class conflicts do make a difference, but they are not the whole story. Herbert Spencer, in contrast, highlighted the importance of social specialization. He observed that the larger societies became, the more detailed were their divisions of labor. This, in turn, sculpted the manner in which they were organized in predictable ways. In this he too had a point. But like Marx it was partial and incomplete. Each may have thought his was the one correct answer, whereas both contributed non-contradictory pieces to a much larger picture.
Later on Parsons sought to reconcile a broad range of observations in an overarching conceptual scheme. Initially it seemed that the elegant symmetry of his system had achieved this objective. Eventually, however, it was realized that his theory was not generating testable hypotheses and was essentially tautological. If it seemed to cover all the contingencies, this was because its referents were unclear and hence plastic. The real world is much messier. Numerous trends intersect one another in a fashion that often appears contradictory. Freud described the human personality as “overdetermined,” that is, as being simultaneously caused by a variety of factors. He also spoke of people being ambivalent, that is, as being able to experience apparently inconsistent feelings concurrently (e.g., both loving and hating a particular other at the same time). Society is like that too. Numerous factors can contribute to the emergence of a specific circumstance and several apparently incompatible conditions can overlap. This drives onlookers crazy, disorienting them and making it unclear how to respond. But it is the way things are and pretending otherwise makes success less likely.
II. A useful sociology must be empirical. To qualify as a science, a discipline needs to be dedicated to learning from reality. It must assume that there are truths that can be learned through careful observation. This may sound obvious but many contemporary sociologists insist the truth is unknowable. Postmodernists, for instance, maintain that social reality is a human construction. They argue that because we define the situations in which we find ourselves, and that because these definitions are shaped by our personal conditions, they are ultimately arbitrary. These theorists talk about the necessity of “deconstructing” reality and then reconstructing it in accord with their ideological requirements. Thus capitalists must learn that their own greed itself impels them to identify individual competence as valuable and must therefore be compelled to redefine their standards to make a place for the less fortunate. To do less is to condone exploitation.
While it is the case that many human institutions are socially constructed, this does not demonstrate that truth is. Our values may be subject to modification, but this does not mean that we can define the sky as green when it is actually blue. Some commentators distinguish between physical truths and social truths, but this is a specious argument. There is a distinction between descriptive and prescriptive propositions, but insofar as we are trying to attain an accurate understanding of society, we are impelled to engage in description. And this requires that our observations be disconfirmable. If close scrutiny cannot demonstrate that an assertion is false, then what is being claimed has no empirical standing. It is at bottom so plastic, that it doesn’t stand for anything. Lewis Carol’s Humpty-Dumpty claimed that he could make words mean whatever he wanted, but actual languages rely on settled meanings. To reiterate, as long as sociology aspires to be a science, it must investigate the real world and not just the fantasy life of its practitioners. Unless it is willing to risk being wrong, it can say nothing worth our listening.
III. Sociology must be reflexive. Unlike the physical sciences, sociology is unalterably bound up with values. Ever since people have been studying society, they have been judging it. Nevertheless there is a big difference between evaluating things and accurately portraying the nature of these evaluations. Sociology should be concerned with the latter. Since values are themselves social facts, they too should be subject to careful examination. What do people feel and why do they feel that way? These are legitimate questions. Yet sociologists are human beings. Like their fellows, they are inevitably drawn to appraising their surroundings. Also like their fellows they are inclined to misperceive their own commitments and the distortions to which these lead them. This is probably the origin of the assertion that the truth cannot be known.
The way out of this conundrum is reflexivity. The sociologist who seeks to avoid error must be aware of his own contribution to what he sees. Since he is his primary instrument in studying society, he must be acutely aware of his own tendencies. The best analogy here is probably counter-transference. Competent psychotherapists know that in order to understand their clients they must apply empathy. But in utilizing their own feelings to do this, they are in danger of projecting them inaccurately. The solution is self-analysis. The therapist must be able to distinguish what comes from himself and what from the client. In practice, acquiring this knowledge can be difficult, yet it remains essential. The same applies to sociologists. They too bring a store of beliefs and aspirations to their task, and these attitudes can create parallel distortions. The solution in this case also entails a self-analysis, albeit of different aspects of one’s personality. Sociologists must be acutely aware of their own values and their own ideologies. They must also recognize what makes them uncomfortable and how they tend to fill in the gaps when they are uncertain. A failure to pursue these matters will surely condemn them to inaccuracy.
IV. Sociologists must be prepared to learn from their mistakes. Ideologues are often captivated by their ideals. They are so enthralled by visions of a perfect future that they refuse to recognize when their recommendations go wrong. Sociology, to the degree that it is applied, must be more flexible. Its empiricism must attach not only to determining the truth, but also to uncovering what works. Once values (i.e., goals} are agreed upon, the question becomes, what is the way to achieve them? This is where pragmatism comes in. Being practical means being able to admit when one has made a mistake and then making the appropriate adjustments.
In particular, when sociologists associate themselves with specific policy recommendations, they must be prepared to assess them honestly. Evaluation research must not be distorted to support prior commitments. The difficulty lies in our human disposition to avoid being caught in error. Because this can be taken as a sign of weakness, and therefore invite attack, there is a tendency to put up a rigid front. Yet inflexibility cancels the benefits of science. It makes learning impossible.
V. All large-scale societies are hierarchical. We human beings are inclined to rank ourselves against one another. We establish a social order in which some people have more power than others, and this results in some having greater access to limited resources than others. This is not fair but it is ubiquitous. Efforts to abolish these disparities are doomed because the proclivity to establish them is built into our genes. It is also counter-productive because this propensity is what enables us to create large-scale organizations. The best we can do is to reshape our hierarchies so that they are more equitable and more effective.
In modern society the most fundamental form of stratification is social class. This is based primarily on economic standing, but education and political power also play a role. In this environment, complete equality is unattainable, yet it is possible to increase the proportion of people in the middle classes. This can be facilitated by promoting a social mobility based upon meritocratic considerations. It is also possible to encourage stewardship in an enlightened elite that is democratically constrained and also to reduce the social distance between the top and the bottom by fostering an egalitarian ettiquette. In the end, there will still be winners and losers, but more individuals will have control over their own destinies.
VI. Representative democracy is a great equalizer. One of the enduring treasures that is the legacy of all Americans in the democratic political system erected by the country’s founding fathers. Ideologues routinely propose participatory schemes designed to flatten social relations, but they forget that prior to our revolution no democratic state had endured for as long as we have. Our republican form of government in which some people are elected by universal suffrage to represent the interests of others has demonstrated remarkable stability. Not everyone, of course, has equal access to the primary decision-makers, but the volume of input from all levels of society is dramatically higher than has been historically true.
One of the geniuses of this arrangement has been the system of checks and balances that James Madison inserted into our constitution. Like many of his contemporaries, he trembled at the dangers of both faction and tyranny. He knew that people would compete for social precedence and that, the given the opportunity, the strong could become overbearing. His brilliance lay in harnessing these energies by pitting contending powers against each other in a divided government. Supplemented by a Bill of Rights, this proved capable of protecting the weak from potential predators and provided a practical equality that has been matched in few other places.
VII. Unless there is a compelling reason for centralization, decentralization is to be preferred. Decision-making is never uniformly distributed. To the extent that people participate in shared endeavors, some people will have more influence than others. Robert Michels characterized this as the Iron Law of Oligarchy and its central premise is that effective planning can only be achieved by limited numbers. Nevertheless, not all decisions need be concentrated in the same place within an organization. When determinations are concentrated at its top, this is designated centralization. When they are more broadly distributed, with even those at the bottom delegated power, it is called decentralization.
All other things being equal, neoconservatives favor decentralization. Both economically and politically it possesses matchless advantages. When those closer to a problem are allowed to respond to it, they are apt to be more responsive and more flexible. Because they are better situated to perceive what is happening when it is happening, they can react more quickly and appropriately. More widespread decision-making also expands the expertise that can be brought to bear. No all powerful boss, or group of bosses, can possibly possess the breath of knowledge or the range of skills of a large population. If this is true, then private or local government solutions are often preferable to federal interventions, and personal entrepreneurship should be favored over monopoly. There are, to be sure, cases in which bigger is better. Economies of scale make it imperative that large corporations rather than backyard tinkerers produce automobiles. But by the same token, some activities demand centralized coordination. The strategy for defeating Hitler’s Germany could not have been decided upon by twelve million privates and the schedules needed to run a railroad must reflect a unified plan. Which is better in a particular case, however—centralization or decentralization—is an empirical matter. This, in fact, is one of the distinguishing features between conservatives and libertarians. The latter have a reflexive bias toward the individual, whereas conservatives recognize the need for government regulation and for programs such as social security.
VIII. Individual responsibility should be cultivated. For decentralization and democracy to work, and for the middle classes to expand, more people must be capable of self-direction. Those who make decisions must have the skills and the motivation to do so. In short they must be prepared to take responsibility for their own actions. Instead of a universal dependency on the welfare state, in which a beneficent Big Brother protects everyone from all dangers, people must nurture the ability and the inclination to take care of themselves and those they love.
Among the assets that responsible individuals must develop is the courage to face life’s uncertainties. They must not shy away from risks, nor fall apart when things go wrong—as they invariably do. Fear is a normal and invaluable emotion, but one that must be under control. On a more general level, it is essential to pursue emotional maturity. Other feelings, such as anger, guilt, and shame, must be mastered for people to live up to their potential and for them to treat others appropriately. Primitive outbursts and excessive reactions have a way of being stupid and harmful. Unlike the weather, however, they do not merely have to be endured. People who genuinely want to grow up can. They can appreciate their limits and operate contentedly within them.
IX. Morality is not optional, and should be internalized. A civilized society must be a moral society. People who live in large agglomerations cannot trust to unregulated impulses. Individuals inevitably want things that conflict with the wants and needs of others. Many are also tempted to employ drastic means of attaining these if they think they can get away with them. Fortunately evolution has produced mechanisms for coping with this dilemma. These techniques are usually grouped together under the heading of morality. Included within this rubric are a multitude of social rules and character dispositions. The former are imperatives that demand compliance within a set of parameters, while the latter are virtues that predispose a person to doing “good.” In either case, if morality is not internalized, it will be imposed, often coercively. Independent decision-making is therefore contingent upon a majority of persons voluntarily complying with standards that allow them to coordinate their activities.
Among the rules that must be respected are those that enjoin people to tell the truth and to refrain from killing one another. So must imperatives about promise-keeping and abstaining from theft. These familiar prescriptions are more complex then people imagine, but in a democratic, market-oriented society are more important than ever. Unless they are widely observed, trust becomes impossible and the whole edifice tumbles down. For similar reasons, these rules must be universally enforced. They must apply to everyone equally, regardless of their station in life. Besides this, people need to be encouraged to feel kindly to toward one another. Honesty, responsibility, compassion, and courage should be built into people’s personalities and not merely be a reaction to social constraints.
X. Social Control must be maintained firmly, but compassionately. If rules are not enforced, they will not be obeyed. Although it is preferable for people to act voluntarily, exceptions are inevitable and must be discouraged. Large-scale societies require respected institutions, such as the police and courts, that are delegated to serve this function. But ordinary people must no shirk their responsibilities. Contrary to what has come to be conventional wisdom, they must be prepared to be judgmental. Those who violate society’s standards ought to feel ostracized because of their behaviors. Universal tolerance sounds civilized, but is an invitation to total chaos.
Some postmodernists assert that people cannot be free unless they are liberated from the day-to-day pressures of social demands. They suppose that anything less than complete spontaneity is bondage. In this they are fundamentally mistaken. There is a sense in which real freedom cannot exist except within a framework of secure social rules. To be able to make independent decisions people must be confident that others will behave in predictable ways. Thus, in order to travel by automobile between Atlanta and Chattanooga, it is essential that other drivers obey the rules of the road. Were they to direct their vehicles as the spirit moved them, ignoring established lanes and traffic flows, what is ordinarily an hour and a half trip would take days.
XI. A utilitarian attitude should be encouraged. We human beings have needs. Exactly what these are may be open to dispute, but there can be no doubt that without the proper nutrition we perish and without genuine love we languish. All of us have aspirations in some form or other. The achievements we pursue differ—they may even be incompatible, but without fulfillment life is not worth living. Traditional Utilitarians spoke about maximizing personal happiness. In this they were unnecessarily restrictive. Life is more than a party on the beach, but everyone does have wants they wish to realize and in so far as this is possible this ought to be facilitated.
The time-honored objective of the utilitarians is “the greatest happiness for the greatest numbers,” but this must be interpreted with a grain of salt. In the real world it is impossible to calculate everyone’s happiness or to ensure commensurate fulfillment. What is possible is to acknowledge that no person’s happiness is worth more than any other’s and that everyone should have an opportunity to contribute to determining the final distribution of goods and services.
XII. Rational bureaucracy and professionalism can co-exist. Large-scale modern organizations require tight controls. The elements of bureaucracy that Max Weber alerted us to a century ago remain in force. Big corporations must possess organizational goals, a functional division of labor, defined offices, a specified hierarchy of authority, standardized procedures and extensive record keeping. These promote efficient centralization, but they also foster dysfunctional constraints and rigidities. In common parlance, these are often designated “red tape.” Nevertheless, they cannot be avoided.
There is however, an alternative. Personal responsibility can be advanced through professionalization. When individuals devote themselves to acquiring specialized skills within an environment that encourages strong motivation, they can be trusted to make decisions without oppressive organizational restrictions. There are, to be sure, inherent conflicts between the centralizing and decentralizing tendencies of bureaucracy and professionalism, but a modus vivendi is possible.
XIII. Traditional gender roles should be respected. Men and women are different. Contrary to the propaganda of the feminists, androgyny is not our natural condition. Like it or not, men do tend to be more aggressive and women more nurturant. There is, of course, an overlap, but women usually do to talk more than men and men usually have greater upper body strength. As time has gone by, science has provided growing confirmation of these distinctions, including physiological differences. In general men seem to be more instrumental in their orientation and women more expressive, that is, men are more goal oriented and women more relationship oriented.
Why then shouldn’t people be able to make their job and family choices on the basis of their abilities and their inclinations? Moreover sociological research demonstrates that husbands and wives gravitate toward a traditional division of labor after children arrive. He acquires the responsibility for supporting the family and she the responsibility for caring for the babies. What is wrong with this? As long as those who dissent from this arrangement have the flexibility to go there own way, what is the point of denigrating what comes naturally?
XIV. Strong heterosexual pair bonds are in society’s interest. It used to be said that nothing was more American than motherhood. Equally assumed was the fact that a mother would have a husband; that she would be part of a heterosexual, nuclear family pair bond. Nowadays liberal activists insist that family diversity is a more valuable ambition. In their view, single parents and homosexual couples can do as good a job of raising children. Once again, reliable research seems to contradict this. The young benefit from having two parents, each of whom can model their own gender, yet who are capable of working together to provide the requisite resources, constraints and emotional supports.
Intimacy is nonetheless difficult. No two people can be in complete harmony, especially when gender points them in different directions. A couple must therefore learn how to work out their differences. They must understand both the limits and the glories of love, and be prepared to endure the low points, while savoring the highs. Divorce, particularly when there are children, is not a pain-free option. The scars tend to be long lasting, especially for the innocent bystanders. Society can help out by encouraging people to take marriage seriously and by providing supports, such as tax benefits, to make the economic burdens less onerous.
XV. The young deserve to be raised in a child-centered environment. It is a cliché to describe children as the hope of the next generation—as the stewards of our collective future. If they are to be able to live up to this mission, their parents must prepare them for it. Instead of being transfixed by their egoistic ambitions, they must acknowledge their children as separate from themselves and as having independent needs that must be understood and cultivated in their own right. The young must gradually be encouraged to make choices that are consistent with their personalities and abilities.
This does not mean that that they should be raised in a permissive manner. Children are not miniature adults who can be safely allowed to figure the world out on their own. They deserve guidance from authority figures who have their interests at heart. In other words, children must be subject to adaptable limits. For their own well-being, there are things they cannot be allowed to do, yet as their capabilities expand they must be able to test these boundaries to discover what works and what doesn’t. In the end, the objective is to provide them with the skills and the emotional toughness to be self-directed.
XVI. Race and ethnicity are irrelevant to social opportunity. Race and ethnicity are real. They may be arbitrary, but they have long been used to separate people into groups that have distinct life-chances. In a market-oriented democracy, this becomes less acceptable by the day. If the rules upon which such a society operates are to be universal and if the talents upon which they draw are to be optimized, then skin color, language, and customs must usually be disregarded. People have to be treated as individuals and their contributions assessed on a personal basis.
The ways people look and behave are very variable, yet beneath these surface disparities a remarkably similar humanity can be found in everyone. Almost identical hopes and fears may be expressed in mutually unintelligible vocabularies, but an effort to particularize individuals is generally rewarded with a glimpse in our common origins. This means that cultural assimilation ought to be open to all those who aspire to it. It also means that we should be color blind when making economic, political and personal decisions.
XVII. Religion is irrelevant to social opportunity. Americans have become very ambivalent about religion. On the one side, people insist on a separation of church and state and on the other celebrate their belief in God. One of the legacies we have inherited from Europe’s religious wars is religious toleration and one of the legacies of our colonial past is the absence of a state sponsored religion. This has enabled a multiplicity of churches to flourish and, paradoxically, because they have the opportunity to make a free choice, to produce one of the most God-fearing populations on earth. The fact that even non-believers are tolerated helps explain why most Americans are convinced there is a deity.
One issue that neoconservatives have not yet resolved is the degree to which religious belief itself promotes morality. Even some nonbelievers assume that for most people a personal faith reinforces their respect for moral dictates. Evidence of this has not, however, been conclusively established. Faith based institutions do contribute to the overall well-being of our society, but they are not its only avenue of support.
XVIII. Freedom does not preclude compassion. Compassionate conservatism is not contradiction in terms. People who are concerned about their own interests can also worry about those of others. Both empathy and sympathy are widespread human capacities, as is self-sacrifice. People can freely choose to be altruistic. They may even choose to do so in concert. But compassion is not always gentle. Sometimes what those undergoing a hardship need most is a demand that they perform—so-called tough love. Unconditional giving can actually enervate people by making them dependent on others.
Good intentions are, in themselves, insufficient. Those who are unconcerned about the consequences of their generosity are usually not being helpful. Foresight, and a sensitivity to life’s limitations, is essential. Often the loudest social benefactors are more intent on raising their status relative to those they assist. It is a reputation for being good, rather doing good, for which they strive.
XXIV. Community effects must be respected. Many human activities unintentionally, but inevitably, intrude into the living space of others. Playing a stereo at ear-shattering volumes may disturb a neighbor’s tranquility, while evacuating particulate matter from a factory chimney can clog his lungs. The environment is everybody’s turf and therefore everybody’s concern. The rules that govern its utilization must, as a consequence, be socially agreed upon. That which encroaches on another’s territory is never a purely private affair.
XX. Both personal and social change are inherently slow. Personalities and cultures are inherently conservative, that is, in most cases when they change, they change slowly. The elements of which they are composed are such that even when they seem to transform, they tend to remain the same. Beliefs, emotions and plans of action are all inherently stable and altered only by relinquishing them and replacing them with superior alternatives. The process whereby this is accomplished is called Resocialization and is intrinsically lengthy and painful. Whether naturally occurring or artificially induced, it entails experiencing feelings that are ordinarily shunned. The upshot is that social change is like New Year’s resolutions, that is, it is more often promised than fulfilled.
Social structures too are conservative. Hierarchies, social roles, and personal relationships are all subject to stabilizing influences. The way people interact can be modified, but there is usually friction to be overcome on the way to what is genuinely different. Those who say that if you can imagine something, you can do it, have apparently never attempted to change. Nor have they experienced the fact that what you wind up with is often poles apart from what you envisaged. It is not for nothing that we have the saying: Be careful what you wish for. You might get it.
To conclude, a neoconservative sociology insists upon respect for America’s numerous historic achievements. Economically, politically and socially the country has advanced further than almost any other in the history of humanity. These advances should not be carelessly jettisoned. Mistakes are too easy and the consequences can be damning. Nevertheless change is occurring. All societies evolve and ours is no exception. There is even reason to believe that as the industrial revolution continues to work itself out that the transformations have accelerated. But this is all the more reason for care. Recent disruptions associated with the growth of the middle class have been particularly nasty. They have convinced many well-meaning individuals to support innovations likely to have catastrophic implications.

An Ode to Juan Williams

When teaching about stereotypes at Kennesaw State University, I often employ a time-tested exercise. In order to give my students a first-hand feel of how these simplified generalizations operate, I run through a series of social categories and ask them to provide the standard characterizations.
I begin with one that applies to me on the assumption that if I am to elicit potentially negative evaluations of others, I should demonstrate a willingness to endure these myself. Thus, I start by asking for the stereotypes of a “professor.”
Generally the initial responses trickle in. The students are not sure of where this procedure is leading and hence are understandably cautious. But soon they are volunteering that professors are thought to be “old,” “smart,” and “overly idealistic.”
Next I query them about Jews. By now they are warmed up and the stereotypes come flowing in. In short order Jews are described as “rich,” “well-educated,” “cheap” and “clannish.” After this come Italians who get labeled as “gangsters,” “loud,” and a source of “great food.”
Following this I offer up “Rednecks.” By now the room is rollicking. Since this is the Deep South almost everyone has an opinion of how rural Southerners are viewed. Having been weaned on the examples provided by Jeff Foxworthy, they are prepared to allow that they are “poorly educated,” “have rifle racks on the tops of their pick-up trucks,” and “go to family reunions to pick up girls.”
But then I get malicious. At this point I ask about African-Americans. Suddenly the class grows quiet. Now no one wants to say anything, as many students look nervously around to determine what will happen next.
Usually the ice is broken by a Black student who suggests that Blacks are not thought “very smart,” but are regarded as “good athletes” and as having “rhythm.” It is only after this that a few whites feel free to say something about Black crime.
It is here that I direct student attention to what has just occurred. We all understand why the Caucasian students were reluctant to say anything negative about African-Americans, whereas they were eager to offer all sorts of questionable evaluations of white southerners.
The fear, of course, is of being labeled a racist. My students worry that their black classmates will suddenly turn on them and accuse them of bigotry. As a result, they look to their African-American peers for permission to join in. Only after this is furnished do they say anything.
But isn’t this where we are in the United States today? People such as our President urge us to embark on a candid national conversation regarding race, but most whites are reluctant to join on the grounds that they will be subjected to the race card.
In this, unfortunately, they are too often correct. Despite all the talk of a dialogue on race, what generally ensues is a one-sided lecture. But more than this, it is a lecture enforced with the “hickory stick.” Those who say the wrong things can expect to be punished.
Anyone who doubts this should consult Juan Williams. Despite being African-American, he paid the price for politically incorrect candor. Having publicly affirmed that he gets nervous when sharing a plane with Muslims dressed in Middle-Eastern garb, he was unceremoniously fired by National Public Radio. His employers, irrespective of his role as a news analyst, deemed this unprofessional.
Many of us were scandalized by such blatant evidence of liberal bigotry, but its authors were unrepentant. Nor did news outlets such as The New York Times deem this worthy of editorial notice. For them, it was business as usual.
This is why Williams deserves our respect. He had the courage to be honest in a world that does not always reward honesty. Unlike my students, he did not look around to determine what was safe. He merely spoke from conviction and was forced to live with the consequences.
We would do well to follow his example, even if it means enduring unwarranted criticism.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University

The Myth of Liberal Niceness

Should I be fired from my job at Kennesaw State University? Some readers of the Marietta Daily Journal seem to think so. They complain that my columns are too conservative and therefore provide evidence that I am too stupid to be a college professor.
Indeed, some of my colleagues and students at KSU have felt the same way. They too have been offended by my political convictions and recommended my termination. Mind you, my job is safe because I am a tenured full professor; nevertheless their sentiment is telling.
Liberals think of themselves as especially nice people. They believe that they are uniquely tolerant and kind. This attitude, however, does not extend to those with whom they disagree. Just ask the tea party activists. Far from being commended for their political activism, they are castigated as stupid, violent, and racist.
Liberal activists, in contrast, are uniformly applauded for their patriotism. However violent or obscene their conduct, they are praised as fighting for justice. The result is that they are allowed to break windows, spit on police officers or steal conservative newspapers with impunity.
Nor, from the liberal perspective, should their lack of niceness necessarily be ruled out of bounds. If I, or my conservative peers, are as threatening to the public well being as alleged, there is no reason they should be extremely polite to us. We should, in fact, be called out and asked to reform our errant ways.
It is just that liberals are hypocritical in their public posture. They proclaim that they are more tolerant than others, whereas the truth is that they are merely selective in their benevolence. Thus, there are very few traditionalists, entrepreneurs, or Republicans they like, while there are even fewer criminals, Arab terrorists, or Black Panther hooligans they seem to dislike.
This imbalance might be dismissed as an innocent matter of style, except that a pretence of universal amiability can have devastating consequences. One of the best examples of this was provided by the Amadou Diallo scandal.
It has been more than a decade since then mayor Rudy Giuliani was castigated by the New York Times for allowing the city’s police department to run wild. For month after month, the paper accused Giuliani of condoning police brutality by tolerating the shooting of an innocent citizen.
The fact that Diallo was killed by officers who mistakenly fired over forty shots at him was taken as irrefutable evidence of recklessness. Although the officers responsible were subsequently acquitted of wrongdoing, they remained guilty in the eye’s of one of the nations’ most liberal journals.
Why does this matter? Why is this ancient history relevant today? It is because the Times stance was not without consequences. The papers editors were convinced that the police were not sufficiently nice to minorities and therefore demanded repentance. They insisted that the authorities back off so that similar mistakes never recur.
But what was the actual outcome? When the police did back off, the crime rate shot up in the affected neighborhoods. More innocent people were killed, robbed, and raped thanks to their increased caution.
To be blunt, niceness that results in increased violence is not necessarily nice. Truly nice people worry about the implications of their compassion. They do not abstain from harsh actions for fear of being perceived as mean-spirited, but neither are they gratuitously nasty.
This outlook not only applies to petty criminals, but to large-scale malefactors such as Iran. Being too nice to Mahmoud Achmedinejad today may result in his being incredibly nasty to many millions of others a few years hence.
The same applies to Republicans being too nice to the Democratic legislators who passed Obamacare. Civility yes, but allowing them to win uncontested re-election—no. Niceness is not absolute, but relative. Sometimes it is essential, whereas reflexive, misplaced, or sham niceness can have dire consequences.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University