The impact of this development of an industrial civilization is vividly revealed in the social and political attitudes of the modern proletarian class. One focus is on the individual's inner life, and the other on the necessity of man's social life. Clarence Marsh Case, in an excellent analysis of the social problem, puts his trust in one.
Moral Man and Immoral Society: A Study in Ethics and Politics by Reinhold Niebuhr
Man and Society: The Art of Living Together
Human nature is not lacking in certain endowments for the solution of the problem of human society. Military and economic overlords and revolutionary zealots have traditionally been contemptuous of the will of the majority. It may occasionally appropriate the police and the state army to defend its interests against internal and external enemies.
The Rational Resources of the Individual for Social Living
In individual relationships, a great faith in the undeveloped potential of the human spirit can be the way to develop it. Any error in the assessment of the moral resources of individuals is accentuated when it is made the basis of political theory and practice. The tyranny of the husband and father in the family only very slowly yielded to the principle of reciprocity.
The Religious Resources of the Individual for Social Living
In the imagination of a truly religious man, the God who condemns history will still redeem history. 34; Without the mystical guidance of the church he must have sunk in the first jungle and. This hope has been born again and again in the history of the Western world.
The Morality of Nations
The necessity of using force in the establishment of unity in a national community and the inevitable selfish use of the instruments of coercion by the groups that use them contribute to the selfishness of nations. The greed of the capitalist classes has sharpened, but not created, the imperialism of nations. The social ignorance of the private citizen has so far been assumed.
Social reality, understood in the existence of a nation, is too great to leave a vivid impression on the imagination of the citizen. This enthusiasm is the unique product of times of crisis, when his nation is in conflict with other nations. In the life of the common citizen this hypocrisy exists as a naive and unstudied self-deception.
The literature of the war period is replete with similar examples of intellectual self-deception. The Spanish-American War provides some of the most striking illustrations of the hypocrisy of. Somewhat in the same way the realities of the Treaty of Versailles were dictated by Clemenceau, while.
A perpetual weakness of the moral life of individuals is simply raised to the nth degree in the national life.
The Ethical Attitudes of Privileged Classes
The answer to them may hold clues to the puzzle of the future of Western civilization. In England, the Reform Bill of 1832, which could not have been approved but for the agitation of The moral virtues claimed by the privileged classes and by which they justify their special advantages in society are not always of the utilitarian type.
There is in the moral attitude of the aristocracy a curious confusion of manners and morals, which manifests itself in interesting ambiguities in every language. Similar evidences of the aristocratic confusion of manners and morals seem to exist in every language. The aristocracy's devotion to art and culture offers it a new opportunity for morality.
They will argue that it is dangerous to disturb the precarious balance and pretend to fear anarchy as the result of the effort. Nineteenth-century English history is replete with similar examples of the use of violence by the privileged classes in purported support of state police services in suppressing rebellion. His motive was the interest of the economic class, and his goal was the exploitation of society with the help of the state.
Godkin stated: “This blow to the courts shows how true the instincts of the revolutionary are.
The Ethical Attitudes of the Proletarian Class
The moral cynicism expresses itself philosophically in terms of the Marxian materialist and deterministic interpretation of history. English declared, "The economic condition is the basis, but the various elements of the superstructure. It stands apart from the whole system of sentiments and loyalties which give cohesive strength to the nation.
It corresponds to the experience of the true proletarian, the truly disinherited worker who is. It is a tribute to the inner rational and moral needs of the human spirit. It is useful insofar as it recognizes the brutality of power struggle as the basis of the collective history of mankind.
The vision of a world without classes gives moral dignity to the dream of the victory of his class. The distinguishing feature of the Marxist dream is that the destruction of power is considered a prerequisite for its achievement. He sees this more clearly than other classes because he is among the unemployed.
In the recognition of the goal of equal justice and in the analysis of the roots of current injustice.
Justice Through Revolution
The question of the relative value of freedom and solidarity cannot be given a final and authoritative answer. He is shocked by the moral cynicism, tendency to violence and indifference to the individual freedom of the proletarian. If such distinctions are made, they must be justified in terms of the consequences they produce.
This could not be maintained indefinitely if Germany remained under the economic pressure of the moment. Nor was he wrong in attributing it to the overproduction caused by the worker's lack of consuming power. Thus Engels prophesied in By the time of the next crisis, which according to its analogy.
Predictions currently being made may have as little validity as this very plausible prediction made by Engels in the mid-nineteenth century. Meanwhile, it is true that every decade adds to the tension caused by increasing inequality in the economic order. Without a new World War, the possibilities of establishing communism through a revolution throughout the Western world are extremely limited.
But societies risk the well-being of millions when they gamble on attaining the absolute.
Justice Through Political Force
The participation of the German socialists in the Revolution of 1918 is not really an exception to this policy. Excessive tax burden destroys the efficiency of the weakest units in the capitalist system and arouses the resistance of the strongest units. In the case of socialist thinkers like Kautsky, the old Marxist prophecy of the concentration of capital and the inevitable.
Any form of government must naturally make use of the specialized knowledge of experts. In Europe, the still strong medieval traditions of the countryside and the feeling of personal loyalty to the landowner. The abandonment of the eschatological element in socialism means the sacrifice of its religious fervor and the.
There is, of course, an element of illusion in the proletarian's faith, as there is in any faith. As long as those proletarians are completely outside the national ethos, which the nation absolutely has. It is partly due to the reabsorption of the entire semi-proletarian movement into the national soul.
This instinct expresses itself in defense against both internal and external enemies of the state.
The Preservation of Moral Values in Politics
It was destroyed by the spontaneous combustion of the mutual fears and animosities it created. Too uncritically glorifying cooperation and reciprocity therefore results in accepting traditional injustices and privileging subtler types of coercion over more overt types. In any case, a more precise analysis of the issue of choosing methods of coercion in the social process is important.
The temper and method of non-violence destroys the credibility of this moral arrogance of entrenched interests. Gandhi and Viceroy Lord Irwin, after the first Round Table Conference, was a perfect example of morality. The emancipation of the black race in America surely awaits the adequate development of this kind of social and political strategy.
It is hopeless for the Negro to expect complete emancipation from the low social and economic position into which the white man has forced him, simply by believing in the moral sense of the white race. It is no accident of history that the spirit of non-violence has been introduced into contemporary politics by an oriental religious leader. The history of human life will always be a projection of the natural world.
To the end of history, the peace of the world, as Augustine observed, must be won by strife.
The Conflict Between Individual and Social Morality
Sometimes it tries to do justice to the inner moral needs of the human soul rather than the needs of society. The more the moral problem is shifted from the relations of individuals to the relations of groups and collectives, the more the predominance of selfish impulses over social ones is established. It justifies the ideal in terms of the integrity and beauty of the human soul.
It is difficult for a wise statesman to justly insist on the interests of his group when they are clearly in an unjust relation to the common interests of the community of mankind. The excesses of the terrorists seem to have indicated a Tolstoian opposition to violence and resistance. From an internal perspective, we can only look at the actions of ourselves; and from this point of view all egoism must be moral.
Moral good will may seek to connect the particular interests of the group with the ideal of the perfect and ultimate harmony of all life. But it cannot hide the moral distrust expressed by the mere use of coercive instruments. Such a policy can easily lead to political irresponsibility, as in the case of the more extreme sects of non-insurgents.
Be it the cooperative and moral aspects of human life or the needs of society.
