Liberal Rights and Political Culture by Zhenghuan Zhou

Author:Zhenghuan Zhou [Zhou, Zhenghuan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, General, Asia, China, Political Science
ISBN: 9781135468354
Google: BehTAQAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2013-10-14T01:19:28+00:00

But, as the authors immediately point out, while individualism has given rise to America's highest and noblest aspirations, it is also responsible for “some of our deepest problems.” Their goal is not to abandon individualism, for that would mean to abandon the fundamental American identity. Rather, the aim is to find a way to reconstruct a coherent moral life which would preserve the positive values contained in individualism while eliminating or at least circumscribing its ill effects.

Like Tocqueville, Bellah and his co-authors offered two perspectives; one looks at the individual in his or her private capacity as a person and the other in his or her public capacity as a citizen. In the private sphere, individualism manifests itself most strikingly. Though the time has changed, the same principles of autonomy, self-reliance, and self-sufficiency which inspired admiration in Tocqueville remain strong moral forces guiding personal conduct with respect to the family, religion, and work. Bellah and his co-authors symbolically describe the young American's declaration of independence as “leaving home.” Ironically, for many Americans, it is precisely within the family that the spirit of self-reliance and autonomy has been cultivated. The act of leaving home is in large part not a hostile rebellion. Rather, it signifies a positive act of living one's own life, making one's own decision, and thinking, judging and taking responsibility for oneself.100

A similar claim for independent and autonomous choice can be heard concerning the objects of belief. If we recall Tocqueville's account of how Christian religion played a fundamental role in American life and how a plurality of religious sects or denominations provided the dynamics for American society, we may be surprised to find a somewhat different situation today. Now religious belief has become a predominantly personal and in many cases educated choice which may or may not have anything to do with the church. It is educated by a liberalized pluralist understanding of religion in particular and world culture in general. Like the act of leaving home, leaving church throws individualism into high relief. It signals a relaxed sense of duty and a concomitant heightened sense of rights. It represents a profound sense of being alone, as one of the interviewees so eloquently put it; of taking responsibility for none but oneself, not even including one's nonage offsprings; and of having one's destiny totally under control both in the negative sense of helplessness and in the positive sense of self-sufficiency. It also suggests knowledge of the lack of objective criteria for moral conduct and, in place of these, drawing on one's own preferences so long as one's conduct does not pose harm to others.101

This understanding of the self as the “arbitrary center of volition” and as the ultimate source of one's interests, wants, responsibilities, and values also lies at the core of the work ethic. The idea of work or calling is relevant to the extent that it helps define one's identity; as is often said, what one does defines what one is. But it is largely stripped of moral connotations.

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