PUBLIC

REASON

Journal of Political and Moral Philosophy

Volume 12, Number 2, 2020

. 2, 2019

. 11, No

Vol

PUBLIC REASON

Editura

Universității

din București

Public Reason

Journal of Political and Moral Philosophy

Public Reason is a peer-reviewed journal of political and moral philosophy. Public Reason publishes articles, book reviews, as well as discussion notes from all the fields of political philosophy and ethics, including political theory, applied ethics, and legal philosophy. The Journal encourages the debate around rationality in politics and ethics in the larger context of the discussion concerning rationality as a philosophical problem. Public Reason is committed to a pluralistic approach, promoting interdisciplinary and original perspectives as long as the ideal of critical arguing and clarity is respected. The journal is intended for the international philosophical community, as well as for a broader public interested in political and moral philosophy. It aims to promote philosophical exchanges with a special emphasis on issues in, and discussions on the Eastern European space. Public Reason publishes two issues per year, in June and December. Public Reason is an open access e-journal, but it is also available in print.

Editors

Advisory Board

Editor in Chief

Radu J. Bogdan, Tulane University

Romulus Brancoveanu , University of Bucharest

Paula Casal, University of Reading

Sorin Baiasu , Keele University

Fred D’Agostino, University of Queensland

Associate Editor

Rainer Forst , Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main

Thomas Pogge , Yale University

Axel Gosseries Ramalho, Catholic University of

Louvain

Editorial Team

Alan Hamlin, University of Manchester

Assistant Editors

John Horton, Keele University

Carmen-Viviana Ciachir, University of Bucharest

Janos Kis , Central European University, Budapest

Ileana Dascalu, University of Bucharest

Jean-Christophe Merle , University of Tübingen

Mircea Tobosaru, Politehnica University of

Adrian Miroiu , SNSPA Bucharest

Bucharest

Adrian W. Moore , University of Oxford

Editorial Board

Philippe Van Parijs , Catholic University of Louvain Ovidiu Caraiani, University Politehnica of Bucharest Mark Timmons , University of Arizona

Luigi Caranti, University of Catania

Radu Dudau, University of Bucharest

Mircea Dumitru , University of Bucharest

Adrian - Paul Iliescu, University of Bucharest

Ferda Keskin , Istanbul Bilgi University

Alina Romascu, Université de Corse Pasquale Paoli

Constantin Stoenescu , University of Bucharest

Ion Vezeanu, University of Grenoble

Public Reason is available online at http://publicreason.ro ISSN 2065-7285

EISSN 2065-8958

© 2020 by Public Reason

Public Reason

Journal of Political and Moral Philosophy

Vol. 12, no. 2, 2020

Proceedings of Cultural Heritage and Identities: Normative Perspectives, Sustainability and Global Governance

ArTiclEs

Ruwen Fritsche

Cultural Heritage Policy as a Challenge to Rawlsian Liberalism? . . . . . 3

Ștefan Ionescu

Collective Identity, between Ideology and Cooperation . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Ileana Dascălu

Cultural Heritage and John Dewey’s Philosophy of Education in a Democratic Community . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Costel Matei

Patriotism, Liberalism, Cosmopolitanism and Globalization . . . . . . . . 37

BOOK rEViEWs

Kirk Ludwig, From Individual to Plural Agency: Col ective Action . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .49

Reviewed by Andreea Popescu

Public Reason 12 (2): 3-16

© 2020 by Public Reason

cultural Heritage Policy as a challenge

to rawlsian liberalism?

Ruwen Fritsche

Georg-August-University Göttingen

Abstract: To answer the question whether cultural heritage policy is chal enging Rawlsian Liberalism, the paper is structured in four parts. In the first part, I will present, as a paradigmatic example, an area of legislation that is specifical y aimed at preserving cultural heritage – namely German cultural property law. In the second part, I will try to answer whether and under what conditions state action to promote and protect cultural heritage can be moral y justified according to the Theory of Justice by John Rawls. In the third part, I will examine whether Rawls’s position as worked out in the second part is consistent or even coherent with the claims of so-cal ed political perfectionism. In the fourth and last part of the paper, I am going to analyse tentatively to what extent German cultural property law would have to be changed to be in accordance with the moral criteria of Rawls’s Theory of Justice, as presented in the parts before.

Key words: ethics, cultural heritage policies, legal ethics, normative political theory, moral philosophy, law, political perfectionism, culture, Aristotelian principle, self-respect, the good, A Theory of Justice, John Rawls, Steven Wal , German cultural property law, cultural property of national significance, accessibility.

The protection of the cultural heritage of a nation, a region, or a specific group is often used as a legitimising goal for a variety of different policy frameworks. The general question I want to examine in this paper is how to justify, from an ethical1 point of view, political action aimed at protecting cultural heritage. The inquiry is restricted in two ways.

Firstly, I would like to focus on the (possible) justification by the liberal moral philosophy of John Rawls’s A Theory of Justice. Secondly, I want to restrict the scope of the ethical examination in this paper to a specific area of political regulations where the motive to protect cultural heritage is especial y dominant, that is German cultural property law. My aim is, therefore, to use the more abstract moral philosophy of John Rawls to make an ethical assessment of the actual design of a legal regulatory regime of cultural heritage policy and thus to bridge the gap between moral philosophy and law.

I. the legal protection of cultural heritage

German cultural property law – de lege lata

In the fol owing, I want to set forth some central legal provisions of German cultural property law to indicate how the concrete law protecting cultural heritage works. The central code for cultural property protection in Germany is the “2016 Act 1] By “ethical” I mean the critical reflection of the actual y existing positive moral norms, (see: Frankena 1963, 4-5).

4

Cultural Heritage Policy as a Chal enge to Rawlsian Liberalism?

on the protection of cultural property” (KGSG).2 One central legislative aim consists in the protection of “cultural property with national significance”. Cultural property with national significance is not to be confused with “national cultural property” which the KGSG uses as the more general term referring to cultural property with national significance and including most publicly owned cultural property.3 Fol owing the aim of the KGSG to protect cultural property, the property rights in cultural property with national significance are therefore restricted.

Cultural property of national significance as a subject of the KGSG

Section 6 KGSG starts by defining what national cultural property should be:

“(1) National cultural property shall be cultural property which 1. is entered in a register of cultural property of national significance”

Thus, what is meant by cultural property of national significance within the meaning of section 6 (1) KGSG depends on the criteria for entering the register of cultural property of national significance in the sense of section 6 (1) (1) KGSG. These criteria are stated in section 7 KGSG. According to section 7, the entrance in the register shall be mandatory when the fol owing conditions are cumulatively fulfil ed: Section 7 (1) “The supreme Land authority shall enter cultural property in a register of cultural property of national significance

1. if it is particularly significant for the cultural heritage of Germany, its Länder or one of its historical regions and thus formative for Germany’s cultural identity; and 2. if its removal would be a significant loss for Germany’s cultural heritage so that keeping it in the federal territory is of outstanding cultural public interest” ( emphasis added by the author).

The procedure for entry into a register of cultural property of national significance is initiated by the appropriate authorities ex officio or upon request by the owner (see Section 14 (1) KGSG). The registration of cultural property may only proceed in consultation with an expert committee (see Section 14 (3) KGSG). This committee consists of experts, i.e. to be considered are: “persons from institutions preserving cultural property, from research, art and antiquarian book trades, and private col ectors”

(see Section 14 (2) (2) KGSG).

Regulation of cultural property of national significance according to the KGSG

There are multiple legal consequences once a piece of cultural property has entered the register for the cultural property of national significance. According to section 18 in conjunction with section 83 (3) KGSG, damaging cultural property of national 2] KGSG means Kulturgüterschutzgesetz of 31. July 2016 (Federal Law Gazette I, 1914), http://

www.gesetze-im-internet.de/englisch_kgsg/index.html (accessed February 1, 2020).

3] See for details: section 6 (1) (2-4) KGSG. The wider concept of national cultural property corresponds to European law terminology, see Art. 36 TFEU and Art. 2 (1) Directive 2014/60/EU.

Ruwen Fritsche

5

significance (even for the property owner) is subject to criminal prosecution. Section 19

KGSG states notification requirements for cultural property of national significance in case of loss, destruction, damage, or any change to the appearance of the cultural property.

The central restriction for cultural property of national significance is stated in section 21

(2) KGSG in conjunction with sections 22, 23, 83 (1) (1) KGSG which makes it a criminal offense to export cultural property of national significance, reserving the right to grant approval for export. Il egal export of cultural property of national significance could thus be punished with a fine or even imprisonment of up to five years. Final y, according to section 16 KGSG, the register of cultural property with national significance is to be published on the internet.4

II. The mor al jusTIfIcaTIon of sTaTe acTIon To promoTe and proTecT

culTur al herITage accordIng To r awls’s Theory of JusTice

The fundamental goal to protect the German cultural heritage and the aforementioned basic means to such end via cultural property legislation is not controversial political y.5 Nevertheless, there are debates about what exactly constitutes cultural heritage. In contrast to the political consensus with respect to protecting cultural heritage via cultural property legislation, there is an ongoing debate in moral philosophy whether and under what conditions a liberal state might engage in active cultural politics to promote the intrinsic values of a culture.6 On a more abstract level, detached from any specific debate on legitimate cultural policies, the debate in moral philosophy revolves around the concept of political perfectionism (see for an overview of the debate Steven Wall (2017)).

In the fol owing, I first want to present relevant ethical norms according to which we could judge whether and to what extent cultural politics could be moral y justified. I want to focus on liberal theories because prima facie it seems to be specifical y suitable for justifying the cornerstones of a western-style liberal constitutional democracy, namely human rights, democracy, separation of powers, etc.7 A sceptical view on the legitimacy 4] See http://www.kulturgutschutz-deutschland.de/DE/3_Datenbank/

LVnationalWertvollenKulturguts/lvnationalwertvollenkulturguts_node.html (accessed February 1, 2020).

5] This becomes particularly clear in the parliamentary debate in the Bundestag, where there was no party that rejected the basic aim to protect the German cultural heritage via cultural property legislation when the Cultural Property Protection Act was revised in 2016, (“Erste Beratung des von der Bundesregierung eingebrachten Entwurfs eines Gesetzes zur Neuregelung des Kulturgutschutzrechts” 2016; “Zweite Und Dritte Beratung des von der Bundesregierung eingebrachten Entwurfs eines Gesetzes zur Neuregelung des Kulturgutschutzrechts” 2016).

6] Intrinsic values of a culture mean in this context values which are not good in virtue of the fact that they are desired or enjoyed by human beings and which are also not classical liberal values like equality and freedom, i.e. non-universalistic or particularistic values.

7] Of course, I do not want to say thereby that liberal theories are the only ones that could justify the cornerstones of a western-style liberal constitutional democracy.

6

Cultural Heritage Policy as a Chal enge to Rawlsian Liberalism?

of cultural politics in light of liberal moral philosophies is paradigmatical y expressed in the Theory of Justice by John Rawls, published in 1971.8 In this paper, I would like to focus solely on Rawls’s magnum opus, A Theory of Justice, as the ethical benchmark for the justification of cultural heritage policy. I first want to give a summary of Rawls’s central arguments which lead to his rejection of perfectionist justifications of politics and which seems especial y relevant for cultural property policies.

The primary object of justice is, according to Rawls, the basic structure of a well-ordered society (1999, 6-10). The principles of justice are, along with his contractualistic account of “justice as fairness”, determined by the (potential) agreement of persons (1999, xvi i). Rawls assumes this agreement to be the result of a thought experiment. The persons in the “original position” should be imagined as being behind a “veil of ignorance”

behind which they agree on the basic principles of justice (1999, 11, 118-21). Rawls’s reason for deploying the veil of ignorance is that the knowledge of (any) contingent societal or natural personal characteristics would motivate to seek advantages, which are based on these contingent facts. An agreement motivated in part by the different contingent personal characteristics would thus not reflect the fundamental equality of men as moral persons (1999, 11). Therefore, the persons behind the veil should be ignorant of any contingent fact about their characteristics as persons, such as their class or intel igence (1999, 11). It is important to notice that this means, for Rawls, that the persons behind the veil should also be ignorant of their specific personal conception of the good which they will pursue once the veil is lifted (1999, 11, 16-17). In the original position, persons would then, according to Rawls, agree upon two principles of justice: The first principle is that every person must have equal basic liberties and the second principle states that social and economic inequality could be justified only when they could be a) “reasonably expected to be to everyone’s advantage” and b) “attached to positions and offices open to al ” (1999, 53).

According to Rawls’s theory of justice, political action, and thus cultural policies, could be general y justified when they are compliant with the two principles of justice (1999, 292). Apart from this positive basis for the justification of political action, Rawls says more about il egitimate forms of justifications for policies, which seems especial y relevant for the question of cultural policy. A “central aim” of the Theory of Justice is to present a convincing alternative to the, at the time, long-dominating theory in Anglo-Saxon thought, namely Utilitarianism (1999, xi). Utilitarianism, for Rawls, is a theory 8] Since Rawls himself considered the revised edition of A Theory of Justice to be the improved and superior edition compared to the original one, Rawls’s theory of justice is presented, in the following, as it is found in the revised 1999 edition (published in German in 1975). For a presentation of Rawls’s theory of justice based on the revised edition, see also Jon Mandle (2009, ix). It is important to note that the change in Rawls’s theory in his later work is also accompanied by a change in his position concerning the possible justification of so-cal ed perfectionist policies (see Rawls 2001, 151-55; Wall 2015, 604). Of course, libertarian theories are even more sceptical about the moral legitimacy of cultural policies, e.g. (Nozick, 1974).

However, the more radical assumptions of libertarian theories lead also to further problems, which would need further discussions, (see e.g. Nagel, 1975), which shall be not the subject of this paper.

Ruwen Fritsche

7

that defines just institutions for society as the ones which achieve the greatest net balance of satisfaction summed over all individuals belonging to it. Besides this, Rawls contrasts his principles of justice with other alternatives, as wel , one of which is perfectionism.

Perfectionism is, according to Rawls, a label for a group of theories which seek to promote values of human excel ence that are, in contrast to Utilitarianism, independent from personal satisfaction (1999, 21-22). Rawls differentiates two different more specific forms of perfectionism.

The first “strict” version of perfectionism describes a teleological theory that demands the maximisation of the good understood as “human excel ence in art, science and culture”, defining thus its sole principle for a just society (Rawls 1999, 285-86, 287).

Rawls’ main argument against the first version of perfectionism is that such a theory would restrict the freedom of those who do not share the perfectionist conception of the good (1999, 288). The rejection of such a version of perfectionism, which has no place for equal freedom and rights in society, seems to be uncontroversial.

The second “moderate” version of perfectionism means that the perfectionist principle (to maximise the perfectionist goods, e.g. human excel ence in art, science, and culture) shall be considered as only one principle among others in determining what a state might legitimately do (1999, 286). For this moderate version of perfectionism, the perfectionist principle thus has to be balanced against other principles. The accounts which fall in this second category of perfectionist theories differ therefore to the extent to which they give weight to the perfectionist claim for excel ence in art, science, or culture. An acceptable account of such a theory can thus demand state action to ensure the satisfaction of basic needs for everyone and demand, beyond this basic needs, to give expenditure to preserve perfectionist values instead of taking action to equal benefit for everybody or the least advantaged (1999, 286).9 Rawls rejects this second version of perfectionism, just like the first, referring to the original position. Thus, for Rawls, even the second version of perfectionism means risking that, once perfectionist values are known, the principles of justice and the fol owing legislation could be discriminatory towards those who do not share these values.10 But Rawls does not general y forbid private cultural engagement in a society. Perfectionist values could, according to Rawls, be pursued by private associations limited only by the so-cal ed principle of free association (1999, 289). This means that, within a society whose institutions comply with Rawls’s two principles of justice, people could join associations and promote, without using the coercive power of the state, their perfectionist agenda (1999, 289). The state may act on behalf of the (perfectionist) associations only under certain restrictive 9] I omit unacceptable „highly perfectionist“ accounts as for example to override strong claims of liberty in favour of promoting perfectionist values – Rawls gives the historic example to legitimise the ancient practice of slavery for the excel ence of Greek philosophy, science and art (1999, 286).

10] In order to refute the moderate version of perfectionism, Rawls refers also to the vagueness of perfectionism in precisely determining the perfectionist values and the relation between these values (1999, 291).

8

Cultural Heritage Policy as a Chal enge to Rawlsian Liberalism?

conditions through the so-cal ed “exchange branch” to overcome “problems of isolation and assurance” between the members of the association (1999, 291, 249-51).11 That means citizens are, according to Rawls, free, through this exchange branch, to impose taxes on themselves.

According to the presented (usual) interpretation of Rawls’s Theory of Justice, cultural policies that go beyond the coordination of col ective self-taxing through the exchange branch must be measured against the two principles of justice to be moral y legitimate.

Rawls explicates this claim with regard to taxation: “Taxation for these purposes

[subsidizing universities and institutes, or opera and the theatre] can be justified only as promoting directly or indirectly the social conditions that secure the equal liberties and as advancing appropriately the long-term interests of the least advantaged.” (emphasis added by the author) (1999, 292)

As an alternative to this usual interpretation of Rawls, which leaves only a very limited space for perfectionist justification of political action within the framework of the two principles of justice, I would like to present a critical interpretation of Rawls’s rejection of moderate political perfectionism which is not only more open to perfectionist justification of political action, it even seems to demand a perfectionist justification of action to a certain extent according to Rawls’s own theory.

III. consIsTency of r awls’s Theory of JusTice regardIng perfecTIonIsm It seems doubtful whether the clear rejection of perfectionist justified policies in the Theory of Justice is coherent or at least consistent with other parts of Rawls’s theory, namely the assumptions concerning the so-cal ed “Aristotelian Principle” (1999, 372).

The Aristotelian principle is formulated by Rawls as fol ows: “[…] other things equal, human beings enjoy the exercise of their realized capacities (their innate or trained abilities), and this enjoyment increases the more the capacity is realized, or the greater its complexity.” 12 (1999, 374) For Rawls, the Aristotelian principle is a basic principle of motivation (1999, 373, 375) and to be the basic principle of motivation means that it

“accounts for many of our major desires and explains why we prefer to do some things and not others by constantly exerting an influence over the flow of our activity.” (1999, 375) Rawls il ustrates the principle with the example of someone who can play both checkers and chess. In this case, the Aristotelian principle would mean, because chess is more “complicated and subtle”, that the person would general y prefer playing chess 11] The main conditions to use the exchange branch is taxpayers’ agreement on cost recovery through the distribution of costs among different types of taxpayers and a proven benefit for all taxpayers (1999, 249-51).

12] Rawls refers to Aristotle’s statements in Nicomachean Ethics on happiness, activity, and pleasure: (Aristotle 2000, 136-42 (book 7, chapters 11-14), 183-92 (book 10, chapters 1-5)). Rawls does not adopt the principle from Aristotle in detail, since according to Rawls “[…] he [Aristotle] does not state such a principle explicitly, and some of it is at best only implied […]” (1999, 374).

Ruwen Fritsche

9

(1999, 374). Rawls stresses though that the Aristotelian principle “does not assert that any particular kind of activity will be preferred. It says only that we prefer, other things equal, activities that depend upon a larger repertoire of realized capacities and that are more complex.”13 (emphasis mine) (1999, 377) Rawls argues that the effort of learning the more complicated activity is general y accepted, as greater satisfaction is expected from an activity using enhanced skil s (1999, 376).14 According to Rawls, the tendency to exercise one’s abilities, as far as it is reasonable under consideration of the effort involved, also fol ows from the nature of the interests of persons and “plain facts of social interdependency” (1999, 376). Fel ow human beings would support such an activity in this sense since they are “likely to support these activities as promoting the common interest and also to take pleasure in them as displays of human excel ence.” (1999, 376) At this point, a crucial connection between the Aristotelian principle and the important primary good of self-esteem is revealed.15 Before we take a closer look at this connection, it is important to remember that for Rawls a person’s good is determined by his most rational long-term plan of life (1999, 79).

For Rawls, self-esteem is “perhaps the most important primary good” (1999, 386).

It consists, on the one hand, of the sense of one’s own value as the secure conviction that one’s life plan “is worth carrying out” (1999, 386). Secondly, self-esteem consists of confidence in one’s own abilities to realise one’s intentions as far as possible (1999, 386).

The special position of self-esteem means that without one of these two components of self-esteem, people would not be able to realise their plans of life.16 For Rawls, one of two essential circumstances that support the sense of one’s own worth as one part of self-esteem is to have a rational plan of life that satisfies the Aristotelian principle (1999, 386).

According to Rawls, activities that do not realize a plan of life in accordance with the Aristotelian principle quickly appear “dull and flat” and “give us no […] sense that they are worth doing” in terms of self-esteem (1999, 387). Persons would in principle have more confidence in their own worth if their “abilities are both ful y realized and organized in ways of suitable complexity and refinement” (1999, 387).17 Rawls argues that, in the context of the theory of justice as fairness, it is not necessary to prove the correctness of 13] Rawls also speaks of “chains” of activities, where each higher link in the chain includes the activity of the previous one and requires at least one other type of activity. In this context, Rawls says: “By itself the principle simply asserts a propensity to ascend whatever chains are chosen” (1999, 377-78).

14] However, according to Rawls, at a certain point, the motivation for individuals to develop their own skil s is limited by the increasing difficulty of learning.

15] Rawls uses the terms “self-esteem” and “self-respect”, at least in A Theory of Justice, interchange-ably (1999, 386; Rivera-Castro 2015, 762).

16] Rawls describes this vividly: “Without it [self-esteem] nothing may seem worth doing, or if some things have value for us, we lack the will to strive for them. All desire and activity becomes empty and vain, and we sink into apathy and cynicism.” (1999, 386).

17] Rawls refers to a psychological work of Robert W. White for the assumptions about the relationship of self-esteem to the Aristotelian principle (White 1963, chapter 7, 125-50). See reference in Rawls, Theory of Justice (1999, 389, n. 26).

10

Cultural Heritage Policy as a Chal enge to Rawlsian Liberalism?

the Aristotelian principle, although he presents various possible explanations (1999, 374-75).18 Rawls also emphasises that the Aristotelian principle is only a “tendency and not an invariable pattern of choice, and like all tendencies it may be overridden”

(1999, 376).19 To summarise: According to Rawls, having plans in life in accordance with the Aristotelian principle is an essential circumstance for one’s own self-worth as part of self-esteem which is a necessary condition to pursue one’s plan in life which, in turn, constitutes a person’s good. Thus, the Aristotelian principle seems to be not only an interesting assumption but of systematical importance for Rawls’s theory as a whole.

In Rawls’s statements on the Aristotelian principle, it is unclear whether, and if so, what normative relevance the Aristotelian principle is given within the framework of his theory of justice as fairness. On the one hand, Rawls repeatedly speaks of his theory of justice taking into account the Aristotelian principle. In this sense, Rawls says:

“Since the Aristotelian Principle is a feature of human desires as they now exist, rational plans must take it into account.” 20 (1999, 379) Rawls also thinks “that in the design of social institutions a large place has to be made for it [the tendency of the Aristotelian principle], otherwise human beings will find their culture and form of life dull and empty.” (1999, 377) On the other hand, fol owing from the Aristotelian principle as a tendency, this principle does not, according to Rawls, claim to apply to all people (1999, 376). Rawls il ustrates this with the example of a person “whose only pleasure is to count blades of grass in various geometrical y shaped areas […]. He is otherwise intel igent and actual y possesses unusual skil s, since he manages to survive by solving difficult mathematical problems for a fee.” (1999, 379) Rawls now thinks that, assuming

“his [the person who counts the blades of grass] nature is to enjoy this activity […], and that there is no feasible way to alter his condition” then “surely a rational plan for him wil center around this activity” (1999, 380). Note that the Aristotelian principle would in principle require the pursuit of a different, more reasonable plan (e.g. a more in-depth study of mathematics, which would include counting as an ability). With the presented example, Rawls wants to il ustrate that “the correctness of the definition of a person’s good in terms of the rational plan for him does not require the truth of the 18] As a possible reason for this, Rawls cites the fact that “complex activities are more enjoyable because they satisfy the desire for variety and novelty of experience, and leave room for feats of ingenuity and invention. They also evoke the pleasures of anticipation and surprise, and often the overall form of the activity, its structural development, is fascinating and beautiful. Moreover, simpler activities exclude the possibility of individual style and personal expression […]” (1999, 374-75).

19] According to Rawls, “countervailing inclinations can inhibit the development of realized capacity and the preference for more complex activities” (1999, 376). Nevertheless, the postulated tendency is

“relatively strong” and cannot be counterbalanced “easily” (1999, 377).

20] Rawls means that “[t]he things that are commonly thought of as human goods should turn out to be the ends and activities that have a major place in rational plans. The [Aristotelian] principle is part of the background that regulates these judgments.” (1999, 379)

Ruwen Fritsche

11

Aristotelian Principle. The definition is satisfactory […], even if this principle should prove inaccurate, or fail altogether” (1999, 380).

Given the close connection to self-esteem as a primary good, it could be argued that the state should enable and promote personal development according to the Aristotelian Principle.21 One argument in favour of such a perfectionist interpretation would be that Rawls himself draws the conclusion that the person in the grass-counting example is also fol owing a reasonable plan, dependent on a decisive condition. The conclusion is in this sense conditioned by the fact that “there is no feasible way to alter his condition [the preferences of the person]” (1999, 380). This passage suggests that, if possible, the preferences of the person, however, should be aligned with the Aristotelian principle (Wall 2013, 581-82). Such an interpretation thus suggests that the conformity of rational life plans with the Aristotelian principle should actual y be regarded as something objectively desirable (Wall 2013, 587). Apart from (probably rare) individual cases, such as the grass-counting example, it seems that, on this basis, a more general perfectionism may be justified in order to promote the realisation of individuals’

abilities to pursue a rational plan of life in accordance with the Aristotelian principle.

Against a broader perfectionism, it could be argued with Rawls that such perfectionist policies are not necessary, since, in a (well-ordered) society, there would be non-state groups for every reasonable life plan which would al ow the members to develop their abilities according to the Aristotelian principle (Rawls 1999, 481). This suggestion can be doubted for various reasons. For example, some life plans may not be accessible to everyone, as they are more expensive to realise than others, or it may be questionable whether there is a sufficiently wide range of possibilities for everyone to realise their abilities (Wall 2013, 588-89). Even if one does not accept these objections, Rawls’s main objection to perfectionism could eventual y be that, by promoting some plans of rational living, it unjustifiably disadvantages others. This could again be countered by the argument that, in this way, at least no public support could be refused which would support all or many different forms of the good in life (pluralistic perfectionism) (Wal 2013, 592-93).22 Should there be any doubts regarding the choice of forms, a fair procedure (e.g. democratic voting under fair conditions) might still be agreed upon fol owing Rawls’s own method (Wall 2013, 594). The Aristotelian principle thus seems to hint at a legitimate pluralistic form of perfectionism in Rawls’s Theory of Justice.

21] In this sense suggestively Steven Wall (2015, 604): “But if it [the Aristotelian Principle] is accepted as true, then it implies that rational plans of life for human beings must make room for the perfectionist value of self-development.” As a thesis more explicitly defended by Steven Wall (2013, 579). With the similarity to perfectionist values, I mean that a corresponding promotion resembles a typical perfectionist policy. However, it must be emphasised that the line of argumentation, presented above, does not incorpo-rate perfectionist arguments into Rawls’ theory. The argumentation, as has been shown, is based solely on Rawls’ own, non-perfectionist premises.

22] Pluralistic perfectionist theories combine thus the perfectionist thesis that the state could legitimately support objective values and the thesis that there is not only one good but that there are instead many expressions of the good, (see e.g. Raz 1986, 133).

12

Cultural Heritage Policy as a Chal enge to Rawlsian Liberalism?

IV. challenges for The legal proTecTIon of culTur al herITage accordIng To The Theory of JusTice

The legitimate aims of cultural property law

As we have seen, according to the usual interpretation of Rawls’s Theory of Justice, only those cultural policies could be justified which are in compliance with the two principles of justice. Could the protection of cultural heritage, without referring to perfectionist reasons, therefore be a legitimate aim for any concrete policy regime in accordance with the two principles of justice? The question is, therefore, whether there is an argumentative path that justifies political action to protect cultural heritage on the legitimising basis of the two principles of justice. Tentatively, I want to sketch out two ways of interpreting the protection of cultural heritage in accordance with the two principles of justice.

For the first argument, which is proposed in its abstract form in a range of different theories23, it is important to remember that, for Rawls, the possibility to choose freely between final ends is a necessary condition for any free person in the sense of the first principle of justice (Rawls 1999, 475-76). If the forms of the final ends and their different values are provided by a complex culture, it could be assumed that a diverse culture is needed to have the different options of the good life in the first place. Cultural heritage might be thus one way of giving a more differentiated meaning to forms of culture and thus to forms of the final ends in life. Cultural heritage policies in this sense might be, on a fundamental level, a necessary part of protecting the cultural condition to choose between final ends. And as you need a culture which provides values and options and so al ows the free choice which is necessary for the first principle of justice, it might seem plausible and legitimate to protect and promote cultural heritage, e.g. via cultural property law, as a part of this cultural condition of free choice between final ends.

Second, you might argue that cultural heritage forms part of a cultural identity that, in turn, forms a common identity as an important part of the foundation for solidarity between citizens (at least) in the non-ideal theory.24 To integrate this argument back into the Rawlsian framework, you could assume that society needs some degree of solidarity among their members to ensure that everybody, and especial y the least advantaged, could benefit in the sense of the second principle of justice – Rawls seems to say as much himself, 23] Will Kymlicka argues similarly regarding liberal culturalism in general (2003, 84-93) Yael Tamir and David Mil er present a similar argumentation about (liberal) nationalism: (Tamir 1993, 33, 36; Mil er 1995, 86, 146-47) Joseph Raz articulated such an argument more specifical y concerning liberal multiculturalism (1996, 176 ff.). Addressing the question, whether the liberal state should support the arts, Ronald Dworkin develops also an argument of that kind (1985, 229-33).

24] David Mil er famously put forward such an argument regarding nationality (1995, 93-96, 2000, 27). One has to keep in mind that Rawls states in the Theory of Justice that in the ideal theory everybody would share the same theory of justice as fairness (as a partly comprehensive doctrine) (1999, 434-41; In his later work, Rawls changed his mind on this point, see 2005, xvi ).

Ruwen Fritsche

13

but refers to it as “the principle of fraternity” (1999, 90-91). And one way of promoting a culture that fosters solidarity between citizens might be securing and promoting a uniting national cultural heritage, e.g. via cultural property law.

As we have also seen, the usual interpretation of the rejection of perfectionist justified policies seems little compel ing, especial y when it comes to the Aristotelian principle.

When fol owing the more perfectionist argumentation, cultural heritage protection might be a legitimate policy aim as it might offer access to potential y more complex cultural traditions in the sense of the Aristotelian principle. Through such a reading, policies for the protection and promotion of cultural heritage might become an important instrument under Rawls’s theory as far as they foster the fundamental value of self-esteem.

The legitimate means of cultural property law

Following Rawls’s Theory of Justice, there seem to exist different ways of giving cultural heritage a legitimate policy objective. The question of the specific German cultural property law now may pivot to the modalities in which the law approaches the protection of cultural heritage, and whether and to what extent the regulatory regime corresponds with the ways of ethical justification that have been stated above.

It is important to recognize that all the presented approaches on how cultural property protection can comply with the two principles of justice have one thing in common. They all would probably attribute a greater communicative effect to a cultural object that is well preserved and accessible to the public than to an object that is poorly preserved and/or not accessible to the public. Accessibility would mean the physical and cognitive accessibility of cultural property for all members of society. The difference between the usual interpretation of the stronger rejection of political perfectionism on the one hand, and the perfectionist reading of Rawls on the other, probably lay in the qualitative requirements. That is to say, the question of a qualitative criterion for the worthiness of the protection of objects. This question would likely be much narrower and exclusive in the view of the usual interpretations. When cultural property would thus be protected and promoted in accordance with the non-perfectionist interpretations presented above, the aim of regulating cultural property would be primarily either a) to enable free decisions about the good in the sense of individual autonomy and/or b) to create solidarity in the sense of Rawlsian fraternity. On the other hand, it would be the declared goal of a perfectionist interpretation of Rawls to promote pluralistic perfectionism and, thus, not to go beyond the qualitative requirements of the Aristotelian principle when determining what kind of cultural property should be protected and promoted. In this sense, the interpretations of Rawls referred to in this paper would thus stipulate different qualitative requirements for cultural property to be protected.

The criterion of “Germany’s cultural heritage” in section 7 (1) KGSG seems to be closely connected to the aim of establishing the basis for common solidarity. The criterion, conversely, appears to be more distant to the pluralistic protection of various

14

Cultural Heritage Policy as a Chal enge to Rawlsian Liberalism?

forms of the good which in turn comply with the Aristotelian principle. Only the expert committees appear to be open for the protection of pluralistic perfectionism, on the institutional level, presenting a kind of pluralism regarding the cultural sector. Final y, looking at the common claim of all the possible Rawls interpretations presented, namely the claim for accessibility of cultural objects, it can first be noted that the prohibition on damaging cultural property of national significance (section 18 in conjunction with section 83 (3) KGSG) introduced in 2016 and the notification requirements for cultural property of national significance in case of loss, destruction, etc. in section 19 KGSG serve to preserve the cultural objects.25 Insofar as all the variants presented have in common that they would argue for accessibility of cultural property, it is questionable to what extent the Cultural Property Protection Act corresponds to this requirement. The central position taken by the regulatory form of export restriction tends to raise doubts, since the destination of an object on a territory of a state alone does not guarantee equal accessibility of the object to the citizens. The reform of the KGSG 2016 has improved access to cultural property only to the extent that international loan circuit has been facilitated (see Entwurf eines Gesetzes zur Neuregelung des Kulturgutschutzrechts, Deutscher Bundestag 2016, 3, 46). Why does access not play a more central role in the act? The central reason for the reluctance of the legislature to regulate access to cultural objects is probably not to be found on the level of content-related arguments – it is rather to be found on the meta-level of legislative competence. Hence, regarding the protection of cultural property, the Federal Government has a restricted competence to “safeguarding German cultural assets against removal from the country” (Art. 73 (1) (5a) GG.26 The Federal Government does not have the legislative capacity to comprehensively regulate anything regarding objects of national significance (Uhle 2009). This does not mean, of course, that its regulation is not possible, but simply that the regulation of access lies in the legislative capacity of the Länder (federal states). So, the chal enge posed by the presented interpretations of Rawls would be better addressed to the Länder to enable the accessibility of cultural property.

V. conclusion

It has been shown that cultural heritage policies may indeed pose a chal enge to Rawlsian Liberalism. The various ways in which Rawlsian Liberalism reacts to this chal enge can lead to productive reflections on Rawls’s theory regarding perfectionism and on the law as it stands – for example, on the central role of the criterion of accessibility in the legal regulation of cultural heritage protection. Even though space does not permit a sufficient answer to any question regarding the relationship between moral philosophy 25] Before 2016, there was no legal prohibition of damage outside the criminal offence of general property damage, which meant that the owner of the protected cultural property was not al owed to export it but did not have to fear legal consequences if he destroyed the work.

26] GG means Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany (Grundgesetz), see https://www.

gesetze-im-internet.de/englisch_gg/englisch_gg.html#p0338 (accessed 1. February 2020).

Ruwen Fritsche

15

and the legal protection of cultural heritage, I hope I have offered a glimpse at the highly controversial field of whether and how to legitimise cultural policies and especial y policies concerning the protection of cultural heritage, such as cultural property law.

ruwen.fritsche@jura.uni-goettingen.de

references

Aristotle. 2000. Nicomachean Ethics. Translated by Roger Cris Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Deutscher Bundestag. 2016. Entwurf eines Gesetzes zur Neuregelung des Kulturgutschutzrechts. Gesetzentwurf der Bundesregierung. Drucksache 18/7456.”

Dokumentations - und Informationssystem (DIP). 3 February. http://dipbt.bundestag.de/

dip21.web/bt (accesed )

———. 2016. Erste Beratung des von der Bundesregierung eingebrachten Entwurfs eines Gesetzes zur Neuregelung des Kulturgutschutzrechts. In Stenografischer Bericht: 155. Sitzung. S. 15282-90.” Dokumentations - und Informatiossystem (DIP). http://dipbt.

bundestag.de/dip21.web/bt (accesed )

———. 2016. Zweite und Dritte Beratung des von der Bundesregierung eingebrachten Entwurfs eines Gesetzes zur Neuregelung des Kulturgutschutzrechts. In Stenografischer Bericht: 155. Sitzung. S. 17644-54. Dokumentations - und Informationssystem (DIP).

http://dipbt.bundestag.de/dip21.web/bt (accesed )

Dworkin, Ronald. 1985. Can a Liberal State Support Art? In A Matter of Principle, by Ronald Dworkin, 221-33. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Frankena, William K. 1973. Ethics. 2nd. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall.

Kymlicka, Will. 2003. Multicultural Citizenship: A Liberal Theory of Minority Rights. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Mandle, Jon. 2009. Rawls’s A Theory of Justice: An Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Miller, David L. 1995. On Nationality. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

———. 2000. Citizenship and National Identity. Oxford: Polity Press in association with Blackwell Publishers.

Nagel, Thomas. 1975. Libertarianism without Foundations. In The Yale Law Journal 85: 136-49.

Nozick, Robert. 1974. Anarchy, State and Utopia. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Rawls, John. 1999. A Theory of Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

———. 2001. Justice as Fairness: A Restatement. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

———. 2005. Political Liberalism. New York: Columbia University Press.

Raz, Joseph. 1996. Ethics in the Public Domain: Essays in the Morality of Law and Politics. Rev. Ed.

Oxford: Clarendon Press.

———. 1986. The Morality of Freedom. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Rivera-Castro, Faviola. 2015. Self-Respect. In The Cambridge Rawls Lexicon, edited by Jon Mandle & David A. Reidy, 762-64. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Tamir, Yael. 1993. Liberal Nationalism. Studies in moral, political, and legal philosophy. Princeton (New Jersey): Princeton University Press.

Uhle, Arnd. 2009. “Grundgesetz: Kommentar. 88, Art. 73, Rn. 129-133.” Beck-Online.

Wall, Steven. 2015. Perfectionism. In The Cambridge Rawls Lexicon, edited by Jon Mandle & David A. Reidy, 602-605. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

16

Cultural Heritage Policy as a Chal enge to Rawlsian Liberalism?

———. Perfectionism in Moral and Political Philosophy. In Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by Edward N. Zalta. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2017/

entries/perfectionism-moral/(accessed January 16, 2019)

———. Rawlsian Perfectionism. In Journal of Moral Philosophy 10 (5): 573-97.

White, Robert W. 1963. Ego and Reality in Psychoanalytic Theory. Psychological Issues 3: 1-210.

Public Reason 12 (2): 17-26

© 2020 by Public Reason

collective identity, between ideology and cooperation

Ştefan Ionescu

University of Bucharest

Abstract: The present article aims to analyze the shaping method of collective identities and how they operate. A collective identity is based on a common set of symbols and values –

both material and spiritual – faiths, rules of conduct and rituals, all consistent through time, and it derives from the interactions of the individuals, but also from their relationships with the social structures and ideologies. The more extensive and original the structures are, the stronger the identity is. Throughout time, collective identity has been identified with different types of membership, such as nationality, tribe, race, ethnicity, thus forming the classic identity model. Therefore, it has been assumed that the biological inheritance includes an inheritance

– in certain cases a cultural superiority, based on the observation that people actual y live in communities genetical y related, going as far as isolating themselves from other groups around.

On the contrary, the American liberal antiracism denies the importance of both biological factors and races, due to the fact that, in this perspective, races do not exist. The current analysis aims to propose an in-between view. We shall see that race is an inherited morphological reality, which, contingently and a posteriori, can acquire cultural significance. Categories such as self-description, social standpoint, affiliation to the group and values of the community might provide us, in the end, the key to a better analysis of the relationship between common identity and ideologies, especial y in modern societies. Consequently, collective identity will appear as a commitment rather than a merely given affiliation, in the formation of which ideologies play an essential role.

Keywords: collective identity, nationality, ethnicity, belonging, values, symbols, culture.

Col ective identity presupposes several agents and it is built on common goals, as a result of complex social interactions, which can, to the same extent, compose or decompose communities. However, how could we define social identity?

“Col ective identity is not simply a stable and enduring set of symbols, values, beliefs, behavioral rules, emotions, and rituals, since these vary widely in their elaboration and stability.” (Downey, Lofland, in Stoecker 1995, 113) Rather, col ective identity is produced and reproduced continual y through the life course of a social movement, as activists interact with targets and other audiences (Benford and Hunt, in Stoecker 1995, 113). “As these individuals interact with each other, they also interact with more enduring social structures, such as race, class, and sex/gender divisions, whose influences they must interpret and define.” (Stoecker 1995, 113)

Col ective identity results from the interactions between individuals and from their relations with the social structures, which survive in time, defining them both individual y and as members of the community. Involvement in solving common problems, as well as participating in structures by which values and acceptability are defined, make col ective identity “the universe of frames that are often linked together” (Stoecker 1995, 113). The more extensive and original the structures are, the stronger the identity is. It seems that col ective identity could be understood as a sum of individual identities, as it is easy to accept that individuals, who pursue their personal interests first and foremost, would

18

Collective Identity, between Ideology and Cooperation also unite in order to achieve goals. And yet, it couldn’t be so, mainly because the frames in which each of them moves are not particularly consistent, especial y in the relation between individual and col ective frames. People can be both self-interested and political y committed, reactionary and radical, brave and fearful. Thus, a col ective identity only partly reflects the various identities of its members, providing further potential for identity disputes.” (Stoecker 1995, 114) Hence, according to Charles Westin, we could say that any community with a stable identity is characterized by internal divergences, and not only by a high degree of convergence to a common set of values (2010, 40).

Researchers, especial y sociologists and political scientists, have tried to define col ective identity on the basis of their representative notes, such as individual, group, interest, ideology, solidarity, thus risking an over-extension of the concept’s sphere.

Instead, a possible compromise solution between a proper definition and one that is too broad could be the one proposed by Francesca Poletta and her col aborators: “We have defined col ective identity as an individual’s cognitive, moral, and emotional connection with a broader community, category, practice, or institution. It is a perception of a shared status or relation, which may be imagined rather than experienced directly, and it is distinct from personal identities, although it may form part of a personal identity.” (2001, 285) As several authors mention, col ective identity should not be confused with personal identity, being a representation of a shared status, “rather imagined, than experienced directly”. (2001, 285) As a construct, the individual finds the col ective identity already formed from the first stage, so, in a way, imposed at an exterior level and only subsequently accepted on a personal one. This level consists of – but is not limited to – cultural references, such as names, denotations, symbols, verbal specificities, rituals, clothing etc.

Col ective identities are not the result of computing opportunities and, unlike ideologies, they generate positive reactions even among groups other than their own.

As DeMarrais and her col eagues prove, ideologies – as part of culture – constitute an important component of socio-political systems and human interactions (1996, 15-31). Their thesis is that ideologies go through a process of materialization, in order to be shared as parts of culture. Thanks to this, ideologies obtain concrete forms that wil al ow them to self-perpetuate, even beyond the group of origin. General y speaking, we can understand ideologies either as epiphenomena caused by certain modes of production, or as active elements meant to influence social, political and economic institutions, possibly resulting from externalizing ideal images of communities. “We approach ideology differently, recognizing it as a central element of a cultural system.

The direction we pursue here is to understand ideology as a source of social power. Social power is the capacity to control and manage the labor and activities of a group to gain access to the benefits of social action.” (1996, 15)

Interestingly, the choice of certain power strategies over others does not lead only to different results, but reflects the historical circumstances in which those choices was made, as well as the goals of the groups – so, indirectly, their degree of cohesion.

Ideologies involve, as DeMarrais and her col aborators state, “both a material and a

Ștefan Ionescu

19

symbolic component”, which have equal degrees of importance in communication (1996, 16). Symbols, including images, rituals, monuments and written texts, have the role of sending messages. How can they convey their messages, especial y when faced with competing ideologies? By taking physical, concrete forms, which translate into

‘materializing the ideology’ (in the current sense, the term should not be confused with that of ‘objectification’, as it appears, for example, in Marx). This special process al ows symbols not only to survive as forms of power radiating from central authorities, but also, in time, to spread and be accepted as values and benefits, at the community level itself. Since they are not self-sufficient, humans need to col aborate with others, this being accomplished within cultures, as organized structures that can include a diversity of individuals. Since we cannot understand culture only as a col ection of abstract norms and values, we must also recognize the importance of its practical component, namely the actual production of objects.

Thus, we can say: “Materialization is the transformation of ideas, values, messages, myths and other similar ones into physical realities – ceremonial events, symbolic objects, monuments, writing systems.” (DeMarrais 1996, 16) Although less evident at the level of small groups, such as families, the need of materialization becomes clearer in the case of larger groups, such as nations. Besides being a form by which leaders legitimize themselves as elites, ideologies facilitate the communication of values, giving meaning to the outside world. Thus, the main effect of the materialization of ideologies is that they bestow power, al owing elites to promote their goals in groups and outside them.

Also, since ideas can be hard to control, there is a risk that ideologies will be sabotaged and destroyed, by manipulating meanings on both inside and outside level. However, the more accessible and less anchored in reality an ideology is, the more easily it can be attacked, copied, modified, replaced or destroyed.

The means by which an ideology can be materialized – ceremonies, symbol-objects, public monuments – can take different forms; speech, for example, can be such a form. Of course, the selected shapes depend on the target audience, the combination of certain means being more capable of ensuring success than others. Therefore, things such as the degree of information, interest or cohesion of the public, play an important role, col ective identities being put into play with a double meaning: as, on one hand, being constituted by ideologies and, on the other hand, by validating or sanctioning ideologies. By examining the ways in which ideologies materialize, we can reconstruct, implicitly, the ideologies themselves and we can determine their degree of success. As expected, the better a community is managed and the greater economic resources it has, the greater its capacity to put ideals into practice.

We may recognize ceremonial events and rituals amongst the most effective forms by which ideologies manifest themselves. This is due to the larger degree of participants involved, to the possibilities of combining various types of materialization, and to the immediate effects they produce. They all involve recognition of rules, while stimulating competition between participants. Consider, for example, the case of ceremonies such as

20

Collective Identity, between Ideology and Cooperation the ‘harvest festival’, which take the form of habits that seem to be lost in the darkness of time. In the same way, we may consider popular assemblies such as those organized

– sometimes according to newly introduced rituals” – by various political leaders: take, for instance, the case of the May 1st holidays or the Nuremberg meetings. Fetish speeches and images, such as portraits of leaders and party and state” symbols, wil , at their turn, reinforce expected responses (‘tightly united around the beloved Party and Leader’).

Ceremonies imply a high degree of perishability in exchange for the immediacy of the effect they produce, in the sense that they require a permanent renewal of the message transmission. The rituals that characterize such ceremonies can be confiscated by elites, who may or may not al ow access to certain categories at different stages or at different places of their activities. “These costs, complexities, and scale demonstrate through dramatic ephemeral images the hierarchical organization of the state and its apparent monopoly on such performances.” (DeMarrais 1996, 18)

In turn, symbolic objects and images produce significant ideological effects, forming rapid bridges in communication. They can constitute distance signals between leaders and groups, reflecting relationships of affiliation, dependence, correspondence, thus being meant to signal loyalty and consensus among individuals. Being possessed, transferred or inherited, some of these objects are excel ent status signifiers. Through them, elites signal who they are, going as far as conveying to others the monopoly they have over them, through their associated images and values – see the case of the treasures with which some leaders are buried, a symbol of the importance of the social position, which goes beyond personal death. Therefore, as power symbols, the objects can take different forms, from valuable ones, to others with insignificant value, as in the case of medals or laurel wreaths.

Also, on the list of symbols manipulated by ideologists, one can find imposing monuments and even changing landscapes; ceremonial or defensive buildings, pyramids, public markets, political centers – all represent the power of authority. As examples, I will mention the mausoleums and memorial houses dedicated to political personalities, such as those in the Red Square or the one in the Tiananmen Square. Hitler’s projected capital (ʻGermania’), with its new meeting building (ʻVolkshal e’) that would have had a dome so large that, alone, would have produced its own atmosphere, or the People’s House and the Civic Center of the dictator Ceausescu, with its Victoria Socialismului boulevard (which is said to have been designed to be one meter wider than the Champs Élysées‘Paris); do these symbols not exactly support this view of the role of materialized ideology? Or, why not, the capital city, Washington D.C.?

The way in which public and management buildings are distributed in space is therefore also a map of the distribution of power over a certain territory – in the most proper way of the term. This has been done since ancient times, as evidenced by the studies of Hyslop and Zuidema, cited by DeMarrais (1996, 19). Thus, in Cuzco, the center of the Inca empire, a series of radiant lines had the role of tracing relationships between different groups, but also between them and the cosmic powers. The monuments remain over time,

Ștefan Ionescu

21

surviving the civilizations that built them, evidence not only of their passage, but of the permanence of the ideologies to which they temporarily gave form.

Last, but not least, writing is another form of ideology. It is a form whose advantage is that it can be direct, because it can say clearly, not only strictly symbolic, what it has to say. “Written documents, such as inscribed stelae or monuments, legal documents, contracts, and stories, are physical manifestations of belief systems and, like other means of materialized ideology, may tell a story, legitimate a claim, or transmit a message. While the other means of materialization accomplish this task indirectly through symbols, some texts are explicit and direct” (DeMarrais 1996, 19). Due to these qualities, written documents have the characteristic of formalizing the rules issued by authorities and of establishing hierarchies, but also of carrying political or propaganda messages, regardless of whether they are exaggerated or even false. It remains to be seen which role would writing still have in the hierarchy of ideological means, in the post -”Gutenberg Galaxy”.

What is an ideology, and what is the origin of this concept? Even if there is no agreement on the definition, the opinions are consistent, at least, on the origin. The first use of the term is from 1796 and belongs to Destutt de Tracy. He returns to the term in his Les élements de l’idéologie (1801-1807), as stated by Michailo Markovic (1984, 70), which also shows that its original meaning has changed several times. Initial y, according to Locke and Condil ac, ideology was considered an exact science, having the role of studying the origin of ideas and even of all knowledge, starting from sensory perceptions; this sense, however, is lost. What remained would be the tendency to criticize social order, from an idealistic perspective, in order to propose other foundations for it. By the 1800s, this tendency was strongly fought by some philosophers and important politicians, as an ʻutopia.’ On the contrary, other thinkers (e.g. Helmut Plessner) believed that man is simply “an ideological being”.

The nineteenth century brought a more objective, even neutral interpretation: ideology is a science that studies the origins, development and variation of ideas. Instead,

“There is a universal consensus nowadays that whatever ideology is, it is not a science, and whatever its social function is, it is not to provide a true description of reality and of existing culture.” (Markovic 1984, 71) Marx, in turn, distinguished between two forms of ideology: a descriptive one, that is widely accepted, and a normative or critical one. According to the first interpretation, ideology would be the totality of the forms that a social superstructure can take: political orientations, laws, religions, philosophy, art, sciences, morals. According to the other, an ideology, as reflecting economic infrastructures, can be false or true insofar as it agrees with or favors historical progress. In contradiction with the Marxist view, A.

Seidel rejects the sociological explanation, proposing instead one of a biological nature:

“ideologies are attempts to sublimate a sick instinctual life” (Seidel, in Markovic 1984, 71).

In the same vein, Erich Fromm’s research shows that “something indeed goes wrong with the instinctive life of an individual with ideological consciousness, but sickness is not a

22

Collective Identity, between Ideology and Cooperation purely biological phenomenon, it is rather determined by the social position and the way of life of the group to which it belongs” (Fromm, in Markovic 1984, 71-72).

After analyzing the origin and meanings of the concept, Markovic (1984, 73), argues that any ideology is an organized corpus of ideas, which satisfies simultaneously the fol owing necessary conditions: it appears in societies where social forces are strongly imbalanced, not being subordinated to an autonomous and democratic regulatory framework; it represents the expression of particular interests of social groups whose purpose is to conserve or change the structures of power; these particular interests are not completely visible, partly because social relations are not sufficiently transparent, which makes their driving forces unconscious, unknown and irrational. “Ideological statements are value judgments expressed in factual (indicative) form” (Markovic 1984, 73): vis-à-vis a given social order, ideologies offer a dual distorted image – either idealizing it, in order to legitimize it, hiding its essential incapacities and presenting it as a necessity of human fulfil ment, or criticizing it, with the aim of abolishing the smal est achievements, regardless of the differences between the ideal and the concrete world.

“Consequently, ideology is neither a true knowledge nor a merely false consciousness; in order to attract and get mass support it must preserve an appearance of truth ( Schein), therefore properly selected half-truths are the material which it builds up.” (Markovic 1984, 73); the social function of an ideology is to incite attack or defense, integrating itself with a particular grouping, offering it a scale of values and a direction in practical activity.

It is not to be understood that, necessarily, every social construction must correspond to an ideology. There are better ways of fighting than ideologies, in accordance with democratic ideals, which, in turn, represent the best compromise between the group interests of those who lead and the general interests of those who are led. Thus, a democratic regime will favor balanced criticisms, taking care in preventing drifts either on the side of the unrealistic idealization or on the other of denying any limits, or practical gains.

What determines people to form communities, and also to consider themselves members of a culture, a group of citizens or of a state? “Self-acknowledgment of membership is a prima facie sufficient, if fal ible, condition for cultural identification.”

(Cahoone 2005, 57) In addition to this we must mention, of course, certain ways of perceiving the world or of sharing common values and norms. As cultures themselves are not perfectly homogeneous, identities cannot be precisely identified, especial y since each one in particular and all in a col ective manner manifest themselves in a continuous change. However, the basis of any col ective identity seems to be a certain type of cooperation and sharing of supplies and ideologies, starting with the physical ownership of land and resources and ending with symbols and rites. The latter can be very diverse, as in the case of large communities, provided there is a number of super-norms recognized and defended by most, as is the case with citizens in a state.

It is not enough, however, to be able to satisfy some characteristics pertaining to a group in order to be part of it, because identity is more than just a sum of features which

Ștefan Ionescu

23

you can approach from the outside. Parekh, quoted by Lawrence Cahoone (2005, 58), exemplifies this aspect, pointing out that being British does not equate with sharing a set of values, a history or civil institutions, but rather “a specific form of life [. .] a specific way of talking about and conducting common affairs. Being British therefore means learning the grammar, vocabulary and syntax of the prevailing form of life and knowing how to participate in its ongoing dialogue [. .] [it is] a matter of acquiring conceptual competence in handling the prevailing cultural language”. Cahoone also gives the example of someone who would learn Italian in order to do business in Italy, which could not turn anyone into an Italian. These would be just cases of “intimacy”, but not of cultural “identity”, because, in fact, cultural identity should be something deeper and be an end in itself, or at least refer to the goals one is proposing. Not even sharing certain values is equivalent to sharing an identity. I can do everything like a Japanese, or even get to know Japanese art, philosophy and civilization better than a Japanese, without becoming one, in the sense of being recognized as such. Being part of a group is not just about matching that group, but, especial y, being recognized as such. Also, over time, col ective identity has been identified as different types of belonging, such as nationality, tribe, race, ethnicity. Each of these has, more or less, been the subject of contradictory debates and idealizations.

Therefore, we can take as example the influence of American liberal antiracism, which denies the importance of both biological factors and races. Under this ideology, there are voices that state presently that races do not exist, although many centuries in a row have supported the contrary, as can be seen in some anthropological movements from the 19th century and some pseudo-scientific ones from the 20th century. In the philosophical field, Anthony Appiah states that the races do not exist and that the term itself is void of meaning. The critiques of the “racial pentagram” (the so-cal ed black, red, yel ow, brown and white races) addressed by David Hol inger, go in the same direction.

On the opposite side, starting from aspects such as skin color or facial features, it has been assumed that the biological inheritance includes a heredity – in certain cases a cultural superiority. Nevertheless, people actual y live in genetical y related communities, going as far as isolating themselves from other groups. Philip Kitcher, quoted by Lawrence Cahoone, defined race from a genetic point of view, as a “phenotypic commonalities in a group defined by sufficiently inbred lineages” (Kitcher in Cahoone 2005, 61).

Isn’t it, though, the in-between version precisely the right one? Indeed, it might be that “Race is a set of morphological traits that are inherited, hence can serve as markers for ancestry, which societies may then pick out as salient whenever they think ancestry matters.” (Cahoone 2005, 61) In other words, race is an inherited morphological reality, which, contingently and a posteriori, can acquire cultural significance. This explains the fact that race worked as a social, cultural and psychological delimitation in many places and historical times. Since there are more cultures than races, it can be clearly stated that races do not determine cultures or, at least, not by themselves.

24

Collective Identity, between Ideology and Cooperation More than race and as culmination of this principle, the so-cal ed ʻland and blood bonds’ or “tribe bonds” provide the basis for group solidarities and the creation of the col ective identity ideologies. “Blood is in one sense narrower and in another sense broader than race. For blood means descent, and descent is a complex matter.” (Cahoone 2005, 62), presenting genetic, social and legal aspects. So, can only genetical y linked persons be part of a family? As a counterexample, spouses do not share the same bloodline. Therefore, this proves that community cannot be constituted of unique clans, no matter how small they are – marriages would prevent that. By gathering together, some clans could form a tribe at best, which could not work as an equivalent to a race, an ethnic group, or a nation. The tribes are surpassing local and cross-ethnic boundaries.

However, bloodline bonds play a key role in individuals’ existence: this is due to the fact that we are born and raised in families, and that these wear the mark of a specific culture, which is passed on to us and acquires a shaping role. The family passes on to its members, and especial y to children, notions and concepts regarding ethnicity, nationality, culture, affiliation and identity.

Another type of connection that unites communities is the place, the ground or land. One’s origin and cultural identity are determined, somehow, by one’s birthplace and childhood place. The ʻland customs’ unite the individuals and provide the feeling of a super-individual identity. This is a historical and geographical identity, and therefore also cultural, although the Western-liberal philosophy seems to deny it. However, the sense of belonging to a certain place generates specific types of socio-economical relationships, based on property and commercial exchanges, which create, in turn, development and therefore culture, including cultural identity as wel . Retrieving an identity justification based solely on place connections is debatable, but surprisingly, moral y plausible: we have been working this land since ancient times and that unites us and provides us certain rights. Furthermore, this interpretation is supported also by real acts, such as repossessions or compensation claims to communities or individuals who, at a certain point, had their land taken away (let’s take as example the native Americans).

Nowadays, the ʻblood’ and ʻland’ concepts have lost much of their importance and there are only a few who still claim them as identity criteria, although these concepts continue to power certain nationalist ideologies. This comes also as a consequence of the individual’s belonging to larger communities, such as nations, and requires larger concepts as wel , such as citizenship, nationality or ethnicity. The last concept of the list embodies multiple interpretative possibilities, including the ones narrowed by race or derived from it. As Cahoone mentions, historical y and linguistical y speaking, “ethnicity”

is often understood as “nationality” and comes from the Greek word “ethnikos”, which refers to a different people, some sort of “barbarians”. “Ethnikos” is related to “éthos”, which translates as character, but also to “ethos”, which translates as custom. Also, the word ʻnation’ comes from Latin, and is correlated with ʻnasci’, which means to be born, to belong to a descendance.

Ștefan Ionescu

25

For a long time, the communities founded on ethnic principles have been considered as the basis for the ideal state. Their problem was the identification of social belonging with the one of a particular culture, which leads to isolation. Moreover, group belonging will be conditioned by the appropriation and consideration towards certain rules, the same for everyone. This shortcoming can be surpassed, as in the case of the great Western or Islamic civilizations, which al owed a very specific col ective identity. They were constructed on a central authority and a religion-based culture, but comprised a diversity of languages and customs. This type of identity has multiple levels, which create, in turn, several adherence criteria, depending on the proximity to the center. In these cases, one might speak of subordinated local identities or, better yet, of identities correlated to the central ones. Furthermore, ethnicity can be understood as descendance. Claiming your identity using ethnic arguments equals stating your belonging to a certain descendance.

However, this type of statement can be easily refuted. Nevertheless, modern societies cannot be considered homogenous to any extent.

Edward Shils stated that “traditional” societies, and a few modern ones as wel , are grounded upon three constituents: the personal one, resulting from individual roles and interactions, the sacred one, religious in kind, and the primordial one, related to territorial and blood bonds. The last ones are mostly related to the past (Cahoone, 2005, 73). Anthony Smith leans towards a similar interpretation, by submitting that the present countries have their origin in ethnic groups. Moreover, he states that nations are not a product of modernity, but modernity is a product of a historical development initiated by ethnic groups (Smith, in Westin 2010, 16). Obviously, considering ethnicity as the basis for identity is controversial. Therefore, Charles Westin mentions (2010, 13) that one should keep in mind at least two meanings of the concept: a primordialist and an instrumentalist one.

Supported by Geerz, the primordialist view states that the ethnical identification is deeply embedded in the human nature. Some interpretations go even further and consider that ethnicity is embedded at a genetic level. Instead, the instrumentalist view claims that ethnicity is not a given feature belonging to the individuals, but instead is a characteristic of human relationships, manifesting under certain economic and political conditions. However, the facts that modern societies have these connections as fundament does not imply, as some think, that they are reduced to or explained ful y by these. On the contrary, Shils mentions that societies should not be considered only as selfish, lacking compassion and based exclusively on interests or impersonal rules, but also that they are established on countless interpersonal connections, moral and civic attitudes. According to Fredrik Barth, even within a primordialist view one must admit that the nature of the interpersonal and cross-cultural exchanges is to modify borders, thus affecting the self-image and affiliation of individuals. The fact that a community can preserve its identity despite the contact with other communities shows that it is grounded on primordialist criteria, along with inclusion and exclusion (Westin 2010 14-15). Similarly to Brubaker and Cooper, in order to reject or tone down primordialism,

26

Collective Identity, between Ideology and Cooperation René Grotenhuis believes that the problem of defining identity can be solved by separating the multiple aspects of the concept.

Therefore, one should consider categories such as identification and categorization (how I characterize myself compared with certain social y predefined roles – for example, being a medic), self-description and social standpoint (what I am, in my own terms and contexts) and affiliation to the group and values of the community. Taken as a whole, these categories might provide us the key to a better analysis of col ective identity, starting from individual ones.

Consequently, col ective identity is a committed and not just a given affiliation. As Cahoone notes, “Nevertheless, clearly modern and postmodern society tend to efface the conditions necessary for primordialism. In those areas and dimensions of social life where it is correct to say that modernity is a world of contract, not status, of individual initiative, liberty, and self-creation, not inheritance or acceptance, of making and doing, not being, primordialism is blocked or demoted.” (2005, 76) Undoubtedly, modern and postmodern societies have a tendency against favoring the conditions of primordialism.

Acknowledgments

This paper was supported by the research project PATCULT#RO (“Complex multidisciplinary platform for integrative and systematic research of identities and tangible and non-tangible cultural heritage in Romania”), PN-III-P1-1.2-PCCDI-2017-0686, 52/

PCCDI-2018, funded by UEFISCDI.

stefan.ionescu@filosofie.unibuc.ro

references

Cahoone, Lawrence. Who is culture? 2005. Cultural Revolutions: Reason Versus Culture in Philosophy, Politics, and Jihad. Penn State University Press: 56-78.

DeMarrais Elizabeth, Luis Jaime Castil o, and Timothy Earle. Ideology. 1996. Materialization, and Power Strategies. Current Anthropology, 37 (1): 15-31.

Grotenhuis, René. 2016. Nation-building: Identity and identification, process and content.

Nation-Building as Necessary Effort in Fragile States. Amsterdam University Press: 125-61.

Markovic, Michailo. 1984. The Language of Ideology. Synthese, 59 (1): 69-88.

Pol etta, Francesca, and James M. Jasper. 2001. Col ective Identity and Social Movements.

Annual Review of Sociology, Vol. 27: 283-305.

Stoecker, Randy. 1995. Community, Movement, Organization: The Problem of Identity Convergence in Col ective Action. The Sociological Quarterly, 36 (1): 111-30.

Westin, Charles, José Bastos, Janine Dahinden, and Góis Pedro, eds. 2010. Identity and inter-ethnic relations. Identity Processes and Dynamics in Multi-Ethnic Europe. Amsterdam University Press: 9-51.

Public Reason 12 (2): 27-35

© 2020 by Public Reason

cultural Heritage and John Dewey’s Philosophy of Education in a Democratic community

Ileana Dascălu

University of Bucharest

Abstract. John Dewey’s philosophy of education has addressed a number of issues that present-day educational and cultural institutions continue to face in their quest for relevance. This paper focuses on some implications of Dewey’s philosophy of experience which he considered foundational for any organized educational activity in a democratic community. The three major writings discussed in reverse chronological order are Experience and Education, Art as Experience and Democracy and Education. The paper concludes by suggesting that Dewey’s philosophy of education provides a comprehensive theoretical foundation to contemporary studies and policies addressing the role of cultural heritage in a democratic society.

Key words: John Dewey, cultural heritage, experience, art, democracy.

Contemporary cultural studies emphasizing what Laurajane Smith referred to as

“the discursive nature of heritage” (2006, 11) have revealed how the construction of values emerged historical y through complex relations between knowledge and power. In this paradigm, the educational role of literature, artworks, cultural artifacts and institutions, notably museums, has for a long time reflected stable cultural identities, which had to be bequeathed to future generations. As various expressions of nationalism, patriotism, and civic al egiances developed against a backdrop of trust in the objectivity of history, major European museums were established fol owing the model of the Louvre and became

“symbols of, and containers for, national patrimonies” (Abt 2006, 129). Nowadays, the dominant approach has chal enged the value distinctions between high and popular culture, considering the rather fluid nature of heritage as a diversity of modes of expression through which communities and individuals transmit what is meaningful to them. In particular, acknowledging Intangible Cultural Heritage as a resource for maintaining cultural diversity in a globalized world has drawn attention to the living nature of heritage and, as a consequence, to new modes of experiencing and transmitting it.

The influence of this paradigm shift on heritage education that takes place in schools and cultural institutions alike cannot be overlooked. How schools, universities, museums and cultural centers of non-formal learning are supposed to educate generations about heritage is far from obvious, once the authority of traditions and specialized expertise have been cal ed into question. Turning to John Dewey for fresh guidelines may be helpful, not only because he was convinced that every philosopher should be deeply interested in education, but also because, as Alan Ryan notes in his biographical study, Dewey

“exemplified the ‘philosopher as sage,’” according to whom “the division of labor had no place within philosophy itself,” (1995, 22). This drove him to always think of education in relation to science, religion, the arts, and especial y to social progress and democracy. From the wide range of topics he investigated, which may provide important insights into how to

28

Cultural Heritage and John Dewey’s Philosophy of Education in a Democratic Community rethink the role of educational and cultural institutions, this paper focuses on the relation between experience, heritage and democracy in Dewey’s philosophy of education. It brings to light a few ideas which may offer a theoretical foundation to contemporary studies and policies on cultural heritage, by drawing attention to the integrative mindset which was Dewey’s hal mark.

i. eDucatiVe eXperiences

An inquiry into the educational role of museums from the perspective of Dewey’s philosophy of education, which he believed was “an explicit formulation of the problems of the formation of right mental and moral habitudes in respect of the difficulties of contemporary social life.” (2004, 356) needs to adopt the postulate of “the organic connection of education with experience” (1997, 74). This was, in his view, not only a matter of calibrating content to engage the participation of those educated or, by analogy, museum visitors. In fact, as stressed in Experience and Education (1938), merely increasing interactivity ran the risk of producing improvised, though entertaining, learning and, unless integrated into a coherent philosophy of education, may defeat the purpose. Nowadays, many museums digitize entire col ections, al owing for open source content, downloading and editing options for innumerable users. This may help stimulate interest in heritage, support lifelong learning, as well as remove financial barriers for the general public and specialized researchers. At the same time, it may foster attitudes of cultural consumerism and shal ow understanding of heritage, despite all the information made available. In the long run, it may also encourage the public to expect “that their experiences will be customized to meet their own particular needs and interests,” (Janes 2009, 83) an aspiration not only difficult to fulfil , due to some degree of institutional inertia, but also likely to affect the “museum as agora” (Janes 2009, 82) idealization, due to the tension between marketplace values and versions of the col ective good, which museums could, in theory, address.

If museums are to provide educative experiences which are “conducive to growth” (Dewey 1997, 46), the content of the col ections, the way exhibits are arranged, presented and promoted to the public, the philosophy and functioning of the institution, its complementarity with formal education and integration into a particular social landscape must be harmonized. Reflecting on the mission of progressive schools, Dewey warned of the danger of a curriculum that marginalizes the past, in radical opposition to traditional education, and strongly defended the idea that “the achievements of the past provide the only means at command for understanding the present.” (1997, 77) His was a worldview perfectly compatible with an anti-elitist stance, yet insistent on claiming that contemporary problems cannot be properly solved unless individuals understood how they came about. As a first and famous example, the experimental school he initiated in 1896 at the University of Chicago for children and teachers, also known as the Lab School, was meant to explore how the conjunction between theory and practice can be made fruitful in a pragmatist framework, where obtaining knowledge was considered a

Ileana Dascălu

29

continuous process of col aborative discovery. The Lab School had a holistic approach: cooking was also a means to initiate pupils into basic notions of chemistry, as well as into the history of culinary heritage and various social customs; science was important, but so was learning about weaving; visits to museums and study of artworks were not only about getting across notions of aesthetics, but also about raising awareness of the reality of social class and expressions of class differences (Durst 2010). As a second example, later in his career Dewey disagreed with Robert Maynard Hutchins, educational philosopher and president of the University of Chicago about the fact that the classics should form the basis of university education, which the latter saw mostly as a matter of cultivating the intel ect.

As Alan Ryan notes with regard to this episode, Dewey’s main concern was with “Social engagement and social commitment,” and this is what led him to strongly oppose the idea

“that higher intel ectual life must be protected from the contamination of practical life.”

(1995, 280)

Dewey’s general framework was both experiential and social y-oriented; interest in the practical side of things was a consequence, not a principle. It understood education as interplay of social organization (and, to some extent, social control) and free individual expression. If successful, education could be an instrument for democratic socialization of individuals with different backgrounds, needs and capacities, helping them better know themselves and one another, and a process of intel ectual, moral and emotional growth that comes about through experience. Experience and Education refers to two complementary criteria, continuity and interaction or “the longitudinal and lateral aspects of experience.”

(1997, 44) Together, they may suggest the image of an ever-broader streambed for inner growth, and also that of the indispensable context to be considered: The principle of continuity in its educational application means, nevertheless, that the future has to be taken into account at every stage of the educational process.

This idea is easily misunderstood and is badly distorted in traditional education.

Its assumption is, that by acquiring certain skil s and by learning certain subjects which would be needed later (perhaps in col ege or perhaps in adult life) pupils are as a matter of course made ready for the needs and circumstances of the future. Now

“preparation” is a treacherous idea. In a certain sense every experience should do something to prepare a person for later experiences of a deeper and more expansive quality. That is the very meaning of growth, continuity, reconstruction of experience.

(Dewey 1997, 47)

This is a recurrent theme in the book, leading Dewey to the conclusion that the main mission of education is to instill the “desire to go on learning.” (1997, 48) and refrain from stifling interest in life, curiosity for solving problems and framing new ones. Rote learning was not the only characteristic of traditional education to blame in this regard. In fact, the entire educational environment, the choice of standards assessing performance and good conduct, the degree of the educator’s familiarity with the interests and backgrounds of those educated were as relevant then as they are now. Although in the case of museums, the lack of the educator as a central figure in Dewey’s argument limits the analogy, it is not difficult to imagine or recall the passivity and boredom of visitors overwhelmed by

30

Cultural Heritage and John Dewey’s Philosophy of Education in a Democratic Community the information they had to absorb navigating their way through some museums. Indeed, Dewey’s worries about the reductionism and dogmatism that characterized the debate between proponents of progressive and traditional education may apply to the museum setting as wel . The predicament of many modern-day museums can be summarized as a quest for relevance, complicated by “the inertia of past practices” and “the uncritical adoption of methods, models and practices from the world of commerce.” (Janes 2009, 14) For Dewey, the relevance of schools and, by extension, of heritage and museums, was indisputable in a conceptual framework linking education with democracy and social progress. The second criterion of experience, interaction, drives this point home by defining education as “essential y a social process.” (Dewey 1997, 58) and a “transaction” (1997, 43) between an individual and the environment in which he forms a community with others.

As Ted Ansbacher argued, applying Experience and Education to the museum setting may raise awareness of the interaction between visitors and exhibits, which needs to generate an experience, and to the ways in which this experience can be assimilated. Consequently, a Deweyan postulate for enriching the educative experiences of museum visitors would read “‘What people do (or see, touch, hear, taste or smel ) in an exhibition is a necessary precursor to whatever they feel and learn.’” (Ansbacher 1998, 39; emphasis in original) Innovative display strategies and guided tours are ingredients, but not guarantees of genuine educative experiences. Another conclusion of the study is that careful planning of exhibitions along Dewey’s recommendations would aim at anticipating a diverse set of learning outcomes considering at the same time that visitors enter the museum with different backgrounds and expectations. In the case of school groups, both the teacher and students need to prepare for the visit, and students need to be encouraged in formulating their own questions beforehand. If this habit is complemented by interactive activities made possible by the museum, it can provide “more sense of ownership” and “can help move social control to the students themselves.” (Ansbacher 1998, 46) Two more questions raised by the study are: (i) how to make sense of this diversity and improve the quality of visitor experience, considering that this is a difficulty distinct from that of the educator dealing with more age-homogeneous, less multicultural groups; (i ) how to extend learning-by-doing, easier to apply in science museums, to other kind of museums. Not least, the balance between the educative and enjoyable aspects of visitor experiences needs to be careful y examined: In attempting to make learning fun, for example, some exhibits have used pinball machines to present concepts of genetic inheritance or have rewarded visitors for correct answers by making funny noises. These types of exhibits may achieve the goal of relatively painless information transfer – a seemingly positive educational effect – but they introduce serious negative effects as well. Since the information has been delivered rather than acquired through inquiry, it has not engaged the visitor’s own thinking. The result (which is also commonplace in schools) is that words may be learned, giving the appearance of knowledge, but understanding is not achieved. Visitors are denied that deeper satisfaction and instead receive the message that the material is inaccessible to them unless

“sugar-coated.” (Ansbacher 1998, 43; emphasis in original)

Ileana Dascălu

31

ii. aesthetic perception anD the eDucational Value of the arts Dewey’s thoughts on artworks and aesthetic perception deserve special attention.

This is not because they form the object of theoretical investigations strictly separate from his other writings but because they were articulated through the interaction of aesthetic theories, mainstream views on the arts in the American society of the thirties, and his critical analysis of capitalism. According to Alan Ryan, Art as Experience (1934), his major work in this field, is so deeply engaged with “the social role of the art”, that Dewey could have safely chosen to name it “Art and Society” (1995, 249).

The opening chapter prepares the ground for a criticism of contemporary society by drawing attention to the negative effects of (i) identifying art with its material dimension, (i ) isolating artistic objects from their context of origin and how they impact experience, and (i i) giving credit to the distinction between art of high and low value, such as fine vs.

applied arts, a fal acy of “the museum conception of art” (Dewey 1980, 6). We find these ideas as central themes of current contributions on heritage studies, along with criticism of hegemonic or authorized discourses of heritage, and the affirmation of heritage not as an object of conservation, but as a cultural practice, discourse or performance (Smith 2006).

Similarly, Dewey’s critique and explanation of the causes of the “compartmental conception of fine art” (1980, 8), the main one being that most European museums emerged at a time of nationalism and imperialism, is in accord with the critical assessment of museums as

“repositories and manifestations of national identity and cultural achievement” (Smith 2006, 18). Dewey also remarked that, as an institution, they tended to conserve the past in an unfruitful way, a mindset he referred to also in Experience and Education, where he dismissed the duty of schools to ensure the transmission of the grand heritage from a generation to another as a proof of comfortable inertia.

The metamorphoses of museums in the context of capitalism when many nouveaux riches established themselves as patrons of the arts, and when due to the mechanization of industry artists were “less integrated than formerly in the normal flow of social services”

(Dewey 1980, 9), provided him with interesting material for reflection. His “ambivalent attitude toward art museums” (Constantino 2004, 400) was a combination of criticism of the use of art as a status symbol by capitalist col ectors, and of acknowledging the positive side, namely facilitating interaction with art for the working classes. His friendship and col aboration with Albert C. Barnes bears witness to his capacity for lifelong learning, as well as for gratitude. It was to him that Dewey dedicated Art as Experience, acknowledging

“the great educational work carried on in the Barnes Foundation” (1980, vi i) which he praised for its quality and innovative nature.

Barnes was born in a working-class family from Philadelphia and after graduating from medical school, prospered in pharmaceutical research and business. He purchased an impressive col ection of artworks, notably late impressionists, which he hosted in a gal ery built for this purpose, and designed to function as an educational center. His scientific approach to public education by art, in many ways a result of Dewey’s influence,

32

Cultural Heritage and John Dewey’s Philosophy of Education in a Democratic Community was reflected in an unconventional strategy of displaying artworks. They created “a whole wall of color and mood,” (Ryan 1995, 253) rather than being classified chronological y or by styles, with details about the work and the artist kept to a minimum. Barnes, who used to il ustrate aesthetic theory for factory workers with paintings from his col ection was, like Dewey, interested in activities that demonstrated how art, ethics, and politics could be brought together to improve quality of life for all people. As George E. Hein noted with regard to Dewey’s debt to Barnes, the success of this partnership was also due to the fact that Barnes himself shared “an unfailing faith that experiencing art was experiencing life and could be life transforming.” (2011, 131) He and Dewey had a long-lasting intel ectual exchange, and Barnes participated in some of Dewey’s lectures. His interest in African art, well represented in his col ection, matched Dewey’s own concerns that aesthetic perception may be distorted by the ideological context in which people learn about art. To correct this, one had to be wil ing to accept that not only the Parthenon, but also “The arts which today have most vitality for the average person” (Dewey 1980, 5) such as cinema and jazz have aesthetic value in view of the experiences they help generate. Indeed, these can be found “in the raw;” (Dewey 1980, 4) that is, in what manages to catch one’s attention, to engage people ful y, including “the delight of the housewife in tending her plants” or

“the zest of the spectator in poking the wood burning on the hearth and in watching the darting flames and crumbling coals.” (Dewey 1980, 5) At the same time, cultivating the capacity for aesthetic appreciation and expression was meant to provide more than

“immediate moral and aesthetic uplift in the viewer;” (Constantino 2004, 408) and rather to enrich everybody’s experiences; in particular, to enable workers, whose everyday life was deprived of aesthetic stimuli, to give new meaning to their labor.

iii. DeMocracY anD eDucation

Art as Experience ends with Dewey expressing trust in the idea that art is important because it brings people together as members of a community. In contemporary paradigms, this last chapter about art and civilization is a discourse aiming to join tangible and intangible heritage by showing that symbols, rites and magic “united the practical, the social and the educative in an integrated whole having esthetic form.” (Dewey 1980, 327) By today’s standards, his view would give a great theoretical foundation to international policies that justify the importance of heritage safeguarding in relation to values such as social equality and cooperation between communities. To unfold this view takes us to Democracy and Education (1916), Dewey’s best known book, which he considered a complete presentation of his philosophy.

Writing about why ancient Greek philosophers devalued experience and customs, turning to reason as the highest source of authority, Dewey noted that the domination of intel ectualism in schooling was bound to come to an end. Experimental science, as wel as new social conditions which could not disconnect “the occupations of the household, agriculture, and manufacturing” (2004, 296) from advances in the sciences, rendered

Ileana Dascălu

33

the rigid distinction between knowing and doing irrelevant. One implication Dewey focused on is that the distinction between cultural and vocational education was, too, a product of the same philosophical dualism that separated mind from body or labor from leisure (2004, 330). Just as our minds are to a greater extent social than individual, no human activity should be considered private or isolated from practical concerns. In Art as Experience, Dewey would reaffirm this view concluding that “As long as art is the beauty parlor of civilization, neither art nor civilization is secure.” (1980, 344) True to his conviction that the tendency to think in extreme opposites makes one overlook the core of a problem, he wrote:

We must avoid not only limitation of conception of vocation to the occupations where immediately tangible commodities are produced, but also the notion that vocations are distributed in exclusive way, one and only one to each person. Such restricted specialism is impossible; nothing could be more absurd than to try to educate individuals with an eye to only one line of activity. In the first place, each individual has of necessity a variety of cal ings, in each of which he should be intel igently effective; and in the second place any one occupation loses its meaning and becomes a routine keeping busy at something in the degree in which it is isolated from other interests. (Dewey 2004, 331)

This claim resonates with the idea that, as social beings, we all play a variety of roles, and, consequently, it would be detrimental to exaggerate the development of one at the expense of the rest. It also implies that education needs to be, if not liberal in the historical understanding of the notion, broad enough to provide options and meaning because “The dominant vocation of all human beings at all times is living – intel ectual and moral growth.”

(Dewey 2004, 334) As an example, the Hull House’s Labor Museum, established by Mary Hil , a teacher at the Laboratory School, the social reformer Jane Addams and Dewey himself, was meant to fulfill a variety of functions: educate adults about the traditions of immigrants, bring together tangible and intangible cultural expressions, preserve modes of spinning and weaving which were no longer used in modern factories, and create a bridge between different generations of immigrants (Durst 2010, 105). Presenting traditions as a form of safeguarding heritage went thus hand in hand with building social cohesion through understanding how life conditions in a particular historical and social setting come to shape worldviews. Similarly, geography and history should not be approached as “ready-made studies” (Dewey 2004, 225). This would only widen the gulf between knowledge and experience. Instead, they could be creatively used as means to improve perception of the physical and social aspects of life, of how our actions are related to nature and to other generations’. Translated into recommendations for heritage management, this could suggest that heritage which is remote from ordinary experience, and would require much effort to be appreciated, would be better understood by focusing on its place in an evolutionary process, rather than by biographies and anecdotes, for example: An intel igent study of the discovery, explorations, colonization of America, of the pioneer movement westward, of immigration, etc., should be a study of the United

34

Cultural Heritage and John Dewey’s Philosophy of Education in a Democratic Community States as it is today: of the country we now live in. Studying it in process of formation makes much that is too complex to be directly grasped open to comprehension.

(Dewey 2004, 231)

In the end, heritage policies inspired by Dewey’s philosophy of education should reflect a democratic society, where individuals take pleasure in associative life (with festivals, cultural centers and museums as forms thereof), classes are not segregated, and education cultivates a diversity of human capacities, primarily “personal initiative and adaptability.” (2004, 94) Even if one may agree that the educational role of cultural institutions is not as clear as it seems because learning comes in many ways and degrees, the influence of the progressive movement could not be overlooked. Learning with the help of objects, recording experiences of heritage in qualitative surveys, organizing debates and creating events meant to express the social responsibility of cultural institutions have become common practice. However, in order to be consistently Deweyan, such initiatives should be guided by his original principles, as summarized by George E. Hein in a study on museum education: “1. Constant questioning of all dualisms” that generate value judgments conducive to social inequalities; “2. Recognition that the goal of education is further education”, which means providing constant conditions for inquiry; “3. Applying progressive education universal y”, which requires self-examination from the part of museum educators, and “4. Connect educational work back to life”, that is, looking at how exhibitions originate in life experiences and relate to life situations (2006, 349-50).

Thinking about today’s problems with the help of such a prolific philosopher and public intel ectual like Dewey is in many ways inspirational. This may be also because changing demographics, political radicalism, social inequalities, the need for firm foundations of democracy, and the importance of science for social progress which he was writing about are part of our world too. How Dewey articulated his philosophical creed of the centrality of education al ows us to see them in a different light.

Applying Dewey’s philosophy of education to the question of cultural institutions and heritage takes us beyond rhetoric, and does more than confirm that education should not be confined to the classroom or that museums do have an educational role. First, it draws attention to the quality of educational experiences that can be created with the help of heritage, and to the need for a theory of experience that gives weight to both the individual and the social aspects. It looks at how the enjoyable and the transformational dimensions can be harmonized to produce educative experiences: how to teach history and geography, how to make the study of a painting relevant for one’s life, how to understand that a spinning tool encapsulates intangible heritage, how to overcome artificial oppositions such as fine vs.

applied arts or intel ectual vs. vocational education. It emphasizes the need for consistency and planning from the part of individual or institutional educators, and raises doubts about the easy success of improvisations.

Essential y, it connects the educational mission of schools and cultural institutions to the aim of consolidating a democratic community in which each individual’s quality of life would be better than in any alternative arrangement. The fact that contemporary studies on

Ileana Dascălu

35

cultural policies look at the instrumental roles of heritage (for example, creative industries and tourism that support communities’ economic self-reliance, common governance of natural and cultural resources as a pathways to developing col aboration, tolerance and social equality) is in accord with Dewey’s view that glorifying the grand achievements of the past does not contribute to our better understanding of the present. Contemporary representations of cultures as dynamic and multilayered or of heritage as a negotiation of meanings find theoretical support in Dewey’s view of the transactional nature of our interactions with the environment, which led him to argue on numerous occasions that experience gained in ordinary situations should be carried into educational contexts and then back into life. The fact that today’s educational and cultural institutions have yet to solve this problem takes us from Dewey’s philosophical insights back to our value commitments.

Acknowledgments

This paper was supported by the research project PATCULT#RO (“Complex multidisciplinary platform for integrative and systematic research of identities and tangible and non-tangible cultural heritage in Romania”), PN-III-P1-1.2-PCCDI-2017-0686, 52/

PCCDI-2018, funded by UEFISCDI.

ileana.dascalu@filosofie.unibuc.ro

references

Abt, Jeffrey. 2006. The Origins of the Public Museum. In A Companion to Museum Studies, edited by Sharon Macdonald, 115-34. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.

Ansbacher, Ted. 1998. John Dewey’s Experience and Education: Lessons for Museums. Curator: The Museum Journal 41 (1): 36-49.

Constantino, Tracie E. 2004. Training Aesthetic Perception: John Dewey on the Educational Role of Art Museums. Educational Theory 54 (4): 398-417.

Dewey, John. 1980. Art as Experience. New York: Putnam; Perigee Books.

———. 1997. Experience and Education. New York: Simon and Schuster, Touchstone Edition.

———. 2004. Democracy and Education. An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education. Delhi: Aakar Books.

Durst, Anne. 2010. Women Educators in the Progressive Era. The Women behind Dewey’s Laboratory School. New York: Palgrave Macmil an.

Hein, George E. 2006. Museum Education. In A Companion to Museum Studies, edited by Sharon Macdonald, 340-52. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.

———. 2011. Dewey’s Debt to Barnes. Curator: The Museum Journal 54 (2): 123-39.

Janes, Robert R. 2009. Museums in a Troubled World. Renewal, Irrelevance or Collapse? London: Routledge.

Ryan, Alan. 1995. John Dewey and the High Tide of American Liberalism. New York: W.W. Norton

& Company.

Smith, Laurajane. 2006. Uses of Heritage. London: Routledge.

Public Reason 12 (2): 37-47

© 2020 by Public Reason

Patriotism, liberalism, cosmopolitanism and Globalization Costel Matei

University of Bucharest

Abstract. Globalization is a chal enge for the way individuals relate to their own identity in the political context of the nation-state. At the same time, the pursuit of moral ideals such as equality and social justice is still conditioned by the existence of the nation-state. Is patriotism still valid if we want to build a personal identity appropriate to a global society or is it necessary to give it up in favor of something more comprehensive that meets the moral chal enges of a global society? This article attempts to provide a framework for answering this question, starting from the premises that can be found in versions of liberal nationalism and cosmopolitanism.

Key words: nationalism, cosmopolitanism, globalization, patriotism, personal identity.

The feeling of patriotism represents “one’s love and loyalty to one’s own country”

(Tan 2004, 137). The phenomenon of globalization has not diminished the feeling many individuals have of belonging to a certain nation or of solidarity with others living within the same national borders, i.e. in the nation-state. Patriotism continues to be relevant in motivating the actions of individuals as moral and political actors, and national identity is one of the main components of individual identity. At the same time, the pursuit of moral ideals such as equality and social justice is still conditioned by the existence of the nation-state. Whereas David Mil er (2007) considers that national identity and patriotism do not hinder the achievement of such moral ideals, some views have chal enged such ideas, for example:

[…] This emphasis on patriotic pride is both morally dangerous and, ultimately, subversive of some of the worthy goals patriotism sets out to serve – for example, the goal of national unity in devotion to worthy moral ideals of justice and equality.

(Nussbaum 2002, 4)

Martha Nussbaum maintains that, in contemporary societies, cosmopolitanism, which supports a global community of human beings, is somehow less ambiguous than patriotism. In such a view, cosmopolitanism is more suitable for pursuing moral values such as equality and social justice, considering the fol owing reasoning:

[…] If our moral natures and our emotional natures are to live in any sort of harmony, we must find devices through which to extend our strong emotions and our ability to imagine the situation of others to the world of human life as a whole.

(Nussbaum 2002, xiii)

Thus, on the one hand, nationalists argue that patriotism, as part of the national identity of individuals, together with the nation-state, are not dangerous and subversive and do not prevent the realization of moral ideals such as equality and justice in the context of today’s globalized society. On the other hand, proponents of

38

Patriotism, Liberalism, Cosmopolitanism and Globalization cosmopolitanism see in the globalized society an opportunity to test their own views of a global society of fel ow-citizens. A global society offers the opportunity for individuals to show solidarity as citizens of the world and better conditions to achieve their moral ideals of social justice and equality. In the context of the antagonism of the two main ideological positions, I think we can raise certain questions, such as: are moral ideals, e.g. social equality and justice, served only by patriotism and within national borders or rather can they be served equal y well by cosmopolitanism and within a global society?

Is patriotism an obsolete political emotion, or can it still contribute to shaping and fulfil ing moral ideals of the new generations? Is patriotism dangerous and subversive or, on the contrary, does it support the achievement of individuals’ moral goals better than cosmopolitanism with its claim of an all-encompassing empathy for all human beings living on the planet?

i. national BorDers anD ethical coMMunities

When discussing moral ideals such as equality or social justice in contemporary society, a relevant question arises about the organizational framework in which these ideals can be acquired. Proponents of nationalism argue that the existence of national borders, i.e. of the nation-state, is practical y a necessary constraint for achieving such ideals, while proponents of cosmopolitanism believe that national borders do not play any important role in accepting, designing and implementing moral ideals. From the perspective of nationalism, national identity as a relationship of solidarity between the citizens of a state is a better basis for accepting the constraints resulting from the application of principles of different moral conceptions and for actions that lead to their implementation. The sense of justice does not only determine accepting different moral principles, but also the feelings, the emotions we share with those closest to us.

For example, in his book On Nationality David Mil er considers nations as “ethical communities” (1995, 11) and maintains that:

[…] a proper account of ethics should give weight to national boundaries, and that in particular there is no objection in principle to institutional schemes – such as welfare states – that are designed to deliver benefits exclusively to those who fall within the same boundaries as ourselves. (1995, 11)

From this perspective, the state in general and the nation as a form of solidarity are at least one of the effective ways to achieve moral ideals. As Mil er said, noting the ways in which some peoples in Eastern Europe, aiming to promote their own well-being after the fall of communism, separated from larger into smal er states: Provided, then, that we endorse ideals of social justice, and recognize that these take hold mainly within national communities, we have good reason for wanting the political systems that can realize these ideals to coincide with national boundaries. (1995, 85)

Costel Matei

39

This could mean that only within national borders human solidarity gains the necessary intensity to accept and promote moral ideals, such as those relating to equality and social justice. At the same time, the moral commitment of individuals to certain sets of rules and institutions is based on other elements such as common territory, common language, common culture, a common social and historical experience, etc. In this sense, we can consider, along with Mil er, nations as ethical communities. Global y, we can speak only in a metaphorical sense of such an ethical community for all human beings. Against Mil er, however, we can accept that feelings of empathy, the capacity to understand what is common to all people, certain emotions towards the underprivileged and the worst-off, and even a sense of fairness and justice that derives from the moral status of human beings – all these should be conceivable and functioning in a consmopolitan society.

ii. nation-state anD gloBaliZation

The term nation-state, often used in political theory, implies a fusion of the concept of state with that of nation and refers to a certain political entity with a certain geographical territory administered by a legitimate and recognized central authority.

In relation to this nation-state, individuals nurture a sense of belonging to a nation and patriotism. At the same time, within a nation-state individuals share prevalent feelings and attitudes towards moral values or ideals, generated by the relations between citizens, which are rooted in their common history, language, traditions and customs. One can maintain that our world is made of nation-states, perhaps exclusively, and further argue that even in our globalized world, various peoples continue to aspire to the formation of a new nation-state, for example, Kurds, Sikhs, Saharawi people and others, considering the national state as the only institution that can respond to all their interests, so that they could benefit from all the opportunities offered by social life. However, the nation-state is an ideal type in Weber’s sense, rather than a reality representing the fusion between a nation and a state. Charles Til y (1990) underlines that nation-states as such have appeared rarely in history and its model as being based on a strong and inevitable community of history, culture and language is not exactly a concrete, a real one: The term national state […] does not necessarily mean nation-state whose people share a strong linguistic, religious and symbolic identity. (Tilly 1990, 3; emphasis in original)

And also:

Although states such as Sweden and Ireland now approximate that ideal, very few European national states have ever qualified as nation-states. (Tilly 1990, 3) If we are looking at the world map, for example, the political borders of the states on the African continent have no connection with the cultural particularities of those

40

Patriotism, Liberalism, Cosmopolitanism and Globalization occupying the space within those limits (Rwodzi and Mubonderi 2015). Modern states are made up, more or less, of a majority of individuals of the same nationality, but also of groups belonging to different nationalities or ethnicities. We can conclude that if the nation-state is only an ideal model and, in reality, most nation-states are more or less heterogeneous, it is even more problematic to prove how patriotism – a feeling that corresponds to this ideal nation-state – and, respectively, cosmopolitanism – a feeling which corresponds to an abstract world community of all people – are compatible with the context of today’s global society and favor (as feelings or emotions which refer to belonging to a national or global community) the achievement of moral ideals such as equality and justice.

When one says during the ordinary or more specialized discussions of political philosophy that patriotism is an ambiguous feeling that can be dangerous and subversive, the underlying idea is that patriotism as a political emotion specific to nationalism is in fact incompatible with the political values of a democratic and liberal society. That is why authors who value patriotism as a political emotion insist on demonstrating its compatibility with a liberal political vision.

For example, attempting to show that nationalism is open to the universal value of liberalism, Yael Tamir tries to reconcile nationalism with liberalism. In her approach, she tries to remove certain prejudices regarding the incompatibility between liberalism and nationalism and to defend nationalism from misinterpretations that see it as a historical y limited conception belonging to a revolute political order. In order to understand Tamir’s approach, we should not neglect also that her view crystal ized around and immediately after the fall of communism, when the young states of Eastern Europe, especial y those of the former USSR, associated the reinvigoration of the national states with their hopes for democratization and welfare. Moreover, at that time and after, these states valued globalization as an opportunity for strengthening their statehood, as well as for social progress and development. Tamir defines the complementarity between liberalism and nationalism as fol ows: The main characteristic of liberal nationalism is that it fosters national ideals without losing sight of other human values against which national ideals ought to be weighed. The outcome of this process is a redefinition of legitimate national goals and the means used to pursue them. Liberal nationalism thus celebrates the particularity of culture together with the universality of human rights, the social and cultural embeddedness of individuals together with their personal autonomy.

In this sense it differs radically from organic interpretations of nationalism, which assume that the identity of individuals is totally constituted by their national membership, and that their personal will is “truly free” only when fully submerged in the general one.[…] Liberal nationalism relies on the assumption that as liberalism is a theory about the eminence of individual liberties and personal autonomy, nationalism is a theory about the eminence of national-cultural membership and historical continuity, and the importance of perceiving one’s present life and one’s future development as an experience shared with others. (1993, 79)

Costel Matei

41

One may agree upon the abovementioned definition of liberal nationalism.

However, one may also ask whether this historical y circumstantiated type of cultural characteristic of a social model and its main political institutions should be normatively extrapolated to the global sphere. Through the processes of globalization, society has undergone a multitude of significant changes. The global sphere is no longer the sphere of citizens belonging only to their national states as national citizens were before the starts of globalization process. The new technologies, the new communication channels, the Internet and social media, the development of international air travels, education abroad, the new forms of migration as voluntary migration, diasporas as transnational communities, as well as network communities between migrants and their family left home, have led to a global context that has transcended and almost made irrelevant the borders of nation-states. The new relationships between individuals, facilitated by these changes and the others, have contributed to the emergence of new attitudes toward the global context. If so, there are some reasons to believe that individuals may have true fel ow-feeling with people who do not belong to the same nation-state as them and that this context accommodates the possibility for them to share fel ow-feelings and attitudes with the other individuals who make up the global sphere. These new attitudes are different from the feelings of belonging to a nation-state and normatively have new significations irreducible to the feeling related to the membership to nation-state. Globalization “[…] creates new types of experiences associated with risk-taking, experimentation, and self-expression” (Svašek and Skrbiš 2007, 372). In their book The New Individualism: The Emotional Costs of Globalization Anthony El iott and Charles Lemert show that a new individualism involves “ongoing emotional struggles to relate internal and external experience in which both processes and structures of self-definition are explicitly examined, revised and transformed.” (2006, 72; emphasis in original), while Ulf Hannerz maintains that:

There are new various kind of people for whom the nation works less well as source of cultural resonance [. .]. It seems rather that in the present phase of globalization is the proliferation of kinds of ties that can be transnational: ties to kin, friend, colleagues, business associates, and others. In all that variety, such ties may entail a kind and a degree of turning out, a weakened personal involvement with nations and national culture, a shift for the disposition to take it for granted […]. (1996, 89) Ulf Hannerz also notes that:

[. .] In their great diversity, these outside linkages tend not to coalesce into any single conspicuous alternative to the nation. The people involved are not all

“cosmopolitans” in the same sense; most of them are probably not cosmopolitans in any precise sense at all. (1996, 89)

Considering these new descriptions of the global sphere the fol owing question can be asked legitimately: can liberal nationalism provide a normative framework for these global attitudes of individuals?

42

Patriotism, Liberalism, Cosmopolitanism and Globalization Liberal nationalism attempts to achieve a conceptual coherence between the values of nationalism, such as patriotism and those of liberalism, such as individual rights:

Liberal nationalism is predicated on the idea that all nations should enjoy equal rights, and in fact derives its universal structure from the theory of individual rights found at its core. If national rights rest on the value that individuals attach to their membership in a nation, then all nations are entitled to equal respect. The justification of national rights is thus separated from the glorious or tormented past of each nation, from its antiquity, or from its success in attaining territorial gains. (Tamir 1993, 9)

In this view, the nation-state has certain rights similar to the individual ones.

States have rights, such as the right to self-determination, to manage their own affairs autonomously, to protect their citizens and borders and other rights that are regulated by international law, by international conventions and treaties, which are guaranteed by international law (Buchanan 2004). But the nature of these state rights is entirely different from the individual liberal rights as those settled under the concept of negative liberty, for example, habeas corpus or the right to freedom of movement.

Those rights regard the relation between individuals and the state as coercive power while state rights are the rights of a sovereign power in relation to the citizens and other states. That is why an extrapolation or transfer of individual rights to the state is somehow inappropriate. For instance, one cannot simply say that “if national rights are grounded on the value that individuals bestow to their belonging to a nation, then all nations are entitled to be equally respected.” (Tamir 1993, 9) We can have moral consideration and respect for each individual. But we cannot infer from this an entitlement of the state to be respected, for example, by other states. Individuals can identify with any national community and can be respected as being member of these national communities, but it is inappropriate to conclude from this that the nation-state deserves the respect of others. Nor does it imply in any way that the actions of such a state will necessarily be appropriate and in full compliance with international regulations or even with the aims and interests of its citizens. If a nation-state does not respect civil liberties, then a state does not deserve respect regardless of whether or not its citizens identify with it.

Tamir also tries to substantiate this theory by making a demarcation between the nation-state understood as a political system and the nation-state understood as a cultural system, believing that this demarcation would make the characteristics of liberal nationalism clearer:

[…] Most contemporary states are multinational, and under these circumstances, the demand that a state should reflect one national culture entails harsh implications for members of minority groups. Drawing a line between the political and the cultural spheres could serve to alleviate some of the problems raised by multinationalism. (Tamir 1993, 10)

Costel Matei

43

Tamir also noticed that:

[…] the liberal state has in practice continued to operate within the constitutive assumptions of the modern nation-state and to see itself as a community with a distinctive culture, history, and collective destiny. The growing dissatisfaction of ethnic groups and national minorities living within liberal states lends persuasive support to this claim. Members of these minorities feel excluded from the public sphere because they realise that it achieves an appearance of dis- interest in cultural issues by exclusion, namely, by rejecting all those who do not belong to the dominant culture. (1993, 141)

Thus, Tamir argues that the multinational or multi-ethnic state should be characterized by an open political culture, which al ows minorities of any kind to live freely within their culture in society and to choose from their culture a moral identity or adhere to a national identity. This seems to be an adequate description of a liberal institutional arrangement for which the plurality of cultures is thus a valuable resource to all human beings (Tamir 1993, 33). Nevertheless, individuals chose their plan of life or other similar goals based on a variety of reasons, political, cultural, and religious according their circumstantiated desires or interests. Yet, from the existence of this mechanism of choosing under a determined cultural context, Tamir deduces for individuals a right to culture as a liberal right and then considers this right a condition of possibility for nationalism and liberalism together. She also believes that the right to culture has the role of al owing individuals to live under a certain culture and to choose their own culture as well as their social affiliation, to recreate the culture of the community they live in and to redefine their borders: “to grant individuals the right to fol ow their culture as given, but also to re-create it.” (Tamir 1993, 49) In her view, the right to culture is not a communal or col ective right and were it accepted as a distinct right, it should be considered of the same nature as the right to association (1993, 44).

More specifical y:

As a matter of principle, the right to practice a culture, like all other rights intended to protect the interests of individuals, is an individual right. (Tamir 1933, 45) The right to culture is a right to a public sphere in which individuals share a language, remember their past, cherish their heroes; in short, they live a fulfil ed national life (Tamir 1993, 8; 35-57). This also seems to be the arrangement liberal nationalism proposes to national states in a globalized society. Tamir suggests that the right to culture implies the free choice of the individual to fol ow a certain culture or another. In her view, a culture of a nation-state thus formed justifies the state’s right to self-determination and can replace the political justification: The right of self-determination, however, stakes a cultural rather than a political claim, namely it is the right to preserve the existence of a nation as a distinct cultural entity. (Tamir 1993, 57)

44

Patriotism, Liberalism, Cosmopolitanism and Globalization Tamir distinguishes between what she cal s a right to self-government and a right to self-determination. The right to self-government concerns the decision-making process, while self-determination seems to be rather a moral right aimed at autonomy.

The right to self-determination, which is also applicable to nations, leads to restricted political systems, and international y to fragmentation, even to Balkanization. In order to avoid the conflicts that would come from the prevalence of this right, then the smal er, royal and perhaps federal political organizations would be more viable and legitimated in line with national liberalism (Tamir 1993, 150 –1).

Liberal nationalism could be a very good theory for the legitimacy of the nation-state. It is problematic to determine whether it also offers a solution for the international order in the present context of globalization and particularly for the new forms of global social life, as I dare to call it, in which more and more citizens of nation-states take part daily. Most individuals who are part of the new games of these forms of global social life are probably not cosmopolitans, but cosmopolitanism as a view, doctrine and feeling gives them better chances to achieve their normative aspiration for equality and social justice in this new form of social life in which they are part daily. That is why cosmopolitan projects are desirable: because they argue in favor of global social relations based on moral principles and standards independent of cultural and national differences. Cosmopolitanism does not imply cultural uniformity but favors the unrestricted manifestation of individuals within a normative framework that regulates individual rights and freedoms but also moral obligations and responsibilities.

iii. patriotisM, cosMopolitanisM anD gloBaliZation

The cosmopolitan project is chal enged by patriotism. Proponents of the former theoretical y should overcome or integrate patriotism into their approaches and explain why people would choose to have similar feelings toward strangers they do not identify with, but are related to the new forms of cosmopolitan social life in which they are involved daily. One way to integrate patriotism into the way cosmopolitanism relates to globalization is Kok-Chor Tan’s conception of limited patriotism. For Tan the feeling of patriotism represents “one’s love and loyalty to one’s own country.” (2004, 137) Patriotism, i.e. the feeling of patriotism, explains the attachment that people have to their national origin and to their compatriots. Patriotism is the basis of social systems, because it makes sense to accept the norms and institutions of the state through the common identity and citizenship of individuals. Thus, it seems easier to achieve social cohesion based on certain expectations that arise from patriotism, on the assumption of duties and obligations and on the solidarity and reciprocity represented by patriotism. Linking a limited patriotism to the theory of cosmopolitanism can be achieved by understanding the spheres to which each refers. Patriotism is closely linked to the nations, borders, citizenship and social systems it generates. Cosmopolitanism as a feeling and concept can be approached from the perspective of global society,

Costel Matei

45

which is a sphere in which norms and institutions regulate the relationships between individuals who need principles capable of dealing with the problems that arise at this level. Therefore, the two spheres, the patriotic one and the cosmopolitan one, can coexist without diminishing their effects on people’s lives. An individual can love their country and, at the same time, accept that they are part of a globalized society characterized by new social relations with individuals from other nations. Individuals identify at the national level with their fel ow citizens, but they can also identify with all other people in the global sphere. Thus, close relationships are established between individuals across national borders, and their feelings can generate the assumption of moral duties and responsibilities, as well as respect for the rights of others. Technology, communication, education, knowledge, circulation of information and ideas generate a global social context that does not deny the importance of national feelings but integrates them into a global sphere where we can respect the moral relevance of the other. For Tan, limited patriotism implies a conception of justice as impartiality:

[…] justice as impartiality does not aim to regulate individuals’ day-to-day interaction with each other as such; rather it aims to define and regulate the background social context within which such interactions occur. (2004, 157) Tan argues that the limits of patriotism are determined by the obligations that individuals have to the nation they come from. When individuals fulfill al their obligations and tasks towards the nation-state, they have full freedom and the opportunity to choose the type of actions they wish to take, for example, in order to fulfill their obligations or the goals they assume for the benefit of individuals from any other part of the world or the duties they have in order to fulfill moral ideals such as global justice. This approach is important because it manages to combine two elements that seemed to be in a total y contradictory relationship: patriotism and individuals’

obligations to the global sphere.

Thus, one can be a patriot and, at the same time, identify with fel ows on a global scale and respect the principles and standards of a cosmopolitan vision on moral ideals as global justice. The two types of attitudes are not mutual y exclusive, but they can build together a global society populated by individuals who respect each other beyond social, cultural or national contexts. Just as our commitment to the idea of social justice does not involve whatsoever neglecting our responsibilities to individuals to whom we have deep moral commitments (family, friends), similarly, global justice as a form of global distributive justice does not involve the elimination of national commitments such as patriotism. Tan speaks of impartiality in regulating these moral commitments to the national community and the community of all people. The impartiality proposed by Tan does not have the role of eliminating national identity, patriotism and other elements specific to the nationalist approach, but only of establishing their conditions and limits. National desires and interests can also be pursued in the global sphere, and the limits to be respected are those of justice or, in Tan’s terms, impartial justice.

46

Patriotism, Liberalism, Cosmopolitanism and Globalization We can observe, through the analysis undertaken that, although patriotism and the nation-state continue to be relevant in certain contexts, this does not deny the possibility of cosmopolitan forms of moral responsibility. Of course, no global system is real y a consolidated transnational culture, and it is problematic whether certain political institutions could replace the national cultures or the nation-state, offering individuals the feeling of membership they have towards national cultures and states. However, at the global level there is an indisputable global moral responsibility shared between a lot of agents starting from individuals and ending with global inter-governmental organizations. This responsibility is distinct from national moral responsibility, a type of col ective responsibility that individuals assume by virtue of their membership to

“those large communities we call nations.” (Mil er 2007, 81) At national level, in most cases, a great number of social policies have the role of supporting every citizen to lead a decent life, to have access to the necessary resources for survival, education and health care. Each of us is a member of such a system that is legal y regulated and imposes certain obligations on us in connection with them. These obligations fuel our sense of responsibility, which contributes to the identification and implementation of public policies aimed at achieving moral ideals of equality and social justice and to supporting our fel ow citizens who need help. Moreover,

In everyday political discourse, we often make judgments that seem to involve holding nations responsible, or for the consequences that follow from these actions.

[. .] Often, when states are held accountable for the outcomes they produce, they are judged as agents of the people they are supposed to serve. (Miller 2007, 111) We also encounter these types of judgments on moral responsibility global y.

But, for the time being, global moral responsibility seems to be assumed primarily by individuals; by civil society, by international organizations only in a diffuse way. There is no comprehensive framework for uniting moral responsibilities global y, although there are countless issues from global warming to the need to eradicate extreme poverty where we may even speak of a broad consensus on initiating and taking action to address them. In connection with this global responsibility, we can once again observe the complementarity of the two spheres, national and global, and we can ask ourselves whether there is any possibility of joining them so that global responsibility emerges victorious. One solution might be that suggested by David Mil er in his book National Responsibility and Global Justice (2007). Mil er distinguishes between two concepts of responsibility and suggests a way to combine national responsibility with global responsibility: an outcome responsibility, which is our responsibility for our actions and decisions, and a remedial responsibility, which for those in need and who would need our help (2007, 81). Using this distinction related to responsibilities, we could say that in our capacity as members of the national state, these global remedial obligations correspond to our cosmopolitan sentiments that can be a pendant of patriotism.

Costel Matei

47

To conclude, although patriotism is strongly manifested as a sense of belonging to the nation-state, and its legitimacy derives from our belonging to a nation and a culture, cosmopolitanism is a strong sense of responsibility we have for all people.

This cosmopolitan feeling can be reflected in a remedial responsibility that could be addressed both by individuals and states for the global sphere.

Acknowledgments

This paper was supported by the research project PATCULT#RO (“Complex multidisciplinary platform for integrative and systematic research of identities and tangible and non-tangible cultural heritage in Romania”), PN-III-P1-1.2-PCCDI-2017-0686, 52/ PCCDI-2018, funded by UEFISCDI.

costel.matei@filosofie.unibuc.ro

references

Buchanan, Allen. 2004. Justice, Legitimacy, and Self-Determination: Moral Foundations for International Law. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Elliott, Anthony, and Charles Lemert. 2006. The New Individualism. The Emotional Costs of Globalization. Abingdon: Routledge.

Hannerz, Ulf. 1996. Transnational Connections. Culture, People, Places. London: Routledge.

Svašek, Maruška, and Zlatko Skrbiš. 2007. Passions and Powers: Emotions and Globalisation.

Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power 14 (4): 367-83.

Miller, David. 1995. On Nationality. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

———. 2007. National Responsibility and Global Justice . Oxford: Oxford University Press .

Nussbaum, Martha C. 2002. Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism. In For Love of Country? edited by Martha C. Nussbaum and Joshua Cohen for Boston Review, 3-17. Boston: Beacon Press, (first edition 1996).

———. 2007. Frontiers of Justice: Disability, Nationality, Species Membership. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Rwodzi, Aaron, and Believe Mubonderi. 2015. State Nations and the Fate of Western Democracy in Sub-Saharan Africa: Prospects and Challenges. International Journal of Humanities and Social Studies 3 (9): 221-26.

Tamir, Yael. 1993. Liberal Nationalism. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Tan, Kok-Chor. 2004. Justice without Borders. Cosmopolitanism, Nationalism and Patriotism.

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Tilly, Charles. 1990. Coercion, Capital and European States, AD 990-1990. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Public Reason 12 (2): 49-54

© 2020 by Public Reason

Book review

The Architecture of collective Action

Ludwig, Kirk. 2016. From Individual to Plural Agency: Col ective Action. Volume 1.

Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. xi+ 315, ISBN 978-0-19-875562-2

Kirk Ludwig’s (2016) From Individual to Plural Agency: Col ective Action discusses the problem of col ective intentional behavior. This is the first of the two-volume work in which Ludwig aims to account for both plural (col ective) and institutional action.

The architecture of the whole project is the fol owing: plural agency and plural action are explained via individual agency and individual action, while the account of institutional agency and institutional action is built upon an account of plural agency and action. Here I will focus on Ludwig’s considerations in volume I, where he provides a bottom-up analysis of action sentences containing plural terms. His analysis starts from the simple case of actions sentences containing singular terms in subject position.

Ludwig is not interested in providing an ontology of col ective action, but in revealing the ontological assumptions contained by our ordinary discourse about col ective action. His central idea is that any reference of such a discourse to col ective agency, collective action or group intentionality can be explained away. This offers a double win for the reader and a double virtue for the book. First, the reader is introduced in the fundamentals of the philosophy of action and also in the logical analysis of action sentences.

Second, Ludwig develops a very comprehensive argument for a reduction schema that eliminates any ontological commitment to a group agent endowed with intentionality.

In ordinary life, there are different activities that we perform either as an individual agent or as part of a col ective. For instance we raise our hand at a conference in order to express that we want to ask a question. We also act as part of a group and describe such activities. For instance, we talk about different activities we had with our friends:

“We went together to the movie theater;” or “I helped my friend move her heaviest suit-case.” As Ludwig puts is: “Col ective intentionality is the most fundamental form of social reality […] A fundamental understanding of the social requires an understanding of the nature of col ective agency and how the various aspects of the social world are grounded in it.” (2016, 2) Yet a discussion about the social world is not possible without an analysis of col ective action. Moreover, Ludwig argues that our understanding of col ective action is grounded in our understanding of individual action.

The big philosophical picture in which Ludwig’s endeavor is set is of the fol owing kind. One way to understand individual action and col ective action is by means of an equivalence structure. If individual action requires an individual agent, col ective action must also suppose a col ective agent. If we accept there is a col ective agent, we must also accept col ective intentionality as wel . What does it mean that there is a collective agent with intentional states? The idea rejected by Ludwig is not that two friends singing a carrying a piano cannot have the same cognitive or conative state, but rather that there is no further agent besides the two friends, namely the pair constituted by the two. The main idea is that we have to reject the thesis that groups are agents and have

50

Book Reviews

a mind of their own1. What seems to compel an assumption about the existence of a group agent is the surface grammar of plural action sentences. Ludwig’s aim is to show that the logical structure of such sentences does not ontological y commit to group agents since they are reducible to a logical analysis of singular action sentences. This kind of aim determines a two-part partitioning of the book.

The first part of the book is concerned with sentences about individual action that we use in our discourse, and the second is concerned with the analysis of plural action sentences that we use in our discourse. The first part spans over seven chapters, while the second consists in nine chapters. Each part begins with a map of the development of the discussion across the chapters and ends with a summary of the discussion. These resources turn out to be extremely useful every time the reader needs to remind herself of the big picture of the argument.

The introduction consists in the general presentation of the problem of col ective agency and col ective action, of the importance of the topic and how it should be placed in the general framework of social ontology, of the methodology and the central assumptions, both methodological and philosophical. For instance, a central working assumption is that a logical analysis reveals the ontological assumptions we work with.

This motivates the account of the logical structure of both singular action sentences and plural action sentences that is developed later on in the book.

Part I is dedicated to the general conceptual framework in which the logical analysis is construed and to the logical analysis of the singular action sentences per se.

Chapters 2 and 4 are concerned with the central concepts of action theory: event, agency, intention and other conative states. The concept of agency is more systematical y developed in Chapter 6, together with what ‘action’ means. The emphasis is on the problem of agency, and not on that of action. The reason is that Ludwig considers

‘agency’ a more fundamental concept than that of ‘action’, and that our understanding of action derives from the understanding we have with respect to agency: “First it is the fundamental notion of action theory. Second, it is crucial to understanding the structure of action and the logical form of action sentences to distinguish between events and states of which we are primitive agents and those we bring about by what we bring about primitively.” (Ludwig 2016, 15) The notions of primitive agency and primitive action turn out to be the key concepts in Ludwig’s account. A primitive action (a term borrowed from Davidson (2001a)) is one an agent performs without performing something else in order to bring it about (Ludwig 2016, 67). For instance, the movement of our hand when we want to grab a glass of water is an example of primitive action. He further explains what it is to be an agent of an event. One is an agent of an event if the event is her primitive action, or if the event is a consequence of her primitive action.

The movement of my hand is my primitive action and I am the primitive agent of it, while indicating that I would like to raise a question at a conference is another action that is the consequence of my primitive action. I am the agent of both the moving of my arm and the sign that I have a question. The conceptual framework is completed with his account of the notion of intention. He distinguishes between prior intention and intention-in-action. One criterion used by Ludwig to distinguish between the two is the temporal projection of the intention. We have prior intentions when we make future plans. For instance, when we plan to take the plane in October 2020 (this is a version 1] One of the references Ludwig invokes is (List and Petit 2011). See (Ludwig 2016, 170).

Book Reviews

51

of Ludwig’s example (2016, 42)). A prior intention is not directed to a specific action or at an action-token, but to an action-type. An intention-in-action is directed towards a specific action at the time we perform the action. This type of intention is directed towards an action-token, and, because of this, it is a de re intention (Ludwig 2016, 43). For instance, my intention-in-action is directed towards the movement of my arm when I want to grab a glass of water.

The second layer of the argument the reader should fol ow is the logical analysis of singular action sentences. Ludwig begins with singular action sentences like “I sang the national anthem,” and completes this technical tool in order to provide an analysis of sentences in which an agent expresses her intention to perform an action, “I intend to sing the national anthem,” and those sentences which contain qualifications regarding the intentional type of the action, namely, sentences that contain the adverb ‘intentional y’.

The logical analysis is inaugurated in Chapter 3. Chapters 7 and 8 extend the analysis to sentences expressing intention and intentional action performed by an agent.

The theoretical framework Ludwig adopts is the Causal Theory of Agency and the technical resources are adapted and extended from Davidson’s (2001b) logical analysis of action sentences. The main idea adopted from Davidson is that action sentences should be represented in their logical form as comprising a quantification over events. Ludwig further develops the analysis in Chapter 6 to integrate the agency relation between the agent and the event. For instance, consider the sentence “I signaled the chairman that I have a question.” The sentence should be understood in the fol owing way: there is an event of signaling to the chair that I have a question of which I am the agent at a certain instance of time if there is a primitive action that I performed that constitutes the event of signaling that I have a question. It should be noted that the type of agency relation between an agent and an event depends upon the relation between the primitive action and the event. This relation is not restricted to constitution. For instance, it can also be a relation of causation. The discussion regarding different types of agency can be found in section 6.3 and in the list of abbreviations in section 6.5.

The last point of analysis regards the content of I-intentions such as the content of the intention expressed by “I intend to sing the national anthem.” Here he adopts the distinction Tuomela and Mil er (1998) use between I-intentions and we-intentions. In-tuitively, an individual agent I-intends to perform an individual action. For instance, “I intend to eat a chocolate” expresses my I-intention to perform a certain action, namely eating the chocolate. We-intentions, on the other hand, are intentions an individual has when she is part of a col ective action. If we carry together the piano, I (as part of the pair) we-intend to perform this action as part of a col ective action. Chapter 7 is restricted to the analysis of I-intentions as expressed in sentences like “I intend to eat a chocolate.” For the evaluation of the sentences expressing intentions, Ludwig applies the Satisfaction Principle used for the evaluation of different kinds of propositional attitudes. Here comes at play the notion of intention-in-action. The sentence “I intend to eat a chocolate” receives a positive evaluation if there is a correspondence between a plan of action directed toward the event type “eating a chocolate” and my intention-inaction directed towards the particular action of eating the chocolate. The intentional character of the action explained in Chapter 8 is given by the success of an agent performing an action in accordance with her intention.

Part II is dedicated to the analysis of plural action sentences. Here is where the reader should seek the philosophical aim of the book. The analysis in Part I sets the

52

Book Reviews

ground for showing that our discourse about col ective action should be understood in a reductive manner. In order to show that our discourse about col ective action does not imply any commitment to a group agent, Ludwig shows that action sentences with plural terms in subject position should not be understood as isomorphic to action sentences with singular terms in subject position. If we understand sentences like “I sang the national anthem” and “We sang the national anthem” symmetrical y, then it seems that if “I” has a referent to which we are ontological y committed, then, in the same way, we are committed to the referent of “we” (Ludwig 2016, 134).

Chapter 9 begins with a short presentation of the reasons plural action sentences seem to be committed to a col ective agent and col ective intentionality. Here Ludwig discusses the ambiguity between reading plural action sentences with a distributive meaning, or with a col ective meaning which seems to motivate a commitment to a group agent in the col ective case. “We sang the national anthem” read distributively means that each of us sang individual y the national anthem. When read col ectively, it implies that each of us participated at a common event of singing the national anthem.

Ludwig rejects the idea that this ambiguity is a case for col ective agency or group agent.

The ambiguity is not related to how we understand predication to the subject, that in the distributive case we predicate (we can think of the event of singing the national anthem as a predicate) something about each member of the col ection, in the second case we predicate something about the group. What Ludwig wants to show is that this ambiguity rests in a scope ambiguity between an event-quantifier and the members of the group quantifier. Thus, in the distributive reading we should understand that for each of us who belong to the col ection referred to by “we” there is an event, “the singing of the national anthem,” such that each of us stays in the agency relation with an instance of the singing of the national anthem. For the col ective reading we reverse the order of the quantifiers (the quantifier for the members of the group and the quantifier for the event), and we get that there is an event, the singing of the national anthem, such that each of us participates at this common event. The technical resources developed in the Part I came into play in order to develop the analysis for plural action sentences and to bring to surface the reason of the ambiguity between the two readings. In the fol owing chapter Ludwig extends the analysis for plural actions sentences to other expressions for plural subject.

Chapter 11 is especial y important because here you can see the philosophical product of the technicalities of the preceding two chapters. Ludwig presents the consequences of his account: nothing in our language structure compels us to assume there is an agent over and above the members of a col ective. Another related consequence is that col ective action is not to be understood as action in the primary sense: “In this sense, the primary sense, then, there are no col ective actions at al , only individual actions, whether we choose the events of which we are primitive agents as our actions and any events of which we are agents.” (Ludwig 2016, 173). Thus, col ective action need not be understood as forcing us to assume any kind of group agent or group intentionality, and since groups are not agents, and col ective action is not brought about by a primitive action, then col ective action is not action in the primary sense.

The fol owing chapters create a symmetry with the analysis of singular action sentences provided in Part I. Chapters 12 and 13 complete the analysis with the necessary tools for plural subject sentences in which the intention to perform a certain action is expressed, as in “We intend to sing the national anthem,” and plural action sentences

Book Reviews

53

containing the adverb “intentional y,” as in “We sang the national anthem intentional y.” The first step is to reject the idea that groups have intentions, in the sense in which the group agent intentional y brings about a certain action. Groups per se do not intend to do something, but it is rather that every member of the group has a certain intention with a specific meaning. Here Ludwig brings into play again the distinction between I-intentions and we-intentions, and this time the focus is on we-intentions. The distinction borrowed from Tuomela and Mil er (1988) is considerably revised in order to fit into Ludwig’s framework of analysis and the requirement of belief present in Tuomela and Mil er’s account is eliminated. What Ludwig argues in Chapter 12 is that the distinction lies in the content of I-intentions and we-intentions. In Chapter 13 he goes on with the analysis in order to show what it means that a member of a group performing an action we-intends to act as a part of the col ective action. In the account for ‘we-intentions’ the central idea is that of a shared plan. A member of a group who participates in an intentional col ective action we-intends that the group performs a certain action as part of the shared plan the members of the group have. The ‘accordance with a shared plan’ requirement comes to secure the account from cases in which the members perform a col ective action, some performing it as a result of being deceived by others. Chapter 15 continues the analysis of intentional col ective action expressed in sentences like “We sang the national anthem intentional y.” Some concepts that are introduced are those of coordination and cooperation, both being necessary to describe collective intentional action.

Chapters 14, 16, and 17 are dedicated to the objections such a reductive account of col ective action may encounter, and to its place in the general philosophical literature concerning col ective action, col ective agency or col ective intentionality. The authors he engages with are Tuomela, Searle, Bratman, Vel eman, and Gilbert. Chapter 16 is dedicated to a comparison between the accounts the mentioned authors provided and his own concerning col ective intentionality.

Some of the ideas presented in this book gave rise to some debates concerning col ective action. The reader who wants to deepen the philosophical discussion concerning col ective action can further go to a debate started by Ol e Blomberg (2019).

The observations Blomberg had were fol owed by an answer from Ludwig (2019). The debate started from Blomberg’s critique against the idea that col ective actions are not actions in the primary sense. Let’s rehearse the argument Ludwig (2016) has that collective action is not action in the primary sense. The thesis is that only singular actions are actions in the primary sense. First, every action is either a consequence of a primitive action or it is a primitive action. Only an individual agent can perform primitive action since only a single individual can have an intention-in-action directed towards a certain action. In this sense, col ective actions are not actions per se since they are not a consequence of a primitive action. The ideas presented in this argument can be found in Chapter 11 in Ludwig’s book. Blomberg chal enges the idea that col ective actions are not actions per se in the fol owing way: he chal enges that a sole agent (sole agency requirement) can have an intention-in-action-directed towards a specific action. In this way he chal enges that a primitive action can be the result of the manifestation of a sole agent. In this way, the members of a group can perform a col ective primitive action, which in turn brings about a col ective action. Blomberg’s article was fol owed by Ludwig’s (2019) answer. Here, the author maintains that col ective actions are not actions per se, the sole agency requirement, but he acknowledges one category of action

54

Book Reviews

that Blomberg brings into light, namely composite actions, actions composed by two or more primitive actions. The way the dispute is developed in the two articles can be of great help for the reader to grasp many of the distinctions and technical terms that build up Ludwig’s (2016) book.

The book is both philosophical y and technical y chal enging. Ludwig embarks in a great philosophical project supported by many conceptual distinctions and refine-ments. The reader should expect a book not intended for the lay. There are many parts which become very difficult from a formal point of view. However, they are important for the philosophical argument of the book. The conceptual construction is also metic-ulously developed and every part of it is essential for the philosophical core. Nonethe-less, since it covers many of the philosophical discussions concerning the philosophy of action, this book can be a great support for introducing the reader in these matters, and can also offer the reader a deeper dive in the chal enging discussion on action, col ective agency and col ective action. Both the experienced researcher and the undergrad student can benefit from the systematic and vast picture Ludwig offers for the intrica-cies of the problems of col ective agency and col ective action.

Acknowledgments

This paper was supported by the research project PATCULT#RO (“Complex multidisciplinary platform for integrative and systematic research of identities and tangible and non-tangible cultural heritage in Romania”), PN-III-P1-1.2-PCCDI-2017-0686, 52/

PCCDI-2018, funded by UEFISCDI.

Reviewed by Andreea Popescu

University of Bucharest

andreea.popescu@filosofie.unibuc.ro

references

Bloomberg, Olle. 2019. From Simple to Composite Agency: On Kirk Ludwig’s From Individual to Plural Agency. Journal of Social Ontology, Vol. 5, No. 1: 101-124.

Davidson, Donald. 2001a. Agency. In Essays on Actions and Events, by Donald Davidson, 43-62.

New York: Clarendon Press. Oxford.

———. 2001b. The Logical Form of Action Sentences. In Essays on Actions and Events , by Donald Davidson, 105-122. New York: Clarendon Press. Oxford.

List, Christian and Philip Petit. 2011. Group Agency: The Possibility, Design, and Status of Corporate Agents. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Ludwig, Kirk. 2019. Individual and Col ective Action: Reply to Bloomberg. Journal of Social Ontology, Vol. 5, No.1: 125-146.

Tuomela, Raimo and Kaarl Mil er. 1998. We-Intentions. Philosophical Studies, Vol. 53, No. 3: 367-389.

Public Reason

Journal of Political and Moral Philosophy

submission information: All contributions whether articles or reviews are welcome and should be sent by e-mail as attachment at brancoveanu@publicreason.ro. Papers will be refereed on a blind basis by Public Reason’s referee board. Acceptance notices will be sent as soon as possible. The editors may ask for revisions of accepted manuscripts. Papers should have an abstract and key words. Please limit your paper submission to 8000 words, including footnotes and references, and format it for blind review (the text should be free of personal and institutional information). Along with the article, but not in the article, please send contact details: current affiliation, address, telephone number and email address. Authors are responsible for reinserting self identifying citations and references when manuscripts are prepared for final submission. Book reviews should have no more than 4000 words.

Manuscript preparation: All manuscripts should be formatted in Rich Text Format file (*rtf) or Microsoft Word document (*doc) with 12 pt. font size and double-spaced. Please use the author-date system documentation style, as it is presented in The Chicago Manual of Style. For more information about our editing rules, please go to: http://www.publicreason.ro/submission-info Notes: The contributions have to be original and not published before. Public Reason does not require exclusivity in submission of articles. However, if you have submitted your article to another journal, we kindly require that you let us know about it, and notify us without any delay about other journals’

decisions about your article. The work has to be approved by all co-authors. Authors wishing to use text passages, figures, tables etc. that have already been published elsewhere are required to obtain permission from the copyright owner(s). Evidence that permissions have been granted are to be sent along with the manuscripts submitted for the blind review.The authors assume all responsibility for the content published in the journal.

Book reviews: Books for review should be sent to: CSRB, Department of Philosophy, University of Bucharest, 204 Splaiul Independentei, Sect. 6, 060024, Bucharest, Romania.

Advertising information: If you want to advertise your books, department programs, conferences, events etc. please contact us at brancoveanu@publicreason.ro in order to get general information or information on costs, specifications, and deadlines.

subscription and delivery: Public Reason is an open access e-journal. For the print version of the journal please contact us at brancoveanu@publicreason.ro.

Permission: Public Reason holds the copyright of all published materials. Requests for permission to reprint material from Public Reason should be sent to brancoveanu@publicreason.ro.

Online publication: Public Reason is available online at http://publicreason.ro The journal Public Reason is published by The Center for the Study of Rationality and Beliefs. CSRB is a unit of scientific research within the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Bucharest (http://www.ub-filosofie.ro). CSRB is located in the Faculty of Philosophy, Splaiul Independenţei 204, Sector 6, postcode 060024, Bucharest. For more information see http://www.csrc.ro/EN/home This issue - vol. 12 (2) - was published in May 2021.

ISSN 2065-7285

EISSN 2065-8958

© 2020 by Public Reason

ARTICLES

Ruwen Fritsche

Cultural Heritage Policy as a Challenge to Rawlsian Liberalism?

Stefan Ionescu

Collective Identity, between Ideology and Cooperation

Ileana Dascalu

Cultural Heritage and John Dewey’s Philosophy of Education in a Democratic Community

Costel Matei

Patriotism, Liberalism, Cosmopolitanism and Globalization REVIEW ARTICLES

Kirk Ludwig

From Individual to Plural Agency: Collective Action

Reviewed by Andreea Popescu

. 2, 2019

. 11, No

Vol

PUBLIC REASON

http://publicreason.ro

ISSN 2065-7285

EISSN 2065-8958

Document Outline

- Front Cover

- About Public Reason

- Contents

- Cultural Heritage Policy as a Challenge to Rawls

- I. The legal protection of cultural heritage

- German cultural property law – de lege lata

- Cultural property of national significance as a subject of the KGSG

- Regulation of cultural property of national significance according to the KGSG

- II. The moral justification of state action to promote and protect cultural heritage according to R

- III. Consistency of Rawls’s Theory of Justice regarding perfectionism

- IV. Challenges for the legal protection of cultural heritage according to the Theory of Justice

- The legitimate aims of cultural property law

- The legitimate means of cultural property law

- V. Conclusion

- References

- Collective Identity, between Ideology and Cooperation

- References

- Cultural Heritage and John Dewey’s Philosophy of Education in a Democratic Community

- I. Educative Experiences

- II. Aesthetic Perception and the Educational Value of the Arts

- III. Democracy and Education

- References

- Patriotism, Liberalism, Cosmopolitanism and Globalization

- I. National Borders and Ethical Communities

- II. Nation-State and Globalization

- III. Patriotism, Cosmopolitanism and Globalization

- References

- The Architecture of Collective Action

- References

- Submission Information

Table of Contents

Front Cover

About Public Reason

Contents

Cultural Heritage Policy as a Challenge to Rawls

I. The legal protection of cultural heritage

German cultural property law – de lege lata

Cultural property of national significance as a subject of the KGSG

Regulation of cultural property of national significance according to the KGSG

II. The moral justification of state action to promote and protect cultural heritage according to R

III. Consistency of Rawls’s Theory of Justice regarding perfectionism

IV. Challenges for the legal protection of cultural heritage according to the Theory of Justice

The legitimate aims of cultural property law

The legitimate means of cultural property law

V. Conclusion

References

Collective Identity, between Ideology and Cooperation

References

Cultural Heritage and John Dewey’s Philosophy of Education in a Democratic Community

I. Educative Experiences

II. Aesthetic Perception and the Educational Value of the Arts

III. Democracy and Education

References

Patriotism, Liberalism, Cosmopolitanism and Globalization

I. National Borders and Ethical Communities

II. Nation-State and Globalization

III. Patriotism, Cosmopolitanism and Globalization

References

The Architecture of Collective Action

References

Submission Information