Communitarianism

Not to be confused withCommunismorCommunalism (disambiguation).

Communitarianismis a philosophy that emphasizes the connection between the individual and thecommunity.Its overriding philosophy is based on the belief that a person's social identity and personality are largely molded by community relationships, with a smaller degree of development being placed onindividualism.Although the community might be a family, communitarianism usually is understood, in the wider, philosophical sense, as a collection ofinteractions,among a community of people in a given place (geographical location), or among a community who share an interest or who share a history.Communitarianism is often contrasted withindividualism,and opposeslaissez-fairepolicies that deprioritize the stability of the overall community.

Terminology

The philosophy of communitarianism originated in the 20th century, but the term "communitarian" was coined in 1841, byJohn Goodwyn Barmby,a leader of the BritishChartistmovement, who used it in referring toutopian socialistsand other idealists who experimented withcommunal styles of life.However, it was not until the 1980s that the term "communitarianism" gained currency through association with the work of a small group ofpolitical philosophers.Their application of the label "communitarian" was controversial, even among communitarians, because, in the West, the term evokes associations with the ideologies ofsocialismandcollectivism;so, public leaders—and some of the academics who champion this school of thought—usually avoid the term "communitarian", while still advocating and advancing the ideas of communitarianism.

The term is primarily used in two senses:

• Philosophical communitarianismconsidersclassical liberalismto beontologicallyandepistemologicallyincoherent, and opposes it on those grounds. Unlike classical liberalism, which construes communities as originating from the voluntary acts of pre-communityindividuals,it emphasizes the role of the community in defining and shaping individuals. Communitarians believe that the value of community is not sufficiently recognized in liberal theories of justice.
• Ideological communitarianismis characterized as aradical centristideology that is sometimes marked bysocially conservativeandeconomically interventionistpolicies. This usage was coined recently. When the term is capitalized, it usually refers to the Responsive Communitarian movement ofAmitai Etzioniand other philosophers.

Czech and Slovak philosophers like Marek Hrubec,Lukáš PernýandLuboš Blahaextend communitarianism to social projects tied to the values and significance of community orcollectivismand to various types ofcommunismandsocialism(Christian, scientific, or utopian), including:

• Historical roots of collectivist projects fromPlato,throughFrançois-Noël Babeuf,Pierre Joseph Proudhon,Mikhail Bakunin,Charles Fourier,Robert OwentoKarl Marx
• Contemporary theoretical communitarianism (Michael J. Sandel,Michael Walzer,Alasdair MacIntyre,Charles Taylor), originating in the 1980s
  • Pro-liberal, pro-multicultural (Walzer, Taylor)
  • Anti-liberal, pro-national (Sandel, MacIntyre)
• The vision of practical, self-sustaining communities as described byThomas More(Utopia),Tommaso Campanella(Civitas solis) and practised by Christian Utopians (Jesuit Reduction) or utopian socialists likeCharles Fourier(List of Fourierist Associations in the United States),Robert Owen(List of Owenite communities in the United States). This line includes various forms ofcooperatives,self-helpinstitutions, or communities (Hussitecommunities,The Diggers,Habans,Hutterites,Amish,Israelikibbutz,Slaviccommunity;examples include theTwelve Tribes communities,Tamera(Portugal),Marinaleda(Spain), the monastic state ofMount Athosand theCatholic Worker Movement).

Origins

While the term communitarian was coined only in the mid-nineteenth century, ideas that are communitarian in nature appeared much earlier. They are found in some classical socialist doctrines (e.g. writings about the early commune and about workers' solidarity), and further back in theNew Testament.Communitarianism has been traced back to earlymonasticism.

A number of early sociologists had strongly communitarian elements in their work, such asFerdinand Tönniesin his comparison ofGemeinschaft(oppressive but nurturing communities) and Gesellschaft (liberating but impersonal societies), andEmile Durkheim's concerns about the integrating role of social values and the relations between the individual and society. Both authors warned of the dangers ofanomie(normlessness) and alienation in modern societies composed of atomized individuals who had gained their liberty but lost their social moorings. Modern sociologists saw the rise of mass society and the decline of communal bonds and respect for traditional values and authority in the United States as of the 1960s. Among those who raised these issues were Robert Nisbet (Twilight of Authority),Robert N. BellahHabits of the Heart,and Alan Ehrenhalt (The Lost City: The Forgotten Virtues Of Community In America).In his book Bowling Alone (2000), Robert Putnam documented the decline of "social capital" and stressed the importance of "bridging social capital," in which bonds of connectedness are formed across diverse social groups.

In the twentieth century communitarianism also began to be formulated as a philosophy byDorothy Dayand theCatholic Worker movement.In an early article theCatholic Workerclarified the dogma of the Mystical Body of Christ as the basis for the movement's communitarianism.Along similar lines, communitarianism is also related to thepersonalistphilosophy ofEmmanuel Mounier.

Responding to criticism that the term 'community' is too vague or cannot be defined,Amitai Etzioni,one of the leaders of the American communitarian movement, pointed out that communities can be defined with reasonable precision as having two characteristics: first, a web of affect-laden relationships among a group of individuals, relationships that often crisscross and reinforce one another (as opposed to one-on-one or chain-like individual relationships); and second, a measure of commitment to a set of shared values, norms, and meanings, and a shared history and identity – in short, a particular culture.Further, author David E. Pearson argued that "[t]o earn the appellation 'community,' it seems to me, groups must be able to exert moral suasion and extract a measure of compliance from their members. That is, communities are necessarily, indeed, by definition, coercive as well as moral, threatening their members with the stick of sanctions if they stray, offering them the carrot of certainty and stability if they don't."

What is specifically meant by "community" in the context of communitarianism can vary greatly between authors and periods. Historically, communities have been small and localized. However, as the reach of economic and technological forces extended, more expansive communities became necessary to provide effective normative and political guidance to these forces, prompting the rise of national communities in Europe in the 17th century. Since the late 20th century there has been some growing recognition that the scope of even these communities is too limited, as many challenges that people now face, such as the threat of nuclear war and that of global environmental degradation and economic crises, cannot be handled on a national basis. This has led to the quest for more encompassing communities, such as theEuropean Union.Whether truly supra-national communities can be developed is far from clear.

More modern communities can take many different forms, but are often limited in scope and reach. For example, members of one residential community are often also members of other communities – such as work, ethnic, or religious ones. As a result, modern community members have multiple sources of attachments, and if one threatens to become overwhelming, individuals will often pull back and turn to another community for their attachments. Thus, communitarianism is the reaction of some intellectuals to the problems of Western society, an attempt to find flexible forms of balance between the individual and society, the autonomy of the individual and the interests of the community, between the common good and freedom, rights, and duties.

Academic communitarianism

Whereas the classical liberalism of theEnlightenmentcan be viewed as a reaction to centuries of authoritarianism, oppressive government, overbearing communities, and rigid dogma, modern communitarianism can be considered a reaction to excessive individualism, understood as an undue emphasis on individual rights, leading people to become selfish or egocentric.

The close relation between the individual and the community was discussed on a theoretical level byMichael SandelandCharles Taylor,among other academic communitarians, in their criticisms of philosophical liberalism, especially the work of the American liberal theoristJohn Rawlsand that of the German Enlightenment philosopherImmanuel Kant.They argued that contemporary liberalism failed to account for the complex set of social relations that all individuals in the modern world are a part of. Liberalism is rooted in an untenable ontology that posits the existence of generic individuals and fails to account for social embeddedness. To the contrary, they argued, there are no generic individuals but rather only Germans or Russians, Berliners or Muscovites, or members of some other particularistic community. Because individual identity is partly constructed by culture and social relations, there is no coherent way of formulating individual rights or interests in abstraction from social contexts. Thus, according to these communitarians, there is no point in attempting to found a theory of justice on principles decided behind Rawls'veil of ignorance,because individuals cannot exist in such an abstracted state, even in principle.

Academic communitarians also contend that the nature of the political community is misunderstood by liberalism. Where liberal philosophers described the polity as a neutral framework of rules within which a multiplicity of commitments to moral values can coexist, academic communitarians argue that such a thin conception of political community was both empirically misleading and normatively dangerous. Good societies, these authors believe, rest on much more than neutral rules and procedures—they rely on a shared moral culture. Some academic communitarians argued even more strongly on behalf of such particularistic values, suggesting that these were the only kind of values which matter and that it is a philosophical error to posit any truly universal moral values.

In addition to Charles Taylor and Michael Sandel, other thinkers sometimes associated with academic communitarianism includeMichael Walzer,Alasdair MacIntyre,Seyla Benhabib,Shlomo Avineri,andPatrick J. Deneen.

Social capital

Beginning in the late 20th century, many authors began to observe a deterioration in the social networks of the United States. In the bookBowling Alone,Robert Putnamobserved that nearly every form of civic organization has undergone drops in membership exemplified by the fact that, while more people are bowling than in the 1950s, there are fewer bowling leagues.

This results in a decline in "social capital",described by Putnam as" the collective value of all 'social networks' and the inclinations that arise from these networks to do things for each other ". According to Putnam and his followers, social capital is a key component to building and maintaining democracy.

Communitarians seek to bolster social capital and the institutions ofcivil society.The Responsive Communitarian Platform described it thus:

Many social goals require partnerships between public and private groups. Though the government should not seek to replace local communities, it may need to empower them by strategies of support, including revenue-sharing and technical assistance. There is a great need for study and experimentation with creative use of the structures of civil society, and public-private cooperation, especially where the delivery of health, educational and social services are concerned.

Positive rights

Important to some supporters of communitarian philosophy is the concept ofpositive rights,which are rights or guarantees to certain things. These may include state-subsidized education, state-subsidized housing, a safe and clean environment, universal health care, and even the right to a job with the concomitant obligation of the government or individuals to provide one. To this end, communitarians generally support social security programs, public works programs, and laws limiting such things as pollution.

A common objection is that by providing such rights, communitarians violate thenegative rightsof the citizens; rights tonothave something done for you. For example, taxation to pay for such programs as described above dispossesses individuals of property. Proponents of positive rights, by attributing the protection of negative rights to the society rather than the government, respond that individuals would not have any rights in the absence of societies—a central tenet of communitarianism—and thus have a responsibility to give something back to it. Some have viewed this as a negation ofnatural rights.However, what is or is not a "natural right" is a source of contention in modern politics, as well as historically; for example, whether or not universal health care, private property or protection from polluters can be considered a birthright.

Alternatively, some agree that negative rights may be violated by a government action, but argue that it is justifiable if the positive rights protected outweigh the negative rights lost.

Still, other communitarians question the very idea of natural rights and their place in a properly functioning community. They claim that instead, claims of rights and entitlements create a society unable to form cultural institutions and grounded social norms based on shared values. Rather, the liberalist claim to individual rights leads to a morality centered on individual emotivism, as ethical issues can no longer be solved by working through common understandings of the good. The worry here is that not only is society individualized, but so are moral claims.

Responsive communitarianism movement

In the early 1990s, in response to the perceived breakdown in the moral fabric of society engendered by excessive individualism, Amitai Etzioni and William A. Galston began to organize working meetings to think through communitarian approaches to key societal issues. This ultimately took the communitarian philosophy from a small academic group, introduced it into public life, and recast its philosophical content.

Deeming themselves "responsive communitarians" in order to distinguish the movement from authoritarian communitarians, Etzioni and Galston, along with a varied group of academics (includingMary Ann Glendon,Thomas A. Spragens, James Fishkin, Benjamin Barber, Hans Joas, Philip Selznick, andRobert N. Bellah,among others) drafted and published The Responsive Communitarian Platformbased on their shared political principles, and the ideas in it were eventually elaborated in academic and popular books and periodicals, gaining thereby a measure of political currency in the West. Etzioni later formed the Communitarian Network to study and promote communitarian approaches to social issues and began publishing a quarterly journal,The Responsive Community.

The main thesis of responsive communitarianism is that people face two major sources of normativity: that of the common good and that of autonomy and rights, neither of which in principle should take precedence over the other. This can be contrasted with other political and social philosophies which derive their core assumptions from one overarching principle (such as liberty/autonomy for libertarianism). It further posits that a good society is based on a carefully crafted balance between liberty and social order, between individual rights and personal responsibility, and between pluralistic and socially established values.

Responsive communitarianism stresses the importance of society and its institutions above and beyond that of the state and the market, which are often the focus of other political philosophies. It also emphasizes the key role played by socialization, moral culture, and informal social controls rather than state coercion or market pressures. It provides an alternative to liberal individualism and a major counterpoint to authoritarian communitarianism by stressing that strong rights presume strong responsibilities and that one should not be neglected in the name of the other.

Following standing sociological positions, communitarians assume that the moral character of individuals tends to degrade over time unless that character is continually and communally reinforced. They contend that a major function of the community, as a building block of moral infrastructure, is to reinforce the character of its members through the community's "moral voice", defined as the informal sanction of others, built into a web of informal affect-laden relationships, which communities provide.

Influence

Responsive communitarians have been playing a considerable public role, presenting themselves as the founders of a different kind of environmental movement, one dedicated to shoring up society (as opposed to the state) rather than nature. Like environmentalism, communitarianism appeals to audiences across the political spectrum, although it has found greater acceptance with some groups than others.

Although communitarianism is a small philosophical school, it has had considerable influence on public dialogues and politics. There are strong similarities between communitarian thinking and the Third Way, the political thinking of centrist Democrats in the United States, and the Neue Mitte in Germany. Communitarianism played a key role in Tony Blair's remaking of the British socialist Labour Party into "New Labour" and a smaller role in President Bill Clinton's campaigns. Other politicians have echoed key communitarian themes, such as Hillary Clinton, who has long held that to raise a child takes not just parents, family, friends and neighbors, but a whole "village".

It has also been suggestedthat thecompassionate conservatismespoused by President Bush during his 2000 presidential campaign was a form of conservative communitarian thinking, although he did not implement it in his policy program. Cited policies have included economic and rhetorical support for education, volunteerism, and community programs, as well as a social emphasis on promoting families, character education, traditional values, and faith-based projects.

President Barack Obama gave voice to communitarian ideas and ideals in his bookThe Audacity of Hope,and during the 2008 presidential election campaign he repeatedly called upon Americans to "ground our politics in the notion of a common good," for an "age of responsibility," and for foregoing identity politics in favor of community-wide unity building. However, for many in the West, the term communitarian conjures up authoritarian and collectivist associations, so many public leaders – and even several academics considered champions of this school – avoid the term while embracing and advancing its ideas.

Reflecting the dominance ofliberal and conservative politicsin the United States, no major party and few elected officials openly advocate communitarianism. Thus there is no consensus on individual policies, but some that most communitarians endorse have been enacted. Nonetheless, there is a small faction of communitarians within the Democratic Party; prominent communitarians includeBob Casey Jr.,Joe Donnelly,andClaire McCaskill.Many communitarian Democrats are part of theBlue Dog Coalition.It is quite possiblethat the United States'right-libertarianideological underpinnings have suppressed major communitarian factions from emerging.

Dana Milbank,writing inThe Washington Post,remarked of modern communitarians, "There is still no such thing as a card-carrying communitarian, and therefore no consensus on policies. Some, such asJohn DiIulioand outside Bush adviserMarvin Olasky,favor religious solutions for communities, while others, like Etzioni and Galston, prefer secular approaches. "

In August 2011, the right-libertarianReason Magazineworked with the Rupe organization to survey 1,200 Americans by telephone. The Reason-Rupe poll found that "Americans cannot easily be bundled into either the 'liberal' or 'conservative' groups". Specifically, 28% expressed conservative views, 24% expressed libertarian views, 20% expressed communitarian views, and 28% expressed liberal views. The margin of error was ±3.

A similar Gallup survey in 2011 included possiblecentrist/moderateresponses. That poll reported that 17% expressed conservative views, 22% expressed libertarian views, 20% expressed communitarian views, 17% expressed centrist views, and 24% expressed liberal views. The organization used the terminology "the bigger the better" to describe communitarianism.

ThePakistan Tehreek-e-Insafparty, founded and led byImran Khan,is considered the first political party in the world which has declared communitarianism as one of their official ideologies.

Comparison to other political philosophies

A variant of theNolan chartusing traditional political color coding (red leftismversusblue rightism) with communitarianism on the top left

Early communitarians were charged with being, in effect, social conservatives. However, many contemporary communitarians, especially those who define themselves as responsive communitarians, fully realize and often stress that they do not seek to return to traditional communities, with their authoritarian power structure, rigid stratification, and discriminatory practices against minorities and women. Responsive communitarians seek to build communities based on open participation, dialogue, and truly shared values.Linda McClain,a critic of communitarians, recognizes this feature of the responsive communitarians, writing that some communitarians do "recognize the need for careful evaluation of what is good and bad about [any specific] tradition and the possibility of severing certain features... from others."And R. Bruce Douglass writes, "Unlike conservatives, communitarians are aware that the days when the issues we face as a society could be settled on the basis of the beliefs of a privileged segment of the population have long since passed."

One major way the communitarian position differs from the social conservative one is that although communitarianism's ideal "good society" reaches into the private realm, it seeks to cultivate only a limited set of core virtues through an organically developed set of values rather than having an expansive or holistically normative agenda given by the state. For example, American society favors being religious over being atheist, but is rather neutral with regard to which particular religion a person should follow. There are no state-prescribed dress codes, "correct" number of children to have, or places one is expected to live, etc. In short, a key defining characteristic of the ideal communitarian society is that in contrast to a liberal state, it creates shared formulations of the good, but the scope of this good is much smaller than that advanced by authoritarian societies. "

Criticism

Liberal theorists, such as Simon Caney,disagree that philosophical communitarianism has any interesting criticisms to make of liberalism. They reject the communitarian charges that liberalism neglects the value of community, and holds an "atomized" or asocial view of the self.

According to Peter Sutch the principal criticisms of communitarianism are:

1. that communitarianism leads necessarily tomoral relativism;
2. that this relativism leads necessarily to a re-endorsement of the status quo in international politics; and
3. that such a position relies upon a discredited ontological argument that posits the foundational status of the community or state.

Other critics emphasize close relation of communitarianism toneoliberalismand new policies of dismantling thewelfare stateinstitutions through development of the third sector.

Opposition

• Bruce Frohnen– author ofThe New Communitarians and the Crisis of Modern Liberalism(1996)
• Charles Arthur Willard– author ofLiberalism and the Problem of Knowledge: A New Rhetoric for Modern Democracy,University of Chicago Press, 1996.

List of communitarian political parties

• American Solidarity Party(United States)
• Australian Progressives(Australia)
• Centre Party(Germany)
• Christian Democratic Party(Norway)
• Christian Democratic Union of Germany(Germany)
• Christian Union(Netherlands)
• Democratic Unionist Party(United Kingdom)
• European Social Democratic Party(Moldova)
• Fidesz(Hungary)
• Finns Party(Finland)
• Islamic Society Party(Afghanistan)
• Law and Justice(Poland)
• Liberal Democratic Party of Russia(Russia)
• People's Party Our Slovakia(Slovakia)
• Poland 2050(Poland)
• Prohibition Party(United States)
• Social Democratic Party (Romania)(Romania)
• Social Democratic Party(United Kingdom)
• Sovereign Poland(Poland)
• United Russia(Russia)
• Xiluva(South Africa)

List of communitarian philosophers

Earlier theorists and writers

• Aristotle
• Martin Buber
• Confucius
• Charles Fourier
• T. H. Green
• Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
• L. T. Hobhouse
• J. A. Hobson
• Niccolò Machiavelli
• Robert Owen
• Jean-Jacques Rousseau
• Alexis de TocquevilleinDemocracy in America

Contemporary theorists

• Benjamin Barber
• Gad Barzilai
• Robert N. Bellah
• Phillip Blond
• Amitai Etzioni
• William Galston
• Mark Kuczewski
• Alexandre Marc
• Stephen Marglin
• Roger Scruton
• Emmanuel Mounier
• Michael Sandel
• Non-conformists of the 1930s
• Costanzo Preve
• Robert Putnam
• Jose Perez Adan
• Joseph Raz
• Charles Taylor
• Michael Walzer
• Yoram Hazony

See also

• Singaporean communitarianism
• Civics
• Civil religion
• Classical republicanism
• Community organizing
• Corporatism
• Corporate statism
• Communalism (South Asia)
• Dark Enlightenment
• Distributism
• List of Fourierist Associations in the United States
• List of Owenite communities in the United States
• Medieval commune
• Nationalism
• National conservatism
• One-nation conservatism
• Postliberalism
• Public sphere
• Radical centrism
• Statism
• Third Way
• Tribalism
• Ubuntu philosophy
• Venezuelan Communal Councils
• Yellow socialism

Further reading

• Amitai Etzioni,1996,The New Golden Rule,Basic BooksISBN0465049990.
• Charles Taylor,1992,Sources of the Self,Cambridge: Harvard University PressISBN0674824261.
• Daniel Bell,2000,East Meets West,Princeton: Princeton University PressISBN0691005087.
• David L. Kirp,2001,Almost Home: America's Love-Hate Relationship with Community,Princeton University PressISBN0691095175.
• Gad Barzilai,2003,Communities and Law: Politics and Cultures of Legal Identities,Ann Arbor: University of Michigan PressISBN978-0-472-03079-8.
• Judith Harris & Donald Alexander, 1991, "Beyond capitalism and socialism: The communitarian alternative."Environments,21(2), 29–37. Retrieved from:http://hdl.handle.net/10613/2733.
• Michael J. Sandel,1998,Liberalism and the Limits of Justice,Cambridge: Cambridge University PressISBN0521567416.
• Sterling Harwood, 1996,Against MacIntyre's Relativistic Communitarianism,in Sterling Harwood, ed., Business as Ethical and Business as Usual, Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Company), Chapter 3,ISBN0-534-54251-4andISBN978-0-534-54251-1.

External links

• Sourcewatch
• Bell, Daniel."Communitarianism".InZalta, Edward N.(ed.).Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
• "Communitarianism",InfedEncyclopedia.
• Fareed Zakaria,The ABCs of Communitarianism. A devil's dictionary,Slate,July 26, 1996.
• Robert Putnam,"Communitarianism",National Public Radio,February 5, 2001: "The term 'Third Way' was used to describe President Clinton's form of liberalism. Now 'Communitarianism' is being used in the same way to describe President Bush's form of conservatism. They're both an attempt to create a middle ground [...] an alternative to the liberal-conservative paradigm."
• Civil Practices Network