Part Three
7
John Kleinig
If I am right about patriotism, its main virtue is that it expresses our commitment and contribution to an important social domain – our country – in a way that counters the tendencies of relatively narrow self-interest and self-assertion. The importance of that domain is, on the one hand (and consequentially), that it provides a stable framework for many of the activities and institutional structures through which and in which we live our lives and flourish as human beings. On the other hand (and nonconsequentially), our country stamps many of those activities and involvements with its own identity, and we have come to value that connection for its own sake. It is the latter that provides us reason to identify with it and not merely with the various institutions and activities that it frames or to which it contributes. This is the source of our specifically patriotic obligations beyond any other obligations that we may formally have by virtue of our membership/citizenship.
In “Keeping to the Middle Ground,” Primoratz elegantly states many of the points that can be advanced in favor of patriotism, while showing a keen understanding of the ways in which patriotism can go wrong or, if not wrong, be seen as a moral luxury. Not surprisingly, even though I acknowledge the moral hazards, I am less persuaded by those considerations that are designed to support Primoratz’s middle-ground position. Although it may be a matter of happenstance which country we are born into (and, I might add, which family or ethnic group we are born into, the pool from which we will choose our friends, and so on), I do not see these identifications as arbitrary in a morally determinative sense or at least in a sense that neuters the moral claims of loyalty that they may place upon us. True, such claims may be perverted, for any loyalty (and virtue generally) can be corrupted or put to corrupt uses.
In his response to me, Primoratz grants that “a certain version of worldly patriotism is morally acceptable” (147)1 – for reasons that he provides in his critique of Keller’s position: even if it involves bias, it need not involve a bias that is immune to reflective correction, and it may be grounded in considerations that do not require the kind of moral endorsement that Keller finds so troubling. What he disputes is my suggestion that it is or can be morally obligatory. Not that I think patriotism is morally obligatory tout court: only that it is defeasibly so.
Wisely, Primoratz sidesteps a possible assault on my suggestion that a country and its various structures might be seen as constituents of human flourishing. That is probably as well, because alternative normative structures might have been invoked to the same end. Instead he – as does Keller – questions whether the communal or associative character of an acceptable human life requires a patria, or more limitedly, its political skeleton (a polity). Obligatory patriotism requires that any consequentialist significance that a country has be transformed into something that one values for its own sake.
This, Primoratz argues, I fail to provide. He adverts to my claim that once we acknowledge the associational character of our lives and the role of our country in enabling that to occur, we will see how countries “can come” to be valued as elements within our identity and why it is “likely” that we will view our countries as “integral to our identity and therefore intrinsically valuable.” The weasel words are can and likely not ought and must be. Someone who does not already acknowledge a patriotic duty is unlikely to be persuaded by such a loose case: how can a person who does not come to value her country for its own sake be said to fail in a patriotic duty?
Primoratz suggests that it begs the question to claim that a person who fails to develop patriotic loyalty shortchanges her relation to her country in the same way as those who view friendships and familial relations only instrumentally. Such an analogy is, moreover, untenable: whereas a person who views friendship in merely instrumental terms fails to understand friendship, a person who views citizenship in merely instrumental terms does not fail to understand citizenship.
So far as Primoratz’s latter complaint is concerned, I demur. Although his point may hold in the special case of end-friendships, some friendships are, as Aristotle recognized, merely instrumental means-friendships, and even in the case of familial relations, which people can view instrumentally, we ordinarily expect loyalty to develop. In like manner, though we can view citizenship instrumentally, it is not unreasonable to think of a person who views citizenship instrumentally as falling short in some way. As I previously noted, most citizenship ceremonies explicitly require the patriotic loyalty of those who accept the status of new citizens – a loyalty that is presumed on the part of other citizens.
More importantly, my statement about shortchanging was not intended as an argument but as the conclusion of one. The argument I sought to advance drew attention not only to the way in which countries provide a framework for our flourishing but also to the way in which they place their particular stamp on our various associative involvements. Our social, political, cultural, aesthetic, and other experiences – experiences that help to characterize who we are – are colored by our Australian, French, or Ecuadorian backgrounds. Were they other than what they are, we would, ceteris paribus, be different from what we take ourselves to be. From this, it doesn’t follow that patriotic loyalty can’t be eschewed or shouldn’t be overridden.
Keller’s rejoinder enables me to make the point more clearly and forcefully (126). His challenge is to differentiate both conceptually and normatively the loyalty of end-friendships and familial relations from the loyalty involved in patriotism. Differentiating loyalties might sometimes appear to be easy – the nature of the association can determine the legitimacy of the loyalty. Friendships and familial relationships are human goods, whereas gangs and organized crime rings are not. But it’s never been quite as easy as that: some friendships are toxic, some families are dysfunctional, and some extralegal enforcement groups may have much to be said for them. The Sicilian Mafia, it is sometimes suggested, began as a morally legitimate law enforcement response to official incapacity. Might we therefore suggest that whether patriotism is good or bad will depend on the country in question? Is American patriotism good and North Korean patriotism bad? Although Keller toys with the possibility (Keller, Chapter 6, in this volume, 6), he does not go that route. He thinks that there is problem with patriotism per se, whether American or North Korean, and he sees the problem as linked to loyalty as well as to the particular associative relation.
So far as the latter is concerned, Keller distinguishes his position from mine by saying that on his view, “the patriot takes her country to be a good country in some central and distinctive respect,” whereas on mine, “the patriot values her country, conceived as an associational object, intrinsically.” Although “our respective depictions of the evaluative attitudes involved in patriotism” are different, he doesn’t see these differences as significant (125). I grant that these forms of expression may not be important for present purposes; however, in the larger view, I think that there may be significant differences – at least when it comes to the matter of criticizing one’s country: the patriotic valuing of one’s country may be associated with vigorous protest at its moral (or other) decline. I may no longer think it good, even though I value it: as a loyal opposition, I pledge to return it to what I think it should be.
But the main burden of Keller’s argument is to deny that it follows – from the fact that a country characteristically makes intrinsically valued contributions to one’s flourishing – that the country itself should be valued intrinsically and patriotically. This would be neither “right-minded nor desirable” (125). He develops an analogy. A university-based academic (let’s say Michelle, at Nullarbor University (NU)) identifies herself as an NU academic and also sees NU as providing a special place for the expression of her academic concerns: developing knowledge, education, and collegiality. Michelle also sees NU as encouraging her academic concerns in a way that “cannot be found in just any university” (125) – it fosters them in a way that she values highly and intrinsically. But, Keller claims, Michelle may view NU only instrumentally. Is this possible? And would it be all right for her to view her university in this way?
Although not easy, it is certainly possible to be Michelle. It is not easy for a person to value intrinsically the things that NU does and to value them in part because of the way in which they are done – the Nullarbor way – without also intrinsically valuing NU. Keller fudges a bit – he doesn’t say that NU is unique in the way it does these things (in the way in which patriotic identities tend to be unique), only that the way in which Nullarbor does these things cannot be found in just any university. If, however, we suppose that there is a distinctive character about the NU way of doing things, an approach not found elsewhere, that we value this approach for its own sake, and that these matter in this way has become important to Michelle’s sense of herself, then it is not going to be a simple matter for Michelle to detach her valuing of them from developing a loyalty to the institution that gives them this character. It is, no doubt, possible that as much as she intrinsically values academic pursuits in the NU manner, she also values other things, perhaps even more: fame or being closer to her family in another country. And so, when offered an opportunity to work at the more prestigious Annarbor University or a job closer to her family, she might take that. In itself, this may not show that she can identify with the NU way of doing things without possessing loyalty to NU. It may suggest only that she values other things more highly or – in the case of her family – prioritizes her loyalties. But I don’t want to reject the possibility of Michelle valuing what she does at Nullarbor without developing any loyalty to it.
Let’s look more closely at the unnaturalness of what Keller proposes. Keller seeks to drive a wedge between intrinsically valuing what it is that NU provides and intrinsically valuing the university by imagining that NU ceases to support the distinctively NU approach to teaching, research, and so forth, the very thing that Michelle valued intrinsically: Why value intrinsically or continue to value even instrumentally the structure or framework when it no longer sustains or supports the diverse activities you value intrinsically? (see 125–126).
But the apparently rhetorical question invites diverse responses. Drawing on Albert Hirschman, Michelle may choose give voice (seek to return it to what it was) or exit it (Hirschman 1970). If it is very unlikely that the NU way of doing things could be replicated elsewhere, she might act as a (loyal?) opposition within NU and seek to reverse what she sees as its detrimental decisions. But if she sees NU as no longer capable of fostering research and teaching in the distinctively NU manner, she may leave. In that case, she will think that NU has forfeited her loyalty, and she will bemoan the passing of an institution to which she once found herself loyally connected. If, however, the Nullarbor way of doing things can be replicated elsewhere (albeit not easily), then she might pursue what she originally characterized as the NU way of doing things at another institution to which she would (most likely) now develop some loyal connection.
Given the original story, should Michelle develop an intrinsic and loyal commitment to NU? Ceteris paribus, I believe so, and especially so if what Michelle intrinsically values about the NU way of doing things is unlikely to be replicated elsewhere. Michelle’s commitment to the NU way of doing things is likely to be gauged by the loyalty she develops to NU.
A bigger question lurks behind this, and this is whether Michelle’s intrinsic valuings are sustainable within a larger normative framework. It may be the case that Michelle’s educational background and experience poorly prepared her for appreciating how research and teaching should be approached and her valuing of the NU way of doing things has therefore been poorly informed. For this reason, perhaps, NU did not warrant intrinsic valuing. Keller does not pursue this question on this occasion, though it lurks behind the assumption that objects of loyalty – such as countries – must be good, and not merely be taken to be so.
Keller’s counterexample supports rather than undermines my case for patriotism. It is unlikely that those who comes to value certain things (opportunities, lifestyle, natural environment, etc.) that are part of their Australian experience, and to value them highly as part of their identity, as well as because of their peculiarly Australian character, will not also come to value the framing structure constituted by the country (Australia). Even if the former things are initially valued instrumentally, once they come to be valued intrinsically and in part because of their Australianness, it will be difficult – albeit not impossible – to resist the development of a patriotic attachment. And, to the extent that one values these highly and appreciates their uniquely Australian context, the step to viewing patriotic attachment as obligatory will be a very small one. No doubt, Australia may change as did NU, and one will be faced with similar options.
There are, Keller asserts, good countries and bad countries whose goodness and badness is (at least in part) a function of what they do for individuals: “the value of individual humans is more fundamental than the value of countries” (126).2 Behind this dialectic of individuals and countries, however, is an individual who does not become the valued individual she is as a result of biological maturation (the product of an ever more accommodating petri dish), but through a process of socialization. And that process is particularized as well as generalized. Ordinarily the context for that socialization will be a country that sustains, integrates, and imprints the social institutions that enable individual development. In other words, to have lives of the kind that Keller, Primoratz, and I value, countries are not merely instrumentally important but to some extent integral to our personalities. We owe them.
Keller expresses the concern that if a person “values a country intrinsically, there is a danger that she will value it wrongly, taking the country to matter independently of, or over and above, the value of the rights and interests of individual humans” (126–127). That is a danger. There are parallel dangers in friendships or in valuing one’s family intrinsically or indeed in valuing intrinsically any particularistic other. Plato worried about familial relationships, lest the state lose the loyalty of its citizens (Plato 1992; cf. Blustein 1982, 32); Kant sometimes worried that friendships might corrupt more universalistic obligations (Kant 1963, 208). No particularistic associative relationship is secure against such dangers. A better question might be whether patriotic loyalties are more dangerous than others, or so much more dangerous that we should eschew them altogether.
I will not rehearse what I said in “The Virtue in Patriotism” about the dangers as well as the benefits of countries and patriotic commitments to them. A lot hangs on Keller’s claim that, as I characterize it, “patriotism is likely to lead to distortions of judgment” (127 my emphasis). How likely? Is it more likely than with other particularistic associations where the other is intrinsically valued? If so, is the mistake a dangerous one? Is the likelihood – and danger – great enough to make patriotism undesirable? Maybe that depends on whether the risks are worth it. On Keller’s account, they are not, for he thinks that the intrinsically valued things that a country enables can be enjoyed without valuing a country intrinsically. That is only if one is a free rider, and countries can accommodate only so many of them.
Toward the end of his response, Keller returns to the issue of bad faith and the ways in which it corrupts. Using mateship as his example, he indicates how such a valued feature might lack distinction or be skewed by ethically dubious features. Is it so distinctively Australian? Does it tend to be sexist? Is it better than American friendship? Do other supposedly distinctive characteristics do any better? Is such patriotism open to question?
There are certainly difficulties in articulating characteristics in a distinctive manner, and detailing a national character is a little like saying what a game is (cf. Wittgenstein 1953, secs. 66–68). Although Keller might want to claim that there is no clear way of distinguishing Italianness from Australianness or Americanness, that is not to deny that there are distinctive differences. Most social concepts have fuzzy edges and overlaps.
Nor do I want to deny that some of a country’s prized characteristics might stand in need of modification – mateship is still shadowed by its sexist history. Nevertheless, an important part of my account of patriotism is the provision for critique, evolution, and development. For example, despite my own patriotic attachment and Australia’s turnaway from Europe and “white Australia” toward Asia, I am still troubled by an ugly racist streak in much Australian patriotism. I no longer live in Australia and think critically of certain of its features, but were Australia to be attacked, I would seriously consider how I could contribute to its defense.
I agree that a patriot will have a “motive to resist evidence that throws her picture of her […] into question” (136). That will be the case, whether […] is her family, friend, organization, or, as Keller fills in the bracket, country. For loyalty is almost always associated with trust, and because one trusts the object of one’s loyalty, one will be motivated to take its side. But, as I have previously argued, trust need not be blind, any more than loyalty, and whatever motivation one may have to resist evidence, one may also be aware that not all evidence is reasonably resistible and so one’s loyalty may be tested or refined. No doubt, the apparatus of education and indoctrination that is available to a country’s powers-that-be should make us wary of what is taught us. But, as I have suggested, that caution needs to be set against the significant benefits that identification with a country may bring with it.
Keller’s final effort to distinguish countries from other objects of loyalty is in a paragraph in which he seeks to distinguish the attachment one has to one’s mother from that which one has to a political party. He writes that even if one’s mother has no special distinguishing virtues and, indeed, is not a good person at all, “she is still your mother and you still have all the same reasons to care for her” (136). That, he claims, is not the case with a political party: if it were no longer to “uphold the political principles you endorse,” you would no longer have any reason to support it (136). Countries, he thinks, differ from each: as a patriot, you cannot see it as independent of your picture of the country or as strictly conditional upon your picture of it.
There are, I agree, reasons for remaining loyal to mothers even though they may not have anything particularly good to be said for them – they remain our mothers, whether we like it or not. And there are no reasons to remain loyal to political parties if they abandon the principles that drew us to them. Our countries remain ours whether we like it or not, but unlike our mothers, we have no reason to remain loyal to them if they do not have enough to commend them. Problematically, we – or at least patriots – do.
I don’t believe that this justifies either Keller’s differentiation of countries from mothers or his complaint about patriotism. We did not choose our mothers and most of us do not choose our countries. And whereas we can abandon support for a party that no longer upholds our political values, we are stuck with our countries.
It is not really necessary that we claim that our country is particularly good for us to feel some identification with it. It is enough that it distinctively frames and holds together a number of things that we intrinsically value and with which we identify. These may range from its physical features, its cultural history, its political structures, its religious traditions, its foods, and so on. To the extent that we find them problematic, then we may question them, even though – as with our mothers – we have grown up with them. On the other side, if our mothers have failed us, we may come to think that we don’t owe them loyalty. That is a common complaint of children who have become alienated from their parents. Older parents may be put in nursing homes not so much out of loyalty but out of some more primitive sense of obligation – not too different from the obligation that makes us think we should pay our taxes and vote.
As I stated in the original chapter, the greatest problem of patriotism is that it can be exploited so dangerously, something less likely of parental loyalty. Granting more or less exclusive and nonnegotiable power to the state (as proxy for the country) may lead to ill-considered and hugely destructive wars. That is one reason why every country needs a significant but loyal opposition.
References
1. Blustein, Jeffrey. 1982. Parents and Children: The Ethics of the Family. New York: Oxford University Press.
2. Hirschman, Albert O. 1970. Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations and States. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
3. Kant, Immanuel. 1963. “Lecture on Friendship.” In Lectures on Ethics, translated by Louis Infield, 200–208. New York: Harper and Row.
4. Plato. 1992. Republic, 2nd ed., translated by G.M.A. Grube. Indianapolis: Hackett.
5. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. 1953. Philosophical Investigations, translated by G.E.M. Anscombe. Oxford: Blackwell.
Notes
1 Although morally acceptable may encompass morally valuable, Primoratz makes it clear later in the chapter and earlier in the book that he means no more than morally neutral or morally indifferent.2 Note, though, that one may say this about a family as well – the value of individual humans is more fundamental than the value of a family.