If you love humanity in general, be careful not to neglect it in the particular.
We often think of access to information as an inherent good. It’s hard to make a case to the contrary, but while I would agree that access to more information is a good thing on its face, when it comes to philanthropy in a democracy, it has the potential to prey on a natural proclivity peculiar to the democratic mentality.
Alexis de Tocqueville, after traveling from his native France to observe democracy in America, saw that a greater awareness of what is going on in the world can actually perpetuate an individualistic mentality in democratic countries. After his tour of the United States in 1831-32, Tocqueville made the following observation:
“In democratic countries, the bond of human affections is extended and loosened.”
Tocqueville noted that citizens in a democracy, viewing their fellow citizens as coequals, extend and apply this same view of equality to all people around the world. Democratic man is egalitarian towards all individuals, near or far; he thus has a greater capacity to express sympathy for people he has never met.
Whereas democratic man is keenly aware of his duties as an individual in society, aristocratic man sees himself more as a component part of a particular class than as an individual in a society of equals (the caste system in India is an extreme version of this today, but traces of this mentality still exist in Europe and most of the rest of the world). His identity is tied to class; thus, he is often disposed to forget himself in the context of the larger group of which he is a part. Citizens in aristocratic countries accept the way society is structured as a given and do not try to alter the entrenched social hierarchy. This might be expressed in the perceived duty of a higher class to provide for certain needs of the lower classes, and lower classes’ dependency on the leadership and aid of the higher classes.
This is why some countries in the Middle East are so often suspicious of the aid that America pours into a foreign country or region after it has been ravaged by a natural disaster. The very idea that someone could be so concerned about people thousands of miles away whom he/she has never met is impossible for them to comprehend. When we hear reports of Saudis or Pakistanis accuse the United States of having ulterior motives for its humanitarian aid, it is often because they find this behavior so peculiar that nothing else could possibly explain it.
But here is the paradox of the democratic citizen’s expanded concern: as he begins to care about the needs of all equally, he doesn’t attach himself to the particular needs of any. He has a tendency to love humanity in general, but not in particular.
On the contrary, citizens who live in traditionally aristocratic countries scarcely think of devoting themselves to the cause of humanity. To the extent we do see citizens in Iran or China or Germany concern themselves with the needs of the world, it is because a more egalitarian (i.e. democratic) mindset has penetrated their aristocratic inclinations.
The danger with this paradox of the democratic mentality is that it creates a society in which citizens develop no sincere attachment to any particular group of people. They love the idea of loving humanity, but when it comes to making a meaningful sacrifice on behalf of others over a sustained period of time, the commitment becomes too great and they either withdraw or move onto something else.
We see evidence of this in the ancillary role that philanthropy plays in the everyday life of those we know. Many of us, almost in an effort to abstain from involving ourselves personally in a particular cause, content ourselves in making a few donations a year. Look back at the organizations to which you donated over the past year. What was your involvement like with those organizations over the past 365 days? Did you stay attentive to the respective issues those organizations were targeting? How often did you read up on the issue, either via an organization’s website or outside research? Was the cause significant enough to you that you would periodically find yourself bringing it up with your peer group? Did you actually step out and associate with others of a like mind?
I’m not turning a blind eye to the fact that the United States is the most philanthropic nation in the world. But the danger in this fluid attachment to causes isn’t so much that Americans will begin to give less. It’s much more subversive: it risks perpetuating an individualistic mentality.
I may profess to care about the poor and oppressed in developing nations, but am I withdrawing from the needs of my own local community simply because, by caring about the needs of those abroad in the abstract, I am able to be “philanthropic” without having to enter into the messiness of relationships? It is easier for me to sponsor a child in Africa who I only hear from a couple times a year than to sponsor a disadvantaged child in my local community, where it would be incumbent on me to be more involved in his/her everyday life.
The less acquainted we are with the needs of others and the less we involve ourselves personally in their struggles, the more likely we are to develop a distorted view of reality. We become increasingly dependent on others to meet our needs. We begin to demand certain things to improve the quality of our own lives without considering the impact it might have on others.
What Tocqueville warned back in the 1830s is coming true today: we are, more than ever, becoming detached from our world at the same time we’re becoming more informed about it. The recent concern among Millennials with global social justice is perhaps the most apparent example. We are increasingly turning into “loose” individuals, without any particular attachment to anything. We drift from cause to cause, abstaining from any real investment in cultivating relationships with those in the midst of those causes. Relationships are the glue that tie us down. They pull us out of our frenzied self, acquaint us with our own limitations, and attach us to others specifically instead of causes generally.
The more distance that exists between us and another person, the harder it is to really know that person. It is almost impossible to have a deep and substantial relationship with someone located thousands of miles away. We are limited beings who were made to invest most heavily (but not exclusively) in those around us. When it comes to giving back, do we focus our donations on nonprofits located outside our own communities and neglect the nonprofits tackling problems going on in our own backyard? Today, it seems we are often more informed about problems of other communities than with the problems of our own. Of course, this isn’t to say we should only concern ourselves with local nonprofits; a balance is needed.
Every society must be aware of its particular predispositions so that it will be able to guard against its own destructive tendencies. We all view access to information as an inherent good, and I would agree. But increased information brought about by advances in telecommunication can also affect our society – the United States – in ways that might seem unthinkable. One of those ways is its ability to draw our attention away from the problems going on right in our own communities.
Originally published here on Philanthro.pe
–Photo: keoni101/Flickr
The post The Tyranny of Globalism Over Localism appeared first on The Good Men Project.
