Not for Profit by Martha Nussbaum

A while ago I read a book called “Notfor Profit:  Why Democracy Needs theHumanities” by Martha Nussbaum.  In it, she argues that humanistic education is key to a healthy democracy, and that both humanistic education and the democracy it underlies are in peril in the 21^st century.

Nussbaum focuses on three key elements of a humanistic education, which will ideally lead to empathy in students:  critical thought (fostered through the Socratic method of open-ended questioning and searching); creation of world citizens through exposure to viewpoints, cultural production, and in-person human contact with peoples different from our own; and finally, the arts as an avenue for exploration and communication of our humanity.  She frames these all as basic skills necessary for the practice of democracy, which I agree with, but I also see the lessons of the humanities as crucial for leading a decent, satisfying life.

On the note of empathy, one of Nussbaum’s most interesting themes for me was the idea of disgust as the ultimate root of injustice.  She argues that, from an early age, children in all societies are taught first a natural disgust for things that can actually be harmful—human feces, poisonous animals, rotten food.  But in many societies, this disgust is also coopted and placed onto certain groups of human beings—blacks, untouchables, women, infidels, gays, the poor, etc.  Children are taught early on and insistently to divert disgust to other people, and this serves as the foundation of much of the structural, systematic hatred and oppression we see across the world.  I agree with this assessment, because I have seen firsthand how parents teach their kids fear and disgust of the natural world and of natural bodily processes, and I have seen instances where this learned reaction is immediately, before my very eyes, translated by the child into pointing fingers and “othering” another kid.  Nussbaum associates this disgust-driven oppression with a feeling of helplessness, both among children and adults; if I feel insecure about myself, I am more likely to step on others to salve my own insecurities.  Interestingly, one of the educational strategies she outlines to get away from these feelings of helplessness is to teach children practical skills like cooking and fixing things.  I have not often heard such “vocational” education categorized under the umbrella of liberal arts, but Nussbaum’s inclusion of it goes with my own personal conviction (shared I think by my father) that general manual/practical skills and the humanities are equal parts of a sound education.  Both my father and I love to develop our intellects, but we also both chose to go to vocational high schools in order to cultivate more than just the intellectual mind.

A humanistic education fights against the impulse to disgust in a number of ways, per Nussbaum.  Learning to see the world critically and with an open mind simply doesn’t allow for received dogmas or irrational, unquestioned gut reactions to things.  Learning about the life experience and the ideas of people and cultures different from you forces you to question your own suppositions, even as you see certain incoherencies in the way those other cultures and people see the world.  And finally, the arts humanize and unite both artist and observer, drawing them away from the dynamic of separation and disgust.  Also, the arts cultivate the imagination, which allows us to envision realities and possibilities far beyond our own limited experience.

I believe that Nussbaum’s keys to democracy are also the way to live a good life—empathy for others, awareness of your place in a larger society, constant critical analysis, awareness of and appreciation for the diversity of humanity, a healthy imagination, and an exploration through the arts of what it means to be human.  A humanistic thinker, someone with a firm grounding in the areas that Nussbaum favors, is constantly questioning and learning.  If you live this way, you will not do things perfectly every time, but when you do do something incorrectly (whether morally or simply in practical terms), you will be able to step back and change course.  This contrasts with a highly specialized education, which prepares you to do one thing only, but to do it efficiently and perfectly almost every time. 

I’ve heard about people who train to be in the circus from the time they’re little kids.  They deliver breathtaking performances, but they don’t learn to do much else, to be flexible and changing, to be responsive to the larger world around them.  This is an extreme case, but it applies to some degree to any technical formation, like an expertise in computer or auto repair, an engineering or medical degree, or my degree in agronomy.  Next to these high-tech, complicated, specialized fields, a humanistic education doesn’t seem that special—what could be more basic than just learning to think, judge, and change based on the available evidence and your own imagination?  But though we are all called to live in this more human way, it seems really rare to meet people who actually do.  It is special to find such a critical, compassionate, aware person, much more special than meeting one who is able to execute a perfect trapeze handoff or a delicate brain surgery.  I feel that most of us are relatively set in our ways.  I read a quote from Kissinger once to the effect that elected officials cease to develop intellectually once they enter office, because they are removed from the new experiences afforded by regular life, as well as being bombarded by criticism to which they respond with an instinctive defensiveness of what they already believe.  I think this applies not just to people in high public office, but to a lesser degree it applies to all of us. 

That said, I am sometimes surprised by people who seem otherwise unremarkable, but who are indeed constantly, gradually changing how they see the world.  In almost everyone I know, even people I regard as very uncritical and complacent, I’ve seen or learned of moments in their adult lives when they make a major change in how they see the world or function within it.  So I guess on balance, I don’t know whether to think that we’re all hopelessly stuck in our respective ruts, or if we are all in fact flexible, thinking actors in our world.

Nussbaum’s book brought up again for me the juxtaposition of progressive private schools and homeschooling versus participating in the non-progressive public school system.  She cites a number of successful pedagogical experiments that took place through private schools with visionary leaders.  But the most progressive, enlightened school in the world, if it’s inherently separate from the schooling most people receive, sort of goes against the principles of solidarity, empathy, and public good that Nussbaum seems to advocate.  Remember, her argument is that a humanistic education is key to a democratic society.  But a democratic society can by definition not flourish if only an elite few have the tools and the formation to live in a civilized, just way.  Where is the space for belonging to and service to the larger community, if your school sets you apart from thecommunity, and even preaches that the rest of the community is gravely mistaken in their approach to teaching and life in general?  Perhaps the experience of Finland, of striving for equity in its public school system, can serve as a blueprint for achieving positive, progressive teaching without limiting it to a few exclusive enclaves.

Much of what Nussbaum promotes aligns nicely with the liberal paradigm—mutual respect, individual liberty, shared basic values underlying a larger diversity of approaches and lifestyles.  But her exploration of the humanistic roots of democracy also hints at a fundamental tension within liberalism.  If you respect others, truly respect and allow for each group’s customs, then you will find that even some of the shared basic values you thought were universal, are in fact not shared.  At that point the liberal paradigm becomes a bit imposing or even dictatorial, because it attempts to aggressively ignore, suppress, or convert values that run counter to it.  Likewise, the very idea of respecting and celebrating group identity often goes against a pure liberal conception of the individual as the basic unit of existence and meaning.  Nussbaum doesn’t really get into any of these issues, and because what she is advocating for is a more humanistic perspective, which I believe is ultimately broader, and more flexible and forgiving, than a strict liberal ideology, her position seems more attractive and coherent to me.  Nussbaum’s humanism also recognizes and allows for the non-rational side of humanity, in a way that the cold, strict Enlightment-era liberal dogmas do not. 

I wish to explore this tension between community, culture, and tradition on the one hand, and individual liberty and modern political paradigms on the other hand.  But this post is not the place for it; I hope to do so soon in an analysis of two other books I read recently about community-centered development processes.

United Airlines behaving badly

This is an article profiling how United Airlines (and most US companies, for that matter) is increasingly using profits in an extractive way, to enrich shareholders, as opposed to reinvesting profits in capital improvements or better compensation for labor.  It seems to illustrate the mechanism of how investors see their wealth grow faster than the economy as a whole, as Piketty demonstrates.  It's a shame for me to see a hometown company acting this way.

Not so fast, mobile technology

This is an interesting take on the future of the internet and mobile technology in general.  The author essentially argues that the internet as we know it today hasn't changed much in a decade or two, and is unlikely to do so.  He doesn't see this as cause for concern, but rather a call to make sure that we are indeed doing well the basics of internet (open access, agile browsers), so that it can bring its revolutionary possibilities to the other few billion people who will go online in the coming years.  Get the basics right, instead of looking for revolutionary changes in the platform, or even worse, a walled-garden, Facebook-type format that actually makes the internet less free and useful.

A stark reckoning of the Central American refugee crisis

This author argues that the flow of Central Americans fleeing violence has not significantly waned from its turn in the media spotlight last year, and that we in the US should be just as concerned about Central American refugees as about Syrian refugees.

Continuation of the child refugee crisis--same story, different border

This is a heartbreaking exposé on the continued Central American refugee crisis, which has not waned from last year so much as it has been shifted farther south from the US border, as Mexico becomes more zealous about detaining migrants.  The article's final conclusion:  "If a child is fleeing danger in his or her home country, and that child knocks on our door pleading for help, we should open the door".

Chicago's blue cart recycling program

Here's a cool description of what actually happens to residential recycling waste in Chicago, and I'm sure it's indicative of lots of other cities' programs of mixed recycling bins.

Parenting in the face of apocalypse

This is an insightful reflection from a mother on how to raise your kids when you know that our world, their world, is on the brink of thoroughgoing ecocide.  I feel it hits a lot of valid points, though from our current vantage point in a climate-vulnerable, impoverished country, the author's vision of a stark future world seems more like the reality plenty of people are already living.  The essay sometimes drifts into white liberal guilt-type hand-wringing, but it is worthwhile if for nothing else than for this admonition for parents to teach their kids:  "regulate your wants, consider others, be comfortable being alone, put yourself second, listen, be in solidarity, choose the harder path".

A philosophical consideration of inequality

Here is one philosopher's level-headed take on some of the arguments against reducing inequality.  He briefly cites Martha Nussbaum, whom I'll be discussing soon in a post.

White poverty in Chicago

This is a fascinating analysis of why Chicago doesn't have any neighborhoods of concentrated white poverty.  There are plenty of poor white folks in Chicago, and certainly neighborhoods that concentrate black or Latino poverty.  But no predominantly poor, predominantly white neighborhoods.

Amazon and the new economy, and Netflix

Here's an article on how the labor practices at Amazon.com are similar to those across the New [Digital] Economy.  It hints that such widespread abuse of labor may represent a recurrence of the conditions that originally inspired the rise of unions.  Here is a short bit on Netflix, expanding on the implications of these companies' offering very attractive benefits to high-skill professional employees while denying the same to the working-class footsoldiers of the operation, those who work in customer service and shipping.

Critical pedagogy from Henry Giroux

I just read an excellent essay by Henry Giroux opposing the totalitarian tendencies that predominate in much of US and world society, with the hope offered by critical pedagogy.  Quoth Giroux:

"At a time of increased repression, it is all the more crucial for educators to reject the notion that higher education is simply a site for training students for the workforce and that the culture of higher education is synonymous with the culture of business. At issue here is the need for educators to recognize the power of education in creating the formative cultures necessary to both challenge the various threats being mobilized against the ideas of justice and democracy while also fighting for those public spheres, ideals, values and policies that offer alternative modes of identity, thinking, social relations and politics."

Personally, my main concern about thought and education today, and perhaps the main thesis of this article, can be summed up in the quote: "an inattentiveness to the never-ending task of critique breeds horrors: the failures of conscience, the wars against thought, and the flirtations with irrationality that lie at the heart of the triumph of every-day aggression, the withering of political life, and the withdrawal into private obsessions".  I worry about a lack of critique in the world.  To this end, I make it my personal quest to always encourage critical thought in the people I encounter, especially kids.  The media offered to kids is so often little more than a marketing vehicle.  See for example the endless procession of movie remakes and sequels that are made not to elucidate or tell a good story, but simply because the producers calculated that the box office receipts and sales of associated merchandise (toys, lunchboxes, etc.) would offer a good return on investment.  In such an environment, it is easy for kids to limit their intellectual life to simply receiving, recognizing, and naming characters and logos.  In short, to mere consumption of symbols (and eventually of their associated sold products), when kids should really be creating their own symbols, characters, and narratives.  I can't tell you how many books we've seen in our library that consist in little more than page after page of "this is character XXX, he is defined by XXX traits".  It is a training for the brand recognition, categorization, and desire that underlie retail consumerism.

My wife's and my little contribution to this fight against unthinking consumption is that we keep our kids and others away from movies and other media whose aim is merely to sell junk.  And whenever we run across something that advances an antisocial message like thoughtless consumerism, sexism, racism, or selfishness, we work with those around us, especially kids, to question and criticize it, and in so doing to disarm its noxious effects.

Here's a closing nugget of wisdom from the article:  "Pedagogy is always political because it is connected to the struggle over agency. In this instance, making the pedagogical more political means being vigilant about those very 'moments in which identities are being produced and groups are being constituted, or objects are being created.'  At the same time it means educators need to be attentive to those practices in which critical modes of agency and particular identities are being denied."

How does the news cover white folks' drug overdoses?

I recently learned of the sad story of this white woman who died from a drug overdose.  Here is an insightful commentary from someone who noticed the media's relatively sensitive, humane coverage of her death.  The commentator doesn't wish for the media to cover this or any other white woman's untimely demise with the insensitivity and disdain normally seen in news coverage when women of color die in similarly sordid circumstances.  She just wants equal treatment for all such cases, preferably affording the victims the same amount of decency and nuance as is given to the wealthy white dermatologist.