The interesting and the true
I have long admired the broad cultural perspectives and keen insights in the writings of Michael Ignatieff, former professor political science at Harvard University, who in 2005 returned to Canada and entered political life. He is now a member of the Canadian Parliament and deputy leader of the Liberal Party. In an essay in today’s New York Times Magazine that contains several worthy epigrams,
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/05/magazine/05iraq-t.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&ref=magazine&pagewanted=print ,
he reflects on the differences in perspective and purpose of his recent professions:
“The philosopher Isaiah Berlin said that the trouble with academics and commentators is that they care more about whether ideas are interesting than whether they are true. Politicians live by ideas just as much as professional thinkers do, but they can’t afford the luxury of entertaining ideas that are merely interesting. They have to work with the small number of ideas that happen to be true and the even smaller number that happen to be applicable to real life. In academic life, false ideas are merely false and useless ones can be fun to play with. In political life, false ideas can ruin the lives of millions and useless ones can waste precious resources. An intellectual’s responsibility for his ideas is to follow their consequences wherever they may lead. A politician’s responsibility is to master those consequences and prevent them from doing harm.
“I’ve learned that good judgment in politics looks different from good judgment in intellectual life. Among intellectuals, judgment is about generalizing and interpreting particular facts as instances of some big idea. In politics, everything is what it is and not another thing. Specifics matter more than generalities. Theory gets in the way.
“The attribute that underpins good judgment in politicians is a sense of reality. “What is called wisdom in statesmen,” Berlin wrote, referring to figures like Roosevelt and Churchill, “is understanding rather than knowledge — some kind of acquaintance with relevant facts of such a kind that it enables those who have it to tell what fits with what; what can be done in given circumstances and what cannot, what means will work in what situations and how far, without necessarily being able to explain how they know this or even what they know.” Politicians cannot afford to cocoon themselves in the inner world of their own imaginings. They must not confuse the world as it is with the world as they wish it to be. They must see Iraq — or anywhere else — as it is.
“As a former denizen of Harvard, I’ve had to learn that a sense of reality doesn’t always flourish in elite institutions. It is the street virtue par excellence. Bus drivers can display a shrewder grasp of what’s what than Nobel Prize winners. The only way any of us can improve our grasp of reality is to confront the world every day and learn, mostly from our mistakes, what works and what doesn’t. Yet even lengthy experience can fail us in life and in politics. Experience can imprison decision-makers in worn-out solutions while blinding them to the untried remedy that does the trick.
“Having taught political science myself, I have to say the discipline promises more than it can deliver. In practical politics, there is no science of decision-making. The vital judgments a politician makes every day are about people: whom to trust, whom to believe and whom to avoid. The question of loyalty arises daily: Who will betray and who will stay true? Having good judgment in these matters, having a sound sense of reality, requires trusting some very unscientific intuitions about people.
“A sense of reality is not just a sense of the world as it is, but as it might be. Like great artists, great politicians see possibilities others cannot and then seek to turn them into realities. To bring the new into being, a politician needs a sense of timing, of when to leap and when to remain still. Bismarck famously remarked that political judgment was the ability to hear, before anyone else, the distant hoofbeats of the horse of history.
“Few of us hear the horses coming. A British prime minister was once asked what made his job so difficult. ‘Events, dear boy,’ he replied ruefully.”
Joe, I usually try to guess, for whatever reason, who the author is of a thread as I scroll down. You definitely took me by surprise on this one.
Thanks for this downright provocative piece. The baggers and the checkers of the Walmart post might fit in here somewhere. Is there another way for a Christian politician to act? Is what is achievable the only criteria and can the achievable just be spiritual or setting the achievable for future generations.
Can the achievable lead a politician into disaster. Chamberlain and other European leaders compromised with Hitler and sold out Czecklovakia and othe small countries in what they thought was a masterful political stroke. “Peace in our time” was apparently achieved at the cost of the Czechs, “a small country of which we know little.”
I guess the devil is in the details and as this thread expands, examples will prove more powerful in advancing a point of view.
As with the checkers and the baggers what is the short term, long term outcome? Some political judgment had the Iraqis welcoming us with parades. Very few politicians opposed the White House then. On the other hand more academics objected than politicians.
These are not easy questions. But a big question is that perhaps academics may see the picture better than the politicians.
Although I am quite tempted to enter the economic discussion being prompted below by other Komonchak findings from today’s Times, things did not go so well the last time I mentioned some economic musings, so I will pass for now and reply to this outstanding post.
I entirely agree with the perspective being defended by Ignatieff. I have been trying to get my social ethics colleagues to consider this problem, as it is they who usually seek to identify ways that the world should be. This goal, it seems to me, requires that ethicists accept two burdens: 1) they ought to have a decent knowledge of the way the world currently is in order to make the ethical comparison meaningful; and 2) they ought to be able to provide a reasonable account of how we could and would get to the way things ought to be, or at least closer to it. In short, social ethicists need to think more like politicians.
While Berlin is mentioned by Ignatieff, I would like to offer two other thinkers who are ahead of the curve on this one. First, I recommend Cass Sunstein and his book Legal Reasoning and Political Conflict. In this book (among many other things) he develops the idea of “incompletely theorized agreement.” It is the exact opposite of Rawls’ Original Position. We need not imagine an original position, because lots of people agree on matters, especially policy matters, for different reasons. They may even agree without knowing with theoretical rigor why they hold the position they do.
While Sunstein’s idea is most fruitful, I find Jeremy Waldron to be an even better philosopher on these matters. Two books, in particular: The Dignity of Legislation, and Law and Disagreement. Both help us think through what politics should look like in a land where intractable political disagreement is one of the inescapable political conditions. Waldron also thinks Rawls does not help much in generating a realistic political philosophy.
Diehard Rawlsians will say that Berlin, Sunstein, and Waldron are defending only a modus vivendi that lacks theoretical coherence. However, I think that all three can help us understand why an actual modus vivendi that helps us get things done is far preferable to an original position that will never happen.
Maybe this is too darn theoretical for such a post or for dotCommonweal, but I just opened a bottle of Talisker, and I can’t help myself.
In Dante’s day when hereditary rule was prevalent the problem was not lack of talent but misallocated talent.
“But you force into a religious order
Someone who would be better with a sword,
And make a king of someone who should be a preacher.
“No wonder your journey takes you off the road.”
Paradiso VIII, 145-148.
We’ve left hereditary rule behind but haven’t advanced very notably in reconciling the perspectives of preachers and politicians. Academics search for the “root causes” of problems which in turn seem to require powerful government solutions and popular mobilization (both of which are quite difficult to sustain and productive of vast unintended consequences).
In the recent past one who had greater success than most in combining politics and academic life was Daniel Patrick Moynihan. In Michael Barone’s judgment: “No American politician since Thomas Jefferson has contributed as much to scholarship and no American scholar since Woodrow Wilson has contributed as much to politics.”
James Q. Wilson wrote of his friend: “If the Senate had a hundred Moynihans, two things would happen: speeches would be a lot better, and the government would be driven by hard facts rather than by empty ideology.”
I think everyone is giving Ignatieff way too much credit. (You have to give credit for brashness — politicians, he says, “must see Iraq for what it is.” This, from a guy who supported the invasion.) Politicians are always relying on stupid ideas that harm millions of people, and they get away with it all the time: “supply-side economics,” “neo-liberalism,” “pre-emptive strikes.” A politician’s responsibility is to the ideas, silly or otherwise, of those who voted for him, or, more precisely, to those who fill his campaign coffers.
As for the wisdom of Daniel Patrick Moynihan, there are millions of East Timorese who might want to take issue with it. Moynihan lied through his teeth back in the mid-70s when he denied in the United Nations General Assembly that the U.S. had anything to do with the Indonesian invasion of that country, and the subsequent murder and repression. Events, dear boy, are what Moynihan denied.
Perhaps we need to differentiate between bad ideas and bad politicians. To be sure, one of the marks of a bad politician may be a willingness to entertain and act upon bad ideas, but I suspect it is more than that, as well. It would include precisely a disregard for Ignatieff’s appeal to events, to political realities, and not simply to theoretical coherence. The fact that politicians entertain bad ideas does not refute the insight that good political ideas need to be more than just good ideas.
As for the influence of voters and donors on politicians, this is obviously, to a degree, the way things are supposed to be in a democracy. They certainly represent some of the political realities that politicians must consider. If one thinks that donor influence has eliminated the ability of politicians to do good, then one can only hope to be among the lucky in society, as there is little point in trying to change matters on behalf of the vulnerable and oppressed. If politicians really are that corrupt and craven, then it is time for a round of golf or a trip to the mall.
Let me follow up a bit on Joe Petit’s postings.
First, all human laws and political policies deal with some set of natural events and some set of human actions that respond to these events and to some prior human actions. This is just an inelegant way of saying that all human laws and policies aim to respond to some historical set of circumstances in such a way that matters are, if not made better, at least not made worse. But, of course, there is no way to guarantee that any particular law or policy will accomplish this objective. So all human law and policies are, by their nature, amendable or revocable in the light of their effects. Recognition of this situation ought to make proponents of any law or policy sufficiently self-critical that they do not claim to have the unquestionably ” right” response to a problem. These remarks are relevant to all positive legislation, ecclesiastical or political. Proponents can claim no more than to have a reasonable confidence that their proposals are likely to succeed. No more. This means that there is always room for someone reasonably to challenge these proposals.
For example, reasonably to propose a piece of legislation or a policy dealing with abortion, one would have to grant that (a) it is not the only possible reasonable proposal, and (b) that, if enacted, it remains subject to amendment in the light of its effects on the community.
Proponents of natural law theories also have to admit that no particular natural law is, by itself “actionable.” To become legally actionable it has to be given some particular formulation. But that formulation is itself, then, the formulation of a positive law and therefore always subject to reeasonable contestation. (By the way, this point is applicable to the motu proprioo that Pope Benedict issued on the Tridentine Mass.)
It’s for reasons of this sort, among others, that Petit is right to recognize that in political life, the objective is always to arrive at a stable modus vivendi. “Stable” here does not mean unchanging. A modus vivendi is stable if it provides adequate room for its own amendment in the light of changing circumstances. And here again, only time can tell. As Eugene McCarthy once observed: “All politics is second act.” There is no “end state” that reasonable politics strives to bring about, all so-called “ideal theories” notwithstanding.
All this might sound like resignation to perpetual political failure. That, I think, is a misreading of matters. Rather, this situation calls for what Paul Ricoeur has called an ongoing “critique and conviction” rooted in hope in the fundamental worthwhileness of human existence At the cost of being guilty of self-puffery, may I point out that Ricoeur’s rich political thought, with its critique of Rawls and its affinity with some of Charles Taylor’s thought, can be found in my “Paul Ricoeur: The Promise and Peril of Politics,” (Rowman and Littlefield, 1998).
I apoligize for plugging this book, but Ricoeur’s own rich thought is spread out in so many works that it’s hard for people to get hold of.
Didn’t we stray from the original point whereby the professor turned politician is appreciating how difficult it is is to implement policy when one is one of the implementor, so to speak, that when one comments from the journalistic or academic point of view.
All things being equal that is true. But in the practical examples set forth about the inane truce with Hitler and the unanimous support for the war except for the press and academia, we have to always distinguish when we make these kind of decisions. That indeed many times the commentators have better practical insights than the politicians.
Matt Yglesias’ response to Ignatieff’s mea culpa is worth considering:
“I found Michael Ignatieff’s reflective essay on getting things wrong about Iraq to be somehow pleasantly soothing. But then someone pointed out to me that the whole thing is founded on the absurd premise that his errors in judgment have something to do with the mindset of academia versus the mindset of practical politics.
“This is, when you think about it, totally wrong. Academics in the field of Middle East studies were overwhelmingly opposed to the war. Similarly, international relations scholars opposed the war by a very large margin. The war’s foci of intellectual support were in the institutions of the conservative movement, and in the DC think tanks and the punditocracy where the war had a lot of non-conservative support. People with relevant academic expertise — notably people who weren’t really on the left politically — were massively opposed to the war. To imply the reverse is to substantially obscure one of the main lessons of the war, namely that we should pay more attention to what regional experts think and give substantially less credence to the idea that think tankers are really ‘independent’ of political machinations.”
http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2007/08/blaming_the_ivory_tower.php
Bill: Which commentators should the politicians listen to? We have commentators representing just about every position possible. It goes without saying that hindsight is 20/20. Politicians must give ear to many commentators, especially when they come from their district, and then they must act. Sometimes they will make dreadfully bad decisions with horrible consequences. This seems to me unavoidable, and a reason to salute most every national and even local politician.
We pay and trust doctors to help us find health in our bodies. One of the worst things to realize as a doctor is that you will likely kill someone over the course of your practice; that is, someone will die when she or he might otherwise have lived under the care of someone else. There simply is no avoiding this outcome, and I think we could do a much better job of ministering to such individuals (and I would include military officers in combat as well). Politicians are in the same boat. We hope that they will help us find health in our nation or city, and we can only hope that they learn from their mistakes.
One thing that does make me laugh when I think about this is the realization that often it is academics who go on to no end about how difficult it is to Chair a department, or even to deal with faculty meetings, but who then go on to say such horrible things about politicians who have to run municipalities, states, or nations.
Yes, it seems like, rather than trying to gain perspective, Ignatieff is running from assuming responsibility for his own errors, instead ascribing blame to the inherent institutional bias of whatever institution it is that he no longer feels compelled to defend. So now that he’s squarely in camp of politics, the fault lies at the doorstep of academia, of which he was a member at the time he enthusiastically supported the Iraqi War. “Really, it’s not my fault; it’s the fault of inherently flawed academic perspective.” It’s like Ignatieff is an apostle of the protagonist in “The Fall.”
I’m surprised how personal this discussion has become: more about Ignatieff than about the point he was making.
I myself didn’t think he was trying to evade responsibility for what he seems now to think was his own mistake.
I read the essay on Sunday and I kept asking myself: Well what EXACTLY did you get wrong, Mr. Ignatieff?
Has anyone spotted a sepcific fact or judgment that he believes he was wrong about, or that he mistaknely accepted?
Working from memory:
1. His experience and identification with the Kurds and fervent desire to help them led him to ignore or dismiss outright factual information pointing to the difficulty of the undertaking.
2. He paid more attention to what he perceived people’s motivations to be rather than the quality of their arguments and information. This led him to believe false information purveyed by those whose motives he agreed with, and to dismiss truthful information purveyed by those whose motives he distrusted.
That’s it for me. I would say that he allowed himself to be duped because scheme fit neatly into how he wanted the world to be and how he wanted to fit into that world. I just didn’t understand how being an academic had anything whatsoever to do with it.
Thanks Barbara. That’s very helpful. I should go back and read it again.
In the meantime, here’s a scathing view of Ignatieff’s piece by Joseph Palermo on Huffington.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/joseph-a-palermo/michael-ignatieff-gettin_b_59261.html
Some academics doubtless are more inclined to pursue the interesting than the true, often because they think that there is no truth anyway. But not all academics are so muddle-headed, probably not even at Harvard. As for politicians, I have not noticed an oversupply of principle among them. They seem more interested in winning for the team/party they belong to. Their practicality is less principled, often enough, than interested.
Maybe there are at least two issus here: 1) Whether or not academics tend to be unusually disconnected from reality, at least much more so than most good politicians; and 2) Whether or not appealling to this idea is a good way for Ignatieff to explain his change of thinking in Iraq. I think the first has a lot of merit. I am less certain about the second. However, I will say that I while Palmero’s review may be scathing, it is far from compelling. Academics are as good at ignoring ideas they don’t agree with as anyone else, and if Ignatieff was ignorning valuable ideas about Iraq, he was not alone.
On the subject of ideas and Iraq, here is one debate that I think is somewhat misleading. The historical split between Sunnis and Shiites has been noted by many, and they act as if only the greatest of dunces could have missed what this would mean for Iraq (it does not help when legislators on intelligence committees are unaware of the difference!). However, if I have my facts straight, pre-invasion Iraq gave significant reason to believe that the divisions between these two groups (and groups within groups) were not insurmountable. Sunnis and Shiites were neighbors, they let their kids get married to each other, etc. To be sure, this was not true of all in each group, but there was real reason to believe that the divisions would not intensify.
What was clearly not fully appreciated is the stress and life and death uncertainty that an insurgency could produce and the effect that this stress would have on the ability to bridge religious and political division. Now, all groups are in a retreat and protect mode. Trust might be nice, but not in a world where people are being shot just because of who they are.
I suppose I was chiefly interested in the philosophical point, useful for an allegedly post-modernist culture–that it is not enough for ideas to be interesting. The key question is whether they are true. A question that many academics seem today to regard as simply quaint.
Perhaps the contrast between the two styles shows itself best in situations where theorists make practical, high-level administrative decisions. Without knowing enough about it to say for sure, I would guess that the field of elementary education might be an example.
Just to be clear, what I meant by my comment above is that educational theorists are likely to blow with the theoretical winds, rather than keeping the more steady course that is required in good governance. But because the theorists and the governors are the same people, policy changes rapidly, whenever a shining idea appears in all the journals or is presented by a keynote speaker at a summer conference.
Joseph: The truth question is less central for me than the missed questions. That is, I think the postmodern idea that worrying about the truth of a claim is only quaint has almost run its course. What I find still relevant is the lack of interest academics have in questions like:
1) Do I really understand the situation at hand?
2) Do I have reason to believe that my proposals could work?
3) Do I have reason to believe that anyone might stop their many preoccupations enough to enable my proposals to work?
4) Do I know what smart people in other fields like public policy, economics, sociology, not to mention practioners of various sorts, think of my proposals?
5) Have I even asked them?
6) What kind of trade offs might I have to consider in advancing my proposals?
I am often surprised by how many such questions are never asked.
Joe, your comment or question of post modern culture being more concerned about what is interesting than true, should be re-introduced on another thread by you without Ignatieff and Iraq to complicate it.
Meanwhile, a politician name Bush (the father) said many years ago why he did not march on Bagdad; because we would be an occupying army in a hostile country. I am just amazed by how many politicians and academics were duped on Iraq. Or is there that much greed to go around?
Is the moral of the story to distrust disgruntled exiles. But if they can vote then you have to obey them. Like in Miami where they are blocking a decent coming to minds with Cuba.
“With pulleys and ropes and time to plan, one could move anything. Now that she thought of it, why couldn’t anyone do anything he or she wished, given the tools and the time? It was hard to understand why scientists had not long ago solved the problems of the world. Were they, the scientists, serious? How could one not solve any problem, once you put your mind to it, had forty years, and people didn’t bother you? Problems were for solving. Perhaps they the scientists were *not* serious. For if people solved the problems of cancer and war, what would they do then? Who could she ask about this? She made a note to look it up in the library.”
Walker Percy, The Second Coming
Actually saying some idea is interesting can be a polite way of not discussing it with its proponent, say at a cocktail party, because you have decided he is an idiot. It can also be a lead in in to a sneak attack, softening up one’s opponent with a suggestion of sympathy.
As for postmoderism I have the sense that it is moribund. But there are always those who will forever parrot what they were once taught to parrot in graduate school.
Richard Burton used to say that when he arrived at a cocktail party he found the people quite boring. After a few drinks they became tolerable. And after a few more they became downright interesting.