Pragmatism. Does a given thing work? No – then reject it. Does it work? Yes – then adopt it. Adopt and improve, with each improvement being introduced as the result of a subsequent round of asking ‘does it work’.
Ideology. Is the given thing ideologically correct? Does it meet the Precepts of the Guiding Principles? Which principles? Those principles that govern the particular -ism is -isms to which one is wedded.
We seem to have drifted into an era of ideology. Rejecting things that work (sort of) but don’t fit the Principle. Brexit is a case in point.
Brexiteers seem incapable of highlighting the ways in which EU membership has hurt them in their personal lives, nor are they able to put forth a cogent strategy for how the UK will emerge from this bałagan stronger, wealthier and more influential globally. And yet they will shout ‘Sovereignty!’ when asked what it’s all about. Ideology ahead of pragmatism.
Trump too – it’s about sticking it to the lefty-liberals, an ideological reason, rather than about some coherent framework of policies with clearly defined aims.
Nationalism, into which both Brexit and Trump tap into, is a particularly pernicious ideology which depends on differentiating ‘us’ and ‘the other’. Inciting hatred of other races, religions, nationalities – people you don’t know, people you've never met, who you cannot possibly judge on human terms, and yet they must be bad because they are not ‘ours’. In person, they may be polite, kind, witty, intelligent – and yet because they are ‘the other’, they are said to be bad.
Preferring ‘ours’ over ‘theirs’ is a natural biological reaction, one that we really should have learned to rise above; it is a base one. We don’t understand; we close in upon ourselves.
But tolerance as an ideology, foisted onto people who are told they must tolerate what they instinctively feel uncomfortable with, is not the answer.
Tolerance and openness work better when they are shown to work. National pride in Britain or France, say, is boosted by black athletes or footballers achieving success for their country in international sporting tournaments. This works better than enforced political correctness.
Religions have their doctrines, their theologies, which spill over into public policy; belief turns into ideology. How on earth do American evangelical Christians manage to square their religious beliefs with support for that unredeemable walking collection of the Deadly Sins, Trump?
Ideology.
My enemy’s enemy is my friend. In this case the counter-ideology of lefty-ism and all the baggage it bears. The Middle East, with its Sunni/Shiite split, is similar. Which is the greater Satan? America, or Shiite Iran? Religion is often the deepest ideology of them all.
A few months ago, I had a dream in which a Chinese journalist told me over a pint of beer in a London pub that China is planning to move from being a one-party state to a no-party state, and that this process is likely to take around two hundred years. This dream/prediction/wish is predicated by the notion that political parties, as groupings of public-policy creators, are ideological creations and should be replaced by pragmatists. The idea that decent people, with the best interest of their townsfolk/countrymen at heart, work diligently to create a continually improving society, without feathering their own nests, without furthering ideologies, is indeed my dream.
“I don’t like X, because X insulted Y, a politician I like.” I hear this often in Poland “Yes,” I reply. “But who is more effective at delivering water treatment plants, effective public transport and decent recreational space – X or Y?” It is easy to abrogate one’s own thinking to an ideology. Left-wing comedian Alexei Sayle says that when doing gigs for left-wing audiences, after he cracks a joke there’s a time delay between the punchline and the laugh, during which people are silently deciding whether the joke is ideologically correct and whether it’s OK to laugh at it in public, among all their peers.
I look at people and I see ideologies of one form or another present to a greater or lesser extent in their thoughts, words and deeds. The ones who live happy lives are those who generally are less troubled by ideology and go through life guided by pragmatism.
As Poland heads towards its local elections on Sunday, I’d make the point that I am not voting for any political party but rather for programmes most likely to deliver on the basis on past performance.
This time four years ago:
Nocturnal mists descend upon Jeziorki
This time six years ago:
Heavy rain hits Warsaw
This time eight years ago:
The autumn sublime in Warsaw
This time ten years ago:
Lublin and its charm
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3 comments:
I was referred to this article on the attitude of certain 'Evangelicals' in the US: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/04/the-last-temptation/554066/. The idea that religious 'leaders' can eschew the role of being moral arbiters, and turn a blind eye in return for favours, is deeply shocking. Pharisees indeed, pals with the Romans, and doing their best to increase the money changers' trade in-between stoning Samaritan women.
In the news today in the UK: "government will not allow 'low paid foreign labour' in to pick fruit, and there is no reasonable prospect of UK citizens doing the work, so farmers had better get used to the fruit sector contracting". Well, I guess that 'low paid' people in other countries will be employed to pick fruit for the UK market grown where they live. As you say, ideology has replaced pragmatism.
The distillation of the definition of ideology I remember from my readings is that ideology explains where we come from and prescribes where we should go. I can think of a few ‘-isms’ that fit this description, one non-ism that does, and one ‘-ism’ that doesn’t.
In the division between the somewheres and anywheres, conveniently elucidated for us by David Goodhart, I put myself in the ‘anywheres’ camp. To go a step further, I’d be a citizen from ‘nowhere’, according to Theresa May’s encapsulation of the attitudinal divide: “If you believe you are a citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere.” Suits me fine. But I’ll have the last chuckle when the anti-global bluster of the oppressed anti-elite elite turns into the global cap-in-hand after Brexit. Europe was too global for Britain! Let’s see what it is like doing business with the US and China.
I don’t as a rule mock the appellations people usurp for themselves except when they gloat, which is why one James Delingpole of the Daily Mail, The Specator, Breitbart, at al, deserves to be singled out. He spelled out once what the ‘-eer’ ads to Brexit, which the plain and simple ‘-er’ doesn’t. Well, now we know: privateer, buccaneer, profiteer, puppeteer, musketeer, etc., all operating in the shadows, all motivated by aggrandisement. So, here is a word from a placard in the people’s march to describe the state we find ourselves in: Brexcrement.
As Ealing is your latest post, I can’t decide which side should claim Passport to Pimlico to champion its cause: the Remainers, to highlight the absurdity of little Britain withdrawing into its shell, or the Brexit(e)ers, to show two fingers to the establishment. Thoughts? Oh, and there is Dad’s Army, as well.
@ WHP:
Many thanks for the Atlantic link - a worthy piece written by one of the most intelligent apologists for the Evangelical movement in the States I've ever read. Makes a change from thickos whose reasoning goes "Abortion is bad, liberals are in favour of abortion, so they are bad, Trump says he is against liberals, so Trump must therefore be good".
@ Jacek Koba
A good definition is what is and what isn't an -ism!
Goodhart's 'anywheres' and 'nowheres' - I wrote about this 18 months ago...
https://jeziorki.blogspot.com/2017/03/globalisation-and-individual-identity.html This is about 'open' vs. 'closed' societies and indeed, people.
Brexcrement - a useful neologism (does that prescribe where we're going and where we're from?)
Passport to Pimlico was about escaping austerity; Brexit means bringing it down upon the nation.
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