America the Virtuous

The Crisis of Democracy and the Quest for Empire

Claes G. Ryn

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• eBook ISBN: 9781351532921
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Democracy
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Urged on by a powerful ideological and political movement, George W. Bush committed the United States to a quest for empire. American values and principles were universal, he asserted, and should guide the transformation of the world. Claes Ryn sees this drive for virtuous empire as the triumph of forces that in the last several decades acquired decisive influence in both the American parties, the foreign policy establishment, and the media.Public intellectuals like William Bennett, Charles Krauthammer, William Kristol, Michael Novak, Richard Perle, and Norman Podhoretz argued that the United States was an exceptional nation and should bring "democracy," "freedom," and "capitalism" to countries not yet enjoying them. Ryn finds the ideology of American empire strongly reminiscent of the French Jacobinism of the eighteenth century. He describes the drive for armed world hegemony as part of a larger ideological whole that both expresses and aggravates a crisis of democracy and, more generally, of American and Western civilization. America the Virtuous sees the new Jacobinism as symptomatic of America shedding an older sense of the need for restraints on power. Checks provided by the US Constitution have been greatly weakened with the erosion of traditional moral and other culture.

1
The Crisis of Western Civilization and the Rise of Jacobinism

“There is no intellectual ground remaining for any regime other than democracy.”—Allan Bloom¹

“Liberalism has won and there are no more contenders.”—Francis Fukuyama²

We live in the age of democracy. People in the Western world take democracy for granted. They see this form of government and life as part of the natural order of things. Western democracy is assumed to be strong, permanent, and invulnerable.

Yet historically and philosophically informed observation and reflection raise grave doubts about Western democracy’s ability to survive in the long run. Perhaps the most compelling sign of trouble is the complacency that marks most public discussion of democracy. Many commentators proclaim democracy’s triumph over evil political forces in the world and hold up today’s Western society as a model for all humanity. They do so in the face of glaring symptoms of social decay. Contrary to widespread belief, evidence is accumulating that Western democracy is in continuous and precipitous decline. The following brief list is merely suggestive: political self-seeking, opportunism, demagoguery and other irresponsibility, erosion of the rule of law, attitudes of self-indulgence and shortsightedness, the disintegration of the family, crime and other dishonesty, declining standards of professional conduct, corporate wrong-doing, drug abuse, sexual promiscuity, academic shoddiness and extremism, religious superficiality and sentimentalism, priestly misconduct, crudity and debauchery in the arts and entertainment, general vulgarization of life. In their pervasiveness these and other phenomena indicate a disintegration of civilization. Among the most compelling and ominous signs of democracy’s decline is a growing conformity and a sharpening intolerance of opinions that deviate from those dominating the mass media, the universities, and government. Public debate stays within a narrow and shrinking range, and those who dare to step outside of it risk being ostracized or demonized and losing their careers or livelihood.

Still, the problems of democracy are, if not ignored, widely discounted, evaded, or misunderstood. The complacency about the problems of Western democracy is perhaps never more glaring than when commentators cite a statistic for a particular year which shows, for example, a dip in some forms of crime, a rise in SAT scores, or a falling rate of a venereal disease, as if any of these or a few of them together were evidence that life in general is improving. Some seriously contend that present-day Western society represents the culmination of mankind’s historical struggle for enlightenment and well-being, that its ideas and institutions signal “the end of history.” Now that Western democracy has been discovered to be superior to all other possible forms of government, so the argument goes, old intellectual conflicts will peter out and backward regimes will disappear, one by one. At a time when the problems of democracy might seem to raise questions about its survival, a new ideology—which in one of its prominent aspects may be called democratism—puts great emphasis on democracy’s superiority and missionary task. The late political thinker Allan Bloom, author of the best-selling book The Closing of the American Mind (1987), was just one voice in a chorus when he proclaimed, “There is no intellectual ground remaining for any regime other than democracy.”³

The theme that mankind has finally reached its political destiny is not new. In the 1950s Daniel Bell and other social democrats and liberals predicted the eventual disappearance of all competition to Western-style popular government and the welfare state, so obvious were their superiority to other possible political arrangements. Today this self-praise has acquired a new fervor and become the justification for an assertive foreign policy—as if the superiority of Western democracy were not so self-evident after all but needed to be conveyed to other parts of the world through political pressure and force. Democratism is not yet the sole influence on the formation of American foreign policy, but it exercises great power.

Given the signs of serious trouble in the West, the spread and intensification of this democratist zeal can be seen as symptomatic of a flight from reality or as a cynical exploitation of moods of escape. The democratist self-satisfaction is ubiquitous and often appears frantic. The celebration of democracy hangs like a narcotic cloud over the public, inducing an intellectual daze and spells of euphoria. No realistic assessment of the state of Western democracy is possible without first breathing a great deal of fresh air.

One of the purposes of this book is to identify and analyze what may be democracy’s central problem. Before some reflections can be presented regarding its present condition in the West and its likely prospects, it is necessary to take up several closely connected philosophical issues. First of all, two different meanings of the term “democracy” need to be distinguished. One of the symptoms of democracy’s precarious state is the uncritical manner in which the word is used. In both theory and practice two radically different notions of popular government are blurred. It will be argued here that only one of these is compatible with liberty and civilized life. At a time when many countries are moving away from totalitarianism and are reaffirming or shaping national identities, the Western democracies, for all of their wealth, conveniences, and technological prowess, are in some respects setting very poor examples. It would not be strange if, in the eyes of discriminating observers around the world, they were discrediting democracy. The assumption that criticism of the United States and the West from other parts of the world must be due solely to envy shows both conceit and lack of imagination.

Although the difficulties of Western democracy are manifold and have no single source, the most important can be traced directly or indirectly to a deficiency at the moral center. The state of democracy is due in large part to the abandonment of an older notion of morality and character and a resulting evasion of individual responsibility. More than any other possible regime democracy needs a population of character. The same ethical considerations that are necessary in defining a civilized form of popular government are important in defining sound nationhood. In the United States, constitutionalism and life in general are suffering the consequences of the virtual disappearance of what used to be called “republican virtue.” The concrete and specific personal obligations of the here and now that were central to an older Western morality are being replaced by an allegedly superior concern about more abstract and distant objectives. The new morality involves empathy for large aggregates of people rather than individuals or groups in the vicinity of the bearer. As the imagination comes to concern itself with the needs of impersonal collectives, attention is distracted from the tasks facing the person up close. Individual and concrete responsibilities—what Christianity spoke of as “love of neighbor”—begin to appear insignificant in comparison to great tasks to be performed far away. The burden of moral effort is shifted from individuals, families, small groups, and local communities. As will be explained, the continual expansion and centralization of the modern democratic state both manifest and aggravate an erosion or abdication of personal responsibility. A few basic distinctions and definitions will make it easier to discern the extent and import of the problems of present-day Western democracy. They will also make it possible to recognize the spuriousness of some current efforts to shore up democracy by making it more “virtuous” and more ambitious abroad.

The profound problems of democracy show the effects of moral, cultural, and political tendencies that have long worked their influence in the Western world. Many of the phenomena that today threaten constitutional popular government can be traced back to sentiments and ideas that gained prominence in connection with the French Revolution that began in 1789. A vision of a new egalitarian social and political order and of popular rule freed not only from traditional elites but from traditional moral and cultural restraints of all kinds had been formulated with great imaginative power by Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) a few decades earlier. Rousseau’s notion of the natural goodness of man gave rise to a radical redefinition of moral virtue and of the preconditions for a good society. His denial of a darker side of human nature—what Christianity sometimes discusses in terms of “original sin”—undermined the ancient belief that checks, internal and external, must be placed on individual and collective action. His idea that man is naturally good formed the basis for his belief that the popular majority of the moment should have unlimited power. Rousseau portrayed existing society as darkly and severely oppressive in all of its aspects, including the arts and the sciences. The latter enslaved man even more powerfully than government. Rousseau wrote of people in existing societies that “the sciences, letters and the arts . . . spread garlands of flowers over the iron chains with which they are burdened.” In his most famous political work, the Social Contract (1762), Rousseau proclaimed, “Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.”⁴ Overturning traditionally formed civilization and instituting equality and majoritarian popular rule would be the virtuous course.

In France, Rousseau’s view of man and his vision of a new society spread quickly and soon became a powerful political force. It was espoused with increasing militancy by the Jacobin clubs, which saw themselves as incorruptible guardians of universal principles. The moral and ideological fervor of the Jacobins played a crucial role before and during the French Revolution. Jacobin societies sprang up in all parts of France. They derived their name from the movement having evolved from a large club that met at a Jacobin convent in Paris. The Paris Jacobins, who had no less than twelve hundred members by 1790, set the standards of rhetoric, agitation and ceremony for the clubs in the provinces, many of which had hundreds of members. The clubs became incubators for theorizing and political activism of a strongly moralistic type. They combined features of a school, a debating society, a political organization, and a church. Their egalitarianism and denunciation of the existing political and social order became increasingly radical. The Jacobins made sharp rhetorical attacks on what were regarded as conspiracies against “the people.” The Jacobins saw themselves as virtuous champions of a great moral cause and as joined by fraternity and solidarity. They were guardians of revolutionary principles. They were ushering in a new way of life, a society of equality and democracy, a glorious goal that permitted no mercy for those who stood in the way. Jacobinism inspired the French Revolution’s murderous hatred of traditional elites, its reign of terror, and its messianic ambitions.⁵

Maximilien Robespierre (1758-1794) was a leading Jacobin ideologue and orator. He became a central figure in the Revolution and leader of France. For him, France and humanity faced a clear-cut alternative. The choice was between virtue, freedom, and popular rule, which was the cause of the Jacobins, and evil and oppression, which were the essence of the existing order. Robespierre was an ardent admirer of Rousseau. He read him repeatedly and deliberately sought to implement his political and moral ideas. He believed passionately in Rousseau’s notion of virtue, and like Rousseau he wanted a complete transformation of society, the removal of all that stood in the way of the triumph of the new virtue. Jacobin politics was for Robespierre the same as morality, an effort to effectuate universal principles.

A feature of Jacobinism that has held great appeal for many later political thinkers and actors is its strong, if unofficial, elitism. Though the Jacobins spoke and acted in the name of the welfare of the people, the Jacobins assumed that they themselves, as the possessors of virtue and deep insight, would have to lead the people in the direction in which it would want to go, if it understood what its leaders understood. The Jacobins here set the precedent for later political movements championing “the people.” These movements would be centrally generated and led rather than driven by spontaneous radical sentiment at the grassroots. In today’s Western world, too, the rhetoric of democratism conceals that democracy operates increasingly by central direction. For the most part, the people vote as their leaders, supported by allies in the mass media, want them to vote. Less and less does “popular rule” mean that people make decisions for themselves in their families, associations, and local communities where they can exercise direct or fairly direct control over their own lives. More and more, “popular rule” means that they are content to cede such power to leaders and to accept decisions that are made for them at a great distance from their places of life and work.

The Jacobin spirit has had many manifestations, more or less extreme, since the eighteenth century. It has sometimes been balanced and moderated within particular movements by countervailing influences, but under varying names and in different forms the Jacobin spirit has remained strong. It has continued to direct hostility against the old Western civilization, especially its religious and moral assumptions and its violations of the principle of equality. If the Jacobin spirit suffered a major defeat with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the discrediting of communism, it is today also experiencing a resurgence.

Within today’s Western democracies a new Jacobinism is exercising growing influence, especially in the United States. It is working to sever the remaining connections between popular government and the traditional Western view of man and society. It employs an idiom somewhat different from that of the earlier Jacobinism, and it incorporates various new ideological and other ingredients, but it is essentially continuous with the old urge to replace historically evolved societies with an order framed according to abstract, allegedly universal principles, notably that of equality. Like the old Jacobinism, it does not oppose economic inequalities, but it scorns traditional religious, moral, and cultural preconceptions and social patterns that restrict or channel social and political advancement and economic activity—a subject that will be explored in depth in later chapters. The new Jacobins are more accepting of existing society than were the old Jacobins, for they regard today’s Western democracy as the result of great moral, social and political progress since the eighteenth century. They see it as an approximation of what universal principles require.

The old Jacobins assumed that their principles were for all peoples, but as they faced pressing and specific obstacles near to home and were culturally focused on France and Europe they did not, for the most part, think globally. The new Jacobins do. They put great stress on the international implications of their principles. The new Jacobinism is indistinguishable from democratism, the belief that democracy is the ultimate form of government and should be installed in all the societies of the world. The new Jacobinism is the main ideological and political force behind present efforts to turn democracy into a worldwide moral crusade.

Not only do the new Jacobins advocate spreading democracy to distant places, but they claim to have the remedy for such problems as the Western democracies still have. What precisely the new Jacobins have in mind for Western society and the world will be discussed at length in this book.

A sign of the power of the new Jacobinism is that it is well represented across the political-intellectual spectrum. It is common among liberals and socialists, many of whom consciously trace their own ideological lineage to the French Revolution. Paradoxically, in the United States the new Jacobinism also finds expression among people called “conservatives” or “neoconservatives.” This is a curious fact considering that modern, self-conscious conservatism originated in opposition to the ideas of the French Revolution. The person commonly regarded as the father of modern conservatism, the British statesman and thinker Edmund Burke (1729-97) focused his scorching critique of the French Revolution precisely on Jacobin thinking.

As ever more extreme ideas emanate from today’s leading universities and cultural institutions and are transmitted to people in general through the mass media and popular culture, notions that were considered radical some decades earlier begin to look rather staid and old fashioned, and those who defend them begin to seem “conservative.” Yet by historical standards the ideas that these persons want to conserve are actually radical in the sense that they are hard to reconcile with the old Western view of man and society. Even the radicalism of the French Jacobins starts to appear conservative when compared to the most extreme forms of radicalism, for example, of the frankly and ruthlessly totalitarian variety.

Powerful historical trends are helped along by the opportunism of people who care more deeply about having the approval of the powers-that-be and about advancement in their careers than about their own deepest convictions. Today the spread of radical attitudes in academia, publishing, journalism, religion, the arts, and elsewhere make many people with a lingering attachment to the old Western tradition shrink from affirming it in ways that may be blatantly offensive to those who set the tone in those fields. Really to challenge the moral, intellectual, and cultural powers in the ascendant is to jeopardize one’s standing in society and risk losing the rewards that come from being in tune with the times and pandering to the arbiters of acceptable opinion. To the extent that the old but disapproved beliefs are not hidden or given up, means are found by opportunists holding them to present them in ways more pleasing to the zeitgeist or at least more pleasing to its least extreme representatives. The old beliefs undergo a subtle change. They are discovered by their bearer to be not quite so distant from the favored opinions of the day as once thought. Fear and opportunism work to the same end of transforming old beliefs.

Many cooperate in this partly self-deluding work of attunement to the new order. The new Jacobins enjoy considerable acceptance in the media, indeed, can be said to be a part of the media elite. For that reason, many conservatives who feel stymied by an inhospitable media and university culture hope to gain favor with the powers-that-be by mimicking the new Jacobins. The latter ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Preface
• Author’s Note
• Prologue: War without End
• 1 The Crisis of Western Civilization and the Rise of Jacobinism
• 2 The New Jacobinism
• 3 Creative Traditionalism or Radicalism?
• 4 Democracy: Plebiscitary or Constitutional?
• 5 Contrasting Forms of Morality and Society
• 6 Aristocratic and Anti-Aristocratic Democracy
• 7 The Father of Democratism
• 8 Love of One’s Own and Love of the Common
• 9 Moral Universality: A Philosophical Interlude
• 10 Pluralistic Political Morality
• 11 Democracy in Peril
• 12 The New Jacobins and American Democracy
• 13 Democracy for the World
• 14 Jacobin Capitalism
• 15 Equality
• 16 A Center that Cannot Hold
• 17 Responsible Nationhood
• 18 Needed: A New Moral Realism
• Index