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Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment
The New York Times bestselling author of The Origins of Political Order offers a provocative examination of modern identity politics: its origins, its effects, and what it means for domestic and international affairs of state
In 2014, Francis Fukuyama wrote that American institutions were in decay, as the state was progressively captured by powerful interest groups. Two years later, his predictions were borne out by the rise to power of a series of political outsiders whose economic nationalism and authoritarian tendencies threatened to destabilize the entire international order. These populist nationalists seek direct charismatic connection to "the people," who are usually defined in narrow identity terms that offer an irresistible call to an in-group and exclude large parts of the population as a whole.
Demand for recognition of one's identity is a master concept that unifies much of what is going on in world politics today. The universal recognition on which liberal democracy is based has been increasingly challenged by narrower forms of recognition based on nation, religion, sect, race, ethnicity, or gender, which have resulted in anti-immigrant populism, the upsurge of politicized Islam, the fractious "identity liberalism" of college campuses, and the emergence of white nationalism. Populist nationalism, said to be rooted in economic motivation, actually springs from the demand for recognition and therefore cannot simply be satisfied by economic means. The demand for identity cannot be transcended; we must begin to shape identity in a way that supports rather than undermines democracy.
Identity is an urgent and necessary book--a sharp warning that unless we forge a universal understanding of human dignity, we will doom ourselves to continuing conflict.
In 2014, Francis Fukuyama wrote that American institutions were in decay, as the state was progressively captured by powerful interest groups. Two years later, his predictions were borne out by the rise to power of a series of political outsiders whose economic nationalism and authoritarian tendencies threatened to destabilize the entire international order. These populist nationalists seek direct charismatic connection to "the people," who are usually defined in narrow identity terms that offer an irresistible call to an in-group and exclude large parts of the population as a whole.
Demand for recognition of one's identity is a master concept that unifies much of what is going on in world politics today. The universal recognition on which liberal democracy is based has been increasingly challenged by narrower forms of recognition based on nation, religion, sect, race, ethnicity, or gender, which have resulted in anti-immigrant populism, the upsurge of politicized Islam, the fractious "identity liberalism" of college campuses, and the emergence of white nationalism. Populist nationalism, said to be rooted in economic motivation, actually springs from the demand for recognition and therefore cannot simply be satisfied by economic means. The demand for identity cannot be transcended; we must begin to shape identity in a way that supports rather than undermines democracy.
Identity is an urgent and necessary book--a sharp warning that unless we forge a universal understanding of human dignity, we will doom ourselves to continuing conflict.
240 pages, Hardcover
First published September 11, 2018
About the author
Francis Fukuyama
98 books1,919 followersYoshihiro Francis Fukuyama (born 27 October 1952) is an American philosopher, political economist, and author.
Francis Fukuyama was born in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago. His father, Yoshio Fukuyama, a second-generation Japanese-American, was trained as a minister in the Congregational Church and received a doctorate in sociology from the University of Chicago. His mother, Toshiko Kawata Fukuyama, was born in Kyoto, Japan, and was the daughter of Shiro Kawata, founder of the Economics Department of Kyoto University and first president of Osaka Municipal University in Osaka. Fukuyama's childhood years were spent in New York City. In 1967 his family moved to State College, Pennsylvania, where he attended high school.
Fukuyama received his Bachelor of Arts degree in classics from Cornell University, where he studied political philosophy under Allan Bloom. He earned his Ph.D. in government from Harvard University, studying with Samuel P. Huntington and Harvey C. Mansfield, among others. Fukuyama has been affiliated with the Telluride Association since his undergraduate years at Cornell, an educational enterprise that was home to other significant leaders and intellectuals, including Steven Weinberg and Paul Wolfowitz.
Fukuyama is currently the Bernard L. Schwartz Professor of International Political Economy and Director of the International Development Program at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies of Johns Hopkins University, located in Washington, DC.
Fukuyama is best known as the author of The End of History and the Last Man, in which he argued that the progression of human history as a struggle between ideologies is largely at an end, with the world settling on liberal democracy after the end of the Cold War and the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Fukuyama predicted the eventual global triumph of political and economic liberalism.
What we may be witnessing is not just the end of the Cold War, or the passing of a particular period of post-war history, but the end of history as such... That is, the end point of mankind's ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government.
He has written a number of other books, among them Trust: The Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity and Our Posthuman Future: Consequences of the Biotechnology Revolution. In the latter, he qualified his original 'end of history' thesis, arguing that since biotechnology increasingly allows humans to control their own evolution, it may allow humans to alter human nature, thereby putting liberal democracy at risk. One possible outcome could be that an altered human nature could end in radical inequality. He is a fierce enemy of transhumanism, an intellectual movement asserting that posthumanity is a highly desirable goal.
The current revolution in biological sciences leads him to theorize that in an environment where science and technology are by no means at an end, but rather opening new horizons, history itself cannot therefore be said to be, as he once thought, at an end.
In another work The Great Disruption: Human Nature and the Reconstruction of Social Order, he explores the origins of social norms, and analyses the current disruptions in the fabric of our moral traditions, which he considers as arising from a shift from the manufacturing to the information age. This shift is, he thinks, normal and will prove self-correcting, given the intrinsic human need for social norms and rules.
Francis Fukuyama was born in the Hyde Park neighborhood of Chicago. His father, Yoshio Fukuyama, a second-generation Japanese-American, was trained as a minister in the Congregational Church and received a doctorate in sociology from the University of Chicago. His mother, Toshiko Kawata Fukuyama, was born in Kyoto, Japan, and was the daughter of Shiro Kawata, founder of the Economics Department of Kyoto University and first president of Osaka Municipal University in Osaka. Fukuyama's childhood years were spent in New York City. In 1967 his family moved to State College, Pennsylvania, where he attended high school.
Fukuyama received his Bachelor of Arts degree in classics from Cornell University, where he studied political philosophy under Allan Bloom. He earned his Ph.D. in government from Harvard University, studying with Samuel P. Huntington and Harvey C. Mansfield, among others. Fukuyama has been affiliated with the Telluride Association since his undergraduate years at Cornell, an educational enterprise that was home to other significant leaders and intellectuals, including Steven Weinberg and Paul Wolfowitz.
Fukuyama is currently the Bernard L. Schwartz Professor of International Political Economy and Director of the International Development Program at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies of Johns Hopkins University, located in Washington, DC.
Fukuyama is best known as the author of The End of History and the Last Man, in which he argued that the progression of human history as a struggle between ideologies is largely at an end, with the world settling on liberal democracy after the end of the Cold War and the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. Fukuyama predicted the eventual global triumph of political and economic liberalism.
What we may be witnessing is not just the end of the Cold War, or the passing of a particular period of post-war history, but the end of history as such... That is, the end point of mankind's ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government.
He has written a number of other books, among them Trust: The Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity and Our Posthuman Future: Consequences of the Biotechnology Revolution. In the latter, he qualified his original 'end of history' thesis, arguing that since biotechnology increasingly allows humans to control their own evolution, it may allow humans to alter human nature, thereby putting liberal democracy at risk. One possible outcome could be that an altered human nature could end in radical inequality. He is a fierce enemy of transhumanism, an intellectual movement asserting that posthumanity is a highly desirable goal.
The current revolution in biological sciences leads him to theorize that in an environment where science and technology are by no means at an end, but rather opening new horizons, history itself cannot therefore be said to be, as he once thought, at an end.
In another work The Great Disruption: Human Nature and the Reconstruction of Social Order, he explores the origins of social norms, and analyses the current disruptions in the fabric of our moral traditions, which he considers as arising from a shift from the manufacturing to the information age. This shift is, he thinks, normal and will prove self-correcting, given the intrinsic human need for social norms and rules.
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September 13, 2018
5 stars for the first half, 3 stars for the solution and a big 0 for a few chapters toward the end. The book begins with a brisk walk thru Western civilization as it went from village life to industrial life and from Catholicism thru Reformation and then Nietzsche. So far so good. The thesis is that people started measuring themselves by their inner lives as opposed to their kin and village ties as society was fragmented. Then he moves through the American founding and another super speedy synthesis of the tension between being a nation that embraces diversity or one that is rigidly white and Christian. I really liked Fukuyama's Political Order and Political Decay--it was 2 volumes of dense history that I thought was really illuminating. I think he probably shortcuts too much of that in here, but he's written it all before. (Louis Menand has a devastating New Yorker critique of this part so maybe read that) Then, in his solutions, it's fine. I don't agree with all of it (he's a HARD assimilationist--no bilingual education, public service requirements, military duties for immigrants, etc), but generally he thinks America should embrace its identity as a nation of immigrants, but also take immigration reform seriously. He says nothing at all about gender or race reform within the country, which is curious given the point of the book is about identity politics and how we might fix it.
(It's also hilarious that all these identity politics naysayers lump #metoo and BLM into identity politics because those have nothing at all to do with identity, but are about very specific and identifiable wrongs, but whatever.)
HERE is where he is just flat out wrong--and it was actually super interesting to read this part because I have long been bugged by the standard narrative of identity politics, but Fukuyama helped me figure out exactly what the problem is at the core of the standard narrative--THE HISTORY IS JUST WRONG!
The narrative of identity politics (as proposed by Lilla, Haidt, Chua and repeated over and over by pundits) is that the left took up identity politics at some point in the late 60s or maybe early 70s and they lost their coalitions of working people. And now it's everywhere and it's metastasized all over the place and look what you did--the right just picked up this beast you created and now we have Nazis.
Fukuyama tells the story of the Civil Rights movement as such: MLK just wanted blacks to be treated equally to whites--he wasn't demanding any sort of big change. Then, the black nationalists and the campus radicals ruined everything by demanding recognition of their dignity AS black people. They drew attention to their specific racial grievances. The "black campus radicals" objected to Stanford's core lit classes because they were mad it was all white men and they wanted to add blacks and women. He quotes a speech by a spokesperson on this--and the important inflection point for Fukuyama is that the whole argument hinges on FEELINGS. Students of color will FEEL psychologically wounded by reading these things and their dignity will not be represented. Haidt in his new book (The Coddling of the American Mind) and Lilla's older book go hard on this thread too--that people were being irrational and focused on feelings and from then on everything went to hell because people couldn't be rational anymore. And by people, they mean mostly black people and women. (Ok, let me take a breath because this part made me want to throw the book at the wall really hard, which was a problem because I was listening to it as I was running so what I actually did was just channel my anger into running faster (so yay for that).)
Here is the problem with this narrative:
1. MLK was not simply asking for blacks to be treated the same as whites. You can either read the rest of the I Have a Dream Speech or literally any speech MLK gave before or after that one sentence that Reagan and everyone after Reagan liked to quote--you know the one. MLK was asking for justice and for redress. He literally used the word redress. He wanted America to make it right after having oppressed, subjugated and enslaved the black population. While Fukuyama is marching through history, he never touches on this by the way.
(Quick TRIVIA: How was slavery justified? You guessed it--by RACIAL IDENTITY!). (Note 2: How was Jim Crow and the Klan organized? Guessed it again, RACIAL IDENTITY).
2. The black nationalists and the "campus radicals" may have said some uncomfortable things, but their movements were also not based on FEELINGS of dignity as Fukuyama claims. It is perfectly reasonable and rational to demand that other voices be included in the cannon. Also perfectly reasonable to demand recognition for race-based claims after centuries of exclusion based precisely on RACE.
3. Also, and this is critical. Demanding dignity was not new. Black people and women have been demanding DIGNITY and RESPECT based on their IDENTITY as blacks for FOREVER. It's just that before, they were either killed or silenced when they did it. The 60s was just the first time whites had to pay attention and apparently, some of them did not like it one bit. Frederick Douglass, Sojourner Truth, W.E.B. Dubois on and on and on have been demanding dignity and justice. Dubois writes The Soul of Black Folk--he was the James Baldwin and the Ta Nahisi Coates of that era. He talked a lot about white people and black people and he spoke of black people as a people whose claims of justice needed to be recognized. (Sorry for all the caps--I am trying to highlight the words Fukuyama cares a lot about).
4. It's also absurd to say that the left and minorities invented identity politics. White identity politics has been conveniently deployed for generations--especially in building coalitions of Southerners who had nothing else in common besides their whiteness. They weren't even from the same places or classes--they were white and that was it. Literally, crack a book about politics in the South between say 1800 to today. (Start with Slavery by another Name or Strange Career of Jim Crow if you prefer to read a book by white men ;)) Which brings me to my last point,
5. NIXON INVENTED IDENTITY POLITICS. Don't believe me? Read my second book (Color of Money) Chapter 6. The Civil Rights coalitions' demands were all based on economics and ending segregation and addressing the wealth gap. Actual economic policy. MLK's last movement was a poor people's movement, which was just class-based and not at all race-based. In fact, most of the black radicals were roaming around the world building coalitions among all sorts of races to build a class-based revolution. They were called communists. So you might not like that, but communism is hardly identity politics. Nixon is the one that puts the kibosh on class-based coalitions (AGAIN--using the white identity southern strategy just like after Reconstruction). Nixon's plank on civil rights is black identity politics-- "black power and black pride and black capitalism" that's his campaign message. I shit you not. He forms an identity based coalition of "real Americans" (white Americans) that is still intact. This is the thread that Palin and Trump pick up on, but it was always there.
So lament identity politics all you want, but get the freaking history right.
(It's also hilarious that all these identity politics naysayers lump #metoo and BLM into identity politics because those have nothing at all to do with identity, but are about very specific and identifiable wrongs, but whatever.)
HERE is where he is just flat out wrong--and it was actually super interesting to read this part because I have long been bugged by the standard narrative of identity politics, but Fukuyama helped me figure out exactly what the problem is at the core of the standard narrative--THE HISTORY IS JUST WRONG!
The narrative of identity politics (as proposed by Lilla, Haidt, Chua and repeated over and over by pundits) is that the left took up identity politics at some point in the late 60s or maybe early 70s and they lost their coalitions of working people. And now it's everywhere and it's metastasized all over the place and look what you did--the right just picked up this beast you created and now we have Nazis.
Fukuyama tells the story of the Civil Rights movement as such: MLK just wanted blacks to be treated equally to whites--he wasn't demanding any sort of big change. Then, the black nationalists and the campus radicals ruined everything by demanding recognition of their dignity AS black people. They drew attention to their specific racial grievances. The "black campus radicals" objected to Stanford's core lit classes because they were mad it was all white men and they wanted to add blacks and women. He quotes a speech by a spokesperson on this--and the important inflection point for Fukuyama is that the whole argument hinges on FEELINGS. Students of color will FEEL psychologically wounded by reading these things and their dignity will not be represented. Haidt in his new book (The Coddling of the American Mind) and Lilla's older book go hard on this thread too--that people were being irrational and focused on feelings and from then on everything went to hell because people couldn't be rational anymore. And by people, they mean mostly black people and women. (Ok, let me take a breath because this part made me want to throw the book at the wall really hard, which was a problem because I was listening to it as I was running so what I actually did was just channel my anger into running faster (so yay for that).)
Here is the problem with this narrative:
1. MLK was not simply asking for blacks to be treated the same as whites. You can either read the rest of the I Have a Dream Speech or literally any speech MLK gave before or after that one sentence that Reagan and everyone after Reagan liked to quote--you know the one. MLK was asking for justice and for redress. He literally used the word redress. He wanted America to make it right after having oppressed, subjugated and enslaved the black population. While Fukuyama is marching through history, he never touches on this by the way.
(Quick TRIVIA: How was slavery justified? You guessed it--by RACIAL IDENTITY!). (Note 2: How was Jim Crow and the Klan organized? Guessed it again, RACIAL IDENTITY).
2. The black nationalists and the "campus radicals" may have said some uncomfortable things, but their movements were also not based on FEELINGS of dignity as Fukuyama claims. It is perfectly reasonable and rational to demand that other voices be included in the cannon. Also perfectly reasonable to demand recognition for race-based claims after centuries of exclusion based precisely on RACE.
3. Also, and this is critical. Demanding dignity was not new. Black people and women have been demanding DIGNITY and RESPECT based on their IDENTITY as blacks for FOREVER. It's just that before, they were either killed or silenced when they did it. The 60s was just the first time whites had to pay attention and apparently, some of them did not like it one bit. Frederick Douglass, Sojourner Truth, W.E.B. Dubois on and on and on have been demanding dignity and justice. Dubois writes The Soul of Black Folk--he was the James Baldwin and the Ta Nahisi Coates of that era. He talked a lot about white people and black people and he spoke of black people as a people whose claims of justice needed to be recognized. (Sorry for all the caps--I am trying to highlight the words Fukuyama cares a lot about).
4. It's also absurd to say that the left and minorities invented identity politics. White identity politics has been conveniently deployed for generations--especially in building coalitions of Southerners who had nothing else in common besides their whiteness. They weren't even from the same places or classes--they were white and that was it. Literally, crack a book about politics in the South between say 1800 to today. (Start with Slavery by another Name or Strange Career of Jim Crow if you prefer to read a book by white men ;)) Which brings me to my last point,
5. NIXON INVENTED IDENTITY POLITICS. Don't believe me? Read my second book (Color of Money) Chapter 6. The Civil Rights coalitions' demands were all based on economics and ending segregation and addressing the wealth gap. Actual economic policy. MLK's last movement was a poor people's movement, which was just class-based and not at all race-based. In fact, most of the black radicals were roaming around the world building coalitions among all sorts of races to build a class-based revolution. They were called communists. So you might not like that, but communism is hardly identity politics. Nixon is the one that puts the kibosh on class-based coalitions (AGAIN--using the white identity southern strategy just like after Reconstruction). Nixon's plank on civil rights is black identity politics-- "black power and black pride and black capitalism" that's his campaign message. I shit you not. He forms an identity based coalition of "real Americans" (white Americans) that is still intact. This is the thread that Palin and Trump pick up on, but it was always there.
So lament identity politics all you want, but get the freaking history right.
March 31, 2019
This is required reading, because with this book, Fukuyama is clearly on to something. At the core, he discusses how we can overcome political polarization and strenghten our democratic systems. In order to grasp the underlying current that drives today's discussions and gave rise to Trumpism ("With regard to character, it was hard to imagine an individual less suited to be President of the United States." ), Fukuyama tackles identity politics - and you know what? My guess it that most people who read this review will have a strong emotional response to the expression alone - welcome to the heart of the problem.
To say it right at the beginning: Fukuyama agrees that discrimination, inequality and injustice must be fought, that the goals of #metoo, #blacklivesmatter, and comparable social movements deserve support ("No critique of identity politcs should imply that these are not real and urgent problems that need concrete solutions."). His point is that on top of that, we need to fight the particularization of society into a mere conglomerate of interest groups. When the economically disenfranchised who are disregarded (e.g. in the Rust Belt) and those groups who have long been deprived of recognition and acceptance start to fight each other, who will win...ähem...bigly? Democratic political entities need meta-narratives that bring people together, and these meta-narratives must be based on ideals and virtues like the rule of law or the belief in human dignity, concepts that people can share and incorporate in their identities no matter their personal background: "One does not have to deny the potentialities and lived experiences of individuals to recognize that they can also share values and aspirations with much broader circles of citizens."
This is of course only the rough outline of Fukuyama's elaborate argument. In a highly interesting chapter dedicated to the rise of identity politics, Fukuyama shows how the concept of dignity is closely connected to the spread of modernity in the 19th century, but was already discussed in Ancient Greece as an inherent urge in all people. This deeply human factor is exploited by the "politics of resentment": "In a wide variety of cases, a political leader has mobilized followers around the perception that the group's dignity has been affronted, disparaged or otherwise disregarded. (...) A humiliated group seeking restitution of its dignity carries far more emotional weight than people simply pursuing their economic advantages." Yes, the rise of fascism, radical Islamism and Trumpism are of course also rooted in identity politics, and this touches on a neuralgic point: People shouldn't get recognition simply for who they are, for showing their inner self, Fukuyama argues, because this is the door through which radicals step to promote the "politics of resentment". Instead, all people should be held up to certain moral standards.
And there's one more argument that I'd like to point out here, because I think it's a very important one: "The tendency of identity politics to focus on cultural issues has diverted energy and attention away from serious thinking on the part of progressives about how to reverse the thirty-year trend in most liberal democracies toward greater socioeconomic inequality." That's true, especially in the States and in Britain. Has the left given up in the fight for a more social economy? Has class been replaced by culture?
There are many things that Fukuyama writes that I don't agree with, e.g., I think that his derogative postulation of a " new religion of psychotherapy" is missing the potentials of therapy, I don't share his skepticism regarding dual citizenship, his assessment of postcolonial studies seems a little dubious, and I think he misrepresents the debate about the "Leitkultur" (leading culture) in Germany - and there is much more. But that's not the point here - the point is that Fukuyama wrote a book that can propel the current discourse forward, that brings up many ideas for discussion and that maintains that identity politics and solidarity are both important.
He aims to bridge the gap in order to defeat the "politics of resentment" and to save liberal democracy - and we should listen to his ideas and debate them with people we agree with, and especially with people we don't agree with.
To say it right at the beginning: Fukuyama agrees that discrimination, inequality and injustice must be fought, that the goals of #metoo, #blacklivesmatter, and comparable social movements deserve support ("No critique of identity politcs should imply that these are not real and urgent problems that need concrete solutions."). His point is that on top of that, we need to fight the particularization of society into a mere conglomerate of interest groups. When the economically disenfranchised who are disregarded (e.g. in the Rust Belt) and those groups who have long been deprived of recognition and acceptance start to fight each other, who will win...ähem...bigly? Democratic political entities need meta-narratives that bring people together, and these meta-narratives must be based on ideals and virtues like the rule of law or the belief in human dignity, concepts that people can share and incorporate in their identities no matter their personal background: "One does not have to deny the potentialities and lived experiences of individuals to recognize that they can also share values and aspirations with much broader circles of citizens."
This is of course only the rough outline of Fukuyama's elaborate argument. In a highly interesting chapter dedicated to the rise of identity politics, Fukuyama shows how the concept of dignity is closely connected to the spread of modernity in the 19th century, but was already discussed in Ancient Greece as an inherent urge in all people. This deeply human factor is exploited by the "politics of resentment": "In a wide variety of cases, a political leader has mobilized followers around the perception that the group's dignity has been affronted, disparaged or otherwise disregarded. (...) A humiliated group seeking restitution of its dignity carries far more emotional weight than people simply pursuing their economic advantages." Yes, the rise of fascism, radical Islamism and Trumpism are of course also rooted in identity politics, and this touches on a neuralgic point: People shouldn't get recognition simply for who they are, for showing their inner self, Fukuyama argues, because this is the door through which radicals step to promote the "politics of resentment". Instead, all people should be held up to certain moral standards.
And there's one more argument that I'd like to point out here, because I think it's a very important one: "The tendency of identity politics to focus on cultural issues has diverted energy and attention away from serious thinking on the part of progressives about how to reverse the thirty-year trend in most liberal democracies toward greater socioeconomic inequality." That's true, especially in the States and in Britain. Has the left given up in the fight for a more social economy? Has class been replaced by culture?
There are many things that Fukuyama writes that I don't agree with, e.g., I think that his derogative postulation of a " new religion of psychotherapy" is missing the potentials of therapy, I don't share his skepticism regarding dual citizenship, his assessment of postcolonial studies seems a little dubious, and I think he misrepresents the debate about the "Leitkultur" (leading culture) in Germany - and there is much more. But that's not the point here - the point is that Fukuyama wrote a book that can propel the current discourse forward, that brings up many ideas for discussion and that maintains that identity politics and solidarity are both important.
He aims to bridge the gap in order to defeat the "politics of resentment" and to save liberal democracy - and we should listen to his ideas and debate them with people we agree with, and especially with people we don't agree with.
October 17, 2018
The modern concept of identity unites three different phenomena. The first is thymos, a universal aspect of human personality that craves recognition. The second is the distinction between the inner and the outer self, and the raising of the moral valuation of the inner self over outer society. This emerged only in early modern Europe. The third is an evolving concept of dignity, in which recognition is due not just to a narrow class of people, but to everyone. The broadening and universalization of dignity turns the private quest for self into a political project.
Referencing Socrates, Rousseau, Luther, Kant, Hegel, et al, Francis Fukuyama begins Identity with an overview of historical thought regarding identity, dignity, and the surprisingly late in human evolution notion that we were all created equal. This notion quickly led to the rise of liberal democracies, and with the end of the Cold War in the 1980s, Fukuyama himself declared that we had reached “the end of history” (and with liberal democracies actually in retreat around the world today, Fukuyama stresses in a preface that people have misunderstood what he meant by terms like “history” and “the end of”). Fukuyama explains that with the despotism of Communism made obvious to the West by the 1960s, the progressive left abandoned their drive for economic redistribution and put their energy into the Civil Rights, Women's Liberation, and Gay Rights Movements, thereby igniting today's identity wars:
The problem with the contemporary left is the particular forms of identity that it has increasingly chosen to celebrate. Rather than building solidarity around large collectivities such as the working class or the economically exploited, it has focused on ever smaller groups being marginalized in specific ways. This is part of a larger story about the fate of modern liberalism, in which the principle of universal and equal recognition has mutated into the special recognition of particular groups.
Because the spoils of Capitalism made possible within liberal democracies has, over the past couple of decades, disproportionately benefited those at the top and left many millions of people in stagnant or declining conditions, this has created many millions of people who feel like their individual dignity has been disrespected. This “politics of resentment”, writes Fukuyama, has been the catalyst for the Arab Spring, the rise of ISIS, the strengthening of Putin's hold on Russia, Brexit, and the populist movements that have seen right-wing governments elected all around the world (with particular attention paid to Trump's manipulation of identity politics to win the presidency of the United States).
Fukuyama's answer to this problem is increased nationalism, since that's the level at which we all feel a unifying pride and since only an entity the size of a nation-state can properly protect and care for its own citizens. He makes the case that the EU should have put more effort into creating a unifying “European” identity (and that the EU is a good example of why we'll never have one global government), and that the US and its “creedal” identity (a melting pot of shared values) is the blueprint for all liberal democracies:
This creedal understanding of American identity emerged as a result of a long struggle stretching over nearly two centuries and represented a decisive break with earlier versions of identity based on race, ethnicity, or religion. Americans can be proud of this very substantive identity; it is based on belief in the common political principles of constitutionalism, the rule of law, democratic accountability, and the principle that “all men are created equal” (now interpreted to include all women). These political ideas come directly out of the Enlightenment and are the only possible basis for unifying a modern liberal democracy that has become de facto multicultural.
To achieve an increased nationalism (to replace divisive identity politics), Fukuyama proposes: the elimination of dual citizenships (in the case of the EU, he suggests a single European citizenship); better assimilation of immigrants to a nation's creedal identity; voters' rights only for full citizens; a universal requirement for national service (not necessarily military); and the right for nations to enforce their borders and set criteria for citizenship. This will, apparently, help all citizens of a nation to remember, “Identity can be used to divide, but it can and has also been used to integrate. That in the end will be the remedy for the populist politics of the present.”
After an interesting historical overview for the majority of this book, I'm not ultimately convinced by Fukuyama's easy-sounding remedy for populism; and what might work in the States doesn't sound like it will translate in Canada, which has always prided itself on being the mosaic to America's melting pot; where to not parrot the official line that “diversity is our strength” makes one a pariah.
While the United States has benefited from diversity, it cannot build its national identity around diversity as such. Identity has to be related to substantive ideas such as constitutionalism, rule of law, and human equality. Americans respect these ideas; the country is justified in excluding from citizenship those who reject them.
Well, we in Canada do build our identity around “diversity as such” – not only were we founded as two distinct societies, but further, we encourage immigrant communities to celebrate their heritage throughout successive generations, and every First Nation is supported in efforts to preserve their unique and diverse identities; “assimilation” is the dirtiest of words in Canada (and I rather think it would be the same for the idea of one pan-European citizenship). So, while most of Fukuyama's writing here was interesting enough (but not, I suspect, anything new for those who follow this sort of thing), his “remedy” to identity politics and populism sort of falls flat. Glad I read it, can't widely recommend.
September 17, 2018
Let me cut to the quick, there are three reasons why I felt this book was inadequate: 1) there was little new in it, 2) the author wrongly argues both sides are to blame by appealing to false dichotomies and false framing and 3) his solutions provided would only exasperate the real problem and not make it better.
For item 1), every author should assume that a reader of their book is interested in the topic and wants to learn more about the topic and is obligated to provide the reader something they don’t already know. In the first third of the book, the author breaks no new ground for those familiar with Charles Taylor’s ‘Sources of the Self’, Plato’s ‘Republic’, and for those who have listened to multiple Great Course Lectures on ‘identity’ and Martin Luther, and who are intimately familiar with Rousseau, and have read some of Freud, read lots of Kant, Nietzsche and Hegel, or have vaguely already understood what identity means. All of those items or people were presented within the first third of this book. I’ll even say it’s okay to bring the all too familiar up if the author can provide a narrative or look at it from a different angle and make the reader see differently, but this author did not. Do not underestimate your reading audience. Most of us want to really understand the world we live in and are doing what we can to the best of our abilities to learn about our world.
Charles Taylor made Schopenhauer his main character in his book. Fukuyama doesn’t mention Schopenhauer and he makes Rousseau his main character. That’s fine I guess, but there are connections that needed to be filled in that Fukuyama didn’t do for his reader and Rousseau’s dignity concept can be derived from Spinoza’s ‘conatus’ which led to Schopenhauer’s ‘will to live’ and Nietzsche’s ‘will to power’. In the end, it’s possible to describe Nietzsche’s ‘will to power’ as self worth or one’s own self esteem (this author makes dignity and respect, self worth and self esteem of the individual, pivotal). The author is out of his field and expertise (I think he is a political scientist) and sometimes I felt he covered his topic superficially and to be brutally honest he should stick to topics he understands.
The author uses dignity as his focal point for rationalizing ones hate. I’ll say that in order to feel superior to the other all one needs to do is hate them, but in order to be superior all one needs to do is not hate the other. Using the word ‘dignity’ does not change the fact that one is justifying their feelings over their reason. The author appeals to ‘lived experiences’ and dignity as he strives to defend his ‘both siderism’, and the squishy middle which really does not exist when it comes to a reality that includes Nazis, alt-right and those who want a return to 1950s America which privileges the privileged over all others.
For item 2), when a Nazi runs a car into peaceful protesters the proper response is not ‘both sides are to blame’. That’s psychotic and an appeal to identity based on dignity doesn’t make it any less psychotic. (I want to be careful here, the author is not advocating that response, but he does rationalize it in some ways, and he does not call it for the psychotic unacceptable behavior that it surely is). Tolerance is not necessary when it comes to the ultimate purveyors of identity, Nazis. Diversity and tolerance are good, but is not necessary when it comes to purveyors of hate or Nazis. There were a lot of false equivalences and poor framing the author made in the middle part of the book. The author seemed to justify mocking a disable person (as candidate Trump did) as a standing up to ‘political correctness’ and that doesn’t make the act itself any less hateful and wrong. Shrouding ones hate with the label of anti ‘political correctness’ doesn’t lessen the cruelty of the act. I always translate ‘political correctness’ into terms of ‘politeness’. Things which are impolite are politically incorrect. All of our values and the golden rule can be derived from the politeness we show others. Mocking somebody for a disability is never polite and one should not whine against those who criticize those who are that kind of cruel by invoking a tirade against political correctness as the author seems to try to do through a juxtaposition of his points as he comments on Trump’s actual behavior and defends his support for such behavior by fictionalizing an alienation of the individual because of their self perceived denial of dignity being thrust upon them by an imaginary elite other.
The author mocked changing the name of ‘manhole’ covers for the sake of political correctness. He really seemed to be channeling the spirit of the ravings against political correctness as espoused in the Unabomber’s Manifesto (I really recommend people read that trash, not because of its stupid arguments, but because that kind of thinking still prevails among the alt-right and Trump followers and those who think ‘both sides are to blame’ when Nazis run their cars into peaceful demonstrators). I think one of the most eye opening segments I’ve seen on TV was when an award show a couple of years ago pointed out how the word ‘actress’ is really sexist and that the ‘actors’ male and female would individually stand up and say ‘I am an actor’, sometimes ‘political correct’ (polite) behavior can make us aware of the ‘ism’ that lies within us such as sexism. That made a difference for me and it changed how I speak (and think) because of that. Morons still want to live in the 1950s and ‘make America great again’ as those supposedly ‘good old days’ by retaining the privileges of the privileged over everyone else who is not a member of the in-tribe.
For item 3), the author’s solutions are the exact opposite from the ones I would recommend. He wants to meld everyone’s identity (and values) into an amorphous blob that would best be characterized by that currently possessed by the privileged. He wants to bring back unearned pride in one’s own culture and the belief that just because it is one’s own tradition that makes it superior and more just than those of the others not part of the in-tribe thus making it easier to exclude those who are different. I think that one should never outsource ones beliefs and must appeal instead to rational justification, evidence, analysis and empirical reasoning. Why is it that those with the power and the privileges never think they are motivated by identity? I’m being rhetorical and already know the answer, but this book doesn’t seem to question that premise. (And why does he call out Muslims but not Mormons, Evangelicals, Catholics or other revealed religions, all of which can have bigotry based beliefs on nothing more than whim or faith. For example, to say ‘gays are going to hell and should not be allowed to get married because they insult my dignity’ is wrongheaded no matter what faith label you are hiding behind or your appeal to religious liberty based on nothing more than your feelings for which you rationalized by putting the label ‘dignity’ onto it). Our myths and traditions can bind us as readily as they separate us.
Those who want to learn nothing new, and think both sides are to blame and want the status quo to remain will enjoy this book. For the rest who really want to understand the sources of the self, read or listen to the books, the authors and the Great Courses alluded to in the second paragraph above.
For item 1), every author should assume that a reader of their book is interested in the topic and wants to learn more about the topic and is obligated to provide the reader something they don’t already know. In the first third of the book, the author breaks no new ground for those familiar with Charles Taylor’s ‘Sources of the Self’, Plato’s ‘Republic’, and for those who have listened to multiple Great Course Lectures on ‘identity’ and Martin Luther, and who are intimately familiar with Rousseau, and have read some of Freud, read lots of Kant, Nietzsche and Hegel, or have vaguely already understood what identity means. All of those items or people were presented within the first third of this book. I’ll even say it’s okay to bring the all too familiar up if the author can provide a narrative or look at it from a different angle and make the reader see differently, but this author did not. Do not underestimate your reading audience. Most of us want to really understand the world we live in and are doing what we can to the best of our abilities to learn about our world.
Charles Taylor made Schopenhauer his main character in his book. Fukuyama doesn’t mention Schopenhauer and he makes Rousseau his main character. That’s fine I guess, but there are connections that needed to be filled in that Fukuyama didn’t do for his reader and Rousseau’s dignity concept can be derived from Spinoza’s ‘conatus’ which led to Schopenhauer’s ‘will to live’ and Nietzsche’s ‘will to power’. In the end, it’s possible to describe Nietzsche’s ‘will to power’ as self worth or one’s own self esteem (this author makes dignity and respect, self worth and self esteem of the individual, pivotal). The author is out of his field and expertise (I think he is a political scientist) and sometimes I felt he covered his topic superficially and to be brutally honest he should stick to topics he understands.
The author uses dignity as his focal point for rationalizing ones hate. I’ll say that in order to feel superior to the other all one needs to do is hate them, but in order to be superior all one needs to do is not hate the other. Using the word ‘dignity’ does not change the fact that one is justifying their feelings over their reason. The author appeals to ‘lived experiences’ and dignity as he strives to defend his ‘both siderism’, and the squishy middle which really does not exist when it comes to a reality that includes Nazis, alt-right and those who want a return to 1950s America which privileges the privileged over all others.
For item 2), when a Nazi runs a car into peaceful protesters the proper response is not ‘both sides are to blame’. That’s psychotic and an appeal to identity based on dignity doesn’t make it any less psychotic. (I want to be careful here, the author is not advocating that response, but he does rationalize it in some ways, and he does not call it for the psychotic unacceptable behavior that it surely is). Tolerance is not necessary when it comes to the ultimate purveyors of identity, Nazis. Diversity and tolerance are good, but is not necessary when it comes to purveyors of hate or Nazis. There were a lot of false equivalences and poor framing the author made in the middle part of the book. The author seemed to justify mocking a disable person (as candidate Trump did) as a standing up to ‘political correctness’ and that doesn’t make the act itself any less hateful and wrong. Shrouding ones hate with the label of anti ‘political correctness’ doesn’t lessen the cruelty of the act. I always translate ‘political correctness’ into terms of ‘politeness’. Things which are impolite are politically incorrect. All of our values and the golden rule can be derived from the politeness we show others. Mocking somebody for a disability is never polite and one should not whine against those who criticize those who are that kind of cruel by invoking a tirade against political correctness as the author seems to try to do through a juxtaposition of his points as he comments on Trump’s actual behavior and defends his support for such behavior by fictionalizing an alienation of the individual because of their self perceived denial of dignity being thrust upon them by an imaginary elite other.
The author mocked changing the name of ‘manhole’ covers for the sake of political correctness. He really seemed to be channeling the spirit of the ravings against political correctness as espoused in the Unabomber’s Manifesto (I really recommend people read that trash, not because of its stupid arguments, but because that kind of thinking still prevails among the alt-right and Trump followers and those who think ‘both sides are to blame’ when Nazis run their cars into peaceful demonstrators). I think one of the most eye opening segments I’ve seen on TV was when an award show a couple of years ago pointed out how the word ‘actress’ is really sexist and that the ‘actors’ male and female would individually stand up and say ‘I am an actor’, sometimes ‘political correct’ (polite) behavior can make us aware of the ‘ism’ that lies within us such as sexism. That made a difference for me and it changed how I speak (and think) because of that. Morons still want to live in the 1950s and ‘make America great again’ as those supposedly ‘good old days’ by retaining the privileges of the privileged over everyone else who is not a member of the in-tribe.
For item 3), the author’s solutions are the exact opposite from the ones I would recommend. He wants to meld everyone’s identity (and values) into an amorphous blob that would best be characterized by that currently possessed by the privileged. He wants to bring back unearned pride in one’s own culture and the belief that just because it is one’s own tradition that makes it superior and more just than those of the others not part of the in-tribe thus making it easier to exclude those who are different. I think that one should never outsource ones beliefs and must appeal instead to rational justification, evidence, analysis and empirical reasoning. Why is it that those with the power and the privileges never think they are motivated by identity? I’m being rhetorical and already know the answer, but this book doesn’t seem to question that premise. (And why does he call out Muslims but not Mormons, Evangelicals, Catholics or other revealed religions, all of which can have bigotry based beliefs on nothing more than whim or faith. For example, to say ‘gays are going to hell and should not be allowed to get married because they insult my dignity’ is wrongheaded no matter what faith label you are hiding behind or your appeal to religious liberty based on nothing more than your feelings for which you rationalized by putting the label ‘dignity’ onto it). Our myths and traditions can bind us as readily as they separate us.
Those who want to learn nothing new, and think both sides are to blame and want the status quo to remain will enjoy this book. For the rest who really want to understand the sources of the self, read or listen to the books, the authors and the Great Courses alluded to in the second paragraph above.
January 7, 2023
На жаль, щодо цієї книги в мене були доволі високі очікування. І вони, як свідчить моя оцінка, не справдилися. З одного боку, дуже добре, що Фукуяма написав популярну книгу про ідентичність. З іншого, рівень спрощень, як на мене, зависокий. Після дилогії Витоки політичного порядку та Політичний порядок і політичний занепад я очікував якщо не відкриттів / прориву в дослідженнях ідентичності, то хоча б солідного / ґрунтовного опертя на дослідження ідентичностей. На жаль, Фукуяма просто ігнорує весь пласт студій ідентичності. Тут навіть немає жодної згадки про Social Identities Theory Тейджфела та Тернера, або про статтю Роджерса Брубейкера (разом з Фредріком Купером) з критикою поняття ідентичності.
Фактично, Фукуяма вирішив "кавалерійським наскоком" розібратися зі складною і плутаною темою. Це дратує, обурює - на початку. Адже Фукуяма навіть не розрізняє особистої та колективної ідентичностей, що є базою для всіх теорій ідентичності!
Але справа в тому, що Фукуяма не пише текст про ідентичність. Насправді, його цікавить політика ідентичності в західних суспільствах початку ХХІ ст. Ось це і є відправна точка його розмірковувань. Втім, ця відправна точка опиняється наприкінці готового тексту, бо... Я не знаю, чому, але, як мені видається, Фукуяма вирішив, що не буде писати просто полемічний текст, а спробує до нього підійти більш виважено, тобто почне з теоретичної бази. Але - в серці - його хвилює політика ідентичності. Тому "теоретичні розділи" виходять доволі п��верховими: аби не відволікати і автора, й аудиторію від того, що буде наприкінці - доволі ґрунтовної та нищівної критика західної політики ідентичності. Все решта має просто підвести базу під цю критику. А тому все, що не стосується Заходу, або не стосується політики ідентичності, написано плутано, суперечливо та дуже спрощено. Особливо дратує, що Фукуяма вважає націоналізм чимось поганим. Що дивно, адже в дилогії про політичний порядок він стверджує, що національна ідентичність - запорука стабільної і ефективної демократії. Та й в цьому тексті так само. Тобто національна ідентичність - це добре, а націоналізм - погано. І це після "поведінкового" повороту 1990-х! (Маю на увазі середину 1990-х, коли в дослідження націй та націоналізму на зміну історикам прийшли соціологи, психологи та антропологи).
І, звісно, деколи бракує посилань. Пишу "звісно", бо така ж біда і в дилогії про політичний порядок. Наприклад, ідея про те, що в основі ідентичності - потреба в гідності, належить чи Чарльзу Тейлору, чи Акселю Гоннету, які висловили її наприкінці 1980-х - на початку 1990-х. Насправді, про це писали й раніше, але саме ці два автори винесли цю ідеї на перше місце в студіях ідентичності - і крізь призму цього поняття пропонували осмислювати політику мультикультуралізму. До речі, в обох - і Тейлора, і Гоннета - є книги про мультикультуралізм, написані ще в 1990-х чи на початку 2000-х.
А от приємна річ - фінал. Там автор радить читати Снігопад Ніла Стівенсона та Нейроманта Вільяма Ґібсона. Мовляв, саме їхні тексти дозволяють зрозуміти, як може виглядати цифровий світ майбутнього. І сумно, і приємно водночас: розуміти, що тексти 1980-х, які на початок 2000-х видавалися вже ретро антиутопіями, знову стають актуальними застереженнями...
Фактично, Фукуяма вирішив "кавалерійським наскоком" розібратися зі складною і плутаною темою. Це дратує, обурює - на початку. Адже Фукуяма навіть не розрізняє особистої та колективної ідентичностей, що є базою для всіх теорій ідентичності!
Але справа в тому, що Фукуяма не пише текст про ідентичність. Насправді, його цікавить політика ідентичності в західних суспільствах початку ХХІ ст. Ось це і є відправна точка його розмірковувань. Втім, ця відправна точка опиняється наприкінці готового тексту, бо... Я не знаю, чому, але, як мені видається, Фукуяма вирішив, що не буде писати просто полемічний текст, а спробує до нього підійти більш виважено, тобто почне з теоретичної бази. Але - в серці - його хвилює політика ідентичності. Тому "теоретичні розділи" виходять доволі п��верховими: аби не відволікати і автора, й аудиторію від того, що буде наприкінці - доволі ґрунтовної та нищівної критика західної політики ідентичності. Все решта має просто підвести базу під цю критику. А тому все, що не стосується Заходу, або не стосується політики ідентичності, написано плутано, суперечливо та дуже спрощено. Особливо дратує, що Фукуяма вважає націоналізм чимось поганим. Що дивно, адже в дилогії про політичний порядок він стверджує, що національна ідентичність - запорука стабільної і ефективної демократії. Та й в цьому тексті так само. Тобто національна ідентичність - це добре, а націоналізм - погано. І це після "поведінкового" повороту 1990-х! (Маю на увазі середину 1990-х, коли в дослідження націй та націоналізму на зміну історикам прийшли соціологи, психологи та антропологи).
І, звісно, деколи бракує посилань. Пишу "звісно", бо така ж біда і в дилогії про політичний порядок. Наприклад, ідея про те, що в основі ідентичності - потреба в гідності, належить чи Чарльзу Тейлору, чи Акселю Гоннету, які висловили її наприкінці 1980-х - на початку 1990-х. Насправді, про це писали й раніше, але саме ці два автори винесли цю ідеї на перше місце в студіях ідентичності - і крізь призму цього поняття пропонували осмислювати політику мультикультуралізму. До речі, в обох - і Тейлора, і Гоннета - є книги про мультикультуралізм, написані ще в 1990-х чи на початку 2000-х.
А от приємна річ - фінал. Там автор радить читати Снігопад Ніла Стівенсона та Нейроманта Вільяма Ґібсона. Мовляв, саме їхні тексти дозволяють зрозуміти, як може виглядати цифровий світ майбутнього. І сумно, і приємно водночас: розуміти, що тексти 1980-х, які на початок 2000-х видавалися вже ретро антиутопіями, знову стають актуальними застереженнями...
September 16, 2018
I keep telling myself not to read books by privileged rich men about the problems of our world, then I do exactly that. I regret it!
There are interesting concepts here, some are somewhat useful in the debate on identity and some just drown in Fukuyama's desire to justify himself. Let me elaborate. There is a point where he goes on about how people misread his controversial and much criticised The End of History and the Last Man, he is telling us how he was not wrong in saying that liberal democracy has won after the end of the Cold War and how we all should have finished reading the book and accepted its wisdom. Then tells us about all the things that the said book hasn't predicted.
That aside, some of the concepts that I find useful include the use of Thumos (Greek meaning spiritedness or, as used here, the human desire for recognition) and branches it into isothumia (I am as good as everyone else) and megalothumia (I am better than everyone else). He is claiming that all modern concepts of identity come from here and they have the same roots whether they are fundamentalist Islamism, hyper nationalism, or other -benign and oppressed- identities such as those of women, people of colour, LGTB, etc.
Fukuyama goes on to tell us that worrying ourselves too much with the lived experience of the oppressed groups comes at the expense of the collective identity and is one of the reasons the left is failing to compete on the liberal democratic arena as it moved away from defending the working classes into defending increasingly smaller fragmented identities. If only we could ignore all that lived experience (by turning it into common experience, which he before acknowledged cannot really be done, how can a rich white man understand the struggle of a gay woman of colour for example) and move towards non-ethnic national identities that will unify us.
I don't believe this is doable. And it would be harmful if it was feasible. The "unifying national identities", even when not ethnic and openly bigoted, will inevitably demand a common denominator imposed by those in power and ignoring the nuances of what people have to live with and suffer from.
This is more the case because the solution Fukuyama suggests is only more of the same: trust liberalism, enforce representative democracy as it is now, enforce border control, make migrants assimilate, and hope for the best.
I have rarely seen a case of head in the sand so severe... but then, reading the views of privileged
rich men is good, it helps those of us who are not that; the non-white, European, rich, older, straight, in power men; know what thought of ideological battle we have to fight.
There are interesting concepts here, some are somewhat useful in the debate on identity and some just drown in Fukuyama's desire to justify himself. Let me elaborate. There is a point where he goes on about how people misread his controversial and much criticised The End of History and the Last Man, he is telling us how he was not wrong in saying that liberal democracy has won after the end of the Cold War and how we all should have finished reading the book and accepted its wisdom. Then tells us about all the things that the said book hasn't predicted.
That aside, some of the concepts that I find useful include the use of Thumos (Greek meaning spiritedness or, as used here, the human desire for recognition) and branches it into isothumia (I am as good as everyone else) and megalothumia (I am better than everyone else). He is claiming that all modern concepts of identity come from here and they have the same roots whether they are fundamentalist Islamism, hyper nationalism, or other -benign and oppressed- identities such as those of women, people of colour, LGTB, etc.
Fukuyama goes on to tell us that worrying ourselves too much with the lived experience of the oppressed groups comes at the expense of the collective identity and is one of the reasons the left is failing to compete on the liberal democratic arena as it moved away from defending the working classes into defending increasingly smaller fragmented identities. If only we could ignore all that lived experience (by turning it into common experience, which he before acknowledged cannot really be done, how can a rich white man understand the struggle of a gay woman of colour for example) and move towards non-ethnic national identities that will unify us.
I don't believe this is doable. And it would be harmful if it was feasible. The "unifying national identities", even when not ethnic and openly bigoted, will inevitably demand a common denominator imposed by those in power and ignoring the nuances of what people have to live with and suffer from.
This is more the case because the solution Fukuyama suggests is only more of the same: trust liberalism, enforce representative democracy as it is now, enforce border control, make migrants assimilate, and hope for the best.
I have rarely seen a case of head in the sand so severe... but then, reading the views of privileged
rich men is good, it helps those of us who are not that; the non-white, European, rich, older, straight, in power men; know what thought of ideological battle we have to fight.
April 17, 2019
DivIdentity
As the author states in his preface, his book was mainly written because Donald Trump was elected president of the U.S. in November 2016, and maybe a little bit because a majority of those taking part in the Brexit referendum were in favour of the UK’s leaving the EU. Fukuyama, under the impression of those two big surprises, apparently wanted to explain how these two events were possible – two events which he regards as standing in need of an explanation.
In his study Identity. Contemporary Identity Politics and the Struggle for Recognition, Fukuyama undertakes to come up with an explanation of political developments that at first sight do not seem to have anything to do with each other, but which are, in fact, two sides of one coin and which are all alarming. Why is it right-wing parties and movements that seem to profit most from the new social inequality due to the failed promise of globalization, when traditionally all those who see themselves as losers on the global market should look to left-wing parties as champions for their interests? Why are liberal values and concepts under assault from both proponents of multiculturalism and dyed-in-the-wool conservatives? Why are western societies breaking apart into a quilt of parallel societies defining themselves by religious or ethnic features rather than by adherence to the same abstract principles of democracy? Or by participation in the same global market? These are some of the questions at the basis of Fukuyama’s study, and it is obvious that the two events named at the beginning are stunning examples of the developments these questions summarize.
Fukuyama, by way of answer, points out that human beings’ needs cannot be explained merely with a view to the economy, i.e. a person’s material well-being is not the only prerequisite for their overall satisfaction. What they also need is social recognition and respect from others but also from themselves, and this is where identity comes into play, namely as people’s concept of what they are and what worth they therefore have in the world. Fukuyama even offers two cool words in this context: isothymia, i.e. “the demand to be respected on an equal basis with other people” (p.xiii), and megalothymia, i.e. “the desire to be recognized as superior” (ibd.) He then starts quite an impressive tour de force through western philosophy and politics in order to pinpoint when and how those two demands arose and shaped political thought. We go, among others, from Plato to Luther and then alight on the fur-hat-wearer Rousseau, who is not only responsible for the theoretical justification of fascism in his contrat social (what would la terreur de la vertu have been without this book?), but who also came up with the notion of there being an inner flower garden of identity within every person that has the right to be watered and admired by society because – although it should not be judged – it is good as such. In other words, Rousseau is also responsible, in a way, for the emergence of the Snowflake as a social and psychological norm. One should think that fascism and rugged individualism which is not based on what I achieved and contributed to society (good old J.T. Adams) but on what I think makes me oh so special and interesting, are two concepts that rule each other out, and yet Rousseau still manages to hold them at the same time. But you may well expect this elasticity of principles from a despicable man who writes a book on education but dumps his own five children into orphanages in order to save himself time and money.
However, let’s return to Fukuyama: As someone who has read Roger Scruton, for instance, the statement that humans are not merely homines oikonomici but that they also (and maybe even basically) define themselves with reference to their culture, their history, and whatever ties them to the region they live in, was not too new to me so that I was already familiar with the starting point of Fukuyama’s argument. However, his distinction between the two major currents the quest for respect can follow was something that added to the thoughts of Scruton and others. In the author’s own words,
In his presentation of these two diverging developments, Fukuyama never tires of showing the potential dangers of the collective identities because their proponents may “often play by democratic rules, but harbour potentially illiberal tendencies due to their longings for unity and community.” (p.69) His scepticism with regard to “[w]hite nationalism […] in Europe” even leads him to equate it with fascism as such (cf. p. 121). Here at the latest, I could not help wondering at Fukuyama’s readiness to simplify history in order to arrive at a point that may curry favour with some of his readers. It is true that an extremely vitriolic variety of nationalism culminated in fascist regimes in various European countries but it is certainly a grossly rash conclusion to say that European nationalism “was called fascism” (ibd.)* What about countries like France and Great Britain, which evinced a high degree of nationalism in the 19th and 20th centuries but where fascism never stood a realistic chance? Apart from that, if you go back in history and look at the origins of nationalism, let’s say in Germany, you will find that it was at first the twin-brother of liberalism. This is quite logical – and stands in contradiction to Fukuyama’s fine, but simply academic, discrimination between individualism/liberalism and nationalism/religion – in that the early liberals who demanded basic civic rights from their governments had to base their claims on something that all those people who would benefit from these civic rights had in common: This was their belonging to one nation. If you no longer saw the state as the personal property of a dynasty but postulated the citizens’ right to have their say, you would have to find some common ground to replace (or complete) people’s attachment to their feudal sovereign, and this was the concept of nation.
What is more, in his final chapters – for me, by the way, the best of the whole book – Fukuyama himself comes to the conclusion that abstract legalistic loyalties like acknowledging the rule of law and diversity as a value as such, will, despite their importance, not be sufficient to ensure the survival of democratic societies as we know them:
The concept of nationhood at the bottom of a liberal democracy may even make such a kind of government practicable: ”Democracy means that the people are sovereign, but if there is no way of delimiting who the people are, they cannot exercise democratic choice.” (p.139)
While reading the last three chapters of his book, where Fukuyama shows fair judgment of the problems threatening modern democracies and, by propagating a creedal national identity, also offers a sensible solution to a lot of these problems, I kept asking myself whether his clear-cut distinction between liberalism/individualism and nationalism/common ground is not at variance with the cleverest parts of his book.
Fukuyama also succeeds in explaining the renascent attraction right-wing political groups exert on large numbers of people in Europe and North America, and at the same time he points out one of the most fundamental mistakes the old left has made, namely its complete change of focus from addressing social inequality to concentrating on righting the wrongs of smaller interest groups that define themselves in terms of culture, gender or sexual orientation. Of course, Fukuyama does not deny that there was actually some reason for addressing some of the issues these groups had and trying to set them right, but he is also awake to the consequences this had: Large parts of the traditional working classes felt themselves and their values disrespected and became prone to looking for a political home on the other side of the party spectrum. Apart from this, too great a focus on whatever special rights certain interest groups might want to claim for themselves, poses another, more principal problem, namely that of discarding democratic and liberal principles. In Fukuyama’s own words:
One might also say, “who – via birth – are made to participate in them”, and then the dangers (e.g. its long-term tendency to undermine legal equality and the liberal constitution as such) and injustices a naïve multiculturalism carries with it might become even clearer. Even Fukuyama himself sometimes fails to see its dangers, as for instance when he says that religious identity may ”take the innocuous form of wearing a hijab to work” (p.72). One should well think about what such a garment stands for, and that in some countries it is imposed by a patriarch culture on its women who have no choice but to wear it, and also that in certain Muslim communities in Europe every woman wearing a hijab adds to the social pressure exerted on those who do not and neither want to, before one labels such a decision merely “innocuous” instead of admitting the complexity of the implications it has.
There are also other particulars in which I tend to disagree with Fukuyama, wholly or by degrees, for instance in his statement that the deleterious effects of the ideology of political correctness on free speech are greatly exaggerated (cf. p.121), or his general acclaim for a European super-state (although he does address the lack of democratic structures in the EU bureaucracy), and there was one passage I really found annoying, namely this one: ”And as a result of the bitter Israeli-Palestinian conflict, many Muslims displayed a kind of anti-Semitism that Europe had been vigilant in suppressing since the end of World War II.” (p.148) I would still say, and I’m sure that Fukuyama would agree with me, that it is the anti-Semite himself that is to blame for his anti-Semitism, and not some excuse he may come up with.
So, after all these lengthy considerations, what do I have to say about this book? On the one hand, it offers deep insight into the identity crises – I am deliberately using the plural here – we are going through, and into why the Left is losing so much ground to the Right (not a truly conservative right, but often a plainly populistic one), and it offers a sensible remedy to these our ailments. The only problem being that people might not be overly ready to apply this remedy to their way of thinking: People on the far right will not like to part with their exclusive concept of nationhood because it disguises their xenophobia, and people on the left will not give up their concept of multiculturalism because in furthering it, they get high on the impression of their own moral superiority, cheaply for themselves, but dearly at the expense of their own liberal society. I cannot see all the parts of Fukuyama’s theoretical introduction really lead to the conclusions he draws, as I’ve already said, and neither do I agree fully with all his observations and assessments. All in all, for me the book was a mixed bag, a rather full but still a mixed one.
* The way Fukuyama presents his argument makes it impossible to tell whether he himself considers “white nationalism” fascist or whether he presents the perspective of its opponents, the text being slightly ambiguous here.
As the author states in his preface, his book was mainly written because Donald Trump was elected president of the U.S. in November 2016, and maybe a little bit because a majority of those taking part in the Brexit referendum were in favour of the UK’s leaving the EU. Fukuyama, under the impression of those two big surprises, apparently wanted to explain how these two events were possible – two events which he regards as standing in need of an explanation.
In his study Identity. Contemporary Identity Politics and the Struggle for Recognition, Fukuyama undertakes to come up with an explanation of political developments that at first sight do not seem to have anything to do with each other, but which are, in fact, two sides of one coin and which are all alarming. Why is it right-wing parties and movements that seem to profit most from the new social inequality due to the failed promise of globalization, when traditionally all those who see themselves as losers on the global market should look to left-wing parties as champions for their interests? Why are liberal values and concepts under assault from both proponents of multiculturalism and dyed-in-the-wool conservatives? Why are western societies breaking apart into a quilt of parallel societies defining themselves by religious or ethnic features rather than by adherence to the same abstract principles of democracy? Or by participation in the same global market? These are some of the questions at the basis of Fukuyama’s study, and it is obvious that the two events named at the beginning are stunning examples of the developments these questions summarize.
Fukuyama, by way of answer, points out that human beings’ needs cannot be explained merely with a view to the economy, i.e. a person’s material well-being is not the only prerequisite for their overall satisfaction. What they also need is social recognition and respect from others but also from themselves, and this is where identity comes into play, namely as people’s concept of what they are and what worth they therefore have in the world. Fukuyama even offers two cool words in this context: isothymia, i.e. “the demand to be respected on an equal basis with other people” (p.xiii), and megalothymia, i.e. “the desire to be recognized as superior” (ibd.) He then starts quite an impressive tour de force through western philosophy and politics in order to pinpoint when and how those two demands arose and shaped political thought. We go, among others, from Plato to Luther and then alight on the fur-hat-wearer Rousseau, who is not only responsible for the theoretical justification of fascism in his contrat social (what would la terreur de la vertu have been without this book?), but who also came up with the notion of there being an inner flower garden of identity within every person that has the right to be watered and admired by society because – although it should not be judged – it is good as such. In other words, Rousseau is also responsible, in a way, for the emergence of the Snowflake as a social and psychological norm. One should think that fascism and rugged individualism which is not based on what I achieved and contributed to society (good old J.T. Adams) but on what I think makes me oh so special and interesting, are two concepts that rule each other out, and yet Rousseau still manages to hold them at the same time. But you may well expect this elasticity of principles from a despicable man who writes a book on education but dumps his own five children into orphanages in order to save himself time and money.
However, let’s return to Fukuyama: As someone who has read Roger Scruton, for instance, the statement that humans are not merely homines oikonomici but that they also (and maybe even basically) define themselves with reference to their culture, their history, and whatever ties them to the region they live in, was not too new to me so that I was already familiar with the starting point of Fukuyama’s argument. However, his distinction between the two major currents the quest for respect can follow was something that added to the thoughts of Scruton and others. In the author’s own words,
”understandings of dignity forked in two directions during the nineteenth century, toward a liberal individualism that came to be embedded in the political rights of modern liberal democracies, and toward collective identities that could be defined by either nation or religion.” (p.91)
In his presentation of these two diverging developments, Fukuyama never tires of showing the potential dangers of the collective identities because their proponents may “often play by democratic rules, but harbour potentially illiberal tendencies due to their longings for unity and community.” (p.69) His scepticism with regard to “[w]hite nationalism […] in Europe” even leads him to equate it with fascism as such (cf. p. 121). Here at the latest, I could not help wondering at Fukuyama’s readiness to simplify history in order to arrive at a point that may curry favour with some of his readers. It is true that an extremely vitriolic variety of nationalism culminated in fascist regimes in various European countries but it is certainly a grossly rash conclusion to say that European nationalism “was called fascism” (ibd.)* What about countries like France and Great Britain, which evinced a high degree of nationalism in the 19th and 20th centuries but where fascism never stood a realistic chance? Apart from that, if you go back in history and look at the origins of nationalism, let’s say in Germany, you will find that it was at first the twin-brother of liberalism. This is quite logical – and stands in contradiction to Fukuyama’s fine, but simply academic, discrimination between individualism/liberalism and nationalism/religion – in that the early liberals who demanded basic civic rights from their governments had to base their claims on something that all those people who would benefit from these civic rights had in common: This was their belonging to one nation. If you no longer saw the state as the personal property of a dynasty but postulated the citizens’ right to have their say, you would have to find some common ground to replace (or complete) people’s attachment to their feudal sovereign, and this was the concept of nation.
What is more, in his final chapters – for me, by the way, the best of the whole book – Fukuyama himself comes to the conclusion that abstract legalistic loyalties like acknowledging the rule of law and diversity as a value as such, will, despite their importance, not be sufficient to ensure the survival of democratic societies as we know them:
”A liberal democracy is an implicit contract between citizens and their government, and among the citizens themselves, under which they give up certain rights in order that the government protects other rights that are more basic and important. National identity is built around the legitimacy of this contract; if citizens do not believe they are part of the same polity, the system will not function. […] Citizens often have to accept outcomes they do not like or prefer, in the interest of a common good; a culture of tolerance and mutual sympathy must override partisan passions.” (p.130f.)
The concept of nationhood at the bottom of a liberal democracy may even make such a kind of government practicable: ”Democracy means that the people are sovereign, but if there is no way of delimiting who the people are, they cannot exercise democratic choice.” (p.139)
While reading the last three chapters of his book, where Fukuyama shows fair judgment of the problems threatening modern democracies and, by propagating a creedal national identity, also offers a sensible solution to a lot of these problems, I kept asking myself whether his clear-cut distinction between liberalism/individualism and nationalism/common ground is not at variance with the cleverest parts of his book.
Fukuyama also succeeds in explaining the renascent attraction right-wing political groups exert on large numbers of people in Europe and North America, and at the same time he points out one of the most fundamental mistakes the old left has made, namely its complete change of focus from addressing social inequality to concentrating on righting the wrongs of smaller interest groups that define themselves in terms of culture, gender or sexual orientation. Of course, Fukuyama does not deny that there was actually some reason for addressing some of the issues these groups had and trying to set them right, but he is also awake to the consequences this had: Large parts of the traditional working classes felt themselves and their values disrespected and became prone to looking for a political home on the other side of the party spectrum. Apart from this, too great a focus on whatever special rights certain interest groups might want to claim for themselves, poses another, more principal problem, namely that of discarding democratic and liberal principles. In Fukuyama’s own words:
”Multiculturalism was a description of societies that were de facto diverse. […] While classical liberalism sought to protect the autonomy of equal individuals, the new ideology of multiculturalism promoted equal respect for cultures, even if those cultures abridged the autonomy of the individuals who participated in them.” (p.111)
One might also say, “who – via birth – are made to participate in them”, and then the dangers (e.g. its long-term tendency to undermine legal equality and the liberal constitution as such) and injustices a naïve multiculturalism carries with it might become even clearer. Even Fukuyama himself sometimes fails to see its dangers, as for instance when he says that religious identity may ”take the innocuous form of wearing a hijab to work” (p.72). One should well think about what such a garment stands for, and that in some countries it is imposed by a patriarch culture on its women who have no choice but to wear it, and also that in certain Muslim communities in Europe every woman wearing a hijab adds to the social pressure exerted on those who do not and neither want to, before one labels such a decision merely “innocuous” instead of admitting the complexity of the implications it has.
There are also other particulars in which I tend to disagree with Fukuyama, wholly or by degrees, for instance in his statement that the deleterious effects of the ideology of political correctness on free speech are greatly exaggerated (cf. p.121), or his general acclaim for a European super-state (although he does address the lack of democratic structures in the EU bureaucracy), and there was one passage I really found annoying, namely this one: ”And as a result of the bitter Israeli-Palestinian conflict, many Muslims displayed a kind of anti-Semitism that Europe had been vigilant in suppressing since the end of World War II.” (p.148) I would still say, and I’m sure that Fukuyama would agree with me, that it is the anti-Semite himself that is to blame for his anti-Semitism, and not some excuse he may come up with.
So, after all these lengthy considerations, what do I have to say about this book? On the one hand, it offers deep insight into the identity crises – I am deliberately using the plural here – we are going through, and into why the Left is losing so much ground to the Right (not a truly conservative right, but often a plainly populistic one), and it offers a sensible remedy to these our ailments. The only problem being that people might not be overly ready to apply this remedy to their way of thinking: People on the far right will not like to part with their exclusive concept of nationhood because it disguises their xenophobia, and people on the left will not give up their concept of multiculturalism because in furthering it, they get high on the impression of their own moral superiority, cheaply for themselves, but dearly at the expense of their own liberal society. I cannot see all the parts of Fukuyama’s theoretical introduction really lead to the conclusions he draws, as I’ve already said, and neither do I agree fully with all his observations and assessments. All in all, for me the book was a mixed bag, a rather full but still a mixed one.
* The way Fukuyama presents his argument makes it impossible to tell whether he himself considers “white nationalism” fascist or whether he presents the perspective of its opponents, the text being slightly ambiguous here.
January 28, 2020
Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment, by Francis Fukuyama, is an interesting book discussing the recent trends and growth in identity politics. Fukuyama posits that this is a natural expression of liberal democracy, as society continues to promote freedom and examine ways to bring concepts and concrete improvements to this in society. Fukuyama looks at identity politics as one of the highest forms of expression. In the past, many countries existed as monarchies and aristocracies - where the domain of politics, free will, expression and even self esteem were the domain of the ruling class. The vast majority of people lived in small villages or towns where social and political hierarchy was static. People worked long hours for their survival, and this left little time for contemplation of self. This began to change when figures like Martin Luther began to question the place of self in society. Luther looked at Christianity and was critical of the Catholic Church for controlling how people interacted with God. He posited that the domain of the spirit was within each individual, and communicating with God was a deeply personal event that could not be controlled by an external hierarchy. The development of Protestantism and its effect of Europe and eventually, the United States, has had a direct and tangible impact on how liberal democracy has emerged, and is in some ways a central tenant of this political theory.
Liberal democracies, however, have not always been so focused on freedom. Although the United States constitution, as well as the rhetoric of its founding politicians, clearly discusses the universal rights of man, this definition was at the time very narrow. Women, renters, the poor, racial and sexual minorities, indigenous peoples, and many more, were excluded from this definition. Instead, the systems were built for white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant men of wealth. This changed over time, with the continued application of universal rights to more and more categories of people, from women's suffragists, to civil rights, to sexual minorities and so on. This process has yet to be completed fully, and the increasingly numerous categories that people are dividing into, is the topic of this book. Fukuyama examines the concept of thymos, which he attributes to the spirit. This concept is justified in feelings of pride and respect - feelings that most want to feel. This concept also expands into demanding respect from others, and to having more respect than others, or feeling superior.
This concept is looked at through a few lenses. Fukuyama states that the first instances of this concept being challenged revolved around nationalism, then religion. States globally began to embrace concepts of pride, superiority and respect in the creation of their states - Germany and Italy amalgamated from small states that shared a common ethnicity. France and Great Britain formed through the forcible absorption over time of neighbouring states with somewhat different cultures and languages. Many of these nations emerged due to a groups feelings of repression, or need to separate their own unique identities from those of others. Similarly, this concept has been used to promote women's rights, the rights of minorities within polities like the United States and Canada - nations that have no real ethnic identity, and within communities that share common characteristics - like Muslim immigrants in Europe, for example. These concepts are mercurial. Woman's, minorities, and sexual minorities rights are all important topics to be discussed, and have legitimate concerns associated with them, like sexual exploitation in the workplace, or lacking rights that are a given to the majority group. However, this need for recognition and respect can also be destructive. Nationalists, racists, the Islamic State and so on all utilize this rhetoric.
Fukuyama looks at how identity politics has been damaging in some respects. On the Left of the political spectrum, tradition has it that these parties often promote the interest of the working class, looking at class above other considerations. However, this has changed. Much activism is being generated in terms of various individual groups demanding more rights and respect. This can be very positive, but can also detract from those most in need. A woman who is passed over for a coveted top position in a large company because of her sex is indeed a serious issue. But this woman also exists at the top of the pay scale. Regardless of whether she receives 10% less on her salary than her male counterpart, this is a dispute between elite, and does not address concerns about equality in society much. (To be totally clear, I am not downplaying the importance of this topic - women CEO's should receive the same salaries as their male counterparts, no question). The underclass of society continues to suffer from lack of resources, but also a lack of thymos. This, rightly or wrongly, contributes to attitudes that can be attributed to growing movements; white, Republican voters in the US espousing racist nationalism, anti-immigrant autocrats in Poland and Hungary, Brexiteers in the UK, and so on. Although this by no means downplays the pressing issues of equality in society, the reaction to these discussions on identity have created an avenue where the extreme right has co-opted the tactics and rhetoric of those on the left fighting for equality within specific groups, to be used by a majority who may be experiencing the stressors of changing identities, conceptions of their nations, as well as the pressing concerns of inequality, poverty and warfare.
Fukuyama is clear that he does not agree with those on the right co-opting this strategy, and is quite insistent that they have the wrong idea in terms of rights. Regardless, feelings of disrespect and alienation, clear hallmarks of a political left promoting greater recognition of traditionally oppressed identities, is also a strategy being used by the right. Fukuyama is reflecting on the dangers of this type of rhetoric, and how it can divide societies into smaller and smaller groups that on paper should be getting along well, but instead feel they are at odds. The dangers of this rhetoric are clear. The Islamic State used this type of identity politics to recruit among a wide range of Muslim's disaffected by Europe's failure to give them opportunities to contribute to their new homes. White nationalists turn the tables on Black Live Matters, co-opting their demands for justice in society (a strategy that white supremacists have used before).
Fukuyama sees the issues not as the fight for rights at all (this is a noble and worthy cause) but the fact that an overarching identity is not present. He looks at the idea of an over-culture (possibly the principles of liberal democracy) as one such solution. An avenue for the promotion of rights for individual groups should exist, but there should also be a recognition of a common identity that transcends, in some respects, any other identity. Multiculturalism as a topic is discussed as a possibility, where groups can express themselves however they like, and are treated with equal respect and opportunity, so long as the laws of the nation they are in is respected. If someone can be who they want to be, and focus on self-esteem and thymos, than so should everyone else.
This was an interesting book. It is a very brief discussion on identity politics, characterizing some of the positives and negatives of the rhetoric of these ideas. I personally do not agree with all of Fukuyama's arguments, for example, he promotes freedom of speech in every case, even where that speech may hurt or target others. His example - someone can be a holocaust denier all they want in their own mind or home, and in public, these ideas should be given an avenue for discussion, even if most people would deride them (and rightfully so). In my mind, someone's right to free speech ends when that speech causes harm to others - if it incites violence, promotes the demotion of rights, dehumanizes and so on. Even so, this book offers an interesting perspective on identity politics and the complexity and controversial nature of the topic. In the age of Donald Trump, Putin, Erdogan, and so on - this topic will increasingly become a theory to be tested and somehow integrated into our growing conceptions of liberal democracy. The discussion here is interesting, insightful, and offers Fukuyama's thoughts on this complex issue. It offers some grandscale solutions as well. Worth a read for those interested in topics like nationalism, current politics, or identity politics.
Liberal democracies, however, have not always been so focused on freedom. Although the United States constitution, as well as the rhetoric of its founding politicians, clearly discusses the universal rights of man, this definition was at the time very narrow. Women, renters, the poor, racial and sexual minorities, indigenous peoples, and many more, were excluded from this definition. Instead, the systems were built for white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant men of wealth. This changed over time, with the continued application of universal rights to more and more categories of people, from women's suffragists, to civil rights, to sexual minorities and so on. This process has yet to be completed fully, and the increasingly numerous categories that people are dividing into, is the topic of this book. Fukuyama examines the concept of thymos, which he attributes to the spirit. This concept is justified in feelings of pride and respect - feelings that most want to feel. This concept also expands into demanding respect from others, and to having more respect than others, or feeling superior.
This concept is looked at through a few lenses. Fukuyama states that the first instances of this concept being challenged revolved around nationalism, then religion. States globally began to embrace concepts of pride, superiority and respect in the creation of their states - Germany and Italy amalgamated from small states that shared a common ethnicity. France and Great Britain formed through the forcible absorption over time of neighbouring states with somewhat different cultures and languages. Many of these nations emerged due to a groups feelings of repression, or need to separate their own unique identities from those of others. Similarly, this concept has been used to promote women's rights, the rights of minorities within polities like the United States and Canada - nations that have no real ethnic identity, and within communities that share common characteristics - like Muslim immigrants in Europe, for example. These concepts are mercurial. Woman's, minorities, and sexual minorities rights are all important topics to be discussed, and have legitimate concerns associated with them, like sexual exploitation in the workplace, or lacking rights that are a given to the majority group. However, this need for recognition and respect can also be destructive. Nationalists, racists, the Islamic State and so on all utilize this rhetoric.
Fukuyama looks at how identity politics has been damaging in some respects. On the Left of the political spectrum, tradition has it that these parties often promote the interest of the working class, looking at class above other considerations. However, this has changed. Much activism is being generated in terms of various individual groups demanding more rights and respect. This can be very positive, but can also detract from those most in need. A woman who is passed over for a coveted top position in a large company because of her sex is indeed a serious issue. But this woman also exists at the top of the pay scale. Regardless of whether she receives 10% less on her salary than her male counterpart, this is a dispute between elite, and does not address concerns about equality in society much. (To be totally clear, I am not downplaying the importance of this topic - women CEO's should receive the same salaries as their male counterparts, no question). The underclass of society continues to suffer from lack of resources, but also a lack of thymos. This, rightly or wrongly, contributes to attitudes that can be attributed to growing movements; white, Republican voters in the US espousing racist nationalism, anti-immigrant autocrats in Poland and Hungary, Brexiteers in the UK, and so on. Although this by no means downplays the pressing issues of equality in society, the reaction to these discussions on identity have created an avenue where the extreme right has co-opted the tactics and rhetoric of those on the left fighting for equality within specific groups, to be used by a majority who may be experiencing the stressors of changing identities, conceptions of their nations, as well as the pressing concerns of inequality, poverty and warfare.
Fukuyama is clear that he does not agree with those on the right co-opting this strategy, and is quite insistent that they have the wrong idea in terms of rights. Regardless, feelings of disrespect and alienation, clear hallmarks of a political left promoting greater recognition of traditionally oppressed identities, is also a strategy being used by the right. Fukuyama is reflecting on the dangers of this type of rhetoric, and how it can divide societies into smaller and smaller groups that on paper should be getting along well, but instead feel they are at odds. The dangers of this rhetoric are clear. The Islamic State used this type of identity politics to recruit among a wide range of Muslim's disaffected by Europe's failure to give them opportunities to contribute to their new homes. White nationalists turn the tables on Black Live Matters, co-opting their demands for justice in society (a strategy that white supremacists have used before).
Fukuyama sees the issues not as the fight for rights at all (this is a noble and worthy cause) but the fact that an overarching identity is not present. He looks at the idea of an over-culture (possibly the principles of liberal democracy) as one such solution. An avenue for the promotion of rights for individual groups should exist, but there should also be a recognition of a common identity that transcends, in some respects, any other identity. Multiculturalism as a topic is discussed as a possibility, where groups can express themselves however they like, and are treated with equal respect and opportunity, so long as the laws of the nation they are in is respected. If someone can be who they want to be, and focus on self-esteem and thymos, than so should everyone else.
This was an interesting book. It is a very brief discussion on identity politics, characterizing some of the positives and negatives of the rhetoric of these ideas. I personally do not agree with all of Fukuyama's arguments, for example, he promotes freedom of speech in every case, even where that speech may hurt or target others. His example - someone can be a holocaust denier all they want in their own mind or home, and in public, these ideas should be given an avenue for discussion, even if most people would deride them (and rightfully so). In my mind, someone's right to free speech ends when that speech causes harm to others - if it incites violence, promotes the demotion of rights, dehumanizes and so on. Even so, this book offers an interesting perspective on identity politics and the complexity and controversial nature of the topic. In the age of Donald Trump, Putin, Erdogan, and so on - this topic will increasingly become a theory to be tested and somehow integrated into our growing conceptions of liberal democracy. The discussion here is interesting, insightful, and offers Fukuyama's thoughts on this complex issue. It offers some grandscale solutions as well. Worth a read for those interested in topics like nationalism, current politics, or identity politics.
December 10, 2018
This new book by Francis Fukuyama about the hot issue in the US and EU politics today – identity. He doesn’t take neither left nor right side in the debate, but shows that the debate itself maybe out of focus.
He starts with Plato's The Republic and introduces concept of thymos - third part of the soul (first two are desires and reason, roughly equivalent to id and ego concepts of Freud) acts completely independently of the first two. It is the seat of judgments of worth: like a drug addict wants to be a productive employee or a loving mother. Human beings crave positive judgments about their worth or dignity. Those judgments can come from within, but they are most often made by other people in the society around them who recognize their worth. If they receive that positive judgment, they feel pride, and if they do not receive it, they feel either anger (when they think they are being undervalued) or shame (when they realize that they have not lived up to other people’s standards).
This leads to two more concepts: isothymia (all people have equal worth) and megalothymia (some people are better). Note that the latter case doesn’t mean only racist douchebags, but everyone, who thinks that e.g. it would be ok to kill Hitler or Stalin (assuming some people are worse). To some extent thymos is similar to virtues as described by Deirdre N. McCloskey in The Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for an Age of Commerce.
Then the author discusses Martin Luther, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Nietzsche, who added to the modern concept of identity. In the classical liberalism of the nineteenth century, the state was held responsible for protecting basic rights such as freedom of speech and association, for upholding a rule of law, and for providing essential public services such as police, roads, and education. The government “recognized” its citizens by granting them individual rights, but the state was not seen as responsible for making each individual feel better about himself or herself.
In the second half of twentieth century the focus shifted: “the triumph of the therapeutic” (see Philip Rieff), when the decline of a shared moral horizon defined by religion had left a huge void that was being filled by psychologists preaching a new religion of psychotherapy. Traditional culture, according to Rieff, “is another name for a design of motive directing the self outward, toward those communal purposes in which alone the self can be realized and satisfied.” As such it played a therapeutic role, giving purpose to individuals, connecting them to others, and teaching them their place in the universe. But that outer culture had been denounced as an iron cage imprisoning the inner self; people were told to liberate their inner selves, to be “authentic” and “committed,” but without being told to what they should be committed. Under the therapeutic model, however, an individual’s happiness depends on his or her self-esteem, and self-esteem is a by-product of public recognition. Governments are readily able to give away public recognition in the way that they talk about and treat their citizens, so modern liberal societies naturally and perhaps inevitably began to take on the responsibility for raising the self-esteem of each and every one of their citizens.
The disillusionment is classic left (communists) after the 1960s shifted the left from the industrial working class and Marxist revolution to the rights of minorities and immigrants, the status of women, environmentalism, and the like. This actually is one of the reasons that white blue collars voted for Trump or Brexit – they still have problems, but the left care mainly about other issues. It was easier to talk about respect and dignity than to come up with potentially costly plans that would concretely reduce inequality. The left continued to be defined by its passion for equality, but that agenda shifted from its earlier emphasis on the conditions of the working class to the often psychological demands of an ever-widening circle of marginalized groups. Many activists came to see the old working class and their trade unions as a privileged stratum with little sympathy for the plight of groups such as immigrants or racial minorities worse off than they were. Recognition struggles targeted newer groups and their rights as groups, rather than the economic inequality of individuals. In the process, the old working class was left behind.
According to Fukuyama, the right currently hi-jacked the left’s identity politics, vocally protecting not the usual targets (black, women, LGBTQ+) but native-born workers and dominant long-established cultural identities. The latter can also feel threatened and it doesn’t matter whether there is a real fact under this threat – the identity is subjective by definition!
What he suggests? He fully agrees that there is inequality and a greater equality of opportunity is desirable. He likes the idea of Bassam Tibi’s Leitkultur, “leading culture,” as the basis for a national identity, which was defined in liberal Enlightenment terms as belief in equality and democratic values.
He starts with Plato's The Republic and introduces concept of thymos - third part of the soul (first two are desires and reason, roughly equivalent to id and ego concepts of Freud) acts completely independently of the first two. It is the seat of judgments of worth: like a drug addict wants to be a productive employee or a loving mother. Human beings crave positive judgments about their worth or dignity. Those judgments can come from within, but they are most often made by other people in the society around them who recognize their worth. If they receive that positive judgment, they feel pride, and if they do not receive it, they feel either anger (when they think they are being undervalued) or shame (when they realize that they have not lived up to other people’s standards).
This leads to two more concepts: isothymia (all people have equal worth) and megalothymia (some people are better). Note that the latter case doesn’t mean only racist douchebags, but everyone, who thinks that e.g. it would be ok to kill Hitler or Stalin (assuming some people are worse). To some extent thymos is similar to virtues as described by Deirdre N. McCloskey in The Bourgeois Virtues: Ethics for an Age of Commerce.
Then the author discusses Martin Luther, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Nietzsche, who added to the modern concept of identity. In the classical liberalism of the nineteenth century, the state was held responsible for protecting basic rights such as freedom of speech and association, for upholding a rule of law, and for providing essential public services such as police, roads, and education. The government “recognized” its citizens by granting them individual rights, but the state was not seen as responsible for making each individual feel better about himself or herself.
In the second half of twentieth century the focus shifted: “the triumph of the therapeutic” (see Philip Rieff), when the decline of a shared moral horizon defined by religion had left a huge void that was being filled by psychologists preaching a new religion of psychotherapy. Traditional culture, according to Rieff, “is another name for a design of motive directing the self outward, toward those communal purposes in which alone the self can be realized and satisfied.” As such it played a therapeutic role, giving purpose to individuals, connecting them to others, and teaching them their place in the universe. But that outer culture had been denounced as an iron cage imprisoning the inner self; people were told to liberate their inner selves, to be “authentic” and “committed,” but without being told to what they should be committed. Under the therapeutic model, however, an individual’s happiness depends on his or her self-esteem, and self-esteem is a by-product of public recognition. Governments are readily able to give away public recognition in the way that they talk about and treat their citizens, so modern liberal societies naturally and perhaps inevitably began to take on the responsibility for raising the self-esteem of each and every one of their citizens.
The disillusionment is classic left (communists) after the 1960s shifted the left from the industrial working class and Marxist revolution to the rights of minorities and immigrants, the status of women, environmentalism, and the like. This actually is one of the reasons that white blue collars voted for Trump or Brexit – they still have problems, but the left care mainly about other issues. It was easier to talk about respect and dignity than to come up with potentially costly plans that would concretely reduce inequality. The left continued to be defined by its passion for equality, but that agenda shifted from its earlier emphasis on the conditions of the working class to the often psychological demands of an ever-widening circle of marginalized groups. Many activists came to see the old working class and their trade unions as a privileged stratum with little sympathy for the plight of groups such as immigrants or racial minorities worse off than they were. Recognition struggles targeted newer groups and their rights as groups, rather than the economic inequality of individuals. In the process, the old working class was left behind.
According to Fukuyama, the right currently hi-jacked the left’s identity politics, vocally protecting not the usual targets (black, women, LGBTQ+) but native-born workers and dominant long-established cultural identities. The latter can also feel threatened and it doesn’t matter whether there is a real fact under this threat – the identity is subjective by definition!
What he suggests? He fully agrees that there is inequality and a greater equality of opportunity is desirable. He likes the idea of Bassam Tibi’s Leitkultur, “leading culture,” as the basis for a national identity, which was defined in liberal Enlightenment terms as belief in equality and democratic values.
October 28, 2018
3.5
After hearing about the book on NPR my husband suggested I read Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment by Frances Fukuyama.
One thing I appreciated about this book is how the author presents his arguments, explains them, and before he moves on restates his case to that point. It really makes it easier for the general reader because this is a theoretical book.
The author begins with a brief history of the development of identity, from the ancient Greeks through the Reformation and the Age of Enlightenment and revolutions in France and America to establish the rising concept of individual's need for dignity and personal recognition. He discusses how democratic governments have failed to "fully live up to their underlying ideals of freedom and equality," with the violation of the rights of the poor and weaker citizens at the hand of the few rich and powerful.
Another aspect he traces is the rise of industrialization and cities which broke down traditional communities. The social upheaval and adjustment to a blended society left a nostalgia for a remembered and idealized past.
He blames the contemporary left for focusing on "ever smaller groups" instead of "large collectivities such as the working class or economically exploited." He also blames the rise of "self-actualization" as a form of narcissism. He sees the rise of Multiculturalism as divisive. Fukuyama calls for the need of a strong national identity, with an official language and civics classes and share cultural values. This need not negate diversity. He writes, 'National identities can be built around liberal and democratic political values, and the common experiences that provide the connect tissue around which diverse communities can thrive." He mentions India, France, Canada as countries who have successfully created a strong national identity that embraces a diverse population.
Fukuyama asks, "How do we translate these abstract ideas into concrete policies at the current movement?" He continues, "We can start by trying to counter the specific abuses that have driven assertions of identity," by protecting the rights of minorities and women, and promoting "creedal national identities" based on the ideals of a liberal democracy. He also calls for better assimilation of immigrants.
My frustration is that the policies presented are not easily or quickly accomplished. This past week Democratic leaders were targeted with pipe bombs and a gunman walked into a synagogue and murdered Jewish worshippers. A friend told me her coworkers believe that these events are hoaxes propagated by Democrats. Considering the political leaders who are today in control of the American government, I don't see implementation of any useful policies coming out of Washington, D.C.
These books were challenging reads and I am glad I read them. They are interesting as a study of how we 'got to here' but I left with the need for something more to hold on to, something concrete that offers me real hope and surety.
After hearing about the book on NPR my husband suggested I read Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment by Frances Fukuyama.
One thing I appreciated about this book is how the author presents his arguments, explains them, and before he moves on restates his case to that point. It really makes it easier for the general reader because this is a theoretical book.
The author begins with a brief history of the development of identity, from the ancient Greeks through the Reformation and the Age of Enlightenment and revolutions in France and America to establish the rising concept of individual's need for dignity and personal recognition. He discusses how democratic governments have failed to "fully live up to their underlying ideals of freedom and equality," with the violation of the rights of the poor and weaker citizens at the hand of the few rich and powerful.
Another aspect he traces is the rise of industrialization and cities which broke down traditional communities. The social upheaval and adjustment to a blended society left a nostalgia for a remembered and idealized past.
He blames the contemporary left for focusing on "ever smaller groups" instead of "large collectivities such as the working class or economically exploited." He also blames the rise of "self-actualization" as a form of narcissism. He sees the rise of Multiculturalism as divisive. Fukuyama calls for the need of a strong national identity, with an official language and civics classes and share cultural values. This need not negate diversity. He writes, 'National identities can be built around liberal and democratic political values, and the common experiences that provide the connect tissue around which diverse communities can thrive." He mentions India, France, Canada as countries who have successfully created a strong national identity that embraces a diverse population.
Fukuyama asks, "How do we translate these abstract ideas into concrete policies at the current movement?" He continues, "We can start by trying to counter the specific abuses that have driven assertions of identity," by protecting the rights of minorities and women, and promoting "creedal national identities" based on the ideals of a liberal democracy. He also calls for better assimilation of immigrants.
My frustration is that the policies presented are not easily or quickly accomplished. This past week Democratic leaders were targeted with pipe bombs and a gunman walked into a synagogue and murdered Jewish worshippers. A friend told me her coworkers believe that these events are hoaxes propagated by Democrats. Considering the political leaders who are today in control of the American government, I don't see implementation of any useful policies coming out of Washington, D.C.
These books were challenging reads and I am glad I read them. They are interesting as a study of how we 'got to here' but I left with the need for something more to hold on to, something concrete that offers me real hope and surety.
June 13, 2018
Identifying is innate
Francis Fukuyama’ Identity starts off very badly, with a bizarre defense of his famous claim that the crumbling of the USSR and the dismantling of the Berlin Wall constituted “the end of history”. Like a Donald Trump (who gets more criticism than everyone else in the book combined), he doubles down on the statement by claiming what it says is nothing like what he meant. He claims to have used a completely different meaning for the word “end” as in “target” or “objective”. Similarly, “history” is actually a word from “Hegelian-Marxist terminology” meaning “development” or “modernization”. Finally, the original use, as an essay title, had a question mark at the end (the later book of the same title did not). So apparently, Fukuyama was saying “The Objective of Modernization?” but it came out End of History. Our bad. It all reminds me of the Rodney King trial, in which police lawyers made the jury review every frame of the beating video until they “proved” that no beating ever took place.
With that out of the way, Identity settles down into a treatise on identity through the ages. From Socrates lecturing on choices to Rousseau on how the first man to have found a use for minerals claimed the land it was on as his own private property – and everybody acquiescing. Next up is Martin Luther, who disintermediated the Catholic Church – or thought he did. Through it all, identity kept changing.
Fukuyama’s current thinking is that there are three parts to identity – thymos, or need for recognition, the recognition of the inner self as opposed to the outer, and dignity, which touches on respect and equality.
His excuse for the disappearance of the left worldwide, particularly in an era of increasingly outrageous inequality is that the message was “misdelivered by the post office”. It went to religions and to nationalists instead of classes. Later, he adds that the left abandoned the masses for specific groups, thus losing the support of the many. Meanwhile identity became enormously fashionable in elections.
Identity is a non-economic analysis of how we got where we are, replacing the rise of capitalism and neoliberalism with the rise of active government and isothymia- the need for recognition by individuals.
Identity reads like a TED talk. An awful lot on one subject, a lot of top line headlines, with not much new information, and little in the way of new insight. Fukuyama deals with the tribalism of Man by ignoring it. He skips straight to nation-states, where borders move, governments change, and international agreements all make keeping a consistent identity difficult. This is a very old frustration for citizens all over the world. Mort Sahl used to say that anyone who kept a consistent foreign policy position in America would eventually have to be tried for treason. Identity is the same kind of moving target. (Or end.)
What Fukuyama misses completely is the splintering back into tribes. There was an era when it was thought bodies like the League of Nations or United Nations could unite us and actually speak for us. But the opposite is happening. Countries are riven by independence movements of tiny enclaves. Nations bristle at the thought of regional associations like the European Union having jurisdiction over them. Everyone seems to be identifying with smaller and smaller groups.
Identity is in a constant flux of redefinition. Lead, follow, or get out of the way. That’s all that need be said. It’s not really worth a whole book.
David Wineberg
Francis Fukuyama’ Identity starts off very badly, with a bizarre defense of his famous claim that the crumbling of the USSR and the dismantling of the Berlin Wall constituted “the end of history”. Like a Donald Trump (who gets more criticism than everyone else in the book combined), he doubles down on the statement by claiming what it says is nothing like what he meant. He claims to have used a completely different meaning for the word “end” as in “target” or “objective”. Similarly, “history” is actually a word from “Hegelian-Marxist terminology” meaning “development” or “modernization”. Finally, the original use, as an essay title, had a question mark at the end (the later book of the same title did not). So apparently, Fukuyama was saying “The Objective of Modernization?” but it came out End of History. Our bad. It all reminds me of the Rodney King trial, in which police lawyers made the jury review every frame of the beating video until they “proved” that no beating ever took place.
With that out of the way, Identity settles down into a treatise on identity through the ages. From Socrates lecturing on choices to Rousseau on how the first man to have found a use for minerals claimed the land it was on as his own private property – and everybody acquiescing. Next up is Martin Luther, who disintermediated the Catholic Church – or thought he did. Through it all, identity kept changing.
Fukuyama’s current thinking is that there are three parts to identity – thymos, or need for recognition, the recognition of the inner self as opposed to the outer, and dignity, which touches on respect and equality.
His excuse for the disappearance of the left worldwide, particularly in an era of increasingly outrageous inequality is that the message was “misdelivered by the post office”. It went to religions and to nationalists instead of classes. Later, he adds that the left abandoned the masses for specific groups, thus losing the support of the many. Meanwhile identity became enormously fashionable in elections.
Identity is a non-economic analysis of how we got where we are, replacing the rise of capitalism and neoliberalism with the rise of active government and isothymia- the need for recognition by individuals.
Identity reads like a TED talk. An awful lot on one subject, a lot of top line headlines, with not much new information, and little in the way of new insight. Fukuyama deals with the tribalism of Man by ignoring it. He skips straight to nation-states, where borders move, governments change, and international agreements all make keeping a consistent identity difficult. This is a very old frustration for citizens all over the world. Mort Sahl used to say that anyone who kept a consistent foreign policy position in America would eventually have to be tried for treason. Identity is the same kind of moving target. (Or end.)
What Fukuyama misses completely is the splintering back into tribes. There was an era when it was thought bodies like the League of Nations or United Nations could unite us and actually speak for us. But the opposite is happening. Countries are riven by independence movements of tiny enclaves. Nations bristle at the thought of regional associations like the European Union having jurisdiction over them. Everyone seems to be identifying with smaller and smaller groups.
Identity is in a constant flux of redefinition. Lead, follow, or get out of the way. That’s all that need be said. It’s not really worth a whole book.
David Wineberg
August 31, 2018
Francis Fukuyama gets a bad rap from many people for being known as the guy who appeared to declare the “End of History” as the brief moment when liberal democracy prevailed over communism at the end of the Cold War. In large part I feel that his bad reputation on this subject is undeserved. His famous book, titled “The End of History and the Last Man,” never actually said that an end of history had arrived that would mean an end to events, only that, according to a Hegelian teleological view of history, liberal democracy was the most satisfactory to people’s needs and the search for a better system was over. His argument about Nietzsche’s Last Man also explained how liberal democracies may even end up destroying themselves due to their own evident soullessness. It’s a contentious argument that I’m not even sure I buy, but he made a much stronger and more interesting case than the caricature of him suggests.
The End of History was an excellent book. This book, disappointingly, is mostly just a warmed over version of parts of that famous work. It specifically deals with the importance Greek concept of “thymos,” the strive for recognition by others. This aspect of the human soul contribute to people’s innate need for the recognition of their dignity and unique identity by others. Rousseau helped develop the idea that people have a unique interior life constrained by an oppressive outer society, which identitarians have been warring against ever since. Unfortunately Fukuyama just retreads much of his old writings for the most part and doesn’t add much more. His solution for the problems caused by identity politics are instituting programs for integration and shared public service. Good ideas but hardly original.
Someone unfamiliar with his work might get more out of this than I did but I found it to be an underwhelming read. Nonetheless I still appreciate him as a serious if at times contentious thinker.
The End of History was an excellent book. This book, disappointingly, is mostly just a warmed over version of parts of that famous work. It specifically deals with the importance Greek concept of “thymos,” the strive for recognition by others. This aspect of the human soul contribute to people’s innate need for the recognition of their dignity and unique identity by others. Rousseau helped develop the idea that people have a unique interior life constrained by an oppressive outer society, which identitarians have been warring against ever since. Unfortunately Fukuyama just retreads much of his old writings for the most part and doesn’t add much more. His solution for the problems caused by identity politics are instituting programs for integration and shared public service. Good ideas but hardly original.
Someone unfamiliar with his work might get more out of this than I did but I found it to be an underwhelming read. Nonetheless I still appreciate him as a serious if at times contentious thinker.
January 25, 2021
Wow, this is some truly sloppy scholarship, Mr Fukuyama. I really expected more.
September 16, 2018
Fukuyama's latest book is a relatively brief, extended-essay form work, that focuses on the history of identity at the personal level and how it is reflected in larger social and political movements. This is obviously a very timely subject on which to be writing as it seems everyone has an opinion on this concept and a series of articles and videos of their favorite speakers either railing against the very idea or explaining how all of their opposition just don't understand why someone would feel the need to bolster their identity as their repressors are the very larger identity who remain and have remained dominant for centuries. In fact right now I imagine you have a favorite line of Jordan Peterson denouncing the cultural marxism of the academic left which has produced a generation fixated on divisions by race, gender expression, or sexual orientation; or perhaps you're recalling a stormy sermon from Michael Eric Dyson defending the concept of individual dignity and respect as reflected in larger group identity politics from those who over-simplify and obscure because at the socio-political level they want to remain at the top of the heap.
Given the passion and the vitriol with which this is normally discussed and frequently not actually discussed in said discussions, Fukuyama's discussion here is very enjoyable even if his proposed solutions to the divide this concept has produced in our society might seem somewhat general.
Beginning with the origins of identity in the Greek word, "thymos," which was the third part of the soul, according to Socrates, that seemed to operate free from reason and desire (the other two parts). Also, this concept was actually thought only to belong to the warrior class in society who were actively defending everything else society held dear. While not an exact parallel to today's notion of identity, it can certainly be seen as a causal concept. Also the larger societal notions of, "isothymia," versus, "megalothymia," terms borrowed from economists, frame the debate between the human drive to be seen as just as good versus the human drive to be seen in comparison to everyone else. Fukuyama then proceeds to give a brief outline of his own concept of identity:
"Identity grows, in the first place, out of a distinction between one's true inner self and an outer world of social rules and norms that does not adequately recognize that inner self's worth or dignity."
This is later expanded to include:
"The modern concept of identity unites three different phenomena. The first is thymos, a universal aspect of human personality that craves recognition. The second is the distinction between the inner and the outer self, and the raising of the moral valuation of the inner self over outer society. The third is an evolving concept of dignity, in which recognition is due not just to a narrow class of people, but to everyone."
The suggestions for remedy of the divide caused by these issues start to center around a broader idea of societal identity free of jingoistic nationalism. Where this discussion has spawned a ceaselessly stupid and deliberately obfuscating discussion about fighting against political correctness when frequently that is what's being talked about at all, we thus get bloated morons who are respected for saying what they think especially if it goes against "politically correct speech," even if it has nothing to do with reality and the amount of thought they have actually put into those remarks is nonexistent. Equally adept at giving criticism to the excesses of the left and right on this idea, Fukuyama writes:
"Identity politics for some progressives has become a cheap substitute for serious thinking about how to reverse the 30 year trend in most liberal democracies toward greater socioeconomic inequality...That an argument is offensive to someone's self-worth is often seen as sufficient to delegitimize it, a trend encouraged by the kind of short-form discourse propagated by social media."
Even though he deftly deals with the conflicts in the EU, US, global discussions of immigration, and the conflict of nationalist politicians with under-represented populations, I can already hear the chorus of people saying that Fukuyama hasn't actually dealt with the issue itself or understood the true position of identity politics (as if anyone has claim to the sole understanding of the idea), however I find his conclusion rational and a reasonable goal to work towards, even if at the moment it seems completely unattainable:
"Identity can be used to divide, but it can and has also been used to integrate. That in the end will be the remedy for the populist politics of the present.
Given the passion and the vitriol with which this is normally discussed and frequently not actually discussed in said discussions, Fukuyama's discussion here is very enjoyable even if his proposed solutions to the divide this concept has produced in our society might seem somewhat general.
Beginning with the origins of identity in the Greek word, "thymos," which was the third part of the soul, according to Socrates, that seemed to operate free from reason and desire (the other two parts). Also, this concept was actually thought only to belong to the warrior class in society who were actively defending everything else society held dear. While not an exact parallel to today's notion of identity, it can certainly be seen as a causal concept. Also the larger societal notions of, "isothymia," versus, "megalothymia," terms borrowed from economists, frame the debate between the human drive to be seen as just as good versus the human drive to be seen in comparison to everyone else. Fukuyama then proceeds to give a brief outline of his own concept of identity:
"Identity grows, in the first place, out of a distinction between one's true inner self and an outer world of social rules and norms that does not adequately recognize that inner self's worth or dignity."
This is later expanded to include:
"The modern concept of identity unites three different phenomena. The first is thymos, a universal aspect of human personality that craves recognition. The second is the distinction between the inner and the outer self, and the raising of the moral valuation of the inner self over outer society. The third is an evolving concept of dignity, in which recognition is due not just to a narrow class of people, but to everyone."
The suggestions for remedy of the divide caused by these issues start to center around a broader idea of societal identity free of jingoistic nationalism. Where this discussion has spawned a ceaselessly stupid and deliberately obfuscating discussion about fighting against political correctness when frequently that is what's being talked about at all, we thus get bloated morons who are respected for saying what they think especially if it goes against "politically correct speech," even if it has nothing to do with reality and the amount of thought they have actually put into those remarks is nonexistent. Equally adept at giving criticism to the excesses of the left and right on this idea, Fukuyama writes:
"Identity politics for some progressives has become a cheap substitute for serious thinking about how to reverse the 30 year trend in most liberal democracies toward greater socioeconomic inequality...That an argument is offensive to someone's self-worth is often seen as sufficient to delegitimize it, a trend encouraged by the kind of short-form discourse propagated by social media."
Even though he deftly deals with the conflicts in the EU, US, global discussions of immigration, and the conflict of nationalist politicians with under-represented populations, I can already hear the chorus of people saying that Fukuyama hasn't actually dealt with the issue itself or understood the true position of identity politics (as if anyone has claim to the sole understanding of the idea), however I find his conclusion rational and a reasonable goal to work towards, even if at the moment it seems completely unattainable:
"Identity can be used to divide, but it can and has also been used to integrate. That in the end will be the remedy for the populist politics of the present.
June 27, 2022
Samuel Huntington a descris o nouă paradigmă prin care se pot înțelege relațiile între statele lumii din punctul de vedere al civilizațiilor din care fiecare fac parte. Francis Fukuyama prezintă o paradigmă prin care teoria economică este îmbunătățită, iar ramificațiile acestei paradigme ajung până la politicile identității indivizilor și grupurilor de oameni.
Oamenii nu aleargă doar după maximizarea bunăstării prin mijloace materiale, după cum patrulează teoria clasică economică, ci, la bază au dorința de autoafirmare și afiliere la grupuri mai mari.
Pe parcursul a 14 capitole, Fukuyama dezvoltă această idee a evoluției gândirii identitare la baza căreia stă nevoia fiecăruia de demnitate. "Identitatea provine, în primul rând, din distincția dintre sinele lăuntric și lumea exterioară, cu reguli sociale și norme care nu recunosc adevărata valoare sau demnitatea a sinelui". În modernitate, demnitatea înseamnă a fi liber în a face alegeri morale. Iar oamenii caută, emoțional, acest sentiment al demnității fără de care suferă conflicte interioare intense care se reflectă în frustrare individuală, ori de grup. Aceste politici orientate pe identitate pornesc de la conceptul definit de Platon, în dialogul Republica, thymos. Thymos este aspectul emoțional de la care pornesc preferințele individuale și toate celelalte afecte precum mândria și mânia. Mai târziu în istorie, thymosul se coagulează în conceptul de identitate, dar pentru asta trebuiau făcuți niște pași în interiorul ființei: trebuia descoperit eul lăuntric și lumea exterioară care va încerca să spună acel eu lăuntric. Martin Luther este primul care își conștientizează acel eu lăuntric, dar doar ca receptacul al credinței, în timp ce Russeau afirmă lupta între eul interior și lumea exterioară, societatea, care vrea să-l supună.
După aportul gândirii iluministe la secularizarea conceptului de sine, tymosul devine isothymos, o recunoaștere generală a egalității între toți oamenii, dar devine și un megalothymos care cere anume privilegii doar pentru anumite clase care-și proclamă superioritatea în fața altora. În modernitate, democrația a trasat transformearea megathymosului spre isothymos.
Incursiunea lui Fukuyama revelează aspecte ale problemei contemporane a oamenilor prinși în conflictul dintre descoperirea conștiinței de sine și nevoia de apartenență într-un grup fie el grup marginalizat în cadrul unei comunități, sau fie el o națiune. Problemele sociale care rezultă din confruntrarea celor două poziții sunt de actualitate și au efecte politico-economice globale: integrarea imigranților, frământările grupurilor marginalizate care își doresc demnitatea, revirimentul mișcărilor naționaliste, dar și nu deloc de ignorat construcția unei identități naționale care să păstreze societatea într-un echilibru care să-i permită totodată progresul, „definirea unor identități naționale mai largi și integratoare, care să țină seama de diversitatea de facto din socitățile democratice liberale”. Pentru asta e nevoie ca o identitate națională să nu fie fondată pe-o etnie sau religie, ci pe niște principii caracteristice unei democrații liberale. „Americanii pot fi mândri de această identitate foarte substanțială; se fondează pe credința în principiile comune ale constituționalismului, statul de drept, responsabilitatea democratică și principiul că toți oamenii sunt reați egali”.
Analiza lucidă a autorului evocă o serie de probleme ale politicilor identitare atât din stânga spectrului politic, cât și de dreapta subliniind o serie de idei care ar putea fi considerate chiar soluții. Atât stânga cât și dreapta crează un tip de identitate sumară, bazată pe caracteristici fixe, cum sunt rasa, etnia și religia și astfel nu reușesc să producă o coeziune sporită în acest amalgam de diversitate. Dacă toți avem nevoia de identitate individuală, dar și de adeziune față de un grup, minoritar sau național, cartea ne descrie cel mai bine acest comportament și evoluția lui ca element cultural care s-a regăsit în plin proces de modernizare al societății europene.
Oamenii nu aleargă doar după maximizarea bunăstării prin mijloace materiale, după cum patrulează teoria clasică economică, ci, la bază au dorința de autoafirmare și afiliere la grupuri mai mari.
Pe parcursul a 14 capitole, Fukuyama dezvoltă această idee a evoluției gândirii identitare la baza căreia stă nevoia fiecăruia de demnitate. "Identitatea provine, în primul rând, din distincția dintre sinele lăuntric și lumea exterioară, cu reguli sociale și norme care nu recunosc adevărata valoare sau demnitatea a sinelui". În modernitate, demnitatea înseamnă a fi liber în a face alegeri morale. Iar oamenii caută, emoțional, acest sentiment al demnității fără de care suferă conflicte interioare intense care se reflectă în frustrare individuală, ori de grup. Aceste politici orientate pe identitate pornesc de la conceptul definit de Platon, în dialogul Republica, thymos. Thymos este aspectul emoțional de la care pornesc preferințele individuale și toate celelalte afecte precum mândria și mânia. Mai târziu în istorie, thymosul se coagulează în conceptul de identitate, dar pentru asta trebuiau făcuți niște pași în interiorul ființei: trebuia descoperit eul lăuntric și lumea exterioară care va încerca să spună acel eu lăuntric. Martin Luther este primul care își conștientizează acel eu lăuntric, dar doar ca receptacul al credinței, în timp ce Russeau afirmă lupta între eul interior și lumea exterioară, societatea, care vrea să-l supună.
După aportul gândirii iluministe la secularizarea conceptului de sine, tymosul devine isothymos, o recunoaștere generală a egalității între toți oamenii, dar devine și un megalothymos care cere anume privilegii doar pentru anumite clase care-și proclamă superioritatea în fața altora. În modernitate, democrația a trasat transformearea megathymosului spre isothymos.
Incursiunea lui Fukuyama revelează aspecte ale problemei contemporane a oamenilor prinși în conflictul dintre descoperirea conștiinței de sine și nevoia de apartenență într-un grup fie el grup marginalizat în cadrul unei comunități, sau fie el o națiune. Problemele sociale care rezultă din confruntrarea celor două poziții sunt de actualitate și au efecte politico-economice globale: integrarea imigranților, frământările grupurilor marginalizate care își doresc demnitatea, revirimentul mișcărilor naționaliste, dar și nu deloc de ignorat construcția unei identități naționale care să păstreze societatea într-un echilibru care să-i permită totodată progresul, „definirea unor identități naționale mai largi și integratoare, care să țină seama de diversitatea de facto din socitățile democratice liberale”. Pentru asta e nevoie ca o identitate națională să nu fie fondată pe-o etnie sau religie, ci pe niște principii caracteristice unei democrații liberale. „Americanii pot fi mândri de această identitate foarte substanțială; se fondează pe credința în principiile comune ale constituționalismului, statul de drept, responsabilitatea democratică și principiul că toți oamenii sunt reați egali”.
Analiza lucidă a autorului evocă o serie de probleme ale politicilor identitare atât din stânga spectrului politic, cât și de dreapta subliniind o serie de idei care ar putea fi considerate chiar soluții. Atât stânga cât și dreapta crează un tip de identitate sumară, bazată pe caracteristici fixe, cum sunt rasa, etnia și religia și astfel nu reușesc să producă o coeziune sporită în acest amalgam de diversitate. Dacă toți avem nevoia de identitate individuală, dar și de adeziune față de un grup, minoritar sau național, cartea ne descrie cel mai bine acest comportament și evoluția lui ca element cultural care s-a regăsit în plin proces de modernizare al societății europene.
May 1, 2023
I had a hard time making sense of Fukuyama’s argument here. It is a short book with many (metaphorical) bullet points.
His argument is that identity politics are threatening liberal democracy. People crave to be equal and superior to others, at the same time.
The way I understood it (I don’t guarantee this is exactly what Fukuyama intended) is that at the core of today politics lies our identity. People want respect. They want their dignity respected. There is a sense of pride in everyone. No economic policy or economic growth will replace this natural need for respect. Modern politics are all about the different identities one has. If in the past people were part of a community and there was a collective identity superior to any individual identity, nowadays the priority shifts from the collective to the individual. But here is the problem: it is not happening for everyone.
There are the minorities and the majority. All individuals want to be heard and seen. If they are not, they rally behind a minority group identity that represents them: blacks, LGBT, women etc. The majority, on the other hand, feels that it is losing its voice. So, they rally behind even bigger ideas: nationalism and religion. In the end, minorities fight for equality, and the majority for superiority. Here is also (in the US) where the left and the right clash. It is a contradiction that has divided the left and the (far) right for a long time: the left wants citizens to be equals and the right wants for them individual and economic freedoms (which may lead for some to a sense of superiority). The left today focuses on representing minority groups and the right on “taking control” for the unheard majority.
In the end, people want the same thing: recognition and respect. Everything stripped down to this basic need, it is hard not to ask: why we fight then? Because we have conflicting identities and different views on how to achieve this basic need. When there is focus on giving a voice to minority groups, the majority feels threatened, and vice versa. Immigration is at the forefront of this debate nowadays.
What is the solution, according to Fukuyama? He proposes a shared national identity. The United States already have a strong national identity, which managed to bring people together up until now: to be American transcended one’s upbringing, religion, race, ethnicity. But with growing rates of immigration and change in demographics, economic inequality, distrust in institutions and political polarization, this shared national identity is becoming inefficient. The solutions are not clear. Of course, addressing economic inequality and political polarization would be good, but with so many immigrants and foreign-born citizens it is not enough to promote a sense of shared purpose.
For the EU, he proposes a common identity. Not just a European citizenship, which today is a set of rights, but a shared identity to transcend the national identities. It is utopian, to say the least.
Not much is said about the rest of the world. When he writes about nationalism, he also writes about Islamism – a form of group identity akin to nationalism characteristic to the Arab world.
There are many interesting ideas here, though I don’t necessarily agree with all of them, but very often they don’t seem developed enough. There is just too much history and political philosophy to summarize in just a few pages.
3.5/5
His argument is that identity politics are threatening liberal democracy. People crave to be equal and superior to others, at the same time.
The way I understood it (I don’t guarantee this is exactly what Fukuyama intended) is that at the core of today politics lies our identity. People want respect. They want their dignity respected. There is a sense of pride in everyone. No economic policy or economic growth will replace this natural need for respect. Modern politics are all about the different identities one has. If in the past people were part of a community and there was a collective identity superior to any individual identity, nowadays the priority shifts from the collective to the individual. But here is the problem: it is not happening for everyone.
There are the minorities and the majority. All individuals want to be heard and seen. If they are not, they rally behind a minority group identity that represents them: blacks, LGBT, women etc. The majority, on the other hand, feels that it is losing its voice. So, they rally behind even bigger ideas: nationalism and religion. In the end, minorities fight for equality, and the majority for superiority. Here is also (in the US) where the left and the right clash. It is a contradiction that has divided the left and the (far) right for a long time: the left wants citizens to be equals and the right wants for them individual and economic freedoms (which may lead for some to a sense of superiority). The left today focuses on representing minority groups and the right on “taking control” for the unheard majority.
“[…] understanding of dignity forked in two directions during the nineteenth century, toward a liberal individualism that came to be embedded in the political rights of modern liberal democracies, and toward collective identities that could be defined by either nation or religion.”
In the end, people want the same thing: recognition and respect. Everything stripped down to this basic need, it is hard not to ask: why we fight then? Because we have conflicting identities and different views on how to achieve this basic need. When there is focus on giving a voice to minority groups, the majority feels threatened, and vice versa. Immigration is at the forefront of this debate nowadays.
What is the solution, according to Fukuyama? He proposes a shared national identity. The United States already have a strong national identity, which managed to bring people together up until now: to be American transcended one’s upbringing, religion, race, ethnicity. But with growing rates of immigration and change in demographics, economic inequality, distrust in institutions and political polarization, this shared national identity is becoming inefficient. The solutions are not clear. Of course, addressing economic inequality and political polarization would be good, but with so many immigrants and foreign-born citizens it is not enough to promote a sense of shared purpose.
For the EU, he proposes a common identity. Not just a European citizenship, which today is a set of rights, but a shared identity to transcend the national identities. It is utopian, to say the least.
Not much is said about the rest of the world. When he writes about nationalism, he also writes about Islamism – a form of group identity akin to nationalism characteristic to the Arab world.
“Both nationalism and Islamism can thus be seen as a species of identity politics. Stating this does not do justice to the full complexity or specificity of either phenomenon. But they nonetheless have a number of important similarities. They both appeared on the world stage at moments of social transition from traditional isolated agrarian societies to modern ones connected to a broader and more diverse world. They both provide an ideology that explains why people feel lonely and confused, and both peddle in victimhood that lays the blame for and individual’s unhappy situation on groups of outsiders. And they both demand recognition of dignity in restrictive ways: not for all human beings, but for members of a particular national or religious group.”
There are many interesting ideas here, though I don’t necessarily agree with all of them, but very often they don’t seem developed enough. There is just too much history and political philosophy to summarize in just a few pages.
“The connection of income to dignity also suggests why something like a universal guaranteed income as a solution to job loss from automation won’t buy social peace or make people happy. Having a job conveys not just resources, but recognition by the rest of society that one is doing something socially valuable. Someone paid for doing nothing has no basis for pride.”
“A third problem with current understandings of identity is that they can threaten free speech and, more broadly, the kind of rational discourse needed to sustain a democracy. Liberal democracies are committed to protecting the right to say anything you want in a marketplace of ideas, particularly in the political sphere. But the preoccupation with identity has clashed with the need for deliberative discourse. The focus on lived experience by identity groups valorizes inner selves experienced emotionally rather than examined rationally. Notes one observer, ‘Our political culture is marked, at the micro level, by the fusion of a given person’s opinion and what they perceive to be their singular, permanent, and authentic self.’ This privileges opinions sincerely held over reasoned deliberation that may force one to abandon those opinions. That an argument is offensive to someone’s sense of self-worth is often seen as sufficient to delegitimize it, a trend encouraged by the kind of short-form discourse propagated by social media.”
3.5/5
January 3, 2021
One of my bookclub mates insisted that we read Francis Fukuyama’s IDENTITY. I am very glad that he did. It is the most incisive and well-supported discussion of identity politics in the West that I have encountered. As a bonus, it is hopeful and pragmatic.
IDENTITY is almost three years old now. And much has been written about it. I will not repeat here what you already know. Instead, I recommend that you seek out Ezra Klein's podcast interview of Fukuyama that happened shortly after IDENTITY was first published. Listening to that podcast will be an excellent investment of an hour of your time. Just as importantly, you will be entertained by two erudite and thoughtful men analyzing a subject of great importance to re-establishing civil discourse in liberal democratic politics.
IDENTITY is almost three years old now. And much has been written about it. I will not repeat here what you already know. Instead, I recommend that you seek out Ezra Klein's podcast interview of Fukuyama that happened shortly after IDENTITY was first published. Listening to that podcast will be an excellent investment of an hour of your time. Just as importantly, you will be entertained by two erudite and thoughtful men analyzing a subject of great importance to re-establishing civil discourse in liberal democratic politics.
November 16, 2021
یه ذره تکرار مکررات داشت،
ولی خیلی از بحثها و کلمههایی که لازم داشتم رو یاد گرفتم.
ترجمه کتاب بد نبود ولی مطمئنم مشکل ویرایش داشت، بعضی وقتها جابهجا نوشته بود اسم کشورها یا بار مثبت و منفی جملهها رو.
دیگه عرض کنم خدمتتون که، از نتیجه کلی کتاب راضی بودم؛
حفظ هویت فردی و اقلیتی بر اساس erlebnis یا تجربه زیستی، در کنار یک هویت اعتقادی [به پیشرفت و توسعه کشور و رفاه هموطن و.. در مقابل قومی و مذهبی و..دیفالت سایندهای که الان هست.] که قراره دموکراسی و کشور رو نجات بده و در عین حال سر حقوق بشر و قول و قراری که به پناهندهها و مهاجرین بالقوه داده بمونه.
پ.س: فوکویاما لیبرال دموکراته یا لااقل دوسشون داره.
ولی خیلی از بحثها و کلمههایی که لازم داشتم رو یاد گرفتم.
ترجمه کتاب بد نبود ولی مطمئنم مشکل ویرایش داشت، بعضی وقتها جابهجا نوشته بود اسم کشورها یا بار مثبت و منفی جملهها رو.
دیگه عرض کنم خدمتتون که، از نتیجه کلی کتاب راضی بودم؛
حفظ هویت فردی و اقلیتی بر اساس erlebnis یا تجربه زیستی، در کنار یک هویت اعتقادی [به پیشرفت و توسعه کشور و رفاه هموطن و.. در مقابل قومی و مذهبی و..دیفالت سایندهای که الان هست.] که قراره دموکراسی و کشور رو نجات بده و در عین حال سر حقوق بشر و قول و قراری که به پناهندهها و مهاجرین بالقوه داده بمونه.
پ.س: فوکویاما لیبرال دموکراته یا لااقل دوسشون داره.
October 16, 2020
According to Fukuyama, the neoliberal political establishment has failed to properly account for and mitigate the disruptive rise of “identity politics”, which began in the middle of the last decade and has taken numerous forms within various cultural contexts, because it has relied excessively on an economistic understanding of human behavior which overemphasizes material needs and dismisses that part of human nature concerned with honor, status, social recognition, and dignity.
The first, and strongest, part of this book is a historical survey of the development of “dignity” as a political concept in Western thought. In Plato’s Republic, Socrates distinguishes three parts of the human person—desire, reason, and soul—each of which is identified with a political class. Desire is the purview of laborers and artisans, as it denotes the basic, material, subsistence needs to which what we would now call the working class must devote the bulk of its attention. Reason is primarily an attribute of the ruling class, as they are separate enough from material necessity to, theoretically at least, govern the polis dispassionately. Soul (Thymos) concerns one’s opinion of oneself, which is inevitably informed by the status bestowed upon one by the surrounding society, and this status-consciousness is attributed by Socrates to the warrior class, which earns a special social rank because of the willingness of its members to sacrifice their lives for the survival of the polis as a whole.
But despite Plato’s analogizing of personal attributes with social classes, he and his interlocutors knew that each faculty was common to every person. Thymos, the concern about status, is as immutable in a slave as it is in a guardian of the state. Though the desire for social dignity among the lower orders was simply suppressed in antiquity, it became a defining feature of the political and social changes wrought by the democratizing and individualizing currents of post-Reformation Western history. Luther, though he considered the inner self to be fraught with depravity and self-deception, was nonetheless among the first to make a clear distinction between the religious life of an individual believer and the institutional authority of the Church, and to argue that the ecclesiastical hierarchy was usurping the prerogatives of the former. Rousseau claimed, contra Luther, that human beings are naturally good and benevolent, and that social strife is a byproduct of external impositions that distort their original character, furthering the notion that there is an authentic self that societies suppress but should instead try to recognize and accommodate.
Liberals of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries attempted to both universalize and individualize this new politics of validation. Hegel definitively applied the struggle for dignity to the political realm, envisioning history as a series of dialectical oppositions among political agents seeking status that would culminate in an apotheosis of universal recognition. Conservatives like Herder consequentially posited that the demand for dignity might not be a project only for individual or universal subjectivities, but for more localized ones based on national or ethnic identity as well. Nietzsche, who would become an important influence for postmodernism, expanded the horizon of subjective dignitarianism by suggesting that the seat of human dignity was situated not merely in an ability to make choices within an established moral framework, but also entailed the capacity to discard that framework entirely and create new values in its stead.
Each of these strands of identitarianism has persisted to the present day, and the fact that they have connected with the economic upheavals caused by the burgeoning of intranational wealth and income inequality, the stagnation of the upward mobility of the middle and lower classes of the post-industrial world, and the culturally-disorienting processes of globalization does much to explain why the political systems of so many countries have broken down into a series of militant identity groups (racial, national, religious, sexual) grappling with one another in a supposedly zero-sum competition for recognition. Unfortunately, Fukuyama’s proposed solutions for this impasse, while reasonable in themselves, are unlikely to be implemented in the face of the massive social currents pushing against them. As much as one desires to offer a note of optimism for times like these, we really are in a hell of a spot.
The first, and strongest, part of this book is a historical survey of the development of “dignity” as a political concept in Western thought. In Plato’s Republic, Socrates distinguishes three parts of the human person—desire, reason, and soul—each of which is identified with a political class. Desire is the purview of laborers and artisans, as it denotes the basic, material, subsistence needs to which what we would now call the working class must devote the bulk of its attention. Reason is primarily an attribute of the ruling class, as they are separate enough from material necessity to, theoretically at least, govern the polis dispassionately. Soul (Thymos) concerns one’s opinion of oneself, which is inevitably informed by the status bestowed upon one by the surrounding society, and this status-consciousness is attributed by Socrates to the warrior class, which earns a special social rank because of the willingness of its members to sacrifice their lives for the survival of the polis as a whole.
But despite Plato’s analogizing of personal attributes with social classes, he and his interlocutors knew that each faculty was common to every person. Thymos, the concern about status, is as immutable in a slave as it is in a guardian of the state. Though the desire for social dignity among the lower orders was simply suppressed in antiquity, it became a defining feature of the political and social changes wrought by the democratizing and individualizing currents of post-Reformation Western history. Luther, though he considered the inner self to be fraught with depravity and self-deception, was nonetheless among the first to make a clear distinction between the religious life of an individual believer and the institutional authority of the Church, and to argue that the ecclesiastical hierarchy was usurping the prerogatives of the former. Rousseau claimed, contra Luther, that human beings are naturally good and benevolent, and that social strife is a byproduct of external impositions that distort their original character, furthering the notion that there is an authentic self that societies suppress but should instead try to recognize and accommodate.
Liberals of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries attempted to both universalize and individualize this new politics of validation. Hegel definitively applied the struggle for dignity to the political realm, envisioning history as a series of dialectical oppositions among political agents seeking status that would culminate in an apotheosis of universal recognition. Conservatives like Herder consequentially posited that the demand for dignity might not be a project only for individual or universal subjectivities, but for more localized ones based on national or ethnic identity as well. Nietzsche, who would become an important influence for postmodernism, expanded the horizon of subjective dignitarianism by suggesting that the seat of human dignity was situated not merely in an ability to make choices within an established moral framework, but also entailed the capacity to discard that framework entirely and create new values in its stead.
Each of these strands of identitarianism has persisted to the present day, and the fact that they have connected with the economic upheavals caused by the burgeoning of intranational wealth and income inequality, the stagnation of the upward mobility of the middle and lower classes of the post-industrial world, and the culturally-disorienting processes of globalization does much to explain why the political systems of so many countries have broken down into a series of militant identity groups (racial, national, religious, sexual) grappling with one another in a supposedly zero-sum competition for recognition. Unfortunately, Fukuyama’s proposed solutions for this impasse, while reasonable in themselves, are unlikely to be implemented in the face of the massive social currents pushing against them. As much as one desires to offer a note of optimism for times like these, we really are in a hell of a spot.
February 5, 2019
“…the preoccupation with identity has clashed with the need for deliberative discourse”
This is a balanced and well-argued account of contemporary identity politics that starts with an explanation of its ancient roots: “Thymos is the part of the soul that craves recognition of dignity; isothymia is the demand to be respected on an equal basis with other people; while megalothymia is the desire to be recognised as superior. Modern liberal democracies promise and largely deliver a minimal degree of equal respect, embodied in individual rights, the rule of law, and the franchise. What this does not guarantee is that people in a democracy will be equally respected in practice, particularly members of groups with a history of marginalization. Entire countries can feel disrespected, which has powered aggressive nationalism, as can religious believers who feel their faith is denigrated. Isothymia will therefore continue to drive demands for equal recognition, which are unlikely to ever be completely fulfilled.”
Francis Fukuyama then goes on to examine the demands of identity that so dominate world politics today and – unlike many other books on this and other related subjects – he actually does address “What is to be done?” He offers pragmatic rather than fanciful solutions and his prose is clear, concise and eminently readable. The author only mentions the influence of the internet in the debate on identity politics in the last few pages of his book; I would have liked to hear more on his analysis of the web’s impact. Are social networks like Facebook and Twitter – or even Amazon and GoodReads! – our new nations to which we feel we belong?
As we head towards the next decade, it strikes me that the rise in identity politics gives a whole new meaning to the term “The Roaring Twenties”.
This is a balanced and well-argued account of contemporary identity politics that starts with an explanation of its ancient roots: “Thymos is the part of the soul that craves recognition of dignity; isothymia is the demand to be respected on an equal basis with other people; while megalothymia is the desire to be recognised as superior. Modern liberal democracies promise and largely deliver a minimal degree of equal respect, embodied in individual rights, the rule of law, and the franchise. What this does not guarantee is that people in a democracy will be equally respected in practice, particularly members of groups with a history of marginalization. Entire countries can feel disrespected, which has powered aggressive nationalism, as can religious believers who feel their faith is denigrated. Isothymia will therefore continue to drive demands for equal recognition, which are unlikely to ever be completely fulfilled.”
Francis Fukuyama then goes on to examine the demands of identity that so dominate world politics today and – unlike many other books on this and other related subjects – he actually does address “What is to be done?” He offers pragmatic rather than fanciful solutions and his prose is clear, concise and eminently readable. The author only mentions the influence of the internet in the debate on identity politics in the last few pages of his book; I would have liked to hear more on his analysis of the web’s impact. Are social networks like Facebook and Twitter – or even Amazon and GoodReads! – our new nations to which we feel we belong?
As we head towards the next decade, it strikes me that the rise in identity politics gives a whole new meaning to the term “The Roaring Twenties”.
April 3, 2019
An okay, if superficial and generic, read. It is also pessimistic, but not pessimistic enough.
I do agree with the author that the real danger lurks on the extreme end of the alt-right, but I disagree with the casual treatment and an easy pass he gives to the excesses of the ctrl-left, and the role they play in the current mess. For better or for worse, they have been summoning into the existence that particular stinky bogeyman we all fear and would rather not see again.
To quote Titania McGrath, the well-known social justice activist:
I do agree with the author that the real danger lurks on the extreme end of the alt-right, but I disagree with the casual treatment and an easy pass he gives to the excesses of the ctrl-left, and the role they play in the current mess. For better or for worse, they have been summoning into the existence that particular stinky bogeyman we all fear and would rather not see again.
To quote Titania McGrath, the well-known social justice activist:
"Activists such as myself are spearheading a new culture war, sniffing out prejudice like valiant bloodhounds of righteousness, courageously snapping at the heels of injustice. To give a tangible example of our achievements, consider how the definition of the word ‘Nazi’ has been successfully broadened to include anyone who voted for Brexit, has ever considered supporting the Conservative Party or who refuses to take the Guardian seriously. Although this is a great victory for the progressive cause, it does mean that there are now more Nazis living in modern Britain than even existed in 1930s Germany."
January 7, 2020
فوکویاما نقدی بلندپروازانه و برانگیزنده از سیاست هویتی ارائه داده است. او با پیگیری خط فکری فیلسوفانی چون هگل و مارکس، مسیر رشد لیبرال دموکراسیهای مدرن را دنبال میکند و با عینکی منتقد پدیدههایی چون بهار عربی، بحران مهاجرت اروپا و دونالد ترامپ را بررسی مینماید. نویسنده عقیده دارد لیبرال دموکراسی در بحرانی جهانی به سر میبرد، بحرانی که به خاطر مشکلات درهم تنیدهای مربوط به تیموس (اشتیاق انسان برای عزت و احترام) شکل گرفته است. راه حل او برای این بحران، باز نیرو بخشیدن به هویت اعتقادی است (که در آن هویت ملی بر خلاف نژاد، مذهب یا قومیت با ارزشهای مشترک گره خورده است) تا تیموس مانند مشارکت مدنی به اهداف سازنده منتهی شود. کتاب هر چقدر که عالی شروع میشود به همان میزان بد تمام میشود؛ البته نکته مهمش برانگیختگی اندیشه است که حداقل در من اتفاق افتاد. اولین کتابی است که از فوکویاما خواندم و مشتاق شدم کارهای دیگرش را هم بخوانم.
به نظر برای ترجمه کتاب زحمت زیادی کشیده شده ولی متن آن به یک ویرایش اساسی نیاز دارد؛ ساختار جملهها و علائم نگارشی جالب نیست.
به نظر برای ترجمه کتاب زحمت زیادی کشیده شده ولی متن آن به یک ویرایش اساسی نیاز دارد؛ ساختار جملهها و علائم نگارشی جالب نیست.
August 17, 2019
Fukuyama dalam lewat penghasilan bukunya ini telah mengangkat tema identiti dan sanubari (soul) dalam menjamin kestabilan dan keamanan geopolitik sesebuah negara.
Perbahasan oleh ahli akademik dan penganalisis politik ini agak ganjil kerana ia dimulakan dengan perbahasan tema-tema penting dalam spiritualiti seperti persoalan thymos (spiritualiti) dan dua entiti di bawahnya iaitu isothymia (perasaan sama rata) dan megalothymia (perasaan lebih superior daripada yang lain).
Fukuyama mengadun definisi-definisi ini dalam tatanan politik antarabangsa dan merujuk tulisan failasuf dan sarjana semisal Plato, Rousseau, Locke, Kant, Freud, Marx, Hegel, Adam Smith, Martin Luther King Jr., Charles Taylor, Olivier Roy dan Samuel Huntington sebelum beralih ke tema-tema penting yang membentuk jati diri sesebuah negara seperti agama dan semangat kebangsaan.
Pembentukan dan pencarian semula makna jati diri dan identiti sesebuah masyarakat terhadap negaranya sangat signifikan kerana beberapa perkara:
1. Keselamatan fizikal.
Perkara ini dapat dilihat seperti yang terjadi di negara Syria dan Libya apabila mereka ketandusan identiti kebangsaan. Britain juga akan menjadi lebih kuat jika tiada konflik dengan Scotland dan oleh sebab itulah, Putin suka apabila kegoncangan dan intervensi terhadap perpecahan politik berlaku di negara ini.
2. Menjamin kualiti sesebuah kerajaan.
Kadar nepotisme dan kronisme dapat dikurangkan apabila kuasawan menyedari bahawa kepentingan komuniti itu lebih signifikan berbanding keturunan, etnik, puak dan parti politik sendiri.
3. Melincirkan perkembangan ekonomi negara.
Ini dapat dilihat di negara Jepun, Korea Selatan dan China yang sangat maju ketimbang negara di Timur Tengah, Afrika dan Amerika Latin.
4. Merangsang akauntabiliti yang lebih meluas.
Ini dapat mengurankgan kepercayaan terhadap golongan yang sebulu sahaja dan bukannya kepercayaan terhadap setiap ahli komuniti mereka.
5. Menjamin kekuatan jaringan keselamatan sosial yang dapat mengurangkan kesenjangan ekonomi.
Apabila mereka mempunyai kesedaran identiti kebangsaan, mereka akan membantu golongan lemah dan menyokong program-program sosial dalam masyarakat mereka seperti yang terlakar dalam negara-negara Scandinavian.
6. Membentuk negara demokrasi liberal.
Sistem demokrasi liberal yang melibatkan kontrak antara kerajaan dan rakyat ini akan menjadi lebih utuh sekiranya rakyat percaya terhadap kerajaan dalam menjamin dan mengendalikan hak-hak asasi dan fundamental bagi masyarakat dalam sesebuah negara.
Perbahasan oleh ahli akademik dan penganalisis politik ini agak ganjil kerana ia dimulakan dengan perbahasan tema-tema penting dalam spiritualiti seperti persoalan thymos (spiritualiti) dan dua entiti di bawahnya iaitu isothymia (perasaan sama rata) dan megalothymia (perasaan lebih superior daripada yang lain).
Fukuyama mengadun definisi-definisi ini dalam tatanan politik antarabangsa dan merujuk tulisan failasuf dan sarjana semisal Plato, Rousseau, Locke, Kant, Freud, Marx, Hegel, Adam Smith, Martin Luther King Jr., Charles Taylor, Olivier Roy dan Samuel Huntington sebelum beralih ke tema-tema penting yang membentuk jati diri sesebuah negara seperti agama dan semangat kebangsaan.
Pembentukan dan pencarian semula makna jati diri dan identiti sesebuah masyarakat terhadap negaranya sangat signifikan kerana beberapa perkara:
1. Keselamatan fizikal.
Perkara ini dapat dilihat seperti yang terjadi di negara Syria dan Libya apabila mereka ketandusan identiti kebangsaan. Britain juga akan menjadi lebih kuat jika tiada konflik dengan Scotland dan oleh sebab itulah, Putin suka apabila kegoncangan dan intervensi terhadap perpecahan politik berlaku di negara ini.
2. Menjamin kualiti sesebuah kerajaan.
Kadar nepotisme dan kronisme dapat dikurangkan apabila kuasawan menyedari bahawa kepentingan komuniti itu lebih signifikan berbanding keturunan, etnik, puak dan parti politik sendiri.
3. Melincirkan perkembangan ekonomi negara.
Ini dapat dilihat di negara Jepun, Korea Selatan dan China yang sangat maju ketimbang negara di Timur Tengah, Afrika dan Amerika Latin.
4. Merangsang akauntabiliti yang lebih meluas.
Ini dapat mengurankgan kepercayaan terhadap golongan yang sebulu sahaja dan bukannya kepercayaan terhadap setiap ahli komuniti mereka.
5. Menjamin kekuatan jaringan keselamatan sosial yang dapat mengurangkan kesenjangan ekonomi.
Apabila mereka mempunyai kesedaran identiti kebangsaan, mereka akan membantu golongan lemah dan menyokong program-program sosial dalam masyarakat mereka seperti yang terlakar dalam negara-negara Scandinavian.
6. Membentuk negara demokrasi liberal.
Sistem demokrasi liberal yang melibatkan kontrak antara kerajaan dan rakyat ini akan menjadi lebih utuh sekiranya rakyat percaya terhadap kerajaan dalam menjamin dan mengendalikan hak-hak asasi dan fundamental bagi masyarakat dalam sesebuah negara.
November 24, 2020
Для України це дослідження просто недосяжна фантастика, на жаль. Ми не можемо сформувати свою власну ідентичність, не говорячи вже про виклики імміграції та глобалізації. А робота Фукуями дуже цікава і як завжди на часі для усього світу.
November 4, 2018
Fascinating and deep stuff: an analysis of everything behind the curtain. Fukuyama show how everything hinges together -- dependencies, relationships, prerequisites, hierarchies, dynamics -- to produce the world we live in. He doesn't cherry-pick the data. Nobody is immune. It's all there: the good, bad and the ugly. At any moment, this is the outcome we get. The one we have to live with. The one we need to adapt to. The cards you get to play. Like it or not . . . what it is.
And from where I sit, it looks pretty grim, no matter what your political persuasion, your group, your town. This boat's full of holes and it's sinking fast. Lotsa luck, y'all.
Cheers!
JIM inMT
And from where I sit, it looks pretty grim, no matter what your political persuasion, your group, your town. This boat's full of holes and it's sinking fast. Lotsa luck, y'all.
Cheers!
JIM inMT
October 31, 2020
Із актуального - можна зрозуміти причини терактів у Франції
September 8, 2023
شرۆڤەم بۆ ئەم پەرتووکە لەو لینکەوە ببینن
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1q...
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1q...
August 1, 2018
Required reading, and very readable
In Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment, Stanford political scientist Francis Fukuyama presents an impressively well-reasoned and lucid explanation of the phenomenon of identity politics, which is being increasingly recognized as a powerful force within the United States and world-wide. Although he acknowledges in the Preface that the 2016 U S presidential election was the inspiration for the book, Identity goes far beyond an analysis of the last election or similar phenomena like the Brexit vote. The scope of the book is summed up well in the aptly-chosen subtitle: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment. Fukuyama is a scholar and deep thinker, and he traces the origins of identity politics back to its roots both historical and psychological. As he explains it, identity politics begins with thymos, a basic human desire for dignity and recognition of an individual’s worth, which creates resentment if an individual feels disrespected. The modern concept of identity has changed over the past few centuries, though, under the influence of thinkers like Martin Luther, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and others. As society has become modern and complex, people have felt their identities more repressed and value their inner selves more. And as modern society has developed, people increasingly began to believe that dignity is something that all people deserve, and not just a narrow class. When large numbers of people sense they are not being accorded that dignity, various forms of unrest develop. Some are positive and productive, and some are not, and Fukuyama presents a number of excellent examples, such as the Arab Spring that was touched off when a Tunisian policewoman slapped a street vendor. If people cannot feel respected for themselves alone, they can look for respect by virtue of membership in a group, be it ethnic, religious, or class, and it is this push for respect by virtue of group identity that is being noted in many ways today, whether it is the tribal antipathies in Africa, anti-immigrant feelings in many countries, or requests for ethnic-focused dorms on college campuses. Although we tend to note negative results of people’s quest for dignity and respect, Fukuyama says “that the demand for dignity should somehow disappear is neither possible nor desirable”. Ultimately, if I may oversimplify a much more sophisticated conclusion, Fukuyama calls for a broadening of the sense of identity based on a commitment to liberal democratic principles as a solution to many ills.
Identity is definitely the best non-fiction book I have read in a very long time. It is disturbing, enlightening, and convincing; to me it also appeared very objective if approached with an open mind, although I suspect it will offend hardliners in both the liberal and conservative camps. His thesis is sophisticated, but the book is very readable, and his ultimate conclusion is positive: “Identity can be used to divide, but it can and has also been used to integrate. That in the end will be the remedy for the populist politics of the present.”
My thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for an advance review copy of this book.
In Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment, Stanford political scientist Francis Fukuyama presents an impressively well-reasoned and lucid explanation of the phenomenon of identity politics, which is being increasingly recognized as a powerful force within the United States and world-wide. Although he acknowledges in the Preface that the 2016 U S presidential election was the inspiration for the book, Identity goes far beyond an analysis of the last election or similar phenomena like the Brexit vote. The scope of the book is summed up well in the aptly-chosen subtitle: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment. Fukuyama is a scholar and deep thinker, and he traces the origins of identity politics back to its roots both historical and psychological. As he explains it, identity politics begins with thymos, a basic human desire for dignity and recognition of an individual’s worth, which creates resentment if an individual feels disrespected. The modern concept of identity has changed over the past few centuries, though, under the influence of thinkers like Martin Luther, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and others. As society has become modern and complex, people have felt their identities more repressed and value their inner selves more. And as modern society has developed, people increasingly began to believe that dignity is something that all people deserve, and not just a narrow class. When large numbers of people sense they are not being accorded that dignity, various forms of unrest develop. Some are positive and productive, and some are not, and Fukuyama presents a number of excellent examples, such as the Arab Spring that was touched off when a Tunisian policewoman slapped a street vendor. If people cannot feel respected for themselves alone, they can look for respect by virtue of membership in a group, be it ethnic, religious, or class, and it is this push for respect by virtue of group identity that is being noted in many ways today, whether it is the tribal antipathies in Africa, anti-immigrant feelings in many countries, or requests for ethnic-focused dorms on college campuses. Although we tend to note negative results of people’s quest for dignity and respect, Fukuyama says “that the demand for dignity should somehow disappear is neither possible nor desirable”. Ultimately, if I may oversimplify a much more sophisticated conclusion, Fukuyama calls for a broadening of the sense of identity based on a commitment to liberal democratic principles as a solution to many ills.
Identity is definitely the best non-fiction book I have read in a very long time. It is disturbing, enlightening, and convincing; to me it also appeared very objective if approached with an open mind, although I suspect it will offend hardliners in both the liberal and conservative camps. His thesis is sophisticated, but the book is very readable, and his ultimate conclusion is positive: “Identity can be used to divide, but it can and has also been used to integrate. That in the end will be the remedy for the populist politics of the present.”
My thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for an advance review copy of this book.
August 22, 2019
Uit het recente boek van Francis Fukuyama (een vertaling van het Engelse origineel uit 2018) blijkt dat er veel facetten zijn aan debegrippen identiteit en identiteitspolitiek. De auteur gaat terug tot Socrates om het begrip thymos te introduceren als deel van de psyche. Hij vertaalt het als karakter, in die thymos schuilt ook de hunkering naar erkenning van de waardigheid. Ressentiment is juist de wrok om het gebrek aan erkenning. Fukuyama noemt thymos de zetel van de huidige identiteitspolitiek. Want niet alleen individuen streven naar erkenning, maar ook groepen. Die groepen kunnen worden gevormd rond etnie, natie, taal, godsdienst. Maar evenzeer vragen subgroepen die gemarginaliseerd zijn of werden om erkenning: vrouwen, zwarten, immigranten, de LGTB-gemeenschap.
Fukuyama richt zijn blik vooreerst op de filosofische wortels van identiteit en op de historische evolutie, voornamelijk sinds de Franse revolutie . De auteur gaat ook dieper in op hedendaagse kwesties i.v.m. identiteitspolitiek. Zo schrijft hij uitgebreid over de huidige linkse identiteitspolitiek die gericht is op gemarginaliseerde subgroepen (zwarten, vrouwen, de LGTB-gemeenschap). Hij ziet een evolutie: waar vroeger gemarginaliseerde groepen vroegen om erkenning als gelijke, begonnen ze de voorbije decennia veel meer op te komen voor een aparte identiteit voor de leden van de groep en voor erkenning van het specifieke anders-zijn. De subjectieve beleving komt hier centraal te staan. Ter linkerzijde groeit de idee van een cultureel pluralisme dat gericht is op het doorbreken van de hegemonie van de westers cultuur en waarden. Deze linkse identiteitspolitiek gaat samen met een politieke correctheid waartegen de rechterzijde dan weer sterk in verzet is gekomen. Waarna de auteur dieper ingaat op de gevaarlijke tendensen in de rechtse identiteitspolitiek (o.m. wanneer die zich rond ras groepeert). Hij ziet in de verenging van zowel de linkse als de rechtse identiteitsbeleving “een bedreiging voor de mogelijkheid tot communicatie en collectieve actie”. Hij is ervan overtuigd dat nationalismen niet exclusief hoeven te zijn maar dat “nationale identiteiten kunnen opgebouwd worden rond liberale en democratische politieke waarden”.
Het boek van Fukuyama is heel veelzijdig en behelst meer thema’s dan in deze bespreking aan bod kunnen komen. Hij schetst de filosofische en historische wortels van de identiteitskwestie grondig en gaat dieper in op hedendaagse kwesties zoals multiculturalisme, diversiteit versus de rechtse identiteitsbeleving rond nationalisme. Ook geografisch is dit boek heel verscheiden: hij schrijft evenzeer over de Verenigde Staten en over de EU en individuele Europese landen, als over de Arabische lente en het Rusland van Poetin. De auteur heeft het in dit boek over een hele waaier van kwesties die verband houden met identiteitspolitiek en doet dit met een grondigheid en een diepgang die weinigen hem zullen nadoen.
Fukuyama richt zijn blik vooreerst op de filosofische wortels van identiteit en op de historische evolutie, voornamelijk sinds de Franse revolutie . De auteur gaat ook dieper in op hedendaagse kwesties i.v.m. identiteitspolitiek. Zo schrijft hij uitgebreid over de huidige linkse identiteitspolitiek die gericht is op gemarginaliseerde subgroepen (zwarten, vrouwen, de LGTB-gemeenschap). Hij ziet een evolutie: waar vroeger gemarginaliseerde groepen vroegen om erkenning als gelijke, begonnen ze de voorbije decennia veel meer op te komen voor een aparte identiteit voor de leden van de groep en voor erkenning van het specifieke anders-zijn. De subjectieve beleving komt hier centraal te staan. Ter linkerzijde groeit de idee van een cultureel pluralisme dat gericht is op het doorbreken van de hegemonie van de westers cultuur en waarden. Deze linkse identiteitspolitiek gaat samen met een politieke correctheid waartegen de rechterzijde dan weer sterk in verzet is gekomen. Waarna de auteur dieper ingaat op de gevaarlijke tendensen in de rechtse identiteitspolitiek (o.m. wanneer die zich rond ras groepeert). Hij ziet in de verenging van zowel de linkse als de rechtse identiteitsbeleving “een bedreiging voor de mogelijkheid tot communicatie en collectieve actie”. Hij is ervan overtuigd dat nationalismen niet exclusief hoeven te zijn maar dat “nationale identiteiten kunnen opgebouwd worden rond liberale en democratische politieke waarden”.
Het boek van Fukuyama is heel veelzijdig en behelst meer thema’s dan in deze bespreking aan bod kunnen komen. Hij schetst de filosofische en historische wortels van de identiteitskwestie grondig en gaat dieper in op hedendaagse kwesties zoals multiculturalisme, diversiteit versus de rechtse identiteitsbeleving rond nationalisme. Ook geografisch is dit boek heel verscheiden: hij schrijft evenzeer over de Verenigde Staten en over de EU en individuele Europese landen, als over de Arabische lente en het Rusland van Poetin. De auteur heeft het in dit boek over een hele waaier van kwesties die verband houden met identiteitspolitiek en doet dit met een grondigheid en een diepgang die weinigen hem zullen nadoen.
November 6, 2019
Certainly, this is a thoughtful piece of research and the book's ideas are applied across the globe, a fact that gives it weight and validity.
Fukuyama's thesis in brief is that politics and identity are fused, a thought that has its origins in Plato and his concept of worth/value/dignitythymos. The USA edition has a title that fits the book better than its alternative: "The Demand for Dignity".
I found that book an interesting path, but its conclusions were somewhat disappointing. Surely, such a complex and detailed piece of writing could come up with something better than compulsory military service as a way of linking individual and State identities. Perhaps, that thought shows the flaw in the book: though it questions both Capitalism and Liberal Democracies and Paternal Rule, the book cannot see beyond patriarchal structures in society.
Fukuyama's thesis in brief is that politics and identity are fused, a thought that has its origins in Plato and his concept of worth/value/dignitythymos. The USA edition has a title that fits the book better than its alternative: "The Demand for Dignity".
I found that book an interesting path, but its conclusions were somewhat disappointing. Surely, such a complex and detailed piece of writing could come up with something better than compulsory military service as a way of linking individual and State identities. Perhaps, that thought shows the flaw in the book: though it questions both Capitalism and Liberal Democracies and Paternal Rule, the book cannot see beyond patriarchal structures in society.
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