Either Laws or Traditions… There’s No Other Way

I’ve been thinking a lot about the differences between liberal and conservative philosophies and how they relate to the Democratic and Republican (and other) parties in the US.

My general impression is that both philosophies believe we should follow the principles of How to Win Friends and Influence People, at least in terms of treating others with respect. There is no current, dominant political philosophy in the US that says we ourselves should harass others and try to hurt people.

There are differences, however, in what we expect from other people. A liberal philosophy preaches tolerance, in which we do not demand that others behave as we do and instead try to give leeway to the behaviors of others. A person wishes to yell in the streets? That is his right.

A conservative philosophy preaches tradition and decorum from all people, and suggests those who do not follow such principles should be ignored or perhaps brought to heel by societal intervention.

This establishes the general framework of political interactions in the 1960s, in which liberals were called “radicals” for rejecting the yoke of society (including government, religion, family, and so on) and conservatives were called “reactionaries” for automatically opposing anything a liberal supported.

Yet both sides still shared a common view about society: that America be a place where people respected each other and could work together to grow and thrive. The major difference was in how to accomplish the goal. A liberal looked to revolutionary movements that called for a new societal contract. A conservative looked to long-established institutions and traditions. In both cases, however, the principles of HTWFAIP played a key role. Whether enforced by custom, ideology, institution, or government, it was necessary that people respect each other and behave in ways that produced harmony, not discord.

Today, that framework and divide is all but shattered. Our 2016 election was not between a liberal revoutionary and a conservative traditionalist. It was not between someone calling for new institutions and someone else calling for renewed faith in our forefathers. Instead, it was between a mainstream moderate who suggested all instutitions deserve respect and change could come incrementally and a populist who said everything must be overthrown and that only he could achieve such change.

All this leaves us, possibly, without mutual respect as a shared value. We are on the precipice of revolutionary chaos that conservatives feared the 1960s would bring, and a fascist oligarchy that liberals feared a lack of revolution in the 1960s would produce. Dismissing decorum now is not a breach but a bastion. Anyone who doesn’t act rudely is suspicious.

If that’s the case, then perhaps what is needed is not revolution from both sides but instead a renewed focus on shared values. If one part of one side is set to trample values and institutions, then perhaps all others need to renew their values and recommit to upholding them. And perhaps that all should start with reading (or rereading) How to Win Friends and Influence People, in which kindness and respect are not signs of weakness but instead tools to achieve goals by reaffirming shared values.