Despite social pressure, boys and girls still prefer gender-typical toys
Fifty years of research on children's toy preferences shows that kids generally prefer toys oriented toward their own gender.
09 April, 2021
Credit: tan4ikk via Adobe Stock
- A recent meta-analysis overviewed 75 studies on children's gender-related toy preferences.
- The results found that "gender-related toy preferences may be considered a well-established finding."
- It's a controversial topic: Some people argue that these preferences stem from social pressure, while others say they're at least partly rooted in biology.
<p>There's more gender equality in Western societies today than in the past. Inequalities still exist, of course, but <a href="https://www.pnas.org/content/117/13/6990" target="_blank">research</a> shows a general uptrend in women joining and <a href="https://www.catalyst.org/research/women-in-management/#:~:text=Globally%20the%20Share%20of%20Women%20in%20Senior%20Management%20is%20Increasing%20Incrementally&text=In%202019%2C%20the%20proportion%20of,this%20percentage%20remains%20the%20same." target="_blank">rising within the workforce</a>, <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d12/tables/dt12_310.asp" target="_blank">obtaining degrees</a>, and earning more money. The social expectations of men and women also seemed to have changed; this is harder to measure empirically, but it seems safe to say that our ideas about gender roles are more fluid today than they were, in say, the 1950s.<br></p><p>So, have these changes affected a crucial part of children's development: play? More specifically, as gender roles have become more fluid, have children's preferences toward gender-typed toys become more fluid, too?</p><p>The short answer seems to be no. For decades, <a href="https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/07/160715114739.htm" target="_blank">studies</a> <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/homo-consumericus/201212/sex-specific-toy-preferences-learned-or-innate" target="_blank">have shown</a> that boys and girls generally prefer playing with toys typically associated with their biological sex: toy trucks for boys and dolls for girls, to give a rough example.</p><p>These results have remained remarkably stable over the past 50 years, according to a 2020 meta-analysis of research on gender differences in toy preferences. Published in <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-021-01989-8" target="_blank"><em>Archives of Sexual Behavior</em></a> and titled "The Magnitude of Children's Gender‐Related Toy Interests Has Remained Stable Over 50 Years of Research," the analysis examined 75 previous studies, 113 effect sizes, and a range of toy preference measurements. </p><blockquote>No matter what society wants, it's worth noting that there seems to be some biological drivers behind children's preferences for gender-typical toys.</blockquote><p>The authors, Jac T. M. Davis and Melissa Hines, found "a broad consistency of results across the large body of research on children's gender-related toy preferences: children showed large and reliable preferences for toys that were related to their own gender. Thus, according to our review, gender-related toy preferences may be considered a well-established finding."</p><p>A letter to the editor in the same journal sought to challenge these findings in a separate <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-021-01916-x" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">analysis</a>, which concluded that children actually spend less time playing with gender-typical toys these days. </p><p>The authors of that analysis speculated that the reason for this decline "might reflect social pressures in recent times for children to be less gender-typical in their behavior." In other words, the decline stems from parents wanting to be more in line with progressive ideas about gender fluidity. </p><p>However, Davis and Hines disagreed, proposing that the supposed decline appeared in the analysis only because of the specific methodology employed by the researchers. What's more, they noted that toy advertisers have been using more gender stereotypes to boost sales in recent decades—a finding that potentially complicates the claim that social pressures are causing kids to spend less time playing with gender-typical toys.</p><p>Davis and Hines concluded:</p><p style="margin-left: 20px;">"It may be tempting to think that social changes over time might be reducing children's play with gender-related toys, given arguments that play with a broader set of toys would be beneficial for both boys and girls. Unfortunately, however, broad change in the social roles of men and women do not seem to have influenced children's toy choices, perhaps because they have been counteracted by stronger marketing of different toys to girls and boys over recent time. If society wants girls and boys to play with the full range of toys, more targeted action is probably required."<span></span></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img class="rm-lazyloadable-image rm-shortcode" type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNjAzNTA4My9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY2ODk4MDkzNH0.ZJC_sylmbACQiQu1zssRSPUnHdPU3qUmeNfKDWDnYf0/img.jpg?width=980" id="97213" width="6658" height="4444" data-rm-shortcode-id="fb367869686ad03cbd1dd84aada1224a" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Little boy playing mathematics wooden toy at nursery">
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Little boy playing mathematics wooden toy at nursery</small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit...">Credit: <a href="https://stock.adobe.com/contributor/204567087/rawpixel-com?load_type=author&prev_url=detail" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Rawpixel.com</a> via Adobe Stock</small></p><p><br></p><h2>Why are we so concerned about which toys kids play with? </h2><p>But does society really want kids to play with less gender-typical toys? Some research suggests the answer is yes. A <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/12/19/most-americans-see-value-in-steering-children-toward-toys-activities-associated-with-opposite-gender/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">2017 survey from Pew Research Center</a> found that a majority of Americans considered it a "somewhat or very good thing" to steer kids toward toys and activities traditionally associated with the opposite gender (though respondents were less enthusiastic about doing so for boys than girls). </p><p>Encouraging kids to play with a wider range of toys could yield benefits. For example, a 2020 study published in <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2020.560176/full" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Frontiers in Human Neuroscience</em></a> found that when both boys and girls play with dolls, they experience heightened activation within brain regions associated with empathy and perspective-taking. </p><p>But no matter what society wants, it's worth noting that there seems to be some biological drivers behind children's preferences for gender-typical toys. </p><p>For example, <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19016318/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">studies</a> have shown that babies tend to prefer toys oriented to their own gender, a finding that suggests their preference is innate because they're in the pre-socialization stage of development. Supporting that argument are <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2583786/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">studies showing</a> that baby monkeys also display gender-typical toy preferences. </p><p>Still, it's easy to see how social pressures might affect kids' toy preferences as they grow up. So, the question of why kids prefer the toys that they do likely boils down to a familiar answer: a tangled mix of environmental and biological factors.</p><div></div><ul class="ee-ul"></ul><div></div>
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Why people become radical extremists and how to help them
New research sheds light on the indoctrination process of radical extremist groups.
08 April, 2021
Credit: Scott Olson/Getty Images
- A new study features interviews with 24 former extremists on the radicalization process.
- Financial instability, online propaganda, and reorienting events that caused them to "snap" are leading causes of indoctrination.
- The research team offers potential solutions, including exposure to diverse ideas during childhood and a tamping down of polarization and media sensationalism.
<p>Researchers are continuing to unpack the reasons why extremists stormed the Capitol on January 6. Political scientist Robert Pape hypothesized that answers could be found in increasingly desperate economic conditions—the distance between the wealthiest and everyone else has <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/02/07/6-facts-about-economic-inequality-in-the-u-s/" target="_blank">never been so stark in America</a>. As he dug into the data, however, a different story emerged. </p><p>The insurrectionists, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/04/06/capitol-insurrection-arrests-cpost-analysis/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">he found</a>, were predominantly from areas that feared immigrants and minorities are taking away rights and opportunities from white people. As Pape <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/06/us/politics/capitol-riot-study.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">told the <em>NY Times</em></a>, </p><p style="margin-left: 20px;">"If you look back in history, there has always been a series of far-right extremist movements responding to new waves of immigration to the United States or to movements for civil rights by minority groups. [The Capitol insurrectionists] are mainly middle-class to upper-middle-class whites who are worried that, as social changes occur around them, they will see a decline in their status in the future."</p><p>Pape isn't the only researcher contemplating the path from aggrievement to insurrection. A <a href="https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA1071-1.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">new study</a>, published by the RAND Corporation, takes a detailed look at the indoctrination process through interviews with white nationalists, Islamic extremists, and their family members and friends. </p><p>The researchers set out with a basic set of questions to better understand the radicalization process in the hopes of developing prevention and intervention measures. </p><ul class="ee-ul"><li>What factors lead individuals to join violent extremist organizations? </li><li>How and why do extremists become deradicalized, leave their organizations, change their minds, and in some cases join the fight against radicalism? </li><li>What can we do better to assist those who have been radicalized and prevent extremist organizations from recruiting new members? </li></ul><p>After poring over existing research, the team conducted 36 interviews, consisting of 24 former extremists, 10 family members, and two friends. Most of the subjects were active in this millennium, with six only active before the year 2000. </p><p>The researchers discovered three major background characteristics that led people to become extremists. (1) Financial instability: In 22 cases, financial instability was key, with seven former extremists claiming this as the main reason they joined an extremist organization. (2) Mental health issues: In 17 cases, overwhelming anger predominated, but PTSD, trauma, substance abuse, and depression around physical issues also played a role. (3) Social factors: Marginalization, victimization, and stigmatization were mentioned in 16 cases. </p><p>Often, these background characteristics weren't enough. In over half the cases, there was a "reorienting event," that is, a moment that "broke" them, such as being rejected from the military, experiencing long-term unemployment, or enduring a friend's suicide. Propaganda was involved in 22 cases, predominantly through social media but also through books and music. Another factor was direct and indirect recruitment, with indirect recruitment being much more common. In other words, the individuals sought to join extremists groups. Social bonds played a role in 14 cases, including "graduating" from one organization to a more extreme group.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img class="rm-lazyloadable-image rm-shortcode" type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNjAzMTExMy9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1MTQ3MTY3NX0.NCbZBnI6VCJ1dLOIeN5qmmybpWBHHlMmSmg5YgEJlj8/img.jpg?width=980" id="1ac2b" width="4032" height="2688" data-rm-shortcode-id="bde6214516f750f61682b249ee410e99" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption..." spellcheck="false">A Proud Boy member is armed with a gun labeled "Zombie Killer" as members and supporters of Patriot Prayer gather in Esther Short Park for a memorial for member Aaron J. Danielson in Vancouver, Washington on September 5, 2020. </small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit...">Credit: Allison Dinner / AFP via Getty Images</small></p><p><br></p><h2>How to help extremists</h2><p>Why do extremists quit? The most common reasons for leaving are feelings of disillusionment and burnout. Members grew disappointed by the failed promises of leaders or noticed hypocrisy among the ranks. Over half of the individuals were involved in failed deradicalization efforts, however, showing the resilience of these organizations even when family members and friends try to intervene. </p><p>The good news is that there is light at the end of the tunnel. An extremist isn't a lost cause. The team lists important steps for helping extremists leave hate groups as well as for preventing people from being seduced in the first place. The researchers' recommendations include: </p><ul class="ee-ul"><li>Exposure to diverse ideas, especially during childhood</li><li>The development of critical thinking skills</li><li>Participation in prosocial activities that promote positive behaviors and inclusiveness</li><li>Exposure to different racial and cultural groups</li><li>Addressing marginalization more broadly</li><li>A tamping down of polarization and media sensationalism</li><li>Better access to mental health treatment </li><li>Targeted outreach and support for military veterans</li></ul><ul class="ee-ul"></ul><p>The researchers note that this is a small study sample, so further work is necessary. Yet, these interviews offer a starting point for understanding the true scope of the problem. The reasons people become extremists are complex and multivariate. Preventing extremism therefore requires a holistic approach that addresses topics such as childhood education, poverty, mental health, ethnic and racial animosity, and the prevalence of propaganda.</p><p>--</p><ul class="ee-ul"></ul><p><em>Stay in touch with Derek on <a href="http://www.twitter.com/derekberes" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Twitter</a> and <a href="https://www.facebook.com/DerekBeresdotcom" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Facebook</a>. His most recent book is</em> "<em><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08KRVMP2M?pf_rd_r=MDJW43337675SZ0X00FH&pf_rd_p=edaba0ee-c2fe-4124-9f5d-b31d6b1bfbee" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Hero's Dose: The Case For Psychedelics in Ritual and Therapy</a>."</em></p><p><em><br></em></p>
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Even in mathematics, who you know may matter more than your talent
The Field Medal was created to elevate promising mathematicians from underrepresented demographics. But has it followed through on that goal?
01 April, 2021
Credit: Fung et al.
- In a recent study, researchers collected data on the backgrounds and academic genealogy of thousands of mathematicians.
- The results revealed that mathematicians of certain backgrounds—namely, from Western countries—are significantly more likely to join elite circles in mathematics.
- The researchers issued recommendations for how elite institutions could help the Fields Medal accomplish its original goal.
<p><br></p><p>As the "universal language," mathematics is commonly considered to be an egalitarian field.</p><p>After all, there's far less room for subjectivity when judging works in algebraic geometry than, say, literature or sociology. The field's objectivity should have, in theory, helped foster something like a global meritocracy over time. But has that happened?</p><p>To shed light on this question, a recent study used big data to explore the relationships between mentorships, prizes, and inclusivity within mathematics. Published in <em>Nature's </em><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-020-00680-y" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Humanities and Social Sciences Communications</em></a>, the study took a close look at winners of the Fields Medal over recent decades.</p><p>The Fields Medal is commonly considered to be the Nobel Prize of mathematics. It's awarded to up to four mathematicians under the age of 40, every four years. First awarded in 1936, the Fields Medal was created in the 1930s to help promote mathematicians from historically underrepresented demographics around the world; it was also part of a larger movement to ensure the destruction of WWII didn't rupture the international mathematics community.</p><p>In the study, researchers from Dartmouth College noted that the Fields Medal has helped elevate mathematicians from underrepresented groups, such as mathematicians from Germany and Japan. However, the results also showed that many Field Medalists came from the same "ancestral tree" of high-profile mentors, suggesting the existence of a "self-reinforcing behavior among the elites."</p><p><br></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img class="rm-lazyloadable-image rm-shortcode" type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNTk2OTAyNS9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzMDE4NTUyNH0.3ZFbH3DNTtRJQ8XSUOEIX24qQB0HOUu7uJb1sgaCv3A/img.png?width=980" id="746b3" width="623" height="599" data-rm-shortcode-id="563070a8b67a9ed5a9b5aa133062ea26" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Fields Medal</small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit..."><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fields_Medal" target="_blank">Credit: Stefan Zachow via Wikipedia</a></small></p><div style="display: none;"><img class="rm-lazyloadable-image rm-shortcode" type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNTk2OTAyNS9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzMDE4NTUyNH0.3ZFbH3DNTtRJQ8XSUOEIX24qQB0HOUu7uJb1sgaCv3A/img.png?width=980" id="746b3" width="623" height="599" data-rm-shortcode-id="0946c1dc57c38c00b0437ae51f80df65" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Fie"></div><p><br></p><p>"There are many sources of inequality in elite-level math and academia," lead study author Herbert Chang, a research affiliate at Dartmouth's Fu Lab, said in a <a href="https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2021-03/dc-bdt032221.php" target="_blank">press release</a>. "Our goal was to characterize how a single factor--mentorship--plays a role, while telling a comprehensive story about mathematics."</p><p>To get a better perspective of the composition and history of elite circles in mathematics, the researchers used data from the Mathematics Genealogy Project. The project contains detailed information about the academic genealogy — such as <em>alma mater</em>, doctoral advisor, doctoral students — of more than 260,000 mathematicians.</p><p>(Note: The researchers defined "elite" by measuring mathematicians' associations with Field Medalists.)</p><p>The researchers also collected data on mathematicians' home countries and lingo-ethnic categories, which helped create visualizations of the migration of mathematicians and the levels of pluralism in different nations. Pluralism was defined in the study as "the proportion of elite mathematicians that are not part of the majority lingo-ethnic identity."</p><p><br></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img class="rm-lazyloadable-image rm-shortcode" type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNTk2OTA1Ni9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY3NDY1MTAzNn0.tJIVaH1JGMWl6AVk30gHyptq7LFaGbPQmoxk2IT2kzk/img.png?width=980" id="ae4a1" width="672" height="684" data-rm-shortcode-id="4affd7cc5794d56ab948add7ea73281d" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
<small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit..."><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-020-00680-y" target="_blank">Credit: Fung et al.</a></small></p><p><br></p><p>The results paint a visual history of the flow of mathematicians into seven key countries.</p><p>"By 1932, the Holocaust led to mass migration from Germany to the United States and other European countries, which accounts for the drop in green volume in Fig. <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-020-00680-y#Fig1" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">1</a>a, including prominent scientist Albert Einstein," the researchers wrote.</p><p>"Similarly, we observe large amounts of outflow from Russia after the cold war, greatly diminishing the presence of Russia mathematicians after the 1990s, and the second Italian mass diaspora after WWII. Beyond forced immigration, flow analysis also reveals the movement of reintegration. Japanese mathematicians immigrated to the United States following WWII, and continued throughout the 1960s to the 1990s. Twenty years later, Japanese mathematicians flowed back toward Japan."</p><p><br></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img class="rm-lazyloadable-image rm-shortcode" type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNTk2OTA3NS9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY0MTcyNjUwM30.uhMi0Owv7Y5yA1pb-rTLB3VrWOrkngg9ZWxtZsnMphU/img.png?width=980" id="a25ef" width="1170" height="794" data-rm-shortcode-id="2bfbf06a2d0276165e4ff4c60487f50d" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
<small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit..."><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-020-00680-y" target="_blank">Credit: Fung et al.</a></small></p><p><br></p><p>The results revealed significant disparities when it comes to identity and membership in elite circles. For example, a mathematician who is French and attends a top-50 institution is 6.4 times more likely to join an elite circle.</p><p>Meanwhile, an East Asian mathematician who also attends a top-50 institution is 4.5 times less likely to join an elite circle than the French mathematician, while an Indian mathematician is 6 times less likely. In general, the results showed that mathematicians from Arabic, African, and East Asian language identities were underrepresented.</p><p>"It's a privilege for a young mathematician to inherit a powerful network of relationships from an influential academic advisor," <a href="https://faculty-directory.dartmouth.edu/feng-fu" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Fu</a> said in the press release. "The growing number of doctoral degrees awarded to international mathematicians in the U.S. indicates that mathematics can be a powerful integrative force in our common humanity."</p><p>To better promote the original goal of the Fields Medal — promoting promising mathematicians from underrepresented communities — the researchers issued two recommendations:</p><p>"First, elite institutions should continue to recruit from a diverse set of communities," they wrote. "Second, prizes that balance intellectual contribution, while simultaneously broadening community, would suit the vision of an equitable society that the Fields Medal once sought to do."</p><p>"Who is under-represented within a state shifts over geography, culture, and time. The vision of equitable scientific production demands constant evolution and reflection, especially at the elite level."</p>
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Politics desperately needs hope, so why does it no longer inspire it?
For some philosophers, hope is a second-rate way of relating to reality.
23 March, 2021
EMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP via Getty Images
In the late 2000s and early 2010s, the word 'hope' was ubiquitous in Western politics.
<p> While its use in the Barack Obama presidential campaign has become iconic, appeal to hope was not limited to the United States: the Leftist Greek Syriza party relied on the slogan 'hope is on the way', for example, and many other European parties embraced similar rallying cries. Since then, however, we rarely hear or see 'hope' in the public sphere.</p><p>Even in its heyday, the rhetoric of hope wasn't universally popular. When in 2010 the former vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin rhetorically asked: 'How's that hopey, changey stuff working out for ya?' she tapped into a widespread skepticism that views hope as unrealistic, even delusional. Palin's skepticism (many will be surprised to hear) has long been at work in the philosophical tradition. From Plato to René Descartes, many philosophers have argued that hope is weaker than expectation and confidence since it requires belief merely in the <em>possibility</em> of an event, not evidence that it is likely to occur.</p><p>For these philosophers, hope is a second-rate way of relating to reality, appropriate only when a person lacks the requisite knowledge to form 'proper' expectations. The radical Enlightenment philosopher Baruch Spinoza gives voice to this opinion when he writes that hope indicates 'a lack of knowledge and a weakness of mind' and that 'the more we endeavour to live by the guidance of reason, the more we endeavour to be independent of hope'. According to this view, hope is particularly unsuitable as a guide to political action. Citizens should base their decisions on rational expectations about what governments can achieve, rather than letting themselves be motivated by mere hope.</p>
<p>This skepticism should be taken seriously and can indeed point us toward a better understanding of the rise and fall of the rhetoric of hope. So is there space for hope in politics?</p><p>We need to be precise about what kind of hope we are talking about. If we are considering what individuals hope for, any policy that has consequences for people's lives will be tied to hope in some way – whether this is hope for that policy's success or hope for its failure. The generation of such hope isn't necessarily good or bad; it is simply a part of political life. But when political movements promise to deliver hope, they are clearly not speaking of hope in this generic sense. This particular rhetoric of hope refers to a more specific, morally attractive and distinctively <em>political</em> form of hope<em>.</em></p><p>Political hope is distinguished by two features. Its object is political: it is hope for social justice. And its character is political: it is a collective attitude. While the significance of the first feature is perhaps obvious, the second feature explains why it makes sense to speak of hope's 'return' to politics. When political movements seek to rekindle hope, they are not acting on the assumption that individual people no longer hope for things – they are building on the idea that hope does not currently shape our <em>collective</em> orientation toward the future. The promise of a 'politics of hope' is thus the promise that hope for social justice will become part of the sphere of collective action, of politics itself.</p>
<p>Even so, the question remains whether political hope is really a good thing. If one of the tasks of government is to realise social justice, would it not be better for political movements to promote justified expectations rather than mere hope? Is the rhetoric of hope not a tacit admission that the movements in question lack strategies for inspiring confidence?</p><p>The sphere of politics has particular features, unique to it, that impose limitations on what we can rationally expect. One such limitation is what the American moral philosopher John Rawls in 1993 described as the insurmountable pluralism of 'comprehensive doctrines'. In modern societies, people disagree about what is ultimately valuable, and these disagreements often cannot be resolved by reasonable argument. Such pluralism makes it unreasonable to expect that we will ever arrive at a final consensus on these matters. To the extent that governments should not pursue ends that cannot be justified to all citizens, the most we can rationally expect from politics is the pursuit of those principles of justice on which all reasonable people can agree, such as basic human rights, non-discrimination, and democratic decision-making. Thus, we cannot rationally expect governments that respect our plurality to pursue more demanding ideals of justice – for example, via ambitious redistributive policies that are not justifiable relative to all, even the most individualistic, conceptions of the good.</p><p>This limitation stands in tension with another of Rawls's claims. He also argued, in 1971, that the most important social good is self-respect. In a liberal society, the citizens' self-respect is based on the knowledge that there is a public commitment to justice – on the understanding that other citizens view them as deserving fair treatment. However, if we can expect agreement on only a narrow set of ideals, that expectation will make a relatively small contribution to our self-respect. Compared with possible consensus on more demanding ideals of justice, this expectation will do relatively little to make us view other citizens as being deeply committed to justice.</p>
<p>Fortunately, we need not limit ourselves to what we can expect. Even though we are not justified in <em>expecting</em> more than limited agreement on justice, we can still collectively <em>hope</em> that, in the future, consensus on more demanding ideals of justice will emerge. When citizens collectively entertain this hope, this expresses a shared understanding that each member of society deserves to be included in an ambitious project of justice, even if we disagree about what that project should be. This knowledge can contribute to self-respect and is thus a desirable social good in its own right. In the absence of consensus, political hope is a necessary part of social justice itself.</p><p>So it is rational, perhaps even necessary, to recruit the notion of hope for the purposes of justice. And this is why the rhetoric of hope has all but disappeared. We can seriously employ the rhetoric of hope only when we believe that citizens can be brought to develop a shared commitment to exploring ambitious projects of social justice, even when they disagree about their content. This belief has become increasingly implausible in light of recent developments that reveal how divided Western democracies really are. A sizable minority in Europe and the US has made it clear, in response to the rhetoric of hope, that it disagrees not only about the meaning of justice but also with the very idea that our current vocabulary of social justice ought to be extended. One can, of course, still individually hope that those who hold this view will be convinced to change it. As things stand, however, this is not a hope that they are able to share.</p><p><em>This Idea was made possible through the support of a grant to Aeon magazine from Templeton Religion Trust. The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of Templeton Religion Trust.</em></p><p><em>Funders to Aeon Magazine are not involved in editorial decision-making, including commissioning or content approval.</em><img src="https://metrics.aeon.co/count/b28112c1-c1e4-4ba1-818a-aaf7f86dc9e6.gif" alt="Aeon counter – do not remove"></p><p>Titus Stahl</p><p>This article was originally published at <a href="https://aeon.co/?utm_campaign=republished-article" target="_blank">Aeon</a> and has been republished under Creative Commons. Read the <a href="https://aeon.co/ideas/why-politics-needs-hope-but-no-longer-inspires-it" target="_blank">original article</a>.</p>
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Hannah Arendt: Change the world, not yourself
How the German political philosopher called out Henry David Thoreau on civil disobedience.
16 March, 2021
JOHN MACDOUGALL/AFP via Getty Images
It is not often that a neighbourhood squabble is remembered as a world-historical event. In the summer of 1846, Henry David Thoreau spent a single night in jail in Concord, Massachusetts after refusing to submit his poll tax to the local constable.
<p> This minor act of defiance would later be immortalised in Thoreau's essay 'On the Duty of Civil Disobedience' (1849). There, he explains that he had been unwilling to provide material support to a federal government that perpetuated mass injustice – in particular, slavery and the Mexican-American war. While the essay went largely unread in his own lifetime, Thoreau's theory of civil disobedience would later inspire many of the world's greatest political thinkers, from Leo Tolstoy and Gandhi to Martin Luther King.</p><p>Yet his theory of dissent would have its dissenters, too. The political theorist Hannah Arendt wrote an essay on 'Civil Disobedience', published in <em>The New Yorker</em> magazine in September 1970. Thoreau, she argued, was no civil disobedient. In fact, she insisted that his whole moral philosophy was anathema to the collective spirit that ought to guide acts of public refusal. How could the great luminary of civil disobedience be charged with misunderstanding it so profoundly?</p>
<p>Thoreau's essay offers a forceful critique of state authority and an uncompromising defence of the individual conscience. In <em>Walden</em> (1854)<em>,</em> he argued that each man should follow his own individual 'genius' rather than social convention, and in 'On the Duty of Civil Disobedience' he insists that we should follow our own moral convictions rather than the laws of the land. The citizen, he suggests, must never 'for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislation'. For Thoreau, this prescription holds even when the laws are produced through democratic elections and referenda. Indeed, for him, democratic participation only degrades our moral character. When we cast a ballot, he explains, we vote for a principle that we believe is right, but at the same time, assert our willingness to recognise whatever principle – be it right or wrong – the majority favours. In this way, we elevate popular opinion over moral rectitude. Because he places so much stock in his own conscience, and so little in either state authority or democratic opinion, Thoreau believed that he was bound to disobey any law that ran counter to his own convictions. His theory of civil disobedience is grounded in that belief.</p><p>Thoreau's decision to withhold his financial support for the federal government of 1846 was, no doubt, a righteous one. And the theory that inspired that action would go on to inspire many more righteous acts of disobedience. Yet despite these remarkable successes, Arendt argues that Thoreau's theory was misguided. In particular, she insists that he was wrong to ground civil disobedience in the individual conscience. First, and most simply, she points out that conscience is too subjective a category to justify political action. Leftists who protest the treatment of refugees at the hands of US immigration officers are motivated by conscience, but so was Kim Davis – the conservative county clerk in Kentucky who in 2015 denied marriage licences to same-sex couples. Conscience alone can be used to justify all types of political beliefs and so provides no guarantee of moral action.</p><p>Second, Arendt makes the more complex argument that, even when it is morally unimpeachable, conscience is 'unpolitical'; that is, it encourages us to focus on our own moral purity rather than the collective actions that might bring about real change. Crucially, in calling conscience 'unpolitical', Arendt does not mean that it is useless. In fact, she believed that the voice of conscience was often vitally important. In her book <em>Eichmann in Jerusalem</em> (1963)<em>,</em> for example, she argues that it was the Nazi officer Adolf Eichmann's lack of ethical introspection that enabled his participation in the unimaginable evils of the Holocaust. Arendt knew from the experience of Fascism that conscience could prevent subjects from actively advancing profound injustice, but she saw that as a kind of moral bare minimum. The rules of conscience, she argues, 'do not say what to do; they say what not to do'. In other words: personal conscience can sometimes prevent us from aiding and abetting evil but it does not require us to undertake positive political action to bring about justice.</p>
<p>Thoreau would likely accept the charge that his theory of civil disobedience told men only 'what not to do', as he did not believe it was the responsibility of individuals to actively <em>improve</em> the world. 'It is not a man's duty, as a matter of course,' he writes, 'to devote himself to the eradication of any, even to the most enormous, wrong; he may still properly have other concerns to engage him; but it is his duty, at least, to wash his hands of it…' Arendt would agree that it is better to abstain from injustice than to participate in it, but she worries that Thoreau's philosophy might make us complacent about any evil that we aren't personally complicit in. Because Thoreauvian civil disobedience is so focused on the personal conscience and not, as Arendt puts it, on 'the world where the wrong is committed', it risks prioritising individual moral purity over the creation of a more just society.</p><p>Perhaps the most striking difference between Thoreau and Arendt is that, while he sees disobedience as necessarily individual, she sees it as, <em>by definition</em>, collective.</p><p>Arendt argues that for an act of law-breaking to count as civil disobedience it must be performed openly and publicly (put simply: if you break the law in private, you're committing a crime, but if you break the law at a protest, you're making a point). Thoreau's dramatic refusal to pay his poll tax would meet this definition, but Arendt makes one further distinction: anyone who breaks the law publicly but <em>individually</em> is a mere conscientious objector; those who break the law publicly and <em>collectively</em> are civil disobedients. It is only this latter group – from which she would exclude Thoreau – that is capable of producing real change, she implies. Mass civil disobedience movements generate momentum, apply pressure, and shift political discourse. For Arendt, the greatest civil disobedience movements – Indian independence, civil rights, and the anti-war movement – took inspiration from Thoreau but added a vital commitment to mass, public action. In sharp contrast, Thoreau believed that 'there is but little virtue in the action of masses of men'.</p><p>'On the Duty of Civil Disobedience' is an essay of rare moral vision. In it, Thoreau expresses uncompromising critiques of the government of his era, while also capturing the powerful feelings of moral conviction that often undergird acts of civil disobedience. Nevertheless, it is Arendt's account of the practice that is ultimately more promising. Arendt insists that we focus not on our own conscience but on the injustice committed, and the concrete means of redressing it. This does not mean that civil disobedience has to aim for something moderate or even achievable but that it should be calibrated toward the world – which it has the power to change – and not toward the self – which it can only purify.<img src="https://metrics.aeon.co/count/38567123-9bc4-4e86-96cc-8b7857547e51.gif" alt="Aeon counter – do not remove"></p><p>This article was originally published at <a href="https://aeon.co/?utm_campaign=republished-article" target="_blank">Aeon</a> and has been republished under Creative Commons. Read the <a href="https://aeon.co/ideas/change-the-world-not-yourself-or-how-arendt-called-out-thoreau" target="_blank">original article</a>.</p>
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