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We are more than we seem - or say
Sunday, January 07, 2001
Amartya Sen won the Nobel Prize in economics in 1998. He is a master of Trinity College at Cambridge. In November of last year, he was invited to present the annual British Academy Lecture.
Given what I have told you so far, you might conclude that his was a dry talk on some aspect of the dismal science. If so, you would be incorrect. The subject was diversity and Sen's gentle point was that the currently fashionable perspectives may be more hidebound and limiting than we realize.
Just as you might have jumped to conclusions after reading "Nobel Prize in economics," so we all may be reaching conclusions about ourselves and others on incomplete intelligence, on "what we have been told so far." The result may be a great variety of individual possibilities and social opportunities foregone.
Here a few ideas from an essay by Sen that was based on his lecture and published in the Dec. 18 issue of The New Republic:
The Notion of 'Plural Identity': Any claim that a person belongs to only one community or group "cannot but be manifestly absurd." Sen points out that a person can be a "Nigerian, an Ibo, a British citizen, a resident of the United States, a woman, a philosopher, a vegetarian, a Christian, a painter and a great believer in aliens who ride on UFOs - each of these groups giving the person a particular identify that may be invoked in particular contexts."
The Notion of Competing Claims: Often there is no tension between different identifies, as between profession and citizenship (philosopher and British citizen), religion and age (Muslim and middle-aged). But it is also true that loyalties can compete for our attention when it comes to giving priority to, say, "race, or religion, or political commitments, or professional obligations, or friendships."
However, Sen suggests, "in such a context, to be guided by only one particular identity (say race) oblivious of others can be disastrously limiting . . . and greatly impoverish our lives and our practical reason."
The Notion of Compatibility: "It is important to recognize the compatibility of plural identities with the demands of citizenship and of social cohesion . . . Criticism is sometimes made of people who take pride in traditional British or English culture, and it has even been suggested that such belief must be seen as proof of their nonacceptance of a multiethnic Britain. Why so?
". . . When J.B.S. Haldane, the great biologist and geneticist, chose to become an Indian citizen and remained so to his death in Calcutta in 1964, he did not demand that the term 'Indian' be disassociated from its historical associations. He demanded only that, he too, be counted in as an Indian, which of course he was. . . . There is no serious reason for caging oneself in a prison of limited identities, or volunteering to be caught in an imagined contradiction between the richness of the past and the freedom of the present."
The Notion of Choice: "The freedom that we actually have to choose our identity, especially in the way others see us, can often be extremely constrained," Sen admits . . . "[But] the point is not whether any identity can be chosen (that would be an absurd claim), but whether we do have choices among alternative identities or combinations of identifies - and perhaps more importantly, whether we have substantial freedom on what priority to give to various identifies that we may simultaneously have.
"One of the claims that many communitarians (and cultural separatists) have made is that our identity is a matter of self-realization, and thus not really a matter of choice. . . [It] comes before reasoning and choice.
"This claim . . . has to be rejected. A person may well discover a fact that she did not know - that she is Jewish. . . . but what importance to attach to this fact is something on which she will have to make her own decision."
The Notion of Social Responsibility: "To deny choice where choice exists is not only an epistemic mistake (a denial of reality); it can also entail a moral and political failure, since it denotes an abdication of one's responsibility to face the fundamental Socratic question: How should I live?
"Choice is inescapably associated with responsibility, and a chosen identity has to be defended in a way that a discovered identity need not be defended. Indeed, this lack of responsibility can be the cause of a great many transgressions, even a great many horrors."
Another aspect of the essay, the transcendence of "moral and political inclusion," cannot be done justice here. But if you have been with me this far, it should not come as a surprise that Sen is also skeptical of the good sense of thinking of an ideal society as a "federation of cultures."
As he points out, "Many of the 'cultures' that are frequently interpreted in rigidly narrow terms by contemporary religious leaders contain enormous internal variants of attitudes and beliefs."
Moreover and finally, "There is need to acknowledge the significance of political inclusion, which has consequences and achievements of its own that need not be confused with social identity. It is essential to recognize not only that identities can be plural, and that the priorities that we assign to our different identities are a matter for us to decide, but also that moral and political inclusion transcends the domain of identity."
Hear! Hear!
John G. Craig Jr. is editor of the Post-Gazette. 