what became of the virtue of a larger loyalty?

One of the most cogent writers for any American newspaper is James Carroll of the Boston Globe.  Regular readers of my diaries know how frequently I use his op ed pieces as a basis for my own writing - I point the reader at what he has to say by excerpting some selections, while urging that the entire piece be read.  In the process I may offer some passing observations,and I usually will offer some thoughts provoked by engaging with the ideas Carroll has presented.

This column will be somewhat different.  I am going to strongly insist that you take the few moments to read the 743 words of A new declaration of liberty and then we can converse.  Or at least then I can have some common basis with you as I share my perceptions
Now that you have read the piece, let me explain first why I picked the title for this that I did.  It is from the end of Carroll's first paragraph.  Carroll has used the closeness of the commemorations of the American and French revolutions, both in history (1776 and 1789) and in our current month (July 4 and 14) to point out that while inevitable steps towards a better world, they also provide a challenge, one that has seen over time an increasing narrowing of the focus to what our loyalty is dedicated.  Even with the addition of the 3rd Declaration that he discusses, that of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, he sees the series of revolutions as incomplete even as he acknowledges that this third reverse some of the dangerous trends created by the first two.

Let us review some of the points that caught my attention in reading this powerful piece.  Those late 18th Century revolutions saw a movement away from loyalty to a monarch whose position was by divine right, and hence to some degree required a religious loyalty as well, towards the rights of a citizen and of a nation constructed around the idea of those rights.  That is, the nation was construed as an extension of the rights of citizens, or as Jefferson says in our own Declaration

that to preserve these rights governments were instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed

To me the key to the article lies in the fourth and fifth paragraphs, which I will quote in their entirety:

In an unintended consequence of historic proportions, the humane new way of seeing the state, as belonging to its citizens instead of to its rulers, changed the meaning of war. No longer was combat an enterprise of the elite, carried out by lords and their lieges, but now whole populations of those self-same citizens would be mobilized for war -- and targeted. Alas, this ideological transformation occurred just as technological innovations made mass destruction possible.

Meanwhile, a new primacy of individual over group, implied in declarations of rights and principles of self-determination, meant that parts could assert autonomy in relation to the whole. In another tragically unintended consequence, this absolutizing of ethnic, religious, and tribal identity, even while enabling the realization of a multitude of national dreams, has led to the modern savagery of successive civil wars. One sub nation after another, asserting a right to independence, ennobles murder and suicide.

Let us look at that final sentence one more time: One sub nation after another, asserting a right to independence, ennobles murder and suicide.  We have seen this constantly in the past several hundred years.  Many, including such notables as Lord Byron, celebrated the Greek assertion of national independence in the 1820s, and the other movements away from dominance by the Ottomans.  Unfortunately that urge towards nationalism led to the assassination of the heir to the Austrian throne by a Serbian nationalist and the concomitant slaughter of the Great War (including during the War the genocidal treatment of the Armenians, asserting their own nationalism by the Turks.)  At the end of that war Wilson propounded a vision of national self-determination that was inconsistently applied and which has haunted the world ever since.  The great empires created entities designed to be weak in order to dominate them (Iraq, for example), and some large ethnic groups, notably the Kurds, were denied the right to self-determination, to their own state.  Subsequent freeing of colonial entities often resulted in similar structures, particularly in the lines drawn in Africa without regard to the characteristics that could bind people together, and thus have contributed greatly to the instability around the world since 1918 and especially since the end of the Second World War.  Religion has often been a cause of dispute and destruction - in N Ireland, in the Indian subcontinent, in what is now Sri Lanka, to a large degree in the former Yugoslavia and Iraq - but so has perceived ethnicity - in the former Yugoslavia, in Rwanda, in Nigeria, in the Congo. 

Carroll argues the the 1948 Declaration of Human Rights was a move away from nationalism.  Insofar as it asserts a set of rights to which each human is entitled and that these are independent from the structure of the nation in which that citizen resides, he might be correct.  But, as he rightly notes, the application of the principles of this declaration occurred in a time and environment which was seeing the dismantling of the previous colonial empires (British, French and Dutch, and to a much lesser extend Portuguese) that were unsustainable after the Second World War. 

Carroll points out the explosion of new states occurs in a context of the Cold War, with superpowers jockeying for position against one another, within a realization of the destruction of war and the desire to avoid large-scale war that motivated the creation of the United Nations.  In less than 750 words it was not possible for Carroll to explore all the dimensions of something that had an inevitable conflict.  The two great powers both attempted to assert their strength relative to the other through their manipulation of the new nations, many of which were quite assertive in their nationalism.  He argues that at least some national leaders, recognizing the destructiveness of modern warfare, felt the time had come to "mitigate" the claims of nationalism.  But in the attempt to find some broader basis by which this could be done, we have found ourselves in a destructive place:

But war is only part of the story now. Eighteenth-century ideas of national grandeur, isolated and "free," contribute, also, to the rolling catastrophe of ecological ruin. Likewise the "free" but amoral market economy that impoverishes the earth's majority. "Human rights" have been hijacked by money and power.

Looking back at the three previous declarations, he acknowledges the good intent, including that of inspiring us, but asks for something more

The time has come for a fourth declaration -- for everyone, for real.

And for me, therein lies the problem.  We have seen history affirm again and again the human tendency to commit to a principle greater than the individual, but to do so only when it has the trappings of something asserted as beyond question, whether it comes about because there is a monarch by divine right, a concept of American Exceptionalism, the superiority of one race or religion or nationality over others . . . all of these tend to draw those so gathered together to the idea of an obligation to spread such truth to others - an evangelizing if you will, a concept as applicable to the Wilsonian idea of the spread of self-determination and democracy as it was to the spread of Islam and still is to many evangelical groups such as Southern Baptists and Mormons. 

I think Carroll does an excellent albeit incomplete job of analyzing some of the historical forces and human impulses.  I would expect that had he more space he would expand the ideas so that some of the questions that arose in my mind as I read would be more fully addressed. 

But I am left frustrated, because I'm not sure how we can define that fourth declaration, this time for everyone.  There is a conundrum that too often we seem unwilling to accept.  If we believe in self-determination, what if the people in that nation decide to opt for a system of government and society which we abhor?  What if their national and individual interests inevitably place them in conflict with what we through our government conceive as our national interest?

The issue would not be resolved by one universal super-state.  The patterns of nationalism, of ethnicity, of religion, of party, are all too deeply embedded in human society and in our individual outlooks.  So many benefit from the assertion of these patterns that it is hard to imagine how the world can be other than it is, which is a history of divisiveness, of intolerance, of smugness, of assertions of superiority, and thus of conflict and war.

To my mind what hope there can be lies in providing a different example.  It is what I believe is not only the promise, but the obligation of our own revolution.  I do not think we can achieve it by force or politics which betrays that promise.  American Exceptionalism should be focused less on our superiority than on our willingness to explore the implications of liberty,  Our loyalty must be beyond even our own nation to all of humanity.  And as we must, if we are true to our heritage, allow for the unpopular opinion and religious outlook (or rejection of same) within our borders we must acknowledge that other may choose to work our their destinies in a different manor and with a different structure of government than we would choose.  We cannot, and should not, impose our self-concept upon other nations.  Rather than an arrogance which presumes that our ways are superior which entitles us to evangelize at the point of a bayonet or with the force of our economy other nations and culture, we can at best attempt to demonstrate how our people can be diverse and yet all can thrive.  Of course, that would require us to live up to the promise of America within our own borders, something we have never completely done.

I would hope that the political processes to which we dedicate ourselves have some sense of this kind of vision.  I would desire that we discuss not only political tactics and strategy, but morality, compassion, and service to others, both within and without our borders. 

I have gone beyond the bounds of Carroll's essay.  My title points at the direction I have taken.  My loyalty is not limited by nation, any more than it is by my white skin, my heterosexuality, my choice to identify as a member of the Religious Society of Friends, or my commitment to the principles I believe are part of being a Democrat. 

There are two phrases that are part of my heritage that point at what I mean, even if they are incomplete statements.  One comes from being a Quaker, that of of George Fox, to walk gladly across the earth answering that of God in each person I encounter.  The other is from Hillel, found in the Pirke Avoth, expressed less than 100 years before the start of the Common Era.  Before I repeat it, at least for me to be for myself is not to see myself as separate or isolated from others:  if I am, as Jesus says, to love others as I love myself, if I am not able to love myself then it is not clear to me what I am doing when I claim to love others.

But let me finish with those words from Hillel, which I think speak in a fashion which connects with Carroll's words and hopes:

If I am not for myself, then who will be for me? And if I am only for myself, then what am I? And if not now, when?

Peace.

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