Movement in-fighting and schisms

Here is an example of a phenomenon that has long puzzled me: Nasty in-group fighting. In The Rise of Neo-Kantianism, Klaus Christian Köhnke asks:

What can “explain one of the most distressing features of the neo-Kantians: the fierceness and bitterness of their polemics, the nastiness of their ad hominem arguments, which destroyed personal friendships and decent collegial relations? Heinrich Rickert (Heidelberg) wrote to Paul Natorp (Marburg): ‘Just because we critical idealists agree on fundamentals, we have to take the knives to each other” (Cambridge University Press 1991, p. x).

It’s easier to understand demonizing the far opposition, i.e., those whose beliefs and values are alien to your own. But it’s harder to understand demonizing those with whom you agree on 99% of key issues. Why does the 1% disagreement drives some to paroxysms of anger, bitter infighting, and denunciation?

The infighting dynamic crops up in a variety of types of movements across history — political movements (e.g., the Marxists), educational movements (e.g., the Montessorians), architectural (e.g., Frank Lloyd Wright’s followers), philosophical (e.g., Objectivists), semi-scientific (e.g., Freudians), and of course most religious movements.

Heinrich Rickert above stated it as an imperative: The closer the agreement, the worse the fighting. Why is that so?

* Is it that we expect or hope for more from those close to us, so disagreements are more crushingly disappointing?
* Is it that those close to us have more power to hurt us, so disagreements lead to defensive over-reactions?
* Is it that movements are social, so disagreements are opportunities for in-group status advancement or for signaling one’s status and alliances?

I can understand the phenomenon more easily within systems that have strong faith-and-authority epistemological traditions. Such groups do not make reasoning and healthy argument habitual, so it makes sense that their members would not be able to handle questioning and disagreement well.

But that makes more puzzling the in-fighting among rational belief systems, i.e., those that explicitly identify and urge productive argument and discovery skills. In those groups, is the descent to nastiness simply a failure of character? Or are there strong psychological and social-psychological dispositions that even rational belief systems have a hard time overcoming? Or is the initial impression great amounts of infighting distorted — that actually most of the group’s members handle the disagreements productively and in proportion, while only a few noisy participants drown them out and drag down the discussion?

A related question about leadership: Does a movement’s leader typically contribute to the in-fighting problem, or do the followers do it all by and to themselves?

One datum: In discussing Freud’s fractious movement, Howard Gardner tells this sad anecdote:

“Less happily, their involvements with Freud proved costly for some individuals, particularly those who had broken with him. Freud’s young protege Victor Tausk, despondent over his recent rupture with the unforgiving Freud, committed suicide; of the earlier followers, at least six others ultimately did the same. These facts represent our first evidence of the casualties that tend to befall those within the orbit of highly creative individuals” (Creating Minds, p. 82).

But I was struck by this contrasting datum about Frank Lloyd Wright’s circle, as recalled by Ayn Rand after a visit:

“She long remembered her indignation over the attitude of hero worship and servitude that Wright was famous for instilling in his ‘Fellowship,’ made up of tuition-paying students. They cooked, served meals, and cleaned. They ate at tables set a step or two below the dais on which Wright and his guests and family dined, and they consumed a plainer diet. Their drawings, she noted, were undistinguished and imitative of Wright. ‘What was tragic was that he didn’t want any of that,’ Rand told a friend in 1961. ‘He was trying to get intellectual independence [out of] them during the general discussions, but he didn’t get anything except ‘Yes, sir’ or ‘No, sir’ and recitals of formulas from his writing.’ She compared them to medieval serfs.” (Anne Heller, Ayn Rand and the World She Made, pp. 169-170). And of course some of Rand’s followers have behaved that way too.

Nietzsche said that one must always forgive an intellectual his first generation of followers. It seems a sorry truth of history that those who grow up directly in the shadow of a genius have special difficulties with becoming independent.

So it is still a puzzle in my mind. Great matters demand great thinking and great passion — and great character in the exercise of both.

About justifiable, virtuous anger, Aristotle stated the ideal best — to be able to “feel anger on the right grounds and against the right persons, and also in the right manner and at the right moment and for the right length of time” (Nicomachean Ethics 4.5, 1125b 31). That is indeed the challenge.

UFM interview on business ethics

I was video-interviewed by Luis Figueroa at Francisco Marroquín University on the topic of business ethics. In the twelve-minute discussion, I respond to the following questions:

* What do you think of “corporate social responsibility”?
* Why do you believe business ethics should begin with entrepreneurship?
* Are there differences between ethics in family and business contexts?
* What is your favorite business ethics book?

Hayek and Rand on values — APEE 2011 conference

For this year’s conference of the Association of Private Enterprise Education, I am organizing and chairing a session on two giants of the twentieth century — Friedrich Hayek and Ayn Rand — with four scholars comparing their views on values and political economy.

Topic: Hayek and Rand on Values

Chair: Stephen Hicks, Ph.D., Rockford College, Illinois

Panelists:

Emily Chamlee-Wright, Ph.D. Elbert Neese Professor of Economics, Beloit College, Wisconsin
Title: “Cultivating the Economic Imagination with Atlas Shrugged”
Abstract: In this paper I describe my use of Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged in an undergraduate comparative economic systems course. I argue that the novel is the ideal vehicle for cultivating what I call the “economic imagination,” by which I mean the ability to see the systematic outcomes that emerge under different political economic rules of the game. Further, I argue that the novel is particularly well-suited to animate discussions of essential comparative systems topics, including Marxism, the various phenomena associated with the soviet-type economy, and fascism. Finally, drawing upon student writing, I argue that though Rand’s view of reason and epistemology are often at odds with Austrian economics, these tensions are productive in conveying Austrian insights regarding the extended order.

Steve Horwitz, Ph.D., Professor of Economics, St. Lawrence University, New York
“Hayek, Rand, and the Ethics of the Micro- and Macro-worlds
Abstract: Hayek and Rand both supported capitalism, but their ethical systems were different. This paper explores the differences and how they apply to the institution of the family. It concludes that Rand’s ethical system matches very well with what Hayek sees as necessary in the “Great Society” of the macro-cosmos, but that our understanding of the institution of the family seems better suited to a more altruistic ethical code. The challenge for a Hayekian ethics that pays attention to institutional contexts is how to ensure that the complex process of making those distinctions is learned as children pass into adulthood.

Edward Hudgins, Ph.D., Director of Advocacy, The Atlas Society, Washington, D.C.
Title: “Is a Moral Foundation Necessary for Spontaneous Order?”
Abstract: F. A. Hayek argued that social order and institutions—markets, money, law—arise spontaneously out of the actions of individuals seeking their own interests but not through specific planning by individuals. Further, because it is impossible in markets for any individual to know what mix of goods and services will best satisfy consumer demands, attempts at central government planning will result in adverse unintended consequences.
But it can be argued that such a system will only operate to protect individual liberty and limit government if enough individuals, reinforced by the culture, accept and live by certain moral principles and the Objectivism provides such a foundation.

William Kline, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Department of Liberal and Integrative Studies, University of Illinois, Springfield
Title: “Individualism and Interdependence”
Abstract: When do we need other people? Both Hayek and Rand agree on the importance of the division of labor. People need other people to produce what they cannot or will not do themselves. Hayek and Rand also broadly agree on the importance of property rights that make the division of labor, and the market in general, possible. Yet, theses authors deeply disagree on the degree of interdependence necessary for establishing valid property claims. This paper explores Hayek’s use of a Humean conception of property that emphasizes tradition and cannot exist independently of others and contrasts it with Rand’s use of a Lockean/Cartesian approach that argues for the existence of objective, nonconventional property rights. This paper argues that the two authors can be reconciled by distinguishing between what Hume identifies as the need for property rights versus the actual rules that protect them.

The session is scheduled for Monday, April 10 at the bright and cheery 8:10 a.m. time slot.

“Egoism in Nietzsche and Rand” now online

My journal article “Egoism in Nietzsche and Rand” [pdf] is now online here. The 43-page study was published this spring in The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies.

The abstract: “Philosophers Friedrich Nietzsche and Ayn Rand are often identified as strong critics of altruism and arch advocates of egoism. In this essay, Stephen Hicks argues that Nietzsche and Rand have much in common in their critiques of altruism but almost nothing in common in their views on egoism.”

My opening paragraph: “To what extent is Ayn Rand’s ethical theory Nietzschean? Three Friedrich Nietzsches are relevant to making that judgment. …”

The major sections of the article:

Part One: On Critiquing Altruism
Three Nietzsches and Ayn Rand
Some intellectuals on Nietzsche and Rand
Egoism, altruism, and “selfishness”
A Nietzschean sketch
God is dead
Nihilism’s symptoms
Two bio-psychological types
Psychology and morality
Genealogy
Comparing Nietzsche’s and Rand’s critiques of altruism
Rand’s break with Nietzsche’s critique

Part Two: On Egoism
Rand’s egoism
Nietzsche’s rhetoric and system
The major differences between Nietzsche and Rand
Are individuals real?
Do individuals have free will?
What is the source of moral values?
How does the self identify its nature and values?
Are individual selves ends in themselves?
Are fundamental values universal?
Are the relations of individuals win/win or win/lose?
Rights, liberty, equality before the law?
Slavery and freedom, war and peace
Conclusion

Keynote lecture in Argentina

I will be giving a keynote lecture in Argentina at the invitation of the Bases Foundation and the School of Economics of the Catholic University in Rosario. The event is the Third International Conference on “The Austrian School of Economics in the 21st Century,” which will be held August 5-7, 2010.

The title of my lecture is: “Austrians, Objectivists, and the Unrequited Love of Philosophy for Economics.” Here is the abstract:

The Austrian school of economics and the Objectivist school of philosophy have both been essential to the liberal/libertarian movement. Mises and Hayek did much work in political economy and explored relevant philosophical issues in metaphysics, epistemology, and values. Rand did much work in philosophy, which she then applied in fictional portrayals of mixed political economies in decline. Yet while there is mutual respect between Austrianism and Objectivism, there are also points of tension. My purpose in this talk is to discuss the key commonalities and differences. Much specialized work in economics and philosophy must be done, so there is a natural and important division of labor. But that work must also be coordinated in making a full and compelling case for the free society.

Thanks for the invitation to Federico Fernandez, the Bases Foundation, and the School of Economics at Catholic University of Rosario.

The Bases Foundation takes its inspiration from Juan Bautista Alberdi, one of the great nineteenth-century Argentine Enlightenment liberal political theorists.

Two lectures in Alexandria, Virginia

I’m giving two talks later this week in historic Alexandria, Virginia, at the Free Minds 2010 conference, co-sponsored by The Atlas Society and the Free Minds Institute.

On Friday I’ll speak on “Ayn Rand’s Entrepreneurial Ethic,” and on Saturday I’ll speak on “CEE’s Mission and Strategy.”

Egoism in Nietzsche and Rand

My “Egoism in Nietzsche and Rand” has come out in The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies. Here is the abstract for my 43-page study:

“Philosophers Friedrich Nietzsche and Ayn Rand are often identified as strong critics of altruism and arch advocates of egoism. In this essay, Stephen Hicks argues that Nietzsche and Rand have much in common in their critiques of altruism but almost nothing in common in their views on egoism.”

In the same issue, Professor Lester Hunt has a commentary on my essay and an independent reading of Nietzsche that is very valuable.

This entire issue of JARS is a symposium devoted to essays comparing Friedrich Nietzsche and Ayn Rand. I haven’t read the other contributions yet, but it looks like a lively set.

Friday talk in Houston, Texas

I’ll be giving a talk on Friday, March 12 to the Houston Property Rights Association on the topic of “Entrepreneurship, Politics, and Ayn Rand”:

“Why are business success and free markets so unpopular in some quarters? There are lots of reasons. One is that business is seen as immoral or boring or both. For the political left, business is money-grubbing and free markets merely let the strong exploit the weak. Even for many conservatives who reject the leftist account, business is what sober, responsible people do to pay the bills.

“Both sides miss the excitement, the nobility, and the romance of business. Ayn Rand’s vision of the entrepreneur — and of those who operate entrepreneurially within existing businesses — is of potentially heroic value creation. At our best, each person in business and in life is akin to the artist creating what was not there before.

“How does Rand’s vision of life and work fit into the current mainstream view of academia and party-in-power politics? Hollywood movies and humanities professors focus on rapacious CEOs and burned-out cubicle workers. Rand focuses on Howard Roark, Dagny Taggart, and the free market system that has empowered and enriched billions.”

Thanks to Rob Bradley of the Institute for Energy Research for the invitation.