Tag: Honesty

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Abraham Lincoln, ambition and recognition of leadership

This post starts a series on the Minerva Strategy Blog dedicated to political leadership. The first subject of analysis will be Abraham Lincoln, who was born in Hodgenville, United States, in 1809 and died in Washington in 1865. An American lawyer and politician, he was the 16th President of the United States (1861-1865). Always remembered as the president who abolished slavery, Abraham Lincoln is one of the most admired figures in American history.

On ambition and recognition of leadership, Doris Kearns Goodwin dedicates a chapter to Abraham Lincoln in her book Leadership in Turbulent Times: Lessons from the Presidents. Below, I will discuss excerpts from this chapter in the style of the Minerva Strategy Blog.

“How Lincoln responded to attacks directed against him and his party reveals much about his temperament and the character of his developing leadership. Such was the law of politics in the antebellum era that discussions and debate between Whigs and Democrats regularly attracted the fanatic attraction of hundreds of people. Opponents attacked each other in fiery, abusive language, much of the delight of raucous audiences, inciting an atmosphere that could burst into fistfights, even, on occasion, guns being drawn. While Lincoln was as thin-skinned and prickly as most politicians, his retorts were generally full of such good-humoured raillery that members of both parties could not help but laugh and relax on the pleasure of the entertaining and well-told stories” (Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership in Turbulent Times. Lessons from the Presidents).

In everything, a distinction can be made between content and form. The terms used by Aristotle for these concepts were substance and accident. In many cases, form is very important, even more so than content. For some, politics is tension and polarisation, while a sense of humour and good manners are always welcome. Lincoln was a leader who used irony as a political weapon, while today some persons use rumours, insults or violence. 

“I desire to live, and I desire place and distinction; but I would rather die now than, like the gentleman, live to see the day I would change my politics for an office worth 3000 dollars a year, and then feel compelled to erect a lightning-rod to protect guilty conscience from an offended God” (Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership in Turbulent Times. Lessons from the Presidents).

This quote refers to someone who changed political parties due to a new, very lucrative position. Lincoln defended honesty and consistency with one’s own ideals in the face of political opportunism. Therefore, we live in times when politicians feel discredited by the behaviour of some who find private benefits in politics. In the end, it all boils down to one of the great philosophical questions: What is the meaning of life? What is politics?

“By the disproportionate vote of 77 to 6 the Assembly resolved that “we highly disapproved the formation of abolition societies” and hold “sacred” the “right of property in slaves”. Lincoln was among the things who voted no. Registering a formal protest, he proclaimed that “the institution of slavery is found on both injustice and bad politics.” he had always believed, and he later said, that ”if slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong”.  Lincoln’s protest stopped well short of abolitionism (Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership in Turbulent Times. Lessons from the Presidents).

The notion of slavery is contrary to equal human dignity, which is at the core of human rights. However, slavery, which turns human beings into property, has been existed until unusually recent times. Even today, there are cases of forced labour and human trafficking. Lincoln’s leadership lesson is that there are values that cannot be compromised; they are non-negotiable and, on these occasions, it is good to hold fast to one’s convictions.

“While the ambition of the hallowed framers had been ‘inseparable linked’ with building up a constitutional government allowing the people to govern themselves, he feared that in the chaos of the moblike behaviour, men of the likes of ‘an Alexander, a Caesar, or a Napoleon’ would likely seek distinction by boldly setting themselves ‘to the task of pulling down’. Such men of ‘towering’ egos, in whom ambition is divorced from the people’s best interests, were not men to lead a democracy; they were despots” (Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership in Turbulent Times. Lessons from the Presidents).

There is a risk of drifting towards authoritarianism in different countries. Some analysts will argue that democracy is mutating. However, we must be wary of “men with excessive egos”. The rule of law emerged as a reaction to the power of the absolutist king. Locke’s approach emphasises the separation of powers, limited power and the right of resistance if the Social Contract is not fulfilled. Charismatic leaders who accumulate power are a risk to political pluralism, alternance, checks and balances, and the vitality of a democracy of quality. 

“To counter the troublesome ambition of such men, Lincoln called upon his fellow Americans to renew the framers’ values and to embrace the Constitution and its laws. ‘Let reverence for the laws be breathed by every American mother,’ taught in every school, and preached in every pulpit. The great bulwark argument against a potential dictator is an informed people ‘attached to the government and the laws’. This argument takes Lincoln back to his first statement to the people of Sangamon County when he spoke of education as the cornerstone of democracy. Why is education so central? Because, as he said then, every citizen must be able to read history to “appreciate the value of our free institutions” (Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership in Turbulent Times. Lessons from the Presidents).

Emphasis is placed on the role of public education as a prerequisite for democracy and as a form of defence against “a potential dictator”. It is worth considering that education and digital literacy are becoming elements that should be included among the virtues that citizens should cultivate. To make autonomous decisions, it is necessary to be well informed, among other conditions. To appreciate free institutions, education for citizenship is beneficial, as in the early days of democracy, the Sophists stood up to demagogues and authoritarian threats. 

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Thomas More, Utopia

Sir Thomas More (1478-1535),  who was executed in July 1535 for his resistance to supporting the separation of the Church of England from the Catholic Church of Rome, was a jurist, intellectual, statesman and Lord Chancellor of Henry VIII of England, who ruled from 1509 to 1547. A highly principled man of deep values, More disagreed with the monarch’s divorce from his first wife, Catherine of Aragon (1485-1536), and especially with the promotion of Henry as head of the Church of England in place of the pope. Before his foray into politics, Thomas More was a renowned writer and scholar, and his most recognisable work today is Utopia, which presents a philosophical description of an ideal society set on an island.

Below, some passages from Thomas More’s Utopia will be discussed in the style of the Minerva Strategy Blog.

“There are no taverns, no ale-houses, nor stews among them, nor any other occasions of corrupting each other, of getting into corners, or forming themselves into parties; all men live in full view, so that all are obliged both to perform their ordinary task and to employ themselves well in their spare hours; and it is certain that a people thus ordered must live in great abundance of all things, and these being equally distributed among them, no man can want or be obliged to beg” (Thomas More, Utopia).

It is significant that Thomas More’s utopian society discards private vices: alcohol, prostitution, gossip, the underworld, and rather, citizens focus on honest work. This means that goods should be distributed equally, without great inequalities or the tale of the lazy grasshopper and the hard-working ant.

“Yet they do not place happiness in all sorts of pleasures, but only in those that in themselves are good and honest. There is a party among them who place happiness in bare virtue; others think that our natures are conducted by virtue to happiness, as that which is the chief good of man. They define virtue thus—that it is a living according to Nature” (Thomas More, Utopia).

Aristotle argues that the purpose of human beings is eudaimonia, a Greek term usually translated as happiness, human flourishing, or good life. This concept is linked to the exercise of virtues such as prudence or temperance. However, there are different conceptions of happiness and pleasure, which some positions unify. What Thomas More says here is that only good and honest pleasure leads to happiness. His life is an example of honesty and courage in dying for what he believed in, against his personal well-being. 

““They think it is an evidence of true wisdom for a man to pursue his own advantage as far as the laws allow it, they account it piety to prefer the public good to one’s private concerns, but they think it unjust for a man to seek for pleasure by snatching another man’s pleasures from him; and, on the contrary, they think it a sign of a gentle and good soul for a man to dispense with his own advantage for the good of others, and that by this means a good man finds as much pleasure one way as he parts with another; for as he may expect the like from others when he may come to need it, so, if that should fail him, yet the sense of a good action, and the reflections that he makes on the love and gratitude of those whom he has so obliged, gives the mind more pleasure than the body could have found in that from which it had restrained itself” (Thomas More, Utopia).

There are several levels of possible strategic interactions between human beings: a) Silver Rule: Reciprocate the response obtained from the other party. It is the biblical ‘an eye for an eye’ or TITforTAT strategy; b) Golden Rule as reciprocity expectation: Treat others as you would like to be treated, with the expectation that they will do the same to you in the future; c) Golden Rule as unlimited altruism: Treat others as you would like to be treated, as part of your philosophy, without expecting anything in return. It is known as love your enemy; d) Platinum Rule: Treat others as others would like to be treated. Here the aim is to go against the particularism of the Golden Rule, which can have its variants of reciprocity and unlimited altruism. 

What is interesting here is that More speaks, in relation to good deeds, of reciprocity of benefits and of conscience as two indicators of the moral rightness of an action. Which of the rules analysed was he referring to?

“Yet they do not place happiness in all sorts of pleasures, but only in those that in themselves are good and honest. There is a party among them who place happiness in bare virtue; others think that our natures are conducted by virtue to happiness, as that which is the chief good of man. They define virtue thus—that it is a living according to Nature” (Thomas More, Utopia).

Choosing the person with whom to share one’s life requires prudence and a proper assessment of several factors. Foremost among these are the character traits with which to deal with everyday conflicts. As Thomas More warns, it is somewhat inept that part of the nuptial ritual is to briefly show the future spouse naked.  Once again, the relevance between the substance and the form of a relationship, between what is important and what is superficial, is fundamental. 

“There was a Jester standing by, that counterfeited the fool so naturally that he seemed to be really one; the jests which he offered were so cold and dull that we laughed more at him than at them, yet sometimes he said, as it were by chance, things that were not unpleasant, so as to justify the old proverb, ‘That he who throws the dice often, will sometimes have a lucky hit.’ When one of the company had said that I had taken care of the thieves, and the Cardinal had taken care of the vagabonds, so that there remained nothing but that some public provision might be made for the poor whom sickness or old age had disabled from labour (Thomas More, Utopia).

The limits of humour in the age of political correctness have become controversial. Laughing at the ignorance or foolishness of the public can be an easy resource. One might expect humour to have a healthy function of social criticism, rather than a reinforcement of prejudices and stereotypes that are already ingrained. In the case posed by Thomas More, making humour about people with disabilities because of their condition is not justified as humour that is compatible with human rights, intelligent humour that makes us think, or humour that invites us to consider values for a more open, plural, and inclusive society, where there is room for everyone.