Category: Commentary

Donald Trump’s indictment is historic and implicates the Caux Round Table Principles for Government.  We should not remain on the sidelines of such a development with global implications.

But I’ve had trouble finding the right voice or context for linking the two.  When I saw the article on the Times/Siena poll on class antagonisms, I thought it provided sound understanding of what is going on in this country.

Here is my commentary for your review.

I recently read two commentaries in the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal that speak to a common, global conundrum: immigration.

The conundrum, as far as I can tell, is who needs to respect whom – the immigrants vis-à-vis their hosts or the hosts vis-à-vis the newcomers from different cultures?  Or both simultaneously?

What do good, civilized, human ethics require?

One commentary discussed the financial burden placed on the taxpayers of New York City to provide free housing and other services to those illegally in the U.S. and living in their city.  The second one, by the noted thinker Bernard-Henry Levi, spoke with passion about the “mad wind” of rage and intolerant destruction which drove the recent “counter-cultural” riots in France.

Antagonisms between normative collectives – religious communities, ethnic identities, races, higher and lower systemic group situations in a society’s structure of power and advantage – seem to have been the norm for humanity for eons.  In-groups and out-groups; my group and your group; your language and my language; my preferences and your preferences in belief, food, dress, behavior.  Which is better, more refined, more “true,” more deserving of respect?

For our 2018 Global Dialogue in St. Petersburg, Russia, I drafted a concept paper on the ethics of immigrants and host nationals.  Five years ago, I proposed:

The calling of the human person is to community.  No one is an island unto themselves.  Each is part of the main.  Our special destiny, opportunities unlike those given to any other and our individual gifts is and are in relationship with others, from our birth until we leave this life.  Trust and responsibility set us apart as worthy of consideration.  Showing respect for others brings us respect and honor in return.

Our character reveals our values and our courage to live for ourselves and for others in the right proportions and with grace and dignity.  Citizenship in community makes justice triumph over evil.

This is especially true for democracies, societies that depend on the quality of their citizens for their success and prosperity.  George Washington concluded that “Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. … It is substantially true that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government.”

It is an insight common to all religions that we are called to rise above mean selfishness and act for higher purposes.  We always live by our values – be they good or bad – but it is better for us and for those whose lives we influence that we live by good values.

Sovereign nation states are inhabited by citizens and residents.  Citizens have a legal right to residence and other rights, privileges and benefits under the laws of the sovereign.  Residents either have permission from the sovereign to remain in the territory or they do not.  Immigrants to a nation state either have permission to reside in the territory or they are trespassers.  Immigrants may choose to become citizens under the nationality laws of the nation state or they may choose not to or do not qualify for becoming citizens.

The laws of citizenship and residency do not discuss the ethics of living in a national community. Ethics references how we use our powers and authority with respect to others.  Ethics arise from the moral sense and conditions how we act freely.  The ethics of community within a nation state are not ordered by law, international or domestic, but are habits of the heart for both citizens and residents.

The Ethics of Citizens

Not every citizen shares commonalities of language, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation, political views, social status and more attributes ascriptive or achieved, with other citizens.  Some nations are very homogenous.  Others are very pluralistic and multicultural.  But the status of citizen is common to all, regardless of other identifications and personal preferences.

The primary ethical obligation of a citizen is to contribute to civil order by going beyond the letter of the law to build the social capital of a community.  In Christian terms, this reflects love of neighbor with neighbors to include all citizens, to some degree, and to do unto other citizens as we would have them do unto us.

Public power constitutes a civic order for the safety and common good of its members.  The civic order, as a moral order, protects and promotes the integrity, dignity and self-respect of its members in their capacity as citizens and therefore, avoids all measures, oppressive and other, whose tendency is to transform the citizen into a subject.  The state shall protect, give legitimacy to or restore all those principles and institutions which sustain the moral integrity, self-respect and civic identity of the individual citizen and which also serve to inhibit processes of civic estrangement, dissolution of the civic bond and civic disaggregation.  This effort by the civic order itself protects the citizen’s capacity to contribute to the well-being of the civic order.

Public power, however allocated by constitutions, referendums or laws, shall rest its legitimacy in processes of communication and discourse among autonomous moral agents who constitute the community to be served by the government.  Free and open discourse, embracing independent media, shall not be curtailed, except to protect legitimate expectations of personal privacy, sustain the confidentiality needed for the proper separation of powers or for the most dire of reasons relating to national security.

Therefore, citizenship is an office of service to the public weal.  The honor which comes from being a citizen lies in fidelity to duty and responsibility.  Entitlements may accrue to individuals for personal enjoyment, but duties are the price paid for membership in the national community. To hold a share of power in the civic order is to assume a status, to have the dignity of positional responsibility above and beyond personal preferences and desires, angers and delights.  As must any agent or other fiduciary, the citizen has an obligation to consider the good of others as a check on each and every personal interest or prejudice.

Accordingly, the first duty of every citizen is to use discourse ethics in the resolution of community difficulties and the promotion of community wellbeing. A citizen must not act from petulance or any other tyrannous instinct.

A citizen should make the following commitments:

–I will learn.  I will read and study to know the past and plan the future.  I will find good values and seek to know the fundamental and the important as best I can.  Though I seek conviction, I will be open minded to new learning and experience.

–I will reflect and deliberate on what I have learned.  I will not jump to conclusions, be hasty with others and give in to prejudice or emotions.  In this way, I will find where to best use my skills and abilities.

–I will tell the truth about what I know.  Integrity and sincerity will be important to me in all my relationships.

–I will not hide my ideas and feelings.  I will not be afraid of debate and discussion.  I can influence others with my opinions, just as others have a right to share their ideas and feelings with me.  What we all do together, many times, is more important than what I can do alone. Listening is a valuable skill that I will learn.

–I will use my powers wisely.  I will try to leave the world a better place for my having been alive.

–I will try hard to make the most of my life.  I am nobody’s fool and nobody’s victim.

–I will not be afraid.  I will learn self-control and come to be self-reliant.

–I will care about others.  There is already enough hurt in the world.  I will not add more, if I can help it.

–I will find happiness not in money, but in doing what is right.  Money is only a convenience.  Doing what is right makes me a real person.

–I will be thankful for all the good that I experience and brave in times of difficulty and frustration.  Happiness doesn’t come every day.  Bad things happen more than we want, but there is good to receive and to appreciate as a reminder that our lives are not lost or hopeless. Despair, however, undermines our ability to do good and to be happy.

Thus, a citizen is self-empowered to be a friend.  The office of a friend is most necessary for the well-being of community.  It is the bond that sustains relationships through strife and adversity. The capacity to be a friend provides for the internal moral vindication of each person and thereby sustains, in psychological comfort, each person, as they confront the ups and downs of fortune.  Aristotle considered that friendliness is the most robust form of justice, balancing judgment and grace.  The best friendships bring forth love and trust, which promote the highest quality of community, where simultaneously and reciprocally, individuals are honored for who they are and community efforts thrive.

For the self, forms of friendship which do not impose serious obligations of reciprocity and so are a lower form of office are based on the utility to one of the other as a friend and the pleasure one takes in being with another.  Friendships based on utility and pleasure are more easily dissolved.  Their partnerships are potentially very vulnerable to dissolution, as are friends on Facebook.

Aristotle advised that goodness comes from good people (Nicomachean Ethics, Books 8, 9).  He proposed that friendship is a kind of partnership, one with another, for better or worse.

Friendship is sustained by character.  When a friend’s character changes or the depths of that person’s character are revealed, the office of friendship may terminate.  Aristotle proposed that we each “ought to strain every nerve” to avoid wickedness and try to be a person of good character, “for in that way, one can both be on good terms with oneself and become the friends of somebody else.”

In addition, citizenship requires contributions to the common good, such as:

1. Using wealth to enhance other forms of capital: finance, physical, human, reputational and social.

First, wealth should be used to sustain and improve the institutions that permit the creation of wealth.  Accumulated over time, wealth can influence the future.  Wise use of wealth avoids immediate consumption and invests in the creation of better outcomes for future

2. Balancing the desires of owners for self-satisfaction against society’s need for robust accumulation of new capital in all forms.

Philanthropy is incumbent upon those who possess wealth.  The social function of wealth is to finance a greater good.  Those who are to inherit wealth should be expected to assume the fiduciary responsibilities of stewardship that accompany the possession of wealth.

3. Using wealth to support the creation of social capital.

Social capital – the reality of the social compact incubating successful wealth creation and permitting the actualization of human dignity – is created, over time, by governments and civil society.  From the rule of law to physical infrastructures, from the quality of a society’s moral integrity and transparency of its decision-making to the depth and vitality of its culture, social capital demands investment of time, money, imagination and leadership.  Wealth should pay its fair share in taxes to support public programs enhancing social capital and should invest in the private creation of social capital through philanthropy.

4. Investing one’s wealth in institutions enhancing human capital.

Education and culture can be funded from public budgets on a consumption basis, but wealth should shoulder the principal responsibility in a society of providing permanent endowments for institutions of education and culture.

5. Using private wealth to supplement public expenditures for the social safety net.

Private charity and philanthropy should respond to the health and human services needs of the less fortunate.

Thus, citizenship looks towards assumption of the office of being a good host to those who come to live in the national community.

With respect to non-citizens, the ethic of citizenship are those of a host, reciprocating the good will and respect of a guest who accepts the responsibility of honoring the customs and beliefs of the host family.  The office of a host is to provide hospitality, respect and welcome.

The Ethics of Residents

Residents (including immigrants) are subjects of the sovereignty.  Unlike citizens, they have no role in sovereign decision-making.  But as residents, they share in the fortunes of the national community.  Thus, as recipients of benefits and privileges provided by the government, society and culture, residents assume ethical obligations in return.  These obligations are to assume the office of a friend as much as possible and to be gracious and charitable in the office of a guest.

Resident as a Guest

The status of guest comes with its own special duties of showing goodwill and thanks of honoring the host with appreciation and never imposing on those who have welcomed us into their homes.

Here are some quite ordinary ethical recommendations for guests:

1. Arrive with a gift.

Your hosts have gone out of their way to prepare for your arrival — cleaning the house, making the beds, hiding their naughtiness — so the least you can do is arrive with a gift to show your gratitude.

2. Buy your own groceries or be responsible for your own needs.

When I’m staying with friends or family, I buy my own groceries for two reasons: 1) I’m a picky eater, so it’s unlikely that they’ll have much that I like and 2) it’s rude to eat your guests out of house and home.  Bring your own toiletries.  Make your bed and clean up after yourself.  Keep your bathroom clean: wipe up any ring in the tub, shaving cream residue in the basin, hair on any object or surface or dirt on soap.

3. Conserve linens and towels or be reasonable in what you demand from your hosts.

At home, I use only one towel a week.  When I’m done drying off after a shower, I hang it on the back of the bathroom door so it can dry properly.  When I’m traveling, I do the same.  A good host will provide you with a towel or two, which is plenty, so don’t abuse it.

4. Ask about house rules.

When guests come to my home, I have three rules: 1) don’t get locked up, 2) don’t get locked out and 3) don’t burn the place down.  Otherwise, my guests are free to come and go as they please and make themselves at home.  However, not every host is as lax as I am.  Some don’t want you making a frozen pizza at 3:00 am on a Sunday night, when you’ve just come home from the bar. To avoid offending your hosts, ask about general policies and rules.  Should the door be locked when you leave?  Is it OK to put silverware in the dishwasher?  Would you like me to let the dog out if you’re not home?  Most people have certain ways they like and do things, so it’s best to ask before you step on any toes.

5. Give the host personal space.

While your hosts are happy to see you (hopefully), they don’t want to spend every minute of every day with you.  Respect that.

6. Lend a hand where necessary.

Is your host slaving away in the kitchen preparing a delicious feast?  Ask if he or she needs a hand.  Does the dog need a walk?  Volunteer to take the pooch for a stroll.  Does somebody need to go on a beer run?  Offer your excellent (and sober) driving skills to accomplish the task. Whatever the case, let your guests know that you’re happy to help out where you can.

7. Keep common areas clean.

Mind your Ps and Qs when staying with friends and family.  Whatever you would do in your own home, don’t do it at your hosts’ home.  Put the toilet seat down.  Wash your dishes by hand or put them in the dishwasher.  Make the bed.  Turn out the lights when you leave a room.  There’s nothing worse than following guests around the house, picking up after them.  Your hosts probably won’t say anything to you regarding your messiness or lack of consideration, but you can be sure that you won’t be invited back because of it.

8. Treat the hosts to a nice meal.

If you’re a whiz in the kitchen, prepare your signature dish (and wash the dishes afterward).  If you’re not so hot at culinary art, ask your hosts what their favorite restaurant is and treat them to a nice meal.  This is a time when you can all be at the same place at the same time to catch up. Conflicting schedules considered, this might be the only chance you have.

Here are things a good houseguest should never do:

1. Expect their host’s undivided attention 24/7.

2. Expect their host to be their daily tour guide.

3. Assume that room comes with board.

4. Expect their host to accommodate their picky eating.

Whatever diet you adhere to is your business.  But if you aren’t prepared to eat what’s served, ask where the nearest supermarket is and go pick up the things that you want to eat. A guest who proselytizes about “their” diet is rarely attractive.

5. Open drawers to find things or start helping themselves to food in the pantry without asking first.

Some hosts have a “make yourself at home” attitude.  But think twice before you start poking around in the medicine cabinet, looking for the aspirin.  Respect your host’s privacy.  And do not use your host’s phone, computer or any other equipment without asking, says the Emily Post Institute.

6. Hog the shower when your host needs to leave for work.

Be proactive and ask about the best time to use the bathroom for showering.  It’s a small thing, but it ranks high on the stress-o-meter.

7. Ignore basic common sense.

We all do things differently and as a guest, the rules you should be following are those of your host.  If you are given a key, don’t forget to use it.  Lock the door when you leave.  Don’t make a lot of noise when you get home and if your host is asleep, maybe heating up smelly leftovers at 2:00 am isn’t such a great idea.  Ask before you assume where the fragile wine glasses go in the dishwasher and yes, you probably should use your towels more than once.

Oh, and practice the rule made popular by Benjamin Franklin: “Guests, like fish, begin to smell after three days.”  Don’t push your expiration date.

Resident as Friend

The ethics of friendship, noted above for citizens, are not limited to those who already have citizenship.  Residents are participants in the national community.  They too, therefore, should carry out the office of friend towards citizens and others alike.

Resident as Prospective Citizen

Some residents intend to become citizens and thus assume the duties of citizenship.  They may prepare for enjoyment of this status with its privileges and obligations by incorporating into their behaviors the traits of good citizens, as noted above.

Immigrant as Prospective Citizens, Friends and Guests

Immigrants – refugee, asylum seeker, worker, student, retiree, etc. – become residents of a nation state with the intention of making a life as part of that community.  As such, they have the status of prospective citizen, learning how to assume the privileges and obligations of citizenship and the status of friend, obligated to perform the office of friend in their new homeland.

In gratitude for receiving permission to become a resident and then, perhaps, a citizen, immigrants should be particularly alert to being a gracious guest.

Conclusion

These ethical standards for the offices of citizen, friend and guest can be placed in the context of great wisdom traditions.  They invoke the principles of human dignity, solidarity and subsidiarity of Catholic social teachings.  Under Protestant social teachings, they stand on the moral goodness of finding a vocation for self to sustain God’s created realm of common grace.  They embody the paramitas of Buddhist teachings: generosity, proper conduct, renunciation, insightful wisdom, effort, forbearance, truthfulness, resolution, goodwill, equanimity.  They reflect Qur’anic guidance to make of yourselves a community that seeks righteousness and enjoins justice and to follow the counsels of only those who enjoin charity, kindness and peace among men.  These ethical standards fully comply with the wisdom of Confucius that “reciprocity” is an ideal which will serve us all life long and the commitment of Mencius to only guide us towards humanness and mutual engagement.  The relationships of citizen, friend and guest embody the Japanese ethic of kyoseior symbiosis.

Participants at the Global Dialogue then drafted a statement on comity between immigrants and host nationals.  This statement is still quite applicable to the contradictions facing many in the U.S., France and other countries.  You may find the statement here.

We have, in recent months, responded, as best we can, to the current levels of distemper in our world, thinking more about social and human capitals as foundations for moral outcomes – social, political and economic.

The outcome of better social and human capitals, on an individual level, is more effective agency for individuals.  Agency, we might say, is the manifestation of human dignity, moving it from norm to fact.  It also provides each of us with the capacity for freedom.  Without agency, how inert would we be?

Individual agency, in fact, is the cosmos’ way of bridging between norms and facts.  Human agency possesses norms and thoughts and at the same time, lives with facts.

I recently read that in the state of Mississippi – long derided for having the lowest achievements in education and the most child poverty among all the 50 American states – over the past decade has committed its educational system to having every child able to read by the end of third grade.  As a result of this community effort, Mississippi children no longer test at the bottom of all American children.  They now demonstrate abilities closer to the average, no matter their family’s economic circumstances.  Among poor families, Mississippi children are now tied for best performers in the nation on one standard test for reading, while ranking second in math.

The abilities of high school graduates have also grown.  In 2011, only 75% of students graduated, 4% below the national average graduation rate, but in 2022, 88% of Mississippi students graduated high school, when the national average for graduation was 87%.

The lesson to be learned from this is that poverty is not an insurmountable obstacle to developing our agency capabilities.  It is the person incubating the divine spark, not life circumstances, which can make all the difference for the quality of our life outcomes.

Does that fact not argue for setting high standards for ourselves and others and persevering in living by them?

Robert Browning insisted that a person’s “reach should exceed his grasp, or what’s a heaven for?”

Recently, I sent you some thoughts on the role and place of corporate social advocacy in a market of competing ideas, values and emotions.  What provoked my concern was an article in the Wall Street Journal.

Now, there is more of the same.

From the article:

Companies’ mentions of green and social initiatives during earnings calls have fallen off sharply in recent quarters, reversing a more boastful approach taken over the past few years amid intensifying pressure from some investors and conservative activists.  … Finance chiefs and other executives have significantly quieted down in public settings about their environmental and employee diversity efforts as opposition has mounted from a confluence of interests: investors who want companies to focus on their operations, not the social good and conservative groups and political leaders who have seized on corporate support of such causes to rally “anti-woke” constituents—for example, calling for boycotts of brands that advertise their support of the LGBT community in the wake of recent disputes with Target and Bud Light.

“The easiest thing to do is just to stay out of the conversation and emphasize other facets of business that are going to be perceived as less controversial and more core to the traditional metrics of the business,” said Jason Jay, senior lecturer of sustainability at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 

Executives at U.S.-listed companies mentioned “environmental, social and governance,” “ESG,” “diversity, equity and inclusion,” “DEI” or “sustainability” on 575 earnings calls from April 1 to June 5, down 31% from the same period last year, according to data from financial-research platform AlphaSense.  That is the largest such year-over-year decline and the fifth consecutive quarter of year-over-year drops, following a pickup in these discussions and corporate social efforts in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd in May 2020. 

Food for thought on what is the social function of enterprise?

While flipping magazine pages recently, I happened to see a reference to something I had not thought of in years and years – the meeting of Alice with Humpty Dumpty when they argued over the meaning of words, as recounted in Through the Looking Glass.

The nub of their conflict is here:

‘When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.’  ‘The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things.’  ‘The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be master—that’s all.’

And there is a “riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma” of just how does language work?  Who sets the meaning of words?  If the boss determines meaning, then where is our fundamental freedom?  Human discourse degrades into another form of artificial intelligence.

What are words anyway: truth, hallucinations, approximations, inventions, carriers of fixed or malleable cultural perceptions?

Humpty Dumpty, as conceptualized by Lewis Carroll, is a narcissistic, post-modern, deconstructionist – meaning is whatever you want it to be.  But to have others get your meaning and follow your lead, you need power to compel or at least manipulate them into seeing things your way.  And just so, post-modernists are 1) fixated on who has power and prestige and 2) desperate to attain social and political power and hold it in their own hands, responsible to none other.

You can read the entire conversation of Alice and Humpty Dumpty here.

Carroll takes us back to Plato’s proposal that only philosophers should be our kings and teach us right from wrong.  Tolkien also made a good story out of Plato’s conceit, where his Lord of the Rings was the one to “rule them all.”  Thomas Hobbes, in 1651, proposed the sovereign state as leviathan to impose order on the anarchy enjoyed by self-interested individuals who think and feel for themselves, just as they wish to do.  Jean-Jacques Rousseau followed with his proposal to have the sovereign create a general will, which would take the place of all the variant “particular wills” animating individuals.

In ancient China, Confucius affirmed that the first thing to do in governing people is to “rectify names,” to give them the proper words which would direct them to the right way of thinking and acting.

So, with words, language and discourse, how can we talk sensibly about ethics?

We recently posted more short videos on relevant and timely topics.  They include:

–The Intersection of Systems

–The Negative Externalities of Social Media

–Rice as an Indicator

–More Hope on The Horizon for Climate Change

All our videos can be found on our YouTube page here.  We recently put them into 9 playlists, which you can find here.

If you aren’t following us on Twitter or haven’t liked us on Facebook, please do so.  We update both platforms frequently.

We are getting close to the opening of the Global Dialogue on the evening of July 25, with sessions on the following two days, July 26 and 27.  If you are thinking about joining us, please let us know if you can within the next week.

You can register here.

I was reminded by Bob MacGregor, our chairman emeritus and the moving force behind the Caux Round Table Principles for Business, that the final discussion and agreement on those Principles took place at Mountain House in 1993 – 30 years ago.

Professor Kenneth Goodpaster of the University of St. Thomas here in St. Paul, Minnesota, has just sent me reflections on the principles after those 30 years have passed.  Ken was the wise adviser in the drafting process and we are indebted to his service.

I attach a copy here of his reflections on our time being a new one with new challenges.  Your insights and courage in meeting those challenges are needed by our global community.

I do hope to see you in Caux in about two and a half weeks.

The U.S. Supreme Court yesterday held that racial discrimination in choosing some applicants over others based on their racial appearance is unconstitutional.

This ruling of first importance to the U.S. is of global relevance.

Our human propensity to use our personal identities as stepping stones for the rejection of others is time-honored and universal across our cultures and religions.

Group A disparages Group B and Group B reciprocates with pleasure or with anger.  Consider the war in Ukraine.

Pope Francis, in his last encyclical, Fratelli Tutti, gave us a lesson from a Catholic perspective in how to get the better of ourselves and not succumb to prejudice and cold-heartedness.

The American poet, Robert Frost, eloquently wrote:

Before I built a wall I’d ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offense.
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That wants it down …

He writes of his neighbor, who was repairing a wall between their two properties:

I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
He moves in darkness as it seems to me,
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father’s saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.’

The Court’s opinion vindicates the Caux Round Table Principles for Government, where we hold that:

The civic order shall serve all those who accept the responsibilities of citizenship.

Public power constitutes a civic order for the safety and common good of its members.  The civic order, as a moral order, protects and promotes the integrity, dignity and self-respect of its members in their capacity as citizens and therefore, avoid all measures, oppressive and other, whose tendency is to transform the citizen into a subject.  The state shall protect, give legitimacy to or restore all those principles and institutions which sustain the moral integrity, self-respect and civic identity of the individual citizen and which also serve to inhibit processes of civic estrangement, dissolution of the civic bond and civic disaggregation.  This effort, by the civic order itself, protects the citizen’s capacity to contribute to the well-being of the civic order.

The civic order and its instrumentalities shall be impartial among citizens without regard to condition, origin, sex or other fundamental, inherent attributes.  Yet, the civic order shall distinguish among citizens according to merit and desert where rights, benefits or privileges are best allocated according to effort and achievement, rather than as birthrights.

Racism subordinates individuals to social oppression and to narrative stereotypes.  It denies humans their personal agency and freedom to flourish and constrains their ability, should they wish to, to be effective moral agents of the most high.  Thus, the Court’s decision vindicates the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as well.  The Declaration says:

Article 1

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.  They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

Article 2

Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.  Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.

The Court, in a robust and intellectually rigorous opinion by Chief Justice John Roberts, vindicated the moral basis of the American Constitutional order.  That moral basis was set forth in the 1776 Declaration of Independence, issued by British colonies in North America, which affirmed:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

As the Court also pointed out, a civil war, where approximately 360,000 white men, mostly volunteers, gave their lives that black persons should be freed from slavery, proved necessary to ensure that the promise of the Declaration would be made good for all Americans.  The Court did honor to those fallen dead and to their president, Abraham Lincoln, also killed for his dedication to the cause that slavery must end.  In his famous address at the battlefield of Gettysburg, Lincoln spoke of his country as a “new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”

On Monday, some of our fellows convened on Zoom to mull over the implications of thinking about “civilizations” and our emerging global order.

The ideal of civilizational states as replacing the nation state system introduced in Europe as a way of ending the wars of religion between Catholics and Protestants is quite current in Russia and China.

The February 4, 2022 pact between Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping contains the following paragraph:

The sides note that Russia and China as world powers with rich cultural and historical heritage have long-standing traditions of democracy, which rely on thousand-years of experience of development, broad popular support and consideration of the needs and interests of citizens. Russia and China guarantee their people the right to take part through various means and in various forms in the administration of the State and public life in accordance with the law. …The sides call on the international community to respect cultural and civilizational diversity and the rights of peoples of different countries to self-determination.

The Economist has concluded that:

Not unrelatedly perhaps, on June 2^nd, Mr. Xi outlined his broadest-yet claim to rule, based on China’s exceptional culture.  He called China the only civilization to be uninterrupted over many millennia.  As if suggesting that convergence with liberal values would betray every dynasty that preceded him, Mr. Xi declared: “The fact that Chinese civilization is highly consistent is the fundamental reason why the Chinese nation must follow its own path.”  Because Chinese civilization is unusually uniform, Mr. Xi went on, different ethnic groups must be integrated and the nation unified: code for imposing Chinese culture on Tibet and other regions and for taking back Taiwan.  For anyone puzzled that a once-revolutionary party now calls itself the “faithful inheritor” of “excellent traditional culture” (plus a dose of Marxism), the People’s Daily weighed in with commentaries explaining why Mr. Xi’s emphasis on cultural confidence is vital in a perilous moment when “strategic opportunities, risks and challenges co-exist.”  Economic heft is not enough, the newspaper added.  If China’s economy develops, but its spirit is lost, “Can the country be called strong?”

Take a step back and Mr. Xi is crafting an appeal to what might be termed civilizational legitimacy. 

I attach here a summary of comments from the fellow’s meeting for your review.

It seems that the scope of problem-solving we will attempt at the Global Dialogue is indeed global and timely.  I hope you can join us.

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