Paul Robinson — The Inability To See

I spend most of my time on this blog mocking all the exaggerated nonsense which passes for political commentary nowadays. It’s a rare day that I come across something which is both stimulating and well-written. Fortunately, this is one of those days. Via Facebook (which has its uses), I was pointed in the direction of an excellent article by Patrick Lawrence in this summer’s edition of the magazine Raritan Quarterly, of which I had not previously been aware. I can recommend it to you all, and you can find it here....

This criticism also applies to American commentary on China and most other things foreign. It is a consequence of the "context" issue that Paul Robinson discusses in this post. There are different cultural worldviews that imply group preference for institutional arrangements that are different among groups, especially nations with long traditions. Human understanding and appreciation are context-dependent.

The only overarching context globally is provided by formal logic, mathematics, and science. Most of the rest is culturally relative. Hence, understanding the world system requires taking this into account. This means determining where others are coming from, as well as as knowing where one's own culture and its biases came from and how they were shaped by historical circumstances.

From this standpoint it is clear why trying to export "American democracy and values" even to Great Britain is folly, or assuming that the British system and the American system are essentially the same. This being the case, how silly is it to presume that "the American way" can be exported, let alone imposed on alien cultures.

It is also interesting seeing a former diplomat and a professor agreeing on this point. Unfortunately, at this point such people have no voice and therefore no influence in US policy or the American corporate media. Without the Internet and social media, they would be unavailable, as long as the Internet and social media escape censorship, that is.

Irrussianality

The Inability To See

Paul Robinson | Professor, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa

See also
Raritan (Volume 38, Number 1, Summer 2018)

Putin: From Soulmate to Archenemy

David S. Foglesong

See also

Valdai Club
Tradition and Future: National Identity in a Changing World
Alexey Kasprzhak