When we talk about how the United States might recover from the damage that has been done to it by the Trump administration, we tend to talk about structural fixes. Things like policy changes, laws, amendments, court reform, etc.
But reading some Montesquieu lately, he basically argues that when civic virtue is corrupted enough, structural mechanisms alone cannot save a republic. They are necessary, but not sufficient by themselves.
Looking at the current state of American politics and the amount of openly corrupt and immoral politicians that the American voters have been tolerating, especially in the past decade, he seems to be proven right. That means that unless we pair structural fixes with addressing the decline of civic virtue in the US, even if we fix the system's structural flaws and loopholes, the corruption of the people will inevitably rot it again at some point.
But what are some policies or reforms the US should pursue to start restoring a sufficient level of common civic virtue in the broader population that voters will not continue to tolerate (or even reward) corrupt or immoral officials?
The Niskanen Center had an interesting article discussing this very problem.
What are some other ideas on how civic virtue can be cultivated?
Posted by loremipsumot
3 Comments
open borders
paired with another policy that i can’t discuss
Institutional competence and civic virtue are a feedback loop.
Ending the filibuster (or at least the two track system so they have to actually talk) and getting rid of the debt ceiling would make it easier for Congress to do stuff so we wouldn’t end up being governed by executive order while legislators stunt for tweets.
“Civic virtue” is one of these things that everyone wants to cultivate in a society, and yet society as a whole most often fails to maintain it. Basically, a collective action problem, which we naturally say are solved by “institutions” making a full circle.
It is difficult because it requires holding very powerful people *who are on your side* to account. In your American context it would mean something like Republicans calling out Trump’s use of executive powers to impose taxes (tariffs) even though he is cutting their income taxes or Democrats calling into question Hunter Biden’s creative business practices. And all the while *the other side* is attacking you because of that same thing.
What Montesquieu knew of republics was shaped a lot by the ancient sources, great proponents of civic virtue like Socrates and Cicero. But an objective view of history reveals that those people were not free from the underhanded politicking of their day (of the former one can only speculate, about the latter we have considerable evidence). Cicero even played a part in the end of the Roman Republic while preaching civic virtue all the time. Even though one can say he ultimately ended up on “the right side” and had “based” ideas about preventing tyranny, the practice was just not there to back the idea.
What is to be done? I guess at best you can educate people what civics is and why certain moral and civil principles should stand above political differences. But on a society wide scale you need immense amounts of courage to uphold virtue. **I think that from a sociological perspective there needs to be some very dedicated grassroots movement that holds political and business elites and the media to account in terms of respecting civic virtues and these people in turn influence the behaviour of the masses.**
Unfortunately the most visible grassroots movements in modern democracies are about hating immigrants or some socialist crap and they do not give a damn about a conservative constitutional order.