A wind of morality has been blowing all over, from the greenwashing watchddogs at Greenwashingindex, to companies broadcasting their good deeds in corporate citizenship reports, to the buzz about sustainability in the blogosphere. It is happening. JWT calls it the ‘emerging new spirit of good-citizen ethics’. Like the EcoMoms phenomenon, however, it is a movement, still confined to a fringe of the American culture.
The good citizen ethics certainly has not made its way through the streets of our cities. From The Open Planning Project in New York City, here is a very thought-provoking video on the ethics of urban automobility, featuring Randy Cohen, The Ethicist from the New York Times – thanks Kyle, for sending the video my way:
I agree with Randy Cohen that ethics cannot be left to individual moral choice. Instead ethics need to be embedded in wise policies, to be decided democratically by informed citizens. The problem of the individual car is just one example of the many environmental villains that are threatening our very existence. One precursor of ethics is consciousness. The more we watch and engage in discussions such as the one in the video, the more aware we become and the more ready we will be to define and accept a new code of ethics. That new code will make room for the consequences of our personal actions when we pollute our environment.
I am really curious to hear your thoughts on that one!
La Marguerite 
Great post Marguerite.
FYI, a great book sheds light on many aspects of the relationships among freedom, cooperation, limits, and related matters: It’s called “The Evolution of Cooperation”, by Robert Axelrod.
As Randy said, freedom is not without limits. Someone once said, “your freedom stops at my nose”, or something like that.
Wise societies should enable “good” actions and make them possible and “easier” for individual citizens, and (in some cases) should actually reward them, and such societies should also set limits to discourage or (in some cases) punish “bad” actions. The important matter is not only to realize this but also to broadly define (for purposes of the development of good policy, anyhow) “good” and “bad”, directionally speaking, in genuine ways that are actually good for the community and good in a more general and grounded sense.
I’m not at all suggesting that there should be a czar of “good” and “bad”, of course: All of this should, ideally, take place in a democratic way, leaving much room for flexibility and freedom and individual flourishing within the community context. And, education is vitally important. In order for all this to happen in a democracy, education is key. As Thomas Jefferson once wrote:
“If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.”
– Thomas Jefferson
Now, that said, I often read Randy’s “The Ethicist” column, and I’ve read his book. I sometimes don’t agree with him, and I think it’s important for the audience to understand that, last I heard, he’s not actually a formally trained philosopher/ethicist. So, there’s a bit of a problem in my view if, by virtue of the column’s title, many readers are given or left with the impression that Randy is a formally trained philosopher/ethicist. That said, I’m not a formally trained philosopher/ethicist either! And, as Thomas Jefferson also once wrote (in a great letter to his nephew, Peter Carr, in August of 1787):
“Man was destined for society. His morality, therefore, was to be formed to this object. He was endowed with a sense of right and wrong, merely relative to this. This sense is as much a part of his nature, as the sense of hearing, seeing, feeling; it is the true foundation of morality, and not the [beautiful], truth, &c., as fanciful writers have imagined. The moral sense, or conscience, is as much a part of man as his leg or arm. It is given to all human beings in a stronger or weaker degree, as force of members is given them in a greater or less degree. It may be strengthened by exercise, as may any particular limb of the body. This sense is submitted, indeed, in some degree, to the guidance of reason; but it is a small stock which is required for this: even a less one than what we call common sense. State a moral case to a ploughman and a professor. The former will decide it as well, & often better than the latter, because he has not been led astray by artificial rules.”
Regarding how this all relates to cars, I agree (to a degree) with some of Randy’s thoughts, but the matter is obviously multidimensional. Nevertheless, sustainability is key, and we need to make sure any use of cars falls within the boundaries of sustainability, health, fairness, and so forth.
Sorry for length. I hope this is helpful in some way.
Cheers.
Thanks Jeff. This article falls right in your field of interest and expertise. Your comments are fortifying it and making it richer.
I resonate with your point about the role of education. Every day, I am made aware through my encounters, of the abyss of ignorance in the general public. Ignorance about simple facts of science, and nature, and economics, that are essential to understand the climate challenge. You cannot develop a sense of right and wrong about something if you do not grasp what the thing is to begin with.
Thanks Marguerite. I also agree with your point. And just FYI, Jefferson wrote that letter I quoted above (to his nephew) while he, Jefferson, was in Paris.
It would be very interesting to understand, for fun and for enlightenment, how the Parisians and French are doing with respect to this issue. For example, some basic questions:
• Are there “congestion pricing” approaches in Paris?
• How do they address traffic problems in Paris these days? Do they have a license-plate approach, where some cars can drive on some days of the week but not on others?
• What’s the average price of a liter of petrol (or gasol, or whatever; I’ve forgotten the terminology) these days?
• What do the French think about the climate problem these days?
If it fits the theme of the blog, it would be very interesting to have a guest post from someone in Paris to touch on her/his personal story and also, if possible, to provide a few of these answers. Too often, as I’m sure you know, we in the US seem to lack any informed concept of what is going on elsewhere. Many people here probably don’t even know that gasoline is much more expensive in Europe than it is here. I think a few of those basic facts may help us understand the bigger picture.
Or, if your blog has a travel budget, I’d be happy to volunteer to go to Paris on assignment.
Anyhow, just a thought.
Well, that’s the thing, I agree with Cohen. We don’t consider personal morality enough for, say, keeping traffic moving, so why would we consider it enough for how the traffic is powered?
Personal morality isn’t enough, we need ethics translated into laws and institutions. And those laws and institutions must have the consent of the public.
But this is where that aspect of democracy comes in – consent must be informed consent. Simple human limits mean I’m not going to be informed on every issue out there, every bill passed through parliament, every building planned and built, and so on. But nor should I be uninformed on every issue there is. So, between total knowledge and total ignorance is where I should be.
I’d say the public as a whole is a bit too far over on the ignorance side of the thing.
Now, that’s not because of stupidity, because when people do become interested in an issue, most can inform themselves of the important points pretty quickly. It’s effort. And most don’t make the effort. Why not? Well, we’re distracted.
This to me is the incredible strength of the consumerist system, it keeps us distracted. We’re distracted by accumulating stuff, and then the stuff itself distracts us. I’d like to say that most of my time with this laptop and the internet was productively spent, but I’d be lying. I’ve been described as a passionate and informed blogger and writer – but even a passionate and informed blogger and writer spends most of their time doing not much at all with the tools they have.
Take away the passion, and the informed part declines a bit, too. The TV, the radio, the glossy magazines, they beckon – and offer more stuff, more simple distraction.
Now, I don’t ever expect us to become some sort of democratic ideal, with every citizen going to public meetings about development of local parks, or the defence budget or whatever, with action committees on this or that – of course not.
But I do think we could be a bit more informed, and a bit more active in political affairs as a whole. I think there could be a bit more of a conversation between us and our elected representatives. Federal MPs receive lots of correspondence, but rather little from private citizens – something like 100 a month from what I hear. 100 a month, 1,200 a year, that’s not a lot from electorates of 100,000 people – especially when you consider that it’s usually not 1,200 different people, just 300 or so quite active ones.
Then they get many more letters from business associations, people inviting them to lunches in fancy hotels and so on. I mean, they’re human – they just listen to whoever’s speaking to them. I’m keen to have it be common citizens more often than private interest groups.
I think there needs to be more informed consent, more of a conversation between the elected and the citizens. After all, “politics” comes from the Greek “politis”, which means citizen.
That’s why I make these indecent proposals about democratic power-sharing – where we deal with the two issues of NIMBYism and where we should get our electricity from by… well… asking each region what they want. “I don’t want this in my backyard!” “Okay, fine – what do you want in your backyard? Remembering that if you say “nothing” then you’ll have no electricity. Here’s a list of choices.”
Once it’s put in terms like that, people start talking instead of just waving placards. When we’re having this kind of conversation, then we can figure out what’s important to us, what our ethics are and how we’d like them to be turned into laws and institutions.
The posts on this blog are very helpful and interesting.
I noticed, this time, that “Kiashu” in post #4 mentions “MP.” This made me wonder whether Kiashu lives in Europe or elsewhere. If so, I’d be very interested to hear about some basics from that country, such as the typical price of gasoline locally, the typical terminology (there) used to refer to (what we here call) “global warming” or “climate change”, and anything else that Kiashu might think is of interest.
Cheers.
Kyle is an Aussie . . .
I typically disagree with most of what Randy Cohen says, I have even started a blog with my own answers to his Sunday Ethicist in the New York Times.
http://www.re-ethicist.com