I suspect that most readers do not spend much time thinking about the practice of nepotism. In this article, I will not try to convince you that nepotism is good or bad, but rather to show that nepotism provides a useful starting point for thinking about contemporary trends in politics in many countries.
Conservatives often talk about the importance of family, faithand the flagBut how much importance should we give to family, religion and nation? Consider the following intensity scales:
1. No religion <—–> moderate religion <—–> intense religion
2. Cosmopolitanism <—–> moderate nationalism <—–> intense nationalism
3. Pure egalitarianism <—–> Nordic family values <—–> strong family favoritism
People often describe intense religion as “religious fanaticism,” a term with negative connotations. Although I am not religious, I do not see why intense adherence to a set of beliefs that are considered good and important is a bad thing. In this article, I will try to avoid value judgments.
It is the second and third points that interest me most, namely, attitudes toward families and nations. A cosmopolitan may consider himself a “citizen of the world” and not declare himself a favorite toward his country of birth. A person of moderate nationalism may be strongly opposed to the kind of intense nationalism found in countries like Russia, and yet, to some extent, prefer social programs that help domestic residents to those of foreign countries.
In much of the world this is considered unethical. not People who are blood relatives tend to show strong favoritism toward people who are blood relatives. In contrast, family ties are weaker in countries like Northern Europe, where nepotism in hiring is widely considered unethical. Few people show no family favoritism, but one can imagine a person who complains about being able to choose his friends but not his family, and who maintains friendships with those who have similar interests, not with those who are close.
I grew up in a culture that gravitated toward the “moderate” position on all three sliding scales, and I have no interest in supporting or criticizing that position. Instead, I am interested in thinking about the logic behind each position, especially on the last two sliding scales (attitudes toward one’s nation and family). Why is it so hard to determine which attitude is appropriate? Is the “middle ground” approach I grew up with just lazy thinking? Remember Thomas De Quincey famous joke:
A happy medium is certainly what every man should aim at. But it is easier to speak than to act; and, my infirmity being notoriously too milky of heart, I find it difficult to maintain that steady equatorial line between the two poles of too many murders on the one side and too few on the other.
Why do the above cases seem different from those where one extreme is clearly preferable? It will be helpful here to think about two terms that have very different connotations: bias And solidarity.
In the United States, prejudice is considered so unethical that there are all sorts of laws against favoring one group over another. On the other hand, solidarity has a positive connotation, obviously linked to patriotism and family values, but also to union solidarity and even loyalty to a sports team. But prejudice and solidarity are two sides of the same coin.
I would be hard-pressed to give you a “rational” reason to support the Milwaukee Bucks basketball team. I haven’t lived in Wisconsin in over 40 years, and even when I did, it wasn’t in Milwaukee. On the other hand, it’s pretty easy to explain why I’m a Bucks fan. They were the home team on TV when I started following the NBA in 1968, and once I was hooked, I stuck with them. Similarly, people generally (but not always) prioritize the religion, nation, and family of their youth.
Nepotism is a strong form of family values or family favoritism. It may seem obvious to you that nepotism is unethical. But many (most?) people in the world don’t think so. In fact, they may view your refusal to engage in nepotism as deeply unethical. Sociologists use the acronym WEIRD to describe our culture (Western, Educated, Industrialized, Wealthy, and Democratic).
In my view, the tension between solidarity and bias is increasingly driving recent trends in politics. Authoritarian nationalism tends to lean toward the center and right of all three of these sliding scales, with a few exceptions. Liberalism leans more toward the center and left of all three of these scales, with a few exceptions.
The concept of tradition The role of homosexuality is probably more important on the right than on the left. In countries like Russia, liberals are criticized (perhaps unfairly) for abandoning religion, family values, and patriotism. A liberal might respond that supporting the concept of gay marriage is actually consistent with family values. When conservatives criticize things like gay rights, trans rights, and abortion, I think they implicitly have in mind the idea that once you go down that path, you end up with a kind of radical individualism, which erodes the solidarity that underpins family and nation. If there is no logical reason why people should not be allowed to follow a particular lifestyle, then (some might argue) there is no logical reason why I should not move from the Bucks to the Celtics, or move from the U.S. Winter Olympics team to the Norwegian Winter Olympics team.
In some cases, tensions exist even within a given ideological framework. My favorite example is that of the right-wing Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn, who opposed Muslim immigration because he feared it would threaten the “traditional values” of Dutch liberalism in areas such as gay rights. French conservatives complain that women from different cultures are being displaced. I didn’t wear bikinis on the beachSo there are important exceptions, cases where people do not place themselves in the same way on the three scales.
(Remember the famous paradox: should liberals tolerate the intolerant?)
Some experts have noted that workers are moving from the left to the right in many countries. This can be interpreted as a reaction to the collapse of the CommunismAs the socialist dream of the working class seemed increasingly unrealistic, politics focused on questions of identifyBoth left-wing labor activism and right-wing nationalism can be seen as emphasizing solidarity over prejudice. From this perspective, the basic ideology of the working class has not changed, but rather the stakes have. Liberals, on the other hand, tend to be very concerned with prejudice and to place less emphasis on family or national solidarity.
Proposals to combat global warming suffer from an “externality problem.” It is therefore not surprising that the same voters who showed solidarity with unions by voting for socialists in the 20th century are now showing national solidarity by voting for right-wing parties that oppose carbon taxes. Most of the benefits of carbon taxes go to foreigners, while most of the costs are borne at home.
To sum up, twentieth-century politics has tended to divide along the line between socialism and capitalism. In the twenty-first century, the fault line seems to be the attitude toward the relative importance of bias And solidarity.
PS. I have already argued that nationalism and patriotism are two very different things. Here I avoid this thorny subject.
