I’m sorry, but once more it is time to return to Donald Trump. I try to avoid spending too much of my life thinking about the man, but there is so much happening right now he can’t be avoided. For today, my excuse is he offers an especially revealing case study. It’s not an edifying case study, but an important one nonetheless: a case study of a person you can’t trust. That might matter less, although still matter a great deal, if he were a business executive with dubious morals. However, he is the President of the United States, at the pinnacle of the political system, and should be the embodiment of what we regard as the fundamental principles of democracy; in fact, like Congress members in the pocket of the NRA, he ignores what he should be doing for the American people, and betrays their hopes for justice, fairness and truth.
You knew all that, but instead of continuing on that vein, I want to examine why Donald Trump might best be seen as an (obnoxious) tiny pimple on the forehead of humanity! [i] Pimple? The forehead of humanity? Let’s take a deep breath and see if we can explore some relevant ideas.
Several years ago, I was very taken by a book by George Fletcher.[ii] It was an examination of the ‘morality of relationships’, counter posing unquestioning allegiance to close family and friends with the acceptance of impartial rules and processes. The essence of his analysis was the incompatibility of loyalty and justice: “In the realm of loyalty, playing the lawyer and insisting on justice may well undermine the bonds of loyal sentiment. Equally true, letting loyalties intrude into the proper real of justice brings about its own form of distortion. We are left with the question, then, when should justice and when should loyalty prevail?” [iii] Without doing too great a disservice to Fletcher’s analysis, he suggested loyalty prevails in intimate relationships, in families, while impartial justice is required for all our other more impersonal relationships.
I’m sure you know the examples that are used to explain this tension. Your adult son comes home unexpectedly. He confesses he’s in trouble: let’s imagine he has taken part in a robbery, but he tells you he was an unwitting participant, tricked by some of his friends. You have no idea as to whether or not that is true. Then the front doorbell rings for the second time in the evening, and there is a policeman on the doorstep. “Sorry to bother you, sir. We were looking for your son. Is he here?” “No,” you reply. “Is there a problem, officer?” “Just following up on some information, sir. Do make sure he contacts us when you see him.” The policeman leaves.
You have just lied, broken the law in fact. Why? There are all sorts of rationalisations you might put forward: the legal system is biased; the police presume guilt, not innocence; you need to hear more; you need to speak to a lawyer. The fact of the matter is that, at least for a short time, loyalty to your son overtakes your willingness to allow the rules and processes of the legal system to take over. Presumed innocent? Protect your son. Loyalty to family members is so well recognised that in many jurisdictions a spouse cannot be required to testify when his or her spouse is under investigation or in court.
Let me pose the question again: you have just lied and broken the law; why? Years ago, we might have argued the unexpected arrival of your son faced you with an ethical dilemma. You had to make a choice between caring for a member of your family as opposed to accepting the fairness of an impartial system. Today, people make choices in situations like this for less than lofty reasons. They don’t see taking a decision as posing a moral or ethical dilemma but rather see it as a straightforward matter. They lie, cover up, seek personal advantage and protect ‘our friends’. As they see it, in our highly individualistic society impartial rules and processes (and government, too, many argue) should, as far as possible, be ignored, reduced or circumvented.
We can think of other examples. If your family has, let’s say, a hotel and functions business (my, I have such a creative mind!), and your own quite independent activities allow you to improperly (unfairly, unethically) direct customers to the family hotels (and thereby increase revenue and profits), then many people would do it, while refusing to disclose any information that would show this was a kind of ‘insider trading’! Good example??
Somehow this is all tangled up with two other concepts: integrity and trust. Stephen Carter, a man I greatly admire, once wrote a book on integrity, and observed “a reputation for integrity, which one must possess in order to be trusted by colleagues, has to be earned”. [iv] Now Carter was very interested in political leadership when he was examining the concept of integrity. Noting we tend to be cynical about our political leaders (and this was in 1996!), he felt there was a need for reliability in politicians as much as in business leaders: “integrity … creates the trust that we need for ordinary social and political intercourse” [v]
When we are loyal to our close kin, is this because we trust them? Do we expect them to show integrity? Or are these issues only to do with the world of justice, where trust and integrity are the building blocks of a set of impartial rules that we agree to follow? Stephen Carter thought more as he moved on to a broader canvas and explored ‘civility’. He established some principles to underpin civility, and through that democracy. One of these rules was “Civility has two parts: generosity, even when it is costly, and trust, even when there is risk” [vi]
As you lie about your son’s whereabouts, is this because you trust your son? I am inclined to say, “possibly not”, because we know our children quite well, good and bad, often better than we would like to. Your level of trust in your son might not be especially high. Or do we lie for another reason: because we don’t trust the police, or the judicial system? Quite possibly. Has the currency of trust has lost most of its value? Trust is in a bear market, and we’re selling it off.
The evidence is disheartening. Certainly, if we focus on government, overall trust is declining, to a frighteningly low level, and has been doing so for a long time. “As has been the case for the last decade, public trust in government remains near historically low levels. Just two-in-ten Americans say they can trust the government in Washington to do what is right “just about always” (4%) or “most of the time” (16%). Nearly seven-in-ten (68%) say they trust the government to do what’s right only some of the time and 11% volunteer the response that they never trust the government.” Is this Donald Trump’s work? Public trust in government is little different that it was before the 2016 election. In October 2015, “19% said they felt they could trust the government in Washington to do what’s right always (3%) or most of the time (16%).
No more than about 30% have expressed trust in the government in Washington to do the right thing at any point over the last decade. This marks the longest period of low trust in government since the question was first asked in 1958.” [vii]
A pimple on humanity’s forehead. Donald Trump is an obvious excrescence, possibly at the leading edge of what is happening (hence the ‘forehead’) but far from the cause. It is better, I believe, to describe him as the result of years of change: he is where that change has led us.
Forgive yet another occasion when I use an extended quote, but here is Bill Bishop offering an overview of the changes that have been taking place: [viii]
“We haven’t simply changed our attitudes. We’ve voted with our feet, walking away from the institutions we supported for generations … civic engagement has declined … Everything about modern life works against community and trust. Globalization and urbanization put people in touch with the different and the novel. Our economy rewards initiative over conformity, so that the weight of convention and tradition doesn’t squelch the latest gizmo from coming to the attention of the next Bill Gates … Widespread education gives people the tools to make up their own minds. And technology offers everyone the chance to be one’s own reporter, broadcaster and commentator …”
The shift in outlook has been all-encompassing. It has changed the purpose of marriage (once a practical arrangement, now a means of personal fulfillment). It has altered the relationship between citizens and the state (an all-volunteer fighting force replacing the military draft). It has transformed the understanding of art (craftsmanship and assessment are out; free-range creativity and self-promotion are in). It has even inverted the orders of humanity and divinity (instead of obeying a god, now we choose one). People enjoy their freedoms. There’s no clamoring for a return to gray flannel suits and deferential housewives. Constant social retooling and choice come with costs, however. Without the authority and guidance of institutions to help order their lives, many people feel overwhelmed and adrift. … As groups based on tradition and consistent association dwindle, they are being replaced by “event communities,” temporary gatherings that come and go without long-term commitment (think Burning Man) …
A polarized and distrustful electorate may stymie the national government, but locally most communities are either overwhelmingly Republican or Democratic. In 2016, 8 out of 10 U.S. counties gave either Trump or Hillary Clinton a landslide victory. In these increasingly homogenous communities, nobody need bother about compromise and the trust it requires.
Where does this leave Donald Trump. The unfortunate result of changes that have been under way for decades? At least we know his views on that. Asked if he was concerned he was “undermining the people’s faith in the First Amendment, freedom of the press, the press in [this] country, when you call stories you don’t like fake news?” Trump responded: “The public doesn’t believe you people anymore. Now maybe I had something to do with that. I don’t know. But they don’t believe you. If you were straight and really told it like it is …I would be your biggest booster.” [ix]
Fact checking suggests the president is right in that many people don’t believe a lot of what they hear. But if Bill Bishop is right, he’s not correct in claiming credit for it. It also seems doubtful that we can suddenly reverse the process of change and put things back the way they were. Trust in the media has matched the decline in trust in the government. As in 2016, few Americans express high levels of trust in news they get from professional news organizations or from their social connections. Just one-fifth of adults say they trust information they get from national news organizations “a lot.” Slightly more (25%) say this of news from local news organizations. When it comes to social media, just 5% of web-using U.S. adults have a lot of trust in the information they get there, and just over a third say they have a lot or some trust. [x]
While trust in politicians, government and news media has been declining steadily, loyalty has expanded, not just to close family and friends, but to ‘friends, people like me’. While President Trump believes in the (trumped up) stories on Fox News and its allies, so his supporters appear to accept just about everything he says. The biggest Inauguration crowd ever? Yes, his supporters agree with him. But the published photographs contradict him, and show the crowd was relatively small. Take no notice: that was all fake news and lies, they don’t show the real crowd that turned up on the day! Combatting facts with made-up information, accusing others of fake news, it is clear that acceptance of his claims is determined by loyalty, not by evidence.
Regretfully, I have to say that George Fletcher’s book (which had its arguable parts then), is now quite out of touch. In the past twenty-five years, it is loyalty that characterises the relationships between people, from close family to the unknown inhabitants of places far away. Impartial rules and the justice system is slowly being eaten away, by lies, dammed lies and statutory changes. Trump is the result, an obnoxious pimple showing where we are today.
And yet. And yet the rules of civility are not lost. Young people may be disheartened by the world they occupy, but their values are still there. They may not trust the generations above them – with good reason. They are less religious. But they do trust to principles and processes that matter. Many haven’t abandoned government and the law; they want protections for the environment, for minorities, and want the government to do more. Many accept that the right to free speech carries an obligation to justify and support what is said. They are “confident, self-expressive, liberal, upbeat and open to change.” [xi]
If the long-term trajectory of change has been disappointing in recent decades, much of the problem sits with the older generations. The millennials and their children include many who’ll want to make the world a better place, loyal to causes that improve our world, building a new basis for trust as they move to take over the messy world we have left them. Despite everything we see happening today, I’m still optimistic: we should enable and support them.
[i] That’s a stolen and mangled line from Katie Alexander, in her novel Bad Girls Don’t Die (Disney Hyperion 2010): “I am a giant pimple on the face of humanity”. I didn’t read the book, of course, but found the quote!!
[ii] George Fletcher, Loyalty, OUP, 1993
[iii] Ibid, pp 162-3
[iv] Stephen L Carter, Integrity, Harper, 1996, page 31.
[v] Ibid, page 31
[vi] Stephen L Carter, Civility, Basic Books, 1998, page 280.
[vii] Pew Research Center, Public Trust in Government, 3 May 2017
[viii] Bill Bishop, Americans have lost their faith in institutions, Washington Post, 3 March 2017
[ix] <http://money.cnn.com/2017/02/16/media/jim-acosta-donald-trump-press-conference/>
[x] <http://www.journalism.org/2017/05/10/democrats-republicans-now-split-on-support-for-watchdog-role/>
[xi] Pew Research Center, Millennials: Confident. Connected. Open to Change, 24 February 2010
