RealClearPolicy Newsletters: Original Articles
In Defense of Chosen Obligations?
Dear Reader —
A recurring theme in the writings of today’s critics of liberalism is the centrality of “unchosen obligations.” By this is meant those relationships and circumstances that are thrust upon you: your history, family, or country, where you are from, perhaps even your biological and metaphysical inheritance. These, the argument goes, provide the attachments that are most significant to us and most capable of bestowing meaning on our lives. In other words, they are necessary conditions for the moral life and therefore deserving of our deference and defense.
Liberalism, by contrast, takes the autonomous individual to be the basic unit of social and political life. Hence our free choices about who to be, with whom to associate, what to pursue, and where and how to live become paramount. Liberalism envisions a world of our own fashioning, in which the given — whether personal, social, historical, or even natural — is subordinate to the freely chosen. If autonomy is the overriding good, then our unchosen obligations become constraints on, rather than conditions for, our freedom; the moral life requires liberation from rather than deference to them.
The critique of liberalism rightly stresses the dangers that a world entirely of our fashioning can pose, as well as the impoverished view of freedom on which it depends. But there is a risk of going too far in the other direction. Not all “unchosen obligations” are equally deserving of deference or defense; fortune plays a large role in determining which circumstances we find ourselves in. Moreover — and more importantly — it is hardly the case that all our chosen obligations are superficial or incapable of bestowing meaning on our lives.
On the contrary, many of the relationships and institutions that we value most — and which traditionalists point to as exemplifying unchosen obligations — depend upon or at any rate involve our free choices. Whom (or whether) we marry, where we live, what careers we pursue, and our friendships all involve choices, especially in modern society, even if our choices remain more or less constrained. And yet, the outcomes of these choices provide much of the context for our lives. The nuclear family is perhaps the most striking example. Whom you choose to marry dictates an array of other, unchosen obligations that may imbue your life with significance.
The point is not merely philosophical. Consider current public policy debates about revitalizing community. Those who emphasize our unchosen obligations tend also to make arguments for policies that incentivize reinvesting in local communities — where you are from — and the institutions of civic society: local associations, clubs, churches, schools, neighborhoods, and families. The goal is to build back up the “social capital” that many communities have lost because of social, economic, and technological forces that are at once liberating and destructive.
But such social capital is not evenly distributed. Wealthier communities today tend also to have healthier civic communities and institutions and thus afford more opportunities of all kinds. To be sure, we should reinvest in our less-well-off communities to help rectify this state of affairs. But, as Ryan Streeter has pointed out, we can hardly blame those who, frustrated with the diminished opportunities afforded them by their communities, seek their fortunes elsewhere. That’s precisely what many who live in “better off” communities did in the first place.
There is a tension here at the level of policy that reflects the philosophical tension between chosen and unchosen obligations, one that likely cannot and perhaps should not be resolved. The impulse to leave home and seek one’s fortune is, of course, quintessentially American. But it is also very human — so too the need for community and the longing for home.
These are some of the many issues lately taken up in our pages. Below you will find just a few highlights.
— M. Anthony Mills, Managing Editor | RealClear Media Group
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Trump’s Chance to Check the Court. Matthew R. A. Heiman argues that progressives’ fears about a conservative court reflects a misguided view of the separation of powers.
Urban-Rural Divide Isn’t What It Seems. Samuel J. Abrams highlights some revealing data.
America’s Greatness Depends on Immigration. Daniel Garza makes his case in our pages.
Voluntary Drug Price Restraint Didn’t Work in the 1990s, and Won’t Now. James C. Capretta contends that President Trump’s plan to lower prescription medicine prices misses the mark.
Did Doctors Help Create the Opioid Crisis? In RealClearHealth, Albert Gustafson argues that overprescription of drugs like fentanyl is partly to blame.
Free Community College Is Not Enough. In RealClearEducation, Jonathan Hasak contends that the quality of the school is key to students’ job success.
States Must Strengthen High School Graduation Requirements. Laura Jimenez & Kira Orange Jones make their case, also in RealClearEducation.
U.S. CO2 Emissions Are Lowest Since 1985. In RealClearEnergy, Jude Clemente highlights the environmental benefits of America’s “shale gas revolution.”
Magazine Funding Skews Left. What Can Conservatives Do About It? In RealClearBooks, Michael E. Hartmann considers the ideological landscape of nonprofit journalism.
Originalism, a Debt Against the Living. RealClearBooks also offers this excerpt from Ilan Wurman’s new work on interpreting the Constitution.
