Redistribution as/and Recognition
posted by Frank Pasquale
In a methodologically interesting essay, Harvey Mansfield makes a silly substantive argument:
You can tell who is in charge of a society by noticing who is allowed to get angry and for what cause, rather than by trying to gauge how much each group gets. Blacks and women wanted benefits only as a sign of equality, not to give themselves greater purchasing power.
I’m much more partial to my colleague Shavar Jeffries’ point that “black people need radical substantive change in their quality of life;” symbolic politics means little in the face of inequalities that greatly reduce individuals’ chances at health care, education, and safe and affordable housing.
This is perhaps why Nancy Fraser worries that “insofar as the politics of recognition displaces the politics of redistribution, it may actually promote economic inequality; insofar as it reifies group identities, it risks sanctioning violations of human rights and freezing the very antagonisms it purports to mediate.” But unlike Walter Benn Michaels and Mansfield, Fraser believes “struggles for recognition can [legitimately] aid the redistribution of power and wealth.” Her books, including Unruly Practices, give some fascinating examples of how that can happen. If you’re tired of reading, check out Deepa Mehta’s film Water.
So why did I think the Mansfield essay methodologically interesting?
Well, this paragraph is an outstanding defense of the humanities’ place in the “human sciences:”
We may now compare science and literature. Let me propose that literature and science have the same aim of finding and telling the truth, but, obviously, literature also seeks to entertain. . . . The social sciences are in a special difficulty because they cover the same field of human behavior as literature. As science, they must claim to improve upon the prejudice and superstition of common sense, and are therefore compelled to restate the language of common sense, full of implication and innuendo, in irreproachable, blameless, scientific prose innocent of bias or any other subtlety. In response, the name common sense gives to this sort of talk is jargon. Science is required to be replicable in principle to everyone; so it speaks directly and without concealment, thus in mathematics as much as possible. In practice, unfortunately, lack of mathematics in the public and lack of communication skills (an example of jargon) in scientists leaves the latter dependent on non-scientist publicists to inform the public and, not incidentally politicians, of what science has found. These publicists usually have an axe to grind, and so science, despite its noble intent to rise above petty human partisanship, often becomes involved in it.
Literature, to repeat, besides seeking truth, also seeks to entertain—and why is this? The reason is not so much that some people have a base talent for telling stories and can’t keep quiet. The reason, fundamentally, is that literature knows something that science does not: the human resistance to hearing the truth.
Those last few lines are about the best defense of popularization (via blogs, or journalism) that I’ve heard.
Photo Credit: Film Journal, on protests against the film Water.
May 17, 2007 at 1:51 pm
Posted in: Civil Rights, Culture, Economic Analysis of Law, Law and Humanities, Legal Theory, Philosophy of Social Science
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Responses (2)
Stokie - May 18, 2007 at 6:03 pm
Sorry to say, but this is the most confusing set of paragraphs I may have ever read – just a peculiar mashing together of disparate quotes and ideas that do not hang together. Rewrite?
Frank - May 18, 2007 at 6:39 pm
Here’s a simpler version:
Part A:
1. Mansfield wants to emphasize struggles for recognition as the proper subject matter of the study of politics.
2. Michaels thinks that the left has overemphasized struggles for recognition.
3. Fraser thinks that if you emphasize struggles for recognition too much, you might end up neglecting redistribution. But she ultimately thinks the two things can be reconciled.
4. Fraser’s critical theory is sometimes jargon-laden, but Jeffries and Mehta show how ideas like that can be put into action. I’m happy to unpack her statements further if you’d like.
Part B:
You’ll have to blame Mansfield for that–it’s almost all a quote from him!
Should Parts A and B be in one post? Maybe not. But it’s nice to point out how Mansfield can churn out substantively silly arguments in the course of a methodologically sophisticated essay. As he said in a lecture I fondly remember, “sometimes the best physician is the best poisoner.”
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