09/08/2019
In this weekend’s Radio Derb and the article distilled from it I quoted sociologist Ruud Koopmans and political scientist Michael Zürn writing, in the introduction to their recent book The Struggle Over Borders, that:
In this book, we label those who advocate open borders, universal norms and supranational authority as "cosmopolitans"; and those who defend border closure, cultural particularism and national sovereignty as "communitarians."
A Radio Derb listener points out a thing I had forgotten: The word "communitarian" had a previous life, late in the last century, tagging a slightly refurbished variety of good old anti-capitalist leftism.
To my annoyance, I once knew this, but had forgotten it. Not only did I know it, twenty years ago I read a book about it. And not only did I read the book, I published a review of it, with maximum ill-will.
Amitai Etzioni is a Professor of Law and writes like one, calling his method a "methodology." He is also a leading voice of the self-styled "communitarian" movement which believes we have been passing through a regrettable period of extreme individualism — egged on by the likes of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan (do you need to be told that communitarians are lefties?) — in which the very concept of "the common good" has almost been lost. What can be done? We "need to lean on [Big Brother] to protect privacy better from Big Buck." It is all the fault of wicked capitalists, you see, and the solution is — guess what? — more government. You did know that we are under-governed, didn’t you? [Private Obsessions; National Review, May 31st 1999]
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