Thomas Nagel begins his review of Michael Sandel's new book in The New York Review of (Each Other's) Books (May 25, 2006) with the following quite startling remark:
The political system of the United States manages to contain...a remarkable range of moral, ideological, and religious conflicts. The conflicts are not so severe as those that led to the Civil War, but they are greater than those that divide most European countries--where public opinion occupies a narrower political range, and religion is not an important element.
I am really quite perplexed by the bolded line: "political opinion occupies a narrower political range" in Europe than in the United States? What can Nagel be thinking? Even in France, where Nagel spends considerable time, the spectrum of political opinion that commands attention in the public sphere runs the gamut from the crypto-fascism of LePen on the right to actual communists on the left. Contrast this with the United States where, from a cosmopolitan perspective, political opinion runs the gamut from mildly conservative to very conservative to crypto-fascist, and "left" political opinion (proponents of social democracy, socialism, or communism) is invisible, confined to marginal publications and blogs! Perhaps what Nagel is thinking is that, because religion is far less important in Europe, there is less divisiveness about certain kinds of "social" issues that religious fanaticism tends to inspire. Perhaps that is correct, but there is plainly much more to "political opinion"--and the range it occupies--than views about sex!
Recent Comments