The Way to a Shared Value of What it Means to be American

Author’s note: there is a theological point to this brief essay so don’t be surprised when you get to the end.

In the previous column I wrote that economic prosperity is not the highest measure of social prosperity and success. The highest standards of individual and public prosperity are moral and ethical values held at arm’s length from contemporary social norms. Finally, there must be a more clear definition of and commitment to the common good striving to make things better while accepting that the temporary condition of good enough is good enough.

It needs some clarification. For there to be a wide spread sense of shared prosperity every full-time job must provide a wage capable of providing adequate housing, food, clothing, related necessary expenses, such as transportation, and perhaps a little extra. Nevertheless, providing that basic economic standard will not lead to satisfaction with the way things are going. It will only prevent dissatisfaction. The idea of satisfaction, of well-being, of national happiness lies elsewhere.

Back in the late 1950s Frederick Herzberg promoted his theory that things like adequate pay, good working conditions, and basic standards of living were what he called hygiene factors. They had to be met in order for people not to be dissatisfied, but they would not lead to satisfaction. His research was deeply flawed but oddly enough, his theory has seemed to stand the test of time. His insights seem to have revealed a fundamental truth that his research could not validate.

So what are the things that lead to social satisfaction, a sense of well-being, national happiness? Another theorist of the same period, Abraham Maslow, offered an equally flawed theory of a hierarchy of needs. He too believed there were fundamental needs in society that had to be met before anything like a sense of well-being and happiness could be achieved. They were basically the same things as Herzberg’s hygiene factors. What led to happiness Maslow said was opportunity to create friendships, be engaged socially, have a sense of full membership in society, have opportunities for learning and what he called self actualization. He believed the hierarchy was fragile and unstable.  A sense of well being and satisfaction could crumble easily  any time basic “hygiene” needs failed to be met. His theory, flawed as it was, has also stood the test of time.

The question remains, how does a nation actually get to a place of shared prosperity and sense of well-being?  I think it requires a shared sense that “my” prosperity and happiness depends on the prosperity and happiness of the community, which depends on there being no obstacle placed in the path of any other person inhibiting their ability to participate as fully as they are able in personal and community prosperity and happiness. That’s asking a lot.

I don’t think it  requires unanimity. It does have to mean a coherence of a reasonable distribution of understandings centered on the core value.   The meaning of community must accommodate variability. The nearer and more clearly defined a community is will make it easier for each to understand what the common good looks like in practice.  The more distant and less intimate will mean a more abstract understanding of community and its relationship with the common good.  Moreover, our multitude of “tribal” affiliations will color every understanding.  Nevertheless, coherence can be had.

America, more than any other nation, should find it easier as it’s always been a nation of tribes slowly learning how to live together as “e pluribus unum.”  Two things stand in our way: our intemperate loyalty to individualism that measures everything by whether it is good for “me” regardless of effects on others, and our history of white hegemony which we are loathe to surrender or forgive.

Two more things need to be said. First, what is meant by the word nation, and second what gives authority to the core value of personal prosperity and happiness dependent on the prosperity and happiness of a just and non discriminatory community?

We are accustomed to equating nation with state or country, so when we say our nation most would take it to mean the same thing thing as the United States of America, or Canada, or any other nation state.  But nation does not mean a state, it means a people who define themselves as belonging together, who tend to live in the same region and who share an implicit understanding of what it means to be an identifiable people.  The prosperity and happiness of a nation does not accrue to a state but to a people. Americans, perhaps more than any others, are positions to identify as a people of many tribes in mutual respect for one another and shared commitment to the promise of American democracy.

A core value making personal prosperity and happiness dependent upon the prosperity and happiness of the community, even community as large as a nation, is not based on theoretical insight backed by research, flawed or not.  It is revealed by God through prophets speaking at God’s command, and God speaking directly through Jesus, God incarnate.  God promised salvation to nations, meaning all peoples, not states defined by governments and borders. Will humankind pay attention? Probably not. As a species, we are simply to inclined to go our own way according to the social norms in which we have been raised. It is not necessarily a bad way to go, but it subordinates God’s way to the human way, or it disregards God’s way altogether. It can make what looks like progress but can never produce a sustainable condition of prosperity and happiness.

Nevertheless, Christians are commanded by Christ to live as best we can in God’s way, and to assist society in moving, however, slightly, in a more godly direction by clearly stating the fundamental importance of ethical and moral principles God has revealed.  Let them speak for themselves without making them a tool of personalization.  Without requiring the participation of others, our obligation is to live evermore fully into the Christian life. Unlike the fragility and instability of Herzberg and Maslow’s systems, it is the way to a robust, flexible, enduring condition of well-being, that can withstand the chances and changes of life in the sure and certain hope of a greater future.