Importance of Timing, by Stacia Berg

            Timing. It can be perfect, or completely wrong. It can create the ideal moment, or it can ruin entire plans.  This counts for pretty much anything: storms, relationships, even the development of a democracy.

            It seems like a simple fact that the outcomes of pretty much any event have something to do with timing.  If Lee Harvey Oswald had shot his gun just a few seconds later, President Kennedy may not have died.  If the allied powers had ended their appeasement policy toward Germany sooner, maybe the war would not have ended so soon.  There is a lot of what ifs involved when speaking of timing, but what about when talking about developing democracy?

            Barrington Moore believes that in order to create a democracy from another form of government, there needs to be certain precursors.  First, the old, feudalistic order needs to be done away with.  This will help the next step immensely: industrialization.  Industrialization is important in establishing the potential for democracy, because it provides grounds for free markets and for people to develop a political and economical foothold in the government.  But what would happen if industrialization happened without destroying the feudal society?  Could the two coexist and still progress to a democracy?  I think it would be much more difficult to industrialize when most people were working in the country, under lords, with little to no power to change their situation.  It would make the people unable to migrate to the cities (a trend of industrialization) and work in factories and large-scale jobs. 

            There are three parts of transforming to a democracy.  First, there’s social transformation, which is much of what I was just talking about.  The society usually shifts from a feudal, agricultural society to an urban, industrialized one.  Next comes the political transformation.  In this case, the government is turned in the direction of democracy, whether by a coup, an elected change of party, or a change within the current regime.  The third part is cultural transformation: developing a national identity, desire for participation in the new government, and working for the success of a new democracy.

            Let’s think for a moment of what would happen if the cultural and social transformations were flip-flopped.  Would it be beneficial to develop support and nationalism before changing the governmental style?  I think that it would increase the new governments chances of maintaining its power.  However, the national identity could also be developed against democracy, making it impossible to maintain it.  I think there are many ways at looking at situations like this, and it would probably work differently in each case.

            In thinking about timing, it is important to remember that not every group of people will act the same way in every situation.  Just because one country has followed the order designed by Moore and had it succeed doesn’t mean it will work the same way for a different country.  It will depend heavily on how receptive the people are to the changes that are being implemented.  The assumption that timing is everything cannot possibly encompass every country’s individual situation.  However, I think it is safe to say that paying attention to the timing of any event and what leads up to it can help us to better understand the situation.

Combining Politics With Culture, by Stacia Berg

            Here’s a question; to what extent does our culture have an effect on our politics, and vice versa?  Obviously there are a lot of different ways to go about answering this question, but I think that the best way is to focus on how beliefs and values are reflected in the way national opinion is presented. 

            In the United States, we have separation of church and state.  However, there are many cases in which the two overlap.  The entire point of Europeans coming to America was to escape a governmental rule over their religion, and their values, which have been passed down through generations, were shaped by their respective religions. Now we see evidence of religious ideas becoming evidence for political arguments.  Should this be happening?  Are arguments based on religion universally valid?  It’s interesting to contemplate these questions, and to narrow our view of current issues to see the extent of how personal values have encroached on political territory.

            One of the main issues where I see this is in the argument over marriage rights.  Those with more liberal leanings argue for civil liberties for homosexuals, saying that the ability to marry is a right of all citizens.  On the other hand, those with more conservative political ideals argue that allowing homosexuals to marry would undermine the tradition of marriage.  To back this up, they take evidence from the bible or other religious texts to show that marriage should be between one man and one woman.  The two sides are backed by incredibly different arguments taking proof and ideas from very different places, and both are supported by large amounts of people.  I think this is a great example of how beliefs and values have an effect on the political sphere of a nation.

            We talked in class about the idea of a divide between traditional and secular values.  In traditional societies, religion is an important part of life, and most values are based off those beliefs.  Due to this, there are strict rules on childrearing and issues of divorce, abortion, etc.  In these traditional societies most everyone holds the same ideals, or at least similar ones.  This shows quite a bit of unity in how people act and think.  Thus, it would seem that there is little room for variety in a traditional culture.

            In a secular culture, however, religion is really pushed to the side in the focus of how people should behave.  Childrearing is much less strict, and focused on allowing for self-expression and development of individual ideas.  There is a much more lenient view toward tough issues such as divorce and abortion.  Overall, the main consensus would be that people can make choices based on what is best for them, rather than what would traditionally be seen as right or wrong.  A secular culture provides for a lot of diversity and self-exploration.

            In the U.S., I believe that we have developed from a primarily traditional society to an increasingly secular one.  When the first settlers came to America, they came in groups based on their religions.  Thus, it only seems fitting that religion would be the basis for governing the individual colonies.  However, with the separation of church and state as we became a nation dealt a blow to that traditional culture.  Industrialization and modernization saw people focusing less on their spiritual well being and more on their material desires.  With industrialization came a consumer society, which in turn produced a consumer society focused on material goods.  This led to the diminishing focus on traditional values for controlling how people should act. 

            It is important to remember, however, that transforming into a secularized nation does not mean that everyone has lost sight of traditional values.  There will always be a divide between traditional and secular minded people, as is clearly illustrated in the debate over marriage equality.  The overlap of church and state, formed through maintenance of traditional as well as secular values, obviously has an effect on politics and how decisions are made in this country.  The question is to what extent do the different values have an impact on the making of big decisions?