Whose life satisfaction is most affected by declining living standards in Australia?

Many Australians have good reasons to feel that their standard of living has declined in recent years.  The graph above shows what has happened to real disposable per capita incomes in Australia over the last decade. The impact of the Covid virus and government income support at that time is obvious. However, it is also obvious that real disposable incomes have declined since then.

Not so long ago, Australians could expect their real disposable per capita incomes to increase on average by about 2.5% per annum. That was the average rate of increase in the period from 1994 to 2014. However, there hasn’t been any increase over the last four years.

We can no longer assume that in Australia each generation will have higher disposable incomes on average than the previous generation at a given age. A recent report by the Productivity Commission has found that “slow growth in recent periods has meant people born in the 1990s have experienced almost no growth in incomes between the ages of 25–30 compared to those born in the 1980s.” See: Fairly equal? Economic mobility in Australia, p. 34 and figure 3.1.

People seem to have a fair idea of how their current income levels compare with those of their parents at a comparable age. Survey data suggests that the majority of young Australians feel that their income levels are lower than those of their parents.

When people feel that their incomes are lower than those of their parents at a comparable age, that often has an adverse impact on their life satisfaction. An essay I wrote on this blog in Nov 2021 made that point using data from the World Values Survey. The perception that living standards are worse than parents is associated with substantially lower life satisfaction in both Australia and United States, but the perception that income is higher than parents is not associated with higher life satisfaction than the perception that it is about the same.

In this essay I extend that analysis using Australian data for 2024 from the survey conducted by the Australian Centre on Quality of Life (ACQOL). The Australian Unity Wellbeing Index (AUWI) 2024 report found:

“On average, younger age groups (18-54 years old) were more likely to feel financially worse off compared to their parents at the same age (Figure 3-64). This was most notable for 25-34-year olds, where more than half (56%) of respondents felt worse off. In comparison, over half of 55+ year-olds felt financially better off than their parents were.”

I focus here on the 18-54 years group. In that group, 33% felt better off than their parents, 48% felt worse off, and 19% felt that their incomes were about the same as their parents’ incomes at a comparable age.

Life satisfaction of the 18-54 years group

The survey question about financial situation relative to parents was: “Thinking about how financially well-off your parents were at your age, do you feel better or worse off? Better, Worse, Same.”

The life satisfaction question was: “Thinking about your own life and personal circumstances, how satisfied are you with your life as a whole?” Scale: 0 to 10 (0 = not satisfied at all; 10 = completely satisfied).

The first graph shows the percentages with different life satisfaction experience for those who feel “better off”, “worse-off” and “about the same” relative to the financial position of their parents at a comparable age. Please note that the life satisfaction ratings are shown in reverse order (highest on the left) in the frequency distributions.

 

The graph shows clearly that those who feel worse off financially have substantially lower life satisfaction. Those who feel better off than their parents don’t have much higher life satisfaction than those who feel that their financial position is much the same as that of their parents at a comparable age. That suggests an important point – although economic progress has little impact on psychological well-being in high income countries, economic decline has potential to have a substantial adverse impact on psychological well-being in those countries.

The second graph indicates the proportions of people with different life satisfaction experience who feel better off, worse-off and about the same, relative to their parents.

 

Those who feel worse off than their parents clearly represent a high percentage of total numbers in the low life satisfaction categories. They are a smaller percentage of the total in the higher life satisfaction categories, but the absolute numbers involved are substantial.

The third graph looks more deeply at the group who feel worse-off than their parents, to observe the extent to which their life satisfaction experiences interact with their resilience. The resilience question was: “How quickly do you normally recover when something goes wrong?” (Scale: 0 to 10) The graph shows the average resilience rating of those who feel worse off than their parents in each of the life satisfaction categories.

 

As might be expected, the graph shows that those in the higher life satisfaction categories tend to have higher resilience. I guess that means that in a period of economic decline people who have a great deal of resilience don’t have too much trouble coping with the idea that their economic prospects are worse than those of their parents. However, there is no magic wand that people can use to enhance their resilience so they can avoid feeling grumpy when their economic prospects deteriorate. Resilience enhancement seems to be a long-term investment rather than something that can be accomplished overnight.

What is to be done?

There is an obvious solution to the adverse impact that declining economic prospects are having on the life satisfaction of young people in Australia. The solution is to adopt economic policies that will enhance growth in productivity and make it possible to return to a situation where each succeeding generation can reasonably expect to be better off than the one that came before.

It would not be difficult for a government to construct an agenda of economic policies to be adopted to raise productivity growth in Australia. The Productivity Commission compiled an extensive list in 2023.

When I look back on the economic performance of past governments in Australia, it seems obvious that the performance of the federal government in the 20 year period from around 1985 to 2005 was outstanding by comparison with the dismal performance of those that followed. During that period, the leaders of governing parties from both sides of politics were willing to undertake productivity-increasing economic reforms despite opposition from powerful interest groups.

By contrast, the current government is more interested in Wafflenomics than productivity-enhancing economic reform. The federal Opposition says they are interested in productivity-enhancing economic reforms but seem to me to be more interested in socialization of the means of production of electricity (by investing taxpayers’ money in nuclear energy). Both of the major political parties now seem to think that when government interference in markets has unintended adverse consequences, the solution lies in further government intervention, including attempts to pick winners. Most of the politicians currently occupying the crossbenches of the parliament are advocating policies that are even worse than those of the major parties.

Australian voters seem to have forgotten the lessons of the 1960s and 1970s about the risks of having faith in the ability of governments to pick winners. They should take heed of the wisdom of Johan Norberg: “Governments are bad at picking winners, but losers are good at picking governments.”

My bottom line

I don’t expect much improvement in economic policy in Australia in the near future.

As I see it, rather than waiting for governments to adopt better policies, it would be wise for young people to invest in personal resilience, so they will be better able to cope with the challenges that lie ahead.

That thought didn’t come from the top of my head just a few seconds ago. I have been thinking about this for several years. Something I wrote at the end of the chapter, “Will Progress Continue?” in my book, Freedom, Progress, and Human Flourishing (2021) is highly relevant. Here it is:

“We cannot rely on governments to maintain conditions favorable to the ongoing growth in opportunities for flourishing.

Whatever governments might do, human flourishing is intrinsically a self-directed activity in which individuals cooperate with others. When we reflect on what determines our own flourishing, we observe our individual capacities for wise and well-informed self-direction to be of central importance.” p. 121.

The following chapter of my book discusses the challenge of self-direction. I encourage people to read my book, but those  who wish to improve their resilience may also need relevant professional advice which is not too difficult to find.

Any Australians who are feeling depressed after reading this essay may be able to find help here, or here. 

Addendum

After reading this essay, a psychologist friend has suggested that Russ Harris’s book, The Happiness Trap: Stop struggling, start living (first published in 2007) might be relevant. I read the book several years ago, and wrote about it here.

Haris’s book is based on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) developed by Steven Hayes. Harris suggests that many people are caught in a happiness trap, which is based on four myths:

1. Happiness is the natural state for all human beings;
2. If you’re not happy, you’re defective;
3. To create a better life, we must get rid of negative feelings; and
4. You should be able to control what you think and feel.

I expect that there would be substantial overlap between people caught up in the happiness trap and the group identified above who feel worse-off than their parents, have low resilience, and low life satisfaction. I have no way to test the extent of overlap involved, but Harris’s suggestions about facing reality seem highly relevant to everyone:

“The reality is, life involves pain. There’s no getting away from it. As human beings we are all faced with the fact that sooner or later we will grow infirm, get sick and die. Sooner or later we all will lose valued relationships through rejection, separation or death. Sooner or later we all will come face-to-face with a crisis, disappointment and failure. This means that in one form or another, we are all going to experience painful thoughts and feelings.”

A point of clarification

When free market advocates (like me) encourage individuals who suffer economic adversity to adjust to their new circumstances, they are sometimes accused of victim blaming. That accusation is rarely appropriate, and entirely inappropriate in respect of the main point of this essay.

My main point is that to avoid the adverse impact that declining economic prospects are having on the life satisfaction of young people in Australia, our governments need to adopt economic policies that will enhance growth in productivity, and make it possible to return to a situation where each succeeding generation can reasonably expect to be better off than the one that came before.

If people who feel that they are worse off than their parents at a comparable age are looking for someone to blame, the group most obviously responsible for their predicament are those who have been seeking to stop economic growth. It is possible to pursue environmental objectives in a balanced way, using appropriate policy instruments, without imposing on young people the burden of adjusting to a no-growth future, offering less economic opportunities than enjoyed by their parents. Those who claim falsely that “degrowthing” the Australian economy is necessary for human survival need to be held accountable for the adverse consequences of their views.  

Why have old Australians become less satisfied with life?

 

The accompanying graphic suggests that there has been a long-term decline in average life satisfaction of Australians since about 2010. The graph also shows that there has been a decline in Australians ratings of “Life in Australia”. The decline in ratings of life in Australia should be a particular concern to politicians. However, my focus in this post is on the decline in average life satisfaction. The graph has been copied from the Summary Report of the Australian Unity Wellbeing Index for 2024. The research was conducted by the Australian Centre on Quality of Life (ACQOL) at Deakin University.

I think the decline in average life satisfaction should be of some concern to Australians, even though I don’t believe that life satisfaction indicators tell us much about human flourishing or well-being. I view life satisfaction as, at best, a rough measure of psychological wellbeing, which is just one of the goods of a flourishing human. (Readers who require further explanation will find it in my book, Freedom, Progress, and Human Flourishing.)

A similar decline in life satisfaction seems to have occurred in North America. (See Chapter2 of the World Happiness Report.) However, that is not of much comfort.

The analysis that ACQOL has presented in their full report focuses mainly on their Personal Wellbeing Index (PWI) rather than on average life satisfaction. The PWI is an average measure of satisfaction across seven domains of personal life. Since the PWI does not show the same long-term decline as observed in average life satisfaction, the ACQOL analysis doesn’t fully answer my question of why Australians have become less satisfied with life.

Since the ACQOL analysis suggests that young people have become less satisfied in domains which seem to have greatest impact on life satisfaction, I thought it might be worth testing whether that explains why average life satisfaction has declined. The approach I adopted was to compare current life satisfaction by age with that in 2005. (I chose 2005 because I had data for that year on my computer.) The exercise has raised more questions than it answers, but I report the results in the hope that someone can solve the puzzle for me.

Comparison of satisfaction levels in 2005 and 2024

 

This graph suggests that the decline in average life satisfaction of old people has been just as great as the decline in average life satisfaction of young people.

Of the seven domains of personal life for which ACQOL collects data, regression analysis indicates the four that have greatest impact on life satisfaction are: Satisfaction with Standard of Living; Satisfaction with Health; Satisfaction with Achieving in Life; and Satisfaction with Personal Relationships. Comparative data for those four domains is depicted below.

 

The graphs suggest that the decline in average life satisfaction on young people is associated with increased dissatisfaction with standard of living and achievement in life. The dismal economic performance of the Australian economy over more than a decade provides young people with good reasons to be increasingly dissatisfied.

However, based on the graphs, taken together, one would expect that the average life satisfaction of young people to have declined to a greater extent than the average life satisfaction of old people. 

So, what explains the decline in average life satisfaction of the old people?

Addendum

I think I now have the answer to my question. While thinking about how to respond to a comment below I began thinking about cohort effects. That led to me to conduct a Google search for "Boomers" and "life satisfaction". I found an article which seems directly relevant:

Botha, F., Vera-Toscano, E. Generational Differences in Subjective Well-Being in Australia. Applied Research Quality Life 17, 2903–2932 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11482-022-10047-x

Boomers do indeed have relatively low life satisfaction and the age cohorts that preceded them had relatively high life satisfaction. The magnitudes of the differences look large enough to answer my question.

Of course, that leads to another question. Are the boomers really less satisfied with life, or do they just have a problem admitting how satisfied they are? 

Can Empirical Natural Rights be viewed as metanormative principles?

 

Prior to attempting to answer the question posed above I briefly outline the concept of individual rights as metanormative principles - as discussed by Douglas Rasmussen and Douglas Den Uyl - and consider the alternative approach that John Hasnas has adopted in his discussion of empirical natural rights.

Rights as metanormative principles

In their book, Norms of Liberty (published in 2005) Douglas Rasmussen and Douglas Den Uyl note that a rule qualifies as metanormative if it “seeks not to guide individual conduct in moral activity, but rather to regulate conduct so that conditions might be obtained where moral action can take place”. (p. 34) They argue that, as metanormative principles, individual rights solve a problem that is uniquely social, political, and legal. They describe the problem as follows:

“How do we allow for the possibility that individuals might flourish in different ways (in different communities and cultures) without creating inherent moral conflict in the overall structure of the social/political context—that is the structure that is provided by the political/legal order? How do we find a political/legal order that will in principle not require that the human flourishing of any person or group be given structural preference over others? How do we protect the possibility that each may flourish while at the same time provide principles that regulate the conduct of all?” (p. 78)

Recognition of individual rights solves the problem because it protects individual self-direction and enables individuals to flourish in different ways, provided they do not interfere with the rights of others.

The “instrumental moral value” of empirical natural rights

I was prompted to ask myself the question posed above as I was re-reading part of John Hasnas’s book, Common Law Liberalism (2024).

As I noted in an earlier essay published here, Hasnas offers an alternative conception of natural rights – empirical natural rights (ENR) – that evolve in the state of nature. He then proceeds to argue that ENR form a good approximation to individual rights as propounded John Locke.

Hasnas claims that he “can offer no argument that empirical natural rights have any intrinsic moral value.” He then goes on to argue that ENR have “instrumental moral value regardless of the moral theory and general approach to ethics one adopts”:

“This is because empirical natural rights facilitate peaceful human interaction and peace is an important, if not pre-eminent moral value in virtually all moral theories.” (p. 150)

Hasnas then proceeds to discuss why peaceful human interaction is necessary for the realization of deontological, consequentialist, and Aristotelian moral theories.

I think I can understand why Hasnas has adopted that approach. If you want moral theorists from a variety of different traditions to see merit in a new concept that you espouse, it is helpful to be able to argue that the concept is in harmony with their traditions.

However, it would be preferable, it seems to me, to be able to argue that recognition of ENR provides the metanormative conditions that enable moral conduct to take place, and that individual rights over-ride other moral claims.

Would Hasnas have grounds for concern that Kantians and Utilitarians might reject ENR as a metanormative concept?

My first thought was that their reactions might depend on how the metanormative principle was stated. Kantians and Utilitarians would have no obvious grounds to object to ENR being recognized as metanormative principles on the grounds that they protect individual self-direction and enable individuals to “to use their knowledge for their purposes”, provided they do not interfere with the rights of others.

The quoted words are from the Friedrich Hayek quote in the epigraph. (Law, Legislation and Liberty, Vol. 1, p. 55.) It seems to me that use of one’s knowledge for one’s purposes comes close to the idea that human flourishing is best understood as “the exercise of one’s own practical wisdom.” As far as I can see, ENR are identical to the “rules of just conduct” referred to by Hayek.

Nevertheless, I think it is preferable to acknowledge the activity of flourishing explicitly because that is the best way to describe the human telos.

Would Kantians and Utilitarians object to a metanormative principle which recognizes that people seek to flourish in different ways?

I asked Chat GPT whether a person who subscribes to Kantian deontology would have grounds to object to my observation that they use their own practical wisdom to flourish. Here is part of her reply:

“They could argue that flourishing may occur as a byproduct of acting morally, but it is not the guiding principle. True moral worth arises when actions are performed out of respect for the moral law, not for the sake of achieving personal flourishing.”

When I think about it, I don’t think many Neo-Aristotelians would claim personal flourishing as their motive for acting with integrity toward others, even though they would view such behaviour as integral to their flourishing. People pursue the goods of a flourishing human because they perceive them to be good. The activity of flourishing is not about doing things that might raise one’s score in an imaginary index of individual flourishing.

From my reading, I don’t think many Utilitarians would raise strong objections to being told that they are seeking to flourish. At one point in On Liberty, J. S. Mill refers to “the judicious utilitarianism of Aristotle”, so it seems unlikely that he would have raised objections. Referring specifically to arguments for individual rights to be given an Aristotelian grounding, Leland Yeager suggests: “Such ‘Aristotelian’ arguments diverge from utilitarianism less in substance than in rhetoric.” (Leland B Yeager, Ethics as Social Science (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 2001) p. 222.

Conclusion

In discussing the normative significance of his concept of empirical natural rights (ENR) John Hasnas suggests that because they facilitate “peaceful human interaction” they have “instrumental moral value regardless of the moral theory and general approach to ethics one adopts.” I suggest that it would be preferable to be able to argue that recognition of ENR provides the metanormative conditions that enable moral conduct to take place, and that individual rights override other moral claims.

In exploring whether Kantians and Utilitarians might object to an argument for ENR to be viewed as metanormative principles I first suggested that they could have no objection to them being justified in Hayekian terms - recognizing that ENR protect individual self-direction and enable individuals to “to use their knowledge for their purposes”, provided they do not interfere with the rights of others.

It is possible that some Kantians and Utilitarians might object to a metanormative justification of ENR being framed in terms of allowing for “the possibility that individuals might flourish in different ways” on the grounds that they don’t recognize flourishing as a prime motivation for moral conduct. However, Neo-Aristotelians also pursue the goods of a flourishing human because they perceive them to be good rather than to raise their score in some imaginary index of personal flourishing.

 It seems to me that it would be very difficult for anyone who supports individual rights to object to them being viewed as metanormative principles. It would be almost as difficult to object to them being justified on the grounds that, among other things, they enable individuals to flourish in different ways.

Addendum

I have been thinking further about the question of whether there are reasons for anyone to object to a metanormative principle which recognizes that humans seek to flourish. It seems to me that to do that one would need to reject a description of human life that recognizes that it has inherent potentiality. For example:

“Humans, like all living things are teleological beings and have an inherent potentiality for their mature state – which is to say, they have what could be broadly called natural inclinations or desires to engage in activities that constitute their completion or fulfillment. They have a natural desire for their good.” (Douglas Den Uyl and Douglas Rasmussen, The Perfectionist Turn, p 237)

That observation owes a lot to Aristotle but is it not still consistent with what we know about humans from the findings of biology, neurology, and psychology?

Second Addendum

This is what ended up in the first draft of the article I am writing:

The idea that it is natural for humans to seek to flourish should not be controversial.[1] It follows from a description of human life that recognizes that “like all living things … [humans] have what could be broadly called natural inclinations or desires to engage in activities that constitute their completion or fulfillment.”[2] Nevertheless, it may be worth adding that recognition of individual rights as a metanormative principle also protects the choices of those who wish to follow the directions of religious leaders rather than to be self-directed, and even of those who are motivated to behave in ways that might detract from their individual flourishing - provided they do not interfere with the rights of others.

---

[1] I raise the issue because Hasnas seems to imply that Kantians and Utilitarians might have reason to object to the concept of flourishing because it is associated with Aristotelian moral theory. He argues that peace is consistent with deontological moral standards and makes the realization of the ends of consequentialist moral theory more likely, as well as well as being necessary for human flourishing. See: Common Law Liberalism, p. 150.

[2] Douglas Den Uyl and Douglas Rasmussen, The Perfectionist Turn (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2016), p. 237. The authors note that knowing that a particular activity is good for you will not necessarily provide you with a reason or motivation to engage in it.

Should Libertarians be Attempting to Influence Culture: A Discussion with Winton Bates and Chris Matthew Sciabarra (III)

 

In this third instalment of our collaboration, we move on to consider more specifically how libertarians should respond to some illiberal tendencies in the cultures of the liberal democracies. The discussion focuses particularly on university culture.   

Before moving into that discussion, however, it is appropriate to outline some points from earlier editions of our collaboration to help readers to see where we are coming from.

First instalment

In raising the question of whether libertarians should be attempting to influence culture, Winton mentioned that he is reconsidering his objections to J. S. Mill’s view that the sanctions imposed by “prevailing opinion and feeling” were akin to tyranny. He suggested that the only reason he could think of why libertarians should not be attempting to influence culture was the difficulty they would have in agreeing on the kinds of cultural change they would like to promote.

In his response, Chris discussed the changes in the libertarian movement that had occurred since he first encountered it in the late 1970s. He noted that “thin libertarians”, who argued that freedom does not require anything more than robust defence of the nonaggression principle, had ended up endorsing paleoconservative values opposed to a cosmopolitan social framework. He suggested that although that approach is fundamentally opposed to liberal values, it is an acknowledgement that some kind of cultural matrix is necessary to nourish the freedom project.

Chris summed up his response to the question by suggesting that libertarians should be focused on exploring the role of culture in shaping political and social outcomes.

One of the points raised in comments on our first instalment is that there is a difference between saying libertarianism qua political philosophy should attempt to change culture and saying that a libertarian concerned in advancing libertarianism should attempt to change culture. One commentator suggested that libertarians should “work as individuals, and in concert with others, to build a freedom-friendly culture of moral and virtuous people who strive to create a good life, to flourish, and to be happy.”

Second instalment

Winton opened the discussion by raising the question of whether Enlightenment humanist values are still broadly supported by public opinion. He observed that support for reason and reality seemed to have diminished with increasing disrespect for truth in narratives of conservative populists as well as radical progressives who are seeking political power. He noted his support for attempts to understand power relations in society.

Chris explained his Tri-level Model of Power Relations, which was first derived from his reconstruction of Ayn Rand’s analyses of social problems in Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical. The Tri-level Model illustrates the importance of paying attention to interactions between personal, cultural, and structural factors (political and economic structures, institutions and processes). An exclusive focus on any one of these levels of analysis overlooks the importance of factors associated with other levels in determining the ability of individuals to flourish. Individual flourishing is affected by cultural and structural factors as well as by the individual’s values and habits.

Chris’s contribution highlighted the potential for personal ethical and psycho-epistemological practices to affect the dominant cultural institutions. It also highlighted the potential for cultural practices to undermine (or reinforce) the humanism and cosmopolitanism that supports personal flourishing and liberty.

Winton Bates’s views on university culture

The sources of illiberal tendencies in universities differ from those that concerned J. S. Mill when he wrote the sentence quoted in the epigraph at the beginning of this article. Mill suggested that “dogmatic religion, dogmatic morality, and dogmatic philosophy” needed to “be rooted out” of the universities. Mill’s main target seems to have been the Church of England.

A modern libertarian who is concerned about illiberal tendencies in universities is likely to have in mind different sources of dogmatism – for example, action by students and staff to silence voices that are opposed to prevailing campus orthodoxies. The common element is interference with the free exchange of ideas that is indispensable to the search for truth.  

The context in which Mill was writing about universities is relevant to the broader question of what attitude libertarians should adopt toward illiberal tendencies in culture. Mill was concerned that growth in the power of public opinion would cause “the individual” to become lost in the crowd. He hoped that the universities would be able to foster “great minds” who would have a positive impact on public opinion.

There is arguably more reason for libertarians to be concerned about illiberal tendencies in educational organisations than in social media and other economic and social activities that influence public opinion. When a social media firm interferes with freedom of expression, self-correcting forces are likely to be activated eventually as people perceive themselves to be adversely affected and shift their support to competing social media firms. Similarly, self-correcting forces are likely to be activated if a community group subjects a media firm to a boycott, if members of other community groups consider such action to be unfair.

Self-correcting mechanisms seem to be more muted in educational organisations. When their actions prevent invited speakers from being heard, students rarely face consequences that might deter such behaviour in the future. Students who have been seeking to silence opposing voices on campuses in recent months are following in the footsteps of students who adopted similar tactics with equal passion a few decades ago. Whether or not they intend it, their dogmatism in insisting that opposing voices should not be heard is placing at risk the culture of free exchange of ideas that should characterize university education.

Libertarians are not alone in having reasons to support the free exchange of ideas in universities. Anyone who has an interest in the search for truth has reason to support free exchange of ideas.

However, there are at least three good reasons why libertarians should be taking a leading role in seeking to restore the culture of universities as bastions for the free exchange of ideas.

First, the personal values held by many libertarians emphasize the importance of behaving with integrity towards other people. That entails recognizing links between individual flourishing and freedom of expression. Individuals are more likely to flourish academically if the free exchange of ideas and search for truth is emphasized in the prevailing cultures of universities.

Second, it is doubtful whether the legal order can continue to protect free speech if freedom of expression is severely restricted within universities, whether by government or by the activities of university authorities, staff, and students. A legal order protecting free speech depends ultimately on public opinion that values free speech, which, in turn, requires intellectual support.

Third, if staff and students do not take action to restore the culture of universities, it is likely that governments will intervene. Some libertarians might consider government intervention to be appropriate in that context, but it could provide a precept for government intervention that limits the autonomy of universities and poses a threat to freedom of speech.

Chris Matthew Sciabarra comments:

In asking “Should Libertarians be Attempting to Influence Culture?”, this dialogue has focused important attention on the role of culture in affecting social change.

In our last instalment detailing my Tri-Level Model of Power Relations, I highlighted Level 2, which brings to the foreground of our analysis the role of cultural traditions, institutions, and practices in helping to sustain the existing social system. I wrote:

How does culture perpetuate existing social conditions? This is achieved through linguistic, educational, and ideological means, among others. Distortions in language—through the use of anti-concepts, for example—will tend to undermine rational discourse, while serving the needs of the powerful. Certain educational institutions and pedagogical practices will tend to undermine autonomy, perpetuate conformity, inculcate obedience to authority, and subvert the development of critical thinking. Stultifying, rigid, intolerant, racist, sexist, or tribalist ideologies or belief systems (including dogmatic religious beliefs) will tend to foster exclusionary “thinking within a square.” Such cultural practices can undermine those humanist, cosmopolitan characteristics consistent with the development of human freedom and personal flourishing.

On Level 2, then, the role of educational institutions and pedagogical practices is of paramount importance. It must be remembered that this is a dialectical framework of analysis—one that preserves the larger context within which such institutions and practices are situated. Hence, it is important to consider not only how political and economic structures tend to perpetuate a certain constellation of such institutions and practices—but also its reciprocal implication: how a certain constellation of educational institutions and pedagogical practices tends to perpetuate the political and economic order.

It is beyond the scope of this brief exchange to examine the nature of these interactions. Suffice it to say, as Winton points out, there are illiberal tendencies in university life that have quelled the free spirit of discussion, silencing voices of dissent and shoring up campus orthodoxies. But this attack on dissent also has the effect of bolstering larger social, political, and economic orthodoxies.

There are virtually no educational institutions that are free of political strictures, guidelines, or subsidies of one sort or another. This isn’t an issue of “public” versus “private” universities. The line between the ‘public’ and the ‘private’ has all but disappeared and the power of the purse has had an unmistakable impact on the ways in which universities function. In these instances, the “self-correcting forces” that Winton ascribes to social media often give way to imposed “corrections” from the top-down. The culture war between left-wing “woke warriors” and right-wing “anti-woke crusaders” has resulted in an explosive political battlefield in which state actors attempt to impose changes to educational practices, whether through restrictions on the curriculum or the hiring and firing of university personnel. As Winton points out, this is precisely the kind of government intervention that must ultimately undermine free expression.

Sadly, even with its self-correcting forces, not even social media is immune to this kind of political gamesmanship, given evidence of government interference in the dissemination of information and the use of certain platforms for the promotion of ideas that are antithetical to liberal, cosmopolitan values. While libertarians should indeed be taking a leading role in nourishing the free exchange of ideas in university life, we should also be vigilant in exposing and opposing those ideas at war with human freedom and personal flourishing. Preserving and extending a liberal cultural atmosphere that allows for vigorous intellectual engagement is therefore the surest way to make transparent the illiberal ideas among us.