This piece is an attempt to reframe the simplistic, dualistic right-left, liberal-conservative categories in public discourse according to the dimension of political maturity. These categories are frequently used to reduce, dismiss, and demonize those with opposing views in ways that stop thinking and foreclose dialogue. By being descriptive, issues can be raised more accurately, intelligently, and with greater maturity. We will focus on discourse about war and conflict with an emphasis on consequences of rhetoric. A proposed Political Maturity in Addressing Conflict Scale follows.
You don't need a degree in psychology to understand the arguments for war in terms of political maturity. The illusion that a war will simply destroy Saddam without fueling hatred and rage, and unleashing widespread chaos, terrorism, death and environmental destruction, primarily aimed at US targets, is shortsighted, simplistic, egocentric, concrete, dangerous, psychologically ignorant and politically immature.
We are in a new age of global terrorism, a form of asymmetrical warfare, proliferating weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). It is naive to believe that that the US can still use threats of violence to dominate and control the world without provoking retaliation.. A war would not be "preemptive" or "preventive", as we are seduced into believing, but provocative. The expectation of clean preemption is an example of what psychotherapists call "poor reality testing."
The fantasy that we can conduct a "war on terrorism" by killing terrorists and physically destroying infrastructures, while we are simultaneously provoking more recruits and more terrorism which is now decentralized, more hidden, more creative and clever, shows a lack of insight into the nature of terrorism and a failure of imagination.
The refusal to recognize and address the root causes that drive terrorism, to work to remedy the suffering, injustice, humiliation, and just grievances is a manifestation of ego-based politics which reinforces escalating spirals of violence. Ego politics splits the world into us and them, right and wrong, good and evil, and is preoccupied with anger, hurt, revenge, and winning and losing in a lose-lose scenario, at the expense of efforts to reduce tension and violence. The obsession with "not letting the terrorists win" clouds thinking about wise strategies. One always gets to be right and good, but fuels cycles of violence and retaliation. There is no way to win anymore on this world of WMDs and asymmetrical warfare.
A higher level political consciousness is required to transcend terrorism and replace war as a healthy way of responding to conflict. There are bodies of knowledge of proven, effective methods in tension reduction, conflict transformation and violence prevention that are virtually absent in politics, the media and public discourse. If people were aware of their existence, and were educated and trained, we could raise consciousness of and support for mature, problem-solving, wise strategies that would increase global security.
Here are some items in a scale that I am developing to evaluate political maturity. Try applying them to the decision to go to war.
This scale is a work in progress, designed to illuminate the underlying maturity of political phenomena in response to conflicts. I have decided to focus on material associated with conflict, which also places this in the field of conflict studies as well as developmental, cognitive, and political psychology.
Focusing on conflict tests maturity very well as it is an emotionally charged field easily predisposed to automatic emotional reactions and requiring maturity to transcend it. As Jung said, consciousness is a work against nature. This model will be applied to political speeches, spontaneous comments and interviews, slogans, articles, policies, strategies and media that address conflict situations, that are intended to influence public opinion with regard to "us and them" and potential for violence.
Maturity is based on simultaneous aspects of inner psychological, emotional and cognitive organization as well as external interpersonal, social, political and military orientations in response to rhetoric, such as in inciting violence or reducing hostility.
PMACS is consistent and isomorphic with developmental models and scales including: Loevinger's ego development, Piagetian cognitive, social and moral development, Kohlberg's moral development, Gilligan's moral orientations of justice and mercy, Erikson's Eight Stages of Man (trust versus mistrust), Kleinian psychological positions of paranoid schizoid position and depressive position.
This scale can function as a tool that provides an objective measure to rate candidates, political speeches and their consequences in a scientific way. We should consider whether a speech is written or spontaneous, as speech writers may be at a slightly different level, and spontaneous remarks may reveal one's level more accurately.
We can compare some historical samples of speeches that provoked consequences - positive and negative - and rate them, and/or compare speeches from Gandhi, Mandela.
This scale is an attempt to replace the simplistic, reductive,
thought-stopping right-left categorization of people and ideas.
Research ideas -
1 - to study relationship between PMACS & violence in history
2 - to rate poltical candidates and strategies for maturity