Cultura de paz: actitudes y acciones para su construcción

It is with such a commitment to the validity of multiple perspectives and rejection of singular truths that brings critics to suggest that pluralism is merely relativism. To qualify such an assertion, we must first explain the basics of relativist theory. Relativism can be traced back to ancient Athens and Protagoras 490-421 B.C. and forward to post-modern cultural relativists such as Foucault, Kuhn and Peter Winch. Relativism can be sub categorised into the areas of moral, descriptive, normative and meta-ethical relativism. These sub-categories are all versions of a theory built upon the foundation that no single viewpoint or value can be held as an absolute truth, therefore all opinions are relative.

These sub-categories range from normative relativism at one end of the spectrum, whereby we should tolerate the thoughts and actions of others, even if they are contrary to our own cultural or moral standards, to descriptive relativism, whereby it is acknowledged that different courses of action will be held as appropriate for different individuals and cultures regardless, when presented with the same foundational facts (Rorty 1982). The key difference between relativism and pluralism lies in the propensity for toleration of different value positioning. To take relativism to extremes, whereby it becomes nihilistic, is to in essence suggest there is no right and wrong in terms of moral positions. Normative relativists, then, may be inclined to accept the extreme positions of others as just and acceptable, whereby pluralism will not, for reasons discussed shortly with the aid of pragmatism theory.

However, as Connolly states, ‘pluralists are not relativists…our image of culture encourages us to embrace certain things in this particular place, to be indifferent to some, to be wary of others, and to fight militantly against the continuation of yet others’ (Connolly 2005 p.42). Berlin qualifies the pluralist position further when he states, ‘value pluralists are not relativists. On the contrary, they insist that there is a world of objective values. They also insist, however,

Chapter 3 – Pluralism 45 that there is no perfect whole or ultimate solution in all the different values that might be reconciled’ (Berlin 2013 p.13 in Cinalli and O’Flynn 2014 p.83).

Pluralism then, when taken at face value, even with the kind of qualifications of both Connolly and Berlin, with its toleration and celebration of multiplicity of value positions, is still understandably mistaken for relativism. The answer for some to the pluralist/relativist dilemma lies with the theory of pragmatism. Pragmatism is a philosophical movement of the late 19^th Century from the United States of America in which James was a main theorist as were Charles Pierce and John Dewey. Pierce is often credited as the founder of pragmatism,

‘pragmatism is sometimes said to have originated in 1878, when Pierce published the article, How to Make Our Ideas Clear’ (Titus 1994 p.290).

James’ radical empiricism in his own admission (James 1908) is essentially the same theory as pragmatism. Dewey preferred to use the term instrumentalism rather than pragmatism, and in the same vein as James, focused upon the importance of experience in documenting fact rather than imagined hypothesis whereby, ‘experience is not a veil that shuts man off from nature, it is the only means of penetrating further into the secrets of nature’ (Titus 1994 p.295).

Dewey’s passion for the necessity of inquiry as a normative democratic duty, gives further reason for the ongoing re-visitation and challenge of existing theory, ‘inasmuch as democracy is concerned with the interests of the governed, it is also concerned with inquiry, which helps us to form and revise interests’ (Festenstein 2001 p.742.)

The following explanation of the Pragmatic Method is taken from lectures delivered by James himself to the Lowell Institute in Boston in 1906 and 1907:

The pragmatic method is primarily a method of settling metaphysical disputes that otherwise might be interminable. Is the world one or many?-fated or free?-material or spiritual?-here are notions either of which may or may not hold good in the world; and disputes over such notions are unending. The pragmatic method in such cases is to try to interpret each notion by tracing its practical consequences. What difference would it practically make to anyone if this notion rather than that notion were true? If no practical difference whatever can be traced, then the alternatives mean practically the same thing, and all dispute is idle. Whenever a dispute is serious, we ought to be able to show some practical difference that must follow from one side or the other’s being right (James 1908).

Chapter 3 – Pluralism 46 If we take James’ metaphysical disputes and substitute them with the practical consequence of actions or in political terms of for example, policy formulation, we can further see they are no longer merely relative when they produce different, manifest outcomes. If we take the empirical study of this project, the Scottish independence referendum of 2014 as an example, we can more clearly see how pragmatism qualifies the pluralist position. In what was a binary argument fuelled by different, entirely legitimate political motivations of unionism and nationalism/separatism, the final result would have practical consequences in areas of certainly sovereign identity, and perhaps, financial well-being. The pluralist, then, accepts the rights and motivations of both value positions and then encourages debate (perhaps through social media) into the practical consequences of the outcomes of either choice.

Bertrand Russell was one of the critics of the pragmatist ideology. Russell points to the ironically practical difficulty in the way that we just do not know what the usefulness of belief will be ahead of time, using the example of Columbus’ exploration of the Americas in 1492.

‘We can’t just look this up in a book; we have to determine its effect on us (or as James puts it, its cash value). But how can we know this ahead of time?’ (Groothuis 2013 p.1). Russell also points to the problem of knowing what effect beliefs have produced after the fact; the meaning of truth simply being its ability to produce desirable states of affairs, whilst stating that pragmatism fails to deal with the fact that a belief may work and not be true and that there are a myriad of ‘useless truths’ (ibid. p.2).

Susan Haack also cites Russell’s criticism of pragmatists, finding ‘their stress on the experiential cash value of truths to be distasteful [saying that] pragmatism was an engineer’s philosophy’ (Haack 1976 p.247). Kadlec further articulated the feeling of vulgarity in pragmatism’s rejection of anything foundational, in preference for only the empirical, stating that, ‘pragmatism as a philosophy reflects with an almost disarming candour the spirit of the prevailing business culture [and can be taken as] a thin philosophy of bourgeois liberalism’

(Kadlec 2006 p.529). Such arguments centred particularly on pragmatism and the discovery of truth per se, have credibility, however, pragmatism as a method for attributing cash value as James would put it, and attributing reason to potential outcomes, helps overcome allegations of pluralism as mere relativism.

The concept of fallibilism and its relation to academic enquiry is an important part of pragmatist theory. Fallibilism is a concept that can be applied to multiple disciplines:

Fallibilism is the thesis that humans can have reliable knowledge, but never absolutely certain knowledge. All knowledge is a product of human reasoning and human

Chapter 3 – Pluralism 47 observation, and, since neither of these methods is infallible, all knowledge produced by these methods may be proven wrong in the future (Cooke 2003 p158).

Such a perspective on the fallibility of people and theory, may seem unquestionable to the modern-day scholar as it has been the basis of enquiry for many years. Such a perspective, however, is at odds with classical, foundational philosophy and its search for the absolute and the unquestionable. The theory of fallibilism then, encourages us to revisit and question our own work and theory as well as that of others. It gives important impetus for pluralism in such matters whilst respecting the rights of those to continue to seek absolute theory, which by its very definition encourages us to stop thinking and stop questioning existing theory.