The Common Good Isn’t So Common Anymore

Discover Democracy’s “Secret Sauce” and Its Main Ingredient

Dec 30, 2023

brown wooden blocks on white table — Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

Did you ever wonder what the “glue” was that held United States’ fledgling democracy together in its early days? Moreover, do you ever wonder what holds our democracy together today in our increasingly diverse United States? So, let’s read on, examine the answer together, learn what is happening now to our “democracy’s glue”, and why it matters.

This Has Been Central From the Beginning

The short answer is “the common good”. It has been a U.S. democracy mainstay from the start. Sure, this question is arguable, but a solid argument as to the criticality of the “common good to U.S. democracy can be made on this one fact alone- it has been with us since our nation’s beginning. So much so, that it is stated clearly in the Preamble to the United States Constitution:

“WE THE PEOPLE of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”[1]

As Orlane I. Gabert insightfully observed about our Preamble in the Door County Pulse, “Noting the words in capital letters, they (i.e., our nation’s founders) clearly meant what they said.”[2] There it is, “the common good”, embedded in the Preamble to our U.S. Constitution. Our founders were (and still are) saying to all Americans- this is the reason we are forming this nation, to provide Americans with Justice, Tranquility, common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty. These are elements of “the common good”, not only for those writing these words, but for generations of Americans to come (Posterity).

The common good, while seemingly a simple concept, is deceptively complex with in a variety of ways. Still, given how basic it is to democracy, how critical is the “common good” for sustaining American democracy?

What Binds Us Together as a Nation?

If the common good is essential to American democracy, one has to wonder if we Americans know to take a look at the Constitution’s the Preamble to see it. Do we even know as a society today what the American “common good” actually is? Do we know its importance? Can we agree on what our “common good” should look like? Author and former Secretary of Labor Robert B. Reich begins to ask some especially important questions about the common good in his book by the same name, saying:

“Is there a common good that still binds us together as Americans? That it’s even necessary to ask shows how far we’ve strayed.”[3] (emphasis mine)

But Reich does not stop there. He does not give up on answering hard questions related to what does or does not comprise our common good. Reich asserts that the common good is not being “…connected by the whiteness of our skin, or our adherence to Christianity, or the fact that we were born in the United States. For Reich, the key to what the common good is that undergirds our democracy is this:

“…we’re bound together by the ideals and principles we share and the mutual obligations those principles entail.”[4] (emphasis mine)

Yet, Reich argues, “…the common good is no longer a fashionable idea. The phrase is rarely uttered today, not even by commencement speakers and politicians.”[5] Reich goes on about our “memory loss” on this concept of the common good, saying:

“The idea of ‘common good’ was once widely understood and accepted in America. After all, the U.S. Constitution was designed for “We the People” seeking to “promote the general welfare”- not for “me the selfish jerk seeking as much wealth and even power as possible.”[6] (emphasis mine)

It’s Been Lost Along the Way

We have moved from “we” to “me” thinking, to the point that today for many Americans, the public good is no longer considered a common good. And, the common good is no longer considered the highest good. This is not an isolated problem; it is nationwide.

As Silas House, writing for The Atlantic in the context of the Covid pandemic, puts it: “Refusing to sacrifice for the common good is an American problem,…opposition to masking and vaccination is happening in such disparate places as San Diego, Phoenix, Portland, Kenosha, and New York City.”[7] House gives recent examples from across the country of our unwillingness to consider the common good, even during a pandemic, saying:

“…A protest in Franklin, Tennessee, led to parents yelling at medical professionals who had spoken in favor of masking. One parent told them there was “a bad place in hell” for them. “We know who you are,” another threatened. “We will find you.” In Texas a parent ripped off a teacher’s mask, and in Northern California an anti-masker assaulted a teacher on the first day of school. In Los Angeles a reporter was attacked and one man was stabbed in an anti-vaccination protest. Likewise, a host of conservative politicians across the country is adding fuel to the flames with anti-vaccination rhetoric and legislation against masks.”[8]

Reich believes this mode of thinking more in terms of the individual, rather than of the whole, began for Americans in the 1970s, where we “…began talking less about the common good and more about self-aggrandizement.”[9] Additionally, a negative view of the common good was promoted by the political thinkers like Ayn Rand who criticized the common good “as an undefined and undefinable concept” as well as a “moral blank check for those who attempt to embody it.”[10]

Rand argued that “government actions that require people to give their money and resources to other people under the pretext of a “common good” are steps toward tyranny.”[11] Rand’s glorification of individualism over the common good led to faulty paradigms. For example- that “free markets”, not government, can fix everything for us. However, as Reich points out, the “…market is a human creation, a set of laws and rules that define what can be owned and traded, and how. Government doesn’t ‘intrude’ on the ‘free market’. It creates market.”[12] We also no longer had the common perils as a people of the Great Depression and World War II which forced us to find common ground and come together.[13] Rand’s views gained acceptance[14] and have been facilitated by five decades “…marked by growing cynicism and distrust toward all of the basic institutions of American society…”[15]

The Common Good Rests on Principles Basic to Democracy

To Reich, those who have likened the common good to tyranny, miss the point entirely. As he puts it:

“Americans sharply disagree about exactly what we want for America or for the world. But we agree on basic principles- such as how we deal with our disagreements, the importance of our democratic institutions, our obligation toward the law and or respect for truth- if we’re to participate in the same society. It’s our agreement to these principles that connects us, not agreement about where these principles lead.”[16] (emphasis mine)

Wisely, Reich points out that “truth itself is a common good”[17] and “the common good depends on people trusting that most others in society will also adhere to the common good, rather than lie or otherwise take advantage of them”.[18] All of these ideas- valuing truth, trusting others, “We the People” (consent of the governed), liberty, and many more, coalesce into our American idea of the common good. Our American idea of the common good, in turn, becomes a key part of our national identity. As Gabert maintains, distilled to its essence, the common good is comprised of “…our shared values about what we owe to one another as citizens who are bound together in the same society.”[19] These ideals rest on the premise that they only work as the common good for us as a whole, but in a way that is uniquely American, a way that reconciles the common good with our need to express and preserve our individuality.

Early On, Americans’ Sense of Common Good Was Seen As Unique

Jeffrey K. Tulis, professor of government at the University of Texas, identified our uniquely American way of looking at the concept of the common good. Tulis studied Tocqueville’s writings regarding American democracy in its early years. Tulis calls our attention to something Tocqueville saw when he visited here from France in the 1830s to observe how our young democracy was doing and whether he thought it would survive.

Understanding what Tocqueville observed may be the key for understanding how the American idea of the common good not only came to be, but flourished, because it was radically different from its predecessor in Europe. Understanding it today can help us reidentify with it, recommit to it, and help us find our way back to the democracy that Americans can understand, accept, support, and practice.

In other societies, virtue as the motivation for the pursuit of the common good has been termed “aristocratic virtue”, since it relied on the good intention of a country’s ruler to value the common good over their own good as ruling nobility. What Tocqueville saw instead was Americans “…had adopted a surrogate for aristocratic virtue- the doctrine of self-interest rightly understood”[20], and it had an immense impact on our democracy’s early success. Certainly, as Tulis makes note of, Tocqueville worried about “democratic pathologies” such as “excessive materialism, atomistic individualism, majority tyranny, and the restlessness and self-dissatisfaction due to the evacuation of the spiritual dimension of the human being.”[21] However, what caught Tocqueville’s attention was that self-interest, not virtue, motivated Americans to pursue the common good.

Instead of reliance on the virtue of rulers as in Europe to achieve the common good, Americans saw it from the perspective of individual self-interest that contributed to the “good of the whole”. To make this point, Tulis quotes Tocqueville who noticed that: “They do not deny, therefore, that each man may pursue his own self-interest, they do their utmost to prove that it is in every man’s interest to behave honorably.”[22] Tulis describes Tocqueville’s observation about this uniquely American interpretation of the concept of the common good this way:

“Nor would nearly any American understand the proposition that one should be honest because it was beautiful. Instead, one does the right thing because it is useful, even necessary, for sustaining and growing a business. Self-interest properly understood is to see one’s own interest in doing deeds that are good for the common interest. For the aristocrat, these same actions would have been done because doing the right thing is virtuous no matter what the reward. Doing the right thing for utility or reward is self-interest properly understood.”[23] (emphasis mine)

The Common Good Does Not Mean a Total Absence of Self-Interest

Tulis calls this idea of the common good ‘self-interest properly understood’. Tomasky calls it “enlightened self-interest.”[24] However one wants to describe it, reviving this idea of individuality as being congruent with the common good may be the ingredient missing today that an ever-more diverse, pluralistic democracy needs to revive itself and foster our desire to embrace democracy again. That is, advocating the idea that it is possible to reconcile our strong American individualism with the common good because the common good is good for all of us, whether we are in business, education, the non-profit world, or whatever our vocation or calling is. Pursuing our individual self-interest in and of itself, is not antithetical to democracy if we pursue our self-interest in a way that promotes the common good.

The Secret Sauce’s Main Ingredient

Secret sauces always have a main ingredient. In the case of democracy, the common good’s “secret sauce” is empathy. What exactly is empathy and why is important to our success as a democracy?

Merriam-Webster define the term empathy as:

“The action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or the present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner…”[25]

To properly grasp what empathy is, it is useful to examine what empathy is not. While related to sympathy, it not the same. Sympathy relies on seeing another from one’s own perspective based on circumstances and experiences in our own lives that, to us, seem like those of another person, but may or may not be, because they are our situations, not theirs. Also, empathy is different from understanding. Understanding involves aligning with another person based on a set of knowledge. While many definitions of empathy exist, one of the best the author has found is from educator Marilyn Price-Mitchell, who says empathy is,

“…Developed through emotional attachment with other human beings, empathy is our ability to recognize, feel, and respond to the needs and sufferings of other people.”[26]

While sympathy and understanding are especially useful qualities for those in a democracy to have, empathy is even more powerful and more essential, for it moves us beyond our own perspectives and understandings by aligning our feelings with others who are in situations we personally have not experienced or are familiar with. For that reason, empathy is the “centrifugal force” that gives the common good its power to make a democracy successful.

Empathy facilitates and enhances our ability to see and accept the common good as necessary, because empathy propels us to respond to the needs of others. It propels the common good because, when we empathize with others, it is a result of us recognizing, feeling, and wanting to respond to the needs and sufferings of others. This is especially so with those we do not interact with or know personally, or have had first-hand experience with the situations are faced with. In short, we make a powerful connection with those we empathize with, and it is not reliant upon us knowing them personally. Empathy truly is the common good’s prime ingredient.

Our Empathy Deficit Undermines Our Sense of the Common Good

Many have recognized that, for some time now, this nation has had an “empathy deficit”- a term first coined by then Illinois Senator Barak Obama when delivering a commencement address at Northwestern University in 2006. Senator Obama described empathy “…as our ability to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes; to see the world through those who are different from us- the child who’s hungry, the laid-off steelworker, the immigrant woman cleaning your dorm room.”[27]

Amy J. Wilson describes a lack of empathy as Empathy Deficit Disorder (EDD), and while she emphasizes it is not an actual diagnosis, she highlights the work of psychologist and director of the Center for Progressive Development, Dr. Douglas LaBier, who says it should be a diagnosis.[28] People who suffer from EDD “…are unable to step outside of themselves and be in tune with what others are experiencing. They also are not in touch with their own mindset, biases, and struggles. EDD can lead to poor communication, conflicts, and hatred toward a specific group of people that does not fit into your world or life view.”[29]

According to LaBier, “EDD grows when people focus too much on acquiring power, status, and money for themselves…EDD keeps a person locked inside a self-centered world, and that breeds emotional isolation, disconnection, and polarization.”[30] All these qualities prevent formation of empathy, much less achieving any semblance of a common good.

Perhaps some of those who have been the most perceptive in seeing the great need for us to learn empathy, and how to empathize for our success as a democracy are our educators. Many educators have worked in recent years to develop empathy, very intentionally, in our school children. As Price-Mitchell says, “…When young people develop empathy, they not only thrive in school and life, they also impact their communities in positive, often extraordinary ways.”[31]

And the work to date in developing empathy in children, most certainly is transferable and adaptable for use with adults. Price-Mitchell cites the work of the Greater Good Science Center at the University of California, Berkeley, which has developed a six-part framework in developing empathy. It is:[32]

1. Cultivate curiosity about strangers.

2. Challenge prejudices and discover commonalities.

3. Gain direct experience of other people’s lives.

4. Listen and open oneself to others.

5. Inspire mass action and social change.

6. Develop an ambitious imagination.

Price-Mitchell has focused her work on the “intersection of empathy and citizenship”. From in-depth interviews during the course of her work she found that “…students who became engaged in social and environmental causes in middle and high school showed that each was motivated to serve the greater good through an ability to empathize with individuals and feel compassion for victimized, oppressed and marginalized groups.”[33](emphasis mine) As Karen Niemi, President and CEO of Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning advocates, “…Students learn to engage civically by analyzing how issues in the world affect their lives. They figure out how they can make a difference and learn how to work with others to create solutions. This is what social and emotional competency looks like.” Niemi goes on to say, “You can’t have meaningful civic engagement without social and emotional skills.”[34]

Social and emotional skills create empathy, the key ingredient to activate a sense of the common good. Imagine the impact if we could find a way for adults to pursue empathy through the Greater Good Science Center’s framework. It might reignite our sense of the common good!

Are We at a Point of Reckoning for Our National Sense of the Common Good?

With the common good being taken hostage by extreme forms of nationalism, evidence is strong that we have come to a point of reckoning. Columnist Robert J. Samuelson describes that point:

“We face a choice between a society where people accept modest sacrifices for a common good or a more contentious society where groups selfishly protect their own benefits.”[35] (emphasis mine)

The power of the common good is that strong- it has the power to “make us” as a democratic nation. Without it, the absence of the common good can “break us” as a nation that claims to be a democracy. But still, even with forces such as extreme and misguided nationalism in play, the common good has persisted. It has not totally evaporated from American democracy. Why? The human heart hungers for it. Intuitively, we know that the common good is the only basis by which a democratic government can sustain itself, and create not only union, but help us strive to perfect that union.

If we want to save, reignite, and revive Americans’ sense of the common good, we must understand acknowledge, and come to terms with the negative forces attacking it today. That is the pathway we must use to restoring Americans’ belief in a greater good that is genuinely good for us all.

For that reason, next we need to next delve deeper into the forces that are assaulting and whittling away at our “democracy’s glue”. We will tackle that in the next Democraticus.

We will continue exploring topics like this one that are not given near enough time and emphasis in our civic education efforts, if they are even taught at all.

Democracy is so important. But it’s hard to keep, and it’s easy to lose. It’s up to us, and only us, to protect it. Support democracy, become a Democratist!

[1] The Constitution: The Essential Users Guide, Preamble, pg. 67, Ibid

[2] “Restoring Our Value of Acting for the Common Good”, by Orlaine I. Gabert, Door County Pulse, June 21, 2019, https://doorcountypulse.com/restoring-our-value-of-acting-for-the-common-good

[7] “Some Americans No Longer Believe in the Common Good”, by Silas House, The Atlantic, August 22, 2021, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/08/some-americans-no-longer-believe-in-the-commmon-good/619856

[8] “Some Americans No Longer Believe in the Common Good”, by Silas House, The Atlantic, August 22, 2021, Ibid

[19] “Restoring Our Value of Acting for the Common Good”, by Orlaine I. Gabert, Door County Pulse, June 21, 2019, Ibid

[20] “Alexis de Tocqueville, Pandemic Virtue and Selfishness, and American Democracy in Decline”, by Jeffrey K. Tulis, LSE Phelan US Centre, United States’ Politics & Policy, June 3, 2021, LSE Phelan US Centre, United States’ Politics & Policy, https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/2021/06/03/alexis-de-tocqueville-pandemic-virtue-selfishness-and-america-democracy-in-decline

[21] “Alexis de Tocqueville, Pandemic Virtue and Selfishness, and American Democracy in Decline”, by Jeffrey K. Tulis, LSE Phelan US Centre, United States’ Politics & Policy, June 3, 2021, LSE Phelan US Centre, United States’ Politics & Policy, Ibid

[22] Alexis de Tocqueville, Pandemic Virtue and Selfishness, and American Democracy in Decline”, by Jeffrey K. Tulis, LSE Phelan US Centre, United States’ Politics & Policy, June 3, 2021, LSE Phelan US Centre, United States’ Politics & Policy, Ibid

[23] Alexis de Tocqueville, Pandemic Virtue and Selfishness, and American Democracy in Decline”, by Jeffrey K. Tulis, LSE Phelan US Centre, United States’ Politics & Policy, June 3, 2021, LSE Phelan US Centre, United States’ Politics & Policy, Ibid

[25] Merriam-Webster Dictionary, Definition of Empathy, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/empathy

[26]“Empathy in Action: How Teachers Prepare Future Citizens”, by Marilyn Price-Mitchell, Edutopia, September 11, 2015, https://www.edutopia.org/blog/8-pathways-empathy-in-action-marilyn-price-mitchell

[27] “Our Empathy Deficit”, by Amy J. Wilson, Medium.com, January 15, 2021, https://medium.com/empathy-for-change/our-empathy-deficit-d170sdd1165d0

[28] “Our Empathy Deficit”, by Amy J. Wilson, Medium.com, January 15, 2021, Ibid

[29] “Our Empathy Deficit”, by Amy J. Wilson, Medium.com, January 15, 2021, Ibid

[30] “Our Empathy Deficit”, by Amy J. Wilson, Medium.com, January 15, 2021, Ibid

[31] “Empathy in Action: How Teachers Prepare Future Citizens”, by Marilyn Price-Mitchell, Edutopia, September 11, 2015, Ibid

[32] “Empathy in Action: How Teachers Prepare Future Citizens”, by Marilyn Price-Mitchell, Edutopia, September 11, 2015, Ibid

[33] “Empathy in Action: How Teachers Prepare Future Citizens”, by Marilyn Price-Mitchell, Edutopia, September 11, 2015, Ibid

[34] “You Can’t Have Meaningful Civic Engagement Without Social and Emotional Skills”, by Karen Niemi, EdSource, October 10, 2021, http://edsource.org/2021/you-cant-have-meaningful-civic-engagement-without-social-emotional-skills/662106

[35] “The Common Good”, by Claire Andre and Manuel Velasquez, Markula Center for Applied Ethics, Santa Clara University, August 2, 2014, Ibid

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