comparative essay
Uploaded by thabiso4 on Apr 05, 2005
A Comparative Essay
After reading Americas Constitutional Soul, by Harvey C. Mansfield,
Jr., and The True and Only Heaven, by Christopher Lasch, I came to the
realization that while they have varying ideas on many topics, they have
similar conservative views regarding citizenship and civil
rights.Specifically, Mansfield discusses his belief that people are best served
through arepresentative government and does not believe that all citizens
should be allowed to rule directly (Mansfield 141). In this regard,
Mansfield contends that people, in general, tend to be irrational and rely
too much on feelings as opposed to reasoned conclusions (Mansfield
29-30). Therefore, if a trueform of participatory democracy were practiced
where all citizens have the right to activelyparticipate in the
decision-making processes, Mansfield believes that our society would not
benefit. Mansfield, in maintaining his views that citizens are easily
swayed by their feelings instead of by intellectual reasoning, believ!
es that professional, special interest groups that are savvy enough to
capitalize on this human weakness, would sway the votes of the majority
and earn themselves a majority vote. To combat this problem, Mansfield
believes (as did our Founding Fathers when theycreated the Electoral
College), that a representative form of democracy is the more viable
form of government which will better suit our society by assuring that
rational, unselfish decisions will be made which will ultimately be needed
for the progression of our free and democratic society(Mansfield
29-30).Furthermore, in continuing with our discussion of citizenship, I
believe that Mansfield believes that through the use of formal, government
institutions, citizens are able to rise above self-interest. He points
to the fact that our United States institution is an institution of
formalizedbehavior. This document requires that actions be formal.
According to Mansfield, the United States Constitution is documente!
d proof that citizens want self-government and that they have the
ability, through formal processes set up by institutions, to rise above
self-interest (Mansfield 151). Similarly, Christopher Lasch seems to have
the same doubts about citizens ability toeffectively decide on matters
of importance. Through his discussions of Walter Lippmans writings,
Public Opinion and The Phantom Public, Lash appears to agree that the use
of self-governing is not an effective form of Democracy (Lasch 364).
Lasch goes on to further set forth that the old ideas of citizenship
are out-dated and that, in fact, citizens can no...