Searching the Ethical Values, Ideals and Concepts

The global search for answers will draw on theaffected the ways in which those ideals were
attempts of different cultures to seek answersexpressed, combined and conceived as liberal
to problems of the human condition. Within eachdemocratic values (for example, the
culture, the process will begin with an explorationcitizen-democracy of Athens gave way to the
of its own culturally specific values, ideals,representative democracy in modern states).
concepts and stories as the way that their cultureConstitutional values for a more global world may
has dealt with those problems.be variations on the values of citizenship,
These can then be compared to the values,democracy and welfare. However, they may also
ideals, concepts and stories in other cultures sobe recombined in new values within new concepts
that we can appreciate similarities and differences.that speak more effectively to the problems of
Different cultures have much to learn from eachglobalization.
other. For example, Anglo-American ideology hasSometimes the values will not be recombined but
been strong on emphasizing the importance ofreinvented in a different form that may expose
individuals but has tended to be weak onmore general classes of value of which liberal
understanding institutions. Institutions are oftendemocratic values were merely the
reduced to matrices of interpersonal contractscontemporary form. It will taken one example
rather than seen as organic wholes. This-citizenship.
preference for individuals and lack ofPost-Westphalia authoritarian states saw individuals
understanding of institutions leads to hostilityas subjects. The enlightenment saw them as
towards them -particularly 'public' ones. Europeancitizens. What was new was the idea that
and Japanese cultures seem to take institutionsinstitutions such as the state existed to serve
seriously and to possess a stronger understandingindividuals rather than the individual in service of
of their nature. For me, this helps to review thethe state. The concept of citizenship built upon
significance of the Enlightenment.earlier enlightenment values of family, tribe and
The Enlightenment certainly, and rightly, placed theethnic group. At each stage of human
individual at the centre of legal and politicaldevelopment, membership in the most socially and
philosophy. The fundamental point of theeconomically powerful groups has been seen as
enlightenment was that institutions should serveof enormous value. Exclusion from that group has
individuals, rather than the other way around. Thisbeen a very great punishment (e.g., being
does not mean that institutions should bedisowned by family, being expelled from the tribe
abandoned, but that the manner of theiror being outlawed from the village). The
justification should be conceived -as means ofEnlightenment vaunted membership in the state,
protecting, realizing and furthering individual humanthen the most significant and powerful social
rights.group. However, as the sovereign state wanes in
Reinventing and recombining values as indicatedsocial significance, other memberships become
above, the values of liberal democracy weremore crucial -including those of work. The new
formed in and for strong states. Although thesevalue may be the right to participate in the
values were often based on long-standing idealsbenefits of social life in the most socially significant
found in a wide variety of cultures, that contextgroupings.