Herbert Croly and The Ideological Origins of The Social Justice Disposition Concept

Herbert Croly (1869-1930) was one of the chief Progressive-liberal authors. He was founder in 1914 of the New Republic magazine, and his 1909 book Promise of American Life is a bulwark of Progressivism. I am reading his later (1914) Progressive Democracy and noticed his emphasis on the concept of social justice. Arguably, the concept of social justice dispositions is rooted in Progressive Democracy. In the book, Croly's use of the term social justice is unabashedly ideological. In fact, Croly's aim is to refute nineteenth century ideological individualism to replace it with with an ideology of unlimited government and democratic power. Croly believed that the American population was better educated to participate in democracy in 1914 than in 1814 and that the legal constraints on the popular will that characterized the early stage of American democracy were no longer needed. Given subsequent European history, specifically Hitler and Stalin, the notion of unlimited government with democratic rationale sounds reactionary or atavistic (if argued by today's "new Progresives" such as Peter Levine) rather than progressive. In any case, Croly introduces the concept of social justice and a construct of the interplay between individual integrity and social welfare that is similar to the educationist notion of social justice disposition as part of his ideological argument. I would go so far as to argue that the concept of social justice disposition is explicitly part of Croly's ideological construction. Even if my strong claim is not true, it is clear that the concept of social justice disposition is rooted in liberal-Progressive ideology, not psychology.

About two years ago there was a controversy at Brooklyn College concerning Professor Priyar Parmar and her student Evan Goldwyn. Professor Parmar was interested in disciplining Goldwyn because he lacked what she considered to be social justice dispositions. As well, Steven Head was dismissed from the San Jose State University education school for disagreeing with a professor concerning a political question. As at Brooklyn College, SJSU's "Progressive" educators claimed that Head lacked a social justice disposition.

The far-fetched claim that social justice dispositions exist and that they are measurable was attributable in part to the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE), which dropped the use of social justice dispositions in its accreditation standards last year. However, universities can still apply standards involving social justice dispositions without NCATE's explicit encouragement. Doing so, however, raises legal First Amendment issues involving the 1943 case of West Virginia Board of Education v Barnette . According to that case, university programs are not permitted to require tests of belief. Thus, if social justice disposition is an ideological construct, universities are, if they mandate social justice dispositional requirements, violating legal standards. Thus, if social justice disposition is a purely ideological construct, for NCATE to properly address the issue of social justice dispositions, and to establish accreditation standards that accord with social justice, i.e., that do not violate the law, it needs to explicitly prohibit the use of social justice as an assessment criteria in any university that it accredits.

Social justice disposition advocates, such as Vernon C. Polite, claim that social justice is a neutral term and not ideological. However, a close reading of Croly suggests that the term social justice played a significant role in the Progressive-liberal framework. There is no pretense in Croly's book that it offers anything but an ideology or political belief system, a counter-argument to the laissez faire views of nineteenth century conservatives(pp. 148-9):

"The idea of individual justice is being supplemented by the idea of social justice. When our constitutions were written, the traditions of English law, the contemporary political philosophy and the economic situation of the American democracy all conspired to embody in them and their interpretation an extremely individualistic conception of justice--a conception which practically confided social welfare to the free expression of individual interests and good intentions. Now the tendency is to conceive the social welfare not as an end which cannot be left to the happy harmonizing of individual interests, but as an end which must be consciously willed by society and efficiently realized. Society, that is, has become a moral ideal, not independent of the individual but supplementary to him, an ideal which must be pursued less by regulating individual excesses than by the active conscious encouragement of socializing tendencies and purposes "(my emphasis)...

"(p. 199) The individual has the best chance of giving integrity to his life in a society which is being informed by the social ideal...Although an advance towards social salvation will be accelerated by increasing individual integrity, society will never be saved as a consequence of the regeneration of individualism...The two ideals (individual and social welfare) cannot become sufficiently interdependent without retaining a large measure of independence."

The inculcation of social justice dispositions is part of Croly's ideological programme. Central to Croly's ideology is his belief that society should be consciously created through state intervention, which in turn he claims is an expression of the popular will. This is an ideological position, not a psychological model. He argues that a "social ideal" is needed for an individual to give integrity to his life. He also argues that individual integrity is necessary for the social ideal. This intersection of the social and individual is precisely the notion of disposition to which the advocates of dispositional assessment allude.

Vernon C. Polite's Provincialism

In June 2006 there was a debate about dispositional assessment in which I participated on the website of Inside Higher Education. About eight months later, in March 2007, Vernon C. Polite, dean of Eastern Michigan University's School of Education, added a lengthy comment, which Steven Head has brought to my attention.

Dean Polite begins by arguing:

"If law, social work, nursing, psychology, etc can speak the words, 'social justice,' professional educators certainly need to have an understanding of what social justice means in the preparation of professional educators."

But, of course, an understanding of "justice" is part of the undergraduate philosophy curriculum and can be gleaned in reading authors as Plato, Aristotle, Augustine and Kant, who are covered in any competently run undergraduate program. A graduate school, including one in the education field, need not cover undergraduate-level material. The question of "what is justice?" belongs in undergraduate philosophy classes. That is, unless the graduate school has a program of indoctrination in mind.

Dean Polite launches into a discussion of "minorities" which is not particularly relevant to the question of "social justice" dispositions. While there have been many injustices brought to bear on minorities, the issue of the existence of "social justice dispositions" is a deeper question. To take one example, in Malaysia the majority ethnic group has instituted an affirmative action program that amounts to apartheid-like discrimination against the minority Chinese. The minority Chinese are more economically successful than the majority Malay population, but is discrimination against this suppressed minority group just?

St. Augustine argued that a person's relationship with God is the basis of justice. Are we to accept St. Augustine's definition of justice? Plato argued that justice is rooted in society. But Karl Popper argued that Plato's definition is totalitarian. Are we to believe Plato's definition of justice, or Popper's? Hitler believed that murdering Jews is just. The Ku Klux Klan believed that lynching blacks is just. Whose definition are we to believe? Dean Vernon C. Polite's and NCATE's? Dean Polite writes:

"NCATE, however, could be most helpful to its member institutions by “defining” social justice rather than simply removing it as if it is no longer relevant or suggest that “it” is sufficiently “covered” under diversity. Some would argue that anything found in the NCATE standards should be measurable and observable in the candidates’ performance."

Yet, Dean Polite's cries for enforcing a rigid, authoritarian definition of social justice will lead not to justice, but to harassment of those who disagree with NCATE and with Dean Polite. It will lead to an authoritarian political correctness. Dean Polite further claims that:

"Social justice tends to equalize disparities in educational attainment, educational achievement and socio-economic status, and the impact of prejudice and discrimination on educational attainment."

But this may not be the case. The rigid definition of social justice as equality of outcomes is anything but just in terms of the thinking of Kant, Plato, Augustine, Aristotle and all other important philosophers outside of a few provincial leftists. Indeed, the moral depravity of the New Left is illustrated in its now-aged sociopathic leaders' ongoing defense of the Pol Pot, Mao Tse Tung and Castro regimes, which butchered 1.5 million, 25 million people and 100,000 people respectively.

Dean Polite goes on with a discussion that is remarkable for its provincialism:

"In essence, social justice is the one true ideal that ensures that “no child is left behind.”

Yet, there are many ways to attain the goal of improved social outcomes. In particular, the laissez faire economy of the late 19th century increased wealth dramatically because deregulation stimulated innovation. The invention of the telephone, AC electricity and the mass production of the automobile were improvements that have not been matched since the ideas of the suppressives/progressives, to include government regulation, have inhibited economic creativity. Justice is necessary for the fulfillment of human purpose, which means that government programs, regulation, whimsical legal requirements and pronvicial definitions of social justice ought to be eliminated. Justice means that each person should be permitted to keep what they produce and be free of the violence of political extremists and criminals.

Rules that suppress speech, that attack those who disagree, that expel students like Steven Head who disagreed with his professor are inherently unjust. Universities have been at the forefront of attacking individual freedom in the interest of a rigid, unjust ideology that argues for a logically impossible equality of outcomes. The concept of equality of outcomes that has no claim to "justice". It is a suppressive Procrustean bed that leads to murder. Far from being just, its advocates are killers.

If NCATE is to advocate justice, then it must advocate laissez faire capitalism. The only justice is equality under the law; freedom of expression; and the right to retain one's earnings. The only meaning of justice is:

"Laissez faire et laissez passer, le monde va de lui même!"