Climate Movement Values: Pragmatism
Introductory Series Post #10.7
Love! Justice! Beauty! Freedom! Creativity! Wisdom! …
Pragmatism? …
Huh?
How does pragmatism fit with these others? Isn’t it a jigsaw piece from some other puzzle?
Remember the three qualities of a value: (1) it inspires; (2) it guides, and; (3) it is valuable to us and worth striving for.
Pragmatism is one of our Movement Values because, like wisdom, it can guide us in how to make progress on our vision, purpose, and Major Goal. Because the application of pragmatism can create such progress, it leads to inspiration. Nothing keeps us going like forward momentum. Pragmatism is valuable because it helps us achieve victories that would have eluded us otherwise.
Pragmatism keeps us limber and flexible to better run the race. It keeps rigidity from causing injury and ruining our chances of achieving progress on our vision, purpose, and Major Goal.
Pragmatism is a dear friend of one of our other values, creativity, because it says, “Hey, the old way isn’t working. Time to come up with something new.” Or “This new approach is better, so let’s do it instead of the way we’ve always done things.”
Pragmatism makes space for compromise. But to increase the odds that a particular compromise is the right thing to do we must balance pragmatism with love, justice, and wisdom.
Pragmatism is unique in comparison to our other nine Movement Values because on its own it is not a value for the Climate Movement and Climate Action Supporters. It is only in relation to our other values that pragmatism can help guide and inspire us to action. It is only in dialogue and creative tension with the others that pragmatism has value for us. Pragmatism must be bounded and guided by love and justice and beauty and freedom and wisdom. It is love and wisdom that must know when pragmatism must come to the fore.
Pragmatism’s supreme quality is openness, and that is a quality these Values share, space where they overlap and make each other stronger and more resilient.
Pragmatism is valuable to us because it is an essential part of achieving our vision, purpose, and Major Goal.
Balancing the Prophetic and the Pragmatic
One of the great values of the pragmatic is when it is balanced with the prophetic.
As a moral movement some of us will speak in what I call the prophetic voice; we will assume a prophetic mentality and stance.
At its most constructive, the prophetic voice
envisions and describes a world filled with love, justice, beauty, freedom, sustainability, and peace;
spurs us to our best to create just such a world, and
calls us up short if we fail to do our best.
Our vision, purpose and Major Goal — to overcome climate change while creating a just and prosperous sustainability that enhances wellbeing for everyone and everything — is in fact in the prophetic voice.
As such, we embrace the prophetic voice wholeheartedly. We work as hard as we can to make it a reality. That is what we are about, why we exist. We are prophetic.
But if we are not careful, unhelpful parts of ourselves can turn the prophetic voice into something less than constructive — even destructive. If we are rigid, if we are shrill, if we are self-righteous and arrogant, we can speak in what some will perceive as a prophetic voice but really isn’t.
Worse, we can succumb to what I call prophetic narcissism. That’s when someone performatively beats their chest and loudly and uncompromisingly proclaims what they assert is a moral standard. But they are doing it to be seen as highly moral, especially to those susceptible to their message and performance. The perception by others that one is highly moral can bring about power and prestige. They don’t really care that much whether progress is made. Some would rather go down in defeat as a wannabe moral martyr than do what they cast as compromising their moral purity. Usually this alienates much more than it helps. At its worst is is morally destructive rather than constructive, bellowing and strutting and reveling in the conflict and opposition created and attention generated. This both feeds ego and affirms the perceived rightness of the stance, as only a select group of the truly righteous have ears to hear. The shrapnel and damage caused to others is both byproduct and proof.
The prophetic narcissist mode knows not love. It knows not wisdom. It knows not the fullness of freedom. It doesn’t stop bad stuff, set wrong right, or make things better. It is a Potemkin village, a hollow shell filled with nothing, a black hole for meaning and goodness.
It is certainly the case that narcissists can cloak themselves in the prophetic.
But the rest of us who are not narcissists must watch out, for we can slip into the prophetic narcissist mode if we are not careful.
To avoid this we must always do two things:
combine the prophetic voice with love and wisdom, which together produce humility; and
balance the prophetic with the pragmatic.
This balancing is one of the key reasons we must value pragmatism and its quality of openness. We need it to help save us from self-righteousness and destructive prophetic narcissism.
Pragmatism can help save us from self-righteousness and destructive prophetic narcissism.
Left unchecked and unbalanced, these two corrosive forces will prevent the Climate Movement from becoming the greatest and most long-lasting social change movement in the history of the world, and from playing our indispensable role in overcoming climate change by creating a just and prosperous sustainability that enhances wellbeing for everyone and everything. If we are rigid, uncompromising, and self-righteous, if we downshift into the prophetic narcissist mode, we will steal our own hope.
But if we combine the prophetic with love and wisdom and beauty, if we balance it with the pragmatic and its openness, then we can see the real path and follow it into the light.
Compromise With Integrity vs “Caving In” or “Selling Out”
One of the great values of pragmatism is keeping us open to compromise. When pragmatism is combined with our other Movement Values they ensure that we compromise with integrity.
However, because we are on the climate clock we must compromise only when necessary. We shouldn’t start out compromising, but at a crucial point we may need to. In many cases we must hang tough until the very end — or near the point of no return — to maximize our gains. Whenever the window of opportunity is about to close we must strike the most favorable deal we can get. But it must be a deal that lays a solid foundation we can build on. If not, we must reject it.
But isn’t compromise “selling out”?
Let’s first reverse that. When selling out is dressed up as compromise, as being pragmatic, giving a bad name to both, then kinda, but not really — because it’s not really compromise. If it doesn’t lay a solid foundation, it’s caving in.
But compromise with integrity, one bounded by our other Movement Values, isn’t caving in or selling out. It’s the opposite. It may involve temporary partial victories, recognizing that we will continue to strive to realize our vision, purpose, and Major Goal.
It is we ourselves, our Movement, and our sustained commitment to collective action over time, that ensures needed compromises are not caving in or selling out.
It is we ourselves, our Movement, our sustained commitment to collective action over time, that ensures we are not caving in or selling out when we need to compromise. For we will keep at it until victory is won. Partial victories over time will yield much more than take-it-or-leave-it stances that covet moral purity more than results.
The prophetic narcissist mode bellows for strong action even as it revels in defeat. Such faux purity posturing is the real selling out, the real caving in into itself.
There are very few times when we must not compromise if compromise is needed to advance us towards victory. There are very few times when we must take an uncompromising stand — especially one that only leads to defeat.
But in such cases is there another path to victory? Pragmatism and openness, combined with creativity and love and justice and wisdom can almost always find a way.
If we must accept a particular defeat, that doesn’t mean we have lost. It means we must retreat and regroup and find another way. We may have to accept defeat on one field even as we achieve victory on another. We don’t give up on our vision, purpose and Major Goal if we lose one race; we regroup for the next one. Pragmatism and openness are key to remaining flexible, to giving space to creativity. When joined with love and justice, this combo will never give up finding a way to Yes. And that is a fount of hope. Join us!
Remember to check out other posts in this Introductory Series, including Love, Justice, Beauty, Creativity, and Wisdom. If you like this post, please “like,” comment, and share. And thanks for all you’re doing.