John Dewey

The Later Works, 1925-1953

EDITED BY JOANN BOYDSTON

TEXTUAL EDITOR, BRIDGET A. WALSH

With an Introduction by James Gouinlock

Carbondale and Edwardsville

Southern Illinois University Press

 324 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS

public will remain shadowy and formless, seeking spasmodically 5· Search. for the Great Community
for itself, but seizing and holding its shadow rather than its sub-
stance. Till the Great Society is converted into a Great Commu-
nity, the Public will remain in eclipse. Communication can alone
create a great community. Our Babel is not one of tongues but
of the signs and symbols without which shared experience is
impossible.

We have had occasion to refer in passing to the distinc-

tion between democracy as a social idea and political democracy
as a system of government. The two are, of course, connected.
The idea remains barren and empty save as it is incarnated in hu-
man relationships. Yet indiscussion they must be distinguished.
The idea of democracy is a wider and fuller idea than can be ex-
emplified in the state even at its best. To be realized it must affect
all modes of human association, the family, the school, industry,
religion. And even as far as political arrangements are con-
cerned, governmental institutions are but a mechanism for secur-
., ing to an idea channels of effective operation. It will hardly do to
·'(,' say that criticisms of the political machinery leave the believer in
I: the idea untouched. For, as far as they are justified-and no can-
1 did believer can deny that many of them are only too well
grounded-they arouse him to bestir himself in order that the
idea may find a more adequate machinery through which to
work. What the faithful insist upon, however, is that the idea and
its external organs and structures are not to be identified. We ob-
ject to the common supposition of the foes of existing demo-
cratic government that the accusations against it touch the social
and moral aspirations and ideas which underlie the political
forms. The old saying that the cure for the ills of democracy is
more democracy is not apt if it means that the evils may be reme-
died by introducing more machinery of the same kind as that
which already exists, or by refining and perfecting that ma-
chinery. But the phrase may also indicate the need of returning to
the idea itself, of clarifying and deepening our apprehension of
it, and of employing our sense of its meaning to criticize and re-
make its political manifestations.
Confining ourselves, for the moment, to political democracy,
we must, in any case, renew our protest against the assumption
 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY
I

that the idea has itself produced the governmental practices Nevertheless the current has set steadily in one direction: to-
which obtain in democratic states: General suffrage, elected rep- ward democratic forms. That government exists to serve its com-
resentatives, majority rule, and so on. The idea has influenced munity, and that this purpose cannot be achieved unless the com-
the concrete political movement, but it has not caused it. The munity itself shares in selecting its governors and determining
transition from family and dynastic government supported by their policies, are a deposit of fact left, as far as we can see, per-
the loyalties of tradition to popular government was the out- man,ently in the wake of doctrines and forms, however transitory
come primarily of technological discoveries and inventions the latter. They are not the whole of the democratic idea, but
working a change in the customs by which men had been bound they express it in its political phase. Belief in this political aspect
together. It was not due to the doctrines of doctrinaires. The is not a mystic faith as if in some overruling providence that
forms to which we are accustomed in democratic governments cares for children, drunkards and others unable to help them-
represent the cumulative effect of a multitude of events un- selves. It marks a well-attested conclusion from historic facts. We
premeditated as far as political effects were concerned and ' hav- have every reason to think that whatever changes may take place
ing unpredictable consequences. There is no sanctity in universal in existing democratic machinery, they will be of a sort to make
suffrage, frequent elections, majority rule, congressional and the interest of the public a more supreme guide and criterion of
cabinet government. These things are devices evolved in the di- governmental activity, and to enable the public to form and man-
rection in which the current was moving, each wave of which in- ifest its purposes still more authoritatively. In this sense the cure
volved at the time of its impulsion a minimum of departure from for the ailments of democracy is more democracy. The prime dif-
antecedent custom and law. The devices served a purpose; but ficulty, as we have seen, is that of discovering the means by which
the purpose was rather that of meeting existing needs which had a scattered, mobile and manifold public may so recognize itself
become too intense to be ignored, than that of forwarding the as to define and express its interests. This discovery is necessarily
democratic idea. In spite of all defects, they served their own precedent to any fundamental change in the machinery. We are
purpose well. not concerned therefore to set forth counsels as to advisable im-
Looking back, with the aid which ex post facto experience can provements in the political forms of democracy. Many have been
give, it would be hard for the wisest to devise schemes which suggested. It is no derogation of their relative worth to say that
under the circumstances, would have met the needs better. In thi~ consideration of these changes is no~ at present an affair of pri-
retrospective glance, it is possible, however, to see how the doc- mary importance. The problem lies deeper; it is in the first in-
trinal formulations which accompanied them were inadequate, stance an intellectual problem: the search for conditions under
one-sided and positively erroneous. In fact they were hardly which the Great Society may become the Great Community.
more than political war-cries adopted to help in carrying on When these conditions are brought into being they will make
some immediate agitation or in justifying some particular practi- their own forms. Until they have come about, it is somewhat
cal polity struggling for recognition, even though they were as- futile to consider what political machinery will suit them.
serted to be absolute truths of human nature or of morals. The fn a search for the conditions under which the inchoate public
doctrines served a particular local pragmatic need. But often now:extant may function democratically, we may proceed from
their very adaptation to immediate circumstances unfitted them a statement of the nature of the democratic idea in its generic so-
pragmatically, to meet more enduring and more extensive needs.' cial sense. 1 From the standpoint of the individual, it consists in
They lived to cumber the political ground, obstructing progress, having a responsible share according to capacity in forming and
all the more so because they were uttered and held not as' hy- directing the activities of the groups to which one belongs and in
potheses with which to direct social experimentation but as final
truths, dogmas. No wonder they call urgently for revision and 1. The most adequate discussion of this ideal with which I am acquainted is
displacement. T. V. Smith's The Democratic Way of Life.
 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY

participating according to need in the values which the groups Only when we start from a community as a fact, grasp the fact
sustain. From the standpoint of the groups, it demands libera- in thought so as to clarify and enhance its constituent elements,
tion of the potentialities of members of a group in harmony with can we reach an idea of democracy which is not utopian. The
the interests and goods which are common. Since every individ- conceptions and shibboleths which are traditionally associated
ual is a member of many groups, this specification cannot be ful- with the idea of democracy take on a veridical and directive
filled except when different groups interact flexibly and fully in meaning only when they are construed as marks and traits of an
connection with other groups. A member of a robber band may association which realizes the defining characteristics of a com-
express his powers in a way consonant with belonging to that munity. Fraternity, liberty and equality isolated from communal
group and be directed by the interest common to its members. life are hopeless abstractions. Their separate assertion leads to
But he does so only at the cost of repression of those of his po- mushy sentimentalism or else to extravagant and fanatical vio-
tentialities which can be realized only through membership in lence which in the end defeats its own aims. Equality then be-
other groups. The robber band cannot interact flexibly with comes a creed of mechanical identity which is false to facts and
other groups; it can act only through isolating itself. It must pre- impossible of realization. Effort to attain it is divisive of the vital
vent the operation of all interests save those which circumscribe bonds which hold men together; as far as it puts forth issue, the
it in its separateness. But a good citizen finds his conduct as a outcome is a mediocrity in which good is common only in the
member of a political group enriching and enriched by his par- sense of being average and vulgar. Liberty is then thought of as
ticipation in family life, industry, scientific and artistic associa- independence of social ties, and ends in dissolution and anarchy.
tions. There is a free give-and-take: fullness of integrated person- It is more difficult to sever the idea of brotherhood from that of a
ality is therefore possible of achievement, since the pulls and community, and hence it is either practically ignored in the
responses of different groups reenforce one another and their movements which identify democracy with Individualism, or
values accord. else it is a sentimentally appended tag. In its just connection with
Regarded as an idea, democracy is not an alternative to other communal experience, fraternity is another name for the con-
principles of associated life. It is the idea of community life itself. sciously appreciated goods which accrue from an association in
It is an ideal in the only intelligible sense of an ideal: namely, the which all share, and which give direction to the conduct of each.
tendency and movement of some thing which exists carried to its Liberty is that secure release and fulfillment of personal poten-
final limit, viewed as completed, perfected. Since things do not tialities which take place only in rich and manifold association
attain such fulfillment but are in actuality distracted and inter- with others: the power to be an individualized self making a dis-
fered with, democracy in this sense is not a fact and never will tinctive contribution and enjoying in its own way the fruits of
be. But neither in this sense is there or has there ever been any- association. Equality denotes the unhampered share which each
thing which is a community in its full measure, a community un- individual member of the community has in the consequences of
alloyed by alien elements. The idea or ideal of a community pre- associated action. It is equitable because it is measured only by
sents, however, actual phases of associated life as they are freed need and capacity to utilize, not by extraneous factors which de-
from restrictive and disturbing elements, and are contemplated prive one in order that another may take and have. A baby in the
as having attained their limit of development. Wherever there is family is equal with others, not because of some antecedent and
conjoint activity whose consequences are appreciated as good by . structural quality which is the same as that of others, but in so
all singular persons who take part in it, and where the realization far as his needs for care and development are attended to with-
of the good is such as to effect an energetic desire and effort to out being sacrificed to the superior strength, possessions and
sustain it in being just because it is a good shared by all, there is matured abilities of others. Equality does not signify that kind of
in so far a community. The clear consciousness of a communal mathematical or physical equivalence in virtue of which any one
life, in all its implications, constitutes the idea of democracy. element may be substituted for another. It denotes effective re-
 330 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY 331

gard for whatever is distinctive and unique in each, irrespective strikes and rives a tree or rock, and the resulting fragments take
of physical and psychological inequalities. It is not a natural pos- up and continue the process of interaction, and so on and on.
session but is a fruit of the community when its action is directed But when phases of the process are represented by signs, a new
by its character as a community. medium is interposed. As symbols are related to one another, the
Associated or joint activity is a condition of the creation of a important relations of a course of events are recorded and are
community. But association itself is physical and organic, while preserved as meanings. Recollection and foresight are possible;
co.mmunal life is moral, that is emotionally, intellectually, con- the new medium facilitates calculation, planning, and a new
sciOusly sustained. Human beings combine in behavior as di- kind of action which intervenes in what happens to direct its
r~ctly and unconsciously as do atoms, stellar masses and cells; as course in the interest of what is foreseen and desired.
dtrectly and unknowingly as they divide and repel. They do so in Symbols in turn depend upon and promote communication.
virtue of their own structure, as man and woman unite, as the The results of conjoint experience are considered and transmit-
baby seeks the breast and the breast is there to supply its need. ted. Events cannot be passed from one to another, but meanings
They do so from external circumstances, pressure from without, may be shared by means of signs. Wants and impulses are then
as atoms combine or separate in presence of an electric charge, attached to common meanings. They are thereby transformed
or as sheep huddle together from the cold. Associated activity into desires and purposes, which, since they implicate a common
needs no explanation; things are made that way. But no amount or mutually understood meaning, present new ties, converting a
of agg~egated collective action of itself constitutes a community. conjoint activity into a community of interest and endeavor.
For bemgs who observe and think, and whose ideas are absorbed Thus there is generated what, metaphorically, may be termed a
by impulses and become sentiments and interests "we" is as in- general will and social consciousness: desire and choice on the
evitable as "1." But "we" and "our" exist only w'hen the conse- part of individuals in behalf of activities that, by means of sym-
quences of combined action are perceived and become an object bols, are communicable and shared by all concerned. A commu-
of desire and effort, just as "I" and "mine" appear on the scene nity thus presents an order of energies transmuted into one of
only when a distinctive share in mutual action is consciously as- meanings which are appreciated and mutually referred by each
serted or claimed. Human associations may be ever so organic in to every other on the part of those engaged in combined action.
origin and firm in operation, but they develop into societies in a "Force" is not eliminated but is transformed in use and direction
human sense only as their consequences, being known, are es- by ideas and sentiments made possible by means of symbols.
t~emed and sought for. Even if "society" were as much an orga- The work of conversion of the physical and organic phase of
msm as some writers have held, it would not on that account be associated behavior into a community of action saturated and
society. Interactions, transactions, occur de facto and the results regulated by mutual interest in shared meanings, consequences
of interdependence follow. But participation in activities and which are translated into ideas and desired objects by means of
sharing in results are additive concerns. They demand communi- symbols, does not occur all at once nor completely. At any given
cation as a prerequisite. time, it sets a problem rather than marks a settled achievement.
C~mbined activity happens among human beings; but when We are born organic beings associated with others, but we
nothmg else happens it passes as inevitably into some other are not born members of a community. The young have to be
mode of interconnected activity as does the interplay of iron and brought within the traditions, outlook and interests which char-
the oxygen of water. What takes place is wholly describable in acterize a community by means of education: by unremitting in-
terms of energy, or, as we say in the case of human interactions struction and by learning in connection with the phenomena of
of force. Only when there exist signs or symbols of activities and overt association. Everything which is distinctively human is
of their outcome can the flux be viewed as from without, be ar- learned, not native, even though it could not be learned without
rested for consideration and esteem, and be regulated. Lightning native structures which mark man off from other animals. To
 332 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY 333
: i

learn in a human way and 'to human effect is not just to acquire tions. As we have also noted, they generate as their result overt
added skill through refinement of original capacities. and external conditions of action and these are known with vari-
To learn to be human is to develop through the give-and-take ous degrees of adequacy. What actually happens in consequence
of communication an effective sense of being an individually dis- of industrial forces is dependent upon the presence or absence of
tinctive member of a community; one who understands and ap- perception and communication of consequences,. upon f~resight
preciates its beliefs, desires and methods, and who contributes to and its effect upon desire and endeavor. Economic agenCies pro-
a further conversion of organic powers into human resources duce one result when they are left to work themselves out on
and values. But this translation is never finished. The old Adam, the merely physical level, or on that level modified only as the
the unregenerate dement in human nature, persists. It shows it- knowledge, skill and technique which the community has ac-
self wherever the method obtains of attaining results by use of cumulated are transmitted to its members unequally and by
force instead of by the method of communication and enlighten- chance. They have a different outcome in the degree in wh.ich
ment. It manifests itself more subtly, pervasively and effectually knowledge of consequences is equitably distributed, and actwn
when knowledge and the instrumentalities of skill which are the is animated by an informed and lively sense of a shared interest.
product of communal life are employed in the service of wants The doctrine of economic interpretation as usually stated ignores
and impulses which have not themselves been modified by refer- the transformation which meanings may effect; it passes over the
ence to a shared interest. To the doctrine of "natural" economy new medium which communication may interpose between in-
which held that commercial exchange would bring about such dustry and its eventual consequences. It is obsessed by the illu-
an interdependence that harmony would automatically result, sion which vitiated the "natural economy": an illusion due to
Rousseau gave an adequate answer in advance. He pointed out failure to note the difference made in action by perception and
that interdependence provides just the situation which makes it publication of its consequences, actual and possible. It thinks in
possible and worth while for the stronger and abler to exploit terms of antecedents, not of the eventual; of origins, not fruits.
others for their own ends, to keep others in a state of subjection We have returned, through this apparent excursion, to the
where they can be utilized as animated tools. The remedy he sug- question in which our earlier discussion culminated: Wh.at are
gested, a return to a condition of independence based on isola- the conditions under which it is possible for the Great Society to
tion, was hardly seriously meant. But its desperateness is evi- approach more closely and vitally the status of a.Great. C?mmu-
dence of the urgency of the problem. Its negative character was nity, and thus take form in genuinely democratiC societies and
equivalent to surrender of any hope of solution. By contrast it state? What are the conditions under which we may reasonably
indicates the nature of the only possible solution: the perfecting picture the Public emerging from its eclipse?
of the means and ways of communication of meanings so that The study will be an intellectual or hypothetical one. There
genuinely shared interest in the consequences of interdependent will be no attempt to state how the required conditions might
activities may inform desire and effort and thereby direct action. come into existence, nor to prophesy that they will occur. The
This is the meaning of the statement that the problem is a object of the analysis will be to show that unless ascertai.ned
moral one dependent upon intelligence and education. We have specifications are realized, the Community cannot be orgamzed
in our prior account sufficiently emphasized the role of tech- as a democratically effective Public. It is not claimed that the
nological and industrial factors in creating the Great Society. conditions which will be noted will suffice, but only that at least
What was said may even have seemed to imply acceptance of the they are indispensable. In other words, we shall endeavor ~o
deterministic version of an economic interpretation of history frame a hypothesis regarding the democratic state to stand m
and institutions. It is silly and futile to ignore and deny economic contrast with the earlier doctrine which has been nullified by the
facts. They do not cease to operate because we refuse to note course of events.
them, or because we smear them over with sentimental idealiza- Two essential constituents in that older theory, as will be
 334 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY 335

recalled, were the notions that each individual is of himself directs future behavior. The dependence 9i habit-forming upon
equipped with the intelligence needed, under the operation of those habits of a group which constitute customs and institu-
self-interest, to engage in political affairs; and that general suf- tions is a natural consequence of the helplessness of infancy. The
frage, frequent elections of officials and majority rule are suffi- social consequences of habit have been stated once for all by
cient to ensure the responsibility of elected rulers to the desires James: "Habit is the enormous fly-wheel of society, its most pre-
and interests of the public. As we shall see, the second concep- cious conservative influence. It alone-is what keeps us within the
tion is logically bound up with the first and stands or falls with bounds of ordinance, and saves the children of fortune from the
it. At the basis of the scheme lies what Lippmann has well called uprisings of the poor. It alone prevents the hardest and most re-
the idea of the "omnicompetent" individual: competent to frame pulsive walks of life from being deserted by those brought up to
policies, to judge their results; competent to know in all situa- tread therein. It keeps the fisherman and the deck-hand at sea
tions demanding political action what is for his own good, and through the winter; it holds the miner in his darkness, and nails
competent to enforce his idea of good and the will to effect it the countryman to his log-cabin and his lonely farm through all
against contrary forces. Subsequent history has proved that the the months of snow; it protects us from invasion by the natives
assumption involved illusion. Had it not been for the misleading of the desert and the frozen zone. It dooms us all to fight out the
influence of a false psychology, the illusion might have been de- battle of life upon the lines of our nurture or our early choic~,
tected in advance. But current philosophy held that ideas and and to make the best of a pursuit that disagrees, because there rs
knowledge were functions of a mind or consciousness which no other for which we are fitted and it is too late to begin again.
originated in individuals by means of isolated contact with ob- It keeps different social strata from mixing."
jects. But in fact, knowledge is a function of association and The influence of habit is decisive because, all distinctively hu-
communication; it depends upon tradition, upon tools and man action has to be learned, and the very heart, blood and sin-
methods socially transmitted, developed and sanctioned. Fac- ews of learning is creation of habitudes. Habits hind us to or-
ulties of effectual observation, reflection and desire are habits ac- derly and established ways of action because they generate ease,
1,,., quired under the influence of the culture and institutions of so- skill and interest in things to which we have grown used and be-
ciety, not ready-made inherent powers. The fact that man acts cause they instigate fear to walk in different ways, and because
from crudely intelligized emotion and from habit rather than they leave us incapacitated for the trial of them. Habit does not
from rational consideration, is now so familiar that it is not easy preclude the use of thought, but it determines the channels
to appreciate that the other idea was taken seriously as the basis within which it operates. Thinking is secreted in the interstices of
of economic and political philosophy. The measure of truth habits. The sailor, miner, fisherman and farmer think, but their
which it contains was derived from observation of a relatively thoughts fall within the framework of accustomed occupations
small group of shrewd business men who regulated their enter- and relationships. We dream beyond the limits of use and wont,
prises by calculation and accounting, and of citizens of small and but only rarely does revery become a source of acts which break
stable local communities who were so intimately acquainted bounds; so rarely that we name those in whom it happens de-
with the persons and affairs of their locality that they could pass monic geniuses and marvel at the spectacle. Thinking itself be-
competent judgment upon the bearing of proposed measures comes habitual along certain lines; a specialized occupation. Sci-
upon their own concerns. entific men, philosophers, literary persons, are not men and
Habit is the mainspring of human action, and habits are women who have so broken the bonds of habits that pure reason
formed for the most part under the influence of the customs of a and emotion undefiled by use and wont speak through them.
group. The organic structure of man entails the formation of They are persons of a specialized infrequent habit. Hence the
habit, for, whether we wish it or not, whether we are aware of it idea that men are moved by an intelligent and calculated regard
or not, every act effects a modification of attitude and set which for their own good is pure mythology. Even if the principle of
 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY 337

self-love actuated behavior, it would still be true that the objects and are supposedly thrown out of the door, they creep in again
in which men find their love manifested, the objects which they as stealthily and surely as does first nature. And as they are mod-
take as constituting their peculiar interests, are set by habits re- ified, the alteration first shows itself negatively, in the disintegra-
flecting social customs. tion of old beliefs, to be replaced by floating, volatile and ac-
These facts explain why the social doctrinaires of the new in- cidentally snatched up opinions. Of course there has been an
dustrial movement had so little prescience of what was to follow enormous increase in the amount of knowledge possessed by
in consequence of it. These facts explain why the more things mankind, but it does not equal, probably, the increase in the
changed, the more they were the same; they account, that is, for amount of errors and half-truths which have got into circulation.
the fact that instead of the sweeping revolution which was ex- In social and human matters, especially, the development of a
pected to result from democratic political machinery, there was critical sense and methods of discriminating judgment has not
in the main but a transfer of vested power from one class to an- kept pace with the growth of careless reports and of motives for
other. A few men, whether or not they were good judges of their positive misrepresentation.
own true interest and good, were competent judges of the con- What is more important, however, is that so much of knowl-
duct of business for pecuniary profit, and of how the new gov- edge is not knowledge in the ordinary sense of the word, but is
ernmental machinery could be made to serve their ends. It would "science." The quotation marks are not used disrespectfully, but
have taken a new race of human beings to escape, in the use to suggest the technical character of scientific material. The lay-
made of political forms, from the influence of deeply engrained man takes certain conclusions which get into circulation to be
habits, of old institutions and customary social status, with their science. But the scientific inquirer knows that they constitute sci-
inwrought limitations of expectation, desire and demand. And ence only in connection with the methods by which they are
s?ch a race, unless of disembodied angelic constitution, would reached. Even when true, they are not science in virtue of their
stmply have taken up the task where human beings assumed it correctness, but by reason of the apparatus which is employed in
upon emergence from the condition of anthropoid apes. In spite reaching them. This apparatus is so highly specialized that it re-
of sudden and catastrophic revolutions, the essential continuity quires more labor to acquire ability to use and understand it
of history is doubly guaranteed. Not only are personal desire and than to get skill in any other instrumentalities possessed by man. ·
belief functions of habit and custom, but the objective condi- Science, in other words, is a highly specialized language, more
tions which provide the resources and tools of action, together difficult to learn than any natural language. It is an artificial lan-
with its limitations, obstructions and traps, are precipitates of guage, not in the sense of being factitious, but in that of being a
the past, perpetuating, willy-nilly, its hold and power. The crea- work of intricate art, devoted to a particular purpose and not
tion of a tabula rasa in order to permit the creation of a new capable of being acquired nor understood in the way in which
order is so impossible as to set at naught both the hope of buoy- the mother tongue is learned. It is, indeed, conceivable that
ant revolutionaries and the timidity of scared conservatives. sometime methods of instruction will be devised which will en-
Nevertheless, changes take place and are cumulative in charac- able laymen to read and hear scientific material with comprehen-
ter. Observation of them in the light of their recognized con- sion, even when they do not themselves use the apparatus which
sequences arouses reflection, discovery, invention, experimen- is science. The latter may then become for large numbers what
tatio~. When a certain state of accumulated knowledge, of students of language call a passive, if not an active, vocabulary.
techmques and instrumentalities is attained, the process of But that time is in the future.
change is so accelerated, that, as to-day, it appears externally to For most men, save the scientific workers, science is a mystery
be the dominant trait. But there is a marked lag in any corre- in the hands of initiates, who have become adepts in virtue of
sponding change of ideas and desires. Habits of opinion are the following ritualistic ceremonies from which the profane herd
toughest of all habits; when they have become second nature, is excluded. They are fortunate who get as far as a sympathetic
 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY 339

appreciation of the methods which give pattern to the compli- positions which give them advance information of forces that af-
cated apparatus: methods of analytic, experimental observation, fect the market; and by training and an innate turn that way they
mathematical formulation and deduction, constant and elabo- have acquired a special technique which enables them to use the
rate check and test. For most persons, the reality of the apparatus vast impersonal tide to turn their own wheels. They can dam the
is found only in its embodiments in practical affairs, in mechan- current here and release it there. The current itself is as much be-
ical devices and in techniques which touch life as it is lived. For yond them as was ever the river by the side of which some inge-
them, electricity is known by means of the telephones, bells and nious mechanic, employing a knowledge which was transmitted
· lights they use, by the generators and magnetos in the auto- to him, erected his saw-mill to make boards of trees which he
mobiles they drive, by the trolley cars in which they ride. The had not grown. That within limits those successful in affairs have
physiology and biology they are acquainted with is that they knowledge and skill is not to be doubted. But such knowledge
have learned in taking precautions against germs and from the goes relatively but little further than that of the competent
physicians they depend upon for health. The science of what skilled operator who manages a machine. It suffices to employ
might be supposed to be closest to them, of human nature, was the conditions which are before him. Skill enables him to turn
for them an esoteric mystery until it was applied in advertising, the flux of events this way or that in his own neighborhood. It
salesmanship and personnel selection and management, and un- gives him no control of the flux.
til, through psychiatry, it spilled over into life and popular con- Why should the public and its officers, even if the latter are
sciousness, through its bearings upon "nerves," the morbidities termed statesmen, be wiser and more effective? The prime condi-
:i. and common forms of crankiness which make it difficult for per- tion of a democratically organized public is a kind of knowledge
I
sons to get along with one another and with themselves. Even and insight which does not yet exist. In its absence, it would be
now, popular psychology is a mass of cant, of slush and of super- the height of absurdity to try to tell what it would be like if it
stition worthy of the most flourishing days of the medicine man. existed. But some of the conditions which must be fulfilled if it is
Meanwhile the technological application of the complex ap- to exist can be indicated. We can borrow that much from the
paratus which is science has revolutionized the conditions under spirit and method of science even if we are ignorant of it as a
which associated life goes on. This may be known as a fact specialized apparatus. An obvious requirement is freedom of so~
which is stated in a proposition and assented to. But it is not cial inquiry and of distribution of its conclusions. The notion
known in the sense that men understand it. They do not know it that men may be free in their thought even when they are not in ·
as they know some machine which they operate, or as they know its expression and dissemination has been sedulously propa-
electric light and steam locomotives. They do not understand gated. It had its origin in the idea of a mind complete in itself,
how the change has gone on nor how it affects their conduct. apart from action and from objects. Such a consciousness pre-
Not understanding its "how," they cannot use and control its sents in fact the spectacle of mind deprived of its normal func-
manifestations. They undergo the consequences, they are af- tioning, because it is baffled by the actualities in connection with
fected by them. They cannot manage them, though some are for- which alone it is truly mind, and is driven back into secluded and
tunate enough-what is commonly called good fortune-to be impotent revery.
able to exploit some phase of the process for their own personal There can be no public without full publicity in respect to all
profit. But even the most shrewd and successful man does not in consequences which concern it. Whatever obstructs and restricts
any analytic and systematic way-in a way worthy to compare publicity, limits and distorts public opinion and checks and dis-
with the knowledge which he has won in lesser affairs by means torts thinking on social affairs. Without freedom of expression,
of the stress of experience-know the system within which he not even methods of social inquiry can be developed. For tools
operates. Skill and ability work within a framework which we can be evolved and perfected only in operation; in application to
have not created and do not comprehend. Some occupy strategic observing, reporting and organizing actual subject-matter; and
 340 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY

this application cannot occur save through free and systematic those who have ability to manipulate social relations for their
communication. The early history of physical knowledge, of own advantage have to be reckoned with. They have ~n uncanny
Greek conceptions of natural phenomena, proves how inept be- instinct for detecting whatever intellectual tendencies even re-
come the conceptions of the best endowed minds when those motely threaten to encroach upon their control. The~ h~ve de-
ideas are elaborated apart from the closest contact with the veloped an extraordinary facility in en~isting_upon thetr stde the
events which they purport to state and explain. The ruling ideas inertia, prejudices and emotional partls~nsh~p of the masse~ by
and methods of the human sciences are in much the same condi- use of a technique which impedes free mqmry and ex~resston.
tion to-day. They are also evolved on the basis of past gross ob- We seem to be approaching a state of government by hued ~ro­
servations, remote from constant use in regulation of the mate- moters of opinion called publicity agents. But the more senous
rial of new observations. enemy is deeply concealed in hidden entrench~ents.
The belief that thought and its communication are now free Emotional habituations and intellectual habttudes on the part
simply because legal restrictions which once obtained have been of the mass of men create the conditions of which the exploiters
done away with is absurd. Its currency perpetuates the infantile of sentiment and opinion only take advantage. Men have got
state of social knowledge. For it blurs recognition of our central used to an experimental method in physical and technical_mat-
need to possess conceptions which are used as tools of directed ters. They are still afraid of it in human concerns._ ~e fear Is the
inquiry and which are tested, rectified and caused to grow in ac- more efficacious because like all deep-lying fears It IS covered up
tual use. No man and no mind was ever emancipated merely by and disguised by all kinds of rationalizations. One of its com-
being left alone. Removal of formal limitations is but a negative monest forms is a truly religious idealization of, and r~~erence
condition; positive freedom is not a state but an act which in- for, established institutions; for example in our own pohttcs, the
volves methods and instrumentalities for control of conditions. Constitution, the Supreme Court, private property, free co~tract
Experience shows that sometimes the sense of external oppres- and so on. The words "sacred" and "sanctity" come readily to
sion, as by censorship, acts as a challenge and arouses intellec- our lips when such things come under disc~ssion. _They te~~ify t?,
tual energy and excites courage. But a belief in intellectual free- the religious aureole. which protects the mstitutlons. If ho~y .
dom where it does not exist contributes only to complacency in means that which is not to be approached nor touched, save With
virtual enslavement, to sloppiness, superficiality and recourse to ceremonial precautions and by specially anointed officials, then
sensations as a substitute for ideas: marked traits of our present such things are holy in contemporary political life. As supernatu-
estate with respect to social knowledge. On one hand, thinking ral matters have progressively been left high and dry upon a se-
deprived of its normal course takes refuge in academic special- cluded beach the actuality of religious taboos has more and
ism, comparable in its way to what is called scholasticism. On more gathered about secular institutions_, especially t~ose con-
the other hand, the physical agencies of publicity which exist in nected with the nationalistic state. 2 Psychiatnsts have discovered
such abundance are utilized in ways which constitute a large part that one of the commonest causes of mental disturbance is _an
of the present meaning of publicity: advertising, propaganda, in- underlying fear of which the subject is not ~~are, but wh_Ich
vasion of private life, the "featuring" of passing incidents in a leads to withdrawal from reality and to unwtlhngness to thmk
way which violates all the moving logic of continuity, and which things through. There is a social patholo~ ":hie? works powe~­
leaves us with those isolated intrusions and shocks which are the fully against effective inquiry into social ms~ltutlons and con~I­
essence of "sensations." tions. It manifests itself in a thousand ways; m querulousness, m
It would be a mistake to identify the conditions which limit impotent drifting, in uneasy snatching at distractions, in ideal-
free communication and circulation of facts and ideas, and
which thereby arrest and pervert social thought or inquiry,
2. The religious character of natio~alis~ has been_ forcibly brought out by Carl-
merely with overt forces which are obstructive. It is true that ton Hayes, in his Essays on Natzonallsm, especially Chap. 4.
 342 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY 343

ization of the long established, in a facile optimism assumed as a man life. All merely physical knowledge is technical, couched in a
cloak, in riotous glorification of things "as they are," in in- technical vocabulary communicable only to the few. Even physi-
timidation of all dissenters-ways which depress and dissipate cal knowledge which does affect human conduct, which do~s
thought all the more effectually because they,operate with subtle modify what we do and undergo, is also technical and remote m
and unconscious pervasiveness. the degree in which its bearings are not understood ~nd ~~ed.
The backwardness of social knowledge is marked in its divi- The sunlight, rain, air and soil have always entered m visible
sion into independent and insulated branches of learning. An- ways into human experience; atoms and molecules and cells and
thropology, history, sociology, morals, economics, political sci- most other things with which the sciences are occupied affect us,
ence, go their own ways without constant and systematized but not visibly. Because they enter life and modify experien~e in
fruitful interaction. Only in appearance is there a similar division imperceptible ways, and their conseque?ce~ ar~ not realized,
in physical knowledge. There is continuous cross-fertilization speech about them is technical; commumcatwn is by means of
between astronomy, physics, chemistry and the biological sci- peculiar symbols. One would think, then, that a fundamental
ences. Discoveries and improved methods are so recorded and and ever-operating aim would be to translate knowledge of the
organized that constant exchange and intercommunication take subject-matter of physical conditions into terms which are gener-
place. The isolation of the humane subjects from one another is ally understood, into signs denoting human consequences of ser-
connected with their aloofness from physical knowledge. The vices and disservices rendered. For ultimately all consequences
mind still draws a sharp separation between the world in which which enter human life depend upon physical conditions; they
man lives and the life of man in and by that world, a cleft re- can be understood and mastered only as the latter are taken into
flected in the separation of man himself into a body and a mind, account. One would think, then, that any state of affairs which
which, it is currently supposed, can be known and dealt with tends to render the things of the environment unknown and in-
apart. That for the past three centuries energy should have gone communicable by human beings in terms of their own activities
chiefly into physical inquiry, beginning with the things most re- and sufferings would be deplored as a disaster; that it wo.ul.d be
mote from man such as heavenly bodies, was to have been ex- felt to be intolerable, and to be put up with only as far as it is, at
pected. The history of the physical sciences reveals a certain or- any given time, inevitable.
der in which they developed. Mathematical tools had to be But the facts are to the contrary. Matter and the material are
employed before a new astronomy could be constructed. Physics words which in the minds of many convey a note of disparage-
advanced when ideas worked out in connection with the solar ment. They are taken to be foes of whatever is of ideal val~e in
system were used to describe happenings on the earth. Chemis- life instead of as conditions of its manifestation and sustamed
try waited on the advance of physics; the sciences of living things bei~g. In consequence of this division, they do become in fact
required the material and methods of physics and chemistry in enemies for whatever is consistently kept apart from human val-
order to make headway. Human psychology ceased to· be chiefly ues dep;esses thought and renders values sparse and pr~carious
speculative opinion only when biological and physiological con- in fact. There are even some who regard the matenahsm and
clusions were available. All this is natural and seemingly inevita- dominance of commercialism of modern life as fruits of undue
ble. Things which had the most outlying and indirect connection devotion to physical science, not seeing that the split between
with human interests had to be mastered in some degree before man and nature, artificially made by <i tradition which originated
inquiries could competently converge upon man himself. before there was understanding of the physical conditions that
Nevertheless the course of development has left us of this age are the medium of human activities, is the benumbing factor.
in a plight. When we say that a subject of science is technically The most influential form of the divorce is separation between
specialized, or that it is highly "abstract," what we practically pure and applied science. Since "application" signifies recog-
mean is that it is not conceived in terms of its bearing upon hu- nized bearing upon human experience and well-being, honor of
344 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY 345

what is "pure" and contempt for what is "applied" has for its lum of refuge, a shirking of responsibility. The true purity of
outcome a science which is remote and technical, communicable knowledge exists not when it is uncontaminated by contact with
only to specialists, and a conduct of human affairs which is hap- use and service. It is wholly a moral matter, an affair of honesty,
hazard, biased, unfair in distribution of values. What is applied impartiality and generous breadth of intent in search and com-
and employed as the alternative to knowledge in regulation of munication. The adulteration of knowledge is due not to its use,
society is ignorance, prejudice, class-interest and accident. Sci- but to vested bias and prejudice, to one-sidedness of outlook, to
ence is converted into knowledge in its honorable and emphatic vanity, to conceit of possession and authority, to contempt or
sense only in application. Otherwise it is truncated, blind, dis- disregard of human concern in its use. Humanity is not, as was
torted. When it is then applied, it is in ways which explain the once thought, the end for which all things were formed; it is but
unfavorable sense so often attached to "application" and the a slight and feeble thing, perhaps an episodic one, in the vast
"utilitarian": namely, use for pecuniary ends to the profit of stretch of the universe. But for man, man is the centre of interest
a few. and the measure of importance. The magnifying of the physical
At present, the application of physical science is rather to hu- realm at the cost of man is but an abdication and a flight. To
man concerns than in them. That is, it is external, made in the make physical science a rival of human interests is bad enough,
interests of its consequences for a possessing and acquisitive for it forms a diversion of energy which can ill be afforded. But
class. Application in life would signify that science was absorbed the evil does not stop there. The ultimate harm is that the under-
and distributed; that it was the instrumentality of that com- standing by man of his own affairs and his ability to direct them
mon understanding and thorough communication which is the are sapped at their root when knowledge of nature is discon-
precondition of the existence of a genuine and effective pub- nected from its human function.
lic. The use of science to regulate industry and trade has gone on It has been implied throughout that knowledge is communica-
steadily. The scientific revolution of the seventeenth century was tion as well as understanding. I well remember the saying of a
the precursor of the industrial revolution of the eighteenth and man, uneducated from the standpoint of the schools, in speaking
nineteenth. In consequence, man has suffered the impact of an of certain matters: "Sometime they will be found out and not
enormously enlarged control of physical energies without any only found out, but they will be known." The schools may sup-
corresponding ability to control himself and his own affairs. pose that a thing is known when it is found out. My old friend
Knowledge divided against itself, a science to whose incomplete- was aware that a thing is fully known only when it is published,
ness is added an artificial split, has played its part in generating shared, socially accessible. Record and communication are indis-
enslavement of men, women and children in factories in which pensable to knowledge. Knowledge cooped up in a private con-
they are animated machines to tend inanimate machines. It has sciousness is a myth, and knowledge of social phenomena is pe-
maintained sordid slums, flurried and discontented careers, culiarly dependent upon dissemination, for only by distribution
grinding poverty and luxurious wealth, brutal exploitation of can such knowledge be either obtained or tested. A fact of com-
nature and man in times of peace and high explosives and nox- munity life which is not spread abroad so as to be a common
ious gases in times of war. Man, a child in understanding of him- possession is a contradiction in terms. Dissemination is some-
self, has placed in his hands physical tools of incalculable power. thing other than scattering at large. Seeds are sown, not by virtue
He plays with them like a child, and whether they work harm or of being thrown out at random, but by being so distributed as to
good is largely a matter of accident. The instrumentality be- take root and have a chance of growth. Communication of the
comes a master and works fatally as if possessed of a will of its results of social inquiry is the same thing as the formation of
own-not because it has a will but because man has not. public opinion. This marks one of the first ideas framed in the
The glorification of "pure" science under such conditions is a growth of political democracy as it will be one of the last to be
rationalization of an escape; it marks a construction of an asy- fulfilled. For public opinion is judgment which is formed and en-
 346 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY 347

tertained by those who constitute the public and is about public Moreover, inquiry must be as nearly contemporaneous as pos-
affairs. Each of the two phases imposes for its realization condi- sible· otherwise it is only of antiquarian interest. Knowledge of
tions hard to meet. hist;ry is evidently necessary for connectedness of knowledge.
Opinions and beliefs concerning the public presuppose effec- But history which is not brought down close to the actual scene
tive and organized inquiry. Unless there are methods for detect- of events leaves a gap and exercises influence upon the formation
ing the energies which are at work and tracing them through an of judgments about the public interest only by guess-work about
intricate network of interactions to their consequences, what intervening events. Here, only too conspicuously, is a limitation
passes as public opinion will be "opinion" in its derogatory sense of die existing social sciences. Their material comes too late, too
rather than truly public, no matter how widespread the opinion far after the event, to enter effectively into the formation of pub-
is. The number who share error as to fact and who partake of a lic opinion about the immediate public concern and what is to be
false belief measures power for harm. Opinion casually formed done about it.
and formed under the direction of those who have something at A glance at the situation shows that the physical and external
stake in havi'ng a lie believed can be public opinion only in name. means of collecting information in regard to what is happening
Calling it by this name, acceptance of the name as a kind of war- in the world have far outrun the intellectual phase of inquiry and
rant, magnifies its capacity to lead action estray. The more who organization of its results. Telegraph, telephone, and now the ra-
share it, the more injurious its influence. Public opinion, even if it dio, cheap and quick mails, the printing press, capable of swift
happens to be correct, is intermittent when it is not the product reduplication of material at low cost, have attained a remarkable
of methods of investigation and reporting constantly at work. It development. But when we ask what sort of material is recorded
appears only in crises. Hence its "rightness" concerns only an and how it is organized, when we ask about the intellectual form
immediate emergency. Its lack of continuity makes it wrong from in which the material is presented, the tale to be told is very dif-
the standpoint of the course of events. It is as if a physician were ferent. "News" signifies something which has just happened, and
able to deal for the moment with an emergency in disease but which is new just because it deviates from the old and regular.
could not adapt his treatment of it to the underlying conditions But its meaning depends upon relation to what it imports, to
which brought it about. He may then "cure" the disease-that what its social consequences are. This import cannot be deter-
is, cause its present alarming symptoms to subside-but he does mined unless the new is placed in relation to the old, to what has
not modify its causes; his treatment may even affect them for the happened and been integrated into the course of events. Without
worse. Only continuous inquiry, continuous in the sense of being coordination and consecutiveness, events are not events, but
connected as well as persistent, can provide the material of en- mere occurrences, intrusions; an event implies that out of which
during opinion about public matters. a happening proceeds. Hence even if we discount the influence of
There is a sense in which "opinion" rather than knowledge, private interests in procuring suppression, secrecy and misrepre-
even under the most favorable circumstances, is the proper term sentation, we have here an explanation of the triviality and "sen-
to use-namely, in the sense of judgment, estimate. For in its sational" quality of so much of what passes as news. The cata-
strict sense, knowledge can refer only to what has happened and strophic, namely, crime, accident, family rows, personal clashes
been done. What is still to be done involves a forecast of a future and conflicts, are the most obvious forms of breaches of continu-
still contingent, and cannot escape the liability to error in judg- ity; they supply the element of shock which is the strictest mean-
ment involved in all anticipation of probabilities. There may well ing of sensation; they are the new par excellence, even though
be honest divergence as to policies to be pursued, even when only the date of the newspaper could inform us whether they
plans spring from knowledge of the same facts. But genuinely happened last year or this, so completely are they isolated from
public policy cannot be generated unless it be informed by their connections.
knowledge, and this knowledge does not exist except when there So accustomed are we to this method of collecting, recording
is systematic, thorough, and well-equipped search and record. and presenting social changes, that it may well sound ridiculous
 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS
SEARCH FOR THE GREAT COMMUNITY 349

to say that a genuine social science would manifest its reality in Just as in the conduct of industry and exchange general~! th_e
the daily press, while learned books and articles supply and pol- technological factor is obscured, deflected and d~f~ated by bust-
ish tools of inquiry. But the inquiry which alone can furnish ness," so specifically in the management of p~bl~ctty. T~e gather-
knowledge as a precondition of public judgments must be con- ing and sale of subject-matter having _a pubhc tmport ts part of
temporary and quotidian. Even if social sciences as a specialized the existing pecuniary system. Just as mdustry conducted_ by en-
apparatus of inquiry were more advanced than they are, they gineers on a factual technological basis woul~ be a very dt~erent
would be comparatively impotent in the office of directing opin- thing from what it actually is, so the assemblmg a1_1d r~portmg of
ion On matters of C<?ncern to the public as long as they are re- news would be a very different thing if the genume mterests of
mote from application in the daily and unremitting assembly and reporters were permitted to work freely. . . .
interpretation of "news." On the other hand, the tools of social One aspect of the matter concerns particularly the stde of dts-
inquiry will be clumsy as long as they are forged in places and semination. It is often said, and with a great appearance of truth,
under conditions remote from contemporary events. that the freeing and perfecting of inquiry would not ?ave an~ e~­
What has been said about the formation of ideas and judg- pecial effect. For, it is argued, th~ ~as~ of the readmg pubhc ts
ments concerning the public apply as well to the distribution of not interested in learning and asstmtlatmg the results of accurate
the knowledge which makes it an effective possession of the investigation. Unless t~ese are read, they cann~t seriously a~e~t
members of the public. Any separation between the two sides of the thought and action of members of the pubhc; they remam m
the problem is artificial. The discussion of propaganda and prop- secluded library alcoves, and are studied and understood only by
agandism would alone, however, demand a volume, and could a few intellectuals. The objection is well taken save as the po-
be written only by one much more experienced than the present tency of art is taken into account. A technic~l high-~row prese~­
writer. Propaganda can accordingly only be mentioned, with the tation would appeal only to those techmcally htgh-brow; tt
remark that the present situation is one unprecedented in history. would not be news to the masses. Presentation is fundamentally
The political forms of democracy and quasi-democratic habits of important, and presentation is a question of ~rt. A newspaper
thought on social matters have compelled a certain amount of which was only a daily edition of a quarterly Journal_ o~ soct~l­
public discussion and at least the simulation of general consulta- ogy or political science would undoubtedly possess a hmtted c1r- ·
tion in arriving at political decisions. Representative government culation and a narrow influence. Even at that, however, the mere
must at least seem to be founded on public interests as they .are existence and accessibility of such material would have some reg-
revealed to public belief. The days are past when government can ulative effect. But we can look much further than that. The mate-
be carried on without any pretense of ascertaining the wishes of rial would have such an enormous and widespread human bear-
the governed. In theory, their assent must be secured. Under the ing that its bare existence would be an ~rresistible invitation to a
older forms, there was no need to muddy the sources of opinion presentation of it which would have a dt_rect popular appeal. _The
on political matters. No current of energy flowed from them. To- freeing of the artist in literary presentatiOn, m other words, ts. as
day the judgments popularly formed on political matters are so
much a precondition of the desirable creation ?f ~deq~ate opt~­
important, in spite of all factors to the contrary, that there is ion on public matters as is the freeing of soctal mqmry. Men s
an enormous premium upon all methods which affect their conscious life of opinion and judgment often proceeds on a su-
formation.
perficial and trivial plane. But their lives reach a deeper level.
The smoothest road to control of political conduct is by con- The function of art has always been to break through the crust
trol of opinion. As long as interests of pecuniary profit are of conventionalized and routine consciousness. Common things,
powerful, and a public has not located and identified itself, those a flower, a gleam of moonlight, the song of a bird, not thin?s rare
who have this interest will have an unresisted motive for tamper- and remote, are means with which the deeper levels of l~fe are
ing with the springs of political action in all that affects them. touched so that they spring up as desire and thought. Thts pro-
 350 THE PUBLIC AND ITS PROBLEMS

cess is art. Poetr!, t~e dra~a, the novel, are proofs that the prob- 6. The Problem of Method
lem of presentatiOn IS not msoluble. Artists have always been the
~eal pur:ey~rs of news, for ~t is. not t~e outward happening in
Itself which. Is .new, but the kmdlmg by It of emotion, perception
and appreciatiOn .
. We ha~e but touched lightly and in passing upon the condi-
tiOns which mu~t be fulfilled if the Great Society is to become a
G~eat Comm_un!ty; a society in which the ever-expanding and in-
tncatel~ ramifymg consequences of associated activities shall be
known m ~he full sense of that word, so that an organized artic- Perhaps to most, probably to many, the conclusions
u!ate P~bhc. comes into being. The highest and most clifficult which have been stated as to the conditions upon which depends
kmd of I~qu~ry and a subtle, delicate, vivid and responsive art ~f the emergence of the Public from its eclipse will seem close to
commum~a~wn must take possession of the physical machinery denial of the possibility of realizing the idea of a democratic pub-
of tra?smisswn and circulation and breathe life into it. When the lic. One might indeed point for what it is worth to the enormous
ma~hme age has thus perfected its machinery it will be a means obstacles with which the rise of a science of physical things was
of hfe and not its despotic master. Democracy will come into its confronted a few short centuries ago, as evidence that hope need
own, for_ democrac~ is a ~arne for a life of free and enriching not be wholly desperate nor faith wholly blind. But we are not
commu~wn. It had Its seer m Walt Whitman. It will have its con- concerned with prophecy but with analysis. It is enough for pres-
summatiOn when free social inquiry is indissolubly wedded to ent purposes if the problem has been clarified:-if we have seen
the art of full and moving communication. that the outstanding problem of the Public is discovery and iden-
tification of itself, and if we have succeeded, in however groping
a manner, in apprehending the conditions upon which the resolu-
tion of the problem depends. We shall conclude with suggesting
some implications and corollaries as to method, not, indeed, as
to the method of resolution, but, once more, the intellectual an-
tecedents of such a method.
The preliminary to fruitful discussion of social matters is that
certain obstacles shall be overcome, obstacles residing in our
present conceptions of the method of social inquiry. One of the
obstructions in the path is the seemingly engrained notion that
the first and the last problem which must be solved is the relation
of the individual and the social:-or that the outstanding ques-
tion is to determine the relative merits of individualism and col-
lective or of some compromise between them. In fact, both
words, individual and social, are hopelessly ambiguous, and the
ambiguity will never cease as long as we think in terms of an
antithesis.
In its approximate sense, anything is individual which moves
and acts as a unitary thing. For common sense, a certain spatial
separateness is the mark of this individuality. A thing is one