Relational Lockdown

“When a nation undergoes occupation by a foreign army, for example, some formerly reliable citizens begin to co-operate with the enemy, perhaps for the rewards that such co-operation promises, perhaps out of fear. Especially when the foreign occupation has a criminal character, it becomes exceedingly difficult for ordinary citizens to maintain their customary honesty and sound moral habits. Cynicism is forced upon them; they must defend themselves on all sides, and feel great pressure to narrow their sphere of moral action to life in the family and among trusted friends”

(Michael Novak, “A Universal Culture of Human Rights and Freedom’s Habits: Caritapolis” a contribution to “Making Globalization Good”, John H.Dunning, Oxford University Press 2003)

I have never lived in a nation under foreign occupation, but this phenomenon feels uncannily familiar.

In Novak’s scenario, the citizen-enemy relationship is crisply defined and the relational lockdown is an obvious resolution for becoming neither the perpetrator nor the recipient of further betrayal.

But life in our increasingly globalised world is far less straightforward. We have created technologies that feed our own expectations. We both want, and are expected to deliver, everything, anywhere, right now. Oh, and for a good price. How do we do it? Well we don’t really do we. The confusion and illusions need only last until the robber is out of reach. And when the smoke clears we find ourselves on our backsides in a muddy pool of conveniently ill-defined roles with our own identities left shaken and our relationships feeling at best misunderstood and at worst betrayed.

For the Globalised Citizen it seems we must add to the temptation of reward and the terror of fear, a third explanatory factor:

Not really understanding who the enemy is.

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