Our loyalty to … larger groups will, however, weaken, or even vanish altogether, when things get really tough. Then people whom we once thought of as like ourselves will be excluded. Sharing food with impoverished people down the street is natural and right in normal times, but perhaps not in a famine, when doing so amounts to disloyalty to one's family. The tougher things get, the more ties of loyalty to those near at hand tighten, and the more those to everyone else slacken (PCP, 42).
Following the pragmatist insight that beliefs are habits of action, Rorty contends that to hold a belief simply means that one is inclined to act in certain ways and not in others. Thus, "to believe that someone is 'one of us,' a member of our moral community, is to exhibit readiness to come to their assistance when they are in need" (Rorty 1996, 13). Thus "an answer to the question 'who are we?' which is to have any moral significance, has to be one which takes money into account" (Rorty 1996, 14).
This helps to explain why Rorty calls for a return to the reformist Left of the 1960s in America, when universities and unions found common cause. What Rorty calls the "cultural Left" – the contemporary, academic left – is plagued by two related problems. First, it has ignored economic inequality (Rorty's shorthand for which is "selfishness") and focused on other, identity-based forms of inequality (Rorty's shorthand for which is "sadism"). While Rorty thinks attempting to ameliorate racial and gender inequality is a laudable goal, he laments the fact that this focus has displaced the focus on economic inequality. Second, Rorty worries that the cultural left tries to theorize its way "into political relevance," and thereby adopts a "spectatorial approach" (AOC, 94). In so doing, it prioritizes knowledge over hope. Thus, Rorty enjoins the cultural Left to abandon its spectatorial approach by abandoning theory and reviving its hope in the promise of America.
A reinvigorated Left would have to reclaim the sort of pride in America that animated the work of the reformist Left. Rorty opens Achieving Our Country (1998) by writing,
National pride is to countries what self-respect is to individuals: a necessary condition for self-improvement. Too much national pride can produce bellicosity and imperialism, just as excessive self-respect can produce arrogance. But just as too little self-respect makes it difficult for a person to display moral courage, so insufficient national pride makes energetic and effective debate about national policy unlikely (AOC, 3).
While philosophical theorizing about America is a symptom of hopelessness, engaging in debates about what America can do and become represents a hopeful attitude that he thinks is required for social progress.
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