I email Stephen Steinlight: "Do you think there’s anything about the English language that helps create a good society or is it entirely coincidental that all English-speaking societies are pretty good places?"
Dr. Steinlight responds:
Luke:
Of course English-speaking societies deserve higher encomiums than your modest praise suggests — "pretty good places" (Luke-warm, I don’t doubt, to elicit a warmer endorsement from me) — and, no, it’s no coincidence. No other societies are nearly as livable, tolerant, free of tyranny, and less susceptible to fanaticism and political violence because no others are founded on the political, philosophical and social fruit of early modern British history, including the culmination of the English version of the Wars of Religion in the religious moderation for which England is justly famous, the early end of Monarchical absolutism (achieved without mass social revolution), and the Enlightenment. Or, to use a parallel chain of historical causation — the outcome of the English Civil War (especially the Army Debates and the emergence of true Parliamentary predominance), the Glorious Revolution, the lucky failure of England to follow the example of the French Revolution — all the way on to middle class political ascendancy and the Liberal reform of the Victorian period and the extension of political rights to all by the last Reform Act that placed Britain on the threshold of the 20th century — the darkest in human history — with a culture and set of institutions least likely to set on the path of mass madness.
All of which established a body of broadly shared values throughout the English-speaking world that, first and foremost, places absolute primacy on the rights of the individual (good old-fashioned social contract theory), limitation on the arbitrary power by the state, emphasis on the inviolability of private property, and the great emphasis we rightly attach to such things as religious liberty, freedom of conscience, and the "natural rights of Englishmen" reflected in our own Bill of Rights.
(Obviously I will be accused, in part rightly, of overlooking some glaring lapses: from slavery and the Middle Passage, the brutal and mindless destruction of native peoples, and colonialism all the way to the appeasement of Hitler and the excesses of anti-communism.) But I stand my ground in any case. One must judge by world standards, and by world standards the English-Speaking Union has been and is remarkably good.
These things lead us, appropriately, to view the countries of the English-Speaking Union (Great Britain, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the USA as having a special relationship and being particularly blessed. Language is of course a shorthand for all of this, but the language is also incomparably splendid and malleable — and has produced among a small percentage of humankind the greatest literature.
I think it necessary to add that while the genius of our culture and political system is unmistakeably a product of the legacy of British experience passed on to new worlds, it is not a matter of race or ethnicity or "Anglo-Saxon" culture. I believe we have been bequeathed a set values and forms of social organization and of governance that are ultimately propositional. If one buys into the propositions and embraces the values than one is a full member of the culture. Race or ethnicity has nothing whatever to do with it, as Jewish experience in America shows, or that of many other groups.
It may well be the case — and it is a cause of great concern — that those reared in certain counter-cultures, such as Muslims, are finally unmeltable; they represent an eternal antithesis to what we value most in our English-speaking world. So — while many can share in this experience — some cannot, and we must protect this cultural/political construct from those who would subvert or destroy it.
