As they pertain to author Kwane Anthony Appiah’s work, Cosmopolitanism, two questions have been posed to us for our first blog entry: Does everybody matter? What about people within corporate America’s supply chain?
Appiah defines cosmopolitanism, in part, not as worldliness or the opposite of provincialism, but a respect for various cultural perspectives. Cosmopolitanism is in contrast to positivism, which is grounded in the age of science that became prevalent in the West. The positivist’s view is from the angle of privilege and superiority, one in which scientific certainty is a dominant and important value. From a positivist’s view, the cultures that place the most value on scientific certainty are right and better than other cultures.
Another key element in Appiah’s definition of cosmopolitanism is that we are all citizens of the planet and part of a global tribe. Though this concept might strike many Westerners as unusual and new, it shares similarities with an old American one, which I heard some twenty years ago from one of my most influential teachers, Harley Swiftdeer, who taught me an expression that closely parallels Appiah’s view and takes it even further: “Mitakye oyosin,” which loosely translated means, “We are all related” or “All are my relations.”
Swiftdeer, who was a “metis” or mixed-blood Cherokee and was considered to be a holy man by the people in his community, was also one of the few people I ever knew who tried to live that relatedness consciously everyday. Most of us do not. However, few of us, if asked, would disagree with the notion that everybody matters. Swiftdeer saw himself not only as part of his immediate community’s circle, but also as part of the greater world circle – a great “Medicine Wheel,” on which each part was equally important, and therefore, mattered, and no one part was superior to another.
Appiah discusses the definitions of and the distinctions between facts, beliefs, values and desires, and describes desire, in part, as being how we would like the world to be. Swiftdeer’s experience with relatedness was not simply a desire or merely a component of a cultural belief system that was handed down to him. It also was observable to him and was based on the science that we “two-leggeds”, as he called us humans, all carry the same human DNA and a genetic blueprint, which the latest scientific theory traces all of us back to an early ancestral migration out of Africa.
So, yes, as we are all related, we all matter. Regardless of whether that view of relatedness is from a science-based or cosmopolitan perspective, we all matter – but to what degree we matter and in comparison to what are arguable points from individual to individual. And this is where we are confronted with our values. We might agree that we all matter, but we might attach more value to someone or something that matters more to us.
For example, as members of a consumer society, we might place more value on acquiring that trendy pair of Nike shoes from Wal-Mart at a cheap price than we value the person who assembled them at the factory under conditions of which we are not even aware. However, as Nike executives discovered a few years ago, many of us do not value shoes above a human being. Many of us are willing – or we say we are willing – to pay more money for that product or seek it elsewhere if doing so will alleviate substandard working conditions.
Raised in the old traditional ways that imbued him with rich metaphors, Swiftdeer, who did not hear English spoken until he went to elementary school, use to say, “Our task is to leave only moccasin prints when we walk this earth. And that’s a hard thing to do.”
By that, Swiftdeer meant that we must do no harm. It is indeed a hard thing to do. Our smallest actions can impact the lives of others in far-reaching and profound ways. Swiftdeer’s view of the earth as sacred mother and its human inhabitants as relatives contrasts sharply with some (fortunately not all) corporate views of the earth as a receptacle of resources and most of its human inhabitants as cheap, disposable labor.
When I contemplate the moccasin metaphor as an indicator of our actions, values and consciousness, I am aware that I occupy that borderland of being part of the problem and part of the solution. The fact that I own a pair of shoes makes me a wealthy woman compared to most of the inhabitants of third world countries. Yes, my consumption creates jobs. Somewhere in the world someone bought a loaf of bread or a bag of rice because I bought that pair of shoes. However, I don’t always know if the exchange was fair or if I contributed to the abysmal conditions in a sweatshop. I don’t know if I left something more damaging than moccasin prints in the life of that person – a person who is not an “other” but is someone to whom I am related.
Though their words are different, Appiah and Swiftdeer speak of the same concept – an awareness and acknowledgment of a greater community and a respect for that community, in which we are all interconnected and related and all matter. Our moccasin prints and our actions as PR practitioners must be not only as advocates of our corporate clients but also as guardians of their integrity and protectors of the human dignity of those who work for them – all of which is also related.
Appiah defines cosmopolitanism, in part, not as worldliness or the opposite of provincialism, but a respect for various cultural perspectives. Cosmopolitanism is in contrast to positivism, which is grounded in the age of science that became prevalent in the West. The positivist’s view is from the angle of privilege and superiority, one in which scientific certainty is a dominant and important value. From a positivist’s view, the cultures that place the most value on scientific certainty are right and better than other cultures.
Another key element in Appiah’s definition of cosmopolitanism is that we are all citizens of the planet and part of a global tribe. Though this concept might strike many Westerners as unusual and new, it shares similarities with an old American one, which I heard some twenty years ago from one of my most influential teachers, Harley Swiftdeer, who taught me an expression that closely parallels Appiah’s view and takes it even further: “Mitakye oyosin,” which loosely translated means, “We are all related” or “All are my relations.”
Swiftdeer, who was a “metis” or mixed-blood Cherokee and was considered to be a holy man by the people in his community, was also one of the few people I ever knew who tried to live that relatedness consciously everyday. Most of us do not. However, few of us, if asked, would disagree with the notion that everybody matters. Swiftdeer saw himself not only as part of his immediate community’s circle, but also as part of the greater world circle – a great “Medicine Wheel,” on which each part was equally important, and therefore, mattered, and no one part was superior to another.
Appiah discusses the definitions of and the distinctions between facts, beliefs, values and desires, and describes desire, in part, as being how we would like the world to be. Swiftdeer’s experience with relatedness was not simply a desire or merely a component of a cultural belief system that was handed down to him. It also was observable to him and was based on the science that we “two-leggeds”, as he called us humans, all carry the same human DNA and a genetic blueprint, which the latest scientific theory traces all of us back to an early ancestral migration out of Africa.
So, yes, as we are all related, we all matter. Regardless of whether that view of relatedness is from a science-based or cosmopolitan perspective, we all matter – but to what degree we matter and in comparison to what are arguable points from individual to individual. And this is where we are confronted with our values. We might agree that we all matter, but we might attach more value to someone or something that matters more to us.
For example, as members of a consumer society, we might place more value on acquiring that trendy pair of Nike shoes from Wal-Mart at a cheap price than we value the person who assembled them at the factory under conditions of which we are not even aware. However, as Nike executives discovered a few years ago, many of us do not value shoes above a human being. Many of us are willing – or we say we are willing – to pay more money for that product or seek it elsewhere if doing so will alleviate substandard working conditions.
Raised in the old traditional ways that imbued him with rich metaphors, Swiftdeer, who did not hear English spoken until he went to elementary school, use to say, “Our task is to leave only moccasin prints when we walk this earth. And that’s a hard thing to do.”
By that, Swiftdeer meant that we must do no harm. It is indeed a hard thing to do. Our smallest actions can impact the lives of others in far-reaching and profound ways. Swiftdeer’s view of the earth as sacred mother and its human inhabitants as relatives contrasts sharply with some (fortunately not all) corporate views of the earth as a receptacle of resources and most of its human inhabitants as cheap, disposable labor.
When I contemplate the moccasin metaphor as an indicator of our actions, values and consciousness, I am aware that I occupy that borderland of being part of the problem and part of the solution. The fact that I own a pair of shoes makes me a wealthy woman compared to most of the inhabitants of third world countries. Yes, my consumption creates jobs. Somewhere in the world someone bought a loaf of bread or a bag of rice because I bought that pair of shoes. However, I don’t always know if the exchange was fair or if I contributed to the abysmal conditions in a sweatshop. I don’t know if I left something more damaging than moccasin prints in the life of that person – a person who is not an “other” but is someone to whom I am related.
Though their words are different, Appiah and Swiftdeer speak of the same concept – an awareness and acknowledgment of a greater community and a respect for that community, in which we are all interconnected and related and all matter. Our moccasin prints and our actions as PR practitioners must be not only as advocates of our corporate clients but also as guardians of their integrity and protectors of the human dignity of those who work for them – all of which is also related.
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