Individualism in a Modern, Corporate Age: Essential Characteristics - Essay Example

May 08, 2006 Individualism in a Modern, Corporate Age: Essential Characteristics What does it mean to be an individual in our present, modern times Under a mass of information and incredibly rapid technological changes and advances, an individual can easily get lost. But this sense of certain aimlessness except when it comes to financial goals in life, leads us to think about what could fill this gap. In order to give some preliminaries to the question of this essay-namely-what does it mean to be an individual in a corporate age, I need to state some introductory points based on John Dewey's philosophy of Individualism. Our modern age has proceeded from the Industrial Revolution of the 1800's. But we need to go back further in history in order to understand the development of human consciousness and morals up to this point. It is easier to do this if we follow Dewey's demarcation of the Individualism into Old and New. According to Dewey, the Old Individualism has proceeded from the feudal age and Medieval times. At those times, Church was a central institution that governed man's life. The central aim of the Church was a salvation of individual soul. The prevailing belief was in the eternal nature of the soul and in the importance of its salvation. To compare this belief with the Industrial age, in the modern times the main aim of man's life is financial prosperity. Thus the results are centered on the here and now, as opposed to them being centered on the after-life. However, since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution Church has lost much of its power in the society. Apart from philosophies of Utilitarianism in Europe, there has been no central unifying philosophy to explain the morals of the modern age and what our goals should be. Of course, In the United States of America, with the Founding Fathers, there is a philosophy of liberty and rights of the individual that were set forth in the American Constitution. This philosophy is still valid, but there needs to be a connection between it and the morals of the modern man in our times. The definition of the morals is what we are lacking. Our present age-the Age of Information-is moving at an even faster pace than when Dewey was writing his analysis of the contemporary American society, in the 1950ies. However, his lucid analysis is still extremely applicable to our times. From the beginnings of the Industrial Age in 1800's, we have moved to the present corporate age, with incredible technological and scientific advances that we see every day. Our pace of life is equally fast, and people tend to change careers at least three times (if not more) in their lifetime. What we have completely moved away from is religion as the basis of our actions. Religion is no longer a unifying factor in the society, and in fact has not been for hundreds of years. What we see in our society today is different groups of people getting back to the religion and trying to unify under different religious and theological beliefs: some of these groups are dogmatic, some of them are impractical and withdrawn from participation in the society at large, some of them follow orthodox religions, but there is no general sense of unity at all. However, one can still see a trend in society whereby the focus is on doing some good for others while one is financially stable, such as in charities, while in the Medieval times the focus was on salvation of the individual soul. Dewey has commented that this is partly due to the fact that the rich might feel guilty and thus to relieve their guilt contribute to charities, but he has also stated that there exists a basic need for solidarity in man. I have to admit that I have had hard time believing this, as he never gave any proof for the last statement, until I did some thinking of my own. Even religion today, as dispersed into different groups as it may be, is focused more on the good for humanity, or society, or at least people other than oneself. The focus is thus on practical help-for example food delivery to the countries such as in Africa, help to the war-torn countries, educational help for the inner-city poor children in the United States, etc. This is, however, the result of financial stability, and I believe that there is an innate desire in man, at least in our, democratic, times, to help others less fortunate when he himself is well off. We will come back to this point later in discussion of essential characteristics of modern individualism. As the science progresses, and information is the currency of our society, we need to use our minds in our daily lives. The reason for this is simple: the methods in our society, be they industrial and related to machines, or related to our personal lives, are technological. Our daily lives depend on a daily basis on scientific innovations. This is a constant in modern life: almost everything is computerized and is becoming more so. In order to truly exercise our individuality in such times, we need to use our reason and thinking that may be called scientific-as science is based on reason. This is not something that everybody at present is doing; the consequences are a certain loss of individuality. If people accept certain choices because their neighbors have made the same choice, or because the TV ad had subliminally suggested it to them, and they do not stop to think whether they really want that, they do not really exercise freedom of choice. This leads to "serial identity"-everybody seems to be the same. Our times are actually, if it may be so said, intelligent times. If we do not exercise our intellect in making choices, we run the risk of becoming almost like a serial number-and we lose part of our individuality. With weakening of the power of religion, to the point that it almost has nothing to do with our modern lives, we need to exercise our judgment in terms of right and wrong. But this is increasingly hard to do, as we are saturated with information, and the only reason one can see for obeying the law is that it is a law. There is no moral explanation why we should not, for example, steal, except that common sense tells us that it is wrong. If we have no religion to resort to, we need to rely on our common sense. Instead of religion, state should act to unify people. But people cannot be unified unless they feel that they participate in the shared life. These morals should both spring from our sense of right and wrong, and from exercising responsibility in seeing how we affect others in our community. Our communal rules need to make sense to us, and if we see the results of our positive contributions to the community, and subsequently the results of negative actions, (i.e. corporate fraud can lead to loss of income for many people), we are more likely to choose positive contributions. There is no all-encompassing moral compass, and thus all the more we need to exercise our judgment. The onus in our age is on the individual. Despite of the fact that we are a democratic society, the society is comprised of many individuals. Today, as individuals, we have more freedoms than ever in the history of civilization: the freedom to choose education, career, lifestyle, what kinds of groups one wishes to belong to, marital situation, etc. There is no pressure as in former times from the Church, and we have political freedoms. Thus-the choices that we have are extremely plentiful. To be an individual in this almost confusing situation means to make a choice. Our choices need to be based on our preferences. The consequences of corporate culture are like a two-edged sword: on one hand we have many possibilities, but on the other hand, if we do not make a choice that suits us, we surrender our individuality and become lost in the masses. As a functional society needs to be based on functional individuals, we ourselves are the ones that have to decide which option to choose. This brings us to another point. In a functional society, we need to be functional individuals. This means that our actions need to have practical results. As we live in democracy, and are part of our communities, our actions can contribute to those communities. In return, we can feel a sense of social fulfillment and satisfaction: as man is a social being, affirming his identity in community or a society is what gives him satisfaction and a sense of fulfillment. In order for our actions to have effect, once again we need to deliberate and use our judgment, and the experiences that we have had living in the community or society. However, to reiterate, in order for an individual to feel a sense of satisfaction, his or her actions need to have concrete results that can also contribute to the community itself, either immediately or in the long run. So far we have seen that in order for individuality to be expressed within a community and modern society, we need to use scientific thinking and reasoning, exercise our judgment and sense of responsibility in moral matters, make choices based on our personal preferences, and be functional-where our actions yield concrete results. There is one more point to be made. We live in a democratic society. We can see, as individuals, more and more that our actions affect others in our community. At present, there are still very many inequalities in our society. In a true democratic society, everyone should have equal opportunity and the society in general should strive for equality of its members. However, financial circumstances are the main barrier to equality, as are things such as education, discrimination, vulnerability of certain groups within the society, etc. There is more effort to provide education to anyone who is interested in attaining one, and there is more effort on the side of socially conscious groups to end discrimination. The financial side of the matter is the last barrier. It is not likely that corporate heads will give up portion of their money in order to equalize with the poor. As true members of democratic society, however, we need to contribute to those perhaps less fortunate, those who are unable to work, those who are at risk. As society, we need to care for our members. This is not only necessary in order to equalize the huge financial gaps in our society. If an individual has achieved something in their career and life, in order to gain a sense of true satisfaction and feeling of belonging to society, they need to, in some way, give back to others, who are, perhaps, less fortunate, less accomplished, less educated, or are at a lower level of financial prosperity. I would say that our charities need to have more specific aims, but also an individual needs to know the results of her or his helpful actions upon the members who receive their help. This can be achieved if the actions are specific, and relevant to both the individual who is giving help as to the one who is receiving it. Thus the last requirement of modern individuality is giving back, in some way, to the community. In this discussion we have looked at the roots of old individualism, and witnessed the change of conditions to a modern, corporate age. The requirements, if it may be so said, for affirming one's individuality within a society, have greatly changed with the times. At present, in order to function in a parallel way to the direction the society is going, we need to minimally exercise five characteristics: we need to use our reason in order not to be overrun by scientific thinking and progress that is dominant in our society. We need to make choices based on personal preferences, in order not to get lost within mass. We need to exercise our judgment and personal responsibility in moral matters. We need to be functional within our society, where we can see the results of our actions as well as how they can affect others and contribute to our communities. And finally, once we have achieved something of worth, we need to give back to our communities in some way. If we are thus personally present and involved in our community, it is more likely that we will feel that our involvement in the community and our actions truly matter, and it is more likely that we will contribute to the forming of true democracy within our society. (2143 words) Read More