China: intelectuais novamente pedem liberdade (vao ser reprimidos peloregime)

The New York Times, October 18, 2013, 1:16 am Comment

Q. & A.: Yang Fenggang on the ‘Oxford Consensus’ and Public Trust in China

By IAN JOHNSON

In late August, two dozen Chinese public intellectuals from four of the country’s main ideological schools — Confucian, New Left, Liberal and Christian — met at Oxford University’s Wycliffe Hall to discuss their country’s problems. Remarkably, for a group of people who in Chinese public life are often at each other’s throats, they came up with what is now being dubbed the “Oxford Consensus” — four theses expressing their hopes for a pluralistic, liberal China.

Purdue University/Andrew HancockYang Fenggang, a professor of sociology and director of Purdue’s Center on Religion and Chinese Society.

The statement is mild compared with more controversial documents like Charter 08, the brainchild of the imprisoned Nobel Peace laureate Liu Xiaobo. The consensus simply states the hope that China will remain committed to pluralism, as well as fairness and justice in the political realm. The full text is posted here.

The signatories include some of the country’s most prominent scholars and writers who publish and speak out on social issues, like Cheng Ming, a leading Neo-Confucian; the Christian sociologist He Guanghu; the New Left film critic Lü Xinyu; and the liberal philosopher Xu Youyu. The statement has not been widely reported in China, although a long feature appeared in the influential newspaper Southern People, or Nanfang Renwu, a sign perhaps that the initiative has not completely run afoul of the government’s continuing tightening of public discussion.

One of the participants was Yang Fenggang, a Christian and a pioneer in the study of the sociology of religion in China. Mr. Yang is a professor of sociology at Purdue University and director of its Center on Religion and Chinese Society, one of the most influential institutions studying religion in China, regularly hosting conferences and academic exchanges.

I recently spoke with Mr. Yang about the consensus and its meaning for public debate in China.

Q.

How did this get started?

A.

The founder is a Wenzhou Christian named Wang Wenfeng. He went to a seminary in Singapore, and that’s where he started the forum. The first three were there and were just about Christian theology. The fourth was in South Korea, and the previous one, the fifth, included Neo-Confucians. But this time they pulled in the New Left and Liberal groups, too.

Q.

In the West, this might be unremarkable — a group of intellectuals meet and issue a statement. What’s the significance?

A.

I think it is severalfold. The New Left and the Liberals, those public intellectuals have stopped talking to each other. When they get an invitation, one of the first questions is, Who else have you invited? If the invited people include those from the other camp, they won’t participate. It got to that level of tension. But this time, they willingly sat together for three full days.

Q.

Is this because it’s abroad?

A.

Well, on the surface, Oxford is attractive. No matter which camp you’re in, if it’s Oxford, it’s prestigious. Also the organizer, Wang Wenfeng, is really humble. He never got into disputes with any of them. That persuaded many.

Q.

In China, these political labels have different meanings than in the West. How would you define New Left and Liberal?

A.

It’s hard. The New Left, in my view, is different from the old Left or the Maoists. The New Left made clear that they don’t like to be called leftists. But they like to be called xinzuoyi, the left wing. Many ideas and terms are borrowed from the left in the West. They are critical of capitalism, imperialism, globalization. This is where they draw their theory, rather than the old Marxist, Leninist or Maoist theory. But every conversation they’ll turn to it being the fault of the U.S. Growing inequality, people losing houses — they’ll say it’s because of capitalism from the U.S.

Q.

And the Liberals, which some people call the “right”?

A.

They have classic liberal ideas: free markets, individual rights, constitutionalism. But, interestingly, there are some closer to the left. These people began to say things like: In the Chinese situation, we need a stronger government. Only a stronger government will make things happen.

I’d say there’s a new reshuffling of the camps. I personally came out of the meeting thinking there were only two camps: There are people who advocate a bigger role of the state and those who argue for individual rights. So I think statism and individual rights is a bigger division. So the four camps may not make as much sense. I can think of people from the Liberals who speak for the need of a stronger state. Neo-Confucians, most of them, argue for that, and even Christian scholars like Liu Xiaofeng have become strong advocates for a stronger state.

Q.

So all these people could sit together and talk.

A.

Yes, we managed to come up with this public statement. Even though there’s nothing big in it, that these four camps could form a consensus, that itself is important.

People in China talk about the country being torn apart, that’s how bitter the camps are. But here they can talk about it and start with what we have in common and then see what our differences are. I think this is needed in Chinese society at this point. The four points of consensus take into account the concerns of the Left, the Liberals, the Confucians and scholars of Christianity. Even though the language, everyone had to compromise. Nonetheless, you can see it expressed their views.

We had very interesting debates during the evenings. But there was this trust, and some people said, “It’s O.K., I trust you to formulate the language.” There was this feeling that they had to move forward and agree or else the country could be torn apart.

Q.

The choice is interesting. You have Christians or scholars of Christianity, but no representatives of traditional religions such as Daoism and Buddhism. Is there a lack of scholars in those areas?

A.

The main idea was, Who are the public intellectuals? Those who have a public voice in China. When you think of it, there are almost no Buddhist or Daoist public intellectuals. On Weibo I follow a lot of Buddhist monks, fashi. Almost none talk about public issues or concerns.

Q.

Why do you think that is? Are they co-opted by the government because they get more benefits from the government — for example in temple reconstruction, soft loans and so on?

A.

Certainly I think that’s an issue. They comply more to the government’s viewpoint. But also I think they may not be equipped to be part of this public debate. Active public intellectuals today are not only college-trained but have graduate degrees. But you’ll find few of them in Buddhism and Daoism.

Q.

This gets me thinking there isn’t much interfaith dialogue in China. You almost never see religious groups getting together to meet. It is like the party’s view is, if there’s a problem, tell us, and we’ll solve it, but don’t you guys start talking about it because it might develop into something independent, and we don’t want that.

A.

That’s something that came up in the discussions. There was a feeling that as long as we come up with something, it’s meaningful. We don’t know how the authorities will react, but at least we can show that we can work together. This group of people have the concern that the authorities may simply go their own way without taking any input. When we sat together we were conscious of this.

Q.

It’s interesting that Christians were included. Of course, it started as a Christian theological forum, but the participants from the other groups evidently felt it was appropriate to be talking to Christians and scholars of Christianity. The government sometimes views Christianity as a foreign religion and less favorably than other religions.

A.

A few years ago someone published a book which listed the main groups in China. It included the traditional Left, social democrats, socialism with Chinese characteristics, plus some newer groups — but no Christians. You could ignore Christianity because it had no social impact. But now Christians are part of the discussion. I see this as an introduction of Christian scholars to the public forum.

Q.

But wasn’t there the “cultural Christian” movement a decade ago?

A.

What they did was to introduce Christianity as a cultural phenomenon and a cultural resource, but not to express social or political concerns. It was cultural: theology, history and the arts. But this time it’s about expressing social and political concerns, like rule of law and that power should come from the people, equality, justice.

Q.

A key Christian contribution to this debate is the idea that rights are God-given and not state-given, meaning a state or government can’t take them away as it pleases. Was this brought up?

A.

Yes, definitely. An interesting case is He Guanghu. He signed Charter 08. He was the only scholar who studies religion who was among the initial signers. Since then he has been more public in making his position known. His Christian faith has become publicly known. For many years he tried not to say anything about it, but now he feels confident to be out.

Q.

When we talk about public intellectuals, how do you define that in China? Public space is limited in China, and Westerners often see it just in terms of Weibo. How do these intellectuals participate in public life?

A.

Weibo is one. Those who aren’t on Weibo participate in other ways. They get invitations to give talks, sometimes appear on television, or write articles to newspapers and magazines. And especially they participate in conferences. Interestingly, in China, the media pay attention to conferences. If a conference like this one here were in the West, journalists wouldn’t care about these sorts of things. But in China the media report on them. Conferences become platforms for people to express their concerns, and their voices can be heard.

Q.

What is the next phase? Will you meet again?

A.

They hope to hold another one, perhaps in Brazil, to put China in a global context. I think they hope to invite people from all four camps, but this consensus is thin, delicate. It depends how people react.

This is not like Charter 08 or anything like that. The language is very toned down. Even the old Left can’t really object. I think the government will not be able to say much about it.

Q.

Maybe in the future it’s not necessary to have a consensus, but just a platform to discuss topics. People should have different viewpoints, because no country has just one viewpoint, one consensus. The key is that people are expressing themselves in a polite, constructive way.

A.

That’s my thinking, too. In the future we could have real debate. We did have some debates and some interesting moments, but the general tone was most people felt this was hard to achieve and let’s maintain good relationships, rather than pushing one’s views too hard. So they want to start with this, but a healthy way is to have genuine debate, to show the differences — not emotional and sentimental, but to make good arguments. If that happens, it would be great. Hopefully this is the beginning for that.

===============

About Sinosphere

Sinosphere, the China blog of The New York Times, delivers intimate, authoritative coverage of the planet's most populous nation and its relationship with the rest of the world. Drawing on timely, engaging dispatches from The Times’ distinguished team of China correspondents, this blog brings readers into the debates and discussions taking place inside a fast-changing country and details the cultural, economic and political developments shaping the lives of 1.3 billion people.

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Q. & A.: Yang Fenggang on the ‘Oxford Consensus’ and Public Trust in China

A group of intellectuals who in Chinese public life are often at each other’s throats have come together to forge what is now being dubbed the “Oxford Consensus” — four theses expressing their hopes for a pluralistic, liberal China.

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Full Text of the Oxford Consensus 2013

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A frase do fim de semana: o peso dos economistas mortos - Hans-Hermann Hoppe

"Não sou fã de John Maynard Keynes. Mas creio que ele estava certo quando disse que
"as ideias dos economistas e filósofos políticos, estejam elas certas ou erradas, são mais poderosas do que comumente se percebe. Com efeito, elas governam o mundo quase sozinhas. Homens práticos, que se acreditam isentos de qualquer influência intelectual, costumam ser escravos de algum economista defunto". 
Ironicamente, ele mesmo, Keynes, é o economista defunto por excelência — emitindo, por sinal, ideias falsas —; aquele por quem os homens práticos de hoje são escravizados intelectualmente."

Hans-Hermann Hoppe
entrevista completa neste link: http://www.mises.org.br/Article.aspx?id=1646

Nao existem intelectuais no Brasil: Milton Simon Pires

Capturado no blog do meu amigo Orlando Tambosi:

Intelectuais? Não, apenas ideólogos.

Blog Orlando Tambosi, 13/05/2013

Milton Simon Pires, de Porto Alegre, envia nova colaboração em que discorre sobre a ideia de intelectual - para ele, uma categoria inexistente no Brasil:

Recentemente, numa das aulas do curso de espanhol que venho fazendo (talvez como preparo para a chegada dos colegas médicos cubanos..rss), surgiu um acalorado debate entre a turma. Queria o nosso professor, natural da Andaluzia, saber se no Brasil os intelectuais são suficientemente valorizados na sua atividade profissional. Respondi, causando “verdadeiro horror” nos colegas brasileiros, que não sabia como abordar a questão pois acreditava (e continuo acreditando) que não existem intelectuais no país faz muito tempo. A reação da turma aumentou ainda mais: perguntaram como podia eu dizer algo assim. Fizeram questão de lembrar que temos Chico Buarque, Luís Fernando Veríssimo e tantos outros dignos de receber esta designação: intelectuais. Fiquei perplexo! A primeira pergunta que fiz  foi:  o que vocês entendem pelo termo intelectuais? Não houve um só colega capaz de fazer a distinção correta entre ser um verdadeiro intelectual e alguém com “cultura geral”. Pois bem, nessas rápidas linhas, vamos tentar falar um pouco sobre a diferença e, como dizem os açougueiros, vamos por partes.

Na Europa dos séculos XII e XIII o conceito de universidade não era nem de perto algo próximo da vida do cidadão comum. Lugares como Bolonha, Paris e Oxford (apenas para citar as três mais antigas instituições de ensino superior) estavam tão distantes da realidade de um europeu como a NASA está de um brasileiro hoje.  O que havia de comum nessas escolas não era o que ensinavam, mas sim o perfil cultural de quem entrava nela – gente e mais gente que vivia, como diria Carl Sagan, num mundo assombrado pelos demônios. Em outras palavras, não havia forma de cultura que pudesse escapar da visão religiosa da sociedade. Seria exagero dizer que os alunos todos entravam na universidade com uma visão semelhante a respeito da vida? Todos eles acreditavam em Deus e viviam aterrorizados pela perspectiva do pecado e de uma eternidade no inferno. Nesse sentido, cabia à Universidade receber um “monte de gente que pensava igual” e mandar para o mundo um “monte de gente pensando diferente”. Foi para isso que a chamada cultura superior se organizou nas universidades. 

Dessas instituições saíram pessoas como Paracelso, Nicolau Copérnico, São Tomás de Aquino e tantos outros que mudaram a História. Isso foi possível porque lhes foi oferecido um ambiente de trabalho e estudo onde puderam exercitar a razão livremente. Suas idéias eram revolucionárias pelo fato de não partirem de nenhum tipo de cosmovisão. A história jamais foi para esses homens um gigantesco mecanismo, complexo como um grande relógio, a ser desmontado e compreendido através de regras e leis imutáveis – duvido muito que Hegel tivesse lugar de professor nos primórdios da universidade. É nessa, e absolutamente somente nessa hipótese, que pode alguém se tornar verdadeiramente um intelectual.

Quando afirmei aos meus colegas de curso que não existem intelectuais brasileiros há muito tempo, era isso que eu queria dizer. Era à morte de um pensamento brasileiro verdadeiramente original que eu estava me referindo. Isso aconteceu no país  em função da apropriação total da razão livre por um partido político. Afirmo (peremptoriamente, como gosta de dizer um certo governador gaúcho) não haver espaço para produção acadêmica dentro da universidade brasileira nas áreas de história, filosofia e ciência política, para aqueles que não têm uma interpretação marxista da realidade. Filiados ou não a essa organização criminosa chamada Partido dos Trabalhadores, os estudantes até podem buscar lugares como a UFRGS, USP ou UNICAMP com idéias diferentes, mas todos, ou a grande maioria, vão sair de lá lá pensando quase sempre a mesma coisa – Deus não existe, liberar as drogas pode ser algo bom, a Terra está aquecendo, viva o casamento gay e as ONGS, e por aí vai.

Em texto anterior em que citei The Closing of American Mind e Tenured Radicals eu expliquei como esse trabalho se deu de forma metódica e constante a partir da década de 1960. Seu resultado pode ser visto hoje numa sociedade em que ser intelectual é ter escrito alguma letra de samba durante a ditadura militar ou ter uma coluna na Revista Playboy. É essa  nação que jamais ouviu falar em Gilberto Freire, não tem a mínima ideia de quem sejam Otto Maria Carpeaux, Mário Ferreira dos Santos ou Olavo de Carvalho que acredita que Paulo Coelho é tão importante quanto Machado de Assis ou que Caetano Veloso tem a dimensão de Heitor Villa Lobos.

Pobre país que perdeu a única referência importante que deve ter quando busca a verdade – a honestidade dos seus intelectuais. Sem ela ainda vamos fazer grandes Copas do Mundo, vamos continuar com mulheres maravilhosas e grandes carnavais encantando o resto do planeta como eternos imbecis. 

O dever dos intelectuais - Ricardo Allan (CB, 5/01/2012)

O dever dos intelectuais

Ricardo Allan

Correio Braziliense, 05/01/2012 

Um oásis no deserto da televisão brasileira, a TV Cultura transmitiu esta semana imperdível entrevista com o escritor israelense Amós Oz no programa Roda Viva. Racional e bem-humorado, Oz deu uma aula sobre como um intelectual deve se comportar. Num dos vários momentos luminosos da conversa, ele contou como costuma ser tratado pelo governo de Israel.

Nas trocas de gabinete, o novo primeiro-ministro sempre o convida para discutir o conflito com os palestinos e outros assuntos políticos. Nessas ocasiões, Oz faz pesadas críticas. Segundo seu relato, o líder iniciante o ouve com atenção, pergunta muito e concorda com quase tudo. Depois, na gestão cotidiana, ignora completamente as recomendações. O caso mostra o claro papel dos intelectuais na vida pública: contestar o poder de forma aberta. No Brasil, onde a tradição é a covardia adesista, o simples acesso aos salões oficiais é suficiente para domesticar eventuais opositores.

Desde 2003, quando o PT chegou ao Palácio do Planalto, poucos intelectuais se levantaram para apontar os erros da administração federal. Cooptada por cargos, subvenções ou meras demonstrações de prestígio, a maioria prefere o silêncio. Em artigos, livros e filmes patrocinados com receita de impostos, a tônica é a bajulação. Cada um fala o que quiser, mas no que contribui um pronunciamento com o único objetivo de enaltecer governantes? No Brasil, eles não precisam de defensores. Sua força já é descomunal — o que falta é oposição.

Também do Oriente Médio vem um modelo acabado da atitude correta de um intelectual. Onde quer que esteja, ele deve cultivar o espírito de um outsider, alheio às pressões e limitações dos governos, da sociedade, da identidade nacional e até da própria língua. Sem medo de represálias, precisa ter a coragem de cutucar as feridas, promovendo a liberdade humana e o conhecimento.

"Penso que um dever especial do intelectual é criticar os poderes constituídos e autorizados da nossa sociedade, que são responsáveis pelos seus cidadãos, particularmente quando esses poderes são exercidos numa guerra manifestamente desproporcional e imoral", afirmou o crítico literário palestino Edward Said (1935-2003), em Representações do intelectual. Aplausos a Oz e a Said.

Intelectuais latino-americanos influentes: Vote em Foreign Policy en Espanol

NUEVOS ROSTROS EN EL PENSAMIENTO IBEROAMERICANO
Foreign Policy en Español
Marzo 2011

Hace dos años FP en español quiso identificar a los intelectuales más influyentes del ámbito iberoamericano. Como todos estos ejercicios, el resultado fue polémico, pero estimulante. Quedó de manifiesto la variedad de autores y disciplinas que ejercen su oficio en español y portugués, y que aportan una visión distinta del mundo y su evolución.

Esta vez, sin embargo, hemos querido buscar los nuevos rostros del pensamiento en España y América Latina; aquellos cuyas ideas deben servir para interpretar la realidad, reflexionar sobre la política, las relaciones internacionales, la ciencia o las artes y analizar las consecuencias de un futuro que ya se nos viene encima.

Las personas que aquí aparecen han despuntado en sus respectivos campos entre los últimos cinco y diez años y cuentan ya, por lo general, con una cuota de influencia que va más allá de su especialización. Representan la figura del intelectual público, consciente de la necesidad de compartir sus reflexiones con la sociedad. Pero no todos han alcanzado todavía una notoriedad que trascienda las fronteras de sus propios países.

La lista es necesariamente imperfecta e incompleta, pero confiamos en contar con su ayuda para acabar de definirla. Por ello les pedimos que, voten sus tres favoritos, pero también que nos digan cuáles creen que faltan y deberían ser incluidos. Tienen para hacerlo hasta el 15 de abril. Con sus aportaciones, elaboraremos un listado final con los 10 más votados.

Gracias de antemano por su colaboración.
Cristina Manzano

Ver os nomes e votar aqui: http://www.fp-es.org/nuevos-rostros-en-el-pensamiento-iberoamericano

LOS 25 DE FP

JUAN MANUEL ABAL MEDINA
Argentina, Politólogo y académico
Por introducir el mundo intelectual en el Gobierno argentino.

RICARDO AMORIM
Brasil, Economista
Por su trabajo de difusión de la economía brasileña y global.

JAIME BAYLY
Perú, Periodista, escritor
Por contribuir con un estilo irreverente a la literatura y televisión en su país.

JAVIER CERCAS
España, Escritor
Por estimular el debate, por desmenuzar la historia.

ANTONIO CÍCERO
Brasil, Filósofo
Por su aportación a la cultura y las letras y por su pensamiento crítico.

RODRIGO FRESÁN
Argentina, Escritor y periodista
Por representar a la nueva generación de autores latinoamericanos, con un toque pop.

JAVIER GOMÁ
España, Filósofo
Por proponer una filosofía acorde con los tiempos.

SERGIO GONZÁLEZ
México, Escritor y periodista
Por investigar los bajos fondos del narcotráfico y la violencia.

DANIEL INNERARITY
España, Filósofo
Por su lúcido análisis de la democracia y el papel de los medios en nuestras sociedades.

FERNANDO IWASAKI
Perú, Escritor
Por su trayectoria literaria y su análisis histórico.

DIOGO MAINARDI
Brasil, Escritor
Por su actividad divulgativa y su denuncia política.

ANDRÉS NEUMAN
Argentina, Escritor
Por una literatura de gran calidad, en cualquier género, en la que se funden tradición y modernidad.

POLA OLOIXARAC
Argentina, Escritora y bloguera
Por su sátira política y cultural y ser el último hito de las letras en su país.

WILLIAM OSPINA
Colombia, Poeta, ensayista
Por ser uno de los impulsores del renacer creativo de la novela latinoamericana.

EDMUNDO PAZ SOLDÁN
Bolivia, Escritor
Por su compromiso con la realidad política y social de América Latina.

MICHAEL PENFOLD
Venezuela, Politólogo
Por diseccionar la Venezuela contemporánea.

MARÍA PAULA ROMO
Ecuador. Politóloga - Ruptura 25
Por su apoyo a la democracia y los derechos de las mujeres.

YOANI SÁNCHEZ
Cuba, Bloguera
Por su aportación al debate político desde un lugar en el que no existe.

JAVIER SANTISO
España/Francia, Economista
Por su afán de integrar las economías emergentes en el debate político-económico global.

EUGENIO TIRONI
Chile, Sociólogo y experto en comunicación
Por su comprensión de la política en Chile y Latinoamérica, y su capacidad para comunicarla.

JOSÉ IGNACIO TORREBLANCA
España, Politólogo
Por acercar lo que ocurre en el mundo de una forma comprensible y amena.

FERNANDO VALLESPÍN
España, Politólogo
Por su mirada lúcida sobre la evolución de la política en un mundo globalizado.

JORDI VAQUER
España, Politólogo
Por aportar un aire fresco a las relaciones internacionales en España.

JORGE VOLPI
México, Escritor
Por sus reflexiones acerca de la ciencia, la política y la ética.

LUIS VON AHN
Guatemala, Científico
Por sus innovadores proyectos tecnológicos.


Ademais desses nomes, pode-se escolher três outros nomes...

O Brasil a caminho do populismo (talvez ja esteja...)

O artigo abaixo é de um escritor consumado, que também é médico e diplomata, o que demonstra que a carreira continua a atrair as melhores vocacões e formações do Brasil, numa diversidade muito saudável para a instituição. Assim, constituímos uma burocracia menos cinzenta e mais diversificada e colorida.
Paulo Roberto de Almeida 

TENDÊNCIAS/DEBATES
Sem olhos em casa
CLÁUDIO GUIMARÃES DOS SANTOS
Folha de S.Paulo, 5.11.2010

Governantes populistas, além de lançarem mão de um farto assistencialismo, se esmeram em dificultar o acesso dos cidadãos à informação variada

Segundo Karl Mannheim, uma sociedade moderna dificilmente consegue escolher bem o seu futuro sem a presença de intelectuais independentes. Somente eles, com seu saudável poder corrosivo, são capazes de garantir a existência de uma opinião pública crítica.
Para fazê-lo, contudo, os intelectuais precisam defender o seu direito de pensar como melhor lhes pareça e recusar a adesão canina a esta ou àquela ideologia, a este ou àquele partido.
A sua falta de identidade coletiva - de "espírito de manada" - é o que lhes proporciona a autonomia imprescindível à realização de sua missão: examinar, sem descanso, as soluções conflitantes de um problema antes de rejeitá-las ou de assimilá-las.
Todavia, por rever constantemente as suas opiniões, a intelectualidade "não engajada" é vista com reservas pelos adeptos do ideal gramsciano de "intelectual orgânico", paladino de "sua classe". Estes não suportam o inquietante inconformismo das mentes livres, as quais se encontram, por isso mesmo, em grande perigo nos regimes populistas.
Tal fato, infelizmente, nem sempre é percebido com clareza, já que, ao contrário dos ditadores declarados - que eliminam os intelectuais indesejáveis sem nenhum pudor -, os governantes populistas preferem atuar de modo mais discreto.
Buscam, inicialmente, cooptar a intelectualidade "rebelde", minando-lhe a independência por meio de favores. Se não o conseguem, procuram desacreditá-la perante a população, o que se dá não tanto pelo confronto direto, mas pelo ataque aos meios de comunicação pelos quais se expressa, que são acusados de serem "contra o governo", ou, ainda pior, de serem "contra o povo". A artimanha, porém, só funciona quando o aparato crítico dos indivíduos aos quais se dirige apresenta um nível rudimentar, resultado das graves deficiências educacionais de que padece a maioria da população nesses regimes: pessoas esclarecidas não se deixam engabelar por pregações descabidas.
É por isso que os governantes populistas, além de lançarem mão de farto assistencialismo e de retórica demagógica pela qual se apresentam como "pais do povo" e "salvadores da pátria", tanto se esmeram em dificultar o acesso dos cidadãos à informação diversificada. E o fazem seja pela restrição "bem-intencionada" à liberdade de imprensa, seja pela utilização de instrumentos próprios, como as redes de TV "públicas", que funcionam, quase sempre, como veículos da propaganda oficial.
O populismo deforma os cidadãos como nenhum regime autoritário é capaz de fazê-lo. Ele os perverte desde dentro, destruindo a sua resistência crítica. Ele os faz crer que são suas as razões que o regime neles implanta sutilmente. Ele os convence de que a loucura que os acomete constitui uma maneira mais lúcida de ver as coisas.
As vítimas do populismo, ofuscadas por essa luz malsã não só não lamentam como até comem or am a destruição do pensamento independente. Ao fazê-lo, porém, colocam-se, ingenuamente, ainda mais à mercê dos hábeis governantes, dóceis e desarmadas, sem olhos em casa. 

CLÁUDIO L. N. GUIMARÃES DOS SANTOS, 50, escritor, médico e diplomata, é mestre em artes pela ECA-USP e doutor em linguística pela Universidade de Toulouse-Le Mirail (França). Blog: http://perplexidadesereflexoes.blogspot.com/

Uma mente independente: Thomas Sowell

Um intelectual negro independente, que não gosta de ser chamado de intelectual, e que tem contribuído de maneira magistral para o debate público nos EUA nas últimas décadas, muito pouco conhecido no Brasil. Suas obras deveriam ser traduzidas e divulgadas, para escapar um pouco da mediocridade ambiente de "intelequituais" de araque no péssimo contexto da academia brasileira. Sinto muito por estes ataques, mas é verdade.
Paulo Roberto de Almeida

Daniel J. Mahoney
An Independent Mind
Thomas Sowell’s prodigious intellect has long been at odds with intellectuals.
The City Journal, 18 June 2010

Book:
Thomas Sowell
Intellectuals and Society
(Basic Books, 416 pp., $29.95)

Thomas Sowell occupies a unique place in American intellectual life, at the intersection of economics, social science, and public philosophy, even as he writes a lively syndicated column. He is equally at home discoursing on “Say’s Law” (or the Law of Market) and exposing divisive and counterproductive affirmative-action programs. He is also among this nation’s most prominent black conservatives, which suggests a certain independence of mind and spirit. That independence, along with truly prodigious learning, is amply on display in his latest book.

Intellectuals and Society is something of a summa of Sowell’s concerns over the last 40 years. It builds upon the “informal trilogy”—A Conflict of Visions, The Vision of the Anointed, and The Quest for Cosmic Justice—in which he first examined the conflict between a “constrained” vision of politics and social change and a vision of society by which intellectuals (“the anointed”) seek permanent “solutions” to social and national problems. Modern intellectuals, Sowell writes, have a “vision of themselves as a self-appointed vanguard, leading towards a better world.” Unlike advocates of the more conservative, constrained vision, this intellectual vanguard tends to take the “benefits of civilization for granted.” The “vision of the anointed” lacks respect for the wisdom inherent in experience and common opinion. Its practitioners value abstractions—dreams for a peaceful, egalitarian world where conflicts have been overcome—over the “tacit knowledge” available to the parent, the consumer, the entrepreneur, and the citizen.

Sowell vigorously defends wisdom—practical reason—against an abstract rationalism that values ideas over the experience of actual human beings. Intellectuals, he argues, are particularly suspicious of the ties ordinary men and women feel to family, religion, and country. They look down upon “objective reality and objective criteria” in the social sciences, art, music, and philosophy. Their “systems” tend to be self-referential and lack accountability in the external world.

Not surprisingly, Intellectuals and Society has occasioned some virulently hostile reviews. In The Chronicle of Higher Education, Russell Jacoby mocked what he called Sowell’s “Vince Lombardi Interpretation of Ideas”—judging ideas not by their complexity or novelty, but by how they work in “the field.” Strangely, he criticizes Sowell for dodging difficult contemporary issues such as the financial crisis, though Sowell has written a best-selling book on the subject. At the same time, he accuses Sowell of being “simplistic,” a rhetorical tactic that Sowell himself highlights as a particularly disingenuous way of evading ideological disputes. More distressingly, attempting to ridicule Sowell’s practical focus, Jacoby suggests that both Nazism and Stalinism “worked” for a time, too—as if totalitarianism ever created anything like a viable social order.

Alan Wolfe’s critique at “The Book”—the New Republic’s online review section—is even more lamentable. He addresses none of Sowell’s arguments. He accuses Sowell of ignoring a few thinkers whom he in fact cites. He denounces Sowell as a “joyless mind” whose animating impulse is a “hatred of ideas.” But Sowell’s book is precisely a defense of ideas against ideology. Wolfe thus makes a mockery of the book’s central argument.

Sowell, it’s true, denies being an intellectual, and we must take him at his word. He renews the critique of “literary politics” first limned by Edmund Burke in Reflections on the Revolution in France and Alexis de Tocqueville in The Old Regime and the Revolution. Burke and Tocqueville both observed a new intellectual type: thinkers inebriated by revolution and the dream of a radically new social order, and dismissive of the inherited wisdom of the past. Burke and Tocqueville didn’t hesitate to denounce injustice when they saw it, whether British oppression of Indians and the Irish or chattel slavery in America. But their critiques drew on the best traditions of Western civilization. They avoided the “rationalist” illusion that the world could be created anew. In this spirit, Sowell refuses to judge ideas by their supposed good intentions, but rather by their effects on human beings.

Sowell appreciates that some men of intellect do respect traditional wisdom and resist the temptation to put themselves on a higher plane than the rest of humanity. In his preface, he cites intellectual giants such as Milton Friedman and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, both atypical of the thinkers of their time. Like James Q. Wilson, the distinguished criminologist and political scientist whom he admires, Sowell “theorizes” in a way that defends sound practice against bad theory. But he never finds a name for the mixture of modesty, empiricism, anti-utopianism, and respect for the “tacit knowledge” of ordinary people that his book so richly embodies. He acknowledges the need to reconnect intellect with practical reason, but he provides no designation for such prudence. He thus leaves himself vulnerable to the charge that he opposes the intellectual life per se. But only an ideologue could confuse Sowell’s social vision, rooted as it is in ideas and respect for the inherent diversity of human experience, with anti-intellectualism.

The power of Sowell’s book owes to its concreteness. Sowell moves deftly back and forth from empirical evidence to a form of social philosophizing rooted in respect for “unforgiving reality,” a reality “to which we must all adjust, because it is not going to adjust to us.” He has an enviable gift for showing that many of our social problems arise from the differences between “the theories of intellectuals and the realities of the world.” When confronted by these differences, many intellectuals conclude that it’s the world that is “wrong and needs changing.”

Among twentieth-century intellectuals, this tendency often led to a shameless indulgence toward the totalitarianisms of Left and Right. This betrayal of intellectual and political liberty, which Sowell depressingly chronicles, often takes more benign forms—like basing political analysis on clichés that misrepresent reality. Sowell shows, for instance, how debates about income distribution in the United States have been distorted by a preoccupation with statistical categories. Journalists and academics alike endlessly repeat that the rich are getting richer while the poor are getting poorer. What these discussions ignore is that people move with some frequency from category to category over time. Only 5 percent of Americans who were in the bottom quintile of income earners in 1975 were still there in 1991. Only 25 percent of the “super-rich” in 1996 (the top 1/100th of 1 percent of income earners) remained in that category in 2005. Over half of the poor earning at or near the minimum wage are between the ages of 16 and 24. As Sowell wryly notes, “these individuals cannot remain from 16 to 24 years of age indefinitely, though that age category can of course continue indefinitely, providing many intellectuals with data to fit their preconceptions.” Abstract talk about “inequities” in income distribution presupposes a social problem, where strictly speaking one may not exist at all. Sowell’s analysis helps us understand why intellectuals so often call for government to promote economic redistribution. When voters in heartland states such as Kansas resist such calls, intellectuals of a certain stripe predictably accuse them of “false consciousness,” of misunderstanding their “class interest,” and of being fixated on guns and religion.

In a splendid chapter, “Optimal Reality in the Media and the Academy,” Sowell chronicles the willingness of journalists and academics to filter reality in ways that make it much harder to distinguish fact from fiction. Sometimes they simply suppress facts. Sowell discusses the infamous example of the New York Times correspondent Walter Duranty, who expressly denied what he knew to be the truth—that millions of people had died in the Ukraine and southern Russia in the early 1930s as a result of a government-created famine. Thankfully, the English journalist Malcolm Muggeridge exposed Duranty’s deceits in his 1933 novel, Winter in Moscow. Sometimes these intellectuals invent fictitious characters out of whole cloth, as in the do-nothing Herbert Hoover of popular legend or the media transformation of Clarence Thomas, a gregarious and public-spirited man who gives dozens of speeches a year, into a “recluse.” Others are all too ready to believe accusations by the Tawana Brawleys of the world (or the accusers in the Duke lacrosse rape case) when the precious ideological categories of “race” and “gender” are at stake. Sowell asks not for superhuman “neutrality” from journalists, but rather for intellectual honesty and an elementary respect for facts.

The book’s highlight may be the two sizeable chapters that Sowell devotes to “Intellectuals and War.” The progressive intellectuals of the first part of the twentieth century initially welcomed war as a source of social cohesion and as a way of overcoming what they saw as the pernicious individualism of American life. But going from one extreme to the other, these disillusioned Wilsonians converted to pacifism and cosmopolitanism in the interwar period. They heaped invective on anyone who was sensitive to the dangers presented by Adolf Hitler. They found enemies in “war” and “arms races” in the abstract, not specific regimes committed to the destruction of a liberal international order. Patriotism and national honor became suspect for many intellectuals long afterward. Sowell’s treatment of intellectuals and war is marred only by his failure to confront an ideological current at work in some conservative circles over the last decade and a half. The Right’s emphasis on “global democratization” owed more to Wilsonian progressivism than to prudent, tough-minded conservatism. As the historian Michael Burleigh has argued, the view that “it is always 1938” is deeply problematic. But Sowell’s Churchillian realism captures the principled middle ground between pacifist illusion and democratic euphoria.

Even sympathetic readers will not agree with all of Sowell’s judgments. But this learned and thoughtful book demonstrates what its author has in mind when he calls for a humane reintegration of intellect, wisdom, and respect for the stubborn realities that constitute our world.

Daniel J. Mahoney is chair and professor of political science at Assumption College in Worcester, Massachusetts. His latest book, The Conservative Foundations of the Liberal Order: Defending Democracy Against Its Modern Enemies and Immoderate Friends, will be published by ISI Books at the end of 2010.