Thank you, everyone, for reading, and for commenting. I love throwing ideas around and I especially love when you make points that broaden my view. David the Barbarian, in my previous post, added some great clarifications that inspired me to connect some dots with ideas we have already explored.
- We can talk about the Peasantly Life
- We can talk about Law and Society
- We can talk about Cities and Rural areas.
Let’s dig in.
David makes two points in his comment which stick out to me and, to me, go together:
(…) proper care, in addition to proper attitude and proper attention to higher things, is as warranted as working for our daily bread. (…) Everyone, even the peasant, has a part in the sustaining of the city’s continuance, part of which is politics.
I am going to go off the path for a minute but follow me and you’ll see how it connects, I hope, by the end of this.
There are three projects for a peasant, and there are three positions a peasant can find himself in.
A peasant’s three projects are:
- Spiritual
- Personal
- Communal
The spiritual project of a peasant is primary–it is his union with God, his connection to the sacraments. The peasant is and ought to be chiefly worried about his soul, all other concerns come second.
The personal project of a peasant pertains to his livelihood. He must provide for his necessities, put food on the table, clothe himself and his family, provide a shelter for himself and his family. Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs kind of stuff.
The communal project of a peasant pertains to his community. I have often ignored this because I treated it as a given, but it is worth discussing specifically and clearly to avoid confusion. A peasant is a part of a community. This could mean a parish, could mean a town, what-have-you. A peasant has a duty to that community to help it to provide for its members and to help the community as a whole flourish. If a peasant’s needs are met, he goes to the community to make sure the needs of the community are met.
And his three positions are:
- Isolated
- Populated
- Powerful
The isolated position is what I have kept in my mind the most–this is the classic image of the remote farmer peasant, far from society and self reliant.
The populated position is the idea of a city-peasant. Peasant life is an attitude towards living, not necessarily a specific work. A city-street-side baker can be a peasant if he focuses on his three projects the same way as an isolated farmer does.
The powerful position is the idea of a peasant in a position of authority. A King can be a peasant–but it can be more difficult with the level of authority. As a King, your family is just bigger–it is a family of subjects, you must provide for their necessities and aid their progress in their spiritual project. The higher the authority the greater the responsibility.
David helpfully offers a distinction for when we talk about politics. We have political theory that governs, shall we say, the philosophy of politics. And we have practical politics, that governs naturally the practice. Political theory is the domain of political philosophers, thinkers who try to understand how and why people behave the way they do. Political practice is the domain of politicians, responsible for the facts of governance.
There’s a third aspect to this, which occurred to me as I was jotting down notes. There is a ritual component to politics–customs, ceremonies, etc. This is like cultural politics. You have to know who to bow to, who to shake hands with, who to smile at. Cultural politics varies by population and locality.
A peasant (regardless of position) needs to have fluency in cultural politics, awareness of practical politics, and does not need a deep study of theoretical politics. Cultural politics will allow a peasant to make connections, sell wares, are provide for his livelihood. The rituals and customs between the rural society and the urban society are important for the peasant to know. Awareness of practical politics is just an awareness that it happens, but a peasant need not participate in it.
A point tangent to this is that political participation itself can be a ritual or custom, kind of like how voting has become a ritual for us here in America. It is serving a cultural and ritual role, rather than a positive, pragmatic effect. This is why so many people have a hard time with not voting, and why the idea is so mind boggling and repugnant. It’s a cultural idiom of America, one of the few that all Americans share in common. Choosing not to vote is a rejection of that cultural idiom, but which satisfies a pragmatic understanding of practical politics. Choosing not to vote is changing the culture of ourselves and those around us.
So we cannot conceive of a peasant independent of the city. Even if a peasant’s position is isolated, it is just primarily isolated, not exclusively. Interaction with the city is a necessity for an isolated peasant, just as interaction with the farmers is a necessity for the populated peasant, and interaction with both is necessary for the powerful peasant.
Now the question becomes, what is the proper order of things?
As David says, everyone has a role to play in sustaining the city, this is part of the communal project of a peasant. I think cultural politics helps us to zero in a bit closer to the proper order of how a peasant relates to the political apparatus. The political apparatus is a means to the peasants ends, which are first spiritual and second personal and third communal. Cultural politics is then the first recourse of the peasant, practical politics is then second, and if absolutely necessary theoretical politics is the last resort. This because a peasant shouldn’t need to know the nuances of the Hegelian Mambo to work a crop or sell baked goods, but if somehow it gets to the point that not understanding the Hegelian mambo is preventing the peasant from satisfying his projects, then he has to understand it.
So I am not offering any specific action or rules of thumb, but I am offering that politics is a tool which can be turned to the advantage of the peasant.
“So why shouldn’t we vote? Voting helps us make sure we are protected and looked out for!”
Because voting as an act interferes with and is detrimental to the spiritual project. A peasant should not seek power for the same reason, but if he finds himself as a community leader he should remember that it changes his position.
I think probably further clarification is needed on this nuance of the topic but I covered a lot of ground so let’s let fly this post and solicit feedback.
God bless you all!
AMDG
Times-Dispatch of Vichy Earth 