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Return to Brotherhood
Jaime Nubiola1
“Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity!” That cry of the French Revolution, which all
learn through their studies in secondary school, deserves renewed attention during
these times of increased egoistic individualism. In my conversation with students, I
frequently remind them how, starting back in the seventies, restless university students
used to parade through the central streets of our cities with shouts – then considered
subversive – of “liberty, liberty!,” just to be subsequently repelled by the violent force
of the national police. Decades of progress and social achievements in our country have
made possible the reality of living basic equality of all citizens in the following domains
of their lives: we are equal before the law, with respect to health, and with respect to
our environment. I, however, have the distressing impression that we have completely
forgotten those cries for fraternity uttered by our predecessors, or perhaps, that we
have merely consigned it to the solemn verses of Schiller’s Ode to Joy: “Thy magic
reunites that which the stern world has parted; all men will again become brothers there
where thy gentle wing rests.”
In 1972, the Council of Europe adopted the themes in
We have liberty,
the Ode to Joy from Beethoven’s Ninth’s Symphony as its
we have equality,
hymn. Two years prior to that, however, Miguel Rios had
already spread with great success that marvelous version of
yet we still lack
the poem which is so memorable: “Listen, brothers, the
fraternity, which
song of joy, the joyful song of he who awaits a new day.
remains as the
Come, sing, dream in song, live while dreaming of the new
sun under which men will become, once again, brothers.”
one pending
The recollection of these verses invites us to return to the
promise of our
streets, this time with the cry: “fraternity, fraternity!”. We
democratic
have liberty, we have equality, yet we still lack fraternity.
Out of those three ideals of Christian origin hoisted up by
experience
the French Revolution, the latter one, which should have
been the cement rooting the other two, as well as the one
bringing most fruits from the Revolution, seems to have become, instead, the one
pending promise of our democratic experience, a signature left blank in the great
decisions of the State and in the smaller aspects of our daily life.
Jaime Nubiola is Professor of Philosophy in the Department of Philosophy at the University of
Navarre and member of the International Advisory Committee of the Charles S. Peirce Society
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The invocation to fraternity is not meant to be an Civil fraternity
appeal to a mellifluous discourse seeking to quiet man’s
conscience, but an urgent call to social partnership, mutual cannot be imposed
solidarity, and cordial conviviality that renders that same in society through
genuine “civil friendship” that Aristotle spoke about 2,400 ideology, law, or
years ago. This has been well described in the insightful
affirmation of the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the genetics, but
Church: “The profound meaning of civil and political life stems
does not arise immediately from the list of personal rights from the heart of
and duties. Life in society takes on all its significance when it
men
is based on civil friendship and on fraternity. The sphere of
rights, in fact, is that of safeguarded interests, external
respect, the protection of material goods and their distribution according to established
rules. The sphere of friendship, on the other hand, is that selflessness, detachment from
material goods, giving freely and inner acceptance of the needs of others. Civil
friendship understood in this way is the most genuine actualization of the principle of
fraternity.” At the end of the day, this is how it is meant to be; our democratic life
should be based on the warm and genuine fraternity between those who make up
society.
Democracy is not merely a model of organized coexistence, but also implies the
existence of a lifestyle whereby whatever is common among men is put before one’s
own individual selfishness or mere private satisfaction. If the rulers and the ruled solely
seek their personal good, coexistence degenerates to the point where all return to the
law of the jungle where the strongest always imposes himself and tramples over reason
and the rights of others. John Dewey explained that the term democracy is a social
concept, which is to say, an ethical conception, and from the ethical meaning of the
term, another meaning arises as a form of government. Dewey believed that democracy
is only a form of government because, prior to that, it was a form of moral and spiritual
association. We should be persuaded that this is truly so. For a happy democratic
coexistence to be present, there must also exist in everyone a deep sense of community
where all offer their hand in the service of one another.
Civil fraternity cannot be imposed in society through ideology, law, or genetics. It
stems, instead, from the heart of men, and is nourished by the goodwill of those who
wish the benefit of others as if they were brothers.
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