Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think, Second Edition

If you have not read this book, I will provide you reasons to want to do so shortly. If you have read this book and liked it, don't try to explain it in general terms to people who have not read it because to do so, I've found, seems to make people think, "Well, of course political ideas are based on personal values, what's so groundbreaking about that?" But that is exactly the point of this book. What George Lakoff is trying to do is put into words how and what people just instictivly feel, but cannot describe. Hence, the essence of cognitive science, the study of the cognitive, not exactly conscious. His questions are not so much WHAT people value and feel, but WHY they do so, consciously or not. Quick warning. George Lakoff is a liberal and so one would naturally think that this book is just a ruse for him to preach. But he does not, he maintains a competely scientific and unbiased approach until the conclusion of the book, where his "epilouge" of sorts offers his nonideological reasons for being a liberal. His accuracy is not tainted by bias and is dead on for 99% of the book, complete with massive amounts of endnotes, citations and nonpartisan analysis of studies and facts, thoroughly emcompassing every side of nearly forty years of linguistics and psychology. In this book, Lakoff lays out the entire structure of the conservative and the liberal ideologies and explores the threads and values that connect those ideologies. He takes on questions like "Why do conservatives link gun control and taxes," or "Why do liberals link universal health care and the environment?" His ultimate answer is that they are connected by a set of values and metaphors that are part of the mental makeup of that person. He believes that the differences in opinion between conservatives and liberals stem from the fact that they hold different metaphorical concepts about the relationship between the state and its citizens and what makes a good person. Conservatives have a "strict father" approach where discipline is learned through respecting authority and enforced through strong emotional reaction or corporal punishment and therefore learn to be self-reliant and disciplined, strict citizens. Liberals have a "nurturant mother" approach, where the key to disciplining and raising a child (or a nation) effectively is to foster a sense of mutual respect through open-mindedness and active engagement that rewards independent thinking, and therefore learn to have empathy for others and not think about only themselves or what impacts them directly. So for Lakoff, the differences in how conservatives and liberals think is not just limited to interpretation of facts or policy results, but is much deeper than that. This book truly shines in shedding light onto the larger issues of human thought. His point that he emphasizes repeatedly is that contrary to popular belief, people do not just vote for candidates or hold political beliefs based only on their best tangible interest

and making sense out of all this mess. I suggest you read "Don't Think of an Elephant" first and then read this book to get an even better understanding of the psychology of the two ideologies. Progressives and even fair minded conservatives can learn a lot about one another and what can be done to change the current political system for the better of everyone and not just a few elitists by giving this book a read. I also strongly recommend this book to all who are sick and tired of the political mess that's getting worse year after year and producing a greater percentage of non-voters than voters election after election. Lakoff knows that politics doesn't have to stink even as it affects our lives for better or for worse.

--"The ``new understanding of American politics'' that he proposes, not surprisingly, favors conservative values." Just wanted to point out that this is incorrect, for what it's worth. Would appear a hurried Kirkus reviewer read the jacket copy, skipped the book, and inferred the above from the book's ironic subtitle ("what conservatives know that liberal don't"). Lakoff's is a book of "cognitive psychology." In the first plaace, the author attempts a value-neutral analysis. In the last part of the book, Lakoff enters in: he attempts to explain why liberal morality may be superior, on some objective grounds, to the conservative moral scheme (which he, I think, compellingly describes.) (...)

Lakoff offers a provocative theory of the differences between liberals and conservatives. He suggests that both liberals and conservatives want government to act like an ideal parent. In the case of liberals, the ideal parent is a "nurturant parent." In the case of conservatives, the ideal parent is a "strict parent."I believe that as a descriptive model, this is very powerful. That is, my guess is that if social scientists conducted a survey, they would find a strong correlation between beliefs about parenting and political orientation.Lakoff goes beyond the descriptive to the prescriptive. He says that the "nurturant parent" model is better for families. He infers from this that liberals are correct on political issues. Lakoff sees the parenting models as the true basis for policy differences. Instead, I see them as symbols that politicians manipulate in order to mobilize voters.Policies which appeal to the "nurturant parent" symbol can have consequences which are quite contrary to what such a parent would want. See Alan Blinder's "Hard Heads, Soft Hearts." Or better yet, Thomas Sowell's "The Vision of the Anointed."This book succeeds as a guide to the process by which politicians can use symbols from family models in order to appeal to voters. When you watch politicians in action, you can "keep score" by seeing how many times they appeal to each of the two stereotypical models.I believe that in making the case for the "nurturant parent" model for families it also succeeds. As a parent, I do not like the "strict parent" approach.However, to the extent that Lakoff's objective is to provide a brief for liberal ideology, with this reader he fails. To take this step requires that we accept policies at their symbolic face value (e.g., one must believe that rent controls are "compassionate"). The reality is that the state is not a family, and you should not make policy on the basis of any parental model.

This book is a must-read for anyone who in interested in and perplexed by the apparent inconsistencies and lack of serious dialogue in political debate today. If one cannot understand why conservatives favor the death penalty yet oppose abortion or why liberals favor abortion and oppose the death penalty, Lakoff gives a cogent explanation.