Article 20 | deewilsoncon

Expanding the Circle of Moral Concern

Introduction

In The Moral Circle: Who Matters, What Matters, and Why (2025), Jeff Sebo, a philosopher and animal rights advocate, defines the moral circle as “the set of beings who matter for their own sake,” (p. 2) regardless of their instrumental value. Sebo acknowledges that “thinking about the moral circle requires embracing disagreement and uncertainty” (p. 4). He begins his discussion with the agreement among many living philosophers that human beings and animals who have sentience and agency have moral standing, along with interests that should be considered in ethical and legal debates. Sebo is so confident in this position that he repeatedly asserts that the question of who does and does belong in the moral circle is a matter for experts, i.e., persons knowledgeable regarding animal sentience and agency and the sentience of AI systems. For example: “Some experts think that only sentient beings matter and only animals are sentient whereas others think that some non-sentient beings matter and that some non-animals are sentient. To the extent possible, I will restrict myself to general assumptions that many experts can endorse despite disagreement or uncertainty about these issues.” (pp. 7-8)

Sebo asserts that “At least in the West, the history of thinking about the moral circle has been one of moral circle expansion.” And: “For instance, many experts previously believed that only rational beings matter, but now many experts believe that all sentient beings matter.” (p.5) Sebo’s discussion assumes an agreement among influential thinkers that all humans belong in the circle of moral concern; and that it’s time to move on to ethical issues regarding the moral standing of animals, insects and AI systems. However, it’s not true that questions of moral standing related to human beings have been resolved either within nations or in international relations, where the views of philosophers count for next to nothing. Societies are still in the process of deciding which human beings matter for their own sake, and which humans are best viewed from an instrumental perspective, or primarily as threats that should be eliminated whenever possible.

Indicators of moral standing in human social groups

The circle of moral concern is a metaphorical boundary that, for a community or society, divides persons and other living beings who receive the full protection of law and care provided by community institutions from those excluded from such protection and care; or for whom the protection of law and care available in the community is provided erratically, in a lackadaisical manner, or resentfully. Law is an important element of the circle of moral concern, but how and to what extent legal protections are implemented is as important as written law.

Community sentiment is a critical feature of moral concern. Community sentiment can undermine the rule of law or even make a mockery of it. Law can also be used to persecute despised minorities, e.g. Nazi laws regarding Jews, Jim Crow laws in the South during the century following the Civil War. It is common for societies to ignore, or even endorse, the mistreatment of some groups such as prisoners, immigrants or alleged terrorists. Legal advocates have an uphill battle in defending the rights of such groups even when their rights have been egregiously violated.

During much of the twentieth century in the U.S., it was common to use Blacks, prisoners and other denigrated groups in dangerous medical experiments without consent, or to commit acts of violence against members of these groups to induce terror and obedience, or in some places for sport (e.g. Texas) where authorities frequently turned a blind eye to killings of Mexicans perpetrated by the Texas Rangers.

Tests of the moral circle in a particular society include how a community reacts to attacks on members of various sub-groups, including racial/ ethnic minorities, and the extent to which social institutions come to the rescue following natural disasters, famines, pandemics, etc. There is no mistaking the large difference between the wholehearted responses to some natural disasters, including famines, and the indifferent response to others around the world.

Empathetic responses to suffering and oppression are a part of moral intuition. For this reason, novelists and other storytellers play an important role in expanding the circle of moral concern. Abraham Lincoln is reported to have said to Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, the bestselling book of its time, “So you are the little woman who wrote the book that started this great war.” The underlying idea behind Lincoln’s comment is that, when slaves were able to elicit empathetic responses from a White audience, slavery became intolerable and had to be eliminated by civil war if necessary.

However, artistic efforts to elicit empathetic responses for noxious causes can boomerang and severely damage reputations, e.g., the movie, Birth of a Nation which celebrated the Ku Klux Klan and which Woodrow Wilson had shown in the White House, is damning evidence of Wilson’s racism that has tainted his reputation with historians.

In extreme instances, political leaders have displayed indifference to widespread suffering and stubborn resistance to providing food aid during famines (e.g., Ireland, 1845-50, India during W.W. II), supported by ideological justification for doing nothing. Currently, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are being allowed to starve in Gaza, while Palestinians seeking food are killed by the Israeli military daily, with muted response in the U.S. Israelis are members of the circle of moral concern in the U.S., while Palestinians are outside the circle. In this moral circle, every Israeli life is precious while Palestinian lives are just a number, or (at best) emblematic of Palestinian suffering. Israeli hostages have personal stories while Palestinian “detainees” are merely a class of combatants.

Us vs. Them

Us vs. Them is a fundamental element of social identity in both ancient and modern societies. Us Includes kinship-based systems such as clans, lineages and tribes and non-kin-based political entities such as chiefdoms, kingdoms, states, empires and, in recent centuries, nations. I discussed the polarized nature of social identity in Essays on Polarity (2024, pp. 249-266). Major themes of this discussion included:

One set of rules, including ethical rules, apply to Us; “very different rules apply to outsiders.” The moral principle, “thou shalt not kill may be strictly applied to tribal members while the tribe (or kingdom) follows a genocidal command from its god to exterminate entire peoples, including women and children,” per the Old Testament (1 Samuel 15: 2-3). The life of anyone who is a part of Us is viewed as precious, while anyone regarded as part of a threatening social group can be killed with near impunity, killings justified with a boilerplate rationale, e.g., targeting enemy soldiers or terrorists.
Organized violence that can take various forms strengthens group cohesion and is useful in maintaining social solidarity. Social groups that lack potent enemies are at elevated risk of social fragmentation. “… a near constant low level of intertribal violence can work to the advantage of competing tribal groups.” However, periodic violence leads to hatred and a desire to inflict pain and suffering on Them whenever possible. The use of torture is common in these circumstances, e.g., at Guantanamo during the decade following 9-11, sometimes with a rational justification that masks a desire to inflict maximum suffering on a hated enemy as an end in itself.
Organized violence is not the only way to strengthen social solidarity. “Another way is to emphasize differences, especially opposed values, beliefs and practices with contiguous groups or societies.” In The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity (2021) David Graeber and David Wengrow refer to the concept of “schismogenesis” which describes “how societies in contact with each other end up joined within a common system of differences, even as they attempt to distinguish themselves from one another.” (p. 180)

Furthermore, schismatic tendencies exist within all societies, movements, and organizations. Proponents of schismatic factions place great importance on their differences rather than their shared beliefs and interests. Schismatic differences are often bitter, deeply felt sources of enmity that exclude opponents from the circle of moral concern and may justify the use of violence.

Kinship systems in premodern societies

It appears that the dynamics of social identity that feed on opposition and conflict inevitably narrow the circle of moral concern. Perhaps the best example of such dynamics is the functioning of intensive kin practices and ethical beliefs in societies around the world as discussed in Joseph Henrich’s book, The WEIRDest People in the World: How the West Became Psychologically Peculiar and Particularly Prosperous (2020).

Henrich asserts: “Throughout most of human history, people grew up enmeshed in dense family networks that knitted together distant cousins and in-laws. In these regulated-relational worlds, people’s survival, identity, security, marriages and success depended on the health and prosperity of kin-based networks.” These networks confer an “extensive array of obligations, responsibilities and privileges in relation to a dense social web.” (p.27) For example, male members of a clan might be obligated to avenge the murder of a second cousin by killing a member of another clan who had nothing to do with the murder. Responsibility for actions was corporate, and family members could be shamed by the disgraceful actions of family members, and even go to jail for an act committed by others in their kin network, according to Henrich.

When intensive kinship principles determine conduct, responses to alleged moral wrongdoing are not determined by law, moral codes or unwritten moral principles but by one’s relationship to the offender. Nepotism, lying under oath for friends or family members, or other types of corruption may be viewed as a family obligation. As a character in The Godfather is warned by the head of the family, “Don’t ever again take sides against the family” on the penalty of death.

Henrich states that members of intensive family institutions make a strict and strong distinction between the in-group and others, especially strangers, and a person not a part of the kin network could never be viewed in the circle of moral concern established by kin membership.

Henrich maintains that members of intensive kin networks are highly susceptible to shame, i.e. loss of “face” vs. guilt. It is a terrible fate to bring shame to one’s family. Henrich asserts: “Emotionally, those experiencing shame want to shrink away and disappear from public view.” (p. 34) “By contrast, guilt rises to prominence in individualistic societies.” (p. 35) Sigrid Undset’s outstanding historical novel, Olav Audunsson (translated by Tina Nunnally, 2021), provides a powerful account of the excruciating shame suffered by a young woman in thirteenth century Denmark who becomes pregnant while her husband is away fighting a war. This extraordinary novel vividly communicates why living with shame occasioned by unforgiveable conduct (from the perspective of close-knit communities) was sometimes viewed as a fate worse than death.

The Catholic Church’s role in undermining intensive kinship institutions

Henrich maintains that the Catholic Church, especially in Western Europe, undermined kin-based institutions through its Marriage and Family Program (MFP) that prohibited marriage of cousins. He states: “The data show that the longer a country’s population was exposed to the Church, the weaker its kin-based institutions.” (p. 226) And: “The idea here is that the medieval church shaped contemporary psychology through its demolition of Europe’s kin-based institutions.” (p. 244)

In Henrich’s account, “The psychological changes induced by this shift in the organization of families and social networks help us understand why the newly forming institutions and institutions developed in certain ways. New monastic orders, guilds, towns and universities increasingly built their laws, principles, norms, and rules in ways that focused on the individual, often endowing each member with abstract rights, privileges and duties to the organization.” (p. 231)

Henrich argues that the economic dynamism of Western Europe advanced in tandem with WEIRD psychology, i.e., analytic thinking, individualism and a non-relational morality, which “favored the development of both impartial rules that granted privileges and obligations to individuals (not clans) and impersonal mechanisms for enforcing trust such as accounting records, commercial laws and written contracts.” (p. 253) In so doing, “The new formal institutions increasingly fostered cooperation and mutually-beneficial exchanges among Christian strangers” (p.254), Henrich asserts.

In summary: intensive kinship systems do not operate on the basis of impartial moral rules or codes. The development of such codes is a relatively recent historical development that occurred after intensive kinship institutions had been weakened in Western Europe and the U.S. based, in part, Henrich maintains, on the sustained effort of the Catholic Church for centuries to undermine kin-based norms and practices.

Henrich has little to say directly that explains why impartial moral codes that he views as evidence of impersonal pro-sociality were so infrequently applied to colonial populations, indigenous peoples in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the U.S., or to slaves, sometimes viewed as a type of livestock. However, Henrich’s explanation of the causes of expanding the moral circle around the world, i.e., “scaling up” to larger societies for purposes of mutual protection and war, provides a partial answer. It was not moral intuition of the inherent value of human beings, or religious revelation and belief, that initially led ancient societies to expand the circle of moral concern. Rather, it was the requirement to create larger political entities that transcended kinship networks for mutual protection and to expand control of territory through war. Henrich asserts: “In hostile environments, only groups with institutions that promote extensive cooperation and sharing can survive at all.” (p. 97)

“Scaling up”, Henrich maintains, involved the development of loyalties larger than a kin network. Citizen soldiers who were not mercenaries had to be motivated to risk their lives to fight for a chiefdom, kingdom, city state or nation. The power of kin networks to command primary loyalty had to be reduced to allow identification with a larger political entity to develop.

“Scaling up,” per Henrich’s discussion, was no easy task due to the power of clans and tribes to achieve cooperation among subgroups, i.e., “ … the more effectively norms galvanize cooperation within subgroups, the more challenge it can be to unite them and scale up.” And: “There’s nothing inevitable, irreversible, or unilineal about this scaling up process.” (p. 98) However, it was inevitable in some parts of the world that societies which failed to first expand, and then overcome, their kinship frameworks would be conquered by a society that had vastly increased in size and in the capacity for conducting war.

To a lesser extent, it is also true that trade between societies required an ethical framework which supported the keeping of promises and the enforcement of contracts. Imagine engaging in trade with persons that recognize no moral obligations or ethical duties to any person or community other than the kin network to which they belong. Rightly or wrongly, this was the reputation of the Roma in Europe for centuries.

Given these motivations for applying impartial frameworks to diverse groups, it is no mystery why universal moral principles have been selectively applied by Westen nations. When the application of these frameworks served the interest of political and economic elites, they were touted as indicators of moral progress. When their use did not serve the economic or political interests of dominant groups involved in settler colonialism, slavery or capitalism they were often ignored and brazenly violated.

Henrich’s analysis of “scaling up” suggests that both in ancient and modern societies an evolving experience and understanding of interdependence has been the foundation of the circle of moral concern. A few centuries ago, it’s unlikely that many Europeans would have grasped the concept of “nation”. Nineteenth century wars of national unification in Europe, along with the U.S. Civil War, followed by two world wars in the 20th century, have driven home the importance of national identity, which in the form of patriotism continues to inspire sacrifice to the larger good around the world. However, a circle of moral concern shaped by nationalism imperils the entire world in an age when multiple countries possess nuclear weapons, and will soon possess advanced AI systems.

The Role of Universalizing Religions

Henrich asserts that “One of the primary ways that cultural evolution has managed to turn our cognitive bugs into potent social technologies has been by favoring deep commitments to supernatural beings who punish believers for violation social norms beneficial to the community. … Communities devoted to such gods are more likely to expand, spread and provide models for other communities to copy. They are also less likely to collapse or disintegrate.” (p. 133)

Henrich hypothesizes that “Under the pressure of intergroup competition, gods should become increasingly concerned about those aspects of behavior that promote cooperation and harmony within groups.” (p. 133) And: “Over time, the gods evolved from divine pranksters to divine judges capable of inflicting injuries, illness and even death.” (p. 134)

This account of how universal religions such as Christianity expanded the circle of moral concern is persuasive but incomplete. Initially, the founders and early proponents of world religions had experiences of the sacred that transcended the boundaries of tribes, kingdoms, racial ethnic groups. Jesus Christ had to be viewed as the savior of all peoples, not just Jews, for Christianity to become a world religion. To achieve this goal, the apostle Paul had to break with leaders of the early Christian Church who had a much narrower idea of the Christian message.

All world religions have struggled with the tension between experiences of the sacred and universal principles that apply to all human beings equally and the tendency for moral intuitions and spiritual beliefs to be degraded in ways that support division, hatred, oppression and violent conflict. All world religions have been vulnerable to tribal, national and racial prejudices and hatreds, and given rise to oxymorons such as “White Christianity,” Hindu nationalism, Islamic terrorism, not to mention wars of religion that have led to many millions of deaths around the world.

Christianity’s fraught relationship with slavery during the Roman Empire and in Medieval Europe suggests the difficulty of applying religious principles supporting the inherent worth of all humans in social environments with very different ideas. Christianity became the state religion in the Western Roman Empire which could never had occurred if the Christian Church had taken a strong stand against slavery, described by Wikipedia as “the bedrock of the Roman and world economy.” The Roman empire contained millions of slaves, estimated by one scholar (Harper, 2011) as one-tenth of the late Roman Empire’s population. The Roman Empire was supremely cruel (per the norm for earlier and later empires) and its elites viewed slave ownership as a source of honor and prestige.

Following the collapse of Rome, the Catholic Church first prohibited Jews from owning Christian slaves before (in parts of Europe) prohibiting the enslavement of Christians altogether. Non-Christians were viewed differently. The Medieval Church authorized the slavery of non-Christians through the 15th and early 16th century before, for centuries, intermittently acceding to or condemning the slave trade and/or the enslavement of indigenous peoples in the Americas. However, some historians insist that the Catholic Church never took a strong stand against slavery in Brazil, a country in which slavery flourished on sugar plantations.

Some Catholic groups in the U.S. owned slaves, e.g. the Jesuits, who famously sold 272 slaves to prevent the bankruptcy of Georgetown University in 1838. In The 272: The Families Who Were Enslaved and Sold to Build the American Catholic Church, Rachel Swarns asserts that “For more than a century, The American Catholic Church relied on the buying, selling, and enslavement of Black people to lay its foundations, support its clergy, and drive its expansion.” (p. xvi)

The only Christian denomination in the U.S. unequivocally opposed to slavery in the 19th century was the Quakers. Baptists, Methodists and Presbyterians split on the issue of slavery on regional lines, i.e., North vs. South.

The only Influential Christian thinker during Roman times who called for the abolition of slavery was Saint Gregory of Nyssa (335-395 CE) who condemned slavery in the strongest terms. Saint Augustine (354-430 CE) was an apologist for slavery which he viewed as due to original sin and a punishment for individuals’ sins, a view of slavery which Thomas Acquinas adopted several hundred years later. John Chrysostom (347-407 CE) opposed unjust and unfair forms of slavery, and urged slave owners to treat their slaves humanely. However, he did not oppose the institution of slavery.

Even after the fall of the Roman Empire, “As strange as it may seem, Christian Europe took the slave law of the Roman Empire and in some ways expanded it. Church leaders codified the legal rights of the Church over its manumitted persons, found new ways of enslaving people that the Roman Empire’s forbade, and made it more difficult to manumit (i.e., free) slaves of the churches by prohibiting the alienation of church property.” (Kellerman, 2022). It appears that in regard to slavery, the Catholic Church was a slave of its past embroilment with the Roman Empire and of its adherence to the traditions and theological opinions of the early Church.

Many abolitionists in the U.S. were inspired to oppose slavery based on Christian beliefs, but slavery was also defended by apologists for slavery on biblical grounds, with quotes from Paul’s letters urging slaves to be “obedient to your master.” Historically, the thinking of the Catholic Church and most Protestant denominations, with notable exceptions, has often been more influenced by abhorrent ethical standards prevailing in the social environment of the time than by their affirmation of the inherent value of all human beings.

Nevertheless, intuitions of the sacred value of all human beings and of Creation have always been a part of world religions and other spiritual traditions. The importance of these intuitions suggests a test of false religion unrelated to doctrines or beliefs in God, saviors or prophets, i.e. to what extent do specific religious practices and beliefs embrace the sacred value of all people, or encourage enmity and divisions based on religious affiliation, national identity or racial/ethnic identification? This is a straightforward test of a religion, religious sect or religious leader’s support in widening the circle of moral concern, or narrowing it. No genuine spiritual leader or religious tradition endorses hatred, division, or violence directed at despised groups, embraces racial/ethnic boundaries to worship, or identifies spiritual truth with a national identity. Those who do so are spiritual frauds.

Expanding the moral circle to animals and other living beings

In recent years, the philosopher, Martha Nussbaum, has been an eloquent advocate for expanding the circle of moral concern to animals. The March 10, 2022 issue of The New York Review of Books contains Nussbaum’s article, “What We Owe Our Fellow Animals.” She is also the author of Justice for Animals: Our Collective Responsibility (2022).

Nussbaum argues cogently that humans have greatly underestimated animal intelligence. She comments: “Now, a revolution in knowledge is revealing the enormous richness and cognitive complexity of animal lives, which prominently includes intricate social groupings, emotional responses and even cultural learning.” Nussbaum maintains: “to think clearly about our responsibility, we need to understand these animals as accurately as we can, what they are striving for and responses they have as they try to flourish.”

Humans have been biased in favor of animals most like us, though “in the case of birds, “convergent evolution” has produced abilities similar to those of apes (tool use, complicated social strategies, the ability to deceive others) through a totally different biological path” that does not include the neocortex. She attacks the idea that language separates humans from all other species, a view that “neglects the tremendous richness of animal communicative systems …” She criticizes “The false lure of metacognition: the idea that reflexive self-consciousness is the be-all and end-all of intelligence and that we humans are unique in possessing it. … any creature who is capable of deceiving another creature is capable of metacognition, since to deceive you must be able to think about the mental state of another.” She asserts: “dogs, squirrel, many birds … have this ability.”

Nussbaum asserts that “it is extremely difficult to get things right about animal lives and capacities.” Even today, biologists and philosophers continue to debate whether animals have feelings, even though Antonio Damasio and others have argued convincingly that affect (not cognition) is the foundation of mind, and that affect was an early development in animals with central nervous systems hundreds of millions of years ago. Nussbaum quotes Frans de Waal: “Emotions are an essential part of our intellect.”

Nussbaum describes animal capacities for social cognition and complexity revealed by the research of recent decades and of cultural transmission of leaning including birdsong, whale song and the social cohesion of sperm whales, orcas and dolphins.

Nussbaum maintains that “many, if not most, animals are not automata or “brute beasts” but creatures with a point of view in the world and diverse ends toward which they strive.” In treating animals as strictly instrumental to human ends, “we cause immense injustice every day, and injustice calls out for accountability and remediation.” She believes that “Elephants and whales can never be ethically kept in captivity” as these species require large territories and the freedom to roam far and wide.” She calls for “an ethical theory to direct our efforts in policy and law.”

Nussbaum favors a Capabilities Approach (CA), a very different perspective than Sebo’s emphasis on sentience and agency. In CA, the central question is “What is this creature actually able to do and to be?” Nussbaum states that this question is the foundation of her theory of justice for animals. Her theory is species specific and seeks to establish a threshold past which “we should judge an animal’s life to be unjustly thwarted.” She asserts: “But we humans are not satisfied with non-torture. We seek flourishing: free movement, free communication, rich interactions with others of our species (and other species too). Why should we suppose that whales, dolphins, apes, elephants, parrots and so many other animals seek anything else? “

The social psychology of an expanding circle of moral concern

Surely philosophers (such as Nussbaum and Sebo) who assume that new knowledge and a better understanding of animals’ capacities and needs can widen the circle of moral concern to include many animals are on solid ground. However, most people (I believe) are far more influenced by the relationships they have, or potentially might have, with animals or humans very different from themselves, some of whom may live in distant countries or in the oceans. Philosophical argument is a weak strategy for changing public opinion and moral attitudes, especially compared to personal interaction with persons and animals outside the circle of moral concern.

Non-judgmental attention without a goal is often an indicator of love, and can also lead to deep affection for animals or groups heretofore disregarded or given little importance. It is not unusual for researchers to come to love the animals they study, even as they pursue a research agenda.

Social roles matter. There is likely to be a large difference in personal experience between serving as a soldier in an occupation army rooting out terrorists in a distant country and employment for an organization that distributes food assistance in an area of the world suffering from famine.

Of course, it’s true that social interaction does not always lead to positive regard – the opposite can also occur – especially when groups are participants in zero sum games, or when social interactions are guided by rules of caste. Feelings of superiority of members of a caste at the top of a social hierarchy are likely to be strengthened by interactions with members of a lower caste who must struggle to meet their basic needs in undignified ways, while demonstrating overt signs of deference to an upper class. Many 19th century White Americans who were strong opponents of slavery, including Lincoln, could never accept the idea that Black Americans were their equal in potential. Rigid social hierarchies are a near impenetrable barrier to an expanding circle of moral concern because those at the top of a social hierarchy usually strongly resist viewing those below them in social rankings as their equals in law, before God, or in any other way.

It is also possible to structure interactions among social groups competing for dominance, or for limited essential resources, in a way that guarantees an increase of enmity, and of rejection of the idea that the opposing group deserves moral consideration. Gangster movies and histories of royal courts demonstrate the contempt for enemies among criminal gangs and ruthless no-holds barred struggles for royal favor among court factions. It is possible to create social structures guaranteed to bring out the nasty traits of human beings.

However, the opposite is also true. Some social arrangements bring out the best in human behavior. Humans have a potential for cooperative teamwork in pursuit of common goals that can bring large populations together, and encourage sacrifice for the common good. Unfortunately, political entities such as tribes, kingdoms, states and nations have learned how to tap into this potential by sustaining tensions and occasional hostilities that increase internal cohesion at the cost of violent conflict, or threat of conflict. Just as consequential, in the absence of conflict with a despised enemy, groups tend to break into factions that eventually threaten group survival.

Human societies must overcome two main challenges to their moral development: 1) The dynamics of social identity depends on social bonds forged, in part, by opposition and conflict. War (contrary to some scholars) has not become less frequent in recent centuries, and international institutions have proven to be no match for nationalism, which continues around the world to figure prominently in social identity, and to create national enmities that can lead to war. 2) For most people, the circle of moral concern is determined by perceived interdependence that leaves excluded groups and nations subject to predation or merciless attacks. As the metaphor of a circle suggests, concern for others has a boundary (usually a narrow boundary) that can be expanded, not usually by philosophical argument or religious belief, but more often by personal contact with citizens of other countries, non-judgmental attention, empathy inspired by the arts, and cooperation in pursuit of shared goals.

The extent to which a better understanding of the dynamics of social identity and of moral development can enhance the circle of moral concern is uncertain. In recent centuries, technological progress has far outpaced humans’ moral development to the point of imperiling both our civilization and all other biological species. Humans are not morally prepared for the power conferred by science and technology to engage in genetic engineering, utilize advanced AI systems, or (apparently) to combat climate change.

In most of the world outside Europe, tribalism, nationalism and racial- ethnic identity are no less powerful in determining social identity and commanding allegiance than at the end of World War II. Europe, however, has dramatically changed from the endemic hostilities between and among nations and kingdoms that existed for many centuries until 1945 e.g., England and France were periodically at war for hundreds of years between the 10th century and 1815.

In countries afflicted by war or violent civil conflict, social identities based on nation, tribe and racial ethnic divisions have hardened, which is the inevitable effect of war, civil violence, oppression and racism. On a positive note, novelists and other story tellers have tapped a rich source of imagination and creativity in writing about diverse cultures with long histories of oppression and/or war in recent decades. Social identity given at birth and sustained in part by opposition to other groups can be a source of strength, resilience and hope. There are understandable reasons why most people in every country accept the social identity into which they are born.

Curiously, some modern novelists (e.g., Jennifer Egan in The Candy House) have begun to question the solidity of personal identity created through continually edited memories and sustained by flimsy, self-serving, often self-harmful narratives that can be set aside, reframed or (amazingly) flipped to create their polar opposite. Both personal identity and social identity turn out to be ambiguous imaginative constructs that can be -- and sometimes are- thoroughly reimagined. Following their defeat and the end of W.W. II, Japan and Germany quickly became vastly different countries with radically altered social values, as described in Harold Jahner’s extraordinary history, Aftermath: Life in the Fallout of the Third Reich: 1945-1955 (2019) and Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II by John Dover (1999). In extreme circumstances, the social identity of entire nations can be as malleable as personal identity.

However, it is just as likely that a nation’s social identity transformed under extreme circumstances will narrow the circle of moral concern rather than expand it. Two Trump Administrations have sought to exclude immigrants and refugees from the circle of moral concern through mass arrests, deportation without due process, disappearing illegal immigrants in foreign prisons where they can be beaten and tortured without legal accountability, incarceration in inhumane conditions, and by punishing outspoken opposition to Israel’s actions in Gaza through arrest, incarceration and deportation. This is only the tip of the iceberg in the moral unravelling of a wealthy and powerful nation - the envy of much of the world until recently - with no end in sight.

Expanding the circle of moral concern, or shrinking it, often leads to political conflict in which all parties develop deep contempt for opponents’ values. It is one thing to be tolerant regarding different political beliefs; it is something else entirely to allow political opponents who view persons and animals inside one’s circle of moral concern with hatred or indifference to harm them with impunity.

A direction for the future

The world is on the verge of cataclysmic changes in the next few decades due to a) global warming, b) mass migration from the global South that is a response to climate change, c) the deployment of advanced AI systems around the world and, d) the ever-present possibility of nuclear war. Trump’s election and the rise of extreme rightwing parties in Europe reflect the political agenda wealthy developed countries may follow: i.e., closing borders, engaging in indiscriminate mass deportation, persecuting migrants, rejecting refugees and those seeking political asylum, terminating non-military foreign aid, arming to the teeth, increasing carbon emissions and leaving poor nations most affected by climate change to their fates, without assistance or a second thought.

This cannot be an acceptable agenda for anyone concerned with the welfare of people around the world. It is an agenda of moral degradation that will lead to catastrophic destruction of our civilization.

Left wing parties in the U.S. and Europe have been unable, to date, to develop a viable response to immigration that demonstrates a commitment to border security while respecting the rights of migrants. Until they do, extreme right-wing parties in the U.S. and Europe are likely to flourish. However, coping with the politics of immigration is only one dimension of the climate crisis and of the danger of war between nuclear powers.

The power of nationalism to determine social identity has to be mitigated, a course of action that is highly unlikely but is nevertheless possible in a civilization that will have to be utterly transformed to prevent its self-destruction during the next century. This transformation can only occur when young people are educated and socialized to regard themselves as citizens of the world, as well as citizens of nations.

This vision has concrete elements in the U.S.:

Teaching of a foreign language or languages to all students beginning in kindergarten.
Foreign exchange programs that allow every high school student to live and study in another country if they choose to.
Collaborative arrangements between colleges and universities in various countries to allow students to spend part of college in another country.
The public and philanthropic support of international think tanks to develop strategies for mitigating the effects of climate change and for the ethical management of advanced AI.

Young people can be raised to care about persons outside their national boundaries. Religious education of missionaries has had this goal for hundreds of years. This is only a far-fetched, crazy idea in a country that has seemingly decided to do the opposite for the foreseeable future. When the consequences of living in a morally blinkered society that cares only for its economic interests and military dominance become apparent, it may be possible to reverse course. ©

References

“Christian views on slavery,” Wikipedia, available online.

Dover, J., Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II (1999), W.W. Norton & Company, New York, NY.

Graeber, D. & Wengrow, D., The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity (2021), Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York, Ny.

Harper, K., Slavery in the Late Roman World, AD 275-425 (2011), Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK.

Henrich, J. , The WEIRDest People in the World: How the West Became Psychologically Peculiar and Particularly Prosperous (2020), Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York, NY.

Jahner, H., Aftermath: Life in The Fallout of the Third Reich 1945-1955 (2019), Knopt, New York, NY.

Kellerman, C., All Oppression Must Cease: A History of Slavery, Abolitionism and the Catholic Church (2022), Orbis Books, Maryknoll, NY.

Nussbaum, M., “What We Owe Our Fellow Animals,” The New York Review of Books, March 10, 2022.

Sebo, J., The Moral Circle: Who Matters, What Matters and Why (2025), W.W. Norton and Company, New York, NY.

Swarns, R., The 272: The Families Who Were Enslaved and Sold to Build the American Catholic Church (2023), Random House, New York, NY.

Undset, S., Olav Audunsson: Providence (translated by T. Nunnally, 2021), University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, Mn.

Dee Wilson

July 2025