Charles Taylor’s near-classic essay (first published in 1992) “The Politics of Recognition” actually focused on contemporary demands of equal recognition, as in, ”Democracy has ushered in a politics of equal recognition,…” a problem obviously fraught with rivalry. It gets further confounded with the introduction of the term “identity,” as in demanding equal recognition of one’s identity in relation to others’ identities, for “identity” actually points in two opposite directions: towards the “identical,” as well as towards the “individual,” as in everyone’s (or every group's) individual, different or even diverse (as well as supposedly authentic) identities. “You can have diversity within a shared sense of identity. And if you don’t have that shared sense of identity, it’s going to be very divisive,” warns Jonathan Haidt in another of his recent talks.
The apt title of Ralph Shain’s essay (from 2008) specifically asks, “Is Recognition a Zero-Sum Game?,” which he himself doesn’t really answer, but many thinkers, including Francis Fukuyama, do answer it in the affirmative, considering meaningful recognition as always being relative or hierarchical and relational. Also, stressing “equal recognition” results in other descriptions, reflective of social polarization, gaining significance, such as differentiation-undifferentiation, or the Haidtian centrifugal-centripetal. We’re smack-dab in the middle of a world of rivalrous mimesis. I would argue that zero-sum and scarcity vs positive sum and abundance is a particularly apt descriptive pair here, parallel to the Christian creative and abundant living vs destructive and rivalrous living, which in turn parallels (Christian) conversion and lack thereof.
Zero-sum here is illuminating also because it points to at least two additional issues:
1. one’s authentic identity is quickly perceived as – at the most – identical in terms of received recognition, whereas, despite that ostensibly being demanded all along, in the heat of mimetic recognition rivalry what is really fought for is getting the upper hand for one’s identity. [And that would have to come at the expense of the rival(s).]
2. the lingering suspicion, in fact one of the crucial reasons for outbreaks of rivalry, that the granting of equal recognition is either insincere, forced (whereas it should be voluntary and forthcoming), or an outright sham, not providing anything of real value to the demanding party. That – in other words – the stronger party doesn’t want to share their recognition “resources.”
Which last point returns us to power politics, and of course struggle for power is most liable to become zero-sum, if it does not belong to the zero-sum domain par excellence. If so, despite a changing social and cultural milieu, with honor cultures giving way in the West to a dignity culture, with its universalist principle of recognizing everyone’s equal dignity, the ostensible struggle for equal recognition cannot but continue.
But is it really about equal recognition? And why should it be if for the mimetically desirous man it feels like a zero-sum game? Certainly equal recognition of each individual or group unique identity – our current game – feels like one (whereas that of universal equal dignity arguably need not: whether grounded in man's autonomy and reason or in religious beliefs, it relies relatively less on, or even tends to deemphasize, reciprocity). Contributing to loss of a shared sense of identity, aided and abetted by man’s rivalry-prone mimetic endowment, it has brought on a victimhood culture, which I would not characterize even as paying lip service to equal recognition. Whether out of a sense of outraged powerlessness or driven by a sense of urgency and a spirit of rivalry, various societal underdogs seemingly decided, for all practical purposes, that they will not be fooled by equality mumbo-jumbo. In venues like American universities the arsenal of those anti-establishment warriors or latter-day revolutionaries has been aptly described by Jonathan Haidt. But as he points out, the fight currently fought on many “victim” fronts is in the process of converging to become intersectional, taking into account and exploiting interactions of discriminatory effects, (aiming at) producing a final and perfect polarization of all societal underdogs, as they perceive themselves, united against those perceived by them as presently wielding power.
What will happen if at that stage, which is still shaping up, the protagonists – we as divided, with none staying on the sidelines! – are roughly evenly matched? The latter is true already, as indubitably borne out by a slew of recent elections, but “victimhood recognition” conflicts are still raging on many distinct planes, and not everybody yet seemingly has succumbed to the virulence of those many mimetic contagions. Bugle calls to “intersectional” communion have not yet met with resounding undifferentiating success, but there are harbingers of that on the horizon, as alluded to by Haidt. Will the "victimizers" oblige and respond in kind? Still Haidt is actually rather optimistic concerning American academe, though not necessarily the other venues, where he seems to be hedging his bets. So, "be alarmed, but do not despair." The fine-tuned machinery of liberal democracy is showing considerable wear and tear, and is seemingly about to come apart even as its denizen mechanics are coming apart at the seams – and yet it just might be able to withstand the age of outrage, just as it did so many prior threats.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qe6-QSnQTdg
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