Deconstructing Anti-intellectualism Written by Alex Etl
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Deconstructing Anti-intellectualism https://www.e-ir.info/2017/09/25/deconstructing-anti-intellectualism/ ALEX ETL, SEP 25 2017
The year 2016 offered a series of shocking political events, culminating in the Brexit referendum and the election of Donald Trump. Observers from across the globe tried to interpret these developments from different angles. The outcome of their work has been a number of newly emerging concepts adapted in order to make meaning out of the current state of affairs. Terms like ‘post-truth era,’ ‘filter bubble,’ and ‘anti-intellectualism’ entered the explanatory jargon of experts, analysts, and journalists. This article takes up one of these linguistic constructs – ‘antiintellectualism’ – and aims to point out that its usage invokes exclusionary and dangerous practices. Inherent in the concept of ‘intellectualism’ is a privileged group – the intellectuals – who, in contrast to those deemed as thinking with emotion, are able to think rationally to address great problems. The Oxford Dictionary calls it ‘the exercise of the intellect at the expense of the emotions.’ Conversely, as Richard Hofstadter writes in ‘Antiintellectualism in American Life,’ anti-intellectual ideas and attitudes share the ‘suspicion of the life of the mind and of those who are considered to represent it; and a disposition constantly to minimize the value of that life’. (Hofstadter, 1963) Many articles have published in recent months that the problem with contemporary political events is the rise of ‘anti-intellectualism,’ a phenomenon which is said to endanger the basis of society. For example, Matthew Motta and Jay A. DeSart both concluded that ‘anti-intellectualism’ can be used to craft support for different political movements and politicians, as it happened during the election of Donald Trump. (Motta, 2017; DeSart, 2017) Besides these examples, ‘anti-intellectualism’ became a popular term in 2017 among such newspapers as the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Guardian, and the Diplomat. ‘Anti-intellectualism’ as a concept is inherently problematic because ‘intellect,’ ‘intellectual’ and ‘intellectualism’ are nothing, but empty or illusionary categories. There is no objectively established group of ‘intellectuals.’ None can decide who obtain the capability to think ‘intellectually,’ that is, to exercise reasoning at the expense of emotions. Nevertheless, the constructed category of ‘intellectuals’ is depicted mostly by academics, experts, journalists, politicians, philosophers, writers, activists and scientists in our everyday discourse. This can be seen in a wide range of lists of top ‘intellectuals’, established by newspapers like the Observer, the New York Times, and the Foreign Policy. A similar example emerges from the above cited scholarly articles, since both Motta and DeSart use the term ‘intellectuals’ as constituted by scientists, academics and experts. However, it is easy to see that one could exercise intellectualism without belonging to this group, just as the constructed group of intellectuals can also easily draw on their subjective emotions even without fully understanding the fact. This was also captured by Noam Chomsky, who argued that in many cases academics constitute a privileged class, while ‘plenty of people in the crafts, auto mechanics and so on, probably do as much or more intellectual work as plenty of people in universities.’ (Mitchell and Schoeffel, 2002: 96) Hence, ‘intellectualism’ and ‘anti-intellectualism’ emerge as illusionary, empty terms from the discursive field. The biggest trouble with ‘anti-intellectualism’ is that the concept presupposes a clear distinction between ‘intellectuals’ and the ‘masses’. As showed above, the former group is constituted mostly by scientists, academics, journalists and experts, the latter consists of ordinary people who do not have access to the truth and therefore require the intellectual services of the former. In this context, ‘anti-intellectualism’ refers to the rejection of the ‘masses’ to allow ‘intellectuals’ to tell them how to solve their own problems. Hence, the concept of ‘antiintellectualism’ implies that persuading the ‘masses’ by logic is not possible anymore, while it portrays ‘intellectuals’
E-International Relations
ISSN 2053-8626
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