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The Real Culture War
Authoritatives and Nurturers
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"The Nurturant and Authoritative ways of life are motivated by very different core values. For instance, Nurturants prioritize traits such as acceptance, empathy, cooperation, perspective taking, and open-mindedness, and they support democracy. Authoritatives cherish obedience to rules, social order, individual responsibility, absolute certainty of the correctness of their views, and lean towards autocratic leaders." (John Sanders, Embracing Prodigals)
Jesus came to turn us away from a way of life based on authority, tribalism, and getting what you deserve to one grounded in acceptance, grace, love, and forgiveness…He showed grace to Jews who did not practice the food laws and welcomed Gentiles. He sought to bring people more fully into the Nurturing life and invited those who lived by the Authoritative approach into a more nourishing way of life. He wanted to change how families and institutions relate to one another. (John Sanders, Embracing Prodigals)
Jesus taught the Nurturing way of life and sought to get those who follow the Authoritative way to turn around and follow him. He said that this would pit family members against one another (Matt 10:34–39). Religious Nurturants and Authoritatives clashed in the first century and in every century since. Today, we feel the polarization in society and the split in families. (John Sanders, Embracing Prodigals)
As the election season unfolds, you may have difficulty having conversations with family members and neighbors who are "on the other side." It may seem as if you live in different and incompatible worlds.
Truth be told, you do.
The differences are not simply about policies or information; they are about moral vision. You and your family members have different visions of what the world ought to be like. This does not mean you don't have some things in common. You may care about each other and love each other. But your moral visions are in conflict. The challenge is to find space where you can at least talk about it and understand the differences. I hope this page helps, especially the questionnaire at the bottom of the page.
My ideas are indebted to a book by the Christian theologian John Sanders titled "Embracing Prodigals: Overcoming Authoritative Religion by Embodying Jesus' Nurturing Grace." Published by Wipf and Stock Publishers in July 2020, the book presents the divide among Christians regarding theological, moral, and political views, exploring the contrasting approaches of nurturers, who value empathy and cooperation, and authoritatives, who prioritize obedience to law and order. I want to build upon Sanders' ideas.
The Two Paradigms
Sanders is right. In contemporary America as well as globally, there are two prevailing moral paradigms: authoritative and nurturant. Scholars debate whether to label authority-centered individuals as "authoritarian," with its negative connotations, or "authoritatives," with its positive connotations. Along with Sanders, I choose the word "authoritative" as a complement to "nurturer," which also has positive connotations.
Authoritatives value order. They prioritize nationalism, tradition, order, stability, adherence to rules, individual accountability, and moral certitude. They know that there is joy in life, and they are enriched by meaningful relations with friends, family, and community. They have a nurturing side to them. But they think nurturing relations depend on having an ordered society. In the American context, this order is not egalitarian. It is a hierarchical order based on merit and achievement. Authoritatives in America think that people should have as much as they want in terms of material possessions, if they "play by the rules." They think that concerns for equity have gone too far in society, leading to mediocrity and missed potential. They value excellence over equity.
Nurturers value love. They prioritize empathy, care for the vulnerable, cooperation, perspective taking, and forgiveness. Their image of the good society is of a beloved community filled with creativity, compassion, and mutual care, with no one left behind. They know that such a society needs to be ordered, but they think order is in service to love, not the other way around. They value compassion over achievement, equity over excellence. The purpose of life is not to be rich, they say, it is to love our neighbors as we love ourselves.
Moral Clarity or Moral Sensitivity
The differences between nurturers and authoritatives are reflected in their respective understandings of morality. Whereas nurturers emphasize moral sensitivity, authoritatives emphasize moral clarity: that is, being "clear" about what is right and wrong, understood in black and white terms. Thus, nurturers are more comfortable with moral ambiguity and uncertainty than are authoritatives. Authoritatives believe that good things happen when people follow rules and live disciplined, decent lives. From the perspective of an authoritative, righteousness should be rewarded and disobedience punished. From the perspective of a nurturer, we are all equal in the sight of God, and mercy is more important than rigid judgment. Authoritatives believe there is a place in life for retribution; nurturers believe rehabilitation and restorative justice are more valuable than retribution.
Mutual Stigmatization
Needless to say, authoritatives and nurturers often stigmatize each other. Authoritatives see nurturers as naïve, overly permissive, weak, sentimental, and unrealistic. They see nurturers as arrogant, too, when they (the nurturers) impose their will or cancel others, in which case they are "woke." Nurturers see authoritatives as rigid, control-preoccupied, self-centered, and simple-minded when it comes to dividing the world into friends and enemies. It is very difficult for them to get past these images and negative judgments, however true or false, and see the world through the eyes of the other.
God
There is a religious side to this, too. While empathy-centered Christians believe that the nurturer perspective aligns more closely with the teachings of Jesus, authority-centered Christians can and do adopt religious rhetoric, seeing close connections between belief in God and an ordered, non-chaotic world. Authoritatives see loving God and serving the nation as two sides of a single coin, a service to what is good. Nurturers are more comfortable with separating God and country and recognizing that serving God can compete with serving the country.
Parallel to this are different images of God. While authoritatives and nurturers believe in God, they often conceive of God differently relative to their moral visions. Authoritatives often perceive God as the ultimate authority who upholds authority-centered values such as law and order and punishes the disobedient, while nurturers envision God as the supreme example of empathy and compassion. Authority-centered individuals envision God on the analogy of a patriarchal father or political ruler, nurturers on the analogy of a caring friend or the Abba (daddy) of Jesus. Moreover, when nurturers are among authoritatives who often speak of God in authoritarian terms, they prefer not to speak of God at all, rather than entering into debates about what God is like. This can lead authoritatives to believe that nurturers lack a spiritual or religious side to their lives.
Poles on a Spectrum
Of course, the caricatures above are stated sharply, and perhaps too sharply. While nurturers and authoritatives lie at opposite ends of a spectrum, there are places in between. An authority-centered individual can have a special care for the vulnerable, for example, and a nurturer can understand and appreciate the need for social order. Both can appeal to aspects of tradition to support their views. Nevertheless, people tend to lean more toward one end of the spectrum, and this helps us understand what is happening in America and the world today. We see a rise in the authority-centered mindset. This rise is partially a response to the perceived permissiveness of nurturers in a world that needs order or, as the Chinese would put it, social harmony.
Authoritatives in Other Nations
The authority-centered mindset often brings with it a sharp dichotomy between "us" and "them." It can include hostility towards outsiders and elites, along with economic protectionism, as exemplified by movements like MAGA in the United States. However, it may also encompass concerns for the well-being of ordinary citizens, provided they are "patriots" and loyal to national traditions.
What we see today is a rise of the authority-centered mindset in nations around the world, fostered by leaders who are themselves religious and patriotic, albeit not in American ways. In Russia and Iran, no less than in the United States, public leaders appeal to religion and the cultural treasures of their past for justification. Their views can also be bolstered through a sense of history.
In Putin's case, for example, the sense of history includes a remembrance of a time when Russia was a great empire, combined with a sense that some or much of this "greatness" was lost through the rise of western-style "liberal" democracy that overemphasized the rights of individuals at the expense of their individual responsibility to the greater good of the whole. To restore order and stability, it is necessary to resist colonization by western-style democracies: to be illiberal rather than liberal. Western-style democracies are seen as an aspect of western "modernity" that elevates the isolated individual to an exaggerated status, as the arbiter of all that is important in life. This elevation includes a rejection of all things sacred, save the value of commodities in the marketplace and individual achievement. Communal well-being is lost.
In terms of foreign policy, the authority-centered mindset can also lead to an emphasis on a strong and powerful military that protects people from harm from outsiders. This further underscores the authority-centered inclination toward security and protectionism, both domestically and internationally.
American Exceptionalism
While conservatives in America adopt the authority-centered mindset and see themselves justified by the authority-centered God to view things in America-first ways, they are nervous about the idea that other nations, too, Russia, Iran, and China, are justified in their embrace of authority-centered values. They worry about the strong militaries of other nations and want to be unrivaled in their economic prosperity. They see the world through the lens of a win-lose scenario and strive for victory. They justify their "American first mentality" as a special case, a divinely ordained moral exception, such that, in the best of worlds, America could, in fact, rule the world or, at the very least, be the beacon of hope for the world. For them, God has "chosen" America over other nations, and God "calls" Americans to lead with authority-centered values of nationalism, tradition, order, stability, obedience to rules, individual accountability, and moral clarity, to which they add "capitalism." In the case of American authority-centeredness, capitalism is the one area of life where individualistic achievement, on primarily individualist terms, can reign, as long as the individuals "play by the rules." Here, self-centeredness, and specifically the profit motive, can be a primary motivation.
It is easy to see that this understanding of American exceptionalism makes no sense to people in other nations, and who understandably wish for a multi-polar world in which many nations cooperate, even amid their differences, not a mono-polar world in which America rules. For nurturers in the Christian tradition, a multi-polar world is more Christian than a mono-polar world. For authoritatives, a mono-polar world is more Christian, because God loves order and is comfortable with hierarchy.
Something New?
The battle between the nurturers and the authoritatives is the real culture war of our time. It is a battle between competing moral visions about what life is about. It is happening in families, in nations, in the world. It is now impossible, given social media and one-sided news, for authoritatives and nurturers to understand each other, learn from each other, and change in the process. Both are entrenched in their views. This is why dinner table conversations are impossible.
The matter is complicated by the fact that many authoritatives are not interested in listening to the other side and being changed in the process. The very desire to listen is a nurturant desire, not an authoritatative desire. In the authoritative world, battles are good and necessary for good to overcome evil.
From a nurturant perspective, the only hope is for a new kind of culture, where listening and dialogue occur, and where both sides are willing to be changed. For that culture to emerge, new kinds of leaders are needed: leaders who highlight "listening to the other side" as an essential practice for the future of the world. None are yet on the horizon, but we can hope. I do.
Meanwhile, perhaps it is possible even within local contexts for people to listen to one another. I offer the questionnaire below toward that end. My suggestion is that family members and neighbors, on different sides, take the questionnaire together and, as necessary, critique it.
The first question is: "Does the essay above mischaracterize you? What would you add or subtract from what is said?" That is the most important question. If you find yourself mischaracterized, explain the mischaracterization to your friends and loved ones in a thoughtful, honest way. And if you are in the presence of someone who feels mischaracterized, listen to them. In that listening, even as you might disagree, a moment of hope, of healing, will have begun.
Jesus encourages us to love our enemies, even if, in terms of politics and moral vision, they sit across the dinner table. Such love begins with listening with a willingness to take on the perspective of the other.
- Jay McDaniel
Questionnaire
- Does the essay above mischaracterize you? What would you add or subtract from what is said?
- How important do you believe tradition is in shaping societal values and behaviors?
- Do you think empathy plays a crucial role in social interactions and decision-making?
- To what extent do you prioritize stability and order in your personal and professional life?
- How do you view the balance between individual accountability and collective responsibility for societal well-being?
- What role do you believe rules and regulations should play in governing society?
- How do you perceive the relationship between religion/spirituality and patriotism/nationalism?
- Do you think there is a need for moral clarity in navigating ethical dilemmas and societal issues? Which is most important to you: moral clarity or moral sensitivity?
- If you believe in a personal God, do you think God's personality is about reward and punishment? About compassion? Which takes priority?
- Do you prefer a world in which America is the dominant leader, or a multipolar world in which America and other nations form a community of communities?
- How do you envision achieving harmony between differing perspectives, such as those of nurturants and authoritatives, within society?
- Can authoritatives and nurturants listen to each other? Is there a leader on the horizon who can help them do this? Do you feel called to lead in this way?