Industrialization – The Modern Frame

Toward a Theory of History

Change is the defining feature of history. By history, I mean human history; specifically, the history of the human world, which exists over and above–yet never entirely independent from–the physical and biological world.¹ As time unfolds the present is influenced by the past; what is, has been conditioned by what once was; the human world of today is a synthesis of the human world of yesterday. Just as any given moment holds the necessary conditions for what is possible in the future, the necessary conditions of the world we inhabit today existed in the past in some way. Today has developed and emerged from new combinations and novel instantiations of a multiplicity of conditions existing in the past. A given moment may be said to comprise a “whole”, out of which emerges a synthesis constituting a larger, more complex, whole. Thus, there is a directedness to the unfolding of history. Like the expansion of the universe or the arrow of time, it would appear history moves in a single direction.² This phenomenon–in which the totality of circumstances constituted within the human world influences and affects itself over time–I will call historical conditioning.³

The Isolated Self and the Limits of Communication, Part II

The phenomenon of the isolated self is best understood within the more general phenomena of communication struggles, breakdowns, and failures that characterize much contemporary debate.¹ While in many ways the isolated self can be described on the basis of theoretical frameworks alone, there is also more to the story. Failures in communication fuel the psychological need for reinforcement and self-affirmation (especially by like-minded others), which in turn lead to a kind of factionalism² that understands one’s group as pure and righteous, and those whose views differ as at best mistaken, or at worst, evil. The pseudo-confidence accompanying this phenomenon ensures that isolated selves live within their own reality, cut off from those holding different perspectives. It appears that this overall condition has, in part, stemmed from the basic human desire for certainty that seems proportionate to the relative uncertainty of the modern world.³ But this is not all. The transformation of the public sphere of rational-critical debate into a commodity–to be consumed like any other–has led to its own problems and complexities, not the least of which is the role it has played in the emergence of the isolated self. To this, I now turn.

The Isolated Self and the Limits of Communication, Part I

In a previous essay, I offered some thoughts on the state of contemporary debate in America. At that time, debates over public health and economics (specifically in light of the unfolding COVID-19 pandemic) and systemic racism were front and center. Add to these the controversies over the 2020 U.S. presidential election and the events of January 6th in Washington D.C., and it is perhaps unsurprising that 2021 has followed the trajectory of 2020.¹ As far as the struggle to communicate is concerned, the problem has become even more pronounced and noticeable. In many ways, the breakdowns in communication over the past year have progressed. Progressed, in the sense that they have reached a new stage of development–one that is perhaps far more dangerous than many people realize. Such failures in communication lead to a peculiar form of isolation, one that is simultaneously beholden to and a consequence of various forms of propaganda and factionalism. For reasons which will become apparent, this essay is more or less an informal continuation of my previous essay, Theoretical Frameworks and the Limits of Communication. As before, this is an initial and undeveloped attempt to shed light on a situation that is in many ways unintelligible.

Achievement Culture: Some Considerations In Context

Over the course of three previous essays, I sketched some of the origins of what I have called “the modern culture of achievement”.¹ What has been missing up to this point in these explorations is a historical understanding of the context in which these origins emerged. The origins of modern success literature (and its corresponding culture) came about at a time when the quest to succeed existed in an almost exclusively–though not entirely–secular way. As Max Weber observed, the “spirit of capitalism” reached a point where it became self-sufficient, no longer requiring the religious impetus which had sparked it.² It was in the rational and methodical reorganization of life, structured around the idea of a vocation or calling, which laid the groundwork for what I have described in the origin story.³ This is what I had in mind, when, speaking of success literature in Part I, I wrote, “the literature in question developed and emerged within a culture that already existed”. It is within the context of the larger whole of socioeconomic history that a deeper and broader understanding of the origins of achievement culture will emerge.⁴

The Origins of the Modern Culture of Achievement, Part III

The previous essay dealt with some of the origins of what will become the mainline¹ thought in self-help or success literature throughout the twentieth century and beyond. In addition to this developing main-current we will find the emergence of offshoots and others, which at first begin slowly, and accelerate over time, up through the present day. Sometimes they are a departure in approach, sometimes they are a more focused look at a specific subject or category–such as personal finance, sales-techniques, human relationships, or something else. Nevertheless, the end-goal or purpose remains the same: success.² As such, what underlies the totality of this literature is a clear sense of utility or pragmatism–it is paradigmatic of the instrumental stance. This is not literature to be contemplated, it is a literature to be used.

The Origins of the Modern Culture of Achievement, Part II

The dawn of the twentieth century witnessed the birth of a unique development in the history of success literature. Ideas and concepts that can be found in both the Transcendentalist and New Thought movements steadily came to be applied to the end-goal of success and wealth creation. This unique synthesis also led to the development of a peculiar science, or what I will refer to as a theology, which was intended to support it.¹ In the wider scheme, technological innovations and continuing industrialization led to an expanding scope of economic and sociological change. Among these changes is the growing use of the telephone and electricity, the development of the automobile and airplane, the age of radio and broadcasting, the rise of the motion picture and the film industry of Hollywood.² The growth of corporations and mass production yielded an ever-expanding set of commodities and consumer goods, in turn leading to the arrival of the professional salesman–a unique sociological type which provided perhaps the first popular audience for the burgeoning industry of success literature.³

The Origins of the Modern Culture of Achievement, Part I

Like most of what I have written about on The Modern Frame, the development of a culture of achievement in modernity, or what I have sometimes called an “ethic of success or wealth”, is a complex subject. It is sometimes referred to as a postmodern phenomenon since much of self-help literature and the like did not become hegemonic until the latter half of the twentieth century.¹ What I refer to is a very broad and general cultural phenomenon where individuals and groups increasingly come to view success–most commonly rooted in monetary success, i.e., wealth creation–as the end-goal or purpose of everyday life and existence. Though there are exceptions, throughout history the rich and powerful have generally been envied by those less fortunate. With the rise of capitalism, we find a broadening of the scope and possibilities for wealth and power. More and more people are able to achieve levels of wealth hitherto unknown. Advances in technology, such as newspapers, pamphlets, mass printing of books, et al., made possible the emergence of a unique body of literature–success literature–which proposed for the first time in history to disclose the so-called wisdom and knowledge of those who claimed to know the way to success, wealth, and prosperity.

Some Further Thoughts on Modern Education

Given what I have said so far about education in the West, specifically about ancient and medieval forms of higher education as they relate to instrumentality and specialization, my treatment of modern forms of higher education needs to be further explored and expanded upon. Here I will continue the general focus on higher education and concerns of instrumentality and specialization, but with an exclusive focus on the modern epoch.

Education: Instrumentality and Specialization

Education in the West has taken many forms throughout history. Like philosophy, its genesis can be traced to ancient Greece, where the first schools of thought were recorded. The first rival conceptions of education–such as those advanced by the ancient sophists, Isocrates, and Plato¹–are in many ways mirrored in modernity, albeit in very different circumstances. Beginning in Greece we find tension with respect to education, which concerns the debate between theoretical and practical forms of higher learning, i.e., between disinterested truth and application or utility. Of course, there is an academic history of this thought, the aggregate of which has come to be known as the philosophy of education. It is not my intention, however, to explore the history of this thought here. It is rather to contrast the varying forms of higher education as they have existed across history in the West in terms of two specifics: instrumentality and specialization. Most important to this comparison will be the question of telos, that is, what is and what has been the goal or purpose of education? What is its raison d’être?

A Sketch of The Workaday World

We live in an age of work for work’s sake, of production, acquisition, and consumption, of income and expenses, GDP and unemployment percentages. Production, acquisition, and consumption have come to be the definitive organizing principles of our lives, conceived–or rather, lived out–as ends in themselves.¹ This provides modern man with what the Greek’s called telos–an end or purpose–and thus structures our lives in a specific way. The tasks of income, wealth, and its management become our primary concerns, and within this Economic sphere, efficiency likewise becomes an end in itself. This situation is unprecedented in history.²