In the Agora: Moral Authority

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September 26, 2007

Moral Authority

Current events in Myanmar (aka Burma) are worth following. Some 35,000 Buddhist monks are currently leading protest against that country's unpopular military junta, despite curfews and sanctions against peaceful assembly. Soldiers in full battle gear met the anti-government protesters yesterday, and today there are rumors of fighting and five deaths. President Bush announced that the U.S. would tighten economic sanctions on the leaders and the financial backers of the regime. It would also impose an expanded visa ban on those responsible for the most egregious violations of human rights.

Myanmar/Burma is already pretty isolated on the international stage, with China as its only real state sponsor. How the Chinese government would respond to a brutal crackdown on government protesters, which the junta did to a previous protest in 1988, is unknown given how the Chinese are busy cleaning up their public image in advance of next year's Olympic Games. We probably shouldn't get our hopes up that atrocities will be avoided.

I'm fascinated that Buddhist monks are apparently the moral inspiration behind these recent events. As The Economist reports (first article linked above),

At first, the monks limited themselves to chanting prayers and sermons, and urged the Burmese public not to join their marches. But over the weekend, a hitherto unknown group, the All Burma Monks' Alliance, urged people to "struggle peacefully against the evil military dictatorship" until its downfall. Monday's march was joined by some of the country's best-known actors and musicians, as well as leaders of the opposition National League of Democracy (NLD) and crowds of ordinary Burmese. It has become the biggest challenge Myanmar's brutal regime has faced since the uprising of 1988, which it crushed with extreme violence....
So far the regime has seemed unsure how to react..... Besides their strength in numbers--there are 400,000 of them--the monks have considerable influence. They are the one group that the military regime might hesitate to confront.

You don't see churches, or any religious organizations, with that much moral authority in the U.S. anymore. Not since the Martin Luther King Jr-led civil rights movement at least. The religious right is (accurately) seen as in bed with the authorities and hated and dismissed by the majority of Americans, while the religious left is trivial. Suppose a need should arise for such a protest in this country, who would have the moral authority to lead it? Jon Stewart? Jack Whelan asks the important questions,

Who has the moral stature to lead such a protest in this country? I think that's what it's going to take for such a protest not to be dismissed as fomented by lefty rabble rousers. This is the point I've been making repeatedly, and which secularists don't seem to get. The lead has to be taken by people who have moral authority, or it just seems like the politics of the disgruntled. There has to be a call to conscience by a leader or a group of leaders who have the credibility to do that. Any sense from readers about potential religious figures in this country who could play a leadership role in such a protest movement? I'm sorry to say that for me no one comes to mind. What is it about American religious life that the emergence of such moral leadership is almost impossible to imagine? Am I being too harsh in saying so?

Posted by David Darlington at September 26, 2007 08:57 PM

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Well done.

Posted by: Joshua Claybourn at September 26, 2007 09:45 PM | permalink

I'm not sure I understand the argument here; is the idea that somehow religious figures would have this authority in some special way? But is that a plausible historical claim? MLK was a reverend, yes -- not that it saved him from being slimed as a Communist -- but the national-level authority started with the general community leadership he showed during in the MIA, along with more straightforwardly secular folks like Bayard Rustin. And many of the other leaders in the civil rights movement as it grew did not have a specifically religious public identity. The SCLC had an obviously religious component, but SNCC and CORE didn't, did they?

We could survey other examples, too. I would note also that Gandhi did not have a specifically religious public identity, either. The American labor movement operated with significant authority back in the day (sadly squandered since), and that wasn't based in religion. I'd argue that Cindy Sheehan generated a great deal of moral authority during her initial sit-in... which she then threw away by acting like a total nutjob. But, again, the relevant point is that it wasn't based in a public religious identity.

Overall, it just doesn't seem that religiosity is much of a necessary component for moral authority.

Posted by: philosopher at September 27, 2007 12:06 AM | permalink

This is how it's done.

Posted by: JohnS at September 27, 2007 04:09 AM | permalink

I'm simply fascinated by how many Buddhist Monks Myanmar has, and that they mobilize so quickly and effectively. Just the mechanics of it seems amazing.

Posted by: George W at September 27, 2007 09:07 AM | permalink

September 26, 2007

Moral Authority

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