Nussbaum: The Importance of Storytelling and Engendering Compassion for Today’s Political Life

Abstract

Nussbaum’s Upheavals of Thought: The Intelligence of Emotions addresses the importance of compassion in social and political practices, in the face of a rather emotionless (and hence, fragmented and reductionistic) Western political mindset. But rather than crude emotion driven by waywardness and directionless thinking, the compassion she suggests is likened to a reasonable political psychology, which is a sort of empowerment for individuals—it opens avenues for understanding the vulnerabilities even of the most marginalized sectors of the society, therefore, rather than hating them for being the way they are, we can be sympathetic about, say, the external economic and institutional causes that deprive them and that disallow them from achieving their potentials. Without doubt, as demonstrated by the paper, Western history and even our local (Philippine) history is filled  with examples about administering populations without compassion, and perhaps Nussbaum’s philosophy has a special insight about how to deal with this problem.