15956. (Timothy Burke) [blog Easily Distracted] Competency as a Cultural Value [article]

This is an inter­est­ing dis­cus­sion of the psy­cho­log­i­cal real­ity of Amer­i­can pol­i­tics, and why Democ­rats from a pro­fes­sional back­ground don’t con­nect with it. How­ever, it makes unwar­ranted assump­tions about the ratio­nal­ity and “pro­ce­dural savvy” of the social group the author sees him­self as belong­ing to. In my expe­ri­ence, they have demon­strated exact­ly the same degree of sus­cep­ti­bil­ity to super­sti­tion, mag­i­cal think­ing, and irra­tional mum­bo-jum­bo as any of the pro­les that he con­trasts them to. You rarely see this kind of dis­cus­sion in Cana­da. We real­ly do live in dif­fer­ent worlds, now. It is a good arti­cle, mak­ing some good obser­va­tions, despite the patron­iz­ing tone, and the annoy­ing use of the sil­ly neol­o­gism “com­pe­tency” in place of the Eng­lish word “com­pe­tence”. Avail­able at Burke’s blog Eas­ily Dis­tracted, or through Brad DeLong’s site..

Leave a Comment