Culture matters 9: CONCEPT OF EQUALITY

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.”

For all who do not know these lines: It is the opening of the American Declaration of Independence. Nowadays all people from the leading industrial nations agree that egalitarianism has to be a political and moral priority, though many people, especially minorities realize that there is still a long way to go. However, it is obvious that some nations have managed better than others to create an equal society. So let us compare, once again the American and the Austrian culture when it comes to this concept of equality.

People in the North America always depended a great deal on teamwork and in successful teams everyone has to be respected equally. When the first British settlers came to America everyone had to make their contribution to create that target “city upon a hill”. Of course, it was not easy to keep up this ideal, since in a community it is likely that there are people who feel superior to others. Just think of the witch trials, slavery and other social evils that took place in the US. But people seem to have overcome those difficulties, to put it euphemistically. Was not the Revolutionary war some kind of struggle against the monarchical structures prevalent in Europe? They wanted to have a more democratic system and what else is democracy than giving all people the right to be heard. That history may explain why Americans emphasize the importance of egalitarianism so much.

Compared to America, Europe has a tradition of monarchies, totalitarian states etc. Europe’s history was always a history of conquering, ruling and suppression, but that just means that we may had to struggle a little harder. People in Europe, too, always longed for egalitarianism, which especially shows in all the revolutions there were. That is why, despite Europe’s cruel history, we also managed to create states in which people are considered to be equal.

However, both concepts are very idealistic ones. There are still people who are discriminated, there are still people who are not heard and there are still people who are assumed to be inferior. Even whole countries are assumed to be below our wonderful industrial nations. When it comes to America such nations are to be found in the Axis of Evil, while Austrians (and let’s be honest here) regard east European countries to be inferior.

Certainly no one would put it like that, but you can see such attitudes every day. Just think of people talking to immigrants or, to give another example, look at some attorney who buys something in a supermarket chain. They speak with the sales clerks as if they were kind of nuts. The reason why I’m getting a bit emotional here is that I also do such blue-collar jobs from time to time and I experienced that some well-off people not even notice what hard work it is to do such jobs.

As you can see there are still many problems in both systems, although it could be so easy if we all just believed in the simple and, according to Jefferson, self-evident phrase “all men are created equal”.