A Later View on Customs (1932)

My mind has recently been plagued with a few thoughts. Dewey seems to be fairly compelled to act against customary morality in his earlier works, and in his later works, as I discuss below, he realizes that his views are radical and comes to a more balanced state, accepting the pros and cons of reflective and customary morality. How can a person be useful if their time is spent in constant reflection? Likewise, how can they be useful if their time is spent in constant act with no reflection? It is interesting to play with the idea of the pragmatic mind as a sort of ying-yang; a balance between the order of reflection and the chaos of act.

Dewey Sections this piece of work into four parts, namely:

1.     Meaning, Authority, and Origin of Customs

2.     Means of Enforcing Customs

3.     Conditions Which Bring Out the Importance of Group Standards and Render Group Control Conscious

4.     Values and Defects of Customary Morality

Meaning, Authority, and Origin of Customs

The definition of customs and customary morality has not changed much from Dewey’s experience. It is still the morality that deals with groups, what is acceptable by a group, conforming to the standard, etc. But the telos has received a much lighter, pragmatic definition in this work. Dewey describes it as a means to keep peace, promote welfare, and maintain right relations within a society or group. They are habits, but they are more than that. Customs have received a usefulness they had been robbed of in Dewey’s earlier works.

Who holds authority on customs? Not simply the old men or priests closest to the founding of custom knowing the reasoning of customs well, but the group itself is an authority. The God or Gods are authority; the totems are authority, and even the dead. When a person acts against a society they act against the gods, against the dead, against the civilization, being comprised of all these things together. Regard for society and custom becomes a sort of religious reverence, as Dewey describes it, and custom becomes, at least in our mindset, part of nature. If Dewey has come to understand anything, it is the true awesomeness of custom. Its power is unfathomably great.

Customs originate from concepts of luck and fairness, as I can discern from Dewey’s writing. To create custom is to bid society to do what will bring them luck, or bid them to do what is just.

Means of Enforcing Customs

Certainly if there is any development in Dewey’s philosophy it is here, and in the following section. His early impression of custom is a form of ignorance, and now he discusses the means of enforcing custom and its importance.

The most general means, by his phrasing, are public opinion, taboo, ritual or ceremony, and physical force. Of course, in modern American society it seems little to not likely to use physical force to enforce any habit of learning, so I lean more towards the concepts of public opinion and taboo, and perhaps ritual practices. The means by which a custom is brought about, at least in contemporary society, is convincing the public that an action is good and just, and making the opposition of said action into a taboo. To loosely relate it to our subject in particular, “it is good and just to foster an open-mindedness. To do otherwise would categorize us as ignorant, and to foster ignorance is surely least desirable in our profession of education.”

Conditions Which Bring Out the Importance of Group Standards and Render Group Control Conscious

Three conditions arise a concept of importance of group standards; education of the young, constraint and restraint of refractory members of the group, and occasions involving a crisis, which bring about sudden especial care. Obviously we focus on education of the young. Dewey’s acknowledgement of the usefulness of custom is evident here. He describes ritual procedures of the tribes of Central Australia, which may seem ill related, but hear me out.

The idea here is the piousness put forth through society into a concept. These tribes hold rituals and procedures that make a boy into a man, and the culture as a whole regards these rituals and ceremonies as sacred beyond all things. As a boy goes through these rituals he fosters this same idea of reverence and piousness, and when it comes time for him to perform the ritual for another, he is imbued with these feelings as his predecessors were. These tribes exalt this process, and though Dewey would perhaps argue that the ends to this process could use some reflective morality, he would not argue the concept of instilling piousness as an ideal method to retain a custom. Reverence is the fuel that drives custom through a society, and if the custom has obtained a fair amount of reflection and consideration, and deemed good/just, installation of reverence is surely good and just as well.

Values and Defects of Customary Morality

I believe that I have discussed the value of customary morality to a sufficient extent, so I will move immediately to the defects. The primary defect of customary morality is unchanged. It is the danger that through habit, reflection can be trampled and made taboo itself. In areas where it may flourish it is snuffed for what can appear as no reason at all. Dewey describes, Dr. Arthur Smith tells us of the advantage it would be in certain parts of China to build a door on the south side of the house in order to get a breeze in hot weather. The simple and sufficient answer to such a question is, “We don’t build doors on the south side.”

Habit limits freedom to think and change. But as human beings we create habit, so surely we must accept that it is useful in some way, though it is indeed a dangerous, often limiting mode of thought.

Summary

I fear that I’ve rambled a bit to get my ideas out, so I summarize in the following statements: The purpose of custom can be seen as an efficient way to promote welfare, keep peace, and maintain correct relations, though it is indeed dangerous and can often snuff reflection and implementation of change. To meet the ends of this morality, custom must be fostered by those revered within a society, and indeed the society itself. As educators, we take the role of those revered and respected with regard to knowledge, and how it is obtained. This fostering cannot be a simple regard, or desire to create habit, but must be an actual piousness. If we wish to create a global citizen that truly desires an open mind, then we must exalt the concept. We must act as if it is the highest of highs, and requires a sort of faithfulness and respect. The Christians say that in order to find God, one must do God’s will, and if you will toward God, then your heart will follow. Let us will toward open-mindedness then, and if we try hard enough, our hearts will surely follow. 

Dewey, John. "Ethics, Revised Edition. Part 1: The Beginnings and Growth of Morality. 4. Group Morality - Customs or Mores." The Later Works of John Dewey, Vol 7 (1932), pp 50-68