Loyalty vs Fidelity

Alan Sullivan of Fresh Bilge ponders the difference (that he would make) between loyalty and fidelity:

Of all the minor virtues, loyalty is most apt for twisting to evil purpose. Unlike fealty, loyalty has no intrinsic value. It is morally neutral. The question must always remain: loyalty to whom? In politics, loyalty to persons is constantly tested against fidelity to principles. In the hierarchy of values, fidelity is more important. Consider the plight of feminists, when President Clinton abused his office for sex with a subordinate. Many kept mum, sacrificing principle to personal loyalty. Some denied, defied, and decried, emboldening future abusers of women.

[“Loyalty”]

You see this sort of thing happen all the time.  Not long ago, I considered the term “primary loyalties” and proposed the idea that a person’s real primary loyalty is always to himself, even if he may have multiple loyalties to others.  This may account for part of Alan’s distinction, particularly when he considers tribalism vs the rule of law:

Throughout human history, until quite recently, most people lived under mafias of one sort or another. The original capos sported bearskins or lion claws. Later, more civilized rulers wore mufti or imperial purple. Now we have power suits. The clothing doesn’t matter; loyalty is always the essence of mafia rule. The price of disloyalty is banishment or death.

But there is an alternative form of governance: rule by law rather than by men. This system is more difficult to maintain. It cuts against the grain — humankind’s history of tribalism. It requires constant vigilance to prevent impartial law from degenerating into mere favoritism. When Noonan sees excessive reverence for personalities and indifference to principles spreading among Republicans, she is witnessing the onset of the Republic’s dissolution.

What causes the split, the move toward mere favoritism from the rule of law?  Quite possibly, those who move in that direction do not see much personal gain possible in the law:  to the degree that it affects everyone the same, no advantage can be gained by sticking to a rule of law regardless of what individual personalities can promise to give you.  I would note that such a trend may happen no matter the forms of that law — democratic or despotic, it makes no difference when considering the relative advantages of sticking to a rule of law, or fidelity, and sticking to loyalty to persons, if the law affects everyone equally.  To the degree that the law does not affect everyone equally, the trend will be accelerated.  Despotic rule inspires loyalty to persons over fidelity to principles; or rather, the ruling principle becomes:  loyalty to those wielding the power of law.

5GW implications can be found in this conflict.

The rule of law, as Alan uses the term, is really a principle, in which individual laws are, together, a complex set of lesser principles.  Their individual rule should be basic and complementary if the consilient principle, rule of law, is going to have any cognitive force itself.

In discussions concerning geopolitical realities, the consilient principle often becomes merely a vague idea.  For instance, Sharia is a complex set of laws and, no doubt, many of those who would institute Sharia globally have great faith in the rule of law even though others looking in on their activities may believe they have no such thing.  Those who regularly oppose the institution of Sharia law in places where it does not yet hold absolute sway may grow confused at their own inability to institute some other form of the rule of law:  essentially, such battlefields have conflicting rule-sets, conflicting laws, and the consilient principle rule of law can only remain vague in such an environment.  This situation reminds me of a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson I recently highlighted in another post:

The key to every man is his thought. Sturdy and defying though he look, he has a helm which he obeys, which is the idea after which all his facts are classified. He can only be reformed by showing him a new idea which commands his own.

[RWE, from “Circles”]

—well, there is the primary loyalty, helm; and there is the consilient rule of law, or, idea which commands his own: a star by which he can guide his ship while believing that his own helm is still to be trusted.  The more stars, of indeterminate brilliance, the more static; and the more static, the more room for loyalties to shipmates who can promise a safe voyage or transparent and obvious path through the chaos.

We can transfer such a dynamic to any consideration of memes at war, ideologies at war, etc. The greater the generalization, the greater the necessity that the ideas it would encompass must be complementary; complementarity in this case means, that those who would be guided by that generalization are, every one, able to see that complementarity. (We are talking cognition, here.) True, we might consider the possibility that each individual being guided by that star may have idiosyncratic and limited observations of that generalization, or may find a unique personal relationship to that generalization or see more clearly some of the subordinate ideas but less clearly other ideas — but these diverse individuals will come into contact with one another during their voyage. If they are to steer a single ship to victory, they will need a common perception of that star; indeed, they must have a common perception of a single ship. Otherwise, mutiny can be expected, or else the ship will go nowhere because no one can agree on what part of the ship is the helm, what are the sails, and so forth.