Abstract
Affective polarization is characterized by deep antagonism between political opponents and is an issue of growing concern. Some philosophers have recently suggested empathy as a possible remedy. In particular, it has been suggested that empathy might mitigate the harm resulting from affective polarization by helping us find common ground across our differences. While these discussions provide a helpful starting point, important questions regarding the conditions under which empathizing and finding common ground are morally appropriate and likely to be useful, given the many risks associated with taking this approach, remain unaddressed. In this paper, I therefore give an account of the risks that we must reckon with if empathy and common ground are to help remedy affective polarization and repair damaged relations between political opponents. Far from suggesting that empathy is morally unimportant or intrinsically harmful, my goal is thus to extend and amplify previous discussion to promote a more nuanced understanding of empathy's role in this important aspect of the moral life and to ensure that our efforts to empathize are appropriate and fruitful.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
I have elsewhere similarly considered two routes by which empathy might help us find common ground, especially in challenging cases that involve opponents from racial groups with asymmetrical power relations (Read, 2021).
Many thanks to an anonymous reviewer for drawing my attention to this connection with Cassam's (2020) project.
Given Hannon's (2020) emphasis on illuminating the ways that empathy might help to bridge affectively polarized divides, he rightly sets aside the question of how exactly to define common ground. As I indicate below, however, while Madva (2020) does not explicitly define common ground, the intuitive notion he invokes intersects with the account sketched here in helpful ways.
Of course, the classical view might accommodate the seemingly non-propositional features of common ground described here by, say, explaining the affectively laden features in terms of propositional attitudes—as has been done in the case of emotions (Wringe, 2015). I leave open the question of whether and how exactly this might be done for all the additional features. For present purposes, the point is simply that these additional features of common ground are especially important in the moral case.
Notice that this false sense of what the common ground consists in is not the same as a so-called defective conversational context in which, according to the classical view, speakers falsely presuppose that everyone in the relevant conversational context believes and presupposes the same things (Stalnaker, 2002).
It is important to note that "sharing" here need not imply having an affective experience that perfectly matches that of the target (Bailey, 2021; Simmons, 2014). Instead, it may be sufficient that one has an affective experience that shares the same valence as, and is relevantly similar to, that of the target.
Many thanks to an anonymous reviewer for pressing the need to emphasize this point.
See also the case of documentary filmmaker Deeyah Khan who has advocated for engagement and dialogue with extreme racists as a means of promoting understanding and connection, as well as combating extremism (https://www.vox.com/world/2019/1/14/18151799/extremism-white-supremacy-jihadism-deeyah-khan).
Many thanks to an anonymous reviewer for raising this important point.
See, for instance, Black Lives Matter activists Kwame Rose and Tariq Touré's disapproval of Davis’ choice to engage so closely with White supremacists as opposed to more directly supporting the Black community of which he himself is a member (Ornstein, 2016).
See also Bailey (2021) for a helpful discussion of some additional tensions that arise in cases of empathy for "vicious outlooks" along with the benefits of empathy with such outlooks even on the part of virtuous persons given its role in ministering to a basic and important human need to be "humanely understood" (18).
There is already valuable work in the cognitive and social sciences addressing this important question. For more on evidence-based strategies for training and developing empathy for those outside our group, see Weisz and colleagues' (2020) discussion of successful empathy-motivating strategies, including mindset interventions which involve changing individuals' beliefs about the nature of empathy (i.e., the extent to which it can be extended even in cases where one is not immediately inclined to empathize), and norm-based interventions that involve conveying information about the expected accepted behaviors of members of one's group. See also Weisz and Zaki's (2017) comprehensive review of evidence-based strategies for motivating and developing empathy. See Morrell (2007) for helpful discussion of the value of empathy education in a democracy, as well as Greenberg and colleagues (2017) for discussion of evidence-based empathy training strategies in schools and their relation to social competence and public health.
It is important to note, however, that the demands of any moral principle of accommodation apply only to cases of reasonable disagreement, so acting in accordance with such principles need not require these efforts to constructively engage and empathically find common ground with those who hold unreasonable views or participate in immoral practices.
For a more recent discussion of the importance of exposure to novel and opposing viewpoints, see Kwong (2016) on the possibility of open mindedness as an openness to engage with and take seriously novel ideas.
See Terkel's (1980) interview with Ellis for a more detailed description of this encounter.
I am indebted to Max Kramer, Lisa Miracchi, Jana Schaich-Borg, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, Gopal Sreenivasan, Matt Stichter, Rafael Ventura, and David Wong for their generous feedback and support. The paper was also significantly improved by comments from members of the MIRA Lab at the University of Pennsylvania, the MAD Lab at Duke University, Monika Betzler's Empathy Research Focus Group at the Center for Advanced Studies at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, audiences at the APA Pacific Division meeting (2021), and two anonymous reviewers.
References
Alcoff, L. M. (2010). Epistemic identities. Episteme, 7(2), 128–137.
Allan, K. (2013). What is common ground? In Perspectives on linguistic pragmatics (pp. 285–310). Springer.
Arendt, H. (1970). On violence. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Bailey, O. (2020). Empathy and the value of humane understanding. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research.
Bailey, O. (2021). Empathy with vicious perspectives? A puzzle about the moral limits of empathetic imagination. Synthese, 1–27.
Batson, C. D. (2011). Altruism in humans. Oxford University Press.
Berenstain, N. (2016). Epistemic Exploitation. Ergo, 3.
Betzler, M. (2019). The relational value of empathy. International Journal of Philosophical Studies, 27, 1–26.
Bloom, P. (2017). Against empathy: The case for rational compassion. Random House.
Blum, L. (2011). Empathy and empirical psychology: A critique of Shaun Nichols's neo-sentimentalism. In Bagnoli, C. (Ed.) Morality and the Emotions. Oxford University Press.
Bohn, M., & Köymen, B. (2018). Common ground and development. Child Development Perspectives, 12(2), 104–108.
Bonilla-Silva, E. (2001). White supremacy and racism in the post-civil rights era. Lynne Rienner Publishers.
Cassam, Q. (2020). "The polarisation toolkit," In Tanesini, A., and Lynch, M. (Eds.) Polarisation, Arrogance, and Dogmatism (pp. 212–228). Routledge.
Cikara, M., Bruneau, E., Van Bavel, J. J., & Saxe, R. (2014). Their pain gives us pleasure: How intergroup dynamics shape empathic failures and counter-empathic responses. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 55, 110–125.
Clark, H. H. (1996). Communities, commonalities, and communication. In J. J. Gumperz, & C. S. Levinson (Eds.), Rethinking linguistic relativity. Cambridge University Press.
Coplan, A. (2011). Understanding empathy: Its features and effects. In A. Coplan, & P. Goldie (Eds.), Empathy: Philosophical and psychological perspectives. New York: Oxford University Press.
Darwall, S. (1998). Empathy, sympathy, care. Philosophical Studies, 89(2/3), 261–282.
Davidson, O. G. (1996). The best of enemies: race and redemption in the New South. UNC Press Books.
Davis, M. H., Conklin, L., Smith, A., & Luce, C. (1996). Effect of perspective taking on the cognitive representation of persons: A merging of self and other. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 70(4), 713.
Dovidio, J. F., Gaertner, S. L., Ufkes, E. G., Saguy, T., & Pearson, A. R. (2016). Included but invisible? Subtle bias, common identity, and the darker side of “we.” Social Issues and Policy Review, 10(1), 6–46.
Dovidio, J. F., Gaertner, S. L., & Saguy, T. (2015). Color-blindness and commonality: Included but invisible? American Behavioral Scientist, 59(11), 1518–1538.
Dovidio, J. F., Gaertner, S. L., & Saguy, T. (2009). Commonality and the complexity of “we”: Social attitudes and social change. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 13(1), 3–20.
Druckman, J. N., Klar, S., Krupnikov, Y., Levendusky, M., & Ryan, J. B. (2021). Affective polarization, local contexts and public opinion in America. Nature Human Behaviour, 5(1), 28–38.
Fletcher, G. P. (1996). The case for tolerance. Social Philosophy and Policy, 13(1), 229–239.
Francis, Z., Depow, G., & Inzlicht, M. (2021). Do early birds share their worms? How prosocial behaviour and empathy vary across the day. Journal of Research in Personality, 90, 104055.
Fricker, M. (2007). Epistemic injustice. Oxford University Press.
Galinsky, A. D., & Ku, G. (2004). The effects of perspective-taking on prejudice: The moderating role of self-evaluation. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 30(5), 594–604.
Glasford, D. E., & Dovidio, J. F. (2011). E pluribus unum: Dual identity and minority group members’ motivation to engage in contact, as well as social change. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 47(5), 1021–1024.
Goldman, A. I. (2006). Simulating minds: The philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience of mindreading. Oxford University Press.
Goldstein, N. J., Vezich, I. S., & Shapiro, J. R. (2014). Perceived perspective taking: When others walk in our shoes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 106(6), 941.
Greenberg, M. T., Domitrovich, C. E., Weissberg, R. P., & Durlak, J. A. (2017). Social and emotional learning as a public health approach to education. The future of children, 13–32.
Gutmann, A., & Thompson, D. (1990). Moral conflict and political consensus. Ethics, 101(1), 64–88.
Hannon, M. (2020). Empathetic understanding and deliberative democracy. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 101(3), 591–611.
hooks, b. (2018). All about love: New visions. William Morrow.
Iyengar, S., & Westwood, S. J. (2015). Fear and loathing across party lines: New evidence on group polarization. American Journal of Political Science, 59(3), 690–707.
Kwong, J. M. (2016). Open-Mindedness as Engagement. The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 54(1), 70–86.
Madva, A. (2020). Individual and structural interventions. In E. Beeghly & A. Madva (Eds.), An introduction to implicit bias: Knowledge, justice, and the social mind. Routledge.
Maibom, H. (2017). Affective empathy. In Maibom, H. (Ed.), The Routledge handbook of philosophy of empathy. Taylor & Francis.
Mill, J. S. (1895/2006). On liberty. In Robson, J. M., (Ed.), The collected works of John Stuart Mill. University of Toronto Press.
Morrell, M. E. (2007). Empathy and democratic education. Public Affairs Quarterly, 21(4), 381–403.
Mutz, D. C. (2006). Hearing the other side: Deliberative versus participatory democracy. Cambridge University Press.
Noddings, N. (2010). Complexity in caring and empathy. Abstracta, 6(2), 6–12.
Ornstein, M. (2016). Accidental courtesy: Daryl Davis, Race and America. First Run Features.
Prinz, J. (2011). Against empathy. The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 49, 214–233.
Rawls, J. (1987). The idea of an overlapping consensus. Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, 7, 1.
Raz, J. (1988). Autonomy, toleration, and the harm principle. Justifying toleration: Conceptual and historical perspectives, 155–175.
Read, H. (2019). A typology of empathy and its many moral forms. Philosophy Compass, 14(10), e12623.
Read, H. (2021). Empathy and common ground. Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 24, 1–15.
Sandel, M. J. (1989). Moral argument and liberal toleration: Abortion and homosexuality. California Law Review, 77, 521.
Scanlon, T. (1998). The difficulty of tolerance. In D. Heyd (Ed.), Toleration: An elusive virtue. Princeton University Press.
Simmons, A. (2014). In defense of the moral significance of empathy. Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 17(1), 97–111.
Sinnott-Armstrong, W. (2018). Think again: How to reason and argue. Penguin.
Slote, M. (2007). The ethics of care and empathy. Routledge.
Spaulding, S. (2017). Cognitive empathy. In H. Maibom (Ed.), The Routledge handbook of philosophy of empathy (pp. 13–21).
Sreenivasan, G. (2020). Emotion and virtue. Princeton University Press.
Stalnaker, R. (2002). Common ground. Linguistics and Philosophy, 25(5), 701–721.
Terkel, S. (1980). American dreams, lost and found. Pantheon Books.
Weisz, E., Ong, D. C., Carlson, R. W., & Zaki, J. (2020). Building empathy through motivation-based interventions. Emotion.
Weisz, E., & Zaki, J. (2017). Empathy building interventions: A review of existing work and suggestions for future directions. The Oxford Handbook of Compassion Science (pp. 205–217).
West, E. A., & Iyengar, S. (2020). Partisanship as a social identity: Implications for polarization. Political Behavior, 1–32.
Wildeman, C., & Wang, E. A. (2017). Mass incarceration, public health, and widening inequality in the USA. The Lancet, 389(10077), 1464–1474.
Wong, D. B. (1992). Coping with moral conflict and ambiguity. Ethics, 102(4), 763–784.
Wong, D. B. (2009). Natural moralities: A defense of pluralistic relativism. Oxford University Press.
Wong, D. B. (2020). Soup, harmony, and disagreement. Journal of the American Philosophical Association, 6(2), 139–155.
Xu, X., Zuo, X., Wang, X., & Han, S. (2009). Do you feel my pain? Racial group membership modulates empathic neural responses. Journal of Neuroscience, 29(26), 8525–8529.
Zaki, J. (2018). Empathy is a moral force. In Gray, K. & Graham, J. (Eds.), Atlas of moral psychology, 49–58.
Zaki, J., & Cikara, M. (2015). Addressing empathic failures. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 24(6), 471–476.
Funding
This research received no external funding.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Publisher's Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Read, H. When and why to empathize with political opponents. Philos Stud 180, 773–793 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-022-01837-y
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-022-01837-y