| Moral Ambition: Stop Wasting Your Talent and Build a Legacy that Matters by Rutger Bregman |
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Book review by Corné Quartel, Share International, September 2024
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The UN Summit of the future in New York is coming up in September, with the aim of finding international consensus and solutions for a better tomorrow. At the same time, many people are wondering impatiently, ‘When can we finally expect any real transformation for the good of all?’
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It seems that the greatest threat to the world is not the climate crisis, escalating conflicts or economic inequality, but people’s inertia – passive inaction against the injustices in the world. Are we paralyzed by the machinations of a system that values the pursuit of material success over human values, justice and the planet? The world is on fire, and democracy and the rule of law are under attack. Shouldn’t we be more ambitious morally?
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Exactly this is addressed by Dutch historian, Rutger Bregman, in his new book Moral Ambition: “The greatest waste of our time is the waste of talent. There are millions of people who could help make the world a better place but don’t; people who got stuck in pointless or just plain harmful jobs. There’s an antidote to that sense of emptiness; it’s called moral ambition.”
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Bregman is also the author of Utopia for Realists (2017) and Humankind (2020). Moral Ambition (2024) is published in Dutch and will be available in English in early 2025.
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Bregman does not lack courage and went viral in 2017 with his TED Talk: “Poverty isn’t a lack of character; it’s a lack of cash” and in 2019, when he was invited by The Correspondent to talk about universal basic income in the lion’s den, the annual conference of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland – a gathering of the richest and most powerful people. There, he could not ignore the elephant in the room: the structural underpaying of taxes by rich individuals and large companies. “Taxes, taxes, taxes”, he said, “the rest is b***s***.” He was also interviewed on The Daily Show (US, 2019), but it wasn’t broadcast because it was deemed too radical. Both interviews, however, can be seen on YouTube.
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Bregman: “Moral ambition is the will to make the world a wildly better place. To devote your career to the greatest challenges of our time, whether that’s climate change or food security, extreme poverty or the next pandemic. It’s a longing to make a difference.”
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His book is aimed at younger people who have not yet become rigid or too entrenched in financial obligations and status. But if ‘older people’ disagree, he cordially invites them to prove otherwise.
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According to Bregman, it is “an almost embarrassingly ambitious book that aims to be the start of a new movement and the guide to a new lifestyle”. It is teasingly provocative and optimistic and aims to ignite courage and faith in human potential, but it also paints a picture of a derailed humanity that is on a fast track to creating an uninhabitable planet. “We are at a pivotal point in history. The question is, what do we want to do about it?”
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When Bregman talks about so-called “b***s*** jobs”, he does not refer to firefighters, healthcare workers, teachers, etc. “They don’t need a lecture on moral ambition because they are in the firing line every day, making the world a better place.” Some professions, however, are not very harmful per se, but don’t contribute much to society either, such as bankers, many lobbyists and marketeers (of whom 22 per cent appear to find their own profession useless). Not surprisingly, research also shows that with higher salaries usually comes less morality.
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Excuses versus effective altruism
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What is holding back any real transformation, and why is the altruism of well-meaning people often only marginally effective?
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Bregman suggests some excuses people use for not taking action:
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In conservative circles: “It used to be much worse than now.” Far more interesting, however, is asking ourselves how we can create a better future.
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“We have our hands full, making a good life for ourselves” and “We want to feel free and be able to do whatever we want.” Bregman: “As a Westerner on an average salary, you belong to the richest three per cent of the world’s population” “[d]oing what you feel like [doing] usually means little more than tagging along with the masses, so is not at all as free as we think” and “… freedom should not be confused with indifference”.
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Countless self-help books (or the popular ‘spiritual manifesting’) put the focus on self-responsibility and that everyone creates their own reality. They encourage self-love but seem to have little regard for loving our fellow humans or caring about world poverty. This is not much different from the right-wing excuse when it comes to structural injustice, that ‘success is a matter of choice’. That, of course, is hogwash, according to Bregman, quoting journalist George Monbiot: “If wealth were the inevitable result of hard work and enterprise, every woman in Africa would be a millionaire.”
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Moral Ambition also provides insightful background stories of heroes who did prove to be effective; heroes who were at the forefront of major transformations such as the abolition of slavery, the ending of segregation in the US, and the right to vote for women. They were ordinary people like you and me, but they believed they could make a difference and simply began, asked other people to join in and managed to create a ripple effect – it turns out that, when asked, most people will help. Above all, they were idealistic and pragmatic.
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According to Bregman, some excuses for the inaction of ‘leftists’ or progressives are:
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“It’s all down to the system, the multinationals, neoliberalism, or the capitalist system”, so they just complain and take no action.
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It is important to be more than just against something like inequality, pollution, or racism. Leftists often lack a concrete vision of a future worth striving for.
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It is sometimes thought that idealism and good intentions alone are enough or that a change in consciousness will automatically lead to systemic change. But it does not happen automatically. It is a battle that has to be fought. It calls upon our will and courage to take a moral stand.
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Bregman repeats one of JF Kennedy’s favorite sayings from Dante: “There is a special place in hell reserved for people who remain neutral at times that require a moral stand.” What is needed is the ambition to win that battle, with a combination of idealism, organizational talent and an entrepreneurial mindset.
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As an example: Ralph Nader’s ‘Raiders’*, who managed to force US car manufacturers to make their cars safer through legislation and who spearheaded the Clean Air Act of 1970, consisted of ‘desk jockeys’ ploughing through piles of memos, letters, reports and transcripts. “Instead of throwing Molotov cocktails, they were throwing motions and subpoenas. They exposed underexposed abuses, proposed solutions and brought together a coalition of activists, lobbyists, politicians and experts to make those solutions a reality.” Everyone is needed. Not just street-savvy people, but nerds, college students, and lawyers – anyone who wants to work for the common good.
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People are rising up all over the world, buzzing with discontent and idealism, but why are the results achieved rather disappointing up to now? Think of the Occupy movement, Extinction Rebellion, climate marches, and Black Lives Matter demonstrations. Bregman: “In the old days, there was no social media, and activists had to build an immense and potent organization, and by working closely together, they became a formidable opponent.”. ...”When Martin Luther King gave his iconic ‘I Have a Dream’ speech on 28 August, his opponents not only saw 250,000 people,. They also saw the organization behind that protest, and thus, how powerful the civil rights movement had become.”
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We should not let this get to us or think we can’t make a difference, but we need to continue in growing numbers. A quote from Nelson Mandela on stepping down as President of South Africa: “Changing Society is not the hardest thing in the world. The hardest thing is changing yourself.” Bregman: “If you manage to choose the path of moral ambition, the ripple effect can be enormous” and “actually, you must have a very individualistic worldview to think that as an individual, you cannot make a difference. Humans are thoroughly social beings, and precisely because behavior is contagious, you can move dozens, hundreds or even millions of others.”
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We cannot do it alone. The aim of this book is to inspire people to start taking their moral ambition seriously. Bregman quotes anthropologist Margaret Mead: “Never doubt that a small group of right-thinking, committed citizens can change the world. After all, it has never been otherwise.” Indeed, research by Dr Erica Chenoweth PhD, a political scientist at Harvard University, on recent major transformations, such as the Fall of the Berlin Wall, the end of apartheid in South Africa, the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, and the Arab Spring, shows that no ‘campaign’ fails when 3.5 per cent of the population is actively, non-violently and persistently committed to it. (See also Share International, March 2020).
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Reframing
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Being pragmatic sometimes means accepting compromises. As an example, the abolition of slavery didn’t seem feasible at first, but a ban on the transport of slaves overseas was when the general public was shocked to find out how many British sailors died in the process. “In Britain, a country in which big money was made from the slave trade and in which less than three per cent of the population could vote at all, millions rallied to overthrow one of the oldest economic systems.”
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Perhaps we can learn from this reframing. For instance, apart from motives such as love and compassion, highlighting that a just global economy has long-term benefits for the Western world as well? After all, according to the UN Brandt Report, inaction will lead to increased global destabilization, which harms everyone in the long run, including the economically privileged.
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Conclusion
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Moral Ambition is not an intellectual exercise in why our systems fail, nor does Bregman come up with ready-made solutions, for which he has been much criticized. Is this criticism perhaps yet another excuse for inaction?
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However, The School for Moral Ambition, co-founded by Bregman, offers several means of support to put people’s ideals into action (more on that in the next edition of Share International). And his encouragement to: “Improve the world by improving yourself; pick an issue close to your heart, just begin, join others, ask others to help, and it will create a ripple effect,” nevertheless offers a solution that can lead to system change. After all, the Whole is the sum of its parts.
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*Ralph Nader is an American political activist, author, lecturer, and attorney noted for his involvement in consumer protection, environmentalism, and government reform causes. He led a group of volunteer law students, dubbed ’Nader’s Raiders’, in an investigation of the Federal Trade Commission, leading directly to that agency’s overhaul and reform.
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