Dewey meant boundaries of all kinds, including national boundaries. Nearly a century ago, in Democracy and Education, he defined democracy in part in terms of the value of pursuing shared interests with those beyond the boundaries that define one’s own experience (Dewey 1985). Dewey’s understanding of democracy was outward looking. The idea I would like to explore today is yet a third reason for continuing to draw on Dewey and his pragmatist tradition in the exploration of appropriate approaches to contemporary social issues. For that reason alone it is important to continue to develop Dewey’s line of thought to the greatest extent possible. Second, there is more than one way to understand democracy, and the meaning Dewey and others have given it differs considerably from the versions advanced by Mr. What does this mean for those of us who think about social and political issues in terms that draw on John Dewey and other figures and traditions in American philosophy? First, democracy as a social and political ideal is far too important to surrender to those who would misunderstand or abuse it for their own ends. In its place some have decided that human rights is a far less polluted ideal on which to base international political goals. Along similar lines, there are political scientists and other theorists who have simply given up on democracy as a valuable component of policy analysis or political theory. In Russia, to give another example, the appeal to democracy to justify the economic, political and social perversities of the Yeltsin era has seriously damaged the ability to appeal to democracy as a guiding principle or an end in view.

The most glaring example is the use of democracy as an ideal by the US, the UK, and their allies in Europe and elsewhere in the world, to justify the war in Iraq. Many people around the world are now suspicious that an appeal to democracy is a veiled attempt by those making the appeal to dominate, to manipulate, or in other ways to advance their own interests at others’ expense. As a practical goal for political development, it has been used too readily to justify foreign and military policies and practices that are so questionable in their wisdom as to render the very term “democracy” undesirable in many places and contexts. John Ryder is Professor of Philosophy and the Director of International Programs for the State University of New York. “John Dewey, Democracy and a Cosmopolitan Ideal” by John Ryder

Dewey john democracy and education