Hey, Economy, Have We Met? (Part 1 of 2)
Monday, 09/21/2009 - 3:15 pm by Anat Shenker-Osorio | 16 Comments
How words shape the way we think…and set our course for the future.
You’ve probably noticed progressives like us are still pretty worried about the economy. No, but I mean worried, about The Economy. As if it were a living, breathing, thing. We hear about things “causing damage to our economy” and conversely about the stimulus package “sending needed relief to the economy.”
We talk about an “unhealthy economy” and use words like “ailing” “suffering” and “ill”. Certain policies, it’s feared, will “cripple the economy.” All of these, and other phrases like the “economic recovery bill” liken the economy to a body. And though they find more favor among conservatives, they pepper explanations of what’s happening and why across the political spectrum.
When we employ language we usually use to talk about the body in our discussions of the economy, we are also applying our assumptions about how bodies can, should and do behave. In this case, we are inadvertently telling our audiences that the things we believe are true about bodies are also true about economies. For example, economies (like bodies) conduct their core functions on their own; only in extreme cases do economies (like bodies) require external intervention; economies (like bodies) will undoubtedly pass through unhealthy periods but when they recover (whether on their own or with some well-applied remedies) they can return back to business as usual.
And it’s not only by metaphor that we suggest the economy is an independent entity. The economy is consistently the subject of our sentences, supplanting and obscuring the actual people who make up the economy and feel the sting of its demise. When something damages our economy, it actually damages the individuals and communities whose jobs are lost and houses are shuddered. So why aren’t we talking about them?
We personify the economy to our peril. Even as our overt messages insist the economy requires consistent external oversight, our language conveys the economy is an autonomous, self-regulating thing. The more we imply that the economy is something that exists and functions on its own, the less credible are our arguments that there’s no such thing as an unregulated free-market.
Leading with the economy, or sub-components of it like “the market”, “the foreclosure rate” or “the dollar” might strike you as the normal way to discuss these matters. And it’s incredibly common. But a sentence like “the economy shed jobs” can just as easily read “people lost their jobs”. Or, along the same lines, we can stop imbuing the market with agency by changing “financial markets were over-leveraged” to say “bankers took dangerous risks with our money.”
Let’s not forget to tell people there were and are people involved in our economy. In fact, people are the economy. And if we’re going to argue successfully that the economy needs steering, we should first stop describing it as a self-contained and even knowledgeable actor.
Let’s restore agency to the real people, not metaphorical ones, who have acted to create and can act to resolve our situation. The actions of workers, bankers and regulators need much more airtime; inanimate objects are getting way too much.
Anat Shenker-Osorio is an Oakland-based communications consultant.
*The name of this series derives from Frank Luntz’s book, Words That Work: It’s Not What You Say, It’s What People Hear
Good article, I totally agree. And it seems apparent to me that progressive economic policies are actually aimed at helping individuals in the economy, such as minimum wage, workplace safety rules, proper regulation and oversight, etc. Conservative economic policies, meanwhile, seem intended to continue to promote the flow of money upwards, such as the proposed elimination of capital gains taxes, slashing corporate tax rates, and more or less removing oversight altogether.
I think most progressive policies actually enhance “the economy”, by helping the individuals that make it up. Universal health care will help ensure healthy, and thus more productive workers stay on their jobs. Combating the worst effects of global warming will help mitigate or hopefully even prevent severe economic disruptions that would occur by cities flooding, mass migrations of people, drought in agricultural regions, etc. And of course if a worker earns a higher income, that worker can then participate more in the economy by purchasing more goods and services, or help guard against some catastrophic cost by saving, which would reduce any public economic burden down the line.
Posted by Zach P | September 21st, 2009 at 4:54 pm
Zach,
Thanks so much for your thoughtful comment. And, moreoever, for further clarifying how progressive policies — intended to help people and therefore the economy as they are on in the same — are far superior to the current language used to advocate for them.
Posted by Anat Shenker-Osorio | September 21st, 2009 at 8:35 pm
Hey Anat,
Nice work! Your exposition on the Market is a Body metaphor is powerful and clear. It reminds me of an article I wrote a while back called Energy Crisis Won’t “Wait for the Market”. You might enjoy it.
This is a cool website… matches well with my own work in the progressive change arena. I’ll add it to the list of “related websites” on my site.
Best,
Joe
Posted by Joe Brewer | September 21st, 2009 at 8:58 pm
I’m not so sure that the leap you make from envisioning the economy as an organic phenomenon to seeing it as autonomous is tenable. It certainly doesn’t follow of necessity. To the contrary, to see the economy as a body actually humanizes it, as even in this post-Christian era the prevailing view is still to imagine the body as inseparable from its animating principle. Only among the ancient gnostics, someone like Thorstein Veblen with his “ghost in the machine”, and certain modern day apologists of abortion rights is the body seen as abstracted from the life that moves it. And God knows, we’ve had altogether enough of that kind of dehumanization.
While I would concur with you, my friend Anat, that there may be danger in seeing the economy as an autonomous reality, I see little peril in our personalizing it. What would concern me would be the tendency in modernity to liken the body to a mechanical device. We see that tendency all-too-frequently in modern science, particularly medicine. In those precincts there is a real and frightening predisposition toward trivialization of the human being and it needs to be fought most energetically.
Posted by Andrei Vyshinsky | September 21st, 2009 at 9:24 pm
Andrei,
Your careful reading of my piece is much appreciated — thank you for finding the time to express your thoughts both for and against my conclusions.
This may be one of those agree to disagree moments — or a much longer conversation difficult to conduct adequately through short missives. Let me say then, in brief, two things.
The first is that the basic premise of conceptual metaphor is that language brings with it implications far beyond what’s immediately assumed consciously. When we liken something to something else, in this case the economy to a body, especially because we do so unconsciously, we bring the immediate, experiental, assumptions we hold about bodies to our reasoning about the economy. I would argue that our default assumptions about bodies are that they conduct their basic functions (breathing, circulation, digestion, sensation) autonomously. It’s only when things go disasterously wrong (heart attack) that we expect and desire intervention. This is at odds with progressive policy preferences for the economy, which require continuous, informed, government involvement.
Second, in my review of the prevailing ways people now talk about the economy, I became quite concerned about anything that likens it to organic matter. The economy is a man-made enterprise. It is the constructed set of agreements we’ve crafted as old as barter and later the invention of currency to facilitate exchange. Any language that conveys the economy is natural and, worse yet, agentive, is deeply at odds with what we need the public to understand.
I would love to believe that we could make people treat each other more humanely by simply humanizing the economy. My work suggests the exact opposite occurs. We have become so concerned about the economy, we’ve stopped worrying about each other.
Posted by Anat Shenker-Osorio | September 21st, 2009 at 9:41 pm
Very good point in this posting. I like the viewpoint here about changing the language to emphasize that individuals make up the economy.
However, there are some fine lines here. For example, I believe lLibertarians, particularly of the “Austrian School” of economics, also hate talking about “the market” as some kind of uniform entity with a mind of its own. They also emphasize the actions of individuals: a market “emerges” from the actions of individuals. Libertarians put a lot of faith and trust in these individual actions to produce the kind of self-regulation that eliminates the need for the “heavy hand” of government. Perhaps there is some additional fine-tuning of the language that is needed to make the Progressive orientation stand distinct.
I also agree to some extent with the last comment. I do not think that personifying the economy has to dehumanize it at the same time. I think someone could make a valid argument that thinking of an economy as a body means thinking about all the vital organs that the body needs to live and thrive (individuals) - each unique, with its own important purpose, no matter how small or big. The difference maker is probably in how you choose to extend the metaphor. For example, I think of the Christian metaphor of calling the church a body…
Posted by Dr. Duru | September 21st, 2009 at 9:55 pm
“I would argue that our default assumptions about bodies are that they conduct their basic functions (breathing, circulation, digestion, sensation) autonomously.”
It’s here that I have my concern, Anat. It is not so much that one presupposes that bodies conduct their basic functions autonomously but rather that they conduct them involuntarily, and precisely here a profound difference in our understandings, eh? A healthy person doesn’t experience the body as objective to himself, that is to say one doesn’t HAVE a body, one IS a body and even AS body one accepts that aspects of one’s bodily life are quite beyond the exersions of the will. You may wish to reflect on this point.
Posted by Andrei Vyshinsky | September 21st, 2009 at 10:19 pm
Anat! I’m so proud, congratulations on your first article.
Joey
Posted by Joseph | September 22nd, 2009 at 1:38 am
Andrei and Dr. Duru,
I can’t thank you enough for engaging in such a concerted and reflective way with the question of saying what we mean about the economy. It’s certainly, as Dr. Duru notes, a work in progress with much left to consider about how to convey our points effectively.
You probably noticed that I intend to write a follow-up to this piece. Your questions and criticisms are proving essential for helping me refine my arguments. I think the next post will benefit greatly from having had your feedback.
As far as your most recent comment, Andrei, I have, once again, two points to add as rejoinder.
You are absolutely right that the bodily functions I selected as examples happen involuntarily. Of course, there are other classic bodily functions like respiration that are so-called semi-involuntary (happen on their own but we can consciously control them) and others still that require deliberate attention. Say, for example, grabbing your water when you’re thirsty. So I elect to say autonomous as a catch-all for basic bodily functions, some of which are involuntary.
However, I would argue that if people think of basic body functions as involuntary that’s even worse if we’re likening the economy to the body. Involuntary means it runs itself the best possible way, the critical way it needs to for its survival and continued health. That’s not want we want people to assume about the economy.
As far as your point that people think of themselves AS a body, as opposed to having a body — I don’t think that’s true. One of the most basic metaphors we have is of the split-self; we routinely talk as if our body and mind were two entities or even as if our minds could be subdivived. This is why it makes sense to say, for example, “she gave herself a good talking to” or “he pulled himself up by his boot straps.” Further still, there’s a basic metaphor of ideas as objects (I GOT your meaning, HOLD onto that thought, that one FLEW right by me) that’s at work here.
Posted by Anat Shenker-Osorio | September 22nd, 2009 at 2:20 pm
I’m really looking forward to part 2.
I agree with Shenker’s point that our discourse on “The Economy” orients our behavior. By personifying/embodying the multitude of decisions and actions of the world’s citizens into a monolithic body called “The Economy,” we talk about and act towards this concept in a way that abstracts it from reality. The reality is that our economy is, fundamentally, the massive set of outcomes and consequences of the numerous decisions and actions of individuals (some of whom hold more clout than you or I). We make daily choices to organize our lives around these complicated webs of actions and reactions, not the other way around. We should stop thinking about ourselves as “vital” parts of the economy, or the “workforce”, as if we’re vital organs that help The Economy avert massive organ failure and an expensive life flight to the ER. I’m a worker, I’m a voter, and an independent member of society who needs to take responsibility for her actions, and who blames our current problems of unemployment/underemployment, broken social safety nets, and shattered futures on the poor choices and criminal behavior of people: People who live in my country and hold more power than I do to make decisions that negatively impact a lot of other people. To attribute these problems to an invisible force that grows, becomes ill, is crippled, etc, etc is just silly.
Hard to believe, but our current iteration of The Economy has been the organizing principle of society for just a sliver of human existence. We talk about it as if it lives outside of us (and is something bigger and badder than us mere humans); in fact, the way we currently choose to organize ourselves as a society is just that, a choice. Choices we make by the minute, by the hour, by the day, when we elect our government, when we buy our imported Chilean bananas, when we invest in our Roth IRAs. We should fess up and start making different choices, and hold the responsible parties accountable when they act in ways that under most circumstances would be considered criminal.
Posted by Christina | September 22nd, 2009 at 11:07 pm
Good post Christina. Believing in the “market” is really just selfishness justified by intellectual dishonesty, I’m starting to think. If you believe in and promote the idea that your actions really don’t cause any harm to anyone else because of an all-powerful and impersonal system, then you’ll never even want to debate any kinds of changes to your life…and you would suspect those who do want change of having nefarious purposes.
Posted by Zach P | September 23rd, 2009 at 12:06 am
Wow, do I get to claim credit for the brilliant things written in response to my posting? Yeah, I didn’t think so.
Christina is right on in her reading of my analysis. How we talk about things, in this case the economy, shapes how we think/understand/make decisions about them. It priviledges certain conclusions and makes others difficult to defend. This is the danger, but also the power, inherent in examining the underlying assumptions behind our most routine expressions and messages. When our messages emerge from and reinforce what we truly believe and want to convey about a topic, they are much more effective.
Posted by Anat Shenker-Osorio | September 23rd, 2009 at 1:06 pm
I’m not an economist and - sadly - I easily relate to people who use metaphors like “body” to describe economic systems. For me, it is a matter of ignorance. I have a flimsy grasp of the variables at work within economic systems, despite the fact that I depend on one to live. I approach my body with the same mix of familiarity and awe. There’s nothing with which I am more personally acquainted - or by which I am more inevitably impacted than my body. And yet, despite millenia of research on human bodies, I understand mine hardly at all. You’re right, Anat. A major difference between economic systems and our bodies is that many economic variables were constructed by human beings - and not very long ago! But most people don’t understand economic systems and will reach for the closest metaphor at hand when they have to take a stab at discussing them (metaphor meltdown!) Perhaps this is especially true for public figures who must appear to understand these things. Anyway, it is great to read your thoughts on this - really enjoyed thinking about this stuff!
Posted by Kate S. | September 23rd, 2009 at 6:12 pm
Kate,
You’ve articulated a fundamental, inescapable principle of human cognition — whenever we think about complex, abstract things we use mental short cuts to do so. This isn’t dumbing stuff down, it’s quite simply how our brains are wired to process information. And it’s not because you’re not an economist that you think through these techniques. They are the natural way we process ideas and covey our thoughts even when we have great expertise on a topic.
But not all of these shortcuts are created equally, as I mentioned.
In my next post, I will explore some suggestions for more promising metaphors for the economy. Ones that priviledge progressive viewpoints about how we can and should interact with the economy.
Please stay tuned and keep the great insights coming.
Posted by Anat Shenker-Osorio | September 23rd, 2009 at 7:19 pm
Hello Anat,
For the sake of clarity, lets review where we’ve gotten in this exchange and make an attempt at a summing up.
1. In your article you suggest that the way we use language is critical to how we understand the reality of the economy.
2. You were concerned that by likening the economy to the human body in our speech we might be implying that it - the economy - exists as a wholly independent phenonmenon and thereby create the false impression that there really is such a thing as an unregulated free market.
3. While I had no argument to make with your concerns about picturing the economy as independent and self-moved, I did express reservations about your choice of an adversary in employing the commonly used analogy of the body and that for the very simple reason that the body doesn’t exist as an entity apart from the life that informs it. I pointed out further that the nature of the relation between the body’s animating principle and its material content is, in fact, so intimate as to make any use of the idea of one’s “having” a body as opposed to “being” a body utterly absurd. My thought, of course, was that your argument would be better served by the use of some other construct. But clearly, my attempts at a rescue have foundered.
4. I don’t think you’ve understood at all what I had in mind when posing the “having” vs. “being” distinction. And it was most certainly not my intention to collapse any notion of “mind”, per se, into some aspect of biology. To the contrary, reason and will are fundamental properties of the life that animates us, and they are decidedly spiritual. But their presence to the body in no way constitutes a duality. Together the two are one thing and as one thing they are personal. It is only in the banality of the modern era that the beauty of this notion could find itself trivialized. When it comes to anthropology, science seems utterly lost in the world of the very, very ancient, a world now long surpassed by the intellectual traditions of Western religion. As it turns out, not all progress is progressive.
5. In sum, in your enthusisasm to see language used correctly, one wonders if you’ve used it correctly yourself.
Posted by Andrei Vyshinsky | September 23rd, 2009 at 10:04 pm
Andrei,
Thanks for summarizing the conversation, from your perspective. As far as your efforts at “rescue”, I feel myself quite on sound intellectual footing (and plus I’m a decent swimmer.)
The idea of selecting a different “adversary” is an interesting one, however it’s impossible. My critique of the economy as body framework is based on actual analysis of existing, commonly-employed, language (and lots of it.) In short, the economy is actually talked about as if it were a body — I’m not sure what other adversary you would suggest but I’m critiquing how people actually communicate not how they might or could. The other “natural” construct I found, though with far less frequency, was that of economy as tides/ocean (”capital flows” “money rushes in” “liquidity” “a rising tide…”) I have similar concerns about this language.
The purpose of examining the limitations and opportunities of common simplifying models is to consider their effects on unconscious, intuitive cognition. In other words, I’m concerned with how people actually reason about complex things — something I’m proposing we can understand through close examination of the underlying assumptions in popular speech.
Posted by Anat Shenker-Osorio | September 29th, 2009 at 1:12 pm