CIAO DATE: 09/02

Moral Freedom or Moral Anarchy?

Abstract

Eminent sociologist and public intellectual Alan Wolfe asked Americans around the country such questions in order to determine how we really think about morality today. Focusing on the traditional virtues of loyalty, honesty, self-restraint, and forgiveness, Wolfe discovered that the virtues are alive and well in America, even though they no longer resemble the ideals espoused by previous generations. Americans of all stripes, from the most radical to the most traditional, want to lead a good life, but in almost every case they are determined to decide for themselves what a good life means.

Moral Freedom reveals the advantages and painful difficulties of living in a society where rather than simply accepting strict conventions, each individual struggles to forge a moral life. Shedding light on Americans' guiding principles are Wolfe's findings in eight very different communities: from the Castro district in San Francisco, the epicenter of gay America, to Tipton, Iowa, a classic American small town of people who, while no longer working on nearby farms, are in one way or another still connected to agriculture; from Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, where much of the population is Mexican American to Fall River, Massachusetts, a once-thriving, predominantly Catholic factory town that has fallen on hard times and is now attractive to immigrants. On the heels of political and economic freedom, Wolfe concludes, an exhilarating and unnerving new era of moral freedom has indeed arrived

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