“…to allow for the possibility that others may see something we have failed to see, or may see it more accurately. [..] The exchange program is not a panacea but an avenue of hope.”
J. William Fulbright
Today, I attended a Fulbright seminar. While listening to each speech, I analyzed its assumption, methodology, and purpose, and slowly, a living thought started to grow. Could one see something in common? What kind of complementarity was there between the discourses?
There is a prejudice that building something global is done in a rational, constructive way. This is not the case.
The first element providing unity to the Fulbright program is intellectual honesty. Whether rationalistic or reasonable, utopian or pragmatic, universalist or about small groups, everyone is honest and defends his or her ideas without ruse.
The second element of unity is the checks and balances between the discourses, their assumptions, and their potential use. Nobody attempts to impose or monopolize. The diversity of methodologies and philosophical assumptions is not a construct but arises from the very diversity of the persons and their thinking. By listening to the other standpoint, the social product is some kind of reasonableness, although sometimes one can stick to a position that is not necessarily so. In the big picture, anyone can play a helpful role as long as listening and trying to understand are the informal rules. And they are.
As a result, a network of networks appears interconnected and different simultaneously in a wise dialogue of speech and silence. The truth of what happens is its underlying structure and the polycentric distribution of the power of the word. Common sense says to anyone that not everything can be formulated, and if yes, it is not necessarily told.
As one can notice, the Fulbright program is the opposite of propaganda. So, we don’t have to be surprised when propaganda doesn’t recognize this. Propaganda is not loving. The society of freedom depends on already-existing love—the love that speaks and mostly the silent love.
Virgil Alexandru Iordache 