The Importance of Institutions

Reflecting on last week's dialogue hosted by the Danforth Center on Religion and Politics

Several weeks ago, I wrote a post about the “theology of institutions” and featured an upcoming dialogue hosted by the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics: “Why Institutions Matter: Religious Perspectives on Building and Sustaining Institutions in a Fractured Society.” That conversation took place last week, as part of a conference I convened about the nature of institutions.

The goal of the conference was to explore, with a blend of scholars and practitioners, how to think theologically about institutions at a time when institutions are often weak and distrusted. I experience this weakness and distrust in my own life when it comes to large institutional structures (like “the law”) and discrete institutions (like my employer, Washington University). In both instances, I’m influenced by Alasdair MacIntyre’s understanding that institutions facilitate practices and habits that emerge within an ongoing (and never ending) argument about the purpose and nature of those institutions. That framework reminds me that I am an active participant in shaping the institutions of which I am a part. It keeps me committed to—albeit sometimes wary of—those institutions and the ways that they in turn shape my own life.

Our conference last week focused on a number of readings that reinforced the importance and limitations of institutions and institutional power, including:

• Johannes Althusius, Politica

• Matthew Kaemingk: “Reformed Theology and Civil Society: The Legacy of John Calvin”

• Hugh Heclo, On Thinking Institutionally

• Yuval Levin, A Time to Build: From Family and Community to Congress and the Campus, How Recommitting to Our Institutions Can Revive the American Dream

• Kavin Rowe, Christianity’s Surprise: A Sure and Certain Hope

• Andy Crouch, Playing God: Redeeming the Gift of Power

• Willie Jennings, After Whiteness: An Education in Belonging

• Gregory Lee, “Race and Christian Higher Education: Toward a Theology of Institutions”

• Kirsten Sanders, “After After Virtue”

• Kristen Deede Johnson, “Cultivating Kingdom Imagination”

These readings generated a robust discussion about how theological resources might inform the kinds of questions we ask about institutions. I was particularly struck by the importance of the slow and steady work of building and sustaining institutions, which requires us to participate in something larger than ourselves and whose eventual fruits we might not even personally experience.

Our conference concluded with a public dialogue that I moderated between Rick Garnett (Notre Dame Law School), Shadi Hamid (Brookings Institution), Kristen Deede Johnson (Western Seminary), and Yuval Levin (American Enterprise Institute).

I began by asking the panelists to define an institution. This turned out to be more challenging than it might seem. Rick helpfully recalled Hugh Heclo’s distinction between “thinking about institutions” (what scholars do) and “thinking institutionally” (what many of us do in our everyday interactions). All of us have the opportunity to think institutionally—to invest in, critique, and shape the institutions in our lives.

Our conversation continued with topics ranging from the constraints imposed by institutions to the opportunities they provide for human flourishing to the challenges created by leaders who successively abandon institutions for the sake of advancing their careers.

One theme that stood out to me was the ways in which younger generations are both suspicious of, but also invested in, institutions. For example, Rick Garnett observed that he sees his students “aware of various institutions’ shortcomings” but “still able to appreciate the role that healthy institutions play in the landscape of civil society.” Kristen Deede Johnson suggested activating the imagination of younger generations toward “a beautiful picture of what we can work on together, acknowledging the messiness and the brokenness, too.”

Yuval Levin captured the tension that emerges from loving imperfect and broken institutions:

 I think that in a functional society like ours, we have to accept that broadly speaking most of our institutions are legitimate and effective but could be doing better. That attitude is almost the hardest thing to achieve in a free society. To say, “this could be better,” rather than on the one hand, “this is perfect don’t touch it,” or on the other hand, “this is a disaster burn it down,” that middle place is very hard to sustain. It requires real commitment. It requires a kind of love of the institution that is not easy to achieve. . . . It’s a kind of love of the institution that makes us capable of reforming it rather than either ignoring its problems or treating it as entirely broken.

At the end of the dialogue, I invited each panelist to offer one practical piece of advice to the audience.

Shadi Hamid:

I would just say that at the end of the day, each of you has agency over your own life at least to some extent. At least you have more agency over your own life than that of others. Reflect on what we've talked about tonight and then think about which institutions are important to you—which ones you might want to be more embedded in. Perhaps you want to find an institution to join. Maybe you feel for whatever reason that you're sort of in this state of anomie where you’re just sort of an individual who’s isolated from deeper social relationships. Just think more consciously about the role that institutions play in your own life. And if you find what we’ve said about the positive aspects of institutions compelling then perhaps this can serve as an inspiration.

Kristen Deede Johnson:

There’s a lot to learn from looking back, not in a rose-colored glasses way, but because we tend to think historically. If you're animated by the idea of change and you’re wondering what does that mean institutionally, can you look back and see how other movements have actually taken shape in what some of the infrastructure was? Can that be part of enlivening your imagination for what you might participate in? Can you imagine then what you might join perhaps even more than what you might start?

Yuval Levin:

I think it’s worth your while to think about institutional engagement not as a burden but as an opportunity, as an answer to the question you ask yourself in the moments when you're most worried about the future. That question very often has to do with the sense that things are out of control if you have no part to play. In fact, for all of us there is some set of institutions where we have a role where we play some part or could. Ask yourself where that is. What’s the set of institutions you really want to be identified with? Find ways to devote yourself to their betterment. There are ways to do that. They don’t have to be huge. You don’t have to give up your life and make everything about those. But find ways to draw happiness and draw meaning out of an institution whose fate you feel like is tied up with yours. Make it better in small ways. Just ask yourself, given the role that I’ve got there, what should I be doing in life? It's a question we can all ask. It’s an answer we can all give. Those small commitments really matter. They matter to the institutions, but they also matter in making your everyday life more enjoyable. So, I think look to it as an opportunity, not as some heavy obligation that feels like homework.

Rick Garnett:

I think I’ve said a couple of times already that one aspect of thinking institutionally is to cultivate an attitude of gratitude. I didn't mean for that to rhyme, but it did. I just thought of this, but make a list of five ways in which you’ve benefited or been blessed by an institution that someone else built—like an inventory of your life. Identify five just to be grateful for. And then the second thing is, this is not a line, but this is religious perspective, you know, we pray for our friends we pray for our loved ones—I think it’s appropriate to pray for the institutions that you care about. Pray for their well-being. Pray for their stewardship. Pray for their leaders. They need it like we all do.

I wonder what challenges and opportunities each of you sees in our current institutions and the ones still left to build. I invite you to watch the entire dialogue and share your reflections in the comments below.