Foreword by Cornel West
Langdon B.
Gilkey (Langdon B.
Gillkey) Preface
Preface to the 1960 edition
introduction

1 Humans and Society: How to Live Together
2. Individual rational sources for social life
3. Individual Religious Sources for Social Life
4 Morality of various peoples
5 Ethical Attitudes of the Privileged Class
6. The ethical attitude of the proletariat
7 Justice through Revolution
8 Justice by political power
9 Preservation of moral values ​​in politics
10 Conflict between individual morality and societal morality

Translator's Note
Translator's Note

The book that shaped the 20th century analyzes individual and collective behavior and proposes measures to establish social justice.

In 1932, American theologian Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1971) published a book titled “Moral Man and Immoral Society.”
This book was a momentous event at the time.
Because it shook the very foundations of American intellectuals' belief that history could be led rationally.
"Even people who are personally moral become collective egoists when they belong to a certain group within society." The title of the book reveals the subject matter.


From a personal perspective, humans are moral in the sense that they can sacrifice their own interests to consider the interests of others, and sometimes consider the interests of others before their own.
Of course, this kind of morality can be promoted through education.


But society often vividly displays national-class-racial impulses or collective selfishness.
Even though the American economy was in a state of panic and Hitler was on the verge of seizing power in Europe, liberal social scientists and religious leaders at the time were optimistic about the future of American society.


Sociologists and educators believed that collective selfishness could be checked by enhancing human rationality, while religious idealists argued that social contradictions could be resolved by appealing to conscience and encouraging charity.
However, Niebuhr criticized them for failing to distinguish between the problems of charity that occur within the framework of social organization and the dynamics between economic groups.


The argument is that "relationships between groups are political relationships governed by power dynamics rather than ethical ones," and therefore "we must pay attention to the coercive nature of movements operating between social groups."


In particular, he emphasized that social injustice arising from the collective selfishness of the privileged class cannot be resolved through adjustment or compromise.
He states that if violence or coercion is used to check the evil of these social groups, a vicious cycle of other violence will continue, and concludes that although it is not an easy task, a solution must be sought in a direction that balances individual morality and socio-political justice.


Since the publication of this book in 1932, the global society of the 20th century has become more immoral than what Niebuhr called an "immoral society," through World War II, the Cold War, racial conflicts, and recent nationalism.
In that sense, Niebuhr is rather a political philosopher of hope.


Niebuhr was born in Missouri, USA, and majored in theology at Yale University.
After serving as a pastor in Detroit for 13 years, he became a professor at Union Theological Seminary in 1928 and wrote over 20 books.
Although he only had a master's degree, he received 18 honorary doctorates.
Niebuhr influenced many politicians.


President Clinton listed five books that helped shape his values.
What I took with me along with the Bible was Niebuhr's "Moral Man and Immoral Society."
The brains who led American policy in the 1950s and 1960s, including Arthur Schlesinger Jr., George Kennan, and McGeorge Bundy, called Niebuhr "the father of us all."
The late New York Times journalist James Reston also expressed his respect for Niebuhr, saying he "clearly demonstrated the irony of American society."