Patriotism As A Virtue

Since the later20th century, virtue ethics has been widely concerned and researched by the domestic and foreign scholars. Virtue ethics, also known as the virtues ethics, is a reaction to the ethics of modern liberalism. The contemporary mainstream western ethics is based on the basis of analytic philosophy, emphasizing the universality of reason, with a universalist attitude in morality. Alasdair Macintyre is the main representative personage of virtue ethics. He represents the communitarianism which opposes to the universalism and claims that the moral is produced in the specific historical practice; therefore he holds a special socialist attitude. Communitarianism thinks that the concept of morality before the social history does not exist, and moral and social is also not the architecture of choice. Freedom is not freedom of choice on the ethical issues. Morality is given to the practice of community history, which in itself constitutes the framework of choice, the so-called framework before the purpose.This view of practice with the communitarianism is not the emphasis on individualistic view of practice, but a focus on community practice. The behavior of the individual is not completely a self behavior, and it does not exist before the community itself. The self is a functional concept, not a congenital existence. The meaning and value of self in the community is realized in practice. And the country as a political community is also a kind of community and also constitutes of our identity as a background frame. View of the state of communitarianism and liberalism is quite different. They believe that the state is, in essence, to pursue good composition, and the state in value is not neutral, but to promote the common interests of the community, the maintenance of common values, the combination of the common bond of the community. Based on this view of the state, the communitarianism thinks that patriotism is a virtue, and an integral part of all virtue. For a man, the love of a nation is not the love of the outside social system. Patriotism is a pursuit of kindness and a manner of self-realization. Individuals as a national members are citizens, and citizenship is not liberalism, said the rights of individuals against state power, but constitutes an integral part of the country. Patriotic means that the citizens recognized and accepted the country’s history, culture, values and interests. Such acceptance out of the internal interests of the pursuit of acceptance, rather than external things to accept. Such acceptance and recognition is firstly a personal choice, not innate, but acquired the education and training results. Country constitutes the basic framework of selection and pursuit, which combines individuals with the figures of history and the ones in future. Based on the function of self, the individual is in a national community to find their own value and meaning, to find the foundation of self. This self-sense of belonging and self-realization is the essence of the patriotism.Patriotic as a virtue to constitute the community, similarly is not done overnight. It is also the result of historical development. Patriotism has different connotations in different historical stages of development. Communitarianism is from the ancient Greek city-state politics, first found as the virtue of patriotism. At that time patriotism means a positive view of freedom, city-states for the individual citizen has a constitutive role. People who is not having the city-state is actually not a real person; free man means nothing more than citizenship. But with the continuous development of the history, the importance of this political community in the West is further replaced by the religious community. Until modern times through the Renaissance and Reformation, the modern nation-state began to appear. This nation-state has long been considered to be a combination of the interests of the people to choose based on natural law. This is actually one-sided. The modern nation-state as a new overwhelming political community is essentially based on patriotic characteristics. It can be said, it is precisely because of people of all nationalities for the recognition of the national history, culture and values, and the pursuit of common interests, that constitutes the basis of nation-state formation.