The Need for Emotions in Decision-Making
“Feeling is self-justifying, thinking requires evidence.” This is what Peter von Matt, born 1937, literary scholar and emeritus professor of modern German literature at the University of Zurich, wrote in an address in 2005 regarding the question of whether emotion is risky for politics. At first glance, it is, because feeling varies from person to person and guides us to our deepest desires. These desires sometimes do not coincide with those of the public, and it is the task of politics to put the common good first. This requires a certain amount of rational thinking in order to make the right decisions. This in turn raises the question of finding the right balance between thinking and feeling. This is the real challenge in politics.
In school, thinking is taught from day one. It is refined and perfected over the years until, on the other side, an optimally formed human being emerges from the system and enters public life. Increasingly, social problems are discussed and opinions are compared at school in order to develop young people’s critical thinking and decision-making skills. On the other hand, this begs the question of whether feeling is not neglected too much in these early years of life. Everything must prove a logical connection, everything must fit together and everything must be correct down to the smallest detail. In all this, emotion has almost no place anymore. We are so engrossed in the urge to learn and perform that we have no time at all to deal with our feelings. They are pushed back more and more until at some point they simply can’t be dealt with anymore. But by then it is usually too late. The damage is done. You have to start all over and learn to feel again.
It is important to understand that feeling is comparable to an inner guideline for life. It shows us what we really want. In many situations, it tries to tell us something, but we usually ignore it, even though we know it would be right. In everyday language, we call this instinct “gut feeling”. This description seems quite fitting, as I actually get this feeling in my gut. But it is impossible to describe or explain because it simply just exists. This also leads to the conclusion that feeling is self-justifying. It is difficult to research scientifically, but it often seems to know what is right for us. Note the word “often”, however, because it is not always right. Especially not when it is so strong that everything else is blocked out. Like in the example of love.
So it takes a healthy mix of reason and emotion to make effective decisions. This is also true in politics because empathy is part of what would fall away if feelings were completely excluded from the decision-making process. Empathy, however, should be an integral part of politics.
In conclusion, I agree partly with Peter von Matt, but I must urge that, for the reasons I have mentioned, a complete exclusion of feeling in politics could have disastrous consequences for society. Rationality is important in order to make logically sensible decisions for the general public. However, emotion and the empathy that goes with it must also play a role, so that politicians can empathise with others and thus determine the impact of their decisions on different people.
To quantify this relationship exactly is an impossible task; that is and will forever remain the art of politics.
