A simple but poignant fact explains the perplexing nature of moral, social, and

political debates: there are almost always at least two opposing perspectives on the
same human problem. Thus, depending on which end of the moral telescope you
look through, an inability or unwillingness to compromise when disputes arise in
these fields can be interpreted as either inflexibility or resoluteness. Moral ability is
the ability to tell which is which.

The risks of failing to compromise in any matter, great or small, scarcely need
mention. These wise acceptances at its best should be satisfying to both parties,
giving each the pleasure of believing that he has got more than he ought to have
while being deprived of nothing that is justly his own. The good negotiator aims to
send both parties away believing that they have achieved this outcome by their own
cleverness.

Whether compromise is appropriate in a given circumstance is a matter of what is at

stake. Between nations and states accommodation is rarely impossible, and it is
almost always better than tariff war or shooting war. But the liberal democracies
were right not to compromise with Hitler, and it is a tragedy that they now too often
compromise with tyrants morally indistinguishable from Hitler.

In many cases, the decision to compromise is not difficult, and the truth is that
Western governments too often compromise with regimes guilty of human rights
violations, aggression, and general criminality, frequently with the goal of saving
money and trouble at home. And when difficult cases arise, it is the mark of a mature
political community that it makes no compromise in the task of making judgement,
nor in acting resolutely when appropriate.

In private life, for example in domestic relationships, compromise is both a saviour

and the destroyer. Obviously, no one can sustain a relationship without
accommodating to the other’s character and some of the other’s needs and ways. It
means negotiation, always in the hope of constructive and mutually satisfactory
adjustment. At the same time, too many relationships are premised on large
compromises made by just one party to them. Traditionally it was women who made
them, giving up whole-life possibilities to care for husbands and children. This oints
to another important factor of wheter to take a compromise – that a compromise
must be made by both parties and for both parties for it to work long term.

Most insidious of all is the compromise an individual makes with himself when
ambitions start to falter, and he begins to ‘accept his limitations’ – a phrase that far
more often denotes retreat and weariness in the face of failure than a just
discernment of powers. we are all potentially heroes and geniuses, if only we would
have the courage, and do the hard work, necessary to becoming so. Perhaps the one
compromise we should never make is with life.