Morality is a social construction, but it is constructed out of evolved raw materials provided by five (or more) innate "psychological" foundations. In surveys and experiments I have conducted in the USA, Europe, Brazil, and India, I have consistently found that highly educated liberals generally rely upon and endorse only the first two foundations (Harm and Fairness), whereas people who are more conservative, more religious, or of lower social class usually rely upon and endorse all five foundations.

Each culture's morality is unique, but an aspect shared by all five-foundation moralities is that they do not regard society as a social contract created for the benefit of individuals. Rather, they see society in more organic terms, as an entity that is of value in and of itself, and they think the building blocks of society are not individuals but rather groups and institutions. The point of moral regulation is to enhance the integrity of these building blocks and to improve the way the blocks fit together, in order to ward off the ever-present danger of social decay.

The Ingroup, Authority, and Purity foundations are moral foundations because they constrain individuals; they pull them away from self-serving, pleasure-seeking individualism by binding individuals into groups and institutions. (Think about the transformation of an 18 year old who enlists in the army.) Liberals do not see this binding as necessary or as desirable, hence they do not see a moral system based on these foundations as worthy of anything but contempt. They think their opponents are motivated by greed, fear, racism, and blind obedience to scripture or tradition.

What a shame. If liberals could only step out of their righteous bubble, they'd be able to solve these riddles, which at present befuddle their thinking and curse their projects.

- Jonathan Haidt