John Locke (1632-1704) was an English doctor and philosopher who was very influential on the American Founding Fathers (Hamilton, Madison, Jefferson), the Declaration of Independence and Constitution. One passage of the Declaration of Independence is almost wholesale lifted from Locke’s political work. He is famous for two works, the classic text of Empiricism, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, and the political work, Two Treatises of Government. He was friends with scientists such as Boyle and Newton. Like Hobbes, he witnessed the struggle between the English Monarchy and Parliament, and his political writings are deeply influenced by his times. Jefferson considered him one of the greatest thinker who ever lived.
Like Hobbes, Locke believed that human beings have natural rights that they derive from the state of nature and that government gets its power and rights from this and not divine decree of God, but unlike Hobbes, Locke believed that the power of the sovereign must not infringe on the right to life, the right to liberty, and the right to property. Like Hobbes, Locke argued that the state of nature is not sufficient for individuals to live as they want and so they establish the state by natural contract, but unlike Hobbes Locke argued that this must be achieved by establishing a separation of powers and a system of checks and balances. While Hobbes argued that the sovereign is transferred the rights of the individual such that the sovereign can take life, restrict liberty and seize property for the good of the people as the people, Locke argues that the people have the right to rebel against the sovereign if the sovereign infringes on these rights. Thus, for Locke, the social contract with the sovereign is not unbreakable and does not fully transfer individual rights to the sovereign. Like Machiavelli and unlike Hobbes, Locke believed in checks and balances to the power of the sovereign to protect the rights of individuals.
As many critics have pointed out, neither Locke nor the American founding fathers believed that these rights extended to all of humanity and there resulted great contradictions between love of individual rights and the brutal practices of slavery and colonialism. Locke was a major investor in the Royal African Company, a secretary to the Council of Trade and Plantations and a member of the Board of Trade, all of which were central to the African slave trade that took Africans from Africa to America to benefit the English plantations. While he argued that labor gives the individual a natural right to property, he also argued that the work of servants and slaves rightfully belongs to their master. Marx would later, as could be expected, agree that labor gives a right to ownership but disagree that the master or ruling class have the right to the fruits of the labor of the slaves, servants and lower classes. Like the founding fathers wrote “All men are born equal” but owned slaves themselves, Locke was clearly in agreement with the racism of his times and was writing for the equality of Europeans who owned property, servants and slaves and not of all-inclusive humanity.
Locke argued that money allowed property to be accumulated without injury to anyone. Many, including Marx and Native Americans and Africans, would take exception to this. Locke also writes that government should act such that individuals can accumulate as much wealth as they can but that wealth is distributed to the rest of society. He does not provide many insights as to how to go about this. Locke does argue that one of the major reasons that individuals should seek a social contract in the state of nature is to preserve their property and the fruits of their labor. In this, he is much more like Aristotle than Plato as Aristotle argues the state must draw everyone into a common unity yet preserve the diversity of personal property and ownership. While Hobbes sees preservation of one’s life as the primary reason for the social contract, Locke argues that the preservation of both life and property are the primary reasons and that the sovereign cannot arbitrarily take life or property from the individuals bound together in the social contract.
One last idea of Locke’s that has been very influential on many is the idea of the individual as a blank slate or tabula rasa (“blank slate” in Latin). An Empiricist, Locke believed that there are no innate ideas in the human mind and that all ideas are acquired by experience (unlike Descartes and much like Hume). Locke read a 12th century Arabic novel (translated into Latin) by Ibn Tufail titled Living Son of Wakening which tells the story of a child isolated from human society on a desert island who grows naturally by experience and reason to human adulthood. Another popular novel at the time was Robinson Crusoe which presents a gentleman and native “savage” on an island in the state of nature. Locke believed that education (like Confucius and the Confucians Mencius and Xun Zi) is central to all development and that the mind is an empty cabinet waiting to be filled.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) was much influenced by many of the thinkers we have covered including the Confucians. He was particularly concerned with being on the side of individual liberty checking the powers of sovereignty with Locke vs. Hobbes. Unlike Hobbes but somewhat like Locke’s idea of tabula rasa, Rousseau imagined that the state of nature was innocent and pure and that it was society that corrupted the purity of the individual. Like Locke, Rousseau was a major influence on the American as well as French revolution (our topic for next week, after Mill and Thoreau). I gave you selections from his two most famous political works, the Discourse on the Origin of Inequality and On the Social Contract. Rousseau was not only influenced by many of the thinkers we have read so far, but was also an influence on many of the thinkers we have yet to read, including the founding fathers, Hegel, Nietzsche, Paine, Marx, Engels and Bakunin.
Rousseau was born in Geneva which was governed as a democracy involving a minority of the male property owning class having voting power. He wandered Italy and France for a time as a secretary and tutor to aristocrats. In 1749 he saw an advertisement by the Academy of Dijon in a newspaper which asked for essay submissions in response to the question, “Has the rebirth of the sciences and arts contributed to the improvement or the corruption of manners?”.
Rousseau had an awakening experience, and decided that the original human nature is innocent and pure and that it must be society that had brought about corruption and ignorance.
This was in complete disagreement with many of his contemporaries including his close friend Diderot, who were champions of the Enlightenment and science and believed that human nature was being freed by the progress of society. Diderot wrote to Rousseau about his Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, “never was so much intelligence used to make us stupid…while reading it, one longs to go on all fours”. Voltaire and Diderot were passionate about science freeing the mind of humanity from primitive superstitions. Rousseau argued that humanity was good in the beginning and that society would ultimately destroy all that was good about humanity. Society makes people take up artificial practices and wear masks (much like those worn to aristocratic parties at the time). Remember that Hobbes argued society was an artificial construction, but Hobbes believed that human beings were naturally selfish, not pure, like Xun Zi. Rousseau argues that the artificial nature of society is corruptive and breeds hypocrisy. Nietzsche would later take up this cynical turn against social progress and argue like Rousseau it chains the individual.
Unlike Locke, Rousseau saw property and the excesses of luxury as evil and destructive to our natural being. Rousseau, unlike Locke and Hobbes, praises the “savage” peoples, using his famous phrase, “the noble savage” and saw them as living a more authentic and peaceful existence than modern “civilized” people. Like Hobbes and Locke, Rousseau believed that human individuals were equal in the state of nature, but he does not see the social contract as helping but rather harming this natural equality. Like Locke, Rousseau believed that humans are a blank slate, but more than Locke he believed that human nature continues to be a free and changeable, determined by the situation in which it lives.
Rousseau avoided arguing about natural laws (key for Hobbes and Locke), preferring human nature as an undefined freedom. While Hobbes believed that the state of nature was brutal, and Locke believed that the state of nature had semi-responsible property retainers who had yet to establish laws for their benefit, Rousseau saw the state of nature as a peaceful and simple time. Society came about through domination and inequality, not natural equality cohering in a social contract of equals (much as Marx and Nietzsche will argue later). Some came to have more than others, and the social contract legitimated these differences (note that Locke would argue the same, but see it as a positive thing). Thus, property is the root cause of social problems because it is an inequality that disrupts the natural equality of humanity such that we have masters and slaves. Later in the class, we will see that Foucault, also influenced by Rousseau (as well as Nietzsche) argues that institutions use binary divisions like knowledge/ignorance and sane/insane to maintain divisions of power and inequality.
While we live in society and enjoy its conveniences, Rousseau argues that we must resist the urge to give up our freedom, our most basic human nature. Because human nature is free and changeable, society can turn us into machines and slaves. To resist this slavery, we must (like Locke argued) be able to overthrow unjust governments and break social contracts (unlike Hobbes who saw the contract as unbreakable). We must also (like Machiavelli and Locke argued) have checks on the power of the sovereign and society such that society preserves the natural freedom of humanity and does not replace it with restrictions and repression. Rousseau turns Hobbes’ sovereign on his head: because the sovereign or government is, in fact, the will and hand of the people, it must be subject to the participation of the people to be authentic. The social contract is founded on mutual agreement, and so it must be maintained by mutual agreement.
Unfortunately, as critics have pointed out, this does not solve all of the problems that many see easily in the theories of Hobbes. Rousseau replaces the sovereign with the general will, which is indeed democratic, but what about the individual or minority group that disagrees with the general will? Both Hobbes and Rousseau argue that those who disagree must be made to agree or they are outside society. Both argue that the individual must be subordinate to the collective for the good of everyone. Rousseau does argue for checks on the power of the state to preserve the liberty of the individual, but the expression of the general will is, for Rousseau, such a check that then overrides the individual who disagrees with the majority. Rousseau does not precisely specify how the general will or government will refrain from dominating the dissenting individual. Rousseau, unlike Marx, was afraid of revolutions because he saw them as domination of the powerless by the powerful and pointed out that they often have terrible consequences. Nevertheless, his ideas were important for both the American and French revolutions. Many have pointed out that Robespierre of the French Revolution referred repeatedly to Rousseau while using the idea of general will to brutally eliminate his opposition. This is very similar to the use of Nietzsche by the Nazis. Others have noted the similarities to the problematic Communist revolutions and their abuses.
In The Social Contract, Rousseau begins famously by writing, “Man was born free, and everywhere he is in chains”. He goes on to consider the birth of the social contract and how it can be, if balanced properly, an aid to freedom as much as a restriction on it. The birth of society is in the family. The major difference is that the father dominates the children (and wife, unmentioned) but loves the children while the state dominates the individual but does not love the individual. Thus, the father encourages the freedom and life of the children out of love while the later relation of the social-contract state does not necessarily encourage the freedom of the individual.
If Hobbes is right, we are mere herds of cattle to be controlled by the state. If Aristotle is right, some are born superior to others and they should control the subordinates. Rousseau argues that society, like slavery, is not natural and came about by the force of the stronger. If we obey society because of force, then there is no reason for duty. He uses the example of a robber with a gun and argues that one is not bound by duty to tell the robber about hidden valuables. If the sovereign/state is given power by protecting the people, why should the people stand with the state when it persecutes them or needlessly seeks war? This is the major question one likely asks after reading Hobbes.
To renounce one’s liberty is to renounce one’s humanity. Any social contract which makes one side the absolute authority and the other the absolutely obedient contradicts itself such that it is meaningless. If a slave has rights but no power, then it is as if the master has the slave’s rights and these rights contradict the rights that the master has already. In so far as the master gives the slave no power, the slave has no duty to follow the master and follows the master merely by force. If it is not unjust for the master to chain or kill the slave, then it is not unjust for the slave to escape or kill the master when the gun or whip can be grabbed. Rousseau mentions Balboa taking possession of the Pacific Ocean and South America from the natives for Spain. The words “slavery” and “right” are mutually exclusive. In the case of the dissenting minority, if the state gets its power from the agreement of the majority, in what way is it just for the minority to be included in the social contract if they do not agree? The only just state is thus the state which enables individual liberty and is controlled by the people as equals.
Rousseau, as already discussed, does believe that the minority is subject to the general/majority will, but for Rousseau this is only because the state justly protects individual freedoms. Otherwise, without such protections, there is no injustice when the minority refuses to participate in the state. This is particularly interesting issue when one considers America and Jim Crow laws.
John Stuart Mill (1806-1873 CE) was born in London, influenced by Ancient Greek, French, and liberal thought. He is considered the major founder of Utilitarianism and one of the first champions of individual freedom, women’s rights, and the abolition of slavery. His father wrote a history of India, and Mill was for a time involved with his father in the British East India company, the corporation that helped Britain maintain their hold over India. Mill’s family was friends with the Bentham family, from whom Mill took up his consequentialist, ‘happy principle’ thought.
In fact, Mill’s father had Bentham tutor Mill as a child with the idea that Mill would become a champion of consequentialist thought. However, it was Mill who found the name ‘utilitarian’ in a Christian text that used the term to describe an evil way to strive for good without principles. Mill picked up the name and developed the thinking in line with Bentham, his mentor, becoming its famous spokesman. Mill is a central thinker in Logic, Economics and Ethics. In all of these subjects, he advocated rethinking basic principles and assumptions based on the ongoing experiences of their usefulness. For Mill and Utilitarianism, the true is not true in itself but true because it is useful for creating happiness and avoiding pain. Like Rousseau, Mill does not argue based on natural rights but rather on the natural liberty and freedom of the individual.
We can see two sides to the Utilitarian Principle, maximizing positive and minimizing negative. Bentham argued that one should always act in order to maximize happiness. Mill agrees, but says the MOST important thing is to minimize pain. It is important to add that Mill argues we must look at consequences in terms of the social view (for the most people) and the long view (for the greatest length of time). While Bentham and Mill are two sides of the same coin, they are different in important ways. There are times when striving for maximum happiness can cause much pain (majority happiness at the expense of the minority), and there are times when striving for minimum pain impairs much potential happiness (overprotective parenting, insurance issues, have to break some eggs etc).
Consider that Communism often sacrifices freedom for equality, providing structure for all but imposing this on those who dissent (much like Bentham) while Capitalism often sacrifices equality for freedom, providing little structural support but imposing very little on the lives of the people (much like Mill). Mill is considered one of the big influences on American law, and American Capitalism leans very much towards Mill. Consider also the example of the Dutch house where the socialist state provides allowances and living space for alcoholics to drink themselves to death vs. homeless people (including Vietnam veterans) drinking themselves to death in the streets in America.
Mill admits that there will be continuous problems whichever way we use the principle, but he argues that we must try to evolve in a positive direction and so we should stick to the Utilitarian social & long view even when there are problems if we want the best society. Some problems with Utilitarianism include the paradox of the bad example and the problem of authority.
The paradox of the bad example is used by critics to argue that Utilitarianism/Consequentialism causes contradictions such as the bad being always useful, and thus good. Any bad act is useful as a good example not only to the one who acted but to everyone else. Consider PBS documentaries on the US overcoming slavery as freedom and the average American of South Africa. Consider a prosecuting attorney arguing that an offender is bound to offend again vs. a defense attorney pointing at the same offender and arguing that they had a bad upbringing but are reformed and pulling their life together. Dennett uses three mile island as an example, arguing it caused nuclear standards to follow. Consider that we love villains who go from good to bad and heroes who go from bad to good. We can very easily see bad as good and good as bad. Is this a problem for Utilitarianism, as critics claim, or a problem for Ethics and humanity in general?
Nietzsche and Marx attack Utilitarianism with the problem of authority: guess who are the ones to tell you what is useful or makes us most happy? For Marx, it is the rulers, the privileged, and the upper class, who use the lower class as labor. For Nietzsche, it is the group, the majority, who cow the individual into agreement with the thinking and tastes of the masses. Mill in fact approves of war to advance civilization, and he approves of colonialism as improving the uncivilized.
Mill was a champion against the enslavement of black people and the second class status of women. His wife was brilliant and a significant influence on this thinking as well as On Liberty. He was one of the first passionate voices in philosophy, in fact one of the few, who argued that we must evolve to overcome slavery and second class status for any type of people. He writes, in 1850 on ‘The Negro Question’ words I love: “It is curious, withal, that the earliest known civilization was, we have the strongest reason to believe, a negro civilization. The original Egyptians are inferred, from the evidence of their sculptures, to have been a negro race: it was from negroes, therefore, that the Greeks learnt their first lessons in civilization; and to the records and traditions of these negroes did the Greek Philosophers to the very end of their career resort (I do not say with much fruit) as a treasury of mysterious wisdom.” I must say that we still are not wise to this in many of our texts and museums today.
In his work On Liberty, which I gave you to read, Mill argues that society only has the right to check or limit individual freedom when the individual is harming others or significantly harming themselves. Otherwise, individuals should have the freedom to do anything. If the state destroys life or property, this affects not only the targeted individual but the entire community. Mill argues that failing to act can also be unjust when it causes harm, such as allowing a child to fall into a well (like the child discussed by Mencius). He argues that the Utility principle will not only protect the individual from the state, but also the minority from the majority (useful, considering the problem Rousseau shares with Hobbes as discussed last time). The state must have checks and balances to prevent abuse of the individual and minorities. Interestingly, in his work on economics Mill argued that managers and executives should be voted into positions of power by the laborers or else there will be economic dictatorship.
Unfortunately, Mill does argue that children and the “uncivilized” (read: native populations of Africa, India, and the Americas) can be limited by the family or state because they are not fully developed and so should not be given full freedom to act on their own. In such cases, strict yet loving parenting and benevolent despotism is justified. Sad to say, this is much in line with British and American foreign policy in Mill’s time and still is today.
Mill also argues for radical freedom of speech. Because offense does not constitute harm, the state has no right to regulate offensive speech or arguments. We learn more by hearing arguments we hate rather than prohibiting them, and any argument may contain an element of truth no matter how much we hate it. As a Utilitarian Mill believes in the evolution and progression of truth over dogmatism and tradition, and new truths are often offensive.
Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) was a writer, naturalist, transcendentalist, and abolitionist who is most famous for his proto-environmental and autobiographical book Walden and his political work On Civil Disobedience. He advocated simple and natural living and the right of the individual to nonparticipation with unjust laws and states. Like Rousseau, Thoreau believed that modern society was corrupting and abusive and hoped that people would cease to participate in war, slavery and other brutal practices by returning to nature and simplicity. Like Rousseau, he argued that many comforts and luxuries are not aids but hindrances to the progress of humanity. Like Rousseau, at least one critic wrote that if Thoreau was right we may as well go back to walking on all fours.
Thoreau did not believe in leaving society or rugged naturalism, but balancing modernity and city life with an appreciation of nature and the transcendent unity of existence. He is sometimes called an anarchist, as he wrote, “That government is best which governs least,” in On Civil Disobedience. While Thoreau did love nature and despise much of modern society, he argued for balance and did not believe in leaving civilization or abolishing government. Many know that Thoreau wrote Walden while secluded in a cabin at Walden pond (on land owned by his mentor and fellow transcendentalist Emerson) but few know that Walden pond was not far removed from society and in fact Thoreau had accidentally burned down 300 acres of Walden Wood with the help of a friend several years before staying in the cabin.
In 1846, Thoreau was jailed for refusing to pay past taxes on the grounds of opposition to the American slave trade and the Mexican-American War. Moved by the experience, he gave lectures on his experience and how it strengthened his convictions and later reworked these lectures into his famous On Civil Disobedience (published in 1849). Many great leaders have been profoundly influenced by the work, including Martin Luther King Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, Tolstoy, JFK, Hemingway, and John Muir. MLK wrote in his autobiography that he first found the idea of noncooperation with the unjust system as effective means of protest in On Civil Disobedience while studying at Morehouse College in 1944, and that he became convinced that noncooperation with evil is as important as cooperation with good.
On Civil Disobedience would make Xun Zi scream. Thoreau argues that government is supposed to be an aid but is most often a hindrance. He points to the Mexican-American war and says that a few, not the people, are benefited by using the state as a tool. Even democracies can dominate the minority and individual. The state does not make us more just and often uses us for great injustice such as war and slavery. We often serve the state as machines, not people, and being like a dog or horse is being a “good citizen”. How should we act toward the state today? Thoreau writes he can’t acknowledge his government as the government of the slave too. If the US is invaded, he says, he will take up arms for the US, but it is we who are the invaders!
We should refuse to follow unjust laws and governments, and be friction against the machine. If you live simply, and have less, then you can more easily not participate in the injustices of war and slavery. The rich are always indebted to the system that maintains the riches. Thoreau quotes Jesus: “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s”, and Confucius, “In an unjust state, riches and honors are shameful”.
Thoreau acknowledges that there has been great progress for individual freedom in the transition from monarchy to democracy, but asks: is democracy the final step of this evolution?
