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Lecture Topic 1
Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)
Thomas Hobbes was born at Westport, now part of Malmesbury in Wiltshire, England, on 5 April 1588.
Though on rational grounds a champion of absolutism for the sovereign, Hobbes also developed some of the fundamentals of European liberal thought: the right of the individual; the natural equality of all men; the artificial character of the political order (which led to the later distinction between civil society and the state); the view that all legitimate political power must be "representative" and based on the consent of the people; and a liberal interpretation of law which leaves people free to do whatever the law does not explicitly forbid.
Hobbes’ question
• How is social order possible?
Hobbes’ assumptions
• People have the capacity to reason– They weigh the costs and benefits– They consider the consequences of their actions
Hobbes’ assumptions, cont’d
• People are self-interested– They seek to attain what they desire
• Security (avoid death and injury)• That every man, ought to endeavour Peace, as farre as he has hope of obtaining it;
and when he cannot obtain it, that he may seek, and use, all helps, and advantages of Warre. (Hobbes chapter XIV).
• Reputation (status)• Gain (possessions)
Assumptions, cont’d
– Their ability to attain what they desire depends on their power
• Because men want a happy life, they seek sufficient power to ensure that life
– All men have a “restless desire for power”
Assumptions, cont’d
• But men are equal in body and mind• Everyone is pulled into a constant competitive
conflict for a struggle for power– Or at least to resist his powers being commanded
by others
Assumptions, cont’d
• Without a power that is able to enforce rules, people don’t enjoy their interactions with each other
Implications
• The natural state of man is a war of all against all (‘the state of nature’)
– People who want the same things will be enemies– They will use all means (including ‘force and fraud’) to attain their
ends
Characteristics of the ‘state of nature’
• People are insecure, and live in a constant fear of injury and death
• There is no place for industry, because the fruit of it is uncertain
– Hence, no agriculture, navigation, building, culture, science
• Life is short and unpleasant– "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short"
Characteristics of the ‘state of nature’
• Nothing can be unjust– The notions of right and wrong, justice and
injustice have no place
Hobbes’ defense of his assumptions
• The fact that people lock their doors at night (even in the 16th century!) provides support for Hobbes’ view that people are naturally inclined to use ‘force and fraud’
Hobbes
• People don’t like the state of nature• They therefore have a desire for social order
Summary of the problem of social order
• Man is a rational egoist who fears death • His egoism competition and war with all
others– He is engaged in a zero-sum game
• His fear of death and desire for ‘commodious living’ demand for social order
Hobbes’ solution
• Under these conditions, how can social order be attained?
• In the state of nature, people have liberty• Since man is rational, he will never use his power to
harm himself• Man will try to attain peace only if he is convinced
that everyone else will do the same
How to make sure that everyone would seek peace?
• No use for everyone to merely agree to give up their individual sovereignty
– because men would still be rational egoists and would renege whenever it was to their advantage
• They would have to transfer them to some person or body who could make the agreement stick
• By having the authority to use the combined force of all the contractors to hold everyone to it
– Agreements alone don’t have any force without some coercive power to back them up
The solution: surrender of sovereignty
• The only way to provide social order is for everyone to acknowledge a perpetual sovereign power (the state, or Leviathan) against which each of them would be powerless
• This represents a coercive solution to the problem of social order. Due to rational egoism, the only means of providing order is by establishing a state that would punish would-be miscreants.
Hobbes: Summary of causal relations and mechanisms
• Macro-level cause: war of all against all• Situational mechanism: people want security• Individual internal state: desire order• Behavioral mechanism: rational egoists decide to give up sovereignty to
the state• Individual action: People give up sovereignty to the state• Transformational mechanism: Aggregation• Macro-level outcome/cause: state• Situational mechanism: Individuals evaluate new costs of deviance• Individual internal state: Recognize that deviance is costly• Behavioral mechanism: Individuals want to avoid costs• Individual action: Obedience• Transformational mechanism: Aggregation• Macro-level outcome: Social order
Hobbes: Draw the theory
War of all against all
Formation of the state
Social order
Unhappy life
Individuals give up rights
Costs of disobedience
Individual compliance
Hobbes
• How do we know if the theory has merit?– Look at the empirical world
• For example, do societies without government have more violence than societies with governments? (Cooney 1997)
Lecture Topic 2
John Locke
Locke’s Second Treatise
I. Biographical/Historical BackgroundII. State of Nature OneIII. Freedom, Liberty, and LicenseIV. Property and Labor
I. Historical Background
• John Locke (1632 – 1704)• Enters Oxford in 1651
– Studies philosophy, natural history, medicine
• Becomes physician and advisor to First Earl of Shaftesbury (big Whig politician)
• Reign of Charles II, Charles dies in 1685
I. Historical Background
• Line of succession issue (Catholic vs. Protestant)
• Locke – through Shaftesbury – gets implicated in plot to assassinate James
• Leaves England for Holland in 1683– Begins to write anonymous political pamphlets,
including the Two Treatises on Government (1689)
I. Historical Background
• 1688 “Glorious Revolution” in England– Replace the Catholic line from
James with William and Mary (both Protestant)
• Locke was an advisor to William while the two of them were in Holland together
• In exchange for throne, William & Mary agreed to a more limited, constitutional monarchy
• Signed “Toleration Act” which allowed for religious toleration for most faiths (except Catholicism and Unitarianism)
I. Historical Background
• Locke lives out his days on government pension
… without further ado, Locke’s Second Treatise
II. State of Nature 1
• Locke begins Chapter 2:– “To understand political power right, and derive it
from its original, me must consider what state all men are naturally in…”
• What we need to know, then, is the natural condition of mankind
II. State of Nature 1
• Continuing with the quote from the opening of Chapter 2
– “… and that is a state of perfect freedom to order their actions, and dispose of their possessions, and persons as they think fit, within the bounds of the law of Nature, without asking leave, or depending upon the will of any other man.”
• What does that mean?
II. State of Nature 1
• Individuals living in state of nature • Also seems we need to know 3 things:
1. Freedom2. Law of nature3. Property Rights
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
• Two senses of freedom at work here– Free from any social bonds, which means
• Not dependent on the will of any other people• I can do “X” without asking someone else’s approval to
do “X”• Bear in mind, he is saying that this freedom is natural;
that we naturally are free from any social constraints or relations
• Note: to this point in human history, very few people could be said to enjoy freedom in this sense
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
• But it’s not just any freedom, rather it’s freedom in accord with “the law of nature”
• And that law is:– “The state of Nature has a law of Nature to govern
it, which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions” (chp.2, par 6).
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
• We get 2 arguments to support this view:1. Religious
• Each of us is created in God’s image• We don’t have the right to destroy ourselves (as we are
God’s creatures), so we can’t have the right to destroy others like us
2. Secular• “equal and independent” phrase• Moral sympathy and rationality
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
• Summary– In state of nature we have freedom, which is life in
accordance with the law of nature– Distinction between liberty and license– For Locke, liberty is not the right to do everything,
but rather to do anything in accordance with the law of nature
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
• Locke contra Hobbes– Locke basically agrees with the structure of
Hobbes’ argument, but disagrees with his account– There is a sense in which people in Hobbes state
of nature have freedom, but it is not a freedom we would want; it is self-defeating
• But…How can I be free if I must obey a law?
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
• Drug addict example– Do I want to be the kind of person who smokes crack?– Do I want to smoke crack now? Or now? Or..– Only the first person is truly free, and that person is obeying a
rule or law– Freer in that life is more fully an expression of your own will
• When following the laws of nature, you are following the dictates of your own reason and nothing else
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
• In other words, freedom does not mean war… it means peace!
• Think of interpersonal interaction … do we need a sovereign to tell us what is right?
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
• So for Locke, state of nature is when we are all free, indeed it is a state of perfect freedom
• Also a state of equality, since no one is forced to submit to any authority higher than the dictates of her own reason
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
• Chapter 2“A state also of equality, wherein all the power and jurisdiction is reciprocal, no one having more than another: there being nothing more evident, than that creatures of the same species and rank promiscuously born to all the same advantages of Nature, and the use of the same faculties, should also be equal one amongst another without subordination or subjection, unless the Lord and Master of them all, should by any manifest declaration of his will set one above another, and confer on him by an evident and clear appointment an undoubted right to dominion and sovereignty.”
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
• For Hobbes, freedom and equality were in large measure responsible for the state of nature being a war of all against all
• For Locke, freedom and equality lead to a radically different situation
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
“Men living together according to reason, without a common superior on Earth, with authority to judge between them, is properly the state of Nature” (chp. 3, par. 19).
II. Freedom, Liberty, License
• Which raises the question of why we would ever leave the state of nature? Why not anarchy?
• Do we find any problems lurking in the state of nature????
Social Contract Theory
Journal Prompt
• What would your life be like without government?– Consider services the government provides – freedoms government limits– your safety, health, happiness and property
• Would you like to live without government? Why or why not?
Social Contract Theory is about
1. Why people theoretically choose to give up some of their power in order to form a government
2. The purpose of government
Who are the main social contract theorists?
• Thomas Hobbes, & John Locke wrote about social contract theory in 1600s & 1700s.
John Locke’s ideas are the foundation of the Declaration of Independence
The Second Treatise on Government by John Locke
• Written 1679-83
124-page PERSUASIVE ESSAY.
Why did he write it?
Purpose of Locke’s Second Treatise on Government
• To explain the role or purposes of gov’t• Justify resisting the power of the king • To protect property rights and increase
Britain’s wealth. (Locke was a big land owner)
Social Contract theorists like John Locke based their ideas about government on
a fictitious “state of nature”
What is this state of nature?
What does “the state of nature” mean?
• What life is “naturally” like before people created governments
• Do we really know what this is? No. It is what different philosophers imagine life would be like without government.
• What do you think the state of nature, or life without government would be like?
According to Locke, in the state of nature everyone
• Is equal• Has liberty • Follows “natural laws of reason” -
– don’t harm others’ LIFE/HEALTHor – LIBERTY or – PROPERTY POSSESSIONS– Everyone has to preserve himself and others
• Has executive power- everybody has the right to punish others for breaking these natural laws
Natural laws of the state of nature: don’t mess with someone’s
• Life
• Liberty
• Property
The state of nature is dangerous!
• If everybody has the right to punish people who break the natural laws then what is life like in the state of nature?
Violent! Chaotic!
Here’s how Thomas Hobbes’ described life in the state of nature, or life w/o government
Life in the state of nature is essential a state of constant violence, a state of war. It is...
“short, nasty, and brutish”
If everyone has executive power to punish then
People who are selfish or revengeful or unfair will be extra lenient on their friends and hard on people they dislike when punishing people who break the natural laws
x
Trade State of Nature for Gov’t• State of nature can easily turn into a state of
war, in which nobody’s life, liberty or property is safe. So…
• Give up some liberties to leave the state of nature and form a civil society, to form a GOVERNMENT.
• You give the GOVERNMENT your executive power to punish people who mess with your life, liberty or property.
The purpose of government according to John Locke is to
Protect people’s natural rights
LifeLiberty
Property
Definition of Political Power
• “right of making laws and penalties for the regulating and preserving of property and of employing the force [power] of the community [to enforce those laws] and in the defense of the common-wealth from foreign injury; and all this for the public good.”
(Locke, 8)
Forming a government to protect yourself
from the violence of the state of
nature is called...
A social contract
Right to revolution
According to John Locke, people have a right to rebel or change the government when it no longer protects their LIFE, LIBERTY & PROPERTY.
This what the Founding Fathers used as the reason for declaring independence from England.
Right to revolution…
“… governments are dissolved from within when they fail to protect, life, liberty and property: contrary to their trust… by this breach of trust they forfeit the power the people had put into their hands for quite contrary ends, and it [the power] devolves [goes back to]the people, who have a right to… provide for their own safety and security, which is the end for which they are in society.”
“The [goal] of government is the good of mankind….
Which is best for mankind,A) that the people should be exposed to the boundless whim of tyranny?
B) that the rulers should sometimes be opposed, then they grow exorbitant in their use of power and employ it for the destruction, and not the preservation of the properties of their people? …people have a right to … erect a new [form of government]… as they think good.”
Should people revolt immediately or over little things?
“Great mistakes in the ruling part, many wrong and inconvenient laws, and all the slips of human frailty, will be born by the people without mutiny or murmur.
But, if a long train of abuses, prevarications [lies] and artifices… make the design visible to the people…. It is not to be wondered that they should then... endeavor to put the rule into such hands which may secure them the the ends for which government was at first erected.”
Compare John Locke’s ideas with the Declaration of Independence
Life
Liberty
PropertyPursuit of
Happiness
Long train of abuses
Natural Rights of men
Dissolve government
Nature of Man
What is man like without restraint of law or morality?
Hobbes:
aggressive, selfish
Locke:
rational, sociable, cooperative
Condition of Man Within Nature
What is life like for Man in the State of Nature?
Hobbes: abysmal; “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”
Locke: frustrating; no room for progression
Extent of Natural Rights
What Rights does Man possess by or in nature?
Hobbes: self preservation
Locke: God-given rights (life, property)
Source of Sovereignty
Where does Political Power come from?
Hobbes: ruler is sovereign
Locke: people are sovereign; government exists with the consent of the governed
Rousseau: the people are sovereign
Purpose of Government
What is the main role of the State?
Hobbes: social control and keep order
Locke: protect rights and serve the majority
Nature of the Social Contract
What is the relationship between the government and the people?
Hobbes: irrevocable, one-sided
Locke: the people retain the right to change the government
John Stuart MillLecture topic 3
Life History
Born May 20th, 1806 in London
Father, James, was a economist, philosopher, and historian
John was home schooled by his father -Very intense schooling -Father's goal was to make a genius
At age 13 he started studying Adam Smith and David Ricardo -Completed some of their work
What philosophical and economic works did any of you complete or study at 13????????????????– thats what i thought!!
History continued...
Around age twenty he started having mental issues
Refused to study at Oxford and Cambridge
Followed his father's footsteps into work at East Indian Company
Married Harriet Taylor in 1851
He was Lord Rector at University of St. Andrews and served on Parliament in Westminster
Died in France on May 8th, 1873 at age 66.
Primary Influences on Work
His Father, James Mill -Biggest influence -Utilitarianism
Jeremy Bentham -Utilitarianism Aristotle & Socrates -Early years of schooling
Influences continued...
David Ricardo -Family friend -Political economy
Harriet Taylor, Wife -The Subjection of Women -On Liberty -Human Rights
Samuel Bentham (Jeremy's Brother) -Lived with for a year in France -Math and Sciences
On Liberty
• Individual should be able to do as he pleases unless he harms others.
• Government should only interfere when it is for the protection of the society
"The sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their
number, is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community,
against his will, is to prevent harm to others."
Freedom of Speech
• Argued for Freedom of Speech based on political grounds saying that it is a critical component for a representative government to have in order to empower debate over public policy
• This allows for Personal growth and self realization• Without being able to speak freely, how are we to know what a
person can accomplish?
UTILITARIANISM
As the antithesis of Kantian ethics
• Kant argued that actions the were ‘right’ were good of themselves regardless of the ultimate outcome. – Categorical Imperative: Act only according to that
maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.
– Deontological• One thing that is clearly distinctive about Kantian
deontologism different from divine command deontology is that Kantianism maintains man, as a rational being, makes the moral law universal. Whereas, divine command maintains God makes the moral law universal
Defining Deontological Ethical Systems
• Deontological ethical systems take the normative ethical position that judges the morality of an action based on the action's adherence to a rule or rules– Kant’s ethical system is deontological because;
• First, Kant argues that to act in the morally right way, people must act from duty (deon).
• Second, Kant argued that it was not the consequences of actions that make them right or wrong but the motives of the person who carries out the action.
What Utilitarianism Is (1863)
Utilitarianism is NOT a deontological ethical system...
"Actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, and wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness"• pain vs. pleasure
o life has no higher end than pleasure, different kinds of pleasure being more desirable than others based on quantity and quality
• Dignity Factor: "Better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied"
• Expectations vs. Accessibility
Directive Rule of Human Conduct: "greatest amount of happiness all together"
o one may be happier than another but acceptable as long as rest of world gains
Happiness as a universally agreed upon good
o Happiness is a good: that each person's happiness is a good to that person, and the general happiness, therefore, a good to the aggregate of all persons.
o People vary in other desires, but happiness is universal
Great Happiness Principle
• Jeremy Bentham's famous formulation of utilitarianism is known as the "greatest-happiness
principle". –It holds that one must always act so as to produce the greatest aggregate happiness among all sentient beings, within reason.
»A sentient being? What does this mean?
Mill’s revision of Benthem
• Mill's major contribution to utilitarianism is his argument for the qualitative separation of pleasures. Bentham treats all forms of happiness as equal, whereas Mill argues that intellectual and moral pleasures (higher pleasures) are superior to more physical forms of pleasure (lower pleasures).• Mill distinguishes between happiness and contentment,
claiming that the former is of higher value than the latter, a belief wittily encapsulated in the statement that "it is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.’
Of the Ultimate Sanction of the Principle of Utility
How do we get people to behave in a proper way and to honor utilitarianism?Sanctions• Internal vs. External
• Dutyo Ultimate Sanction: in the conscience and feeling in mind
• Nature & Equality among population
Opposition to Government, Politics, and Religion
"
Parts of Happiness• Money
o "Moving forces of human life, desire to possess it is stronger than desire to use it"
o Principle ingredient of individual's consumption of happiness
• Virtueo Want people to desire virtue
Habits• In feeling and in conduct, habit gets in the way of doing good• we rely on ourselves and each other, "habitual independence"
On the Connection between Justice and Utility
Justice• Right and Wrong
o Unjust: Depriving someone of the things they are allowed to by legal right
• Receive good for doing good • In all languages, the word justice deals with the law, or conforming
to the law, or a legal constraint, yet the "notion of justice varies in all different persons, and always conforms in its variations to their notion of utility"
Unjust Actionso A wrong doneo An assignable person performing a wrong doneo An individual being harmed
When are we legally constrained? When are we punished? What is the proper punishment? How is that determined?• Law, our conscience & duty, or by others
Punishment:• Should be proportional to the offense
Adaptations of Utilitarianism
• Prioritarianism o Not to Maximize happiness, but to Minimize Paino Not simply overall well-being o Compassion – Help out worse off individualso Many people with average lives is better than a large deviation
of well-being amongst people Situation A: Jim: 110 Jane: -70 Situation B: Jim: 20 Jane: 15
Critiques of Utiliarianism
• ‘Mere Addition’ Paradox• As a population grows, the ‘Well being’ will
decrease.. But there are more happy people.
• Challenge of Modern ethics • Basically we need to acknowledge the fact that
simply maximizing the utility is not the only important factor. Morality of growth of the population and a sense of duty to have children must be taken into account.
What have we learned
• John Stuart Millo British born Son to Economist/Philosopher o Unique upbringing o Many influences growing up such as:
Jeremy Bentham, David Ricardo, Aristotle, His family (Wife, brother and father)
o Had mental issues in his 20’s, died at the age of 66
Impacts on the world
• Early Works:o Liberty o Freedom of speecho Human Rightso Feminism
Also: Limiting power of government, social liberty
Utilitarianism
• Conflict of Determining right and wrong• The foundation • Great Happiness Principle • How to regulate and guide this idea• Explain why happiness is so crucial • Decisions about punishment and praise
John Stuart Mill
Human Rights/Feminism
In "The Subjection of Women," Mill argues for perfect equality.
• Mill believed that female roles were misconstrued in his days contemporary society.
3 Major Reasons for the Subjection of Women1. Society and gender construction
2. Education 3. Marriage
Mill on women being in bondage to men
• ‘from the dawn of human society every woman was in a state of bondage to some man, because she was of value to him and she had less muscular strength than he did.
• Laws and political systems always begin by recognizing the relations they find already existing between individuals, converting a mere physical fact into a legal right, giving it the sanction of society.’
Women consent to male domination?
• It will be said that the rule of men over women differs from all these others in not being a rule a rule of force, that it is accepted voluntarily, that women don’t complain, and are consenting parties to it.
FALSE!
• Well, the first point to make is that a great number of women do not accept it. Ever since there have been women able to make their sentiments known by their writings (the only form of going-public that society permits to them), increasingly many of them have protested against their present social condition; and recently many thousands of them, headed by the most eminent women known to the public, petitioned Parliament to allow them the vote
The silent hopes...• We can’t possibly know how many more women
there are who silently have such hopes, but there are plenty of signs of how many would have them if they weren’t so strenuously taught to repress them as improper for their sex. ·It may have occurred to you that these examples concern only certain parts or aspects of the subjection of women, not the whole thing. Nothing much follows from that, however. No enslaved class ever asked for complete liberty at once.
We want you to OBEY us men, AND TO LIKE IT!!
• Women are in a different position from all other subject classes in this: their masters require more from them than actual service. Men want not only the obedience of women but also their sentiments [their love and affection].– All but the most brutish of men want to have, in the
woman most nearly connected with them, not a ‘forced slave’ but a ‘willing one,’ not a slave merely but a favourite. So they have done everything they could to enslave women’s minds.
Let think about this...
• What fun is it being with a girl (or guy) if they dont love you back? Even if they go on the dates, and buy you nice stuff, and even kiss and hug you, is it even worth it if the girl you love doesnt love you too, on her own free will?– Indeed... Men ‘want it all’ but i think the same can
be said about women to in the case of love and intimate relationships– Agree or no?
Do men really ever understand women?
• ‘But most men have had the opportunity of studying only one woman in this way, so that usually one can infer what a man’s wife is like from his opinions about women in general!
• To make even this one case yield any result, it has to be the case that – the woman is worth knowing – the man is a competent judge – the man can. . . .read her mind by sympathetic intuition or has
nothing in his character that makes her shy of disclosing it.
• This, I believe, is an extremely rare conjunction.’
Mill’s Point here..
• Getting even your wife to open up to you can be difficult and confusing; trying to get women you know in daily life to is almost impossible, even in Anglo-Christian societies!– Is this even more difficult in Islamic societies??
Reading and Writing as the keys to freedom...
• ‘If men are determined to have a despotic law of marriage, they are quite right—as a matter of mere policy—to leave women no choice about it. But in that case, everything that has been done in the modern world to loosen the chain on the minds of women has been a mistake.
• They never should have been allowed to become literate: women who read, and even more women who write, are as things now stand a contradiction and a disturbing element: and it was wrong to bring women up with any skills except those of a sex-slave or of a domestic servant.’
Are women capable of working?
• Mill argues that men opposed to women working outside the house claim, ‘women’s greater nervous susceptibility disqualifies them for any practical activities except domestic ones.’– Women are just not emotionally stable enough to
handle stressful jobs outside the house.
Mills response...
• ‘But women brought up to work for their livelihood show none of these morbid characteristics, unless indeed they are chained to sedentary work in small unhealthy rooms. Women who in their early years have shared in the healthy physical upbringing and bodily freedom of their brothers, and who have enough pure air and exercise in adult life, rarely have excessively fragile nervous systems that would disqualify them for active pursuits.’
Explanation
• All this ‘nervousness’ and fragilness are socially constructred and are transmitted to you girls making them believe this. Mill argues if Women are taught to work and be independent from an early age, they can work just like any male.
• Mill goes on to counter pseudo-scinetific claims that women have smaller brains and are less intelligent overall.
Generalizations as the basis of male views on the nature of women
• ‘People’s views about the nature of women are mere empirical generalisations, formed on the basis of the first instances that present themselves, with no help from philosophy or analysis.’– ‘An oriental thinks that women are by nature
peculiarly voluptuous. An Englishman usually thinks that they are by nature cold. The sayings about women’s fickleness are mostly French.’
Rememdies to this problem
• 1) Better moral education for young boys about women and their abilities.
• 2) Opening the opportunity for employment for women in the workforce (‘doubling the brain pool,’ as he calls it)
Lecture Topic 4
Max Stirner
Who is Max Stirner?
• Stirner was an anarchist is an often forgotten figure in today’s discourse on social theory, but his ideas were relevant during his time and he was deeply at odds with Marx on many fundamental issues.– Marx priortized the proletariat and and solidarity
whereas Stirner focused on the individual and promoted a form of radical egoism.
Not popular with many anarchists…
• Some anarchists, however, have been uncomfortable with the inclusion of Stirner in their tradition. This is primarily because of Stirner’s stubborn individualism and his rejection of the idea of revolution and political programs. Stirner’s favored form of political action is the individual revolt or insurrection, a form of action which may perhaps not even be properly conceived of as political
Ownness according to my friend and colleague, Dr. Justin Mueller:
– ‘[Stirner’s] Ownness is conceptually tightly related to the Unique and its egoistic attempts to rid itself of that which is alien to itself and that which attempts to possess it. As Kathy Ferguson observes, ownness is a “way of being oneself, of having oneself within one’s power” (Ferguson 2011, 169). The spooks [religious and supernatural beliefs] that possess us and limit our ownness are those that we deem to be sacred, to be unquestionable, and that compel us for their ends.’ (Mueller 2015)
Ownness as more than just negative liberty for Mueller
• ‘One’s own therefore comprises an expansive notion of one’s self that includes one’s context, individuated developmental history, and the power and capacities one has in relation to oneself and one’s world, while ownness entails a way of living this fact, of carrying, recognizing, and relating to one’s own.’ (Mueller 2015, 65)
Mueller continued…
• ‘To engage in ownness and thus be one’s own is not to throw off all obstacles the world puts in your way. One can never be totally rid of obstruction, limitation, and counterpowers.’ (Mueller 2015, 65)
‘I am my radical reality’• Stirner’s view of ownness can be compared to
Weinstein’s notion of being ones own radical reality. In a recently published book chapter on Weinstein, I stated:– “Later in Finite Perfection , Weinstein goes on to state,
“When I declare myself to be the radical reality, I may either be drawn toward the body and through it into the rooted realities, or toward an awareness even more distant from even the promptings of expression and thought” (Weinstein 1985, 129–130). He articulates that the first direction of “being his own radical reality” is that element which gives his life concreteness. It is in this mode of “being his own radical reality” that he recognizes his own physical limitations and ultimately his inevitable decay and death.” (Kaminski, 2015, 160)
Shameless self-publicity
• If you are interested in more on this topic of the ego, the self, and the thought of the great 20th century philosopher Michael Weinstein, get a copy of, Michael A. Weinstein: Action, Contemplation, Vitalism. (Routledge, 2015)– As mentioned, Dr. Mueller and Myself have
chapter in this well reviewed edition!
Stirner’s Union of Egoists
• ‘Morality is incompatible with egoism, because the former does not allow validity to me, but only to the Man in me. But, if the State is a society of men, not a union of egos each of whom has only himself before his eyes, then it cannot last without morality, and must insist on morality. Therefore we two, the State and I, are enemies. I, the egoist, have not at heart the welfare of this “human society,” I sacrifice nothing to it, I only utilize it; but to be able to utilize it completely I transform it rather into my property and my creature; i. e., I annihilate it, and form in its place the Union of Egoists.’ (Stirner)
• Max Stirner’s idea of the "Union of egoists" (German: Verein von Egoisten), was first expounded in The Ego and Its Own.
• The Union is understood as a non-systematic association, which Stirner proposed in contradistinction to the state. The Union is understood as a relation between egoists which is continually renewed by all parties' support through an act of will.
• The Union requires that all parties participate out of a conscious egoism. If one party silently finds themselves to be suffering, but puts up and keeps the appearance, the union has degenerated into something else.
• This union is not seen as an authority above a person's own will. This idea has received interpretations for politics, economics, romance, and sexual relations.
• He establishes that reciprocity and what he calls "intercourse“ (Interpersonal communication) are important elements of the Union of egoists.– People must develop bonds based on the exercise
of free will outside the coercive sphere of the state.
• As such egoistical relationships have to be flexible enough so that it can be ended up at the will of the participant.– The egoist must recognize that others are also free
and must not impose upon ones liberty– Personal accountability based on pure reason is
the essence of the egotistical relationship
Union of Egoists as most free form of association that can be had
• Stirner admits that "complete freedom" is not possible but sees that the union of egoists are the most free form of association that can be had. – "Limitation of liberty is inevitable everywhere, for one cannot get
rid of everything; one cannot fly like a bird merely because one would like to fly so, for one does not get free from his own weight...The union will assuredly offer a greater measure of liberty, as well as (and especially because by it one escapes all the coercion peculiar to State and society life) admit of being considered as “a new liberty”; but nevertheless it will still contain enough of unfreedom and involuntariness. For its object is not this — liberty (which on the contrary it sacrifices to ownness), but only ownness)’
James L. Walker on Stirner
• "In Stirner we have the philosophical foundation for political liberty. His interest in the practical development of egoism to the dissolution of the State and the union of free men is clear and pronounced, and harmonizes perfectly with the economic philosophy of Josiah Warren.
• Allowing for difference of temperament and language, there is a substantial agreement between Stirner and Proudhon. Each would be free, and sees in every increase of the number of free people and their intelligence an auxiliary force against the oppressor."
Truces as a means of avoiding Hobbes War of All against All
• Stirner believed that as more and more people become egoists, conflict in society will decrease as each individual recognizes the uniqueness of others, thus ensuring a suitable environment within which they can co-operate (or find "truces" in the "war of all against all"). These "truces" Stirner termed "Unions of egoists."
Popular Amongst Later Anarcho-Syndicalists
• Many in the anarchist movement in Glasgow, Scotland, took Stirner's "Union of egoists" literally as the basis for their anarcho-syndicalist organizing in the 1940s and beyond.
Anarcho-Syndicalism
• Anarcho-syndicalism is a theory of anarchism which views revolutionary industrial unionism or syndicalism as a method for workers in capitalist society to gain control of an economy and, with that control, influence broader society.
• Syndicalists consider their economic theories a strategy for facilitating worker self-activity and as an alternative co-operative economic system with democratic values and production centered on meeting human needs
• The basic principles of anarcho-syndicalism are solidarity, direct action (action undertaken without the intervention of third parties such as politicians, bureaucrats and arbitrators) and direct democracy, or workers' self-management.
• The end goal of anarcho-syndicalism is to abolish the wage system, regarding it as wage slavery. Anarcho-syndicalist theory therefore generally focuses on the labor movement.
The Incompatibilities of Stirner and Anarcho-Syndicalism
• Despite anarcho-syndicalists adopting many of Stirner’s ideas, Stirner himself was not as concerned with labor issues and solidarity as he was with the individual ego.– Remeber what we listened to earlier? Did it sound
like Stirner was concerned with anything that was not ‘mine’??
Stirner as dogmatic and missing the material realities impinging liberty
• Marx’s arguments against Stirner reveal the shortcomings of Stirner’s approach, in that they demonstrate how Stirner succumbs to ideological illusions about the nature of individuality.
• Stirner conceives of liberation as involving simply a change of belief and ignores the material realities of the oppressive apparatus of the state and other social and economic institutions.
• It was Marx who was able to see that liberation and freedom required changes in the material conditions of human society, and not merely changes in our ideas.
Engels poem critiquing Stirner
Look at Stirner, look at him, the peaceful enemy of all constraint.
For the moment, he is still drinking beer,Soon he will be drinking blood as though it were water.
When others cry savagely "down with the kings"Stirner immediately supplements "down with the laws also."
Stirner full of dignity proclaims;You bend your willpower and you dare to call yourselves free. You become accustomed to slavery
Down with dogmatism, down with law.
Marx and Engels very critical of ‘Saint Max’
• Marx's lengthy, ferocious polemic against Stirner has since been considered an important turning point in Marx's intellectual development from idealism to materialism. It has been argued that historical materialism was Marx's method of reconciling communism with a Stirnerite rejection of morality.
Max Weber1864-1920
Max Weber
Influenced Parsons, Habermas, and many others
Presented sociology as the “science of human social action”
Developed antipositivism; stressing the differences between social and natural sciences
Weber Bureaucracies: showed how there are bureaucratic elements of every part of society
On Bureaucracy
• Hierarchy• Division of Labor• Consistency• Qualification• Professional–Private Separation• Devotion to Purpose• Advancement / Seniority
Hierarchy • Authority and its flow– subordination
• “Such a system offers the governed the possibility of appealing the decision of a lower office to its higher authority” (p. 50).
Highest Office
High OfficeHigh Office
Low Office Low Office Low Office
Lowest Office Lowest Office Lowest Office Lowest Office
Consistency
• Rules regulate all matters “abstractly.”– i.e. no one is special
• Management has well defined Duties
• The bureau is separate from the “private domicile of the official” (p. 51).
Division of Labor• Specialization• Separation of
roles and duties
• “’higher’ authority [is not] authorized to take over the business of the ‘lower’” (p. 50).
Executive
OperationsPolicy & Planning
Strategic Planning
Policy Development
RegionalManagement
Special Projects
Legislative Relations Office Staffing Maintenance
The Theory of Bureaucracy Developed by Max Weber (1864-1920), a German professor of sociology.
Principle 1:
• In a bureaucracy, a manager’s formal authority derives from the position he or she holds in
the
organization.
Authority - the power to hold people accountable for their actions and to make
decisions in reference to the use of organizational resources. (Textbook / Contemporary
Management - 6th Edition)
In today’s business models, this type of theory is not very common. Nowadays, we see more of
an informal authority approach in which there is personal expertise, technical knowledge, moral
worth, and the ability to lead and to generate commitment from subordinates, without the use
of this absolute power from one individual.
The Theory of Bureaucracy Developed by Max Weber (1864-1920), a German professor of sociology.
Principle 2:
• In a bureaucracy, people should occupy positions because of their performance, not because of
their social standing.
• Some organizations and industries are still affected by social networks in which personal contacts
and relations, not job-related skills, influence hiring and promotional decisions.
The old ways, of not what you know, but who you know, are still around in today’s society, but it
can only get you so far. In today’s business world, what you know and educational knowledge, play
a very important part in moving up the corporate latter and being able to maintain a managerial
position requires the utilization of staying current on up to date techniques and information.
The Theory of Bureaucracy Developed by Max Weber (1864-1920), a German professor of sociology.
Principle 3:
• The extent of each position’s formal authority and task responsibilities, and its relationship to
other positions in the organization should be clearly specified.
• When the task and authority associated with various positions in the organization are clearly
specified, managers and workers know what is expected of them and what to expect from each
other.
Most organizations should and are clearly defining task and position responsibilities. Job
descriptions should include all facets of an employee held position. Clarification of one’s job
expectations is essential for all five business functions in order to manage and maintain a high level,
and measurable level of success for all organizations.
The Theory of Bureaucracy Developed by Max Weber (1864-1920), a German professor of sociology.
Principle 4:
• Authority can be exercised effectively in an organization when positions are arranged
hierarchically, so employees know whom to report to and who reports to them.
• Managers must create an organizational hierarchy of authority that makes it clear who reports to
whom and to whom managers and workers should go if conflicts or problems arise.
Today’s business models utilize the initiative factor in which employees are given the ability to act
on their own, without direction from a superior. This empowerment of employees relieves the
stress of constant supervision and allows supervisors and managers to concentrate more on other
administrative duties. The balance between a vertical and horizontal organizational structure is
more widely used in today’s business models.
The Theory of Bureaucracy Developed by Max Weber (1864-1920), a German professor of sociology.
Principle 5:
• Managers must create a well defined system of rules, standard operating procedures, and
norms so that they can effectively control behavior within an organization.
• Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) are specific sets of written instructions about how to
perform a certain aspect of a task.
Most companies have SOPs and require employees to learn and follow them. We have seen how in
addition to following rules and regulations, many organizations have allowed for creativity and
innovation to supersede the common way of conducting business where it was once said, “rules
are rules and they could never be broken”. Guidelines are needed and common sense is always
important, but have an open line of communication to new ideas and thoughts is essential in
today’s business society.
Rationalization
“The fate of our times is characterized by rationalization and, above all, by the ‘disenchantment of the world’”
Instead of the power elite holding society back, it is the laws, rules and regulations capitalism requires
Curtails people’s freedoms and traps them in bureaucratic society
Process is less welcome of individualism and “dehumanizes people”
