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Locke's Political Philosophy

Consent, Political Obligation, and the Ends of Government

The most direct reading of Locke's political philosophy finds the concept of consent

playing a central role. His analysis begins with individuals in a state of nature where

they are not subject to a common legitimate authority with the power to legislate or

adjudicate disputes. From this natural state of freedom and independence, Locke

stresses individual consent as the mechanism by which political societies are

created and individuals join those societies. While there are of course some general

obligations and rights that all people have from the law of nature, special obligations

come about only when we voluntarily undertake them. Locke clearly states that one

can only become a full member of society by an act of express consent. The

literature on Locke's theory of consent tends to focus on how Locke does or does not

successfully answer the following objection: few people have actually consented to

their governments so no, or almost no, governments are actually legitimate. This

conclusion is problematic since it is clearly contrary to Locke's intention.

Locke's most obvious solution to this problem is his doctrine of tacit consent. Simply

by walking along the highways of a country a person gives tacit consent to the

government and agrees to obey it while living in its territory. This, Locke thinks,

explains why resident aliens have an obligation to obey the laws of the state where

they reside, though only while they live there. Inheriting property creates an even

stronger bond, since the original owner of the property permanently put the property

under the jurisdiction of the commonwealth. Children, when they accept the property

of their parents, consent to the jurisdiction of the commonwealth over that property.

There is debate over whether the inheritance of property should be regarded as tacit

or express consent. On one interpretation, by accepting the property, Locke thinks a

person becomes a full member of society, which implies that he must regard this as

an act of express consent. Grant suggests that Locke's ideal would have been an

explicit mechanism of society whereupon adults would give express consent and this

would be a precondition of inheriting property. On the other interpretation, Locke

recognized that people inheriting property did not in the process of doing so make

any explicit declaration about their political obligation.

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Jean Jacques Rousseau

Political Philosophy

Rousseau's contributions to political philosophy are scattered among various works,

most notable of which are the Discourse on the Origins of Inequality, the Discourse

on Political Economy, The Social Contract, and Considerations on the Government

of Poland. However, many of his other works, both major and minor, contain

passages that amplify or illuminate the political ideas in those works. His central

doctrine in politics is that a state can be legitimate only if it is guided by the “general

will” of its members. This idea finds its most detailed treatment in The Social

Contract.

In The Social Contract, Rousseau sets out to answer what he takes to be the

fundamental question of politics, the reconciliation of the freedom of the individual

with the authority of the state. This reconciliation is necessary because human

society has evolved to a point where individuals can no longer supply their needs

through their own unaided efforts, but rather must depend on the co-operation of

others. The process whereby human needs expand and interdependence deepens is

set out in the Discourse on the Origins of Inequality. In that work, the final moment of

Rousseau's conjectural history involves the emergence of endemic conflict among

the now-interdependent individuals and the argument that the Hobbesian insecurity

of this condition would lead all to consent to the establishment of state authority and

law. In the Second Discourse, this establishment amounts to the reinforcement of

unequal and exploitative social relations that are now backed by law and state

power. In an echo of Locke and an anticipation of Marx, Rousseau argues that this

state would, in effect, be a class state, guided by the common interest of the rich and

propertied and imposing unfreedom and subordination on the poor and weak. The

propertyless consent to such an establishment because their immediate fear of a

Hobbesian state of war leads them to fail to attend to the ways in which the new

state will systematically disadvantage them.

Karl Marx is best known not as a philosopher but as a revolutionary communist,

whose works inspired the foundation of many communist regimes in the twentieth

century. Marx sees the historical process as proceeding through a necessary series

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of modes of production, characterized by class struggle, culminating in communism.

Marx's economic analysis of capitalism is based on his version of the labour theory

of value, and includes the analysis of capitalist profit as the extraction of surplus

value from the exploited proletariat. The analysis of history and economics come

together in Marx's prediction of the inevitable economic breakdown of capitalism, to

be replaced by communism. However Marx refused to speculate in detail about the

nature of communism, arguing that it would arise through historical processes, and

was not the realization of a pre-determined moral ideal.

Philosophy and social thought

Marx polemic with other thinkers often occurred through critique, and thus he has

been called "the first great user of critical method in social sciences." He criticized

speculative philosophy, equating metaphysics with ideology. By adopting this

approach, Marx attempted to separate key findings from ideological biases.  This set

him apart from many contemporary philosophers.

Human nature

Fundamentally, Marx assumed that human history involves transforming human

nature, which encompasses both human beings and material objects. Humans

recognize that they possess both actual and potential selves. For both Marx and

Hegel, self-development begins with an experience of internal alienation stemming

from this recognition, followed by a realization that the actual self, as

a subjective agent, renders its potential counterpart an object to be

apprehended. Marx further argues that, by molding nature in desired ways, the

subject takes the object as its own, and thus permits the individual to be actualized

as fully human. For Marx, then, human nature—Gattungswesen, or species-being—

exists as a function of human labour. Fundamental to Marx's idea of meaningful

labour is the proposition that, in order for a subject to come to terms with its

alienated object, it must first exert influence upon literal, material objects in the

subject's world. Marx acknowledges that Hegel "grasps the nature of work and

comprehends objective man, authentic because actual, as the result of his own

work", but characterizes Hegelian self-development as unduly "spiritual" and

abstract. Marx thus departs from Hegel by insisting that "the fact that man is

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a corporeal, actual, sentient, objective being with natural capacities means that he

has actual, sensuous objects for his nature as objects of his life-expression, or that

he can only express his life in actual sensuous objects." Consequently, Marx revises

Hegelian "work" into material "labour", and in the context of human capacity to

transform nature the term "labour power".

Thomas Hooker

 Thomas Hooker was a prominent Puritan colonial leader, who founded the Colony

of Connecticut after dissenting with Puritan leaders in Massachusetts. He was known

as an outstanding speaker and a leader of universal Christiansuffrage.

Called today “the Father of Connecticut,” Thomas Hooker was a towering figure in

the early development of colonial New England. He was one of the great preachers

of his time, an erudite writer on Christian subjects, the first minister

of Cambridge,Massachusetts, one of the first settlers and founders of both the city

of Hartford and the state of Connecticut, and cited by many as the inspiration for the

"Fundamental Orders of Connecticut," cited by some as the world's first written

democratic constitution that established a representative government.

Most likely coming out of the county of Leicestershire, in the East Midlands region,

the Hooker family was prominent at least as far back as the reign of Henry VIII.

There is known to have been a great Hooker family in Devon (colloquially called

Devonshire, in the middle of the southwestern peninsula), well-known throughout

Southern England. The Devon branch produced the great theologian and clergyman,

the Rev. Richard Hooker who, with Sir Walter Raleigh, was one of the two most

influential sons of Exeter, the county town of Devon. Family genealogist Edward

Hooker linked the Rev. Thomas to the Rev. Richard and the Devon branch. Other

Hooker genealogists, however, have traced the Rev. Thomas back

to Leicestershire where, in fact, he is said to have been born. Positive evidence

linking Thomas to Leicestershire is lacking since the Marefield parish records from

before 1610 perished. Any link to the Rev. Richard is likewise lacking since the Rev.

Thomas’s personal papers were disposed of and his house destroyed after his

death. There remains no evidence giving positive information as to which region

Hooker came from, so the issue remains unsettled.

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Plato

CONSEQUENCES OF THE THEORY OF THE IDEAS FOR ETICS AND POLITICS

a) The virtue. The theory of the Ideas implies the overcoming of the sophistic moral

relativism: the Ideas of Justice and Rightness become the perfect criteria for

distinguishing right from wrong or fair from unfair. The Ideas are values themselves.

Plato’s ethics tries to find out what is the Highest Rightness for man, Rightness

whose attainment implies happiness and which is achieved by the practice of

virtue. The Highest Rightness can be understood in two ways: a good life cannot be

achieved neither by the only means of moderate pleasures nor by the only means of

wisdom, but by a mixture of both, simply because man is a mixture of animal and

intelligence. (Of course, the pleasures we can indulge in are the purest ones).

According other philosophers, Plato’s Highest Rightness means contemplating the

Ideas, contemplation which is the supreme happiness. In this sense the virtue, as the

method for achieving the Highest Rightness, performs an analogous roll as dialectic,

the method for achieving the Intelligible World. By means of the practice of virtue we

achieve the Highest Rightness and, therefore, the supreme happiness; virtue is the

natural disposition for rightness of our souls, and as our souls have three elements,

there will be three peculiar virtues, one for each one of them: self-control for the

concupiscent element: "certain order and moderation of the pleasures"; strength or

braveness for the irascible element: the strength allows man surpasses suffering and

sacrifices pleasures if necessary; and wisdom or prudence for the rational element,

which rules the whole human behaviour.  The virtue of the soul as a whole is justice,

which settles order and harmony between those three elements and is, obviously,

the most important virtue.

b) The king-philosopher. As every Greek, Plato thinks man is naturally a social

being; that’s why there are States (Polis). The individual can reach his utmost

accomplishment in the State, but only in a perfect State. Plato divides the State or

society in three classes following the three elements of the soul; the State is a great

organism with the same material and immaterial requirements and ethical aims as

man. The rational element of the soul is represented by the class of the governors,

who are philosophers; the irascible element is represented by the social class of the

soldiers; the concupiscent element by the craftsmen. The philosophers, whose

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particular virtue is wisdom or prudence, are the only ones capable for government;

the soldiers, whose virtue is the strength, must defend and keep safe the polis; the

craftsmen, whose virtue is self-control, provide the commodities needed in the State.

Thus, a total parallelism between anthropology, ethics and policy is settled down.

The three social classes are needed, but each one enjoys different rank and dignity.

c) The "Platonic Communism". Philosophers must seek the general welfare and

so, trying to avoid temptations and useless distractions, they neither have private

property nor family; their main purpose is wisdom which enables them to carry out

their mission of government. Soldiers also sacrifice family and private property, only

the craftsmen are allowed to them (though limited and controlled by the State). 

Craftsmen do not need education, except the professional for their own tasks, and

they must obey political powers. In this ideal State only a very best selected minority

have power. Plato’s ideal State is clearly aristocratic. Finally, along with this

description of the ideal society, Plato describes and assesses the actual forms of

government: there are five, but they all come from the monarchy or aristocracy by

progressive decay: military dictatorship, oligarchy, democracy and, the worse of

all, tyranny. Monarchy or aristocracy is the most perfect form of government: is the

government of the best individuals.

Aristotle

Aristotle's View of Politics

Political science studies the tasks of the politician or statesman (politikos), in much

the way that medical science concerns the work of the physician. It is, in fact, the

body of knowledge that such practitioners, if truly expert, will also wield in pursuing

their tasks. The most important task for the politician is, in the role of lawgiver, to

frame the appropriate constitution for the city-state. This involves enduring laws,

customs, and institutions (including a system of moral education) for the citizens.

Once the constitution is in place, the politician needs to take the appropriate

measures to maintain it, to introduce reforms when he finds them necessary, and to

prevent developments which might subvert the political system. This is the province

of legislative science, which Aristotle regards as more important than politics as

exercised in everyday political activity such as the passing of decrees.

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Aristotle frequently compares the politician to a craftsman. The analogy is imprecise

because politics, in the strict sense of legislative science, is a form of practical

knowledge, while a craft like architecture or medicine is a form of productive

knowledge. However, the comparison is valid to the extent that the politician

produces, operates, and maintains a legal system according to universal principles.

In order to appreciate this analogy it is helpful to observe that Aristotle explains the

production of an artifact in terms of four causes: the material, formal, efficient, and

final causes.

Socrates

 Credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy, he is an enigmatic figure

known chiefly through the accounts of later classical writers, especially the writings

of his students Plato and Xenophon, and the plays of his

contemporary Aristophanes.

Politics

It is often argued that Socrates believed "ideals belong in a world only the wise man

can understand", making the philosopher the only type of person suitable to govern

others. In Plato's dialogue the Republic, Socrates was in no way subtle about his

particular beliefs on government. He openly objected to the democracy that ran

Athens during his adult life. It was not only Athenian democracy: Socrates objected

to any form of government that did not conform to his ideal of a perfect republic led

by philosophers, and Athenian government was far from that. It is, however, possible

that the Socrates of Plato's Republic is colored by Plato's own views. During the last

years of Socrates' life, Athens was in continual flux due to political upheaval.

Democracy was at last overthrown by a junta known as the Thirty Tyrants, led by

Plato's relative, Critias, who had been a student of Socrates. The Tyrants ruled for

about a year before the Athenian democracy was reinstated, at which point it

declared an amnesty for all recent events.

Socrates' opposition to democracy is often denied, and the question is one of the

biggest philosophical debates when trying to determine exactly what Socrates

believed. The strongest argument of those who claim Socrates did not actually

believe in the idea of philosopher kings is that the view is expressed no earlier than

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Plato's Republic, which is widely considered one of Plato's "Middle" dialogues and

not representative of the historical Socrates' views. Furthermore, according to

Plato's Apology of Socrates, an "early" dialogue, Socrates refused to pursue

conventional politics; he often stated he could not look into other's matters or tell

people how to live their lives when he did not yet understand how to live his own. He

believed he was a philosopher engaged in the pursuit of Truth, and did not claim to

know it fully. Socrates' acceptance of his death sentence, after his conviction by

the Boule (Senate), can also be seen to support this view. It is often claimed much of

the anti-democratic leanings are from Plato, who was never able to overcome his

disgust at what was done to his teacher. In any case, it is clear Socrates thought the

rule of the Thirty Tyrants was at least as objectionable as Democracy; when called

before them to assist in the arrest of a fellow Athenian, Socrates refused and

narrowly escaped death before the Tyrants were overthrown.

Jeremy Bentham

Political Philosophy

Bentham was regarded as the central figure of a group of intellectuals called, by Elie

Halévy (1904), “the philosophic radicals,” of which both Mill and Herbert Spencer can

be counted among the “spiritual descendants.” While it would be too strong to claim

that the ideas of the philosophic radicals reflected a common political theory, it is

nevertheless correct to say that they agreed that many of the social problems of late

eighteenth and early nineteenth century England were due to an antiquated legal

system and to the control of the economy by a hereditary landed gentry opposed to

modern capitalist institutions. As discussed in the preceding section, for Bentham,

the principles that govern morals also govern politics and law, and political reform

requires a clear understanding of human nature. While he develops a number of

principles already present in Anglo-Saxon political philosophy, he breaks with that

tradition in significant ways.

In his earliest work, A Fragment on Government (1776), which is an excerpt from a

longer work published only in 1928 as Comment on Blackstone’s Commentaries,

Bentham attacked the legal theory of Sir William Blackstone. Bentham’s target was,

primarily, Blackstone’s defense of tradition in law. Bentham advocated the rational

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revision of the legal system, a restructuring of the process of determining

responsibility and of punishment, and a more extensive freedom of contract. This, he

believed, would favor not only the development of the community, but the personal

development of the individual.

Bentham’s attack on Blackstone targeted more than the latter’s use of tradition

however. Against Blackstone and a number of earlier thinkers (including Locke),

Bentham repudiated many of the concepts underlying their political philosophies,

such as natural right, state of nature, and social contract. Bentham then attempted to

outline positive alternatives to the preceding “traditionalisms.” Not only did he work to

reform and restructure existing institutions, but he promoted broader suffrage and

self (that is, representative) government.

Edmund Burke

Philosophical and Historical Writings

Burke seems to have worked on the imagination—the faculty of devising and

combining ideas — as an undergraduate, and continued to do so into the 1750s. The

result, A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and

Beautiful (1757) emphasized, unsurprisingly, the activity of mind in making ideas and

the influence of these upon conduct. It was in the first place an exercise in clarifying

ideas, with an eye to refining the ways in which the arts affect the passions: in other

words, a refinement of complex ideas was taken to be the precondition of a

refinement of practice.

The roots of human activity, Burke thought, were the passions of curiosity, pleasure

and pain. Curiosity stimulated the activity of mind on all matters. Ideas of pain and of

pleasure corresponded respectively to self-preservation and society, and society

involved the passions of sympathy, imitation and ambition. Imitation tended to

establish habit, and ambition to produce change. Sympathy did neither, but it did

establish an interest in other people's welfare that extended to mental identification

with them. The scope of sympathy could embrace anyone, unlike compassion, which

applied only to those in a worse situation than oneself. Such width of concern had an

obvious reference to the social order (and may express also Burke's thinking about

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the theatre). The passions, understood in Burke's way, suggested at once that

society as such answered to natural instincts, and that it comprised elements of

continuity and improvement alike. Burke then proceeded to show that self-

preservation and its cognates suggested the complex idea of the sublime, and not

least the idea of a God who was both active and terrible. Beauty, on the other hand,

comprised a very different set of simple ideas, which originated in pleasure. Sublime

and beautiful therefore sprang from very different origins.

Niccolo Machiavelli

Morality, Religion, and Politics

These basic building blocks of Machiavelli's thought have induced considerable

controversy among his readers going back to the sixteenth century, when he was

denounced as an apostle of the Devil, but also was read and applied sympathetically

by authors (and politicians) enunciating the doctrine of “reason of state”. The main

source of dispute concerned Machiavelli's attitude toward conventional moral and

religious standards of human conduct, mainly in connection withThe Prince. For

many, his teaching adopts the stance of immoralism or, at least, amoralism. The

most extreme versions of this reading find Machiavelli to be a “teacher of evil,” in the

famous words of Leo Strauss, on the grounds that he counsels leaders to avoid the

common values of justice, mercy, temperance, wisdom, and love of their people in

preference to the use of cruelty, violence, fear, and deception. A more moderate

school of thought, associated with the name of Benedetto Croce, views Machiavelli

as simply a “realist” or a “pragmatist” advocating the suspension of commonplace

ethics in matters of politics. Moral values have no place in the sorts of decisions that

political leaders must make, and it is a category error of the gravest sort to think

otherwise. Weaker still is the claim pioneered by Ernst Cassirer that Machiavelli

simply adopts the stance of a scientist—a kind of “Galileo of politics”—in

distinguishing between the “facts” of political life and the “values” of moral judgment.

Thus, Machiavelli lays claim to the mantle of the founder of “modern” political

science, in contrast with Aristotle's classical norm-laden vision of a political science

of virtue. Perhaps the mildest version of the amoral hypothesis has been proposed

by Quentin Skinner, who claims that the ruler's commission of acts deemed vicious

by convention is a “last best” option. Concentrating on the claim in The Prince that a

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head of state ought to do good if he can, but must be prepared to commit evil if he

must, Skinner argues that Machiavelli prefers conformity to moral virtue ceteris

paribus.