Hume, Foucault, Becker, (and Spinoza) on our fundamental and obvious interests

The case is precisely the same with the political or civil duty of allegiance, as with the natural duties of justice and fidelity. Our primary instincts lead us, either to indulge ourselves in unlimited freedom, or to seek dominion over others: And it is reflection only, which engages us to sacrifice such strong passions to the interests of peace and public order. A small degree of experience and observation suffices to teach us, that society cannot possibly be maintained without the authority of magistrates, and that this authority must soon fall into contempt, where exact obedience is not payed to it. The observation of these general and obvious interests is the source of all allegiance, and of that moral obligation, which we attribute to it.

What necessity, therefore, is there to found the duty of allegiance or obedience to magistrates on that of fidelity or a regard to promises, and to suppose, that it is the consent of each individual, which subjects him to government; when it appears, that both allegiance and fidelity stand precisely on the same foundation, and are both submitted to by mankind, on account of the apparent interests and necessities of human society? We are bound to obey our sovereign, it is said; because we have given a tacit promise to that purpose. But why are we bound to observe our promise? It must here be asserted, that the commerce and intercourse of mankind, which are of such mighty advantage, can have no security where men pay no regard to their engagements. In like manner, may it be said, that men could not live at all in society, at least in a civilized society, without laws and magistrates and judges, to prevent the encroachments of the strong upon the weak, of the violent upon the just and equitable. The obligation to allegiance being of like force and authority with the obligation to fidelity, we gain nothing by resolving the one into the other. The general interests or necessities of society are sufficient to establish both.

If the reason be asked of that obedience, which we are bound to pay to government, I readily answer, because society could not otherwise subsist: And this answer is clear and intelligible to all mankind. Your answer is, because we should keep our word. But besides, that no body, till trained in a philosophical system, can either comprehend or relish this answer: Besides this, I say, you find yourself embarrassed, when it is asked, why we are bound to keep our word? Nor can you give any answer, but what would, immediately, without any circuit, have accounted for our obligation to allegiance. David Hume Of Original Contract, (emphasis in original)

In the context of explicitly criticizing both the tacit and explicit versions of social contract theory, Hume draws upon (and subtly rewrites) his account of the origin of justice from the Treatise. In the quoted passage Hume works with a distinction or contrast between primary or original instincts (which are said to be "strong passions") and reflection or interest. And, in case one treats Humean reflection as a rationalist principle, Hume quickly adds that reflection is shaped or informed by "experience and observation." Even a small amount of this experience is sufficient to become aware of our "general and obvious" interest in obedience to the law not as something abstract, but as instantiated by the authority of magistrates. And so one important feature of Hume's account is that on his view it clearly does not require much intelligence to recognize such an interest in obedience. It's not, say, the product of philosophy or much enlightenment.

For a certain kind of theorist, Hume's claim that both our original and continuing adherence to the law are ground in our interests and not in some promise is suspect. For, after all, what if it is not in our general interest to do so? Here Hume seems to edge rather close to the Spinozistic position that our obligations dissolve once they (structurally) violate our interests. I use 'structural' here to echo Hume's use of 'general' and to allow for occasions where particular laws violate some of our (short-term or material) interests. Structural interests are akin to basic or fundamental rights.(To be sure, Spinoza clothes this doctrine in the language of social contract, and Hume rejects it.) This position is a feature and not a bug of Spinoza's account: rulers can't count on our allegiance and obedience when they violate our most fundamental interests or basic rights. And, while Hume is no fan of revolution (the passage is about obedience to government, after all), Hume is happy to bite this Spinozistic bullet (see Treatise 3.2.9.4, which Foucault will allude to [see below Foucault's treatment of the Humean response to Blackstone's account of tacit contract]). 

The passage quoted above is discussed by Foucault on 28 March 1979, published as the eleventh lecture of Birth of Biopolitics. Foucault introduces it in the context of his revisiting and elaboration of kind of natural history of homo oeconomicus that, as I have noted before (recall), runs through the lecture series:  (i) in the Smithian period he is the man of exchange (224); in the (ii) classical period starting with Ricardo he is man the consumer in terms of satisfaction/pursuit of needs (p. 225); (iii) in the neoliberal period, especially in the (recall) ORDO senses, "he is the man of enterprise and production." (147, lecture 6). And (iv) at Chicago he is also "an entrepreneur," but now, especially, "an entrepreneur of himself," who develops and produces/maintains his own human capital as a source of earnings (226), even a possible earning stream into the future (230).  

And, in fact, as an aside, just before het gets to Hume, Foucault subtly refines (recall) his account of Chicago, especially Becker, who he correctly recognizes (v) treats homo oeconomicus as "any conduct which responds systematically to modifications in the variables of the environment, in other words, any conduct, as Becker says, which “accepts reality,” must be susceptible to economic analysis." (Birth of Biopolitics, p. 269; recall also this post). Foucault connects this feature of Becker's economic imperialism to Skinnerianism.

Now, Hume is treated by Foucault as a kind of radicalization of Locke's empiricism, which is said to posit a "subject of individual choices which are both irreducible and non-transferable,"  (BofB,  p. 272; I have discussed this here.) They are irreducible and non-transferable because, in Foucault's treatment of Hume, these choices express or ultimately refer back to the subject's pleasure and pain. Crucially, Foucault adds: "This principle of an irreducible, non-transferable, atomistic individual choice which is unconditionally referred to the subject himself is what is called interest." (BofB, p. 272)

As an aside, that Hume is an atomist in this way is by no means obvious (a lot hinges on how one understands his account of sympathy), but Foucault buttresses his interpretation with an appeal to "Hume's famous aphorism which says: If I am given the choice between cutting my little finger and the death of someone else, even if I am forced to cut my little finger, nothing can force me to think that cutting my little finger is preferable to the death of someone else." (BoB, p. 272) The editors of Foucault helpfully note that this is a reference to Treatise 2.3.3.6.* It is worth adding -- since one may well be tempted to ascribe to Hume's doctrine a kind of base selfishness --  that the next example Hume gives of the very same phenomena/doctrine is "'Tis not contrary to reason for me to chuse my total ruin, to prevent the least uneasiness of an Indian or person wholly unknown to me." That is, on Hume's explicit account, one's interest need not be selfish.

Okay, with that in place, let me quote Foucault's analysis of the nature of Humean interest in the context of Hume's "Of the Original Contract" (quoted above):

This means that it is not because we have contracted that we respect the contract, but because it is in our interest that there is a contract. That is to say, the appearance and the emergence of the contract have not replaced a subject of interest with a subject of right. In a calculation of interest, the subject of interest has constituted a form, an element in which he will continue to have a certain interest right to the end. And if, moreover, the contract no longer offers an interest, nothing can oblige me to continue to comply with it. So, juridical will does not take over from interest. The subject of right does not find a place for itself in the subject of interest. The subject of interest remains, subsists, and continues up to the time a juridical structure, a contract exists. For as long as the law exists, the subject of interest also continues to exist. The subject of interest constantly overflows the subject of right. He is therefore irreducible to the subject of right. He is not absorbed by him. He overflows him, surrounds him, and is the permanent condition of him functioning. So, interest constitutes something irreducible in relation to the juridical will.--Foucault, 28 March 1979, p. 274.

In context, Foucault plausibly treats Blackstone's account of tacit contract as a source of obedience as the target of Hume's analysis. And what Foucault recognizes is that in Blackstone the social contract changes something fundamental about the agent: we become a juridical subject or a subject of right, or someone who can be held accountable in virtue of his or her promises (as it is in Hobbes and, say, Rousseau [and Christianity as Nietzsche explores in his Genealogy]).

Now, in larger context of Foucault's argument, it is clear that Foucault admires Beccaria and Bentham, and Benthamite radicalism as it flows into, and is revived by, Chicago economics because this tradition has an anthropologically thin account of the criminal. In Becker, arguably, the criminal has perhaps a different risk appetite (and, perhaps, bad luck that the government deploys significant resources to catch him) than other subjects, but is not different in nature.

And what Foucault recognizes is that this tradition is (as Bentham had hinted) rooted in Hume's philosophy. For even if a social contract is conceptually possible, as Hume allows for the sake of argument, the interest of the contracting agent subsists after the contract. As my comment about Spinoza above hints, I actually think this insight predates Hume (and, perhaps, even can be traced to Hobbes himself). Foucault goes on to argue "that in the eighteenth century the figure of homo oeconomicus and the figure of what we could call homo juridicus or homo legalis are absolutely heterogeneous and cannot be superimposed on each other...and have essentially a different relationship to political power." (276)  Foucault develop this idea more fully in light of an account of Mandeville, Condorcet, and Smith. 

But I want to close with two observations. First, the contrast that Foucault draws here actually helps explain, and historically anticipates, his claim that there are two liberal traditions (which he had articulated first in lecture two of 17 January 1979) one 'axiomatic, juridico-deductive' one that one might better call the republican stream within liberalism one can discern in Rousseau and, especially Kant and Constant (and later strands of ordoliberalism and Rawlsianism), and the other, the Benthamite radical (or utilitarian) one. And here Foucault suggests that Hume is really the fount of the radical tradition.

And, second, that from the perspective of Hume's metaphysics it's notable that reflection can generate a subsisting interest, even though the impressions of pain and pleasure that give rise to it, perhaps help constitute it, are themselves rapid and evanescent. And one suspects, but Foucault shows no interest in this, that such a steadfastness of our interest especially when the magistrate is not visible or absent, itself, requires (see, e.g., Treatise 1.2.3.11) some kind of fiction of the imagination, on Hume's account. To be continued.

 

*Unfortunately, Foucault's editors get the page number right, but mistakenly suggest it is in Book III, Part III, section III.