Digressions&Impressions

On Humean sovereignty with some Dicey, Schmitt,

A.V. Dicey's life (1835-1922) and work is known almost exclusively for the 'rule of law.' I have some amusing, reductive evidence for this claim: the one and only annotation by Foucault on Dicey is the definition of the rule of law (see here). Presumably the annotation was prompted by Foucault's reading and use of Hayek's Constitution of Liberty, where Dicey's Law of the Constitution is treated as a classic (as the editors of Foucault's Biopolitics lectures note in their endnotes 23-25 on p. 282 in the English translation). One of the best essays on Dicey's significance on thinking about the rule of law to political theory, "Dicey and his Legacy" (Political Theory, 1995) by Julia Stapleton, explores its impact on especially what she calls English liberal-conservative thought.

But it is not impossible that Foucault also read Dicey's Lectures on the Relation between Law and Public Opinion for the very passage in his lecture that elicited the editors' comment is this: "the Rule of law is clearly defined as a state in which the state itself does not organize administrative courts which arbitrate between citizens and the public authorities; the Rule of law is a state in which citizens can appeal to ordinary justice against the public authorities. The English say: If there are administrative courts, then we are not living under the Rule of law." (p. 170, 21 February 1979). This echoes the introduction to the second edition of Lectures on the Relation between Law and Public Opinion (hereafter LRLPO):

But administrative law has two defects which have till very recent years forbidden its existence in England. Administrative tribunals always tend to exclude the jurisdiction of the ordinary law Courts. Administrative Courts are always more or less connected with the Government of the day. Their decisions are apt to be influenced by political considerations. Governmental officials cannot have the thorough independence of judges....An administrative Court is never a completely independent tribunal. (p. 373 in the Libertyfund edition)

Anyway, as I have noted before (recall; here), Dicey's LRLPO (sorry) had a significant impact on mid-twentieth century neo-Liberal thought (including Lippmann, Milton Friedman, and Hayek (see also this paper by Nathanaël Colin-Jaeger).* But to the best of my knowledge there has been no real attempt to explore LRPLO's political theory in light of some of their theoretical concerns, and the viability of liberalism.

At the very start (pp. 4-5) of LRLPO, while drawing on the opening lines of Hume's "Of the First Principles of Government," Dicey notes that "Hume’s doctrine holds good, and the opinion of the governed is the real foundation of all government." (This Humean stance has been explored in my own scholarship, and also in book-length works by Andy Sabl and Paul Sagar.) Dicey then turns this into a Humean theory of sovereignty that is, as it were, neutral among constitutional forms:

the public opinion which governs a country is the opinion of the sovereign, whether the sovereign be a monarch, an aristocracy, or the mass of the people.

This conclusion, however, though roughly true, cannot be accepted without considerable reservation. The sovereign power may hold that a certain kind of legislation is in itself expedient, but may at the same time be unwilling, or even unable, to carry this conviction into effect, and this from the dread of offending the feelings of subjects who, though they in general take no active share in public affairs, may raise an insuperable opposition to laws which disturb their habits or shock their moral sentiment; it is well indeed, thus early in these lectures, to note that the public opinion which finds expression in legislation is a very complex phenomenon, and often takes the form of a compromise resulting from a conflict between the ideas of the government and the feelings or habits of the governed. This holds good in all countries, whatever be their form of government,--Albert Venn Dicey Lectures on the Relation between Law and Public Opinion, p. 10 (libertyfund edition)

So, if I understand Dicey correctly, sovereignty is constituted by the effectual public opinion that governs the country (which we might call 'conventional wisdom') but this opinion is self-limited by considerations of practical wisdom or prudence. I set aside the non-trivial challenges in measuring effectual public opinion in ways that would meet contemporary standards of rigor in political science. Dicey's lectures are a game attempt at exhibiting its existence, but does often flirt with the 'post hoc ergo propter hoc' fallacy.+

Now, as is well known, in the preface to the (1934) second edition of Political Theology, Schmitt presented his account of sovereignty as a polemic with 'liberal normativism and its kind of "constitutional state.'  And certain radical-chic scholars with contempt for liberalism have been all too willing to echo Schmitt's three-fold typology: among (i) "the pure normativist [who] thinks in terms of impersonal rules, and [(ii)] the decisionist [who] implements the good law of the correctly recognized political situation by means of a personal decision, and [iii)] institutional legal thinking unfolds in institutions and organizations that transcend the personal sphere" and then associate liberalism exclusively with the proceduralist-normativist (by taking Rawlsian intellectual hegemony as a kind of natural outgrowth of liberalism or the only liberalism left standing).

Now, I would argue that Dicey's Humean approach to sovereignty formally anticipates the Schmittian decisionist, but without Schmitt's focus on the decisive individual leader (or Führerprinzip) because, to put it classically, Dicey's approach also allows for complex, collective forms of (aristocratic and democratic) leadership. So, to put this as a serious joke: Schmitt's approach is a subset of Dicey's analytically purer approach.

In fact, from a liberal perspective, Dicey anticipates the main problem in Schmitt's analysis of sovereignty, the absence of accountability (a word and its cognates wholly absent in Schmitt's Political Theology and Dicey's LRLPO). By contrast, Hume would also emphasize the role of accountability (recall this post inspired by Lazar's States of Emergency in Liberal Democracies; and this earlier post). [I don't mean to suggest Dicey ignores accountability of government officials.]

Now, it's important that in LRLPO, Dicey recognizes that the actions of the sovereign can be balanced and frustrated by the "checks imposed on such opinion by the existence of counter-currents and cross-currents of opinion." Elsewhere in his theorizing Dicey explored other, institutional checks (like referenda) on sovereignty (especially that effected by parliament).* But without mechanisms of accountability (be it symbolic, formal, political, or juridical) Dicey's Humeanism slides into illiberalism. For, it is not sufficient that there are checks and balances or fractured sovereignty even when the form of the law is obeyed; accountability is required from a liberal perspective. Interestingly enough (in light of efforts to claim that Hayek, who is very influenced by Dicey, is a neo-Schmittian), Hayek does emphasize the significance of accountability to the rule of law by quoting this passage in “Declaration of Parliament Assembled at Westminster” approvingly: “There being nothing more essential to the freedom of a state, than that the people should be governed by the laws, and that justice be administered by such only as are accountable for mal-administration." (chapter on the Origins of the rule of law" Constitution of Liberty, p. 251 in Volume XVII of the Collected Works. n.)

These digressions are all very theoretical, I recognize. And perhaps it would help if we put it in more concrete form if we think of a concrete example: President, Donald Trump's attempted usurpation (starting, roughly, with the phone call to Brad Raffensperger, the Georgia Secretary of State, and culminating in the events of Jan 6, 2021). His actions generated a hasty (second) impeachment on january 13, 2021, by a 232–197 vote. There is no doubt that this conviction had the support of conventional wisdom. But it lacked sufficient votes in the Senate for conviction, primarily, I think, because too many Republican Senators feared the governed, especially their own primary voters' wrath. (Of the seven Republicans who voted to convict only one had to face her voters within two years.) 

The dangerously slow investigation of and legal procedures against Trump's efforts to overturn the Georgia results have undermined accountability and, thereby, help undermine the constitutional order (and risks shifting toward forms of  plebescite despotism). I would be amazed if the delay isn't caused by a general unease felt by prosecutors over the prosecution of a vindictive politician who could return to power and whose supporters are feared. (The perceived odds of his winning again are better than the perceived odds ahead of his first primary run.)

Unfortunately, the conventional wisdom already reflects this shift to some degree by its tendency to deplore the fact that Trump is being prosecuted for mere hush money payments (in a different jurisdiction) without a willingness to urge on prosecution for actions surrounding his attempted usurpation. Noticeably, and in striking contrast, in living memory the French were willing to prosecute (and covinct) former President Sarkozy thereby also derailing any attemp at re-election.

Now, in closing, before you accuse me of Trump derangement syndrome, I don't mean to suggest that lack of accountability is unique to our era or Trump among US presidents. As I have noted in my blogging (recall here; here), since, say, 1940, plenty of US Presidents have committed egregious war crimes (or worse) abroad, including internment of innocent US citizens and assassination of US Citizens on foreign soil, without (symbolic, legal, political,  etc.) accountability. To what degree this gap in American political practice reflects a tacit approval of the American people I leave to the reader.

• This post was first published at my substack account here. Digressionsimpressions’s Substack is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber there.

 

Pufendorf and Locke on Tacit Consent (in language and money)

But that the Nature of Discourse may be more throughly understood, it must first be known, that there is a two-fold Obligation respecting Discourse, whether exprest with the Voice, or written in Characters. The first is, that those who make use of the same Language, are obliged to apply such certain Words to such certain Things, according as Custom has made them to signify in each Language. For since neither any Words nor any particular Strokes form’d into Letters can naturally denote any certain Thing (otherwise all Languages and Characters for writing would be the same; and hence the Use of the Tongue would be to no purpose if every Man might call every Thing by what Name he pleas’d;) it is absolutely necessary among those who speak the same Language, that there be a tacit Agreement among them, that this certain Thing shall be so, or so call’d, and not otherwise. So that unless an uniform Application of Words be agreed upon, ’twill be impossible for one Man to gather the Meaning of another from his Talk. By virtue then of this tacit Compact, every Man is bound in his common Discourse to apply his Words to that Sense, which agrees with the receiv’d Signification thereof in that Language: From whence also it follows, that albeit a Man’s Sentiments may differ from what he expresses in Words, yet in the Affairs of Human Life he must be look’d upon as intending what he says, tho’, as was said, perhaps his inward Meaning be the clear contrary. For since we cannot be inform’d of another’s Mind otherwise than by outward Signs, all Use of Discourse would be to no purpose, if by mental Reservations, which any Man may form as he lists, it might be in his power to elude what he had declar’d by Signs usually accepted to that end.--Pufendorf, Samuel and Barbeyrac, Jean. The Whole Duty of Man According to the Law of Nature (1673, 2003). Liberty Fund, 1673.  pp. 120-121

As regular readers know I have been directed toward Pufendorf's account of tacit consent because of my reading of Martin Lenz's entertaining and stimulating Socializing Minds (recall this post, especially; but also this one). Lenz (pp. 138-139) explicitly quotes the passage above, and notes four key anticipations of Locke in Pufendorf:

• • the characterisation of language as the great instrument of society,
  • the anti-naturalist conventionalism and the argument that if language were naturally significant, there would be just one language
  • the use of customary outward signs for inward meaning
  • the tacit agreement that binds everyone to apply words in accordance with the received use (receptus usus).--Socializing Minds, p. 138

Lenz is surely right about this, and I accept his contention that Locke's account of the conventionality of language (especially at Essay 3.2.8 and 3.11.11) is inspired by Pufendorf's  De Officio hominis civis, or at least that it would have evoked it to contemporary readers then.

So, this raises the question to what degree what I call recall 'the Humean template' for analyzing convention is already present in Pufendorf. The elements of the Humean template are: (i) a sense of common interest (i*) felt in each person's breast; (ii) and it (that is, (i)) observed in others; (iii), this fact (the existence of (i&ii) creates collaboration; (iv) the collaboration is structured in non-trivial ways; (v) and this has good consequences or positive externalities for society. (I avoid the language of 'utility' to avoid issues pertaining to utilitarianism.) And (vi) a Humean convention is contrasted with practices founded in promises and in practice regulated by formal governmental law. In addition, (vii), the process (i-iii) need not be verbalized at all. It can be entirely tacit. And I argued (recall) that Locke articulates the Humean template at Essay 2.28.10 in the context of describing how moral terms are structurally the same in each language even though they can refer to locally different moral behaviors and characters/character-traits. (And that we can also find (recall) the template in the Second Treatise, paragraph 50 in his account of the value off money.)

If we then look at the quoted passage from De Officio, we can read that Pufendorf treats the convention in terms of an existing "custom." And while this is fully compatible with the elements of the Humean template, we are left without an account how the custom could arrise. That's to say while Pufendorf makes, as Lenz notes, the obligatory character of the convention quite clear, he leaves its origin quite mysterious. For, earlier, Pufendorf defines custom as "the frequent Repetition of Actions of the same kind does also incline the Will to do certain Things" (pp. 34-35). But why linguistic practices get repeated in particular patterns is simply contingent now. 

This absence of a mechanism of how tacit consent arises is actually notable when Pufendorf explicitly treats of the practice:

Consent is usually made known by outward Signs, as, by Speaking, Writing, a Nod, or the like; tho’ sometimes it may also be plainly intimated without any of them, according to the Nature of the thing and other Circumstances. So Silence in some Cases, and attended with some Circumstances, passes for a Sign expressing Consent. To this may be attributed those tacit Contracts, where we give not our formal Consent by the Signs generally made use of among Men; but the Nature of the Business, and other Circumstances make it fairly supposable. Thus frequently in the principal Contract, which is express, another is included which is tacit, the Nature of the Case so requiring: And it is usual, in most Covenants that are made, that some tacit Exceptions and imply’d Conditions must of necessity be understood.--pp. 111-112

Pufendorf is undoubtedly correct that even in explicit covenants lots of tacit exceptions and implied conditions are presupposed and understood. (In a later passage he treats as plainly resulting "from the Nature of the Thing." (p. 127)) That there is often a social scaffolding on which a formal contract is built is pretty much a shared insight of all critics of Hobbes. But how we should think of the character and sources of this 'necessity' is left opaque in Pufendorf.

I don't mean to suggest Pufendorf never has a mechanism when he is discussing custom. So, for example, when it comes to price formation of prices in the market place (so called vulgar prices) he writes the following. 

But the Vulgar Price, which is not fix’d by the Laws, admits of a certain Latitude, within the Compass whereof more or less may be, and often is, either taken or given, according to the Agreement of the Persons dealing; which yet for the most part, goes according to the Custom of the Market. Where commonly there is Regard had to the Trouble and Charges which the Tradesmen generally are at, in the bringing home and managing their Commodities, and also after what manner they are bought or sold, whether by Wholesale or Retail. Sometimes also on a sudden the Common Price is alter’d by reason of the Plenty or Scarcity of Buyers, Money, or the Commodity. For the Scarcity of Buyers and of Money, (which on any particular Account may happen) and the Plenty of the Commodity, may be a Means of diminishing the Price thereof. On the other hand, the Plenty of Buyers and of Money, and the Scarcity of the Commodity, inhanses the same. Thus as the Value of a Commodity is lessen’d, if it wants a Buyer, so the Price is augmented when the Possessor is solicited to sell what otherwise he would not have parted with. Lastly, it is likewise to be regarded, whether the Person offers ready Money, or desires Time for Payment; for Allowance of Time is Part of the Price.--pp. 143-144

Here it is quite clear that the customary price itself reflects underlying costs and even disutility of production and procurement ("the Trouble and Charges which the Tradesmen generally are at, in the bringing home and managing their Commodities") and also reflects supply/demand conditions ("plenty or scarcity"/"plenty of buyers...wants a buyer") in the market-place as well as what we would call inflation, but in Pufendorf's time is felt in terms of the availability of coins [say because the local gold/silver/copper value of coins has made it attractive to melt them down or export them], or "ready money." Interestingly enough buying on credit ("time for payment") is not treated as pure equivalent for buying with coin, presumably not just in virtue of the delay ("allowance of time"), but also the implied risk.  Here Pufendorf has a relatively clear account of the mechanism by which the vulgar price can change, but again, he has no account of how it can become customary (except that conditions  of change are not operative).

I have not done an exhaustive survey of Pufendorf. (You go read, Of the Law of Nature and Nations: Eight Books!--Seriously, I welcome suggestions.) But Locke deserves some credit for recognizing that Pufendorf's account of convention and tacit contract left too much unexplained. And while I have not defended the adequacy of the Humean template, the fact that Locke adopts it in non-trivial ways is no small advance over Pufendorf's analysis.

Hobbes and Descartes on the Distribution of Wit, and some Plato

Nature hath made men so equall, in the faculties of body, and mind; as that though there bee found one man sometimes manifestly stronger in body, or of quicker mind then another; yet when all is reckoned together, the difference between man, and man, is not so considerable, as that one man can thereupon claim to himselfe any benefit, to which another may not pretend, as well as he. For as to the strength of body, the weakest has strength enough to kill the strongest, either by secret machination, or by confederacy with others, that are in the same danger with himselfe.

And as to the faculties of the mind, (setting aside the arts grounded upon words, and especially that skill of proceeding upon generall, and infallible rules, called Science; which very few have, and but in few things; as being not a native faculty, born with us; nor attained, (as Prudence,) while we look after somewhat els,) I find yet a greater equality amongst men, than that of strength. For Prudence, is but Experience; which equall time, equally bestowes on all men, in those things they equally apply themselves unto. That which may perhaps make such equality incredible, is but a vain conceipt of ones owne wisdome, which almost all men think they have in a greater degree, than the Vulgar; that is, than all men but themselves, and a few others, whom by Fame, or for concurring with themselves, they approve. For such is the nature of men, that howsoever they may acknowledge many others to be more witty, or more eloquent, or more learned; Yet they will hardly believe there be many so wise as themselves: For they see their own wit at hand, and other mens at a distance. But this proveth rather that men are in that point equall, than unequall. For there is not ordinarily a greater signe of the equall distribution of any thing, than that every man is contented with his share.--Hobbes (1651) Leviathan, Chapter 13.

As regular readers know I am rather fond of these two paragrahs in Hobbes and I treat them as foundational to my own methodological analytic egalitarianism (MAE) [recall here; here and originally here]. But recently, during a seminar discussion, I noticed two features that invite reconsideration. First, in the top paragraph, it is striking that when Hobbes justifies that the strength of body is sufficiently equal, he appeals to a political mechanism that has solved what  we may call the original coordination problem (confederacy). This is a bit awkward for two reasons (;) because such fundamental equality is a kind of premise or step in the argment that is supposed to lead to the social contract in the state of nature. But here we are informed that even in nature, political alliance secures such equality. This is not the place to elaborate what this signifies, but the paragraph suggests to me that for Hobbes politics ("secret machination") is constitutive of human co-existence. The state of nature is not, as it sometimes taken to be, pre-political. About that some other time more. But (ii) the capacity to enter into sucessful confederacy with others (or to execute "secret machination" successfully) seems to presuppose non-trivial social intelligence. And while it can provide evidence for bodily equality, it seems to undermine the idea that we are truly equal (intellectually). I return to this in the paragraph below the next one.

It's also worth noting that in that first paragraph, Hobbes here is recalling some key features of Glaucon's version of the social contract in at Republic 358E-359B: that is, "those who lack the power to avoid [being harmed by others] and [unable to impose harms on others] determine that it is for their profit to make a compact with one another" (translated by Shorey).I don't mean to suggest Hobbes is deliberately evoking Plato here, but I do think it possible that there is a more general moral lurking here: in order to argue for the conceptual possibility for an egalitarian social contract that has normative or political authority, the construct seems to rest on a prior step in which the many collaborate in subdueing the strong.

My second point pertains to the final three sentences of the second quoted paragraph above (and these I will connect to Hobbes below). Here, in line with my remark above, Hobbes does not really affirm equal mental capacity in extensional terms. (The existence of rhetoric and science, and perhaps education more generally undermines it.) But this extensional perspective is not really doing the work there. He switches to an intensional context, and points out that we all tend to believe we're smart (in the way at Lake Wobegon parents think their child above average) and that we do not tend to envy other people their smarts. Hobbes is articulating here an envy-free distributive principle, which is a key criterion for an egalitarian distribution of an item.

He explains the endorsement of one's own sufficient keen intelligence ('wit') in terms of a kind of perspectival bias--we are too close to ourselves to judge this really impartially. But interestingly enough, the fact that we're free of envy of other people's smarts suggests that this kind of perspectival bias is itself equally distributed among us.

Of course, Hobbes is also being very funny here (and kind of implying he is smarter for noticing this), because on the whole wisdom is in short supply. In conversation, some people deny what Hobbes attributes to them--they are modest and genuinely wish they were as smart as others. In my view these putative counterexamples are not very problematic to Hobbes because such people are not a source of the kind of political trouble he worries about (ambition): as he puts it in chapter XI, "Men that have a strong opinion of their own wisdome in matter of government, are disposed to Ambition. " In chapter 13, he is not too worried that people will think they are not sufficiently equal to others and so can be rightfully denied political equality. (A theorist of adaptive preferences or structural injustice may well worry more.)  

It occurred to me,  too, that in these three sentences, Hobbes is trolling Descartes with whom he had an unfruitful, acrimonious exchange, published in 1641 as part of the "Objections and Replies" to/in the Meditations. For Hobbes is here evoking, even adopting for his own ends, the then famous opening lines of Part 1 of Descartes' (1637) Discourse on method. Descartes starts with pretty much the same envy-free criterion to establish the equal distribution of good sense:

Good sense [bon sens] is, of all things among men, the most equally distributed; for every one thinks himself so abundantly provided with it, that those even who are the most difficult to satisfy in everything else, do not usually desire a larger measure of this quality than they already possess. And in this it is not likely that all are mistaken the conviction is rather to be held as testifying that the power of judging aright and of distinguishing truth from error, which is properly what is called good sense or reason, is by nature equal in all men; and that the diversity of our opinions, consequently, does not arise from some being endowed with a larger share of reason than others, but solely from this, that we conduct our thoughts along different ways, and do not fix our attention on the same objects. For to be possessed of a vigorous mind is not enough; the prime requisite is rightly to apply it. The greatest minds, as they are capable of the highest excellences, are open likewise to the greatest aberrations; and those who travel very slowly may yet make far greater progress, provided they keep always to the straight road, than those who, while they run, forsake it.--Descartes (1637) Discourse on Method, part 1.*

The Discourse on Method is not read much in political philosophy/theory, even though it has quite a bit of pertinent material (recall here; and here).

Of course, Hobbes and Descartes may not saying exactly the same thing (wisdom is not often thought identical to good sense/reason). I am unsure what Hobbes' definition of wisdom in Leviathan is, but in the dedication to  his (1651) De Cive, Hobbes writes that "Wisdome properly so call'd is nothing else but this, The perfect knowledge of the Truth in all matters whatsoever." Leaving aside if wisdom is then possible in reality, this definition suggests that wisdom is considerably rarer than we tend to think it.

Whereas Descartes is suggesting that the capacity to distinguish truth from error is available to us all. That we are led into error is fundamentally the effect of the diversity of or developmental paths and our diverging interests (we conduct our thoughts along different ways, and do not fix our attention on the same objects.) Our life's experience corrupts our capacity to distinguish true from false.

Somewhat surprisingly Descartes goes on to deny the natural equality he had just diagnosed with an intentional envy free criterion, by offering the following extentional judgment: "The greatest minds, as they are capable of the highest excellences, are open likewise to the greatest aberrations." Descartes here echoes a rather important passage [491D] Plato's Republic that one can naturally read as concerned with the inductive risk of the teaching of philosophy to ambitious and smart types  [like Alcibiades].[Recall also Ibn Rushd's commentary here.]

Descartes treats reason as the capacity to distinguish truth from falsity. It's pretty clear that Hobbes thinks this a mistake (and I suspect that's the trolling). For Hobbes defines reason, in deflationary fashion, as "nothing but Reckoning" and, in particular, of tracking "the Consequences of generall names agreed upon, for the Marking and Signifying of our thoughts; I say Marking them, when we reckon by our selves; and Signifying, when we demonstrate, or approve our reckonings to other men." (see chapter 5 of Leviathan, emphasis added). What reason really does, for Hobbes, is keep track of our linguistic conventions. 

 

 

Hobbes on Natural Equality

[1] Nature hath made men so equall, in the faculties of body, and mind; as that though there bee found one man sometimes manifestly stronger in body, or of quicker mind then another; yet when all is reckoned together, the difference between man, and man, is not so considerable, as that one man can thereupon claim to himselfe any benefit, to which another may not pretend, as well as he. For as to the strength of body, the weakest has strength enough to kill the strongest, either by secret machination, or by confederacy with others, that are in the same danger with himselfe.

[2] And as to the faculties of the mind, (setting aside the arts grounded upon words, and especially that skill of proceeding upon generall, and infallible rules, called Science; which very few have, and but in few things; as being not a native faculty, born with us; nor attained, (as Prudence,) while we look after somewhat els,) I find yet a greater equality amongst men, than that of strength. For Prudence, is but Experience; which equall time, equally bestowes on all men, in those things they equally apply themselves unto. That which may perhaps make such equality incredible, is but a vain conceipt of ones owne wisdome, which almost all men think they have in a greater degree, than the Vulgar; that is, than all men but themselves, and a few others, whom by Fame, or for concurring with themselves, they approve. For such is the nature of men, that howsoever they may acknowledge many others to be more witty, or more eloquent, or more learned; Yet they will hardly believe there be many so wise as themselves: For they see their own wit at hand, and other mens at a distance. But this proveth rather that men are in that point equall, than unequall. For there is not ordinarily a greater signe of the equall distribution of any thing, than that every man is contented with his share.--Hobbes Leviathan, Chapter XIII.

It's natural to read a Spinozism before Spinoza into the first sentence quoted above. While I do not want to reject that out of hand, it's worth recalling that in the first sentence of the "Introduction" of the Leviathan, we learn that nature just is "the art whereby God hath made and governes the world." So, we are equal in virtue of God's art which both creates and governs the world. To what degree this government is providential I leave to discussion of chapter XXXI.

Such cosmocraft is the theological, or natural, counterpart to the statecraft (or art of governing people) that Hobbes teaches. The term 'statecraft' does not appear, I think, in the Leviathan, but we are informed in chapter XIX that the absence of "the art of making fit Laws" is one of the main conditions of the dissolution of states. And in that very sentence (of chapter XIX) laws are treated as coordination devices of human action. In fact, Hobbes is explicit that only fit laws can make a state last. 

That there is an art of government, Hobbes explicitly defends -- against a kind of Thrasymachian objection "some say, that Justice is but a word, without substance; and that whatsoever a man can by force, or art, acquire to himselfe, (not onely in the condition of warre, but also in a Common-wealth,) is his own" -- in chapter XXX. And he explicitly goes on to say that "time, and Industry, produce every day new knowledge" of  commonwealths. And "so, long time after men have begun to constitute Commonwealths, imperfect, and apt to relapse into disorder, there may, Principles of Reason be found out, by industrious meditation, to make use of them." And while "industrious meditation" gives the suggestion that these principles are rationalistic or Cartesian in character (as thinkers as different as Hume and Hazony imply), the wider context suggests he thinks these principles are empirical in character, even subject to trial and error. For these principles are "observed by industrious men, that had long studied the nature of materials, and the divers effects of figure, and proportion, long after mankind began (though poorly) to build."* That Hobbes thinks that the longevity and well-structured-ness of a state is a kind of practical response to the Thrasymachian objection is worth further exploration, but I leave it aside for now.

As regular readers know (recall here), I am rather fond of Leviathan's account of natural equality. Even so, Hobbes' defense that we are naturally bodily equal is a bit peculiar. Leaving aside the Spinozistic way of expressing things, in effect, in the first quoted paragraph (13.1) Hobbes re-tells the story of Glaucon's account of the origin of the social contract in Book 2 of the Republic at 358e/359a, where the not so powerful gang up against the powerful in order to restrain them. I call it 'peculiar' not just because Hobbes appeals to our political nature (confederacy, secret cabals) to explain we're naturally equal, but also because if Glaucon's social contract is apparently just as possible in the state of nature (and later in 13, we're reminded about the brutish and short lives there) as Hobbes' own version of the contract; then why do we need Hobbes' (different) version of the social contract?+ 

In XIII.2, Hobbes articulates a kind of natural ignorance. Science is historically late on the scene, and by Hobbes' light it is something "which very few have, and but in few things." Those that deny our equal natural ignorance tend to be our elitist vanity. As regular readers know, I think XIII.2 is significant because Hobbes shifts here from a kind of extensional perspective (in XIII.1) to a more intentional perspective in what we believe. And he appeals to a kind of no-envy-principle to suggest that we often seem satisfied with our own capacities or natural wisdom. And by 'wisdom,' Hobbes means here a kind of superior prudence in human/social affairs. 

It is worth noting that Hobbes here rejects what Hume would call the monkish virtue associated with (say) Christian humility and epistemic deference to superiors as somehow unnatural. By this I mean that Hobbes thinks these are acquired perspectives on ourselves and can't be used in the escape from the state of nature. We don't really have easy epistemic access to the practical wisdom of others, while, on his view, we can relatively easily discover that others are funnier, and more eloquent and learned than we are. Since Hobbes is, in fact, very funny in XIII.2, I take it he means this claim to be proven or illustrated by example.

There is, of course, a peculiar fact that in defending our mental equality, Hobbes presupposes a distinction of rank between the gentlemen (who are, in fact, a mere subset of "all men") and the "vulgar."  It's a nice example of a rhetorical maneuver that appeals to the prejudices of one's audience to simultaneously undermine it. That is to say, in XIII.2, he also illustrates superior eloquence by example. In fact, I am inclined to say that in 13.2 Hobbes improves rhetorically on (say) Romans 12:16, which also presupposes the distinction of ranks: "Be of the same mind one toward another. Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate. Be not wise in your own conceits." That Hobbes has this in mind is plausible because in chapter XV he writes, "For there are very few so foolish that had not rather govern themselves than be governed by others: nor when the wise, in their own conceit, contend by force with them who distrust their own wisdom, do they always, or often, or almost at any time, get the victory."

Be that as it may, Hobbes goes on to say (in XIII.3) that each of us think ourselves wise is a political problem in a world of material scarcity because it generates dangerous (because mutually incompatible) hopes. Hope had been defines as a passion or "Appetite with an opinion of attaining." That is to say, how we view ourselves is, alongside our desires, action guiding. And, in fact, earlier (at chapter XI.13) Hobbes had already alerted the reader to the political problem of our satisfaction with our own wisdom: "Men that have a strong opinion of their own wisdome in matter of government, are disposed to Ambition." And for this to be true, one need not assume that satisfaction in one's own wisdom is equally distributed. The political problem Hobbes is pointing to is generated if even only a few are really excessively self-satisfied in their own capacities, and these few are not in a position to hope to rule. Of course, making room for them to rule can cause its own problems. But I have gone on long enough.

 

 

Hobbes and Newton on the co-constitution of bodies and minds

The definition, therefore, of body may be this, a body is that, which having no dependence upon our thought, is coincident or coextended with some part of space...they answer best that define an accident to be the manner by which any body is conceived; which is all one as if they should say, an accident is that faculty of any body, by which it works in us a conception of itself. --Hobbes, Elements of Philosophy, Concerning Body, Part Second, chapter 8 "Of Body and Accident" [HT Jennifer Jhun]

In what follows I use 'Hobbes' as shorthand for his Elements of Philosophy. (I, thus, ignore any other works by Hobbes.) Because Hobbes is a quintessential modern corpuscularian, and we are often told that the encounter with Galileo was decisive to Hobbes' life it is natural to read passages like the one just quoted as instantiating a primary/secondary quality distinction, especially because Galileo seems clear on the distinction in (say) The Assayer. (See Martha Bolton's lovely review essay in the Stanford Encyclopedia.) Hesitation on the ascription of the primary/secondary quality distinction to Hobbes immediately creeps in (not just because Bolton does not mention Hobbes, but also) because in (the quoted passage from) Hobbes it seems nearly all qualities of bodies are what one might call 'secondary' and only the bare bodies themselves, and perhaps magnitude (as being the quality body shares with extension or parts of space), are what one might call 'primary' if it wouldn't be so odd to call body itself a quality of (ahh) body. 

A Hobbesian accident may be thought of as a disposition or relational quality (as Jhun suggests in the paper that triggered this post). In particular, it is a quality of body that is intelligible to us (assuming that if we an have a conception of it, it's intelligible). There is an interesting question lurking here to what degree accidents are co-constituted by the conceptions of agents. And, so, it seems that for Hobbes there is a bare and parsimonious absolute ontology of fairly homogeneous matter, and that the rest of nature's structure or differentiation is, in part, the effect of the conceptualizing existence of material minds like ours.*

So, if Hobbes has or anticipates a primary/secondary quality of bodies distinction at all (which I am doubting), the list on the primary side is going to be rather short (it seems to include only magnitude or extension, which Hobbes explicitly treats as synonyms "The extension of a body, is the same thing with the magnitude of it, or that which some call real space.")+ And the list of secondary qualities will include features that are generally taken to be primary in the early modern tradition. For example, in the same section Hobbes goes on to write: 

[T]here are certain accidents which can never perish except the body perish also; for no body can be conceived to be without extension, or without figure. All other accidents, which are not common to all bodies, but peculiar to some only, as to be at rest, to be moved, colour, hardness, and the like, do perish continually, and are succeeded by others; yet so, as that the body never perisheth. [emphasis in Hobbes]

So, Hobbes does have a distinction between universal or what one may call 'intrinsic' or 'essential' qualities of body -- these are the accidents that make a body a body while it exists -- and non-universal or extrinsic or inessential qualities of body. Now, as readers of Newton's third rule of reasoning know, there is no necessary requirement to treat universal qualities as intrinsic qualities of bodies. That a quality is a universal property of matter may be an accidental feature of the universe; God's will or the laws of nature could have been otherwise. But it looks like Hobbes tacitly denies any gap between the universal and intrinsic qualities of body. And that makes sense, because Hobbes' list of these is incredibly short: only extension/figure is universal to body, and it must intrinsic to it.

Again, one may well treat the distinction between features of body that never perish except when the body perishes and features that are transient qualities of bodies as a kind of anticipation of the primary/secondary quality distinction. And I think that's fine, as long as one remembers that the transient qualities of bodies include accidents that are often treated as primary (hardness, motion/rest) by the rest of the tradition.

The significance of this is two-fold. First, relative to Galileo, Descartes, Boyle, and Locke, Hobbes is really an outlier. But, second, I do think pre-Principia Newton toyed with something close to Hobbes' position. This seems to be suggested by an extended aside in Newton's manuscript known as 'De Grav.' (I call it an 'aside' because it both detracts from the main argument of De Grav, and, in fact, is in some tension with it, or so I have argued.) After articulating the exceptionally clear idea of space, Newton offers a tentative hypothesis on the nature of body with an extended thought experiment involving God's creation. I quote the crucial passage from Andrew Janiak's edition:

And hence these beings will either be bodies, or very similar to bodies. If they are bodies, then we can define bodies as determined quantities of extension which omnipresent God endows with certain conditions. These conditions are: (1) that they be mobile, and therefore I did not say that they are numerical parts of space which are absolutely immobile, but only definite quantities which may be transferred from space to space; (2) that two of this kind cannot coincide anywhere, that is, that they may be impenetrable, and hence that oppositions obstruct their mutual motions and they are reflected in accord with certain laws; (3) that they can excite various perceptions of the senses and the imagination in created minds, and conversely be moved by them...--Newton's Philosophical Writings, edited Janiak, p. 43

To be sure, this is not exactly Hobbes' position. For, Newton does not rely on Hobbes' terminology of 'accidents'. Hobbes would not define body as determined quantities of extension (let alone let God's will play such an outsized role).  And it does seem that Newton is inclined to treat mobility and impenetrability as universal qualities of bodies, where Hobbes would not. But here in (3) Newton does echo Hobbes in thinking that except for the spatiality of body, it is rather to central to body (I almost wrote 'intrinsic to body') as such that body has a relationship to minds. 

Now, again there are important differences between Hobbes and Newton even on this point. In Newton this relationship is causal: bodies can "excite various perceptions of the senses and the imagination," whereas in the passages quoted from Hobbes the relationship is conceptual, we cognize features of bodies which, thereby, become intelligible if not differentiated. (Of course, there are plenty of passages in Hobbes, in which our thinking is treated in terms of the effects on the senses by bodies in motion!)

This soft connection between Hobbes and Newton is not wholly contingent. We know from Newton's early notebooks that Newton read De Corpore, and that he reacted strongly against Hobbes' materialism. And so while I don't want to claim that Newton was self-consciously following and modifying Hobbes (and Newton's position evolved away from  the one presented De Grav), I do want to claim them as occasional partial fellow-travelers when it comes to analyzing bodies as spatialized, in one absolute sense, and as treating the differentiating properties of bodies as being more than accidentally linked to minds that perceive or cognize them. 

On Esoteric Locke (and Cicero/Newton); Yolton's (and Blau's) Polemics with Strauss, PT 2

Strauss has gone to very particular pains to say that Locke was really a genuine Hobbist in his social theory, a claim Strauss pretends to demonstrate by minute attention to and quotation from the Locke corpus. It is not so much the obvious incorrectness of Strauss's reading which calls for comment as it is the techniques employed in support of his reading. Strauss has an ulterior reason for dealing with Locke as he does: he claims that Locke's real doctrine has been purposely hidden under the show of respectability.5 It is not surprising that the Strauss esotericism turns out to be insupportable when applied to Locke, but it is startling to discover the flimsiness of the pretended support and the unscholarly nature of Strauss's analysis. Strauss's general esotericist thesis suffers a severe blow when we consult the techniques he employs.

5. I do not want to question Strauss's general theory about techniques of saying one thing and meaning another, the theory of esotericism. His views on this subject are best expressed in Persecution and the Art of Writing (Glencoe, Ill., 1952). (For a judicious discussion and rejection of this claim as applied against ancient writers, see George Boas, "Ancient Testimony to Secret Doctrines," The Philosophical Review, LXII [I953], 79-92.) What I challenge and charge with irresponsibility is Strauss's application of this esotericist thesis to Locke. The lengths to which Strauss will go in making Locke say what Strauss wants him to say are clearly evident on pp. 207-209 of Natural Right and History. Locke is there made to hold a "view of caution" which accepts the generalization: "cautious speech is legitimate if unqualified frankness would hinder a noble work one is trying to achieve or expose one to persecution or endanger the public peace." Strauss refers to those passages in Locke's Reasonableness of Christianity which discuss Jesus's activities and the way he kept his identity as the Messiah implicit. Locke's point is that Christ did not come right out and say "I am the Messiah" simply because he knew he had to fulfill his mission of preaching the gospel. Locke in no way generalizes from this very special situation to a theory of the art of writing under persecution.--, John W. Yolton (1958) "Locke on the Law of Nature." The Philosophical Review 67.4: 478.

This post originates in my interest in finding critical engagements with Leo Strauss within analytic philosophy in Strauss' lifetime during the post-WWII era (triggered by (recall here; here; here; especially this one; here; here; here; and here, which was pt 1 on Yolton vs Strauss) an invite by Sander Verhaegh). In the last post I discussed Yolton's (1955) "Criticism and Histrionic Understanding" Ethics (65):3, which is a respectful criticism of Strauss' Natural Right and History (NRH). The underlying point is that in his arguments against relativism Strauss has ignored a plausible alternative position. Yolton's argument can fruitfully be read as an immanent criticism (also because of the kind of authors/authorities he appeals to). As I noted, Yolton's argument itself suffers from some weakness, and somewhat surprisingly does not engage with Strauss views on Locke in NRH which diverge greatly from those that Yolton defends in his important monograph, (1956) John Locke and the Way of Ideas (OUP).

In fact, while I have encountered lots of criticism of Strauss, on the whole the criticism is professional in character. Even when there is deep disagreement, there is also a mark of respect. For example in criticizing Strauss' Hobbes' book, J.W. N. Watkins, who later became quite an influential Popperian at LSE, writes (1955), "Professor Leo Strauss's brilliant, influential and, I believe, misguided work." The main exception is Vlastos' (1951) review of Strauss' (1948) treatment of Xenophon's Hiero, but while the review is polemical the tone is more one of disappointment than the disparagement of Strauss he engaged in later in life (see here). 

Yolton's (1958) "Locke on the Law of Nature" in The Philosophical Review 67(4), changes all that. In it, Yolton explains that one of the main reasons "a reappraisal of Locke on the law of nature is" needed is in virtue of "the violently distorted interpretation recently advanced by Leo Strauss." (p. 478; he then cites NRH.) Yolton anticipates, say, the polemics of Ryle's (Yolton's supervisor) review of Bloom's Plato translation (NYRB, 1969 [HT Wiep van Bunge]) and (his student) Shadia Drury (here).

It's very hard to find neutral ground on the issue of Strauss' esotericism. But I warmly recommend Adrian Blau's (2012)"Anti-Strauss." The Journal of Politics 74.1: 142-155, which accepts that for some historical authors esotericism is likely, that most criticisms of Strauss have been lazy/hasty, and who is simultaneously rather critical (even satirical) of Strauss' particular techniques. (This sums up my own position.) Somewhat sadly, in his paper, Blau does not discuss Yolton's paper or Strauss' reading of Locke in NRH. What follows is a mitigated defense of Strauss against some of Yolton's criticism.

Even Yolton, who claims to restrict himself to Strauss' esoteric reading of Locke ("I do not want to question Strauss's general theory about techniques of saying one thing and meaning another, the theory of esotericism"), immediately adds a reference to George Boas, who is presented as undermining esoteric readings of the ancients. So, while Yolton's official argument is restricted to Strauss' interpretation of Locke, it's pretty clear that Yolton is a critic of esoteric readings more widely. In context, I find Yolton's hostility toward esotericism rather odd because McCarthyism had been a real thing Stateside (and elsewhere).

Now, unlike most critics of Strauss' esotericism up to that date (and since), Yolton actually followed Strauss' steps in depth. And it is worth quoting one of Yolton's footnotes to get a sense of what this might involve:

10. I indicate in what follows the more glaring errors made by Strauss and the irresponsible methods he uses to substantiate them. But a word about his method of citation may lend more flavor to the appreciation of what is involved. The pages devoted to Locke in Strauss's book (pp. 202-25i, especially 202- 227) are filled with brief words, phrases, sentences quoted from Locke. After a long series of such quotations, a footnote lists a string of references to the Locke texts. But the order of references in no way corresponds to the order of quotation. In many cases, the references are quite irrelevant to the point Strauss has been arguing. In other cases, parts of sentences have been turned around, a later portion being quoted before the earlier. In all cases, Locke is quoted out of context, the context being ignored or carefully covered up; the references are scattered throughout the Locke corpus. It takes literally hours to trace the references to single words and brief phrases, which usually have a different meaning in their context than they have on Strauss's page. (Yolton 1958: 483, [emphasis added])

At a high level of superficiality/generality, Strauss's esoteric method in NRH is two-fold: first, he interprets texts as if they are written in a code that needs to be broken, and, second, he demands from his readers that his texts are read as if they were scrambled/jumbled ("the order of references in no way corresponds to the order of quotation") and so in kind of code, too. If each code has a different key, then each interpretation will have to be worked out on its own terms; this is one reason why even Strauss' most prominent methods can, as Blau recognizes, be no better than very imperfect heuristics. As Yolton notes this means that one spends hours tracing references in the primary and secondary source(s).

So far so good. But now comes the weird part. Yolton's practice and arguments suggest that he thinks that in order to refute Strauss's irresponsible method "the techniques employed," all Yolton needs to do is show that (i) Strauss is quoting out of context and that (ii) in context Locke is saying something different than what Strauss claims about Locke. If Strauss were not offering an esoteric reading, then (i-ii) would be devastating to Strauss' argument even scholarly standing. (And this is presumably the effect of Yolton's procedure on an impartial bystander.) But they are the wrong sort of argument against any esoteric reading. (I hope Blau would agree.)

Now, Yolton's procedure does make sense if you assume that Locke never practiced esotericism. I have to admit -- and I know I will be ridiculed for this -- that I find this a very strange bedrock assumption, especially (of all books) about the Essay. So, in what follows, I first show why I think this is strange. My argument is my own. I then look at Newton's reception of the Essay to suggest Strauss' response is not a fortiori silly. But, third, I also show that Yolton fails to acknowledge and engage with Strauss' (more or less) explicit argument denying Yolton's bedrock assumption about Locke's esotericism.

On the frontispiece of Locke's Essay, there is a quote from Cicero's de Natura Deorum (on the Nature of the Gods) 1.84: "Quam bellum est velle confiteri potius nescire quod nescias, quam ista effutientem nauseare, atque ipsum sibi displicere." Here's a recent translation (by Walsh): "How splendid it would be, Velleius, if you were to admit ignorance of what you do not know, rather than puking and feeling disgust with yourself for uttering such balderdash."  Yolton does not discuss the motto in his book on Locke (or 1958 article). 

Now, it's not at all surprising that Locke would use a motto that expresses a skeptical position. The motto also is an injunction to avoid babbling/nonsense [effutientem]. And it foreshadows the Locke we analytic philosophers admire (if only he had been more concise).

Of course, it is a bit peculiar that pious Locke would, of all people, use Cicero's de Natura Deorum (on the Nature of the Gods). It's a book more naturally associated with Hume (whose Dialogues concerning natural religion are clearly inspired by if not modelled on it). The Motto, thus, also invites the reader to reflect on how Locke's Essay relates to theology. How to understand that relationship is, in fact, the core intellectual debate between Yolton and Strauss. (Something I cannot do justice to here.)

As regular readers know (recall), Locke echoes a famous argument from Cicero's De Natura Deorum (without attribution to Cicero or Boyle, who had used the same argument) later in the Essay (at 3.6.9). (For a more scholarly version of this material, see here.) So, the motto is not wholly incidental as a source to the content of the Essay.

So far so good. But in De Natura Deorum, Cicero also has one of his characters say the following:

Undoubtedly closer to the truth is the claim made in the fifth book of his Nature of the Gods by Posidonius, whose friendship we all share: that Epicurus does not believe in any gods, and that the statements which he made affirming the immortal gods were made to avert popular odium. He could not have been such an idiot as to fashion God on the lines of a poor human, even if merely in broad outline and not in substantial appearance, yet endowed with all the human limbs but without the slightest use of them, an emaciated, transparent being conferring no gifts or kindness on anyone, and in short discharging no duties and performing no actions. ‘First, such a nature cannot exist. In his awareness of this, Epicurus in actuality discards the gods, while paying lip-service to them. (1.123; here's the Latin.)

I quote it for two reasons. Somewhat oddly, Boas, who Yolton cites approvingly, skips this whole passage. Second, Cicero's Nature of the Gods was very widely read and debated in the early modern period. (For evidence of that see my paper.) Of course, this debate also involved debates over Cicero's own position relative to the arguments and character's in the dialogue (with free thinkers reading it very skeptically and more orthodox types reading it in support of design arguments). That is to say, to those familiar with Cicero's text, and its reception, the motto invites alertness to the significance of Locke's doctrines to theology, and to the possibility that Locke may be paying lip-service to orthodoxy. 

As an aside, throughout his life Strauss repeatedly cites Cicero's Nature of the Gods (although I am unfamiliar whether he ever discussed the passage just quoted or the motto to Locke's Essay.) But in NRH Strauss does not use Cicero to motivate his esoteric reading of Locke. To the best of my knowledge, the only time that Yolton refers to the work is to alert the reader that Locke's critic, Stillingfleet, is drawing on it (in his Origines Sacrae), when describing the Epicurean version of prolepsis or anticipations of nature (usually associated with Stoicism).

Anyway, on my view Yolton is on shaky ground to assume without argument at all that Locke would never engage in esotericism.  (It would also be odd an claim because we know that Locke was quite interested in alchemy and he definitely hid that interest.) As I noted above, all Yolton's arguments against Strauss presuppose such a denial.  

Having said that, what I have said so far (and below) cannot decide the many first order, interpretive questions between Strauss and Yolton about Locke. However, as Yolton notes (see the quote above), Strauss ends up reading Locke's social theory as a kind of Hobbist/Hobbesian in all kinds of ways. It's quite clear that Yolton thinks this utterly ridiculous. I have to admit that I would never teach or read Locke this way myself. But it is worth nothing that Newton (and now I quote Peter Anstey) "after reading Locke’s Essay he took him for a Hobbist." (See The Correspondence of Isaac Newton, 3: 280). Locke and Newton shared mutual acquaintances, but when Newton first read the Essay they were not very well known to each other.

I mention this not because Newton's reading of Locke would settle the debate between Strauss and Yolton (it doesn't because it is by no means clear in what sense Newton took Locke to be a Hobbist). But to note that if we take Locke's Essay in context, which is what Yolton claims to be doing throughout his work, the esoteric, Hobbist reading cannot be ruled out by assuming it away or by quoting passages that seem to violate it because it is a natural reading for some of Locke's major contemporaries. (See what I did here; I used a contextualist move to block a contextualist dismissiveness of Strauss.)

Now, Newton himself was rather prone to esoteric readings and (as Steve Snobelen has shown in 2001) practiced the esoteric art of writing even in the General Scholium to the Principia. It's no surprise, then, Newton would engage in such a reading of Locke because (through Boyle) he knew that Locke shared in their common fascination with chymistry (whose practitioners used code to record and share findings). This is not the end of the matter: as Anstey notes, after Newton got to know Locke personally he changed his mind over Locke's Hobbism. (So I am not motivating a Hobbist reading of Locke myself!)

I am close to wrapping up. What I find really odd about Yolton's criticism of Strauss is that he does not confront Strauss' explicit argument to motivate an esoteric reading of Locke while devoting lots of effort on refuting footnote minutiae. When Strauss introduces his interpretation of Locke, he points out that Locke has a tendency to refer to Hooker as "the judicious Hooker." To the best of my knowledge Locke does this three times in short order in Second Treatise. And admittedly when you hit the third one, it is a bit jarring. Strauss then goes on to claim "But the moment we take the trouble to confront Locke's teaching as a whole with Hooker's teaching as a whole, we become aware that, in spite of a certain agreement between Locke and Hooker, Locke's conception of natural right is fundamentally different from Hooker's." (NRH 165)* And at first this seems to be Strauss' ridiculous argument to motivate an esoteric reading of Locke.

Strauss then skips forty pages (mostly on Hobbes) to indicate the significance of this: Locke "appealed as frequently as he could to the authority of Hooker—of one of the least revolutionary men who ever lived. He took every advantage of his partial agreement with Hooker. And he avoided the inconveniences which might have been caused by his partial disagreement with Hooker by being practically silent about it." (NRH 207) Again, if this were Strauss' argument for his esoteric reading of Locke, I could completely understand Yolton's dismissiveness.

But Hooker is a feint. The real argument follows immediately, and it involves Socrates' fate and Plato's prudence as seen by Locke. Strauss quotes the following passage from Locke's Reasonableness of Christianity:

There was no part of mankind, who had quicker parts, or improved them more; that had a greater light of reason, or followed it farther in all sorts of speculations, than the Athenians, and yet we find but one Socrates amongst them, that opposed and laughed at their polytheisms, and wrong opinions of the deity; and we see how they rewarded him for it. Whatsoever Plato, and the soberest of the philosophers thought of the nature and being of the one God, they were fain, in their outward worship, to go with the herd, and keep to the religion established by law; (NRH 208, emphasis added).

Somewhat oddly Yolton skips this entirely. But Locke is here praising ("soberest") a certain kind of lack of forthrightness when it comes to religious views that may violate common opinion and the law (and with the soberest philosophers seemingly endorsing a Hobbesian claim about outwardly following the law regardless of one's private views). This passage in Locke recalls the passage from Cicero's On the Nature of the Gods 1.123 above. And this motivates Strauss' stance on Locke.

One need not accept Strauss' argument that Locke is an esoteric writer in the Essay. (After all, the Reasonableness of Christianity is the later work.) I am honestly agnostic on the matter.** And I certainly agree with Yolton (and Blau) that Strauss' particular readings often seem strikingly ad hoc and based on selective quotation without method and with confirmation bias. But what I have shown is that Yolton does not address Strauss' own explicit argument and evidence to motivate his esoteric reading of Locke. And so the purported refutation with appeal to ordinary scholarly practice, does not get off the ground. That's notable because Yolton's was, I believe, the most elaborate attempt to discredit Strauss' practice in the early English language reception of Strauss. And certainly the most careful before Blau. 

On Tyranny and Method: Vlastos vs Strauss

I noted a few weeks ago that near the end of his career, in (1991) Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher, Vlastos praises "Irwin's brilliant review of Leo Strauss." (I noted, too, that Irwin's review is nothing of the sort--it's a non-review, and would be thought scandalous if professional philosophy weren't also, at times, political in character.) Vlastos makes this claim in note 71, which is about the "shortcomings of Xenophon's perceptions of Socrates as a philosopher." Note 71 is attached to the following passage.

One could hardly imagine a man who in taste, temperament, and critical equipment (or lack of it) would differ as much as did Xenophon from leading members of the inner Socratic circle. The most important difference, of course, is that people like Plato, Aristippus, Antisthenes, Euclid, Phaedo were philosophers with aggressively original doctrines of their own, one of them a very great philosopher, while Xenophon, versatile and innovative litterateur, creator of whole new literary genres, does not seem versed nearly as well as they in philosophy or as talented in this area.'71 This is the first thing we need to understand about him, if we are to use his witness about Socrates, as we must, for we cannot afford to neglect a single scrap of first-hand testimony, as Xenophon's no doubt is.--"The evidence of Aristotle and Xenophon," p. 99.

The reason, then, that Vlastos needs note 71, is to block the idea that [a] Xenophon was a very good or able philosopher in order support Vlastos' claim that [b] Xenophon is the odd man out of the leading people in the inner Socratic circle. Vlastos (1907-1991) goes on to claim in the note that "For what can be said on Xenophon's behalf by a spirited, intelligently non-Straussian defender, see Morrison, 1987: 9-22." What follows from this, then, is that Vlastos recognizes that the Straussian (and Strauss) accepts something like [a] and denies [b].*

This post originates in my interest in finding critical engagements with Leo Strauss within analytic philosophy in Strauss' lifetime during the post-WWII era (triggered by (recall here; here; here; especially this one; here; and here; here) an invite by Sander Verhaegh). And it's clear that by the time of Irwin's (1974) review of Strauss' Xenophon's Socrates in The Philosophical Review which appeared within a year after Strauss' death (1973), the convention within analytic circles of disparaging Strauss and Straussians in print was established.

It is worth noting that Vlastos didn't need to appeal to Irwin for the denial of [a]. He always thought that Xenophon had a "pedestrian mind" who probably couldn't "rise to such [platonic/philosophical] refinements." (Vlastos reviewing On Tyranny by Leo Strauss with a preface by Alvin Johnson (1951) The Philosophical Review, 60(4): 593.)+ I am quoting a bit out of context, but the point stands. In fact, Vlastos' 1951 review of Strauss' (1948) treatment of Xenophon's Hiero is a much better review qua the platonic form of a review than Irwin's (although that low bar turns out not to be cleared by much). Vlastos' (1951) review starts as follows:

Xenophon's Hiero turns to the much debated question whether the tyrant can be happy and answers it with an emphatic affirmative. The tyrant Hiero concedes that what ruins his chances of happiness is mainly the distrust and hostility of his subjects. The poet Simonides replies that this is just what can be fixed; he offers a recipe of skillful and generous statesmanship which will make him loved and, therefore, happy.

Professor Strauss cannot bring himself to believe that a pupil of Socrates could have condoned tyranny to the extent of assuring tyrants that they can be happy and showing them how. So he argues, against the general view, that the "tyrannical" teaching of Simonides in this dialogue is not Xenophon's own; to get at the latter one must "add to, and subtract from Hiero's and Simonides' speeches" (p. 50). The plusses and minuses to the text with which he seeks to redeem Xenophon's Socratic virtue would have astonished the retired colonel who was nothing if not plain spoken and straightforward. Short of its subtleties, the argument boils down to the question: Are the views of Simonides here demonstrably at variance with those we can certainly ascribe to Xenophon on the strength of his other writings. (592)

This passage does not assert the denial of [a], but the way Xenophon is described [c] "the retired colonel who was nothing if not plain spoken and straightforward" contributes to it. The problem with [c] is that Vlastos should have known better. As he notes in 1991 (quoted above), whatever else he was, Xenophon, was a [d] "versatile and innovative litterateur." And while it's possible to reconcile [c] with [d] in all kinds of ways that preserve Vlastos' position (and make it coherent in the technical sense), the much more natural interpretation of Xenophon is, once one recognizes him for the "versatile and innovative litterateur" that he is acknowledged to be, that [e] Xenophon sometimes presents himself as plain spoken and straightforward, but that this is part of his larger literary skill. Notice that strictly speaking [e] is completely agnostic on [a] and even on the right interpretation of the Hiero.

Now, at this point it would be natural to evaluate Vlastos' criticism of Strauss' reading of the Hiero on its merits. But it is worth noting that here Vlastos does not object to Strauss' methodology (with its willingness to engage in esoteric readings) as such. Rather he thinks it badly suited to Xenophon, who is simply claimed to be not that kind of thinker. In fact, it would be wrong to treat Vlastos in 1951 as an anti-Straussian (avant la lettre) or even a fierce critic of Strauss. Here is an excerpt from the final paragraph of the review:

Those who have read and admired Professor Strauss's earlier book on Hobbes will be disappointed in this monograph. The author's learning is still considerable, the agility of his mind exceptional; the weak ness of this work can be traced directly to his present addiction to the strange notion that a historical understanding of a historical thinker is somehow a philosophical liability. If the author had used, instead of spurning, the historical method (surely not to be confused with "historicism"), he would have seen two clues out of the problem raised by the Hiero's lessons in happy and virtuous tyranny. For one thing, the historical Xenophon was not just a shadow of Socrates. He was an upper-class Athenian, an ardent admirer of Sparta, and most of all a successful military commander, bent on generalizing the art of efficient man-management from the army camp to all areas of human relation ships, political, domestic, and economic. (593)

Vlastos' admiration of Strauss' (1936) The Political Philosophy of Hobbes is, I suspect, sincere. (In it, Strauss had put Hobbes in context with great detail to Hobbes' development.) And, in fact, Vlastos treats Strauss as having switched methodology between 1936 and 1948 from the 'historical method' to the method of 'plusses and minuses to the text.' In order to avoid confusion (with historicism), let's call the historical method which aims at historical understanding, 'contextualism.' 

However, it is pretty clear that whatever Strauss is up to in On Tyranny, it's not merely historical understanding. This becomes obvious from the 1954 (French) and 1963 (English) editions expanded with the material of the Strauss Kojève debate (recall my post on Pippin's three essays). The correspondence between Strauss and Kojève  makes clear that Strauss actively sought out Kojève's review.** And in light of the debate, it's quite impossible to ignore the fact that On Tyranny is also an intervention in contemporary philosophy (and, perhaps even, the political atmosphere). [I am not alone in noticing this; see the then contemporary review by Robert D. Cumming in JPhil.]

To be sure, one may  well argue that contextualism and its output, historical understanding, are capable of preparing the way for an intervention in contemporary philosophy. But they are not the same thing. 

And, in fact, I am not guilty of prolepsis here. Because Strauss is quite explicit about of his official intentions for the book on the first page of his analysis: "tyranny is a danger coeval with political life" and this is why he submits it to "political scientists." He goes on to claim:

The analysis of tyranny that was made by the first political scientists was so dear, so comprehensive, and so unforgettably expressed that it was remembered and understood by generations which did not have any direct experience of actual tyranny. On the other hand, when we were brought face to face with tyranny-with a kind of tyranny that surpassed the boldest imagination of the most powerful thinkers of the past-our political science failed to recognize it. (Expanded and Revised (2002) edition, pp. 22-23--all my quotes of Strauss are from this edition.)

So, Strauss is clearly trying to instruct and correct a manifest failure of contemporary political science, and by retrieving Xenophon (who seems to be treated as a 'political scientist') to (and to be cheeky) correct for a Kuhn-loss. And, in fact, Strauss immediately makes an important categorical distinction between two kinds of tyranny: (i) the 'elementary natural form of tyranny' of classical periods; and (ii) the (what we might call) 'monstrous' (or totalitarian) tyranny of our age which can draw on a "science applied to "the conquest of nature" [and] ...popularized and diffused," (23) that is the Enlightenment project. What they have in common is that they are an "essentially...faulty political order." (66)

Vlastos' reading of Strauss' work is, thus, actually quite puzzling. (Also in light of Strauss' motto from Macaulay.) It completely and rather comically misses the stated point of Strauss' book. To anticipate my conclusion: it fails as a book-review. Again, to assert this is not to take sides in the debate over [a].

What is, curious, however, is that Vlastos explicitly recognizes that Xenophon was a kind of expert in 'man-management' and so may well have something to teach in what one may call the art of government even if it is limited by the fact that his art primarily is derived from the army camp. That is, even if one were to grant that one shouldn't read Xenophon in order to understand (say) liberal democracy, I think it's pretty obvious that Vlastos himself should have been able to grasp that from his own commitments about Xenophon, he might well be worth reading on tyranny (if this is understood, say, as the art of efficient 'man-management' on the plan of an army camp.)

Let me wrap up. According to Vlastos, Strauss is wrong to claim [f] "that the "tyrannical" teaching of Simonides in [Hiero] is not Xenophon's own." (592) Most of Vlastos' review is really about contesting this claim (and the denial of [a] is in support of [f].) However, what is most peculiar about Vlastos' presentation of Strauss' position is that Strauss actually explicitly denies that Simonides fully endorses tyranny: "to see the broad outline of Simonides' criticism of tyranny at its best, one has only to consider the result of his suggested correction of tyranny..." (68)

It gets stranger; recall that Vlastos claims that "Professor Strauss cannot bring himself to believe that a pupil of Socrates could have condoned tyranny." But this, in fact, is what Strauss explicitly does allow. He assert that "While Xenophon seems to have believed that beneficent tyranny or the rule of a tyrant who listens to the counsels of the wise is, as a matter of principle, preferable to the rule of laws or to the rule of elected magistrates as such, he seems to have thought that tyranny at its best could hardly, if ever, be realized." (75, emphasis added)

To put this in anachronistic terms: Strauss explicitly diagnoses in Xenophon a preference for what we might call the ideal type of benevolent dictatorship as an ideal worth having. (To say that is not to claim that such benevolent dictatorship is the best kind of rule for Xenophon, or that absent the influence of the wise, tyranny has anything to say for it.)  So, it is a mistake to claim that Strauss deviates from the "general view" of the interpretation of the Hiero as such.

To sum up: Vlastos's review fails to convey accurately what Strauss' book is about, and fails to convey properly Strauss' views. What Vlastos does properly convey is that Strauss' interpretation of Xenophon deviates from contextualism and relies on a method of interpretation that would be a source of ongoing controversy about Strauss. And eventually this controversy of his method, in turn, has functioned as a mechanism (for the allocation of scarce jobs and) not to engage with the underlying ideas of Strauss. (That's compatible with these being false or worse.) But, as we have seen in this series of posts, Vlastos' (1951) stance was still the outlier. Through the 1950s and early 1960s Strauss was debated on the merits of his arguments by analalytic types. And in my next post I turn to Yolton's (1955) reflection on Strauss' Natural Right and History, which in many ways is the most serious 'analytic' response to Strauss on record that I have been able to locate. To be continued.

 

On Dutch War Crimes and Perry Anderson on Schmitt, Hayek, Strauss, and Oakeshot.

    After the debacle of the First World War, and the victory of Bolshevism in Russia, the old political world of landed rulers and limited electorates, modest budgets and stable currencies, had crumbled away. A new kind of mass enfranchisement and expectation gripped Europe, the arrival of a democracy capable of brushing aside, in the pursuit of security or equality, traditional barriers between the tasks of government and the affairs of business - a semi-oligarchic state and a still-hierarchic civil society. Where would popular sovereignty without social liability lead? Communism was, of course, the first and greatest danger. Fascism, which looked to some as if it might be an antidote, proved little better - indeed, in German guise at least, all but identical. But even when these were seen off, there was still the welfare state, a creeping version of the same disease. In the course of six decades, political judgements of this changing scene varied. Strauss and Oakeshott, scornful of liberalism before Hitler came to power, were more circumspect after the war; Hayek, who described himself as a classical liberal during the war, repudiated the term as compromised beyond recovery when he got to America; Schmitt, who never had any truck with liberalism, moved from Catholic authoritarianism to National Socialism, before ending as an informal doyen of the most respectable post-war constitutionalism. But beyond the discrepant local sympathies of these careers - with their splay of temporary identities: Conservative, Zionist, Nazi, Old Whig - they reflected a common theoretical calling....

    But the Stygian cap fits the collective effort of this cluster of thinkers. For these were indeed constructions designed to hold something back. What they all in the end sought to restrain was the risks of democracy - seen and feared through the prisms of their theories of law, as the abyss of its absence: to misterion tes anomias, the mystery of lawlessness.

Each put up their own barriers against the danger. The dichotomies which are the signature of their work - the esoteric and the exoteric, the civil and the managerial, the friend and the foe, the lawful and the legislative - are so many cordons. Their function is to hold popular sovereignty at bay. The different gifts displayed in this enterprise, whatever view is taken of it, were remarkable. For all his later tendency to textual dressage, Strauss's range and subtlety as a master of the canon of political philosophy had no equal in his generation. Schmitt's moral instability never impaired an extraordinary capacity to fuse conceptual insight and metaphoric imagination in lightning flashes of illumination around the state. Hayek could seem tactically ingenuous, but he fashioned a theoretical synthesis out of his epistemology and economics whose scope and strength has yet to be supplanted.
    Oakeshott was the literary artist in this gallery.--Perry Anderson (1992) "The Intransigent Right" in Spectrum: From Right to Left in the World of Ideas, p. 25-27 [HT Jonathan Kramnick]

The other day (recall here), I quoted the conclusion of Anderson's essay (which contrasts Rawls with the four horseman of the Intransigent Right) in order to introduce my digression on Katrina Forrester's In the Shadow of Justice. And before I turned to my serious engagement with Forrester, I made a snarky remark about Anderson's 'acrobatics' in order to lump Schmitt, Hayek, Strauss, and Oakeshot together. I don't plan to withdraw the remark here, but I do regret making it for two reasons: first, I wouldn't want to discourage  anyone from reading Anderson's essay, which is, in fact, very perceptive about these four thinkers and their relations. In fact, at times Anderson practices a kind of judicious, esoteric reading to reveal their core commitments. Along the way he draws on chapter 24 of Leviathan in illuminating ways.

As an aside, when Kramnick (a distinguished literary scholar) mentioned Anderson's essay to me he remarked (I am paraphrasing) that Anderson was more charitable of these four than Rawls (something characteristic of certain kind of Marxists more generally). The veracity of Kramnick's remark can be readily judged not just by comparing the quoted passages above with the paragraph I quoted from in my digression on Forrester, but also by reading his self-standing scornful essay, "Designing Consensus: John Rawls," primarily on Rawls' Political Liberalism.  Nothing like the praise of Hayek's "theoretical synthesis" can be found in Anderson about Rawls.

Second, while lumping people together with Schmitt is generally a sign that we're in the ambit of rhetorical delegitimation, it's not true (as I kind of implied) that these thinkers have nothing important in common. For, I agree with Anderson that the specter that haunts all of them, at a certain of level of abstraction is indeed "the risks of democracy," especially if that is understood in terms of "popular sovereignty." And this is not a trivial communality nor is it something that by itself deserves criticism.

It's worth noting that anyone that worries about minority or civil rights and, say the respect for the kind of rights that are associated with human rights or a bill of rights, or the division of powers is ipse facto also worried about popular sovereignty and the risks of democracy. And there is widespread theoretical agreement that such rights ought to be respected. Yet, one problem that pollutes a lot of contemporary theorizing about democracy is that proponents of popular sovereignty, deliberative democracy, and (alas) public reason tend to take for granted, on some fundamental level, that these rights are respected, or that they are in accord -- I am now using the words of Rawls -- with "the most deep-seated convictions and traditions of a modern democratic state."*

Just yesterday, the Dutch government admitted, after commissioning a new formal historical study in 2017,  that the Netherlands had engaged in all kinds of war crimes toward innocent civilians and enemy combatants in what was Indonesia's war of independence (concluded in 1949). And subsequently these facts were covered it up, and for decades public opinion did not permit these facts to be aired (often under pressure of not especially large groups of veterans), or to be taught in history classes (not even by my teachers who were rather progressive by Dutch standards). This despite the steady drip of materials that suggested the official narrative was hopelessly flawed, and the accumulating evidence of the non-trivial trauma for those that actually witnessed and perpetrated the atrocities. The time it took to admit any of this formally, and to offer (modest) compensation to victims, is of biblical proportions: the generations that experienced had to die off first for a sober and truthful discussion to be possible.

A friend of popular sovereignty may well respond that the Dutch inability to acknowledge their war crimes just shows that our liberal democracy -- which tends to get incredibly high marks for democratic freedom --  is fatally shaped by our colonial heritage. I am by no means unsympathetic to the charge. But I see little reason to believe that popular sovereignty unmediated by parliamentary institutions will do much better (given that it public opinion never really wanted to know the truth).

My reason for mentioning the case is straightforward. From afar the entrenched, small liberal democracies of Scandinavia and the North Sea are often treated as and seem paragons of democratic virtue (with robust proportional representation and reasonably generous welfare states). But even these exhibit the non-trivial democratic risks and rights violations that ought to concern friends of popular sovereignty. (Google, "Compulsory sterilisation in Sweden" or "Denmark xenophobia.") While it's true that all these places have not abolished capitalism (on the contrary they also tend to do well in economic freedom rankings), they are kind of limit examples that illustrate that even in the best circumstances democracies may misfire greatly. 

To be sure, the claim in the previous paragraph does not require to accept the road to serfdom thesis. While I am not inclined to treat the road to serfdom thesis as an empirical prediction (spoiler: I think Hayek's work belongs in the genre philosophical prophecy), if one were to treat it as an empirical prediction then the small liberal democracies of Scandinavia and the North Sea have clearly falsified it. And while I am much less sanguine about the state and character of British liberal democracy, its current state also stands as a falsification of it 70+ years after the fact. 

The explicit or implicit theoretical denial of the risks of democracy and popular sovereignty strike me as instances of irresponsible theorizing. (When I am polite I call it 'democratic innocence.') And it is a peculiar feature of far left critics of those concerned with the risks of democracy and popular sovereignty, that they then have to treat Leninism and Stalinism as contingent perversions of the ideal  or, -- and now I am speaking of Anderson -- and criticize Rosa Luxemburg, who almost alone among the friends of popular sovereignty recognized its risk, for lacking a "theory of the conquest of power by the proletariat."**

The problem is, of course, that once one has diagnosed the risks of democracy and popular sovereignty it's very hard to avoid solutions that are inimical to democracy (as the example of Mill's Considerations on Representative Government shows). And it is no surprise that those who do emphasize the risks of democracy and popular sovereignty are often reactionaries of some sort or don't reject temporary despotism. But what follows from this is not that a true friend of democracy should wish away the risks of democracy and ignore the dangers of popular sovereignty in order to avoid being tainted by the charge of 'right-wingism.' Rather, it's incumbent to find ways of navigating these risks in ways in accord with if not the letter then the spirit of democracy. But about that some other time other time more.

 

Fear is the Cause of Hatred: Joshua Child on economic growth and Jewish naturalization

Those that are for the admission of the Jews, say in answer to the aforesaid Reasons, viz .
1st, The subtler the Jews are, and the more Trades they pry into while they live here, the more they are like to increase Trade; and the more they do that, the better it is for the Kingdom in general, though the worse for the English Merchant, who comparatively to the rest of the People of England is not one of a thousand.
2dly, The thriftier they live, the better Example to our People; there being nothing in the World more conducing to enrich a Kingdom than thriftiness.
3dly, it is denied that they bring over nothing with them; for many have brought hither very good Estates, and hundreds more would do the like, and settle here for their Lives, and their Posterities after them, if they had the same freedom and Security here as they have in Holland and Italy, where the Grand Duke of Tuscany, and other Princes allow them not only perfect Liberty and Security, but give them the privilege of making Laws among themselves'; and that they would reside with us, is proved from the known  Principles of Nature, vz.
Principle 1. All Men by Nature are alike, as I have before demonstrated, and Mr. Hobbs hath truly asserted, how Erroneous soever he may be in other things.
Principle 2. Fear is the cause of Hatred, and hatred of separation from, as well as evil Deeds to, the Parties or Government hated, when opportunity is offered: This by the way shews the difference between a bare connivance at Dissenters in matters of Religion, and a toleration by Law; the former keeps them continually in Fear, and consequently apt to Sedition and Rebellion, when any probable occasion of success presents: The latter disarms cunning, ambitious minded Men, who, wanting a popular discontented Party to work upon, can effect little or nothing to the prejudice of the Government. And this methinks discovers clearly the cause why the Lutherans in Germany, Protestants in France, Greeks in Turkey, and Sectaries in Holland, are such quiet peaceable-minded-men, while our Non-conformists in England are said to be inclined to strife, War, and Bloodshed; Take away the cause and the Effect will cease.
While the Laws are in Force against Men, they think the Sword hangs over their Heads, and are always in fear (though the Execution be suspended) not knowing how soon Councils, or Counselors, Times or Persons, may change, it is only only Perfect Love that casts out fear; and all Men are in love with Liberty and security: It cannot be denied that the Industrious Bees have Stings (though Drones have not) yet Bees sting not, except those that hurt them, or disturb their Hives.

    It is said, the Jews cannot Intermarry with us, and therefore it cannot be supposed they will reside long amongst us, although they were treated never so kindly: Why not reside here as well as in Italy, Poland, and Holland? They have now no Country of their own to go to, and therefore that is their Country, and must needs so esteemed by them, where they are best used, and have the greatest Security.--Sir Josiah Child (1698) A new discourse of trade: wherein is recommended several weighty points relating to companies of merchants, the Act of Navigation, naturalization of strangers, and our woolen manufactures, the balance of trade, and the nature of plantations, p. 142-144 [I modestly modernized spelling--ES]

As I noted in a piece I contributed to The Reading Room, Josiah Child's writings on the naturalization of the Jews, which he developed in successive editions of his works, and his mercantile thought more generally were influential through the intercession of Vincent de Gournay in the political economy circles associated with the Encyclopédie. Child (1630/31–1699) was a MP, and governor of the East India Company, and had not trivial importance for its expansion in India. He is generally treated as a Mercantilist. As can be gleaned from the quoted passage (and larger context), he is advocating for policies that are meant to fundamentally copy Dutch success in trade and economics, and thereby displace their power. He has some claim to being the source of the very idea of economic progress.

Child frankly acknowledges that Jewish immigration and naturalization, which will bring in stock and trade-connections, may have zero-sum effects for relatively small number of English traders. But the overall effect will be good for the English economy due to the expansion of exports and change in culture they will bring. Child clearly thinks that, alongside trade, savings are essential to economic growth. The underlying idea is that once one opens borders to people and capital, a rising population and capital will facilitate trade and enhance competitiveness, and so allow the English to compete more successfully with the Dutch. Child does not suggest here that one should open borders to goods and commodities. People and capital are de facto treated as inputs with the goal (or output) being export of goods and a competitive trade balance.

That immigration may harm some locals was, as regular readers know (recall this post), tackled by John Toland in his (1714) Reasons for Naturalizing the Jews in Great Britain and Ireland, Chapter XVI, by explicitly drawing on Locke’s political economy. But unlike Child, Toland addresses the displacement concerns of what one may call the working poor. Yes, they will have to compete with new workers. But these new workers will also ensure a larger internal market with an improved cost of living (due to "cheaper wrought" goods). And the goods will be cheaper not just because the division of labor can be more specialized, but also because the newcomers will bring technological improvements. The newcomer’s ‘stock’ is also a human capital. This build's on Child's own claim about the Jews ("subtler").  That is to say, Toland grasps and fully articulates the more liberal win-win logic that is essential to Locke's more liberal arguments, and later generalized by Hume and Smith. 

I can't prove that Toland read Child (although it would be surprising if he had not), but I would be amazed if Mandeville hadn't. For Child's "thrifty bees,' are clearly Mandeville's target in the Fable. In Mandeville's hive, they will indulge in luxury spending. 

Child inscribes his argument in what I (following Levy and Peart) call methodological analytic egalitarianism (MAE): the positing of homogeneous human nature such that we're equal for theoretical (including moral and political) purposes. Observed differences are due to cultural, educational, institutional factors. This is developed (as I have argued) by Mandeville, but, as Child also notes, first articulated by Hobbes (recall here). 

That there is an important difference between mere toleration and formal legal recognition/protection is explained by Child in terms of its effect on one's expectations. The underlying logic is Hobbes', but I don't think Hobbes (who emphasizes the positive impact of the rule of law on stabilizing expectations and reducing uncertainty) actually makes this point. The security afforded by the rule of law is conducive to liberty and economic growth.

That "fear is the cause of hatred" does not, I think, have a Hobbesian provenance (although I would be delighted to learn otherwise).* It does have a Shakespearian ring: "In time we hate that which we often fear." And I suspect that lurking behind Shakespeare and Child is Machiavelli's Prince, Chapters 17&19. (There are other Machiavellian allusions in Child.) To be sure  Machiavelli is clear that part of political skill is to be feared without causing hatred. 

In fact, Child clearly recognizes that the benefit of an impartial rule of law, which does not discriminate against some groups, is not in the first instance economic but to reduce civil unrest greatly. And for him this is compatible with a thoroughgoing multiculturalism because he sees no problem in allowing the Jews self-government ("the privilege of making Laws among themselves') so they can maintain their identity.

Hume, Lazar, Locke, and the State of Exception, revisited

The protector, the two secretaries, the council of state, with any five or more that the senate appoints, are possessed, on extraordinary emergencies, of dictatorial power for six months.--David Hume, Idea Of a Perfect Commonwealth

Seven years ago (recall) I discussed the quoted passage on this blog, and then eventually published a paper on the material (here). Today, I revisit it because of an extraordinarily fertile book (published in 2009), States of Emergency in Liberal Democracies by Nomi Claire Lazar, which I recently read and had overlooked before. Lazar offers what she calls a 'Lockean' approach to states of emergency amply documented in Locke's Second Treatise, but developed and elaborated by her in very creative ways.

Now, the key move of Lazar's Lockean approach is to insist that states of emergency need not abolish accountability (of the sovereign, the executive, the dictator). In the right sort of political order, accountability is "an ever-present possibility." (p. 149) And one of the neatest chapters in her book shows that this is even so in the case of the institution of Roman dictatorship (made famous (recall) by Livy in his treatment of Cincinnatus). Such accountability can be formal in a political and juridical sense. Or it can be more informal by way of the political restraints of countervailing powers and forces, including public opinion.

That during states of emergencies accountability need not be abolished builds on another key insight of hers: that there is no sharp division between states of emergency and the ordinary rule of law. In particular, first, in both instances rights derogation occur, but the manner in which this happens is different. In fact, her book reminds the reader that even in the most noble liberal democracies, many of our rights can be derogated within the ordinary rule of law (as rights clash or in instances of ordinary punishment). This is recognized in treaties and constitutions that set an explicit limit on which rights can be derogated (see p. 145). Second, these rights derogations reflect the ordinary pluralism, even "pervasive" conflict of values in ordinary political life (p. 89).

And, third, office holders have considerable discretion not just in cases understood as emergencies, but also in ordinary political life. As Locke notes in his "Of Prerogative," which, as noted, is important to Lazar's overall argument, "many things there are, which the law can by no means provide for; and those must necessarily be left to the discretion of him that has the executive power in his hands, to be ordered by him as the public good and advantage shall require." (Second Treatise, Chapter 14, sect 159; quoted by Lazar on p. 116). The cumulative effect of these three points is that states of emergency are part and parcel of what Locke (and Foucault) call the 'art of government.' If Lazar is right -- and she is -- then states of emergency also belong to a distinctly liberal art of government.

However, there is also a complication. And I introduce it by way of Locke. Locke goes on to claim that this discretion is in the service of "public good and advantage" in the context of circumstances "that as much as may be, all the members of the society are to be preserved...for the end of government being the preservation of all." It is notable that Locke puts this not in terms of the survival of society (the effect of, or instituted by, the social contract), but rather in terms of the preservation of  "all" the individuals (the "members") that compose society. On Locke's view, the prerogative, thus, really is in the service of the preservation of (individual) life rather than, say, the preservation of the state.  (This makes sense because for Locke, unlike Hobbes, we can survive just fine outside society and the state.)

The claim in the previous paragraph nicely illustrates Lazar's point that "emergency powers take on the moral character of the end they serve." (p. 138) In Locke, then, the prerogative and the powers it licenses are means toward serving the interests of individuals. Admittedly, Locke often treats this in terms of serving the "public good" -- which is more expansive than mere individual survival --, so I don't mean to suggest that for Locke emergency powers ought only focus on preservation of bare life. But for Locke the proper functioning prerogative is in the service of the same values as those that justify the social contract. And in so far as we can treat these as liberal -- some will object here to my anachronism here -- for Locke emergency powers can be liberal.

The point of my last two paragraphs is to note that Lazar goes beyond Locke in an important way . To be sure, Locke anticipates, as she notes, her claim that public opinion is an important check on the use of prerogative. But rather (and this gets me to the complication), for Lazar, emergency powers are invoked when "the state order through which norms and laws are normally enforced is threatened, the order itself is threatened." (p. 103) As she recognizes the preservation of such order is not self-evidently a liberal value. In her account this is not a bug, but a feature. Because for her, 'extra-liberal values' are also "pervasive" in "the moral life of liberal democracies." (P. 93) She includes "security, order, desert, group cohesion, cultural pluralism, and the preservation and expression of cultural heritage" among the list of pervasive non liberal values, and the source of pervasive pluralism and conflict of values in liberal democracies. 

And the way Lazar handles this conflict -- and this puts her in the camp of political realists -- is to distinguish between the "quotidian ethics animating the day-to-day functions of political order" which are constituted by "liberal values" and the "existential ethics" that govern the foundation and preservation of the liberal democratic order (p. 88; see also p. 12). And such existential ethics "are characterized by their relative uniformity across regime types." (24) So, for Lazar, the ordinary liberal art of government always involves navigating extra liberal values. And this is, we might say, intensified and more noticeable during states of emergency where the existential ethics that guide the preservation of order may be more important.

In a way, Lazar meets contemporary critics of liberalism, often inspired by Schmitt on their own ground (recall this post on Agamben). These tend to insist that the state of emergency is always (and hypocritically) lurking in liberal practice. And such critics have had ample ammunition during the last (say) fifteen years with the ways in which central banks operated during the great financial recession, the ways in which France (and other countries) have tackled Islamic terrorism, and the ways in which the Pandemic has been governed. Lazar shows that the critics are not wholly wrong in calling attention to the phenomenon, but they misunderstand the significance of it. 

As an aside, I take the positing of two such ethics as characteristic of what is now known as political realism, which insists that political life has norms of its own and, if the state is worth having, ought to be governed by them. (For a an important recent paper on this, see Matt Sleat here, which nicely refutes the idea that such political norms must be non-moral a view he associates with my colleague Enzo Rossi.) And Lazar's slender work (but fertile in ideas) ought to have a place in the developing canon of recent political realism.*

Be that as may, as should be clear from what I said above I do not think Locke is committed to such bifurcation between quotidian ethics and existential ethics. Because for Locke the state of nature is livable, the preservation of order is always instrumental to the grounds of (entering) civil society.

Having said that,  Lazar's view does characterize Hume's position nicely. (For recent work on Hume as such a political realist, see Andrew Sabl's book (here), and my paper.) As the quoted passage above makes clear, in his ideal constitutional order, Hume made place for provisions of states of emergency. That order -- it is a federation -- is modeled (and Hume is explicit on this) on Dutch political arrangements improved in light of experience. And, in fact, Hume's construction quite clearly addresses a weakness in the Dutch political order that Hume has diagnosed in his History. That in foreign policy affairs its decision-making process could be too slow and so too vulnerable to foreign influence: 

The articles of this confederacy [viz. the defensive alliance between England Holland negotiated by Temple and De Witt] were soon adjusted by such candid and able negotiators: But the greatest difficulty still remained. By the constitution of the republic, all the towns in all the provinces must give their consent to every alliance; and besides that this formality could not be dispatched in less than two months, it was justly to be dreaded, that the influence of France would obstruct the passing of the treaty in some of the smaller cities. D’Estrades, the French ambassador, a man of abilities, hearing of the league, which was on the carpet, treated it lightly; “Six weeks hence,” said he, “we shall speak to it.” To obviate this difficulty, de Wit had the courage, for the public good, to break through the laws in so fundamental an article; and by his authority, he prevailed with the States General at once to sign and ratify the league: Though they acknowledged,13th Jan. that, if that measure should displease their constituents, they risqued their heads by this irregularity. [Emphasis added]

The emphasized part in the quoted passage nicely illustrates one of Lazar's key points that even in an emergency, a political leader is aware of the reality of accountability and acts accordingly.+

In larger context, Hume presents De Witt as acting for the survival of the Dutch republic which is threatened by (their former ally) France which has just overrun Flanders. And so the alliance with England is negotiated (while England and Holland are still at war with each other!) in order to save "the remaining provinces of the Low Countries could be thereby saved from the danger, with which they were at present threatened." And it is clear that for Hume the survival of the state, the continued existence of order (and property), "the public good" justifies the means. While Hume rejects the social contract, he is in this respect closer to Hobbes than to Locke (as I have argued in a paper with Spencer Pack here).

That, for Hume, non-liberal values can guide the art of government is illustrated by Hume's praise for the De Witt (earlier in the 1665 war with England) "by his management a spirit of union was preserved in all the provinces." This shows that for Hume the conditions that maintain the survival of the state -- this includes among them such a public spirit -- are, indeed, part of the non-liberal art of government. So, I'd like to suggest that Hume (who I am here treating as a key thinker in the liberal tradition) is the historical figure that anticipates Lazar's position.