Political Theories

1. PoliticalTheories 4. Lecture. The 19. and 20..centuries

2. Liberalism, conservativism, socialism • The three most influential modern political ideologies, liberalism, conservativism and socialism, have their roots in the late 18th century, more precisely: in the French Revolution. • The three basic words of French Revolution could be linked to the three main contemporary political ideologies: liberty (liberalism), equality (socialism) and brotherhood (conservativism). • Liberalism has its emphasis on the individual rights. Conservativism on the national tradition, the national linkage between a society and the importance to maintain traditional institutions of a society. Socialism (and left-wing ideologies) on the importance of solidarity in a society, and the importance of helping the less fortunate members of a society.

3. Classical liberalism • Influential figures of classical liberalism: John Locke, Adam Smith, Benjamin Constant, John Stuart Mill. • Benjamin Constant (1767-1830) criticized Rousseau’s idea of collective freedom of a people, („Freedom of the Ancients and Freedom of the Moderns”). According to Constant Rousseau represented the classical, antique conception of freedom. Once this conception had its own right. But now the time passed beyond this conception. • In Constant’s opinion the collective freedom could be a source to oppress a minority of a society. It cannot grant equal freedom and liberty to each member of a society. • Therefore we must emphasize the individual freedom, such a conception of freedom, which fixes a circle of private sphere and rights that cannot be violated by the state under any circumstances. Such basic rights is the right of free thought, free speech, of religious and scientific conscience, of the sanctity of private property.

4. Economic freedom. Idea of the Night Watchman State • The representatives of classical liberalism thought that the individual knows always better how to live with his own property than somebody else or the state. • For this very reason the state must leave as much space for economic and business as it is possible. The state economizes less efficiently with the properties and goods of others than the individual private people do it themselves. • For this very reason the classical liberal thinkers thought that the only task of state concerning economic sphere is to grant the condition of equal and fair economic competition. It is the picture of Night Watchman State. • Adam Smith’s paradigmatic concept: the „Invisible Hand”. The citizens follow their own selfish interests like if they follow an invisible hand, and it is beneficial for the entire society. The society develops due to the selfish nature of man, because everybody is forced to take care his private property well.

5. Conservativism • Main classical representatives: David Hume, Edmund Burke, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Alexis de Tocqueville. • The institutions of a society passed the test of time, they are worthy enough to be preserved. These institutions, the traditions of a particular society have an intrinsic value. • Edmund Burke: The French Revolution demonstrates what horrific and disastruous consequences could yield if a group of in a society tries to make experiments with the society in question, and destructs the well-probed institutions of the nation, and begin to transform the entire society following their fancies of an ideal community, in a completely irresponsible way. („Reflexions On The Revolution in France”, 1792). • Conservativism means the radical rejection of any experimenting with the society. If changes and reforms are unavoidable we must alter the structure of society in very slow steps. We could never know what result could a particular change yield on the long run in the life of a society. Our rationality is always very limited.

6. Alexis de Tocqueville • Tocqueville in his book „The American Democracy” warns to the dangers of the majority principle also. • The majority principle that the majority of the society owns the political legitimacy and the will of the majority is always just and legitimate. • Tocqueville showed that this conception could also result a form of tyranny in a society, oppressing minorities in a country. • His book „The American Democracy” has a chapter „The Tyranny of the Majority”, in which he make a detailed account concerning this danger. • In a small town during the Independency War in America, the journalists of the town were very contra-war minded, while the vast majority of the same town was pro-war minded. The majority in the town became very upset to these journalists and lynched all of them. • A just society, concluded Tocqueville, must defend its minorities also.

7. Socialism • Utopian socialism: Saint-Simon, Fourier, Robert Owen. It has its roots in the French Enlightenment. A perfectly developed society must eliminate every difference between man and man. • Communism: Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels. The capitalism is not the final stage of historical development. Under capitalist conditions of productions men are alienated from: 1) each other (competition), from 2) the product of their work (the capitalist owns them), 3) their productive force, their force to create (the capitalist owns it), 4) from the nature (which is just a heap of exploitable sources, and loses all its inherent beauty). • The aim of communism as a political movement is to eliminate this alienation, that is to say: to humanize the society, to create a completely just society without alienation.

8. Communism and social democracy • The young Marx and Engels imagined this transformation of society through a revolution of proletariat. The old Marx tended to accept the rule of games of capitalist democracy. He became a founding father of SPD, (Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschland), he became a founding father of social democracy. • Thus the left-wing movements branched into two main directions in the twentieth century: communism which maintained the moment of necessity of revolution (e.g. Lenin, Trotsky, Rosa Luxemburg), and social democracy (e.g. Eduard Bernstein) which attempted to effectuate of the needs and claims of working class through the means of parliamentary democracy. The former was faster, the latter was slower. • Eduard Bernstein: „The movement is everything the goal is nothing!”

9. Isiah Berlin and the two concepts of liberty • According to Berlin there were two basic concepts of liberty: positive and negative. • Positive liberty: liberty to something. It referred to a positive capacity to a positive right to something. E.g. the right to work. • Negative liberty: liberty from something. E.g. liberty from oppression. It is a firmly determined sphere of individual rights that can be violated under no circumstances. • Berlin thought that a political movement which set forth the positive concept of liberty could possibly lead to an authoritarian or even totalitarian society, to dictatorship, and the only guarantee of democracy is the emphasis of negative liberty, is the protection of such individual rights that cannot be ever violated.

10. John Rawls and the Theory of Justice • Rawls is another classical political, liberal author of the twentieth century. He tried to articulate the idea of a just society on the basis of classical contract theory. • His question was: which is the society whose rules and norms of justice could be accepted for every member of the particular community in question?

11. The Veil of Ignorance in Rawls • Rawls’ answer was that in order to have an answer to a question like this we must first construct a theoretical starting position for the partners who are going to set the rules and laws of social orders. • In this imaginary starting position no one knows what position, social relationships, abilities and talents he will actually have in the society. Rawls characterized this position with the term „The Veil of Ignorance”. • So nobody should actually know in this position whether he belongs to the more or less fortunate layers of society – and s/he must accept a set of rules, which grants him/her enough space to use his capacities and resources if s/he is lucky, but which also helps him/her if s/he is not very lucky, and s/he has average or even worse capacities, resources and social background. • The partner articulates and fixes the norms of a just society under the veil of ignorance through a rational and impartial discourse.