Coexist: Evolution of Freedom
Part I : Evolution of cooperation - Chapter 3
THE ENLIGHTENMENT
The quest to use science to design the ideal society–one that maximizes individual liberty– is not a novel pursuit. It was, in fact, the main thrust of political philosophy during the Enlightenment. This quest produced competing schools of thought about what the moral foundations of our politics should be and how governments should establish their legitimacy. Our inquiry thus revives a centuries-old debate at the heart of Western civilization.
The Enlightenment, or the Age of Reason, was a revolutionary intellectual movement that swept over Europe between the late 17th and early 19th centuries. Sparked by fundamental discoveries in science, the Enlightenment sought to displace the authority religion and mysticism had in explaining how the universe works with scientific methods. In politics, philosophers questioned the divine rights of kings and sought to replace hereditary monarchies with constitutional democracies that would draw their legitimacy from the consent of the governed. In economics, it sought to usher in free trade capitalism by upending feudal rule, mercantilist trade policies and the monopolies they were built on.
To this day, Enlightenment ideas and solutions form the bedrock of Western civilization and its institutions. To make sense of this debate, it’s worth reviewing the key arguments about the moral foundations of politics. Philosophy delineates between two different kinds of freedoms: the freedom from something, and the freedom to do something. Freedom from externally imposed restrictions is called negative liberty, and you will find many examples listed in the Bill of Rights in the US Constitution: freedom of speech and assembly, right to a fair trial etc. The freedom to act upon one’s free will, on the other hand, is called positive liberty, and here you can list things like having access to food, shelter, education and health care. A positive freedom always contains the negative freedom within it. For Enlightenment thinkers, maximizing liberty was the path to the ideal society and this is something we can still agree on today.
The challenge against the divine rights of kings revived the idea of natural law, which originated in antiquity and was later synthesized for the Christian context by Thomas Aquinas. It built on the notion that “God, nature and reason” had bestowed all humans with inalienable rights, which became very attractive at a time when despots ruled the land. According to its proponents, natural law is revealed through close observation of human nature and challenges earthly laws that deny humans their natural rights. By claiming that all humans have intrinsic value, natural law inspired both the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Declaration of Independence:
The Enlightenment, or the Age of Reason, was a revolutionary intellectual movement that swept over Europe between the late 17th and early 19th centuries. Sparked by fundamental discoveries in science, the Enlightenment sought to displace the authority religion and mysticism had in explaining how the universe works with scientific methods. In politics, philosophers questioned the divine rights of kings and sought to replace hereditary monarchies with constitutional democracies that would draw their legitimacy from the consent of the governed. In economics, it sought to usher in free trade capitalism by upending feudal rule, mercantilist trade policies and the monopolies they were built on.
To this day, Enlightenment ideas and solutions form the bedrock of Western civilization and its institutions. To make sense of this debate, it’s worth reviewing the key arguments about the moral foundations of politics. Philosophy delineates between two different kinds of freedoms: the freedom from something, and the freedom to do something. Freedom from externally imposed restrictions is called negative liberty, and you will find many examples listed in the Bill of Rights in the US Constitution: freedom of speech and assembly, right to a fair trial etc. The freedom to act upon one’s free will, on the other hand, is called positive liberty, and here you can list things like having access to food, shelter, education and health care. A positive freedom always contains the negative freedom within it. For Enlightenment thinkers, maximizing liberty was the path to the ideal society and this is something we can still agree on today.
The challenge against the divine rights of kings revived the idea of natural law, which originated in antiquity and was later synthesized for the Christian context by Thomas Aquinas. It built on the notion that “God, nature and reason” had bestowed all humans with inalienable rights, which became very attractive at a time when despots ruled the land. According to its proponents, natural law is revealed through close observation of human nature and challenges earthly laws that deny humans their natural rights. By claiming that all humans have intrinsic value, natural law inspired both the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Declaration of Independence:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Another perspective offered by the Enlightenment was the social contract theory, which posited that legitimate government was the result of an explicit or implicit social contract in which people had given up certain freedoms they enjoyed in the “state of nature” to receive the numerous benefits society had to offer, including law, order and civil rights. While no actual written contract exists between people, participation in society is seen as a tacit agreement to conform with the current social order. At the root of the social contract theory is the idea that the legitimacy of a government comes from the consent of the governed.
But perhaps no Enlightenment political philosophy aspired to turn itself into a science more than utilitarianism. First articulated by Jeremy Bentham in his book An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation in 1780, utilitarianism seeks to turn morals into pure computation. Bentham rejects both natural law and social contract theory to claim that morality ultimately derives from pleasure seeking and pain avoidance, and that political institutions should be built on this premise:
But perhaps no Enlightenment political philosophy aspired to turn itself into a science more than utilitarianism. First articulated by Jeremy Bentham in his book An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation in 1780, utilitarianism seeks to turn morals into pure computation. Bentham rejects both natural law and social contract theory to claim that morality ultimately derives from pleasure seeking and pain avoidance, and that political institutions should be built on this premise:
Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as to determine what we shall do. On the one hand the standard of right and wrong, on the other the chain of causes and effects, are fastened to their throne. They govern us in all we do, in all we say, in all we think.
The task of a utilitarian government was therefore to maximize the happiness and well-being of the greatest number of people. Bentham sought to reduce all human values to a single calculable metric, which could ultimately be represented by money. Influenced by the rise of capitalism and the Industrial Revolution, he was in essence trying to turn cost–benefit analysis into a moral principle that would then underpin the actions of governments. According to utilitarianists, the legitimacy of governments comes down to their ability to deliver utility, and the reason governments were needed was because there is an inherent conflict between individual utility and social utility–and these two have to be balanced.
At its core, utilitarianism is a consequentialist philosophy where the ends, or the maximization of utility, justify the means by which utility is achieved. It should also be noted that the philosophy seeks to maximize the well-being of the greatest number–but not everybody. This can result in rather cruel calculations, and is one of the main criticisms leveled against utilitarianism.
While this is often forgotten, Marxism also started as an Enlightenment quest to use science to further the cause of individual liberty. What made Karl Marx’s answers different from others was his own account of science, which he called historical materialism. This was an attempt to provide a material account of historical changes and the current structure of society using economics and class struggle as an explanation. Instead of history being changed by abstract ideas such as freedom and democracy, or “big men” such as kings and conquerors, Marx thought historical changes happened due to the relative bargaining power individuals and classes had in economic relations. For Marx, the absence of exploitation was what conferred legitimacy to governments.
While actively debating these competing arguments about our coexistence, the West settled on the democratic rationale to justify the legitimacy of their governments. By this logic, representative democracy represents the will of the people. The act of voting is a social contract that expects you to abide by the election results even when your candidate loses. To avoid the tyranny of the majority, the system creates various checks and balances that include the separation of powers, guaranteed civil rights and a mechanism by which bad rulers can be ejected.
Representative democracy didn’t prevail as a result of some conscious design process, however, but as a result of armed struggle in the form of numerous revolutions, including the French and American Revolutions. And while these revolutions did get rid of autocracy, they didn’t replace it with genuine democracy. Instead, they ushered in a form of oligarchy, as both the French and American Revolutions reserved the right to vote only to property-owning men. The crisis in Western democracies that we witness today can be traced back to the mistakes made at this time.
While universal suffrage was reached later, the tide has again turned against democracy with the influence of money re-entering politics. As a result, citizens now question whether their governments truly represent the will of the people. As inequalities widen and millions of people have to settle on a lower socioeconomic status than their parents, many question the utility democratic institutions can deliver them. This has created a growing segment of the population that is disillusioned with the system they live under and who actively question its legitimacy.
When it comes to the terms that govern our coexistence, we are still far from having identified a satisfactory answer. This alone is reason enough for us to seek out new and better solutions.
At its core, utilitarianism is a consequentialist philosophy where the ends, or the maximization of utility, justify the means by which utility is achieved. It should also be noted that the philosophy seeks to maximize the well-being of the greatest number–but not everybody. This can result in rather cruel calculations, and is one of the main criticisms leveled against utilitarianism.
While this is often forgotten, Marxism also started as an Enlightenment quest to use science to further the cause of individual liberty. What made Karl Marx’s answers different from others was his own account of science, which he called historical materialism. This was an attempt to provide a material account of historical changes and the current structure of society using economics and class struggle as an explanation. Instead of history being changed by abstract ideas such as freedom and democracy, or “big men” such as kings and conquerors, Marx thought historical changes happened due to the relative bargaining power individuals and classes had in economic relations. For Marx, the absence of exploitation was what conferred legitimacy to governments.
While actively debating these competing arguments about our coexistence, the West settled on the democratic rationale to justify the legitimacy of their governments. By this logic, representative democracy represents the will of the people. The act of voting is a social contract that expects you to abide by the election results even when your candidate loses. To avoid the tyranny of the majority, the system creates various checks and balances that include the separation of powers, guaranteed civil rights and a mechanism by which bad rulers can be ejected.
Representative democracy didn’t prevail as a result of some conscious design process, however, but as a result of armed struggle in the form of numerous revolutions, including the French and American Revolutions. And while these revolutions did get rid of autocracy, they didn’t replace it with genuine democracy. Instead, they ushered in a form of oligarchy, as both the French and American Revolutions reserved the right to vote only to property-owning men. The crisis in Western democracies that we witness today can be traced back to the mistakes made at this time.
While universal suffrage was reached later, the tide has again turned against democracy with the influence of money re-entering politics. As a result, citizens now question whether their governments truly represent the will of the people. As inequalities widen and millions of people have to settle on a lower socioeconomic status than their parents, many question the utility democratic institutions can deliver them. This has created a growing segment of the population that is disillusioned with the system they live under and who actively question its legitimacy.
When it comes to the terms that govern our coexistence, we are still far from having identified a satisfactory answer. This alone is reason enough for us to seek out new and better solutions.