No Equivalency

In the aftermath of January 6, most Americans have condemned the violence perpetrated by the insurrectionists in our nation’s capital. Some 57% even blame Trump. But many white Americans seem to feel uneasy about taking a stand against seditious violence by white extremists without also throwing in the violence we saw last year in the events surrounding Black Lives Matter protests and during Trump’s 2017 inauguration. So these conflicted whites must add that they oppose all violence to achieve political ends.

Now, there was violence during the Trump inaugural, in the aftermath of police killings of unarmed Blacks and during the events prompted by Trump’s waving a bible in front of St. John's Episcopal Church on June 1, 2020. Some of the worst was committed by white anti-fascists. The violence during the mostly peaceful protests of police behavior – especially burning down a Minneapolis police station – served no useful purpose and hurt communities that still deserve security. (Two of the four indicted in August for the Minneapolis incident are white.) But the rage expressed by the Black Lives Matter protests must be understood as the pent up reaction to white violence directed at Blacks going back to the days of lynching and often perpetrated or condoned by public officials and police. One can say violence out of even righteous rage is wrong. But it is not in the same category as what happened last week.

There is no equivalency – moral or legal – between any recent past incidents of protest violence and that carried out at the request of the President of the United States against the US Congress. Just saying this should make it clear. After railing against “criminals” including members of Congress, other Republicans, the press and social media that block his dog-whistle tweets – and threatening the Vice President to “do the right thing” – the President of the United States sent white thugs, extremists and fanatics to intimidate the US Congress through what Rudy Giuliani had just called a “trial by combat.”  And the white crowd that invaded the Capital targeted the very government that provides them, more than others, their race privilege and economic support.  

Yes, political violence in a democracy is always wrong. But there is no way that what happened on January 6 is anything less than treason and the attempted overthrow of the US Constitution. That is in a class by itself and needs to be understood as such without the white caveats.

Continuing Notes on Sabine's "A History of Political Theory" -- Episode 31

For episode 30, see here

The Theory of the Nation-State: The Moderns

XXXI. Marx and Dialectical Materialism
 A. Marx transformed Hegel's struggle of nature into a struggle of
     classes thereby taking away nationalism, conservatism and
     its counter-revolutionary character and becoming a powerful
     form of revolutionary radicalism. 
       1. Marx accepted dialectic as a logical method.
       2. For both the driving force of social change is the struggle
           for power.
 B. Marx perceived the importance of the rise to political self-
     consciousness of the industrial working class. 
 C. Saw the French Revolution and the resulting rise of natural
     rights in politics and economics as a prelude to social 
     revolution. 
 D. Marx and Hegel provided cause greater than oneself as the
     only reward to individual.  
 E. History (with a big "H") takes the place of God for Marxist
     revolutionist because Historical necessity provides cause and
     effect, desirability and moral obligation.
 F. Marx studies Hegel at the University of Berlin under materialist
     Hegelian, Ludwig Feuerbach.
 G. Economic materialism sees that social development depends
     upon the evolution of the forces of economic production.
 H. Marx tended to equate "materialism" with "scientific." 
       1. Also implied radical rejection of religion.
       2. Materialism and dialectics suggested a new and far-reaching
           revolution by giving materialism an ethical dimension:
           economics as the root of social inequality.
 I. Marx's belief that socialist society would extend political liberty
    never depended on analysis of socialism but only on a priori
    belief that in a developing society, nothing of worth would be lost.
 J. Understood through the dialectic, economic determinism did not
    mean cause and effect but through economic factors operating
    as semi-personalized agents of creative energies.
 K. The individual counts mainly through his membership in his
     class because his ideas reflect the ideas generated by class.
 L. Marx's theory of cultural development:
       1. A succession of stages each of which is dominated by a
           typical system of production and exchange of goods.
           i. The system of production forces generates its own
              characteristic and appropriate ideology including;
           ii. law, politics, morals, religion, art and philosophy
       2. Whole process is dialectical with its motive force supplied
           by internal tensions created by the disparities between a
           newly evolving system of production and the persisting
           ideology of the old.
       3. The forces of production are always primary as compared
           to the secondary, ideological consequences.
       4. Dialectical development is an internal process of unfolding
           or of vitalistic realization.
 M. Marx and Friedrich Engels rejected the idealist interpretation of
      dialectic as self-development of thought, saw instead the self-
      development of nature itself reflected in thought.

"The notion that ideology may in some cases affect what figures in a
society as a standard of truth has, however, produced the rather large
body of theory now known as sociology of knowledge."

 N. "Ideology," "economic determinism," and "class struggle" are
     core theoretical concepts of Marx's social philosophy from
     which two divergent political strategies emerged:
       1. Evolutionary party socialism.
       2. Revolutionary communism.  

Next week: Communism
     
 

Notes on "A History of Political Theory" -- Episode 28

For episode 27, see here

The Theory of the Nation State: The Moderns

XXVIII. Hegel: Dialectic and Nationalism
 A. The typical conclusions of the Enlightenment:
       1. Hume showed ambiguities of "reason."
       2. Rousseau set up reasons of the heart (sentiment) against reasons
           of the head.
       3. Immanuel Kant sharpened contrast of science and morals (and between
           theoretical and practical reason) to preserve both.
       4. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel sought unifying synthesis through
           transcending analytic logic of science. 
 B. Hegel proposed dialectic to demonstrate logical relationship between
      fact and value.
 C. Revolution seen by many, including Hegel, as destructive, doctrinaire
      attempt to remake society and human nature.
       1. Therefore necessity of reconstruction of continuity of national
           institutions.
       2. But was to be reconstruction of stability by the creative forces
           of the nation.
 D. The nation, not the individual, is the significant unit of history via the 
      genius or spirit of the nation -- Volksgeist.
 E. Hegel's political philosophy built around the dialectic and the theory
      of the nation state as the embodiment of political power.  (These two
      did not necessarily entail each other.)
 F. The historical method:
       1. Method of studying history also could be applicable to other
           social studies.
       2. Mode of deriving from the order of historical events standards
           of valuation with which to access significance of particular
           stages in evolution (a philosophy of history).   
       3. Assumed single pattern or law of development that can be 
           exhibited by a proper arrangement of subject matter.
       4. Order is not imposed but immanent.
       5. Standards progressively revealed in evolution of morals, 
           law, etc., provides historically objective standard of values
           to fill vacant place of natural law.
        6. Hegel sought to show necessary stages by which reason 
           approximates the Absolute.
       7. Understanding and reason were faculties of analysis and 
           synthesis respectively and dialectic unites the two.
       8. Understand "breaks up" organic wholes, it is the philosophic 
           basis of indivualism.
           i. fosters illusion that men can remake society
           ii. misses organic creative continuous growth
       9. Only reason can see below historical detail to perceive forces
           that really control events and thus understand that the process
           should be as it is.
 G. In study of religion, following Herder and Lessing, saw succession of
      world religions as progressive revelation of religious truth.
 H. Thought Western civilization product of Greek free intelligence and
      deeper moral and religious insights of Christianity.
 I.  The process of development of the spirit of a people:
       1. Period of "natural" happy but largely unconscious spontaneity
           (thesis).
       2. Period of painful frustration and self-consciousness in which
           the spirit is "turned inward" and loses its spontaneous 
           creativeness (antithesis).
       3. Period in which spirit " returns to itself" at a higher level
           embodying insight gained from frustration (synthesis).
       4. The total process is "thought."
 J. Hegel saw freedom as existing only within bounds of a nation state.
       1. The state is the expression (de facto power) of national unity and
           a national aspiration to self-government.
       2. The state is consistent with any lack of uniformity which does not
           prevent effectively unified government (such as class differences).
       3. With Machiavelli saw no higher duty for the state than its own 
           strengthening and preservation.
       4. The state is the realm in which the Idea of Reason materializes 
           itself (The German Constitution, 1802).
 K. Realization of national spirit contributes to progressive realization of
      the world spirit and is the source of dignity and worth that attaches
      to private concerns of individuals. 
       1. Freedom is voluntary dedication to that realization.
       2. National monarchy is the highest form of constitutional government.
 L. Dialectic and historical necessity (The Philosophy of Right, 1821). 
       1. Dialectic is the new method.
       2. History of a people records the growth of a single national
           mentality that expresses itself in all phases of its culture.

"The individual is for the most part only an accidental variant of the culture
  that created him and insofar as he is different his individuality is more
  likely to be capricious than signficant."

       3. Dialectic is the opposition of forces moving in orderly equilibrium
           and emerging in a pattern of progressive, logical development.
       4. Contradiction means fruitful opposition between systems that 
           constitutes an objective criticism of each and leads continually to
           a more inclusive and coherent system. (Dialectic could manifest as 
           evolution or revolution.) 
 M. Hegel claimed dialectic as logic of reason to supersede logic of
       understanding.
       1. Dialectic both moral judgement and causal law of historical
           development.
       2. Unites relativism with the absolutism.
 N. Dialectic offered no criterion of rightness except success of outcome.
 O. Hegel: individualism and theory of the state.
       1. Individualism had no hold in Hegel's Germany and the same with
           sense of national unity.
       2. Hegel's Philosophy of Right deals with the relationships between
           individual and the social and economic institutions.
       3. Placed state as on a level of political evolution above civil
           society (the result of the end of feudal law and institutions).
       4. Revolution's ideals of liberty and equality made state a mere 
           matter of private interest, a utilitarian device for satisfying private
           needs elevating abstract individualism over society and state.
       5. The individual's best interest lies in being a member of society and 
           the state.
       6. Individualism indifferent to moral and spiritual development of 
           personality by falsifying the nature of social institutions through
           regarding them only as accidental and mere utilitarian devices to 
           satisfy irrational needs
       7. Hegel shared the "Greek notion" of citizenship not in terms of private
           rights but of social functions. 
 P. Hegel saw individual motives as capricious and sentimental, with civil
     civil society as a realm of mechanical necessity, a result of irrational 
     forces of a society.
       1. Society, apart from the state, is governed by non-moral causal laws
           and hence ethically anarchical.
       2. Only the state embodied ethical values and ought therefore to be
           absolute.
       3. Individual attains moral dignity only as he devotes himself to
           the state.
       4. Hegel's theory of freedom implied nothing definite in the way of
           civil or political liberties but he did not reject them in practice. 
       5. The state depends on civil society as the means of accomplishing
            the moral purpose it embodies.
       6. The state is absolute but not arbitrary, it must rule through law and
           law is "rational."
       7. Civil society consists of corporations and the legislature is where
           they meet the state.
       8. The legislature only advisory to the ministry of the governing class
           or "universal class."
 Q. Hegel's constitutionalism not liberal (i.e., democratic procedures)
      but based on orderly bureaucratic administration not subject to
      to public opinion but to the public spirit of an official class that
      stands above conflicts of economic and social interests.
 R. Hegel united Rousseau's general will (the manifestation of the 
      spiritual force forming the core of reality) and Burke's religious
      vision of history as a "divine tactic." 
 S. Replaced eternal system of unchangeable natural law with a
      rational unfolding of the Absolute in History.
       1. Reason manifested itself in social groups not individuals.
       2. Society seen as system of forces rather than community of 
           individuals.
       3. Highlighted importance of historical study of institutions but
           left individual actions as merely a "reflection" of social forces.
       4. Can be seen as giving rise to Marxism (a direct link), the English
           liberalism of Oxford idealists and the Italian fascists. 

Next week:  Liberalism -- Philosophical Radicalism
 
 
 

Notes on "A History of Political Theory" -- Episode 15

For episode 14 see here

The Theory of the National State

XV. Machiavelli
 A. Medieval representative system suffered eclipse
       1. Growth of national unity  
       2. Growth of royal absolutism
       3. Corresponding changes in political thought
       4. Extended trade broke through localized economies:
          i. led to formation of class of men of wealth and enterprise
          ii. and allied with king against nobility
 B. Italy of Machiavelli (early 16th century) divided and weak
 C. Naked individualism of Italian republics' political life presaged modern age
      of individualism
 D. Writing in diplomatic tradition, Machiavelli lost sight of ends, seeing method
      (politics) as its own end*
 E. Saw two standards of morals
       1. Ruler -- judged by success in keeping and increasing power
       2. Private citizen -- judged by strength which his conduct imparts to the
          social group
 F. Assumed human nature is essentially selfish
       1. Meant desire for security on part of the masses...
       2. ... and desire for power in rulers
 G. Also saw man as aggressive and acquisitive; that there are limited resources
       leads to:
       1. condition of continued conflict, restrained by ...
       2. ... for of law, leading to ...
       3. ... the power of the ruler who provides security.
       4. became the political philosophy of Hobbes 
 H. Lawgiver constructs not only political life but also social
 I.   In society of egoists, only force behind law could hold society together
 J.  Favored popular, liberal and lawful government when possible, monarchy
       when necessary
 K. Was an Italian nationalist  

* Note:  Sabine gets Machiavelli not so much wrong as incomplete.  He did not loss sight of ends --  seeing only method -- but rather sought to bring The Prince to see that the best way to maintain power was to act with prudence (and at least appear to be moral) even when using force.  (The Prince was in effect a job application.)  In The Discourses, Machiavelli essentially encourages the rulers towards a Republic based on law as the best way to ensure stability.
 
Next week:  The Early Protestant Reformers

Notes on "A History of Political Theory" -- Episode 5

For episode 4 see here.

Theory of the City-State

V. Aristotle: Political Ideals
 A. Pupil of Plato at the Academy
 B. Politics is probably not a unified work but a collection of essays 
 C. The Politics can be divided into two parts
       1. Books II, III, VII and VIII on an ideal state
       2. Books IV, V and VI offer final thoughts on political science
       3. Book I considers nature-convention problem
 D. Prefers to stick more to common experience rather than logical departures
      from it.
 E. His ideal state is the second best of Plato, never accepted Plato's ideal
       1. Best was constitutional 
       2. Based on some degree of moral equality of men [citizens]
       3. Rejects the model of the father's rule over children
 F. Aristotle sees law as "reason unaffected by desire"
       1. Law gives authority of the magistrate a "moral quality" to which all are
           obliged
 G. Under constitutional rule, the public, or general, interest determines law
       rather than factions or tyrannous rule by one or some 
       1. Government carried out by general regulations not arbitrary decrees
       2. Government of willing subjects not merely due to force 
 H. Saw experience of ages as embedded in law, or capable of being so, 
      contrary to Plato
       1. Saw possible supremacy of collective wisdom over single wise lawgiver
       2. Wisdom that should guide the state goes from being the exclusive domain
          of the philosopher to being the result of social custom embodied in law. 
 I. Aristotle's ideal state based on Plato's Laws. 
 J. Wisdom as embodied in custom must be the guiding principle in taking
      advantage of actual conditions to gradually reform them. (For Plato, the
      ideal often in radical opposition to facts.)
 K. The state is the association of men to realize the good in the form of the best
      moral life
 L. Looks to build up the best state from experience and from not a preexisting
      ideal
       1. Saw some merit in the usual claiments for power -- democrats and 
          aristocrats
       2. Reasoned that since none had absolute claim, law (good law) must be
          supreme
M. Aristotle saw forces working on and through real agents and not from Plato's
      Ideal Forms. [Perhaps two sides of the dialectic.]


Next week: Aristotle: Political Actualities

Notes on "A History of Political Theory" -- Episode 4

For episode 3 see here.

 Theory of the City-State

IV.Plato: The Statesman and The Laws
 A. Written much later than The Republic
 B. Resemblance between the two
       1. Marked difference from The Republic
       2. Plato's final reflections on the city-state
 C. Of greater influence on political thought after Plato, departure point for
     Aristotle
 D.The Laws sketches a government in which law is supreme
       1. Was a change from government of philosopher-kings of The Republic
       2.  Plato did not fully recognize these changes in his theory
       3. Law-based government is still only the second best and not logically
          compatible with it 
       4. The Republic presumed opposition between intelligence and perception
       5. Law was seen by the Greeks as on the side of perception and experience
         (i.e., convention)
       6. Even now, law can be seen as irrational obstacle to intelligent chance or
          action
       7. For Plato, the good ruler, one who rules through knowledge and reason
          should not be bound by law as that is meant to govern the average man
       8. In The Laws, law become a surrogate for reason
 E. The Statesman puts off The Republic as an ideal model not usually attainable
       1. Has six-fold classification of governments, three good and three bad that
          Aristotle later used
       2. Sees democracy more favorably 
 F.  The state in The Laws constructed with temperance as its chief virtue 
       1. Seeks to achieve harmony through a spirit of obedience to law
       2. This meant a mixed state as the mode of political organization
 G. The mixed state --  harmony through balance of forces or tendencies
       1. Mixed monarchic principle of wisdom with democratic principle of
          freedom
       2. Saw original 'state of nature' as the life of peaceful herdsmen. With
          agriculture comes civilization.
       3. Urges study of politics attached to history of civilization (causes and
          changes in political stability)
 H. In The Laws, still favors communism but concedes private property and
       private family life, due to human frailty, but regulates both
       1. Land inherited but not to be divided or alienated
       2. Produce goes to common (public) mess
       3. Property to be equal except for limited personal items allowed
       4. Citizens not to engage in industry or trade; what is necessary to be done
          by resident aliens
       5. Use of property regulated, only token currency, no loans with interest
 I. Government belongs to the citizens, those who can afford to leave private
      business of earning a living to slaves (on farms) and aliens. This was not
      Periclean democracy. 
       1. State still to be weighted in favor of richer through four-fold division on
          basis of private property
       2. Education and religion remain roughly the same as in The Republic except
          education becomes institutionalized
       3. Religious persecution and the Nocturnal Council out of line with the rest
 J. Government in the [ideal city]* of The Republic follows the rule of the father
      over children, while The Laws more in line with government of and by 
      responsible citizens through law.

*Note:  Sabine's reading of The Republic, Laws and Statesman follows traditional lines.  He takes them literally, especially The Republic.  But if one reads Plato's Socratic dialogues closely, it should be noticed that he actually is focused on justice, virtue (arete) of the individual.  The Republic presents the model for the healthy soul balanced between its three parts with reason guiding desire and will.  Socrates presents the outer polis to better see the inner one.  As Plato understood the 'ideal city' of The Republic to be difficult to achieve in reality, he offered in The Laws a model for a city guided by reason embodied in law.  (Even here he did not trust any particular system so added the Nocturnal Council, a group to be guided by philosophy to meet at night and review that was done during the day.)  In The Statesman, he offers a model for rule by an individual guided by knowledge.  But such a person would also be hard to find achieving or holding power.


Next week: Aristotle: Political Ideals

Notes on "A History of Political Theory" -- Episode 3

For episode 2 see here.

 Theory of the City-State

III.Plato: The Republic
 A. Elaborated from Socrates the belief that there is a discoverable, objective
      good life for the individual and the polis
 B. Political philosophy is the effort to discover this 'good life'
 C. Plato's version primarily found in The Republic, Statesman and Laws (written
      in that order)
 D. The Republic concerns the good man and the good life and the means for
      knowing what these are and how to attain them
       1.Political theory of The Republic an over simplified version of the later
        presentation. Plato's fundamental focus was the soul (psych, the inner polis]
       2. The good is objectively real, will is secondary
       3. Man with knowledge of the good ought to have decisive power in the polis
       4. Association of man with man in society depends on reciprocal needs and
          resulting exchange of goods and services.
       5. Philosopher attends to his share of the work, three classes are all
         necessary
       6. Class-based specialization of function depends on natural aptitude and
         training (whereby the given is made better) 
       7. Two parts of the theory:
           i. government ought to be art (techne) depending on exact knowledge 
           ii. society is mutual satisfaction of needs by persons whose capacities
              supplement each other
 E. The public is the great sophist
       1. Man has a split nature, higher and lower
       2. Politicians, especially in a democracy, are ignorant and  incompetent
       3. The incompetence of popular opinion ought to be countered through
        education -- the coupling of questioning and training
 F. Factional conflict arises from class, property owners vs the poor
 G. The Republic presented the 'ideal city' because it was important for the
      statesman -- the 'physician' of the state  -- to know the healthy city
       1. Plato wanted to establish the art of politics
       2. The ideal city modeled along the lines of geometry and ideal types
 H. Conceived society as a system of services in which every member both gives
      and receives
       1. Men have many wants
       2. No man is self-sufficient
       3. The state seeks to arrange the most adequate satisfaction of needs and
        most harmonious interchange of services
 I. Man receives freedom not for exercise of free will as much as for the practice
    of his calling (given by nature)
       1. Exchange implies division of labor
       2. Man has natural aptitudes which become skills when men apply them-
        selves to what they are given, as they work at it.
       3. Philosopher rules because his knowledge is at once his right and duty to
        do so
       4. Assumes that properly educated, man is not anti- or unsocial and can live
        in harmony.
           i. Man and the state have underlying structure
           ii. These structures are parallel, what is good for one is prevented from
             being different from what is good for the other (the polis is the individual
             "writ large)
 J. The division of labor necessitates division into three classes
       1. Workers and Guardians (divided into soldiers and rulers) 
       2. Rulers were source of sound knowledge of the good leaving the others as
         political onlookers
 K. Justice is the bond holding society together
       1. All should fill the station to which he is entitled
       2. "giving to every man his due"
           i. Man should be due treatment as what he is, in light of his capacity
             and training
           ii. Due from him is an honest performance of tasks which place accorded
             him requires
       3. What is due is based on services performed not power or "rights"
  L. The task becomes reaching perfect balance between human beings and
      possibilities of significant employment that the state affords 
       1. Achieved by removing hindrances to good citizenship; and
       2. Creating positive conditions of good citizenship through education
 M.  Achieved for rulers through 'communism'
       1. Prohibited from holding private property
       2. Abolition of permanent monogamous sexual relations
       3. Controlled breeding
       4. Wealth equalized to remove disturbing influence on government, along
          with abolition of family (affection)
 N. Education is the positive means to direct human nature
       1. Main reliance placed here
       2. State would control compulsory education
       3. Elementary till age 20, gymnastics and "music" as training, direct or
          indirect, for the mind
 O. The Republic has been eternally the voice of the scholar, as such overly
      simplified, leaving out human dignity and the person
 P. Omits law and influence of public opinion 

Next week: Plato: The Statesman and The Laws