A Middle Way

Weber – Substantive

Well, I’m still not quite sure how to BLOG in the proper sense, but in any case here is my take on M. Weber.  Besides the constant reference and glorification of Goethe, the relevance of political science is made clear.  How often have our ever-increasing acquaintances within this course (the authors) referred to those who undertake politics as a role?  Well, a quick look back will see that all, or almost every author, alludes to a figure that takes on politics as a role in their life, but can these roles be considered a vocation, a sort of calling and duty?  I would have to have to say that “yes,” these people are not in politics for brevity of reaping the booty and spoils.  Pericles, Hobbes’ sovereign, Rousseau’s founder, and Kant’s moral politician all seemed to have a vocation for politics.  This talk of vocation leads to Weber’s final point of what a vocation for politics entails.  M. Weber sums this up as(sorry for the length but the point is best seen in whole):

Politics means a slow, powerful drilling through hard boards, with a mixture of passion and a sense of proportion.  It is absolutely true, and our entire historical experience confirms it, that what is possible could never have been achieved unless people had tried again and again to achieve the impossible in this world.  But the man who can do this must be a leader, and not only that, he must also be a hero—in a very literal sense.  And even those who are neither a leader or a hero must arm themselves with that staunchness of heart that refuses to be daunted by the collapse of all their hopes, for otherwise they will not even be capable of achieving what is possible today.  The only man who has a “vocation” for politics is one who is certain that his spirit will not be broken if the world, when looked at from this point of view, proves too stupid or base to accept what wishes to offer it, and who, when faced with all that obduracy, can still say “Nevertheless!” despite everything (93-94).

While examining this position of a true vocation for politics, I began to wonder if the mutually complimentary ethics of conviction and ethics of responsibility resembled Carr’s mixture/balance of utopianism and realism.  Weber initially declares the ethics to be mutually exclusive, a sort of antithesis of ethics but the two antitheses come to form the ideal thesis of what a vocation entails, a balance of yin and yang.  Similarly, Carr begins his work with a constant pull of different forces on utopianism and realism but comes to conclude that one cannot exist on its own, they are symbiotic in a sense, one depending on the other, and vice versa, for its very survival and existence.  Like Weber believes, as quoted above, the possible could only be achieved through the attempts to achieve the impossible.  Hmm, does this sound familiar, utopianism perhaps?  And with the collapse of these ideals comes the harsh reality of failure, a view that there are forces in play in the realm of politics that do deal with the balance of power in one form or the next.  The point being that perhaps there is a middle way to the conceptualization of politics and what appears to be an antithesis may be a part of the whole, whether in vocation or the subsequent within international relations.

Pondering the next dimension of societal structure...and using Carr's IR to determine actions for the future

I agree with Holly. Kant was cake compared to Carr.

In previous texts, authors have described societies that want to grow, but ultimately have limits. Kant’s nature, a force that will ultimately bring about universal truth, divided people and held them in conflict over minute differences in language, religion, etc. Rousseau suggests that the strongest nations are the smallest ones, those that are capable of having true democracy. Locke and Hobbes did not suggest limits for the size of their ideal socially contracted societies, but both limited them in that there would always be people outside of them. This brings up the idea of unification against, versus unification for a cause or an entity.

Carr discusses the differences between utopianism (building a fictional ideal organizational structure between nations) and realism (that that fictional ideal would never be possible, rather, it is important to observe this existing organizational structure and build rationally on those observations). He obviously disapproves of the League of Nations, because they are not enough in reality (they do not hold a tangible stick). However, I would contest his statement on page 213: “As has often been observed, the international community cannot be organized against Mars.” I assume this is in response to the broadcast of “War of the Worlds”… but I think if the universe (and this is a sci-fi stretch) were structured like how the world is structured, the world would end up with a real governing body – a league of nations with a stick. This would happen because, despite international conflict on earth, there would be other nations outside of earth to have interplanetary relations with. International relations would become a non-issue, because society would have scaled up one more: from intrastate relations to international relations to interplanetary relations. Of course, Carr’s reality v utopia dispute would then apply to the highest level – in this case interplanetary relations – and would encounter the same problems as on earth.

Once other planets have intelligent life, Earth just becomes one nation in a larger world…However, Earth would still have nations as they are. The idea of a next level up allows for a body to govern the secondary level in the larger social structure.

However, this isn’t Carr. As political science lacks hard and fast facts (as it is based on human behavior), it relies on either observation or utopian models. Carr observes that international relations has been, in the past, an oscillating power system, where some nations or ideas have power, then shift (through the realism-utopianism-realism-… cycle). This is realist because it is observation. Though Carr speaks copiously of observations of past and ideals for using these observations to better manage the future, the issue of hindsight severely limits this possibility. In class we discussed varying opinions of the hindsight is 20/20 idea: I agree that it is, and that, unless we can look back on the existing present, we can’t use realism based political science to determine potential courses of events for the future. Learning from experience is one thing, but determining actions based on analysis of previous events opens up far too many options to accurately determine the appropriate response to a situation.

New Utopia and Muddleheaded thoughts

Carr – Reflective

Of Carr’s analysis of international relation, of political science as a mixture of reality and utopianism, he says:  “This, too, is a utopia.  But it stands more directly in the line of recent advance than visions of a world federation or blueprints of a more perfect League of Nations.  Those elegant superstructures must wait until some progress has been made in digging the foundation” (219).  So what do you have to say for your self, E.H.?  What is this utopia you speak of?  And then Carr goes on to describe the real international crisis:  

The real international crisis of the modern world is the final and irrevocable breakdown of the conditions which made the nineteenth-century order possible.  The old order cannot be restored, and a drastic change of outlook is unavoidable (217).

On page 87 Carr says “Having demolished the current utopia with the weapons of realism, we still need to build a new utopia of our own, which will one day fall to the same weapons.”  So the inference is that the laissez-fair/harmony of interests/political Darwinist order has collapsed on its own weight and the new arising utopia of the League of Nations is so too doomed to fail.  

But returning to the question, what is this utopia?  This utopia is a political order that recognizes the smorgasbord of both, utopia and reality, plains.  Simply put (HA! Carr  Simple.  And you said Kant was the hard drugs!), an order that would know when to switch between being utopian and realist as the international system changed.  

Come on!  Can this even be a possibility?  This idea of measuring the international climate and creating a forecast for political outlook, is more utopian than anything that spilled over Woodrow Wilson’s typewriter late at night typing up the foundation for the League of Nations.  Like I brought up in class, not even history is 20/20 so could we ever predict the future of politics or even the present for that matter?  Even if political science was successful in mapping out this inclement IR landscape, how could those implementing policies ever change their view to fit the circumstances?  This is like telling Bush JR that the war on IRAQ is no longer pertinent and we need to start cooperating with Osama in order to institute a cooperative democracy in the Middle East, conductive to peace.  So ok, this isn’t the best example to get my point across but it is meant only to support my claim that, like it or not, politicians are going to have strong unwavering beliefs that are not likely to quake in the near future.

Maybe somebody else can help me to clarify my own thoughts?  Comments are welcome.

International Legislation?

Carr – Substantive

So what exactly is E.H. Carr’s point?  Well, I don’t know.  However, what I do know is that Carr is pretty good at fence sitting.  As Rebecca Shakespeare pointed out, “It seems like Carr is trying to define a shade of gray.”  To which I replied, “No, I think he is just acknowledging that a specific shade gray exists.” But maybe this is just the way of life.  Can there truly be a resolution to all things in life?  At any rate, this does not diminish the substance that exists within the pages of The Twenty Years’ Crisis and the contribution to international relations, much to the despise of Carr throughout his career.  

In any case, I would like to review Carr’s examination of international law.  Has international law changed since the publishing of this book and would Carr concede his fundamental assumption that international legislation does not exist (160) in light of the functioning of the United Nations?  

So what is Carr’s view of international law?  

1. “International law recognizes no court competent to give on issue of law or fact decisions recognized as binding by the community as a whole” (159).  


2. “International law has no agents competent to enforce observance of the law” (159).


3. International law knows only of custom and not of legislation.  Thus, international legislation does not yet exist (160).

Yes the United Nations has a general body of legislators known as the General Assembly.  In this Assembly every member state has 1 representative to cast a single vote for their nation.  Isn’t this process international legislation?  Carr says “International agreements are contracts concluded by states with one another in their capacity as subjects of international law, and not laws created by states in the capacity of international legislators.”  From this view, I would have to say that the international legislation is more of a reality now then it was in Carr’s time.  But, to this extent, what is the point of making laws if there is no authority to make these laws binding?  And also, since the laws created by the United Nation cannot be imposed on non-member countries are they not truly international but multilateral?

Facets and Forces - Why isn't this physics?

Carr gives many scales by which to judge systems of thought, international forces, and political perspectives. The fact that he uses them throughout the book as models to illustrate his analysis of the 1919-1939 crisis interested me. However, it bothers me that, with all his attemept to create science of IR as he observes it, he does not attempt a model to aid in the understanding of his point, like a scientist would had done from teh very start.

Following from Kant’s theory and practice, Carr’s theory and practice leads to two new variables: “Political Science must be based on a recognition of the interdependence of theory and practice, which can be attained only through a combination of utopia and reality.” (14) I thought it curious that, though Carr specifically defines that Realism and Utopianism exist on two separate planes (I can’t find the citation! Help!), he says that they are impossible to have at the same time – one solves the problem of being too theoretical and general and one solves the problem of being too concrete and specific. Looking at this from a science perspective, it seems he is comparing things of two entirely different units, like apples and oranges, and, although his balancing act does seem to be the most practical (realist?) way to try to create international governance, it fails to prove that realism and utopianism are mutually replacing schools of thought.

The differences between power and morality, as he puts, I think best, by alluding to the biblical passage “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s” (94). The specific division of these two forces, power and morality, also put them on separate planes – interdependent, but not replacing of eachother.

My mind wants to make a line from realism to utopianism, and generate a point of where international relations currently is, then determine the appropriate magnitude of these “forces” and their specific applications to push it to this ideal balance that Carr says exists, but does not formulate.

In some ways, I prefer the simplicity of Rousseau’s mathematical models to the obscurity of Carr’s…I know he wants to define the ideal structure of international relations by criticizing the ones he sees in play, but it seems to me he is defining a shade of grey: he knows it exists somewhere between black and white, but how to get to it, and what value it really is is difficult for me to theorize. I know, that’s his point. I still wish there was a more concrete and general model for me to look at. Perhaps that will be class.

Universalality

Kant – Reflective

In this post, I would like to reflect on the universality of Kant’s position as opposed to the anti-Kantian relativist position. I believe that Kant is so grounded in his perception of the world that he does not believe that there could be true differences other than deviations from the true universal consensus. In this reflection of Kant’s view, how could Kant be anything other than a cultural/relative imperialist in his views? It is now new found to think of one’s own culture as superior to other “inferior” cultures or beliefs. These sentiments are often considered nationalistic. Kant’s view is in fact one step farther than the superiority of nation aspect, he takes it to mean a universal aspect, and there can be no other true cultures but one’s that are plain misguided. There was a time when the white men took it upon themselves to cultivate and reform the “savages” of the world because the European way of thinking, living and behaving was the correct way. I don’t deny that Kant’s vision of a moral world was visionary in a world where all people could live together without war but at what costs? If Rousseau’s general will was so great of a threat then imagine Kant’s version of obligating those outside of the contract to be a part of the society or of forcing them to leave their place of inhabitance.

Life, Liberty, Kant, and the Pursuit of Happiness

Wow. That discussion brought up all kinds of new things that I hadn’t gotten out of my original reading of Kant, and the things discussed keep coming up in other places.

For example, in one of my classes, we were talking about security versus privacy as an issue of international communication. None of us had thought about it exclusively, and were all surprised that our responses were something along the lines of “well, as long as it doesn’t bother us, we’d rather have someone make the decisions for us.” In class Tuesday, we talked about the decidedly non-democratic setup of Kant’s ideal society, and how representatives vote, not the whole population of individuals. (see pages 77 and 117) The idea Kant presents of the representative body making the laws that the peoples would make (if they had a chance), and would stand behind was SO apparent in my other class discussion…it is curious that Kant knew so much about people while only living in such a small physical territory. The idea that the universal good, when instituted by the law would obviously be agreed upon by the populace is an interesting support, but it does weaken his argument.

Though this idea of a universal good (/truth/duty) is not supported in Kant’s argument, his idea of universal good and universal endpoint for society and government and mankind as a whole is so interested. I have always been bothered by the idea of development – why do we have to impose our ways of life onto other people? Reading Kant made me realize that this kind of development is inextricably tied to the idea of a universal good. The idea of a moral politician ties into this also – since there is a “universal truth” it must be reflected in the setup of governments too…again, the idea of imposing such a truth sounds like a good idea, but discovering whose is the universal truth seems an impossible task.


So are we justified in aiding so-called developing nations? The international communication world would complain of cultural imperialism - that we (the US) are taking over other cultures with our own, invading and destroying their way of life and replacing it with ours. If ours is a universal truth, then Kant would say this was ok, but who is to say ours is?

So, what was Kant trying to say?

So basically, I found Kant insanely intense.  Hard drugs?  Maybe they should be included in the price of the text.

In “What is Enlightenment,” Kant writes: “One age cannot bind itself, and thus conspire, to place a succeeding [contract] in a condition whereby it would be impossible for the later age to expand its knowledge (particularly where it is so very important), to rid itself of errors, and generally to increase its enlightenment. (43-44)”  The contract would essentially stop the ability of growth of a population.  This statement embodies his idea of progress towards the highest good, individually, in society, and internationally, and how it cannot be stopped by people.

In terms of this process, there are two “actors” – nature, the thing that made earth harmonious and balanced (and put it in conflict and spread the peoples throughout it by war)*, and the people as a whole.  He expresses the role of nature as inevitable:  “…Nature irresistibly wills that right should finally triumph.  What one neglects to do will ultimately occur of its own accord, though with a great deal of inconvenience. (124)”  The peoples’ role in this inevitability is that of following the ‘directions’ nature gives – what Kant calls duty.  This duty does not involve actions based on the outcomes, namely happiness (as Garve makes a point that people only do things for their happiness), but actions based on doing what is right (right as in morally right, the right thing to do) (70).  This connection with inherent right is a connection with the will of nature.

So Kant makes the point that nature will prevail, but that the state of nature with society is one of war and disruption.  He concludes that people understand nature, and then use the directions that nature gives to compel peoples, civil societies, and nations to a perpetual peace (perpetual, because, once achieved, the progress of nature would continue to push all levels of society towards it, therefore not allowing them to retreat into their warring, conflicted state.  So is nature a puzzle, and once its true nature is understood, perpetual peace is attainable?  

*This idea of Nature putting in barriers to divide peoples and cause them to war to make sure they took up all land on earth is quite interesting (see page 125 for Kant’s description of nature-imposed separation by language, religion, but then unifying factors like trade).  It was the tactic used by the colonial governments to ensure conflict in their colonies – look at how Iraq was set up, with conflicting groups within its one-country borders.  This conflict meant that there would be no supreme power in the nation, and therefore impeded the colony’s ability to rise up against its imperial ruler.  I may be reading Kant wrong, but I seem to see this same kind of created conflict attributed to nature, along with the design of trade, another feature of colonization.  Curious.  Worth an asterisk, I think.

The Relationship of Obedience

Kant – initial

Wow, what is there to say about Immanuel Kant, who is such a respected and quoted philosopher?

This is not my first encounter with Kant but it certainly is the most in depth encounter that I have had, to-date. Kant’s vision of the organization of a state was most surprising when considering his views of humanity as wanting to obtain the greatest good. On human nature Kant says: “…I also take into account human nature, which since respect for right and duty remains alive in it, I cannot regard as so immersed in evil that after many unsuccessful attempts, morally practical reason will finally triumph and show it to be lovable”(89). Thus when Kant speaks of democracy as a despotic form of government, I am taken aback. “Democracy in the proper sense of the term, is necessarily a despotism, because it sets up an executive power in which all citizens make decisions about and, if need be, against one (who therefore does not agree); consequently, all who are not quite all, decide, so that the general will contradicts both itself and freedom” (114). Of course, this observation is, at least, in reference to the ability of Rousseau’s general will to force the people to be free. How then can a republican form of government, in which the executive power is separated from the legislative power, be “more bearable under a single person’s rulership than other forms of government are” (115)? I fail to agree with Kant in this respect. Reason would lead one to believe that the legislative would be less likely to be separated from the executive in a monarchy. How can a monarchy, with representatives, be anymore representative than a democracy? Especially when Kant admits that tyranny of the ruler is not to be opposed, for rebelling is the worst danger of a society (79). I would then propose: what is worse, the general will that forces men to be free or the subjugation to obey a tyrannical ruler?

In this respect, Kant is completely transparent in his primary support for a federation of states. Kant knows that the possibility for war is always possible when there is not a supreme chain of power associated with the organization. A federation “prevents war and curbs the tendency of that hostile inclination to defy the law, though there will always be constant danger of their breaking loose” (118). Kant’s true belief, as the ultimate end is a universal nation of nations, a “world republic.” (117)

Reason can provide lawlessness, which consists solely of war, than that they give up their savage (lawless) freedom, just as individual persons do, and, by accommodating themselves to the constraints of common law, establishing a nation of peoples that (continually growing) will finally include all the people of the earth. But they do not will to do this because it does not conform to their idea of the right of nations, and consequently they discard in hypothesis what is true in thesis (117)

General Will and Popular Opinion

JJR defines General Will as the general interest of all people comprising the sovereign, collectively, not additively. This idea of General Will is one that we had trouble defining or understanding in class…and so I will take a shot at my view of what JJR means.

First, JJR uses the idea of the will of all to contrast General Will. He describes the difference between them by saying that the will of all is the combination of all private interests, whereas the General Will is the absolute value of these interests (155). Curiously, this sounds a great deal like statistics. When calculating the mean of a group of numbers, namely values representing an aspect of a population, a statistician must provide a standard deviation along with his average value to show just how widely spread the whole of the opinions are. This makes it possible for a person to determine whether the average presented is just the average, or in fact, the predominant value. Procedure for acquiring this standard deviation is quite simple – you find the average, then you find how much each individual data point varies from the group average, and then you use the absolute value of these differences to find how much the population differs from the average, thus showing how widely spread the population really is with respect to the “average” value. He reiterates this standard deviation assessment with regards to the spectrum of individuality of the population: when everyone thinks for themselves, the standard deviation of the population is very small, thus General Will; when there are small groups representing thought, the standard deviation is medium; and when there is only one association with one thought, private opinion dominates.

I think it is unfortunate that the term Public Opinion has come to mean roughly “the private opinion of the population” and not the general will. From all that JJR says in reference to the General Will, as long as it is truly the opinion of the public (as a mass of individuals thinking for the public) and not of smaller groups built of the public, the Public Opinion would BE the General Will. A cultural difference now, a change in the meaning of the word, but at root, I think they are the same thing. Given idyllic polling, I think JJR would have enjoyed a full systematic and objective assessment of the General Will compiled the way that, ideally, public opinion would be derived now.

War is Not Individual

Rousseau – Reflective

For this reflective post I would like to discuss Rousseau’s conception of war.  

“Men are not naturally enemies, for the simple reason that men living in their original state of independence do not have sufficiently constant relationships among themselves to bring about either a state of peace or a state of war.  And since this state of war cannot come into existence from simple personal relations, but only from real [proprietary] relations, a private war between one man and another can exist neither in the state of nature, where there is no constant property, nor in the social state, where everything is under the authority of laws…War is not therefore a relationship between one man and another, but a relationship between one state and another.  In war private individuals are enemies only incidentally:  not as men or even as citizens, but as soldiers; not as members of the homeland but as its defenders.  Finally, each state ca have as enemies only other states and not men, since there can be no real relationship between things of disparate natures (145-146).

This concept of war is significant of the current arena of international relations.  Ever since the Treaty of Westphalia, which established the Westphalia nation state system, the nation state has been the predominant and primary actor in international relations.  In many IR theories the state, as an entity, speaks with one voice.  

This concept of war is also significant in how it contrasts with Hobbes’ view of war.  Hobbes emphasizes that war can be between individuals.  In fact, the state of nature is a state of war of all against all.  This shows in Hobbes’ conception that private wills are predominant and there really was no unison in wills among the people.  

Population growth: Good or Bad?

I think Rousseau’s explanation of sizes and geographical locations of states setting the stage for certain types of government is very interesting, especially when he later talks of the degeneration of governments, and their ultimate demise.

In summary:

Small population/poor/minimal surplus of goods ( Democracy
Medium population/moderately wealthy/some surplus of goods ( Aristocracy
Large population/wealthy/maximum surplus of goods ( Monarchy

Rousseau then says that, as the government has more difficulty maintaining itself, it will shrink, democracy to aristocracy, and aristocracy to monarchy (keeping in mind the spectrum of governments is continuous, per p. 179) (192).  I find that this contradicts the gauge of strength, which is population alone (191): If a population grows, it follows that the government should shrink.  As a population grows, it also follows that it will become wealthier, if it is to remain intact (as monarchy is best supported in wealth). However, Rousseau notes that wealth leads to people “serving with their wallet (197),” which ultimately leads to people giving themselves representatives and is thus “no longer free: it no longer exists (199).”

So this increase in population, a sign of strength in government, leads to a decrease in size of government (also a sign of increasing strength in government), but such a smaller government will thrive if there is great surplus (188), leading to greater wealth, leading to downfall.  

Rousseau notes that all government/legislative systems will eventually fall apart (degenerate because of size or because of usurpation), and comments that the larger the population, the more overworked the government will be, the more that the “body which is too big for its constitution collapses and perishes (168).”  

How does population size then reflect the strength of a government, when a too-large population will (in many ways) bring the death of the body politic?

Being One Being

Rousseau – Substantive

How is Hobbes’ Leviathan different from Rousseau’s general will?

At one point in the social contract Rousseau describes the general will as the body politic.   “Each of us places his person and all his power in common under the supreme direction of the general will; and as one we receive each member an indivisible part of the whole”(Rousseau 148).  In addition:  

At once, in place of the individual person of each contracting party, this act of association produces a moral and collective body composed of as many members as there are voices in the assembly, which receives from this same act its unity, its common self, its life and its will.  This public person, formed thus by union of all others formerly took the name city, and at present takes the name republic or body politic, which is called state by its members when it is passive, sovereign when it is active, power when compared to others like itself” (Rousseau 149).  

This description reminded me of Hobbes Leviathan, in the sense that the sovereign is one body with a single voice.  But this is where the similarity ends and the distinction is evident.  

Hobbes, in describing his Leviathan says of him, “And in him consisteth the Essence of the Commonwealth; which is One Person, of whose Acts a great Multitude, by mutuall Covenants one with another, have made themselves every one the Author, to the end he may use the strength and means of them all, as he shall think expedient, for their Peace and Common Defense” (Hobbes 96).  And furthermore, “And he that carryeth this Person, is called Soveraigne, and said to have Soveraigne Power; and every one besides, his subject” (Hobbes 96).  These two views of politics are drastically different.  I would first like to point out that Rousseau’s body politic is a union of all of the members who are sovereign.  By contrast, Hobbes’ Leviathan is a being to which the people secede their liberty through covenants to the commonwealth, which is protected, by way of the sword, by a sovereign that is separated and superior to the people.  In the section titled, “On the Liberty of Subject,” Hobbes claims:  

But as men, for the atteyning of peace, and conservation of themselves thereby, have made an Artificial Man, which we call a Common-wealth; so also have they made Artificiall Chains, called Civill Lawes, which they themselves, by mutuall covenants, have fastned ill Lawes, which they themselves, by mutuall covenants, have fastned at one end, to the lips of that Man, or Assembly, to whom they have given the Soveraigne Power; and at the other end to their own Ears.  These Bonds in their own nature but weak, may neverthelesse be made to hold, by the danger, though not by the difficulty of breaking them (Hobbes 116).

Hobbes acknowledges that man created these artificial chains, civil laws, when they entered the Commonwealth by covenant.  Rousseau in the first chapter of Book I references back to Hobbes artificial chains when he acknowledges:  “Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.”  But Rousseau does not believe that these chains are as useful to the preservation of man as Hobbes would have liked to believe.  Rousseau instead proposes that since we cannot return to a state of perfect liberty and throw off the chains that bind us we have no other choice but to make the chains legitimate.

These are just a few thoughts.  Perhaps somebody can add to this by offering comparisons/contrasts to other philosophers we have discussed, such as Rousseau’s relentless references back to Machiavelli.

On one last note, I thought this was an interesting quote from Rousseau:  “All power comes from God – I admit it – but so does every disease” (Rousseau 143).