Wealth and Good

In Wealth of Nations, Smith does not address his earlier promotion of Sympathy, so that the relation between the latter and Self-Interest, which is the motor of his later work, remains unresolved.  The disconnection also leaves ungrounded and unexamined the status of Wealth as a Good, either of an Individual, or of a Collective.  Thus, for example, he does not defend his program against the familiar counter-examples of an individual suffering from either the pursuit or the possession of Wealth, nor does he consider that the acquisition of National Wealth can sacrifice social cohesion.  So, even if Self-Interest and Collective-Interest can be systematized, it does not follow that Wealth should be the object of Interest in either case.

Capitalism, Democracy, Plutocracy

The common interchangeability of the terms 'Capitalism' and 'Democracy' tends to ignore that the concept of the latter entails Equality, but that of the former does not.  Now, implicit in the identity is that of an Economic system and a Political one.  Furthermore, there is only one Political system the ideal of which is unequivocally an Economic Good--Plutocracy.  Thus, the prevalence of that interchangeability is an implicit expression of Plutocratic influence.  The classifications of a corporation as a 'Person', and spending money as 'Freedom of Speech', are explicit ones.

Health, Wealth, Capitalism

Since an organism is in constant interaction with its environment, the distinction between 'inner' and 'outer' is analytical, not ontological, e. g. from a Biological perspective, lungs and oxygen are moments in the process of Respiration, from which they are subsequently abstracted for analytical purposes.  Likewise, the distinction of 'inner' from 'outer' goods is not ontological, and just as the value of oxygen is a function of its contribution to Health, so, too, is that of Wealth, i. e. of external possessions.  Now, Smith's earlier Moral writings suggest that he conceives of his later study of Wealth as being framed by some more comprehensive set of goods, perhaps Sympathy, a priority of which today's Capitalists are oblivious.  As a result, the society which the latter promote is diseased in two respects--with respect to the health of an individual member, in whom the pursuit of Wealth as the Highest Good is conditioned; and to the health of the collective, which, absent a binding factor such as Sympathy, is internally incoherent, if not antagonistic.  

The Unhealth of Nations

Though the etymological roots of 'health' and 'wealth' are similar, i. e. 'wholeness' and 'well-being', respectively, their usages have diverged to connote a distinction between 'internal' and 'external' goods.  Thus, there has become no contradiction entailed in either the concept of a 'poor but healthy' person, or that of one who is 'rich but ill'.  Similarly, qua biological unit, a collective can possess bountiful external goods, while being beset by internal strife.  Accordingly, a subtitle of Das Kapital could be 'The Unhealth of Nations'.  For, with the advantage of decades of hindsight, Marx discovers an analytical flaw in Smith's model--that private property qua means of production breeds antagonism between those who own it, and those whose labor transforms it into profitable products.  So, his cure for that illness--the collectivization of such property, can be distinguished from his projection of the means to that end--a communist revolution, which he conceives as inevitable.  The failure of the latter has tended to overshadow any soundness of the his initial diagnosis.

Capitalism, Socialism, History

While, as the title of his book indicates, Smith conceives Capitalism as a nationalistic system, Marx envisions Socialism as international.  Thus, it is perhaps ironic that currently it is Capitalism of the two that has attained greater global coherence, e. g. the stock markets, the World Bank, the WMF, vs. the dissolution of the Soviet Union.  Now, whether or not that apparent success validates the 'invisible hand' as a principle of History is unclear.  But, less uncertain is that Marx miscalculated in putting his trust in a variety of Determinism that is as unverifiable as is the Capitalist hypothesis.  So, whether or not Socialism still does prevail, eventual dominance will more likely be a function of the biological drive that has impelled the patent global ascendance of the species over several millennia, than of any developmental principle that has been traditionally associated with the competing systems.

Humanity, History, Political Philosophy

The turning of Philosophical attention to History, by Kant, Hegel, and Marx, yields, under the influences of Enlightenment Optimism and Theological Messianism, a concept of the human species as progressing over the centuries.  In contrast, Nietzsche, Spengler, and Heidegger, conceive the trend as, conversely, degenerative.  Now, hampering both sides of the disagreement are both an insufficient set of facts and commitments to contingent theses.  For, in the subsequent century alone, the species has achieved an unprecedented unity and control over Nature, to the extent that it has demonstrated the capacity both to destroy itself en masse, and, even, to leave the planet.  So, on Nietzsche's criterion, the Will to Power of the species has been on the ascent, whether or not any other of the traditional grounds of assessment are still relevant.  So, the more modest interpretation of the History of species, based on the available evidence, is that it is a work-in-progress, with respect to which any theorizing, e. g. Political Philosophy, is a contingent endeavor.

Time, Politics, Locality

Annals indicate that social Time is localized for the earliest humans, e. g. Northern Hemisphere winter is Southern Hemisphere summer; night in Asia is daytime in America, etc.  Now, technology has standardized those differences, e. g. room temperature of 72 regardless of the season; lamplight at 3 AM, etc.  Likewise, Time itself has become globalized, as is perhaps best evinced by the recent development that timekeeping devices are now functions of international telecommunications systems, in which, e. g. one cannot even set one's clock at an arbitrary time anymore.  Similarly, if Politics is local, then the locality is now the entire planet, and no longer tribal, civic, or even merely national anymore.  But, even the earliest localized temporal phenomena are manifestations of more pervasive processes, i. e. of Astronomical forces governing the relations between Earth, Sun, and Moon.  So, likewise, the context of the globalization of Politics may exceed the tabula rasa of Political Empiricism and its Atomistic concept of Society.    

Time and Political Philosophy

Perhaps the best evidence of the contemporary de-centralizing globalization of the human race is a factor that transcends doctrinal differences--Time.  Of course, societies have always been organized according to natural rhythms, primarily days and seasons.  But, Time has never been as standardized, both macro- and nano-cosmically, as it currently is.  For example, a delay of only a few seconds can be costly to an investor in New York playing the Hong Kong market.  Now, because in recent centuries, the Philosophical interest in Temporality has tended to focus on either personal experience, e. g. Kant, Bergson, and Heidegger, or History, e. g. Hegel, its significance to Political Philosophy has usually been no more than implicit.  Notable in that regard is Heidegger, whose hostility towards "everydayness", codified in his Being-beings duality, blinds him to the possibility that what he denigrates as 'ontic' Time can, rather, have Ontological import.

Democracy and Empiricism

Smith's "invisible hand", even if interpreted as a heuristic device, as he likely intends, not as an actual entity, as some of his self-styled followers presume, introduces a factor of Justice into his system of profit-seeking.  Mill's 'general good', and his distinction between 'higher' and 'lower' pleasure, introduce objective normative principles into Bentham's Psychological Egoism.  Each variation by these prominent Political Empiricists implicitly acknowledges a significant shortcoming of that doctrine--that wish-expression does not suffice as a foundation of a Poltical Philosophy.  Thus, insofar as the essence of Democracy is such wish-expression, i. e. electoral processes, it shares that weakness.  Now, while Smith's device may itself be no more than another example of wishful thinking, Mill's measures suggest how Democracy can be salvaged--via Education that re-directs conduct beyond immediate data, i. e. towards more comprehensive personal or collective ends.  But, whether or not such cultivation can be based strictly on Empiricist premises is unclear.

Empiricism, Populism, Progressivism

According to Political Empiricism, the foundation of any social organization is the perceived self-interests of its members, with, contrary to the Aristotelian thesis, perceived self-interest and actual self-interest identical.  Now, an often appealing manifestation of that ideology, commonly called 'Populism', illustrates at the same time some of its shortcomings.  For, to begin with, that appeal is a function of prior conditions, which determine whether an Empiricist moment is liberating, or is dissipation, e. g. Occupy Wall Street as a reaction to Plutocratic infection of Democracy, vs. the Ku Klux Klan as resistance to counter-segregation measures.  Furthermore, it also a function of what ensues, in the absence of which even an anti-tyrannical moment is merely nihilistic, e. g. the American Declaration of Independence without the subsequent construction of the United States Constitution.  So, Populism has value only as a stage of a more general Progressive process, to which an immediate perception is usually inadequate.

Conservatism, Liberalism, Progressivism

Every entity entails both a Unity and a Multiplicity, and Rationalism privileges the former, while Empiricism, the latter.  Now, in contemporary American Politics, 'Conservatism' and 'Liberalism' combine elements of each differently--in the former, adherence to tradition is Rationalistic, but its Individualism is Empiricistic; while in the latter, which in its history is, more accurately, 'Libertarianism', is also Individualistic, but the unifying factor is Government, not Tradition.  In contrast with Rationalist and Empiricist principles is Progressive Reason, varieties of which include Evolutionary Reason and Experimental Reason, which balances Unity and Multiplicity, by privileging neither.  Kuhn's concept of 'Scientific Revolution' illustrates that balance, in its rhythm of the introduction of a new fact, followed by its incorporation into an already established set of facts, expressed by the jettisoning of a less comprehensive hypothesis, in favor of a more comprehensive one.  Kuhn is plainly influenced by Dewey, who, correspondingly, is one of the pioneers of what can be called Political 'Progressivism'--though he himself used the term 'Liberalism' via 'Libertarianism'--a program of deliberate expansion of the body of self-determining individuals, and, hence, an alternative to both 'Conservatism' and 'Liberalism', at least in their prevalent contemporary connotations.

Empiricism and Political Philosophy

The standard academic segregation of Philosophy and Political Science makes it difficult to appreciate that Locke is the pioneer of Empiricism in not only Epistemology, but in Political Philosophy, as well, i. e. he conceives both as a posteriori.  Thus, just as what is 'true' is whatever happens to be believed, what is 'good' is whatever happens to be agreed upon.  Furthermore, as independent of prior conditions, Truth and Goodness are a-historical, i. e. there can be no Empiricist concept of History, only a manifold of unconnected events.  Now, the American Political system is Empiricist in its electoral processes, but not so in some of its other features, e. g. check-and-balance mechanisms, the possibility of amending the Constitution, etc., in which happenstance is potentially constrained.  In those respects, the system is Experimental, insofar as a novelty is further subject to integration into what has preceded.  Accordingly, Originalism, which presumes to adhere strictly to the intentions of the Founding Fathers, expresses an extreme anti-Empiricism.

History, Evolutionary Reason, Experimental Reason

While the essential moment of Analytical Reason is Inference, that of Dialectical Reason is Totalization.  Thus, correspondingly, according to some Rational concepts of History, new developments are deducible from their antecedents, while according to others, they are the results of the reconciliation of prior conflicts.  In contrast, what can be called Evolutionary Reason has two essential moments, often conflated--Mutation and Reintegration, e. g. the emergence of opposing thumbs, and the integration of them into the use of the hands, are distinct processes.  Now, the interrogative moment, i. e. 'What if X?', that initiates experimentation can be classified as a species of Mutation.  Thus, just as Evolutionary Reason can be conceived as a concept of History, so too can be Experimental Reason.

History, Necessity, Reason

Because Reason is traditionally conceived as entailing Necessity, and History as constituted by new events, the Rational concept of History has typically involved the reconciliation of Necessity and Novelty.  However, two prominent attempts at such a reconciliation have been inadequate.  For, on the one hand, in Teleological Reason, all apparently 'new' moments are entailed in their End, while, on the other, Dialectical Reason fails to explain how Necessity can be other than abstract.  In contrast, an alternative--Experimental Reason--jettisons any commitment to Necessity.  Previously analyzed here, the initial moment of this variety is the interrogative 'What if X?', its pattern can be conceived as an instance of Lucretian Swerve, and the charge that it is 'not Reason' can only be question-begging.  Indeed, even Descartes' axiom is preceded by what Dewey characterizes as a 'quest for certainty'.  So, for example, on the basis of this alternative, the American experiment that begins in the last quarter of the 18th century is exemplarily Rational.

Society, Rationality, History

One of the shortcomings of Plato's pioneering concept of a Rational society is an account of its genesis from non-Rational antecedent conditions.  The problem is not explicitly addressed until Hegel, likely influenced by Kant's concept of a 'Universal History', proposes that the historical process which yields such an ideal is itself Rational.  Still, his scheme remains speculative, until Marx interprets its pivotal moment, Contradiction, as an abstraction from concrete Class Conflict.  However, at the same, Marx uncritically assumes another of the abstract characteristics of the Hegelian scheme--Necessity--on the basis of which he asserts the inevitability of the revolutionary arrival of a Rational society.  But, subsequent events have tended to disprove that assertion, leaving the violence wreaked in its name groundless, and a Rational society unachievable.

Heredity and Election

Nietzsche's specific example of Experimentation--Eugenicism--is fatefully distorted by the Nazis.  For, while their ideal is 'racially pure', the means to which is inbreeding, Nietzsche's is a comprehensive type, the means to which is miscegenation.  Now, he likely did not consider one potential Democratic benefit of the latter--the elimination of ethnic antagonism.  Also, he seems not to have recognized the replacement of reproductive processes typically interpreted either as 'natural', or as 'random', with artefactual ones, as a clue to the essential innovation in the American experiment--the institution of electoral procedures to replace heredity as the primary determinant of succession.

Experiment, Oligarchy, Democracy

One blind-spot in Nietzsche's exhortation to Experimentalism, e. g. in Beyond Good and Evil, is the possibility of Dr. Mengele.  Now, whether or not that possibility is inherent in the concept of Experiment, in Nietzsche's case, it is independently rooted in his Oligarchical interpretation of the Will to Power as a principle of Overpowering.  In contrast, in Experimentation determined by the Will to Power qua principle of Empowerment, maximum strengthening of the Species is the aim, in the context of which no human is as disposable as any of Mengele's guinea pigs.  So, similarly rooted is another blind spot--his lack of recognition, implicit in the futural direction of that exhortation, of the innovations in Modern Political Philosophy, culminating in the experiment in Democracy of the American Founding Fathers, a century prior to Beyond Good and Evil.

Species and Political Philosophy

Receiving less attention than Nietzsche's anti-egalitarianism is his grounding it in a Species drive.  Accordingly, the Political Leader-Follower relation can likewise be interpreted Biologically, i. e.  Empowerment as Growth.  The perhaps unique capacity of a Species interpretation of Political phenomena has probably been best illustrated in the eventuation of a JFK program in a giant leap for mankind,  

Will to Power and Oligarchy

Nietzsche's apparent Oligarchism is in part derived from his concept of the Will to Power as aiming at the production of cumulative individuals, i. e. of individuals that comprehend all others.  Now, enthusiasm, both his and that of self-styled 'Nietzcheans' such Fascists and Leo Strauss, tend to ignore that on that concept, the ultimate aim of a music composer is the conductor of the performance of that music.  It also tends to ignore the implication that an apex benefits by cultivating the strata that supports it, resulting in a symbiosis that does not easily reduce to standard classification, including to Oligarchy.  Regardless, also implicit in the concept is that the Will to Power is a species drive, and, so, that the privileging of a type of Political organization is determined by the maximization strengthening of the species.  On that basis, a Nietzschean Oligarchical society is weaker than one in which each individual achieves maximum strength.  

Empowerment and Strengthening

In some of its more dramatic manifestations, Empowerment is easy to conceive dualistically, i. e. as a transition from an absence to a presence, e. g. Martin Luther King inspiring the taking of a previously forbidden seat, or the instituting of a right to vote.  However, some of those inspired by JFK to set imaginative goals, i. e. by his goal of a Moon-landing, or to magnanimity, i. e. by his Peace Corps initiative, are already in circumstances plentitude.  These examples demonstrate that Empowerment is fundamentally constituted by an increase in Power, of which the antecedent condition of no power is a special case, i. e. it fundamentally spans a condition of lesser, to one of greater, strength.

Leadership, Fetishism, Aggression

The proper object of Following is an example set by a Leader, not the Leader themselves.  The latter typically involves fetishizing someone's reputation or authority, no matter how noble their specific actions might be.  Also not to be confused with Leadership is aggression qua initiating a course of events.  So, a compound confusion is involved in the case of compliance with the authority of a belligerent ruler.  Conversely, the charge of 'failure of leadership' is not necessarily applicable in the case of an avoidance of proactive military action, especially when it is intended to set an example of temperate conduct.

Law and Leadership

A Law is generally conceived as an impersonal prohibition.  However, as defining a mode of behavior, it is individual, and tax-paying, military service, and parent-honoring, are examples of positive content in a Law.  So, a Law can be analyzed as a communication between Ruler and Subject.  But, insofar as compliance is mandatory, it is antithetical to the Leader-Follower relation, in which the conduct of the latter can only be voluntary.

Leadership and Empowerment

By setting an example, a Leader demonstrates to a Follower something that can be done, and, in the process, how it is done. In other words, a Leader can empower a Follower.  Accordingly, a Leader can strengthen a Political body in a way that no mere ruler can.

Democracy, Leadership, Power

To lead is to perform an act with the intention of setting an example.  To follow, therefore, is to imitate an example.  Thus, the essence of Democracy is the Leader-Follower relation, in which, qua ordered, the terms are unequal, while qua involving the performance of the same type of act, they are equal.  Now, the causality that generates the sequence can be characterized as Inspiration, a power which seems to escape Nietzsche's notice.  So, while positing that the Will to Power is essentially Oligarchical, on the basis of his focus on Conqueror-Conquered Domination-Submission relations, he misses the possibility of a manifestation of it in which a Democracy is potentially stronger than an Oligarchy.

Democracy, Leader, Follower

Though 'leader' and 'ruler' are sometimes casually used interchangeably, an important distinction between them can be inferred from one between their respective correlates, 'follower' and 'ruled'.  For, entailed in the former, but not in the latter, is that it becomes, in some respect, like what it follows.  In other words, qua possessing some characteristic, Leader and Follower are equal, but qua order of acquisition of the characteristic, they are not.  So, the Leader-Follower relation has an inherent Democratic structure, but one grounded personally, not imposed from without--its basis is not institutional, but volitional, i. e. a Leader sets an example that a Follower imitates. 

Circle, Democracy, Leadership

As has been previously discussed, a Circle, the two-dimensional figure one property of which is Area, needs to be distinguished from what the term usually denotes, i. e. the Circumference of a Circle.  Now, the Circle, properly conceived, illustrates a fundamental problem for Democracy--how, just as the Center of a Circle is both one among its many points, and is functionally unique among them, the Leader of a Democracy can be both only one member among the others, and, yet, is functionally distinctive.  In contrast, the mere Circumference of a Circle evades the problem, since its Center is not a part of the 'circle' thus understood, but is also the origin of all its points, thereby suggesting a Theocratic image.  Regardless, one approach to a solution is to conceive a Circle as dynamically generated radially from an initial point, a process that even the Emanatist Spinoza does not consider, so that the Center is both part of the generated Circle, and is, still, a unique point in it.  The resultant mode of organization can thus be conceived as Ordinal, i. e. the Center as the First point of a Circle, and, like, in any Ordinal sequence, only one among a plurality of constituents, the application of which to a Democracy is apt, since to 'lead' connotes to 'be first'.

Centralization, Democracy, Circle

One concept often associated with Political organization is degree of Centralization.  Now, the concept of Centralization entails that of the Circle.  But, the latter has been pervasively compromised by a profound error.  For, a standard definition of Circle is 'a set of points equidistant from some point', the main alternative to which is Spinoza's "the figure described by any line whereof one end is fixed and the other free".  However, neither formula is that of a Circle--each is that of the Circumference of a Circle.  So, while the latter might be suitable as an image of Egalitarianism, it abstracts from all other points of a Circle, notably the Center, which, on the basis of the definitions, is not part of a 'Circle', even while determining it.  Accordingly, Leadership, which can be symbolized as the 'Center' of any Polity, is unthinkable in a Democracy on the basis of that imagery, as is, therefore, any application to that structure of a concept of Centralization.

Democracy, Egalitarianism, Pluralism

Because the Modern emergence of Democracy involves the destruction of Medieval hierarchies, it is often interpreted as an Egalitarian trend.  Now, an important factor in any Theocracy is the concentration of access to scriptures.  But, as is concretely clear from Gutenberg's invention, the scriptures that ground Medieval hierarchies are pluralized, the result of which is universally equal access to them.  So, while Hierarchy and its leveling are different moments in the historical developments, the process itself can be interpreted as fundamentally one of Pluralization, with Egalitarianism as the hypostasization of one of its phases.  Accordingly, lacking in the Egalitarian-Inegalitarian debates that have been prominent in Political Philosophy since the emergence of Democracy is any attention to the possibility that the essence of the latter is its Pluralism.

Democracy and Plebiscite

While the United States may, in principle, at least, be "of" and "for" the people, in its actual operations, it is "by" representatives of the people.  For, its governance combines elements of Democracy, Oligarchy, e. g. Legislative branches, and Monarchy, e. g. Executive branches.  Given the infeasibility of a plebiscite process in most of its functions, the admixture of system seems to be a practical necessity, not only in current conditions, but also in a not implausible future expansion of the basic Political unit to a global society.  But, also no longer unimaginable in the ongoing rapid development of digital and nano-technology, is the implantation in each person of a chip that could facilitate a plebiscite in every political event.  Thus, size of a Polity and Technological capacity can be among the determining factors in the concept of a 'best' mode of organization.  Still, a plebiscite does not eliminate a resultant institution of a majority-minority hierarchy, i. e. in which the interests of the latter are subordinated to those of the former, so a pure Democracy, i. e. one in which unanimity rules, remains difficult to conceive.

Political Philosophy and Visionary Leadership

As History has shown, among the most important factors in a strong society is a visionary leader, and, as is clear in the cases of the founders of such societies, they tend to transcend specific modes of organization.  Accordingly, such examples demonstrate that the 'best' Political structure eludes easy formulation.  Now, such visionary leaders can be conceived as combining the wisdom of the Platonist or Aristotelian ruler, wih the creativity of Nietzschean artist.  So, in the absence of an adequate term for such a leader, a corresponding '-ocracy' that can suffice as a definition of the 'best' type of Political organization remains lacking.

Small Government and Anarchism

Insofar as the smallest Political unit is the Individual Person, the smallest type of Government is Individual Autonomy.  But Individual Autonomy can be the determining basis of a Political Philosophy only if it includes some thesis about collective organization, which in the case of Anarchism is Atomistic, i. e. usually that the best type of organization is universal Individual Autonomy, implicit in which is the calculation that the total strength of the Collective is the aggregate strengths of each of its members.  However, such Atomism is only a contingent doctrine, because it excludes the possibility that a visionary leader can increase the total strength by artful combination of the individual components, e. g. as a conductor orchestrates the various sounds of the individual musicians.  A similar counter-argument applies to weaker versions of 'Small Government', e. g. Libertarianism, Conservatism, etc., while exposing the premises that they can leave unaddressed when opposing 'larger' structures--the implicit premises that distinguish those doctrines from Anarchism, i. e. that at least some limitations of Individual Autonomy are conducive to the general Good, e. g. non-interference measures, etc.