Mutualism and Property

Proudhon's Mutualist theory of Property has two main principles: 1. The product of one's own labor is inalienably one's own, and 2. The means of production is collectively owned.  Now, while such an arrangement eliminates much exploitation, it is not completely coherent.  For, it leaves undeterminable the status both of the production of means of production, such as tools, and of the collective production of goods.  Common to the two problems is the absence of a formulation of the relation between My and Our, an absence that originates in that between I and We.

Mutualism and Solidarity

Proudhon conceives his Mutalist Anarchism to be Socialist, i. e. an associative solidarity.  However, one problem with his concept is that there is no systematic relation between Mutuality and Solidarity.  For, the former is constituted by a multiplicity of Is, while the latter consists in a We.  Similarly, Kant's Kingdom of Ends is an aggregate of Rational agents that is outside the scope of Synthesis--Quantity in his system is applicable to only Phenomenal entities, not to Noumenal ones like Rational agents, and, hence the aggregate cannot be unified while retaining internal distinctions.  In other words, a Mutualist collective can never be more than a concatenation of Individuals, i. e. can never solidify as a We.

Mutualist Anarchism and Rationality

The derivability of Mutualist Anarchism from Kantian Morality, previously discussed, thus marks it as a model of a Rational social system.  However, it diverges from Kant's Kingdom of Ends in two respects--it is not necessarily constituted by laws, and it includes no King.  The very brief and oblique allusion to a King in the Groundwork seems to imply that the monarch in question is Kant's deity, the positing of the existence of which is justified only elsewhere, in the 2nd Critique, by a dubious proof, as has been discussed here a while ago.  And, Kant never shows that the process of Universalization entailed in the functioning of Pure Practical Reason is ever more than a mental operation.  So, Mutualist Anarchism can be conceived as a critique of Kantian Rationalism, separating its essential features--Autonomy and End-in-Itself--from its inessential legalist Monarchism.

Mutualism, Form, Content

As has been previously discussed, Mutualism can be conceived as an instance of Kantian Morality, i. e. voluntary fairness combines the concepts of Autonomy and End-in-Itself.  Conversely, as an instance of Kantian Morality, Mutualism exposes an inadequacy of one of the prominent criticisms of that doctrine.  The criticism is that it is merely abstract, deficient for guiding concrete behavior.  However, Mutualism shows why such under-determination can be regarded as a virtue.  For, beyond the formal requirement that an exchange be fair, its details are contingent, determinable by the parties involved, not a priori.  In other words, the formal requirement is not, as is charged in the criticism, abstract, but, rather, concrete, awaiting content that complements it.  So, Mutualism illustrates that the Abstract-Concrete contrast that is the basis of the criticism is actually one of Form-Content, each of which is concrete.

Anarchism, Mutualism, Kantianism

Mutualism can be conceived as an instance of Kantian Morality--of the feature characterized as the End-in-Itself Duty.  For, treating another as an End in that system entails both elements of a Mutualist exchange--voluntary participation, i. e. Autonomy, and fairness, i. e. respect for the interest of another.  Now, one of the looser transitions in Kant's system is that from the Fundamental Principle of Pure Practical Reason to this Duty, i. e. the latter admirably enriches the former, but is not rigorously derived from it.  Similarly, Mutualism enhances Proudhon's Anarchism, but it is not logically entailed by it.  That looseness can explain why Wolff's Kantian defense of Anarchism, based on the concept of Autonomy, bypasses the parallel Kantianism of Proudhon's Mutualism.

Mutualism and Egoism

Mutualism entails the voluntary participation in equitable exchange, and, hence, that fairness is freely pursued.  However, Prouhon does not supply a principle that would ground such behavior, so it can only be an object of speculation.  Now, there can be little doubt that the principle is neither Psychological nor Ethical Egoism, each of which excludes Fairness as an immediate conative aim.  An alternative possibilty, one consistent with optimistic concepts of Human Nature, is the thesis of an instinct for Justice, though proof of the existence of such an instinct would seem difficult to establish, since that would require study of behavior under conditions that are completely abstracted from historical vicissitudes.  Instead, a more accessible possibility is Dewey's thesis that human behavior is essentually plastic, from which it follows that Mutualist conduct is the product of education.  In any case, at minimum, Mutualism is antithetical to any of the prominent traditional varieties of Egoism.

Democracy, Capitalism, Mutualism

Democracy combines Equality and Freedom, the actualization of which is more Art than either Science or Dialectical Necessity.  Now, Capitalism entails Freedom, but not Equality.  In contrast, the fundamental element of Proudhon's Mutualism, the voluntary and equitable Exchange, entails both Freedom and Equality.  Thus, despite the deeply ingrained, especially in the U. S., synonymity of Democracy and Capitalism, it is Mutualism, not the latter, that is the Economic system that is more appropriate to the former.