Het
onbehagen in de liberale democratie heeft de afgelopen decennia geleid tot een
aantal alternatieve democratie-opvattingen.
In de jaren '80 en '90 stond het communitarisme centraal; sinds 1997 (de verschijning van het boek
"Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom and Government" van Philip
Pettit) is het republikanisme aan een opmars bezig. Hieronder een lemma uit de online encyclopedie van Standford.
Het is
zaak het republikanisme duidelijk te onderscheiden van het liberalisme en het
communitarisme, maar tevens van het "burgerhumanisme".
Ook
het Franse "républicanisme" kent belangrijke verschillen met het
Angelsaksische "republicanism".
De Franse variant is verwant aan de "harde"
democratie-opvatting van Jean-Jacques Rousseau, terwijl de Angelsaksische versie leenplichtig is aan
"zachtere" visie van Charles Montesquieu en, later, Alexis de Tocqueville.
]]>
____________
Republicanism
In
political theory and philosophy, the term 'republicanism' is generally used in
two different, but closely related, senses. In the first sense, republicanism
refers to a loose tradition or family of writers in the history of western
political thought, including especially: Machiavelli and his fifteenth-century
Italian predecessors; the English republicans Milton, Harrington, Sidney, and
others; Montesquieu and Blackstone; the eighteenth-century English
commonwealthmen; and many Americans of the founding era such as Jefferson and
Madison. The writers in this tradition emphasize many common ideas and
concerns, such as the importance of civic virtue and political participation,
the dangers of corruption, the benefits of a mixed constitution and the rule of
law, etc.; and it is characteristic of their rhetorical style to draw heavily
on classical examples--from Cicero and the Latin historians especially--in
presenting their arguments. (In light of the last point, this is sometimes
referred to as the 'classical republican' or 'neo-roman' tradition in political
thought.)
Beyond
this brief sketch of the classical republican tradition, there exists
considerable historiographical controversy--with respect to who the tradition's
members are, and their relative significance; with respect to how we should
interpret its underlying philosophical commitments; and with respect to its
role (especially vis-à-vis liberalism) in the historical development of modern
political thought. This brings us to the second sense of the term
'republicanism'. In contemporary political philosophy, it most often refers to
a specific (and still contested) interpretation of the classical republican
tradition, associated especially with the work of Quentin Skinner; together
with a research program dedicated to developing insights from this tradition into
an attractive contemporary political doctrine, associated especially with the
work of Philip Pettit. According to republicans in this second sense (sometimes
called 'civic republicans' or 'neo-republicans'), the paramount republican
value is political liberty, understood as non-domination or independence from
arbitrary power. This entry will primarily discuss republicanism in this second
sense.
In
their interpretation of the classical republicanism tradition, civic
republicans are often in debate with civic humanists, with whom they are often
confused (see the entry on civic humanism). Developed as a contemporary
political doctrine, civic republicanism is broadly speaking progressive and
liberal, but not without important distinct features. Some of its policy
implications diverge from mainstream liberalism in particular ways, and for
this reason civic republicans are sometimes also confused with communitarians
(see the entry on communitarianism). For the strengths or weakness of civic
republicanism to be fairly assessed, both confusions should be assiduously
avoided.
1. Political Liberty as Non-Domination
Absolutely
central to the contemporary civic republican program is the conception of
political liberty as non-domination or independence from arbitrary power, and
so it makes good sense to begin with an explication of this idea.
1.1 Political Liberty, Positive and Negative
It is
notorious that there are several competing conceptions of political liberty.
The now standard account was laid down most influentially by Isaiah Berlin in
his famous lecture on "Two Concepts of Liberty" (Berlin 1969). According to the
first, 'negative' conception of liberty, people are free simply to the extent
that their choices are not interfered with. There are many variations on this
conception, depending on how exactly one wants to define 'interference', but
they all have in common the basic intuition that to be free is, more or less,
to be left alone to do whatever one chooses. This idea of negative liberty
Berlin associates especially with the classic English political philosophers
Hobbes, Bentham, and J. S. Mill, and it is today probably the dominant
conception of liberty, particularly among contemporary Anglo-American
philosophers. In Mill's well-known words, "the only freedom which deserves the
name, is that of pursuing our own good in our own way, so long as we do not
attempt to deprive others of theirs" (1859, 17).
The
second, 'positive' conception of liberty is not quite so easy to define.
Roughly speaking, a person or group is free in the positive sense to the extent
that they exercise self-control or self-mastery. It is not agreed, however,
what exactly constitutes this self-mastery in the relevant sense. According to
one particularly influential account, to be free in the positive sense is to be
able to act on one's second-order desires (Frankfurt 1982). For example, the
addicted gambler may be free in the negative sense not to gamble--since no one
actually forces him to--, but he is not free in the positive sense unless he can
actually succeed in acting on his presumed second-order desire not to desire
gambling. Berlin associates this second conception especially with such
continental philosophers as Spinoza, Rousseau, and Hegel. Although it found
some support among English Hegelians like T. H. Green, those who advocate the
positive conception of liberty have generally been in the minority,
particularly among contemporary Anglo-American philosophers.
The
troubling implications of the positive conception of liberty are well-known,
and need not be rehearsed here. For the most part, these stem from the problem
that freedom in the positive sense would seem to license fairly extensive
coercion on behalf of individuals' allegedly 'real' interests--for example,
coercively forcing the gambler to quit on the presumption that this is, in
fact, what he really wants to do (even if he doesn't say so). Regarding this
danger, Berlin writes:
It is
one thing to say that I may be coerced for my own good which I am too blind to
see: this may, on occasion, be for my benefit ... . [But] it is another to say
that if it is my good, then I am not being coerced, for I have willed it,
whether I know this or not, and am free (or 'truly' free) even when my poor
earthly body and foolish mind bitterly reject it, and struggle against those
who seek however benevolently to impose it ... . (1969, 134)
Liberals
like Berlin have thus understandably rejected the positive, and emphatically
embraced the negative conception of liberty. The question remains, however,
whether the received view of negative liberty as non-interference in particular
adequately captures the political ideal we should be most interested in.
Contemporary civic republicans argue that it does not.
1.2 Liberty as Non-Domination
By way
of illustration, consider the following scenarios (both are standard examples
in the republican literature). In the first, imagine a group of slaves with a
generally well-meaning master. While the latter has an
institutionally-protected right to treat his slaves more or less as he pleases
(he might start whipping them just for the heck of it, say), let us suppose
that this master in particular leaves his slaves for the most part alone. Now
to the extent that he does not in fact interfere with his slaves on a
day-to-day basis, we are committed to saying--on the non-interference view of
liberty--that they enjoy some measure of freedom. Some find this conclusion
deeply counterintuitive: if there is anything to the idea of political liberty,
one might think, surely it cannot be found in the condition of slavery!
Even
if we are willing to accept this conclusion, the non-interference view of
liberty commits us to others that are perhaps even more paradoxical. For one
thing, notice that we are committed to saying that the slaves of our
well-meaning master enjoy greater freedom than the slaves of an abusive master
down the road. Of course, the former slaves are better off in some respect than
the latter, but do we really want to say that they are more free? For another,
consider the slave who, over time, comes to understand his master's
psychological dispositions better and better. Taking advantage of this improved
insight, he manages to keep on his master's good side, and is consequently
interfered with less and less. Thus, on the non-interference view of liberty,
we are committed to say that his freedom is increasing over time. Again, while
it is clear that the slave's greater psychological insight improves his
well-being in some respect, do we really want to say that it increases his
freedom specifically?
Now
consider a second scenario. Imagine the colony of a great imperial power.
Suppose that the colonial subjects have no political rights, and thus that the
imperial power governs them unilaterally. But further suppose that the imperial
power, for one reason or another, chooses not to exercise the full measure of
its authority--that its policy towards the colony is one of more or less benign
neglect. From the point of view of liberty as non-interference, we must
conclude that the colonial subjects enjoy considerable freedom with respect to
their government for, on a day-to-day basis, their government hardly ever
interferes with them. Next suppose that the colonial subjects revolt with
success, and achieve political independence. The former colony is now
self-governing. We may imagine, however, that the new government is somewhat
more active than its imperial predecessor, passing laws and instituting
policies that interfere with people's lives to a greater extent than formerly
was the case. On the view of liberty as non-interference, we must therefore say
that there has been a decline in freedom with independence. As in the first
scenario, many find this counterintuitive. Surely, a nation that has gained
independence must have increased its political liberty.
What
these examples are driving at is that political liberty might better be
understood as a sort of structural relationship that exists between persons or
groups, rather than as a contingent outcome of that structure. Whether a master
chooses to whip his slave on any given day, we might say, is a contingent
outcome; what is not contingent (or at least not in the same way) is the
broader configuration of laws, institutions, and norms that effectively allows
him to do so or not as he pleases.
The
republican conception of political liberty aims to capture this insight as
directly as possible. It defines freedom as a sort of independence--as the
condition of not being subject to the arbitrary power of a master. Pettit, who
has done more than anyone else to develop this republican conception of freedom
philosophically, puts it thus: a person or group enjoys freedom to the extent
that no other person or group has "the capacity to interfere in their affairs
on an arbitrary basis" (1999, 165; cf. Pettit 1996, 1997, 2001, 2002, 2003). On
a plausible rendering of the term 'domination' as, roughly speaking, arbitrary
power (see Wartenberg 1990; Pettit 1996, 1997; Lovett 2001), we might
equivalently say that freedom in the republican sense is the enjoyment of
non-domination.
1.3 Republican versus Negative Liberty
Notice
that the republican view of freedom is, at least in the broad sense, a negative
conception of political liberty. One need not do or become anything in
particular to enjoy political liberty in the republican sense; one need not
exercise self-mastery, on any view of what that entails, nor succeed in acting
on one's second-order desires. Republican freedom merely requires the absence
of something, namely, the absence of dependence on arbitrary power or
domination. (Also like non-interference, non-domination comes in degrees; on
the civic republican view, one is not either free or unfree, but rather more or
less free depending on the extent of non-domination one enjoys.)
Despite
these similarities, however, republican freedom is not equivalent to the
received view of negative liberty as non-interference. In contrast to the
non-interference view, it easily accounts for our intuitions in the two
scenarios described above. The slave lacks freedom because he is vulnerable to
the arbitrary power of his master; whether his master happens to exercise that
power is neither here nor there. Likewise, what matters with respect to
political freedom on the republican view is not how much the imperial power
chooses to govern its colony, but the fact that the former may choose to govern
the latter as much and however it likes.
Moreover,
the republican conception captures in a more intuitively satisfying way what
would improve either situation with respect to political liberty. Most people
are not inclined to say that slaves enjoy increasing freedom just because, with
experience, they improve their insight into their master's psychological
dispositions. But many would be inclined to say that their freedom is enhanced,
other things being equal, if some effective reform in the laws, institutions,
or norms sharply regulates their master's authority over them. (This is not
necessarily to say that they enjoy greater well-being, all things
considered--only that because their domination is lessened, they enjoy greater
freedom to that extent.) And of course, no matter how benevolent their
particular master happens to be, no slave can be completely free until the
institution of slavery itself is abolished.
Political
freedom, in other words, is the upshot of rightly-ordered laws, institutions,
and norms, and thus only changes in how those laws, institutions, and norms
effectively structure the relationships existing between the various persons
and groups in a community can change the level or degree of freedom they enjoy
(Pettit 1989, 1997, 2003; Maynor 2003).
2. Republican Liberty: Problems and Debates
The
appeal of the republican conception of political liberty as independence from
the arbitrary power of a master is perhaps understandable. This is not to say,
however, that this conception is uncontroversial. Before discussing its role in
developing contemporary civic republican arguments, we should consider various
problems and debates surrounding the republican idea of freedom.
2.1 What about non-interference?
A
common objection to the republican idea of freedom is that it fails to pick out
an distinct conception at all. The suggestion here, first noted perhaps by
Paley (1785), is that talking about non-domination is really just another (more
obscure) way of talking about security of non-interference. Contemporary civic
republicans must reject this view. Pettit (1997, 73-4) observes that one might
secure a low expected level of non-interference in more than one way, and the
republican idea of freedom is by no means indifferent as to the method adopted.
For example, to have a master with an exceptionally benevolent disposition is
to be reasonably secure in one's expectation that one will not often be
adversely interfered with--but it is to have a master nonetheless. The
republican idea of freedom specifically instructs us not to make our master a
better person (the goal of the old "mirror for princes" literature), but to
render him less of a master. This can only be done by curbing either his
arbitrary power, or his subjects' dependency on him.
Supposing
then that non-domination and non-interference are indeed distinct ideas, one
might wonder where this leaves the latter, on the civic republican view of
things. Is obtaining freedom from arbitrary power the only thing we should care
about? Roughly speaking, there are three possible answers civic republicans
might give to this question.
The
first is simply to answer yes. It was a mistake, one might argue, to ever think
non-interference important or desirable in itself. Of course, as a contingent
empirical fact, extensive arbitrary power often brings extensive interferences
in train (slave masters and absolute monarchs just can't help meddling in their
subjects' affairs, one might think), so it is understandable that our distaste
for the former should influence our assessment of the latter. There are good
reasons for rejecting this first answer, however. Imagine living in a community
where our lives are regulated down to the tiniest detail, but always in strict
accordance with commonly-known, non-arbitrary rules and procedures. Although we
enjoy extensive freedom from arbitrary power, we have hardly any freedom of
individual choice. Most would not want to live in such a community, and this
suggests that we do indeed place some independent value on non-interference.
This
leaves two other possible answers. On the one hand, we might try to incorporate
some measure of non-interference into our idea of freedom as non-domination.
Something like this approach is taken by Pettit (1997, 74-7; cf., Pettit 2002).
He distinguishes between factors that "compromise" liberty, and factors that
"condition" it. My republican freedom is compromised when someone gains
arbitrary power over me, but it is merely conditioned when I lack the means or
opportunities to make full use of it. He then goes on to argue that
interferences are one such conditioning factor. On the other hand, we might
allow that republican freedom and non-interference are both valuable and
distinct goods. We might then either regard them as having roughly equal value
(Skinner 1998), or regard republican liberty as having greater importance than
non-interference (Viroli 2002). Each of these options has its advantages and
disadvantages, and there is no settled view in the contemporary civic
republican literature on this point.
2.1 What Counts as 'Arbitrary' Power?
A
second major difficulty in developing the republican idea of freedom lies in
giving precise meaning to the notion of arbitrariness. According to what
criteria are we to consider power arbitrary? Not simply when its exercise is
random or unpredictable. This view would undermine the whole point of the
republican conception of political liberty. As discussed above, with long
experience a slave is better able to predict his masters' behavior, and so it
appears less random to him, but (the civic republican wants to argue) the slave
does not enjoy greater freedom by that fact alone. Just because one is better
able to cope with arbitrary power, it does not follow that one's domination is
any less.
'Discretionary'
is much closer to the relevant meaning of arbitrary, but it is not quite right
either. Discretionary power might be delegated to a public agency with a view
to advancing certain policy goals or ends--as for example Congress has delegated
discretionary authority to the Federal Reserve--but we would not want to say
that this reduces our freedom (or, at any rate, not so long as that
discretionary authority is appropriately answerable to a common knowledge
understanding of the goals or ends it is meant to serve and the means it is
permitted to employ). For reasons explained further in the fourth section of
this entry, contemporary civic republicans must be able to offer an account of
non-arbitrary, yet discretionary authority.
How
then should we define arbitrary power? There are at least two possible answers
to this question. The first is to define it procedurally. Power is arbitrary,
on this view, to the extent that it is not externally constrained by effective
rules, procedures, or goals that are common knowledge to all persons or groups
concerned (Lovett 2001). This would have the effect, roughly, of equating
republican freedom with the traditional idea of the rule of law (provided we
are willing to extend the latter idea considerably).
Alternatively,
we might define arbitrariness substantively: power is arbitrary, on this second
view, when it fails to track the "welfare and world-view" of those affected
(Pettit 1997, 56). This substantive definition, however, is open to at least
three possible interpretations, depending on whether we interpret the welfare
and world-view of those affected as (a) their objectively-defined interests,
(b) their subjective preferences, or (c) their shared ideas as expressed
through suitably-structured deliberative procedures. These might be called the
common good, welfarist, and democratic interpretations, respectively (see
Richardson 2002).
The
disadvantages of the welfarist interpretation are obvious in light of
well-known preference aggregation problems. In earlier work, Pettit (1997)
seemed inclined towards some version of the common good interpretation, but
this too has significant drawbacks. In particular, it would seem to collapse
our conception of republican freedom into a general account of the human good
(McMahon 2005). Thus many contemporary civic republicans have followed Pettit's
lead in latching on to the democratic interpretation of the substantive
definition (Pettit 1999, 2001; Richardson 2002). Difficulties here remain,
however.
2.3 Republican Freedom and the Human Good
So far
we have assumed that, however ultimately defined, republican freedom is always
a good thing. Some have wondered whether this is the case, however. This
objection is most often expressed via the example of benevolent care-giving
relationships. On the republican view that one enjoys freedom only to the
extent that one is independent from arbitrary power, it would seem that
children do not enjoy republican freedom with respect to their parents. But
surely, one might suppose, the parent-child relationship is (in most cases) an
extremely valuable one, and so we would not want greater republican freedom in
such a context. Republican freedom is, perhaps, not always a good thing.
As
stated, this objection rests on a conceptual error, though (as we shall see) it
points to an important set of issues as yet under-developed in the contemporary
civic republican literature. The error in the above example stems from our
confusing an overall evaluation of a whole with an evaluation of its parts
considered separately. It is undeniable that, at least in the ordinary course
of things, parent-child relationships are extremely valuable, considered as a
whole; it does not follow from this, however, that this relationship is
necessarily valuable in each and every part. For the objection to hold, it must
be the case--not only that the parent-child relationship is valuable overall--but
further, that that it would actually be worse if, holding all its other
features constant, it involved less arbitrary power. But this is highly
doubtful. Clearly, the introduction of children's rights into western law was a
boon, precisely because it reduced the arbitrariness of the power to which
children are inevitably subject (which is to say, because it increased their
republican freedom). That their republican freedom cannot be increased still
further, perhaps, without destroying family life altogether, and thus loosing
its many other benefits, is neither here nor there.
What
consideration of this faulty objection does reveal, however, is that republican
freedom is simply one good among others, with which it might come into
conflict. The challenge for contemporary civic republicans, therefore, is not
to show why the freedom from dependence on arbitrary power is an important
human good (for which there are plenty of good arguments in the literature),
but rather to show how republican freedom fits into a broader conception of
human flourishing, and specifically, the comparative weight we should assign to
republican freedom vis-à-vis other important human goods in the achievement of
human flourishing.
3. The Classical Republican Tradition
Contemporary
civic republicans have drawn on insights from the classical republican
tradition in developing their political doctrines. But their interpretation of
this tradition is hardly uncontroversial. This section will discuss the
relevant debates, and explain how they relate to the conception of political
liberty outlined above.
3.1 The Neo-republican Revival
After
long-standing neglect among historians of political thought, there has been a
dramatic revival of interest in the classical republican tradition in the past
fifty years or so. For the first few decades of this revival, a particular
interpretation of that tradition prevailed. According to this view, the
classical republicans held what would now be described as a perfectionist
political philosophy--that is, a political philosophy centered on the idea of
promoting a specific conception of the good life as consisting in active
citizenship and healthy civic virtue on the one hand, while combating any sort
of corruption that would undermine these values on the other. This distinctive
vision of the good life is supposed to be rooted in the experience of the
ancient Greek polis, especially as expressed in the writings of Aristotle. The
goods of active political participation, civic virtue, and so on, are to be
understood as intrinsically valuable components of human flourishing.
It is
now standard to refer to this as the 'civic humanist' interpretation of the
classical republican tradition. Major figures associated with this view include
Arendt (1958, 1963, 1968), Wood (1969), Pocock (1975), Worden (1994), and Rahe
(1992). The civic humanist program has left such an impression on the field
that it probably remains the most widespread view today, especially among those
who are not themselves experts in the history of political thought. This no
doubt largely accounts for the continuing confusion of civic republicanism with
civic humanism (for a recent example, see Honohan 2002).
Among
the more specialized historians of political thought, however, civic humanism
has largely, though not completely, given way to civic republicanism. This has
in large part been due to the path-breaking research of Skinner (1978, 1984,
1991). Following his lead, contemporary civic republicans have in recent years
advanced revised interpretations of Machiavelli (Skinner 1981, 1983, 1984;
Viroli 1990, 1998), the seventeenth-century English republicans (Skinner 1998,
2000; Dzelzainis 1995, 2001; Lovett 2005), and Rousseau (Viroli 1988), among
others.
3.2 The Historiographical Debate
One
relatively simple way to characterize the contemporary debate between civic
humanists and civic republicans is as a debate regarding the meaning of
political liberty in the classical republican tradition. If there is one
overriding commitment shared by all the classical republicans, it is clearly
their commitment to the paramount value of political liberty. This fact is
obvious from even the most casual reading of the relevant texts and, naturally,
is denied by no one; the question is only what to make of it.
As we
have seen, civic humanists argue that the goods of active political
participation, civic virtue, and so on, should be understood in the classical
republican tradition as intrinsically valuable components of human flourishing.
In order to reconcile this interpretation with the classical republican's
emphatic commitment to political liberty, however, one must interpret their
view of freedom in a particular way. Specifically, freedom must be seen as
consisting in an active participation in the political process of
self-determination. In Arendt's language, the polis is "a kind of theater where
freedom could appear," and the political sphere "is the realm where freedom is
a worldly reality" (1968, 154). That is to say, to enjoy political freedom is
to share in the good life, understood as active citizenship and civic virtue.
Referring back to Berlin's typology, this is clearly a sort of positive
liberty.
It
should be no surprise that contemporary civic republicans interpret the
classical tradition quite differently. A detailed examination of the source
materials, in their view, illustrates that the classical republicans held a
decidedly negative conception of political liberty--and indeed, the republican
conception of freedom as independence from arbitrary power in particular (see
especially Skinner 1984, 1991, 1998; Pettit 1997; Viroli 2002). The idea of
liberty in the classical republican tradition has its roots not in an
Aristotelian vision of the ancient Greek polis, but rather in Roman
jurisprudence with its fundamental and categorical distinction between free men
and citizens on the one hand, and dependent slaves on the other.
Given
the rhetorical prominence of liberty in the classical republican writings, it
follows from their holding a negative conception of freedom that they cannot
have been advancing a perfectionist political philosophy, as the civic
humanists claim. This of course is not to deny the importance of active
political participation, civic virtue, combating corruption, and so on to the
classical republicans. But rather than viewing these as intrinsically valuable
components of a particular vision of the good life, they must instead be viewed
as instrumentally valuable for securing and preserving political liberty,
understood as independence from arbitrary rule (Skinner 1984, 1991; Maynor
2003). Contemporary civic republicans argue that a careful reading of the
classical republican texts firmly supports this instrumental view, rather than
the intrinsic perfectionist view advanced by civic humanists.
3.3 Classical Republicanism and Liberalism
The
contemporary civic republican interpretation carries with it what could be seen
as an significant drawback, namely, it reduces dramatically the distance
between classical republicanism and the mainstream liberal tradition. At one
level, this should surprise no one. After all, classical republicans and
classical liberals shared many political commitments (constitutionalism and the
rule of law, for example), and many figures are regarded as central to both
traditions (Montesquieu, for example). The difficulty arises, however, from the
suggestion that on the new instrumental interpretation, republicanism for all
intents and purposes collapses into liberalism (Herzog 1986, Haakonssen 1993,
Patten 1996, Dagger 1997). Indeed, at one point in his Political Liberalism,
Rawls explicitly states that his theory has "no fundamental opposition" with a
non-perfectionist, instrumental interpretation of republicanism (1993, 205).
What then could the advantage of civic republicanism over mainstream liberalism
be?
The
standard reply to this among contemporary civic republicans is to argue that
there is indeed a connection between republicanism and liberalism, but that
liberalism is "an impoverished or incoherent republicanism" (Viroli 2002, 61)--a
bastard offshoot, so to speak, of what was originally a considerably more
appealing political philosophy.
Republicanism
does not collapse into liberalism if there is a real and substantial difference
between the former's view of liberty as independence from arbitrary power, and
the view of negative liberty as non-interference, generally embraced by the
latter. Contemporary civic republicans, quite naturally, insist that there is.
The significance of this difference will be easier to assess after the
discussion below, but in the main it comes down to this: on the view of
negative liberty as non-interference, any sort of public law or policy
intervention counts by definition as an interference and, ergo, a reduction in
freedom. Being committed to the received view of negative liberty, liberals
thus tend to be overly hostile to government action.
On the
republican view of political liberty, by contrast, public laws or policy
interventions need not necessarily count as reductions in freedom. Provided
that the law or policy is adopted and implemented in an appropriately
non-arbitrary manner, the citizens' freedom remains untouched. Indeed, if the
law or policy ameliorates dependency, or curtails the arbitrary powers some
exercise over others in the community, the freedom of citizens may be enhanced.
In the classical tradition, this idea was often expressed as the idea that, as
Blackstone for example puts it, "laws, when prudently framed, are by no means
subversive but rather introductive of liberty" and thus "where there is no law,
there is no freedom" (1765, 122). The grounds for this view will be explained
further below.
4. The Contemporary Republican Program
However
interesting the historiographical debates discussed in the previous section,
one may still wonder whether republicanism has anything valuable to contribute
to contemporary normative political theory and philosophy. One reason many
people remain skeptical has to do with the fact that the classical republican
writings often express views that are decidedly elitist, patriarchal, and
militaristic. How could the basis for an appealing contemporary political
program be found in such writings (Goldsmith 2000)?
That
the classical republicans often expressed these very unappealing views is not
disputed. But what are we to make of this fact? There are two possibilities. On
the one hand, the parochialism of the classical republicans might reflect
logical consequences of their core value commitments, in which case we cannot
adopt the latter without taking on board the former. On the other hand, it
might merely reflect the accidental prejudice of their day, in which case it
can easily be dispensed with as we modernize the republican program. Now
according to the civic humanist reading of the tradition, the classical
republicans were committed to a perfectionist conception of the human good as
active citizenship and civic virtue. On this view, it is clear that some
individuals will be more successful than others in attaining the good so
understood--some are more adept at politics than others, some are more capable
of heroic displays of virtue than others, and so on. Indeed, political power
and public honor are, to some extent, positional goods, meaning that their
distribution among the members of a community will necessarily be unequal. It
follows that, on the civic humanist reading of the tradition, the elitist bent
of the classical republican writings is a consequence of their core values.
The
civic republicans, naturally, reject this view. There is nothing inherently
elitist about the ideal of freedom when this is understood negatively as
independence from arbitrary power. The classical republicans, to be sure,
typically confined the extension of this ideal to a narrow range of propertied,
native-born male citizens. But, on the civic republican reading of the
tradition, this merely reflects an unnecessary prejudice we can easily dispense
with. Suitably universalized, the classical republican ideal of freedom as
non-domination is indeed a strikingly progressive political doctrine (Pettit
1997; Maynor 2003). Indeed, Pettit goes so far as to argue that the potentially
radical nature of the ideal was itself partly the reason early liberals rejected
it, in favor of a less demanding ideal of liberty as non-interference (1997,
49).
The
remainder of this section will sketch some of the wide-ranging applications of
a universalized republicanism, dedicated to the promotion of freedom as
non-domination. Much of the contemporary republican program, as one would
expect, bares some familial relationship with the political commitments of the
classical republicans. There are also divergences, however. Contemporary civic
republicans draw inspiration from the classical tradition, but they do not aim
to anachronistically implement the republicanism of yore for its own sake.
4.1 Criminal Justice and the Rule of Law
Contemporary
civic republicans aim to promote freedom, understood as independence from
arbitrary power. Roughly speaking, there are two directions from which
republican freedom might be threatened. First, there is the obvious danger of
an autocratic or despotic government assuming arbitrary powers over its
subjects; this concern, and republican remedies for it, will be discussed
below. But there is a second danger to republican freedom as well--one that
concerns contemporary civic republicans just as much as the first. This is the
danger that some individuals or groups within civil society will succeed in
assuming arbitrary powers over others. A few examples will help clarify this
second danger.
Imagine
for a moment there were no system of domestic criminal and civil law. In this
case, citizens would not know where they stood with one another; their
interrelations would be governed simply by force--which is to say, by the
arbitrary whim of the momentarily stronger party. In order to enjoy some degree
of republican freedom, therefore, it is absolutely essential to introduce a
domestic legal system so as to govern the citizens' mutual relations. Notice
that, on the republican view of freedom, the laws do not merely protect some
freedoms at the expense of others (as on the non-interference view), but rather
themselves actually introduce or enable that freedom. On this view, only when
their interrelations are mutually governed by a system of commonly-known and
stable rules is it possible for fellow citizens to enjoy some measure of
independence from arbitrary rule (Pettit 1989, 1997; Viroli 2002).
This
connection between the rule of law and freedom is a common theme in the
classical republican literature. Contemporary civic republicans observe,
however, that even when the rule of law is firmly established, there remain
other potential dangers of which the classical republicans were less well
aware. For example, there is the danger that basic needs deprivations will
place the least advantaged members of society in a position of economic
vulnerability (Pettit 1997; Viroli 2002). In order to satisfy their basic
needs, individuals may well submit themselves to the arbitrary power of
exploitative employers or become dependent on the whims of voluntary charity.
Ensuring the enjoyment of republican freedom may therefore require some public
provision for otherwise unmet basic needs. Yet another danger to republican
freedom arises in the context of family life and gender relations. Traditional
family law subjected both wives and children to considerable arbitrary power:
circumstances in the case of the latter, circumscribed opportunities in the
case of the former, ensured the nearly complete dependency of both on the
family they happened to be in. The contemporary civic republican program is
thus congenial to both an expansion of children's rights, and the elimination
of sex domination (Pettit 1997).
It is
always important from a civic republican point of view to be on guard against
the introduction of new forms of dependency and arbitrary power through those
very laws and policies designed to enhance individual freedom. In the area of
criminal and civil law, for example, freedom might be threatened by legal
uncertainty or prosecutorial discretion; and, of course, there are grave
republican concerns with respect to the existing system of punishment in many
western nations (see Braithwaite and Pettit 1990). Similarly, in the public
provision of basic needs, there are republican concerns with respect to
dependence on government aid and arbitrariness in the distribution of benefits
that might point to the introduction of an unconditional basic income. In many
of these areas, however, there remains considerable work for contemporary civic
republicans in determining the appropriate public policy implications of a
universalized concern for republican freedom.
4.2 Republican Government
Turning
from questions of public policy to the form of government, we return to issues
more familiar to the writers in the classical tradition. Protecting citizens
from the arbitrary power of their government through good institutional design
represents perhaps the signature classical republican concern. Many of the
standard devices for achieving this aim--the rule of law, the separation of
powers, federalism, constitutionally entrenched basic rights, and so on--have
been adopted by liberals and others. Contemporary civic republicans, naturally,
remain committed to these institutional devices in some measure (Pettit 1997,
2001; Maynor 2003).
However,
contemporary civic republicans also recognize that these sorts of devices can
only go so far. The basic reason for this is that, no matter how carefully
designed, the operation and functioning of government necessarily entails
considerable discretion on the part of public authorities (Pettit 1997;
Richardson 2002). There are two especially prominent instances of this. First,
it is clear that no matter how detailed and carefully-crafted it is, no system
of explicit rules and regulations can possibly cover all contingencies and
circumstances. It follows that discretionary authority must inevitably be left
in the hands of courts, public agencies, and administrative bureaucracies.
Second, even apart from this, there remains extensive discretion in the hands
of legislatures to set public law and policy in the first place. A
daily-changing system of rules is no better than having no rules at all.
The
standard republican remedy for this problem is enhanced democracy. It must,
however, be democracy of the right sort. In particular, contemporary civic
republicans reject the populist model of democracy according to which all
public laws and policies must express the collective will of the people in
order to be considered legitimate. Instead, they generally endorse some form of
"qualified populism" (Richardson 2002) or "contestatory democracy" (Pettit
1997, 1999, 2001; Maynor 2003). Roughly speaking, the idea is that
properly-designed democratic institutions should give citizens the effective
opportunity to contest the decisions of their representatives. This possibility
of contestation will make government agents wielding discretionary authority answerable
to a public understanding of the goals or ends they are meant to serve and the
means they are permitted to employ. In this way, discretionary power can be
rendered non-arbitrary in the sense required for the secure enjoyment of
republican liberty.
Next,
of course, we will want to know what, pragmatically speaking, the requirements
of suitable democratic contestation turn out to be. These are commonly
addressed under three headings, outlined by Pettit (1997). The first and most
thoroughly discussed is the requirement that discretionary decision-making be
guided by the norm of deliberative public reasoning. This means that the
relevant decision-makers (legislatures, courts, bureaucrats, etc.) must be
required to present reasons for their decisions, and those reasons must be
subject to open public debate (see Sunstein 1993; Pettit 1997; Richardson
2002). So, for example, legislative processes should be designed so as to
discourage back-room bargaining on the basis of sectional interests, and to encourage
open public deliberation instead. Similarly, bureaucratic agencies should not
be allowed to merely issue determinations on the basis of technocratic
expertise without offering reasons for their decisions that are open to public
challenge.
The
other two requirements have not received as much attention as the first,
perhaps because both are relatively obvious. The second is that of
inclusiveness. Opportunities for democratic contestation must be equally open
to all persons and groups in the society. This requirement follows naturally
from a universalized concern for republican liberty, and it has implications
for the design of representative institutions, campaign financing, and so on
(Pettit 1997). And the third requirement is that there exist institutionalized
forums for contestation--impartial 'courts of appeal,' so to speak, where
citizens can raise objections to public laws and policies (Pettit 1997, 1999).
4.3 Civic virtue and corruption
Among
the more salient themes in the classical republican tradition are the
importance of civic virtue and the dangers of corruption. We may understand the
term 'corruption' simply to mean the advancement of personal or sectional
interest at the expense of the public good, and 'civic virtue' as its
opposite--that is, a willingness to do one's part in supporting the public good.
Critics of republicanism often fear that this implies extensive self-sacrifice
and frugality, a renunciation of individuality and self-identification with the
community. These fears are no doubt encouraged by the civic humanist reading of
the classical tradition along perfectionist lines. Civic republicans
accordingly have been at pains to show the contrary--that civic virtue should be
understood as a strictly instrumental good, useful in establishing and
maintaining republican liberty. Far from calling for the subjection of
individual to collective aims, they argue, republican liberty is desirable in
part because it enables citizens to pursue their private aims with assurances
of security (Skinner 1984, 1991; Viroli 2002; Maynor 2003).
Broadly
speaking, there are two topics to consider under the heading of civic virtue.
On the one hand, there is the civic virtue and danger of its corruption on the
part of public officials; on the other, there is the civic virtue and danger of
its corruption on the part of citizens in general. With respect to the former,
republicans typically reject the view (common in the liberal tradition) that
public officials are by nature corrupt, and instead view individuals as
inherently corruptible, but not necessarily corrupt (Pettit 1997). Working from
this assumption, it is a strictly pragmatic and empirical question what
configuration of public laws, institutions, and norms is most likely to
minimize the danger of corruption, and enhance the civic virtue of public
officials. Options here include screening procedures on the selection of
officials, rules and norms keeping some policy options out of bounds, and both
positive and negative sanctions. In designing such institutions, it is
important not to assume the worst of people, for otherwise we might
inadvertently encourage (through an evident lack of trust) the very corrupt
behavior one aims to guard against.
Promoting
civic virtue on the part of the citizens in general, however, is just as
important from a republican point of view. There are a variety of possible
reasons for this. For the most part, they stem from the observation that the
widespread enjoyment of republican liberty is most likely to be maximized in a
community where the citizens are committed to that ideal, and each is willing
to do his or her part in realizing it. For example, through collective
political action, citizens can bring instances of domination to public
attention; they can support laws and policies that would expand republican
freedom; and they can do their part in defending republican institutions when
called upon to do so. Promoting this sort of commitment to republican ideals
will require a fairly robust program of civics education, together with a
culture that rewards virtue with public esteem (Pettit 1997; Brennan and Pettit
2000, 2003; Maynor 2003). Again, it should be emphasized here that citizens do
not enjoy republican freedom, on the civic republican view, by being virtuous.
Indeed, this could not be the case since, as argued earlier, the degree of
republican freedom enjoyed is rather a question of how the laws, institutions,
and norms of the community are ordered. Civic virtue is, however,
instrumentally useful both in bringing about the right sorts of laws,
institutions, and norms, and in ensuring their durability and reliability on
the other.
Finally,
it is worth mentioning the connection between civic virtue (both on the part of
public officials and citizens in general) and the rule of law. The significance
of the rule of law for republican liberty was discussed above; in the classical
republican tradition, this was expressed as the "empire of law" ideal--the
notion that in a free republic laws, not men, rule. Of course this cannot ever
be literally true, but it can be approximated in a sort of artificial way, so
that life can be experienced as if it were true within a given community. This
requires, however, that the law be widely regarded as clear, predictable, and
legitimate, and this in turn is possible only when there is a generally high
level of compliance and when legal rules are embedded in a shared network of
informal social norms (Pettit 1997).
5. Conclusion
In
many respects, civic republicanism remains an underdeveloped political
doctrine. Further work is required in all the areas discussed above, and there
are many issues, central to the concerns of contemporary political theorists
and philosophers, that civic republicans have barely touched on. To mention a
just few: multiculturalism, distributive justice, conservation and
environmentalism, international relations, and others still await substantial
treatment. Nevertheless, civic republicanism is a dynamic and growing field,
which stands to make continuing positive contributions to debate in
contemporary social and political theory.
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If
we are to build a plural society on the foundation of what unites us,
we must face up to what divides. But the questions of core freedoms and
primary loyalties can't be ducked. No society, no matter how tolerant,
can expect to thrive if its citizens don't prize what their citizenship
means -- if, when asked what they stand for as Frenchmen, as Indians, as
Britons, they cannot give clear replies.
Hij
sympathiseerde met Johan de Witt (1632-1677), de raadspensionaris van
Holland (van 1653 tot 1672) tijdens het Eerste Stadhouderloze Tijdperk.
De Witt steunde op de stedelijke elites en propageerde het
republikanisme; hij wilde voorkomen dat er ooit nog een Oranje
stadhouder zou worden in de Nederlanden.