Reappraising the Scottish Moralists and Civil Society

Polity

Volumn 33, Issue 1, 2000, Pages 101-125

  Boyd, Richard ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO   (United States)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0034550925     PISSN: 00323497     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/3235462     Document Type: Article

References (106)

1. For Habermas, this transformation mirrors the underlying imperatives of capitalist development, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry Into a Category of Bourgeois Society (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1989), esp. 19, 51-56, 222-24; for Sandel, it stems from post-World War II American jurisprudence, Democracy's Discontents: America in Search of a Public Philosophy (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 1995), esp. 22-24, 28-30; and for MacIntyre it is linked to modern positivism, After Virtue (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press, 1981).
2. For Habermas, this transformation mirrors the underlying imperatives of capitalist development, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry Into a Category of Bourgeois Society (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1989), esp. 19, 51-56, 222-24; for Sandel, it stems from post-World War II American jurisprudence, Democracy's Discontents: America in Search of a Public Philosophy (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 1995), esp. 22-24, 28-30; and for MacIntyre it is linked to modern positivism, After Virtue (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press, 1981).
3. For Habermas, this transformation mirrors the underlying imperatives of capitalist development, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry Into a Category of Bourgeois Society (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1989), esp. 19, 51-56, 222-24; for Sandel, it stems from post-World War II American jurisprudence, Democracy's Discontents: America in Search of a Public Philosophy (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 1995), esp. 22-24, 28-30; and for MacIntyre it is linked to modern positivism, After Virtue (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press, 1981).
4. Notably, Stephen Macedo, Liberal Virtues: Citizenship, Virtue and Community in Liberal Constitutionalism (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991); Bernard Yack, "Does Liberal Practice 'Live Down' to Liberal Theory: Liberalism and its Communitarian Critics?" in Community in America: The Challenge of 'Habits of the Heart', ed. Charles Reynolds (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988).
5. Notably, Stephen Macedo, Liberal Virtues: Citizenship, Virtue and Community in Liberal Constitutionalism (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991); Bernard Yack, "Does Liberal Practice 'Live Down' to Liberal Theory: Liberalism and its Communitarian Critics?" in Community in America: The Challenge of 'Habits of the Heart', ed. Charles Reynolds (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988).
6. On the value of political order to classical liberalism, see Stephen Holmes, Passions and Constraint: On the Theory of Liberal Democracy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995); Rogers Smith, Liberalism and American Constitutional Law (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985). Despite this recognition, neither attempts to fully reinterpret classical liberal thought as a response to the dilemmas of political pluralism.
7. On the value of political order to classical liberalism, see Stephen Holmes, Passions and Constraint: On the Theory of Liberal Democracy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995); Rogers Smith, Liberalism and American Constitutional Law (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985). Despite this recognition, neither attempts to fully reinterpret classical liberal thought as a response to the dilemmas of political pluralism.
8. Hobbes speaks of "Private Systemes, some are Lawfull; some Unlawfull: Lawfull are those which are allowed by the Common-wealth: all other are Unlawfull," Leviathan, ed. C. B. Macpherson (New York: Penguin, 1968), Pt. II. ch. 22, 275. For a more extensive discussion of this problem in Hobbes, see Richard Boyd, "Thomas Hobbes and the Perils of Pluralism" Journal of Politics, forthcoming 2001.
9. Hobbes speaks of "Private Systemes, some are Lawfull; some Unlawfull: Lawfull are those which are allowed by the Common-wealth: all other are Unlawfull," Leviathan, ed. C. B. Macpherson (New York: Penguin, 1968), Pt. II. ch. 22, 275. For a more extensive discussion of this problem in Hobbes, see Richard Boyd, "Thomas Hobbes and the Perils of Pluralism" Journal of Politics, forthcoming 2001.
10. Compare James Madison, "Federalist #10," esp. 78-79.
11. David Hume, Essays: Moral, Political and Literary, ed. Eugene Miller (Indianapolis: Liberty Press, 1987), "Of the Coalition of Parties," 493.
12. Hume, "Of Parties in General," 59.
13. Hume, "Of Parties," 60.
14. Hume, "Of Parties," 61.
15. Hume, "Of Parties," 62.
16. Hume, "Of Parties," 62.
17. Hume, "Of Parties," 60.
18. Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, ed. Richard Popkin (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 1980), 80.
19. "Of Parties," 57.
20. The Natural History of Religion, ed. James Fieser (New York: Macmillan, 1992), esp. 38-43.
21. "Of Parties," 62.
22. Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, Pt. 2, ch. 29, esp. 365-66; On the arguable liberality of Hobbes's view of toleration, see Eldon Eisenach, Two World's of Liberalism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981) and Alan Ryan, "Hobbes, Toleration and the Inner Life," in The Nature of Political Theory, ed. David Miller and Larry Siedentop (Oxford: Clarendon, 1983).
23. Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, Pt. 2, ch. 29, esp. 365-66; On the arguable liberality of Hobbes's view of toleration, see Eldon Eisenach, Two World's of Liberalism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981) and Alan Ryan, "Hobbes, Toleration and the Inner Life," in The Nature of Political Theory, ed. David Miller and Larry Siedentop (Oxford: Clarendon, 1983).
24. Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, Pt. 2, ch. 29, esp. 365-66; On the arguable liberality of Hobbes's view of toleration, see Eldon Eisenach, Two World's of Liberalism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981) and Alan Ryan, "Hobbes, Toleration and the Inner Life," in The Nature of Political Theory, ed. David Miller and Larry Siedentop (Oxford: Clarendon, 1983).
25. Compare the rather formidable criteria imposed even by John Locke, A Letter Concerning Toleration (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1983), esp. 49-51
26. Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, Pt. 4, ch. 46, 700.
27. History of England, IX, 48.
28. NHR, 41.
29. DCNR, 82.
30. DCNR, 85.
31. As Keith Yandell has observed, any recourse to Hume's Dialogues presents interpretive difficulties, as no single interlocutor speaks for Hume. I follow Yandell, however, in his suggestion that various interlocutors express parts of Hume's own teachings and that properly triangulated with his other writings the Dialogues can shed considerable light on Hume's thought. See his "Hume on Religious Belief," in Hume: A Re-evaluation, ed. Donald Livingston and James T. King (New York: Fordham University Press, 1976), esp. 110-12.
32. As Keith Yandell has observed, any recourse to Hume's Dialogues presents interpretive difficulties, as no single interlocutor speaks for Hume. I follow Yandell, however, in his suggestion that various interlocutors express parts of Hume's own teachings and that properly triangulated with his other writings the Dialogues can shed considerable light on Hume's thought. See his "Hume on Religious Belief," in Hume: A Re-evaluation, ed. Donald Livingston and James T. King (New York: Fordham University Press, 1976), esp. 110-12.
33. For a more general account of this consistency, see Donald Livingston, Hume's Philosophy of Common Life (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984). Rather than finding Hume's philosophy confirmed in his social and political writings, my account implicitly reverses the emphasis of this work.
34. My task is not to examine Hume's moral philosophy at large. No dearth of more qualified commentators have traced the philosophical implications of Hume's empiricism and skepticism. What remains is to draw attention to the obvious public consequences for this philosophical break, perhaps more evident in Hume's social and political thought. Instead the consistency of his philosophical writings with the twin constitutional goals of liberty and order will be my limited concern here.
35. On Hume's conservatism, see Sheldon Wolin, "Hume and Conservatism" in Hume: A Re-evaluation, whose point is echoed, albeit somewhat differently, by Donald Livingston, Hume's Philosophy of Common Life, esp. 306-42. On Hume as the founder of thinking on civil society, see Adam Seligman, The Idea of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992), 36-41, whose account of how Hume's thinking transformed the public sphere has most influenced this treatment.
36. On Hume's conservatism, see Sheldon Wolin, "Hume and Conservatism" in Hume: A Re-evaluation, whose point is echoed, albeit somewhat differently, by Donald Livingston, Hume's Philosophy of Common Life, esp. 306-42. On Hume as the founder of thinking on civil society, see Adam Seligman, The Idea of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992), 36-41, whose account of how Hume's thinking transformed the public sphere has most influenced this treatment.
37. On Hume's conservatism, see Sheldon Wolin, "Hume and Conservatism" in Hume: A Re-evaluation, whose point is echoed, albeit somewhat differently, by Donald Livingston, Hume's Philosophy of Common Life, esp. 306-42. On Hume as the founder of thinking on civil society, see Adam Seligman, The Idea of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992), 36-41, whose account of how Hume's thinking transformed the public sphere has most influenced this treatment.
38. Aristotle, Politics, Bk. 1.
39. David Hume, Treatise of Human Nature, ed. L. A. Selby-Bigge (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978). Bk. III, Pt. II, 2, 491.
40. THN, 489-99.
41. THN, 500. Cf. 533-34, 546.
42. THN, 500.
43. THN, 533-34.
44. THN, 500-501.
45. THN, 526.
46. THN, 497.
47. THN, 538.
48. THN, 539.
49. Steven Wallach has argued that Hume's concept of human psychology is robust enough to recognize this tendency, "The Elements of Social Status in Hume's Treatise," in Hume as Philosopher of Society, Politics, and History, ed. Donald Livingston and Marie Martin (Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 1991), esp. 46, 50-52, 55.
50. THN, Bk. III, Pt. 2, 514.
51. THN, 542-43.
52. Notably, THN, 562.
53. "Of Parties," 60; cf. "Of the Coalition of Parties,"493-501.
54. "Of Parties," 60; cf. "Of the Coalition of Parties,"493-501.
55. "Of the Original Contract," 466.
56. "Of the Original Contract," 481.
57. See Alasdair MacIntyre,Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame University Press, 1988).
58. Notably, Michael Sandel, Democracy's Discontents, esp. 7-53. These concerns are anticipated in Benjamin Barber, "The Compromised Republic: Public Purposelessness in America" in The Moral Foundations of the American Republic, ed. Robert Horwitz (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1986).
59. Notably, Michael Sandel, Democracy's Discontents, esp. 7-53. These concerns are anticipated in Benjamin Barber, "The Compromised Republic: Public Purposelessness in America" in The Moral Foundations of the American Republic, ed. Robert Horwitz (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1986).
60. This constitutionalist emphasis on the requirements of public order remains prominent in James Madison's most explicit defense of religious liberty. In his Memorial and Remonstrance, Madison describes not only the "liberal" good of individuals being allowed to pursue the dictates of individual conscience. He more interestingly defends the distinction between "public good" and "private" religion as most likely to protect constitutional arrangements from the centrifugal and fanatical tendencies of religious conflict: "Every relaxation of narrow and rigorous policy...has been found to assuage the disease. The American Theatre has exhibited proofs, that equal and compleat liberty, if it does not wholly eradicate it, sufficiently destroys its malignant influence on the health and prosperity of the state." In defending religious disestablishment, Madison merely restated the conventional wisdom of the eighteenth century when he sought to prevent "impotency in the Government" by safeguarding constitutional arrangements from "this enemy to the public quiet." James Madison, The Complete Madison: His Basic Writings. ed. Saul K. Padover (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1953), 304.
61. Cf. Michael Sandel, Democracy's Discontents, 55-57. Sandel's historical treatment of this divide between public and private is a curious case of Whig history. Because its most recent permutation has had the effect of "unencumbering" the self, Sandel presumes that liberal constitutionalism must have been intended to achieve this result all along.
62. "Of the Populousness of Ancient Nations," 407, 413, 415-20.
63. "Of Commerce," 274.
64. Albert Hirschman, The Passions and the Interests: Political Arguments for Capitalism before Its Triumph (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977); Stephen Holmes, Passions and Constraint: On the Theory of Liberal Democracy.
65. Albert Hirschman, The Passions and the Interests: Political Arguments for Capitalism before Its Triumph (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977); Stephen Holmes, Passions and Constraint: On the Theory of Liberal Democracy.
66. Adam Smith, The Theory of Moral Sentiments (Indianapolis: Liberty Press, 1982), esp. 233-34.
67. TMS, 232.
68. TMS, 232.
69. TMS, 233.
70. TMS, 233.
71. TMS, 234.
72. Albert Hirschman, The Passions and the Interests: Political Arguments for Capitalism before Its Triumph; "Rival Views of Market Society" in Rival Views of Market Society and Other Recent Essays (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992).
73. Albert Hirschman, The Passions and the Interests: Political Arguments for Capitalism before Its Triumph; "Rival Views of Market Society" in Rival Views of Market Society and Other Recent Essays (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992).
74. Alexis de Tocqueville, The Old Regime and The Revolution, trans. John Bonner (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1856), esp. 25-27.
75. "Idea of a Perfect Commonwealth," 512. To discourage attempts at rational reform, Hume cautiously observes that the form of the ideal commonwealth is a matter only for philosophical speculation, perhaps only applicable in the special circumstances of founding moments. Yet after this brief demurrer against the dangers of philosophical speculation, Hume nevertheless inaugurates a discussion of the very ideal commonwealth whose abuses he so feared
76. David Hume to Adam Smith, in Smith, The Correspondence of Adam Smith (Indianapolis: Liberty Press, 1987), 43.
77. Smith, TMS, 15.
78. Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, ed. Edwin Cannan (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976), v. ii, 314.
79. WN, 315.
80. WN, 314.
81. Samuel Fleischacker, "Insigificant Communities" in Freedom of Association, ed. Amy Gutmann (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998), esp. 282-86.
82. TMS, 157.
83. TMS, 157.
84. TMS, 156-57.
85. Compare Nancy Rosenblum, Another Liberalism: Romanticism and Reconstruction in Liberal Thought (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1987).
86. Compare Avigail Eisenberg, Reconstructing Political Pluralism (Buffalo: SUNY Press, 1995); Nancy Rosenblum, Membership and Morals: The Personal Uses of Pluralism in America (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998).
87. Compare Avigail Eisenberg, Reconstructing Political Pluralism (Buffalo: SUNY Press, 1995); Nancy Rosenblum, Membership and Morals: The Personal Uses of Pluralism in America (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998).
88. Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, Pt. II, ch. 22, 285-88; see also, Irene Coltman, Private Men & Public Causes: Philosophy and Politics in the English Civil War (London: Faber and Faber, 1962).
89. Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, Pt. II, ch. 22, 285-88; see also, Irene Coltman, Private Men & Public Causes: Philosophy and Politics in the English Civil War (London: Faber and Faber, 1962).
90. "Of the Coalition of Parties," 493.
91. "Of Superstition and Enthusiasm," 78.
92. Hume, History of England. (New York: Harper, 1879), Vol. 4, 576-77.
93. See for example, Ronald Hamowy, The Scottish Enlightenment and the Theory of Spontaneous Order (Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1987); Louis Schneider, ed., The Scottish Moralists on Human Nature and Society (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967), esp. lvi-lxv.
94. See for example, Ronald Hamowy, The Scottish Enlightenment and the Theory of Spontaneous Order (Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1987); Louis Schneider, ed., The Scottish Moralists on Human Nature and Society (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967), esp. lvi-lxv.
95. Cf. Sheldon Wolin, "Hume and Conservatism," whose emphasis on Hume as a theorist of party government oddly seems to discount Hume's deep-seated ambivalence toward parties, 249-53.
96. "Of the Origin of Government," 40-41; "Of Some Remarkable Customs," 375-76. cf. THN, Bk. III, Pt. II, 2, 494-501.
97. "Of the Origin of Government," 40-41; "Of Some Remarkable Customs," 375-76. cf. THN, Bk. III, Pt. II, 2, 494-501.
98. "Of the Origin of Government," 40-41; "Of Some Remarkable Customs," 375-76. cf. THN, Bk. III, Pt. II, 2, 494-501.
99. THN, Bk. III, Pt. II, 2, 494-501.
100. "Idea of a Perfect Commonwealth," 529.
101. Albert Hirschman, "Social Conflicts as Pillars of Democratic Stability" in A Propensity to Sell-Subversion (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995).
102. "Of Parties in General," esp. 55, 58.
103. "Of the Parties in Great Britain," 67-72.
104. F. A. Hayek, Law, Legislation and Liberty, Vol. 2 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976), 12-13.
105. Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue.
106. Stephen Holmes, The Anatomy of Antiliberalism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993).