Honour, face and reputation in political theory

European Journal of Political Theory

Volumn 7, Issue 4, 2008, Pages 472-491

  Olsthoorn, Peter ^a  

^a NETHERLANDS DEFENCE ACADEMY   (Netherlands)

Author keywords

Autonomy; Honour; Reputation; Shame; Virtue

Indexed keywords

EID: 52049099141     PISSN: 14748851     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/1474885108094056     Document Type: Article

References (79)

1. Charles Taylor (1994) 'The Politics of Recognition', in A. Gutmann (ed.) Zulticulturalism: Examining the Politics of Recognition, p. 27. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Peter Berger (1984) 'On the Obsolescence of the Concept of Honour', in M.J. Sandel (ed.) Liberalism and its Critics, p. 151. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
2. Avishai Margalit (1996) The Decent Society, p. 43. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
3. The notion of conscience as an 'inner voice' has its most influential expression in the work of Rousseau, who, in the Profession of Faith of the Savoyard Vicar (part of Emile), wrote: 'Everything I sense to be good is good; everything I sense to be bad is bad... Too often reason deceives us... But conscience never deceives; it is man's true guide.' Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1991) Emile, pp. 267, 286 and 290. London: Penguin. See also Taylor (n. 1), pp. 28-29. Today, conscience as an inner voice is not only considered important because it tells us what is right; it has also become something with 'independent and crucial moral significance'. Listening to our moral feelings is 'something we have to attain if we are to be true and full human beings'. Ibid. p. 28.
4. See for instance Charles H. Cooley (1922) Human Nature and the Social Order, rev. edn, p. 238. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. Julian Pitt-Rivers (1974) 'Honour and Social Status', in J.G. Peristiany (ed.) Honour and Shame: The Values of Zediterranean Society, p. 21. Chicago: Midway Reprint. In this article, the emphasis is on honour as public recognition. See for honour as a 'quality of character' and for honour codes: Sharon R. Krause (2002) Liberalism with Honor, pp. 2-3. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
5. See for instance Alasdair MacIntyre (1985) After Virtue, p. 196. London: Duckworth. Michael Walzer (1983) Spheres of Justice: A Defense of Pluralism and Equality, p. 257. New York: Basic Books.
6. John Rawls (1971) Theory of Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
7. According to one author, 'Rawls does not limit social wealth to concrete goods. In his view self-esteem (and thus apparently honor too) is a primary good. But Rawls ignores that the whole point of honor is to distinguish oneself from others... No distinction, no honor.' William Miller (1993) Humiliation, p. 129. New York: Cornell University Press. Margalit writes that 'social honor given equally to everyone will be empty' (n. 2), p. 42. According to Finley, 'when everyone attains equal honour, then there is no honour for anyone'. Moses I. Finley (1993) The World of Odysseus, p. 118. London: Penguin Books.
8. See also Bernard Williams (1973) Problems of the Self, p. 47. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
9. See for instance Michael J. Sandel (1982) Liberalism and the Limits of Justice, p. 43. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Allan Bloom (1987) The Closing of the American Zind, p. 30. New York: Simon & Schuster.
10. John Rawls (1993) Political Liberalism, pp. 86-7. New York: Columbia University Press. See also Sandel (n. 9), p. 9. Kant stated that his ethics should be free from all that 'nur empirisch sein mag und zur Anthropologie gehört' (Grundlegung zur Zetaphysik der Sitten BA VIII). Consequently, in Kant's ethical writings 'shame is on the bad sides of all the lines'. Bernard Williams (1993) Shame and Necessity, p. 77. Los Angeles: University of California Press.
11. Cooley and Goffman saw humans as essentially led by pride, shame and the fear of losing face, while Riesman portrays the modern employee as other-directed. See Cooley (n. 4). Erving Goffman (1958) The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh Press. David Riesman (1950) The Lonely Crowd. New Haven: Yale University Press.
12. Walzer (n. 5), pp. 252-3. See also Taylor (1994, in n. 1); Margalit (n. 2), p. ix; Krause (n. 4); William Miller (n. 7).
13. Williams (n. 10), p. 5.
14. Ibid. p. 77. Rawls (n. 6), p. 461n., based his account of moral development partly on the works of Piaget.
15. See also Charles Taylor (1992) Sources of the Self, p. 20. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
16. See for instance De Re Publica 1.27, De Off. 3.33, 36 and 38, and Tusc. Disp. 2.52-3. All quotations from Cicero are taken from the Loeb Classical Library edns, Cambridge, MA.
17. De Finibus 4.21, 55, 63-8, 75-7; Pro Zurena 61-5.
18. See also Pro Archia Poeta 28-9.
19. This also holds true for philosophers: 'Do they not inscribe their names upon the actual books they write about contempt of fame?' Tusc. Disp. 1. 34.
20. Elsewhere, he wrote about 'a thirst for virtue, which of necessity secures fame, even if it be not its object'. Tusc. Disp. 1. 91.
21. See also De Off. 1.65.
22. Honour caused more deaths than the plague, as John G. Peristiany and Julian Pitt-Rivers (1992) state in a foreword to their Honor and Grace in Anthropology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
23. Quentin Skinner (1978) The Foundations of Zodern Political Thought, 2 vols, vol. 1, pp. 100-1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
24. Ibid. p. 101.
25. Taylor (n. 15), p. 214. According to Taylor, 'we find this with Hobbes as well as with Pascal, La Rochefoucauld, and Molière'. However, 'the negative arguments in these writers are not new. Plato himself was suspicious of the honour ethic, as concerned with mere appearances. The Stoics rejected it; and it was denounced by Augustine as the exaltation of the desire for power.'
26. Bernard Mandeville (1988) The Fable of the Bees: Or Private Vices, Publick Benefits. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund.
27. Adam Smith wrote that
28. it is the great fallacy of Dr. Mandeville's book to represent every passion as wholly vicious, which is so in any degree and in any direction. It is thus that he treats everything as vanity which has any reference, either to what are, or to what ought to be the sentiments of others: And it is by means of this sophistry, that he establishes his favourite conclusion, that private vices are public benefits.
29. (1976) The Theory of Zoral Sentiments, VI.ii.46.12. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Smith concluded however that 'some of the articles, at least, must be just, and even those which are most overcharged must have had some foundation, otherwise the fraud would be detected even by that careless inspection which we are disposed to give' (VII.ii.4.14) and that the Fable would not have made such an impact, 'had it not bordered upon the truth' (VII.ii.4.13).
30. Charles Montesquieu (1989) Esprit des Lois, I.iii.1-7. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
31. Alexis de Tocqueville (1969) Democracy in America, pp. 620-1. New York: Harper & Row. According to Fukuyama, the 'struggle for recognition has shifted from the military to the economic realm, where it has the socially beneficial effect of creating rather than destroying wealth'. Francis Fukuyama (1995) Trust, p. 7. New York: Free Press.
32. See also Leo Braudy (2003) From Chivalry to Terrorism: War and the Changing Nature of Zasculinity, p. 49. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
33. Donald Winch (1978) Adam Smith 's Politics, p. 184. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
34. Ibid.
35. Peter Gay (1973, 1979) The Enlightenment: An Interpretation, 2 vols, vol. 1, p. 105. London: Wildwood House. According to Gay, 'Cicero's reputation in the Enlightenment is hard to appreciate today: Nothing illustrates our distance from the eighteenth century better than this.' Ibid. p. 106. See also Friedrich von Hayek (1985) New Studies in Philosophy, Politics, Economics and the History of jdeas, p. 122. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. The Greeks were less inclined to the view that virtue needs a reward. Plato, for instance, held that 'the good are not willing to rule either for the sake of money or of honour' (The Republic 347b). In the concluding sections of The Republic Plato wrote that just conduct will be rewarded in this life with a good name (612-13), yet this reward is not presented as a necessary incentive. Name and reputation are necessary incentives however in Plato's Laws (738, 740d, 754e-755a, 764a, 784d, 926d), which is meant as a more realizable ideal. Aristotle held that a mature person does not need the sense of shame to keep him on the path of virtue. Nicomachean Ethics 1128b. On the other hand: According to Aristotle honour was the most important of the secondary goods. Ibid. 1123b.
36. Quentin Skinner and James Tully (1988) Meaning and Context, p. 292, n. 16. Cambridge: Polity Press.
37. John Locke (1963) Two Treatises of Government. New York: Mentor.
38. Nathan Tarcov (1984) Locke 's Education for Liberty, p. 116. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
39. John Locke (1989) Some Thoughts Concerning Education. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
40. See also Smith (n. 27), VI.iii.46 and Mandeville (n. 26): 'it is certain, that nothing... has a greater Influence upon Children, than the Handle that is made of Shame' (vol. 2, p. 78).
41. See also Tarcov (n. 36).
42. John Locke (1975) An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
43. David Hume (1969) A Treatise of Human Nature. London: Penguin Books. In fact, utilitarianism's main protagonist, Jeremy Bentham, went further than Hume: While to Hume, utility was the standard we normally use for judging, for Bentham it was a standard we all should use: The concern for reputation has to keep the conduct 'of each in the line which promotes the general happiness'. John Stuart Mill and Jeremy Bentham (1987) tilitarianism and Other Essays, pp. 249-51. London: Penguin. The latter phrase is from John Stuart Mill, who, defending Bentham against the allegation that he made approval into the foundation of morality, wrote that public sanctions have their value 'not as constituents or tests of virtue, but as motives to it'. Ibid.
44. Brian Barry (1989) Theories of Justice, p. 167. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf.
45. In his essay Of Zoral Prejudices we read that, according to Hume, too many of his contemporaries copied the Stoics, whose philosophy he regarded as utterly unsound. David Hume (1987) Essays: Zoral, Political and Literary. Indianopolis: Liberty Fund. See for a similar opinion: Jeremy Bentham (1996) An jntroduction to the Principles of Zorals and Legislation, XI. xvi. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
46. Peter Jones (1982) Hume's Sentiments: Their Ciceronian and French Context, pp. 10-11. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Hume wrote that 'the fame of Cicero flourishes at present; but that of Aristotle is utterly decayed'. Hume (2000) An Enquiry Concerning the Human/ nderstanding, §1. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
47. Vanity is 'a social passion, and a bond of union among men'. Hume (n. 41), III.ii.ii. In his short autobiography Zy Own Life Hume (n. 43) called 'love of literary fame' his 'ruling passion'.
48. David Hume (1957) An Inquiry Concerning the Principles of Zorals. Indianopolis: Bobbs-Meril Co.
49. Smith (n. 27).
50. See also Gay (n. 33), pp. 54-5, and Charles E. Larmore (1987) Patterns of Zoral Complexity, p. 17. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
51. Hume wrote likewise: 'Men have, in general, a much greater propensity to overvalue than undervalue themselves; notwithstanding the opinion of Aristotle' (n. 46), VIII. See also Mandeville (n. 26), vol. 1, p. 125.
52. 'We should view ourselves, not in the light in which our own selfish passions are apt to place us, but in the light in which any other citizen of the world would view us' (III.3.11).
53. However, Smith called our tendency to judge by consequences instead of intentions a 'salutary and useful irregularity in human sentiments concerning merit or demerit, which at first sight appears so absurd and unaccountable' (II.iii.3.2).
54. The love of true glory is 'a passion which, if not the very best passion of human nature, is certainly one of the best' (VI.iii.46).
55. Adam Smith (1961) An jnquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations. London: Methuen. According to Hume, 'Honour is a great check upon mankind: But where a considerable body of men act together, this check is, in a great measure, removed' (n. 43: On the jndependency of Parliament). According to Tocqueville, in modern societies with their 'constantly fluctuating crowd', honour is less binding because it 'is only effective in full view of the public, differing in that from sheer virtue, which feeds upon itself, contended with its own witness'. Tocqueville (n. 29), p. 626.
56. Tocqueville (n. 29), p. 616
57. 55. See also Hume (n. 46), app. iv.
58. See also Krause (n. 4), p. 52.
59. A problem addressed by Mill is hampering this process in democratic times: Although we have a right to warn someone if we think him at fault, or even a fool, 'it would be well, indeed, if this good office were much more freely rendered than the common notion of politeness at present permit, and if one person could honestly point out to another that he thinks him in fault, without being considered unmannerly or presuming'. John Stuart Mill (1993) Utilitarianism, On Liberty, Considerations on Representative Government, p. 145. London: Everyman. Rendering this 'good office' is in our day probably even more contrary to custom than in Victorian England; an honour-based ethic can however only function as a check when criticism does not amount to a narcissistic injury in its own right. See for the virtue of rudeness: Emrys Westacott (2006) 'The Rights and Wrongs of Rudeness', jnternational Journal of Applied Philosophy 1: 1-22, esp. p. 13.
60. Tocqueville (n. 29), p. 624.
61. Ibid. p. 625.
62. Ibid. p. 617. Walzer (n. 5), pp. 251 and 267.
63. Tocqueville (n. 29), p. 618.
64. Compare Hume (n. 41), II.ii.v.
65. See for instance Smith (n. 27), I.iii.3.2-4.
66. Walzer (n. 5), p. 257.
67. Ibid. p. 266.
68. Walzer himself is of the opinion that such a redistribution of honour can be reached without a 'gigantic increase in social control'. Ibid. 257n.
69. See also Krause (n. 4), pp. 66-7.
70. See on politics and business Francis Fukuyama (1993) The End of History and the Last Zan, pp. 229, 233. New York: Avon Books.
71. In that sense, we 'are all Kantians now'. Arthur W.H. Adkins (1960) Zerit and Responsibility: A Study in Greek Values, p. 2. Oxford: Oxford Clarendon Press. Further, we often echo the Stoics' distrust of the urge to distinction. Leo Braudy (1986) The Frenzy of Renown: Fame and its History, p. 148. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
72. See also Krause (n. 4), p. 11. p. 11.
73. In this famous passage Hume was mainly bothered by the fact that the move from 'is' to 'ought' often goes without explanation, not with the move itself (n. 41), III.i.i. Hume 'assumed that the basic division in the fields of knowledge is that between physical and moral subjects... Moral subjects are what we, for lack of better terms, probably would call, "the humanities" and the "social sciences"'. John B. Stewart (1963) The Zoral and Political Philosophy of David Hume, p. 10. New York: Columbia University Press.
74. See for instance Berger (n. 1), p. 153; Taylor, (1994, in. 1), p. 27. Margalit (n. 2), pp. 42-3. Finley (n. 7), p. 118.
75. Berger (n. 1).
76. Pitt-Rivers (n. 4), p. 39. Today, only some 'quaint survivals' of honour are left, like the academic cum laude. Skinner (n. 23), p. 101.
77. However, 'the fact-value distinction is taken as a given by almost everyone today, no matter whether they are behavioral scientists or committed revolutionaries'. Allan Bloom (1980) 'The Study of Texts', in Political Theory and Political Education, p. 118. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Modern political philosophy 'belongs firmly to the Utopian genre'. John Dunn (1985) Rethinking Zodern Political Theory: Essays 1979-1983, p. 9. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
78. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. In After Virtue MacIntyre presents Sartre and Goffman as respective representatives from these two extreme positions (n. 5), while, elsewhere, he states 'the virtue of Hume's ethics, like that of Aristotle and unlike that of Kant, is that it seeks to preserve morality as s
79. Williams (n. 10), pp. 81-2. Without shame being internalized the idea of a shame culture would make no sense (ibid.), and although the internalized other is abstracted and generalized, 'he is potentially somebody rather than nobody, and somebody other than me'. Ibid. p. 84. This somebody is not necessarily the one in closest geographical proximity, i.e. it is not the opinions of one's neighbour that matter most. Ibid. p. 83.