Objectivism & Politics, Part 51

Ayn Rand contra Conservatism 5. Rand, in her essay “Conservatism: an Obituary,” contends that “there are three interrelated arguments used by today’s “conservatives” to justify capitalism, which can best be designated as: the argument from faith—the argument from tradition—the argument from depravity.”

In my last post, I examined Rand’s attack on the argument from tradition. Now we’ll take a look at her attack on the argument from depravity:

This leads us to the third—and the worst—argument, used by some “conservatives”: the attempt to defend capitalism on the ground of man’s depravity.

This argument runs as follows: since men are weak, fallible, non-omniscient and innately depraved, no man may be entrusted with the responsibility of being a dictator and of ruling everybody else; therefore, a free society is the proper way of life for imperfect creatures. Please grasp fully the implications of this argument: since men are depraved, they are not good enough for a dictatorship; freedom is all that they deserve; if they were perfect, they would be worthy of a totalitarian state.

Dictatorship—this theory asserts—believe it or not, is the result of faith in man and in man’s goodness; if people believed that man is depraved by nature, they would not entrust a dictator with power. This means that a belief in human depravity protects human freedom—that it is wrong to enslave the depraved, but would be right to enslave the virtuous. And more: dictatorships—this theory declares—and all the other disasters of the modern world are man’s punishment for the sin of relying on his intellect and of attempting to improve his life on earth by seeking to devise a perfect political system and to establish a rational society. This means that humility, passivity, lethargic resignation and a belief in Original Sin are the bulwarks of capitalism. One could not go farther than this in historical, political, and psychological ignorance or subversion. This is truly the voice of the Dark Ages rising again—in the midst of our industrial civilization.

The cynical, man-hating advocates of this theory sneer at all ideals, scoff at all human aspirations and deride all attempts to improve men’s existence. “You can’t change human nature,” is their stock answer to the socialists. Thus they concede that socialism is the ideal, but human nature is unworthy of it; after which, they invite men to crusade for capitalism—a crusade one would have to start by spitting in one’s own face. Who will fight and die to defend his status as a miserable sinner? If, as a result of such theories, people become contemptuous of “conservatism,” do not wonder and do not ascribe it to the cleverness of the socialists.

This passage constitutes one of the most embarrassing assemblage of words one is likely to find in all of Rand’s writings. It distorts and mauls the conservative arguments beyond recognition. It demonstrates that when it came to representing ideas and views she disagreed with, Rand suffered from a severe case of narcissism. She was extremely sensitive to any perceived distortions of her own views, but showed no such sensitivity towards others.

In the passage quotes above, Rand actually conflates two different conservative arguments: (1) the argument behind the U.S. constitution explicated by James Madison in the Federalist Papers; and (2) the argument against an enlightened dictator.

1. Madison’s argument. Let us begin by dismissing Rand’s first serious distortion. Rand claims that conservatives regard human beings as “innately depraved.” While there may be a handful of eccentrics who hold that belief, that is not the belief of most conservatives. Consider the following from James Madison:

As there is a degree of depravity in man [“degree” of depravity! Please consider this distinction!] which requires a degree of circumspection and distrust, so there are other qualities in human nature which justify a certain portion of esteem and confidence. [Human beings are not all bad, they are not completely depraved, they have both good and bad in them!] Republican government presupposes the existence of these qualities in a higher degree than any other form. [That is to say, free institutions depend on the better qualities of human nature—which goes against Rand’s caricature of the conservative argument!] Were the pictures which have been drawn by the political jealousy of some among us faithful likenesses of the human character, the inference would be, that there is not sufficient virtue among men for self-government; and that nothing less than the chains of despotism can restrain them from destroying and devouring one another. [Federalist 55]

Madison admitted the mixed character of human nature. While free institutions must rely on the good qualities in men, they also must reckon with the bad qualities, since both exist! Hence the theory behind “checks and balances.”

In Federalist #10, Madison begins by noting that man are by nature given to faction:

The latent causes of faction are ... sown in the nature of man; and we see them everywhere brought into different degrees of activity, according to the different circumstances of civil society. A zeal for different opinions concerning religion, concerning government, and many other points, as well of speculation as of practice; an attachment to different leaders ambitiously contending for pre-eminence and power; or to persons of other descriptions whose fortunes have been interesting to the human passions, have, in turn, divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to co-operate for their common good. So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities, that where no substantial occasion presents itself, the most frivolous and fanciful distinctions have been sufficient to kindle their unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts. But the most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property. Those who hold and those who are without property have ever formed distinct interests in society. Those who are creditors, and those who are debtors, fall under a like discrimination. A landed interest, a manufacturing interest, a mercantile interest, a moneyed interest, with many lesser interests, grow up of necessity in civilized nations, and divide them into different classes, actuated by different sentiments and views. The regulation of these various and interfering interests forms the principal task of modern legislation, and involves the spirit of party and faction in the necessary and ordinary operations of the government.

This view of human nature, held by nearly all of the Founding Fathers, is incompatible with Rand’s view. Yet it is the view behind the theory of checks and balances in the Constitution—which, in this sense, is not a document that is philosophically compatible with Objectivism. In Federalist #51, Madison lays out this theory of checks and balances:

But the great security against a gradual concentration of the several powers in the same department, consists in giving to those who administer each department the necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist encroachments of the others. The provision for defense must in this, as in all other cases, be made commensurate to the danger of attack. Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. The interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional rights of the place. It may be a reflection on human nature, that such devices should be necessary to control the abuses of government. But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.

This policy of supplying, by opposite and rival interests, the defect of better motives, might be traced through the whole system of human affairs, private as well as public. We see it particularly displayed in all the subordinate distributions of power, where the constant aim is to divide and arrange the several offices in such a manner as that each may be a check on the other -- that the private interest of every individual may be a sentinel over the public rights.

Rand tended to think favorably of the Founding Fathers; but they held what, for all intents and purposes, is the conservative view of human nature which she so violently opposes. In this conservative view, human beings are not (despite Rand's mendacious distortions) entirely depraved or wicked, but merely “imperfect,” limited, flawed. Conservatives like Burke, Hamilton, Madison (in his Federalist Papers phase), Adam Smith, Hume, Mosca based their views of human nature not on wishful thinking or philosophical speculation, but on a careful study of history. As Hamilton puts it in the Federalist #75: “The history of human conduct does not warrant that exalted opinion of human virtue which would make it wise in a nation to commit interests of so delicate and momentous a kind [to one man].”

2. Argument against an enlightened dictator. I’ll examine Rand’s confusions concerning this argument in my next post.

Objectivism & Politics, Part 15

The Objectivist cure for faction. In Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, Rand equates political faction (i.e., "Lobbying") with a mixed economy:

“Lobbying” is the activity of attempting to influence legislation by privately influencing the legislators. It is the result and creation of a mixed economy—of government by pressure groups. Its methods range from mere social courtesies and cocktail-party or luncheon “friendships” to favors, threats, bribes, blackmail. [168]

Rand, however, appears go beyond merely equating a mixed economy with government by pressure groups. She seems to have believed that a mixed economy is the cause of warring pressure groups; that, in other words, there would exist no pressure groups, no political faction, no competing political interests under laissez-faire capitalism, so that the problem of faction could be cured merely (per impossible) by instituting laissez faire.

What is wrong with this point of view? The main error is one of mistaking the effect for the cause. Faction (Rand’s “government by pressure groups”) is not the inevitable byproduct of a mixed economy; rather, a “mixed economy” is the inevitable byproduct of faction. As James Madison put it: “Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, an aliment without which it instantly expires.”

Rand’s cure for faction is no cure at all, but on the contrary, is the very cause of faction. Indeed, for Madison, there exists no cure for faction, because faction is “sown in the nature of man.” Madison therefore concludes that, since “the causes of faction cannot be removed, … relief is to be sought in the means of controlling its effects.”

What reasons are there to believe that Madison, rather than Rand, is right on this issue? Well, besides the testimony of history, we have the evidence of the science. As Steven Pinker explains in The Blank Slate:

Liberal and conservative political attitudes are largely, though far from completely, heritable. When identical twins who were separated at birth are tested in adulthood, their political attitudes turn out to be similar, with a correlation coefficient of .62… Liberal and conservative attitudes are heritable not, of course, because attitudes are synthesized directly from DNA but because they come naturally to people with different temperaments… But whatever its immediate source, the heritability of political attitudes can explain some of the sparks that fly when liberals and conservatives meet. When it comes to attitudes that are heritable, people react more quickly and emotionally, are less likely to change their minds, and are more attracted to like-minded people. [283]

In other words, political divisions are built-in: they part of the hardware of human nature and cannot be abolished by merely changing people's premises. There exists an ingrained psychopathology behind the phenomenon of faction that we will expore in the following "Objectivism & Politics" posts, which will cover the politics of human nature. It is on the issue of human nature that Rand’s politics goes awry. Human beings are not constituted so that they are likely to ever fully accept Rand’s political ideals. This is why her politics, in the final analysis, must be reckoned as “utopian.”

Objectivism & Politics, Part 14

Interests and spoliation. In many of the previous “Objectivism and Politics” posts, I have slowly been building the case against Peikoff’s assertion that “Philosophy shapes a nation’s political system.” The main pillars of my argument are: (1) The influence of non-rational factors, such as Pareto’s residues, on political conduct; and (2) the inability to determine political ends via rational means (i.e., Hume’s is-ought gap). Yet we must consider one other major factor in the determination of political conduct: interests.

In society, the interests of men often conflict. The interests, for example, of members of the ruling elite often conflict with the interests of ruled masses. Since there exists no absolute harmony of interests, divisions exist within society that cannot be resolved by “reason.”

Few political thinkers have understood the fact of conflicting interests in society better than America’s founding fathers. As James Madison wrote in The Federalist:

The latent causes of faction are … sown in the nature of man…So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities, that where no substantial occasion presents itself, the most frivolous and fanciful distinctions have been sufficient to kindle their unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts. But the most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property. Those who hold and those who are without property have ever formed distinct interests in society. A landed interest, a manufacturing interest, a mercantile interest, a moneyed interest, with many lesser interests, grow up of necessity in civilized nations, and divide them into different classes, actuated by different sentiments and views. The regulation of these various and interfering interest forms the principal task of modern legislation, and involves the spirit of party and faction in the necessary and ordinary operations of the government.

According to Madison, factions based on sentiments and interests are part of the human condition. There is nothing that can be done to make them vanish. They will always exist in society.

Objectivism attempts to counter Madison’s view of the inevitably of faction with the assertion “that there are no conflicts of interest between rational men.” [OPAR, 236] Now on the face of it, this seems like a hopelessly naive view. If you are an auto worker making $70,000 a year working in a GM plant, isn’t it in your interest for the government to bail this company out and allow you to continue making your handsome salary until you retire? If so, then your interest conflicts with taxpayers and consumers of automobiles. If you are a company specializing in environmental products, isn’t it in your interest to have the government support legislation which, in effect, forces businesses to become buy your products? If so, then your interest conflicts with consumers, who now have to pay more for products that fall under environmental regulation. If you are unable to afford health care, isn’t it in your interest to have the state force medical facilities to treat you if you are ill? If so, then your interest conflicts with taxpayers and with other consumers of medical goods.

So how does Objectivism deal with such conflicts of interest? By the very simple but controversial strategy of claiming that such interests are not “rational.” According to the implied logic of the Objectivist position, it is not rational for a GM autoworker to support the bailout of the company he works for, even if the only viable alternative for him is to take a low paying service job; nor is it rational for a company specializing an environmental products to support environmental legislation, even though, in the absence of such legislation, the company will almost certainly go out of business and its stockholders will come away empty handed; nor is it even rational for a poor person unable to afford health care to desire forced medical care on his behalf, even if the alternative means death. Consequences are of little importance in determining the rationality of interest. What is important is that individuals do no violate the political and social ideals of Objectivism.

One of the most critical assumptions behind the Objectivist denial of conflicting interests between “rational” men is the notion that it is not in the interest for one individual to exploit or despoil another because, sooner or later, this will lead to a complete despoiling of the productive classes, resulting in impoverishment for every one. While there is always a danger of the despoilers killing the goose that lays the golden egg, there is no guarantee that this will happen. All human societies, past and present, have featured a certain amount of spoliation of the many by the few; yet some of these societies have flourished for hundreds of years.

How is this possible? How can spoliation occur without wiping out wealth altogether? The main reason for this stems from a kind of asymmetry of motivation that exists between the despoilers and the despoiled. As Pareto explains: 


It is a curious circumstance, and one meriting attention, that men are often observed to act with much more energy in appropriating the property of others than in defending their own. As we have noted elsewhere, if, in a nation of thirty million, it is proposed to levy one franc per annum on each citizen and to distribute the total to thirty individuals, these latter will work night and day for the success of this proposal, while it will be difficult to get the others to bestir themselves sufficiently to oppose the proposal, because, after all, it is only one franc! Another example: it is proposed to establish a ‘minimum salary’ for the employees of public administration. The people who in consequence of this measure will receive an increase of salary are perfectly aware of the advantage this proposal has for them. They and their friends will exert themselves all they can for the success of the candidates who promise to provide them with this manna. As for the people who are going to have to pay for this salary increase, each of them has great difficulties in working out what this is going to cost him in tax, and if he manages to access it, the amount seems of small significance. In most cases, he doesn’t even think about it…. One of the hardest things to get tax payers to understand is that ten times one franc makes ten francs. Provided the tax increases occur gradually, they can reach a total amount which would have provoked explosions of wrath had they been levied at one swoop.

Spoliation therefore seldom meets with a really effective resistance from the despoiled…. Rules for the distribution of goods … have to be applied by human beings, and their conduct will reflect their qualities and defects. If today there are arbiters who always decide against persons belonging to a certain class and in favor of persons belonging to certain other classes, there will very likely be ‘distributors’ in this society of tomorrow who will share out the loaf in such a way as to give a very little piece to A and a very big piece to B. [Les Systèmes Socialistes, Vol 1, ch 2]

Now while Objectivists may, if they wish, denounce those who engage in spoliation as “irrational,” such condemnations are not likely to prevent the spoliation from taking place. The term “irrational” in this context is merely an epithet of abuse. Objectivists, when using it, are clearly involved in an argumentum ad hominem. If an individual is given the opportunity to enrich himself at the expense of more productive individuals, why is it rational for him to abstain? If selfishness is a virtue, shouldn’t an individual seek to enrich himself in any way he can? As long as runs no great risk of retribution, his self-interest would appear to demand the use of every means at his disposal.

Once we grasp the motivational and situational logic of spoliation in society, it becomes clear that, as Madison warned us, “the latent causes of faction” are in fact “sown” in the nature of man and society. Rand’s assertion that no conflicts exist between rational men is irrelevant nonsense. Because of the asymmetry of interests between the despoilers and the despoiled, it is idle to denounce spoliation as “irrational.” Whether irrational or not, those who benefit from it are not going to give up their ill gotten gains without a fight. This means that in every society there will always exist powerful vested interests that will use every means at their command to support spoliation (and oppose Rand's "laissez-faire"). In short, there will always be factions, including, most ominous of all, factions in support of spoliation. Nor will these vested interests go away merely because Rand claimed she solved the problem of universals. Reality doesn’t work like that.