The Selfish Self or the Social Self?

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     Students of language and history understand that the keepers of the canon and those who control the narrative by and large determine what is accepted as the truth, as well as what  is worth knowing and what is not. For that reason, the struggle for the narrative over American history is now being waged fiercely  between those who argue for individual rights - particularly property rights - and limited government and those who contend that any alleged conflict between the interests of the individual and the public interest is a false dilemma.

         Proponents of governmental minimalism, whether intentionally or as a matter of unconscious, internalized  ideology, draw their inspiration from the tenets of John  Locke's liberalism. As Carl Becker noted in his book, The Declaration of Independence (New York: Random House, 1922), "Most Americans had absorbed Locke's works as a kind of political gospel; and the Declaration, in its form, in its phraseology follows certain sentences in Locke's second treatise on government." Jefferson, Madison and John Adams, among many others, were intimately familiar with the most minute details of Locke's political philosophy.    In fact, Jefferson was so impressed by Locke's arguments that he read Locke's treatise on civil government three times and used Locke's compact theory of government to justify the American Revolution, just as Locke's treatise had, almost a century before, been interpreted to justify the "Glorious Revolution" of 1680 and the ouster of the Catholic Stuart kings.
Garrett Hardin, 1986

Garrett Hardin, 1986 


    The problem is that here in the United States, however, Locke's political philosophy, unlike that in England  has been constructed upon a foundation which recognizes and envisions only solitary selves, and  a concept of the whole--the public interest, what we owe to one another as citizens--is largely missing from American public discourse. Whether the issue is universal medical coverage, poverty, antiquated labor laws which harm workers and benefit employers, access to education, the need to rebuild our economy and to address decaying infrastructure, the impediments--which are the legacy of Locke's politics--remain: parochialism, special interests, and, all too often, an inability to see beyond the refrain of "What's in it for me?"

    In contemporary American society, the anti-social individualism which is the essence and legacy of Locke's political philosophy has been given free reign, unencumbered by the restraints, modifications and caveats to which it was subjected in England and in other European political systems. There the ties of the traditional society and medieval ideas which place an emphasis upon cooperation and extol communitarianism have not unraveled and continue to inform and bind the political discourse. As a consequence, in Europe, Locke's individualism was given nuance and context; whereas in America, in the context of the political tabula rasa of the New World, the self has become the avatar.

      In  his now-famous essay, The Tragedy of the Commons, the ecologist Garrett Hardin commented upon the deleterious effects which the pursuit of unbridled self-interest has upon the public interest. To Hardin, the Commons was a metaphor for the Earth and its environment, which belongs to all, and for which each of us has a special, collective obligation to protect; and he warned that it cannot withstand the incremental effects of individual anti-social acts. Pollution, as one example, is often caused by individuals who, based upon purely personal, self-serving calculations, seek to maximize their individual opportunities, irrespective of the consequences. Thus, over time, the public effects of pollution are gradual and diffuse. Therefore, the harm--the disutility--is slower to manifest itself. However, the utility to the polluter who disposes of  pollutants by releasing them onto the Common is immediate and positive.

    Hardin's prophetic essay underscores the difficulties of overcoming personal predilections and self-interest, even where important public concerns are at stake. The prognosis for a political culture such as the United States in which citizens have been acculturated to think only in terms of "me, myself, and I" suggests the dangers about which Hardin warned will only worsen unless the mindset of the population changes and begins to think in terms of the first person plural, "We."



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3 Comments

It seems to me that you are conflating voluntary social relationships with coerced governmental ones. Minarchists are no more anti-social or selfish than anyone else; they simply recognize that as governmental power expands, individual liberty contracts. They value freedom itself - for everyone, not just for themselves, and recognize the disutility and market distortions caused by large centralized authorities. Many socialists, on the other hand, support extensive government programs because they profit from them as unionized government workers, politicians, lawyers, lobbyists or "non-profits" organizations which survive on governmental largess.

Surely even Minarchists acknowledge that there are limits to individual freedom -- those points where 1 person's freedoms interfere with another person's freedom.

I'm afraid out of all my socialist (their definition not mine) friends, I cannot think of a single that matches Jeffrey's definition. True, some have been at one time or another in a union or a government employee or a child. However, all of them have sacrificed much in the way of personal financial gains, leisure time, etc. in their efforts to make the world a more rational, fair, and long-lived place for more people. I think you are confusing socialists with capitalists who are more likely to seek individual gains. Increasingly, there is much effort by capitalists to get government support in making their profits.

You might also be heartened to know that I have often heard so-called "socialists" advocating for reduced government because they see how the few elite have bloated the government in order to gather taxes and power for roads, shipping, telecommunications, and military to support their money-making endeavors just as they usurped government to pay for their railroads.

One can argue these benefited the public. Yet do "free" individuals willingly choose to abandon families to work for long hours at slave wages in dangerous jobs? How free to individuals feel when they aren't sure if they will have water poisoned by another individual's idea of small-government/no-regulation oil industry?