A Conflict of Visions: Ideological Origins of Political Struggles Read online

  If one believes, like Lenin, that the level of popular consciousness spontaneously achievable is inherently insufficient to the task,94 then more far-seeing elites have an enormous historic role to play95 and must employ whatever means are necessary. Although both Godwin and Lenin rejected the naturally evolved systemic processes which are central to the constrained vision, the differences in degree in their assumptions about human knowledge and reason produce profound differences in kind as to the role of truth and force. Relations between believers in Lenin's version of Marxism and believers in democratic socialism have historically been very bitter. A small shift of assumptions can have profound effects on the vision- and on the action that follows from it.

  Youth and Age

  With experience and articulated rationality having such vastly differing weights in the two visions, it is virtually inevitable that the young and the old should be seen in correspondingly different terms. In the constrained vision, which depends upon "the least fallible guide of human experience,"96 the young cannot be compared to the old in wisdom. Adam Smith considered it unbecoming for the young to have the same confidence as the old.97 "The wisest and most experienced are generally the least credulous," he said, and this depended crucially on time: "It is acquired wisdom and experience only that teach incredulity, and they very seldom teach it enough."98

  By contrast, when knowledge and reason are conceived as articulated rationality, as in the unconstrained vision, the young have considerable advantages. Condorcet wrote, in the eighteenth century: "A young man now leaving school possesses more real knowledge than the greatest geniuses- not of antiquity, but even of the seventeenth century- could have acquired after long study."99 In an unconstrained vision, where much of the malaise of the world is due to existing institutions and existing beliefs, those least habituated to those institutions and beliefs are readily seen as especially valuable for making needed social changes. According to Godwin:

  The next generation will not have so many prejudices to subdue. Suppose a despotic nation by some revolution in its affairs possessed of freedom. The children of the present race will be bred in more firm and independent habits of thinking; the suppleness, the timidity, and the vicious dexterity of their fathers, will give place to an erect mien, and a clear and decisive judgment.100

  "Children are a sort of raw material put into our hands," according to Godwin.101 Their minds "are like a sheet of white paper."102 The young were viewed by Godwin as a downtrodden group,l03 but from among them may be found "one of the long-looked-for saviors of the human race."104 However, the constrained view, which seeks prudent trade-offs rather than dramatic solutions, cannot seek prudence in youth, for prudence was regarded as the fruit of experience.105 Nor was moral fervor a substitute: "It is no excuse for presumptuous ignorance that it is directed by insolent passion," according to Burke.106 Burke's American disciple, John Randolph, said: "I am not speaking to the groundlings, to the tyros and junior apprentices; but to the grey-headed men of this nation ...."107 But to those with the unconstrained vision, old age merited no such special consideration. According to Condorcet, "prejudice and avarice" were characteristics "common to old age."108

  SUMMARY AND IMPLICATIONS

  The distribution of knowledge in society varies greatly according to the definition of knowledge. Where knowledge is defined, in the constrained vision, to include vast amounts of unarticulated but vitally important information and conclusions, summarized in habits, aversions, and attractions as well as in words and numbers, then it is far more broadly spread through a society than when its definition, as in the unconstrained vision, is restricted to the more sophisticatedly articulated facts and relationships. The constrained vision, which sees severe limits on man's conscious rationality, relies heavily on evolved systemic processes to convey and coordinate the broad array of knowledge necessary for human survival and progress. The unconstrained vision, which sees greater prospects for human mastery of knowledge, sees in those with special intellectual skills both the proof of its assumption and the vehicles of knowledge and reason for promoting social improvement.

  Articulation plays an important role in the dissemination of knowledge, as knowledge is conceived in the unconstrained vision. "Discussion is the path that leads to discovery and demonstration," according to Godwin109 who, as noted earlier, also considered accuracy of language to be "the indispensable prerequisite of sound knowledge."110 But articulation plays no such crucial role in the constrained vision. "It has been the misfortune (not, as these gentlemen think it, the glory) of this age that everything is to be discussed," Burke declared.111 He had no use for "pert loquacity,"112 and argued that even reason, by frequent repetition, "loses its force."113 Hamilton was suspicious of skilled articulation, which could be "mere painting and exaggeration"114 or "artificial reasoning to vary the nature and obvious sense of words,"115 and noted that "it is extremely easy, on either side, to say a great number of plausible things."116 Hobbes declared that words are wise men's counters "but they are the mony of fooles."117 Unarticulated social experience has remained a more effective guide to behavior than articulated rationality, in the tradition of the constrained vision. According to Hayek, it is enough that people "know how to act in accordance with the rules without knowing that the rules are such and such in articulated terms."118

  Articulate youth, idealistic and trained in the latest and most advanced forms of knowledge, as knowledge is conceived in the unconstrained vision, are a great hope for the future to those with that vision. So are intellectuals. Neither is viewed in this way in the constrained vision. Where knowledge is more expansively defined and consequently more widely distributed, as in the constrained vision, intellectuals have no commanding advantage over the common man. According to Hayek:

  Compared with the totality of knowledge which is continually utilized in the evolution of a dynamic civilization, the difference between the knowledge that the wisest and that which the most ignorant individual can deliberately employ is comparatively insignificant.119

  When Hayek referred to "that little extra knowledge" which intellectuals possessed,120 he echoed a skepticism about intellectuals that goes back for centuries among those with the constrained vision. Hobbes, like Smith, found little natural difference among men,121 and such social differences as he found were by no means always favorable to intellectuals. The common man, according to Hobbes, seldom engaged in meaningless words, which he saw as the hallmark of intellectuals. 122 Moreover, the real differences among the quality of people's decisions were due more to systemic incentives than to their individual knowledge or sophistication: "A plain husband-man is more Prudent in the affaires of his own house, than a Privy Counselor in the affaires of other men."123 In this view, the incentives facing intellectuals were to demonstrate their cleverness rather than to be correct in terms of results affecting other people. According to Hobbes, intellectuals "study more the reputation of their own wit, than the successe of another's business."124

  The arrogance and exhibitionism of intellectuals were likewise recurring themes in Burke125- along with the dangers that such intellectuals posed to society. He spoke of their "grand theories" to which they "would have heaven and earth to bend."126 Hobbes also saw those who "thinke themselves wiser, and abler to govern" as sources of distraction and civil war-127 Hamilton likewise saw intellectuals as dangerous, because of their tendency to follow "the treacherous phantoms of an ever craving and never to be satisfied spirit of innovation."128 Even where intellectuals were not conceived of as positively dangerous to the social order, their role as policy-makers was seen in the constrained vision as often inferior to that of ordinary people. John Randolph said that he knew men "who could not write a book, or even spell this famous word Congress" who nevertheless "had more practical sense" than any intellectual. 129

  But to believers in the unconstrained vision, intellectuals are "precursors to their fellows in the discovery of truth,"130 in Godwin's words. Likewise, according to Condo
rcet, "the discovery of speculative truths" is "the sole means of advancing the human race."131 However, those with a radically different conception of man, knowledge, and rationality see intellectuals as a danger- not simply to a particular society, but to any society.

  Chapter 4

  Visions of Social Processes

  'ifferences in the vision of human nature are reflected in differences in the vision of social processes. It is not merely that social processes are seen as mitigating the shortcomings of human nature in one vision and as aggravating them in the other. The very ways that social processes function and malfunction are seen differently in the two visions, which differ not only in their view of morality but also in their view of causation.

  Social processes cover an enormous range, from language to warfare, from love to economic systems. Each of these in turn comes in a great variety of forms. But there are also some things in common among social processes in general. Whether viewed within the framework of a constrained or an unconstrained vision, social processes have certain characteristics- an order, whether or not intentionally designed. Social processes also take time and have costs. Each of these- and other- aspects of social processes is seen differently in the constrained and the unconstrained visions.

  ORDER AND DESIGN

  A pattern of regularities may reflect either an intentional design or the evolution of circumstances not planned by any of the agents or forces involved in its emergence. Trees or vegetation of different kinds may grow wild at different heights on a mountainside, or a garden may be laid out with great care and forethought by a gardener. Both visions acknowledge the existence of both kinds of social processes, but they differ on the extent, efficiency, and desirability of evolved orders and planned designs.

  The Constrained Vision

  The contrained vision puts little faith in deliberately designed social processes, since it has little faith that any manageable set of decision-makers could effectively cope with the enormous complexities of designing a whole blueprint for an economic system, a legal system, or a system of morality or politics. The constrained vision relies instead on historically evolved social processes and evaluates them in terms of their systemic characteristics- their incentives and modes of interaction- rather than their goals or intentions.

  Language is perhaps the purest example of an evolved social process- a systemic order without a deliberate overall design. Rules of language are indeed written down, but after the fact, codifying existing practices, and most people have begun obeying these rules in early childhood, before being explicitly taught them. Yet languages are extremely complex and subtle, and of course vital to the functioning of a society. Even for small children, language is not so much a matter of parroting what has been explicitly articulated, but rather of inferring complex rules never fully explained.'

  Language is thus the epitome of an evolved complex order, with its own systemic characteristics, inner logic, and external social consequences- but without having been deliberately designed by any individual or council. Its rationality is systemic, not individual- an evolved pattern rather than an excogitated blueprint.

  Language is, in effect, a model for social processes in legal, economic, political, and other systems, as viewed within the constrained vision.2 It is not that languages cannot be created- Esperanto clearly was- but that they are more effective when evolved, because natural languages draw upon a more vast wealth of experiences over the centuries than will be at the command of any individual or council designing a language. Evolved language also serves a greater multiplicity of purposes than any given individual or council may be able to enumerate, much less weigh.

  In much the same way, the complex characteristics of an economic system may be analyzed in skeletal outline, after the fact, but the flesh-and-blood reality has often evolved on its own-and it is considered more efficient when markets have evolved than when "planned" by central authorities. Deliberate action or planning at the individual level is by no means precluded by the constrained vision, just as individuals choose their own words and writing style, within the scope and rules of language. What is rejected in both cases by the constrained vision is individual or intentional planning of the whole system. Man, as conceived in the constrained vision, simply is not capable of such a feat, though he is capable of the hubris of attempting it. Systemic rationality is considered superior to individual or intentional rationality.

  The constrained vision is not a static vision of the social process, nor a view that the status quo should not be altered. On the contrary, its central principle is evolution. Language does not remain unchanged, but neither is it replaced according to a new master plan. A given language may evolve over the centuries to something almost wholly different, but as a result of incremental changes, successively validated by the usage of the many rather than the planning of the few. In politics as well, evolution is the keynote of the constrained vision. Burke declared: "A state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation."3 Yet he would not subject whole political systems to "the mercy of untried speculations."4 Individual brilliance was no substitute for pragmatic adjustments, even by people of less brilliance:

  I have never yet seen any plan which has not been mended by the observations of those who were much inferior in understanding to the person who took the lead in the business. By a slow but well-sustained progress, the effect of each step is watched; the good or ill success of the first gives light to us in the second; and so, from light to light, we are conducted safely through the whole series.5

  The same basic view has been expressed in the twentieth century by F. A. Hayek:

  Tradition is not something constant but the product of a process of selection guided not by reason but by success.6

  The Hayekian view is even further removed from deliberate design than that of Burke, since Hayek incorporates a "survival of the fittest" culture-selection process which depends upon survival in competition with other social systems rather than simply on the basis of pragmatic individual judgments of success.? The intervening influence of Darwin between these two exponents of the constrained vision is apparent. It is not, however, a theory of the survival of the fittest individuals but of the fittest social processes.

  The Unconstrained Vision

  Without the underlying assumption that man's deliberate reason is too limited to undertake comprehensive social planning, an entirely different set of conclusions emerges in field after field. If, for example, effective rational planning and direct control of an entire economic system is possible, then it is clearly more efficient to reach desired results directly in this way, rather than as the end result of circuitous and uncontrolled processes. Where desirability can be specified by a small group of social decision-makers, rather than depending upon a multitude of mutually conflicting values among the populace at large, then social issues become very much analogous to engineering problems-an analogy often occurring among those with this approach, and equally often denounced from the opposing perspective of the constrained vision.8

  One of the most striking visions which conceived of social issues as essentially engineering problems was that of Thorstein Veblen. This view, expressed in a number of Veblen's writings, was crystallized and elaborated in his The Engineers and the Price System. Here he explicitly rejected the systemic processes of the marketplace-the price system-in favor of direct control by the relevant experts, the engineers. Few others have carried this mode of thought to such a logical extreme, but elements of it appear in a number of later writers. John Kenneth Galbraith, for example, like Veblen, conceived of the pricing mechanism as inadequate and manipulated by powerful interests, if not wholly fraudulent.9 Others with varying degrees of skepticism about economic and other systemic processes have likewise tended to seek more direct control by those with the requisite expertise and commitment to the public interest. Advocates of "industrial policy" are one of the latest in this tradition. Not all seek a special role for engineers,
as such, but rely on an analogy between engineering problems and social issues.

  In the engineering analogy, growing out of the unconstrained vision, one can begin with society's "needs" because it is possible to have an "objective analysis" of "what is really desirable."10 The "public interest" can be specified, and therefore pursued rationally. It is then a question of assembling the relevant facts, and articulating them-"a full presentation of the items we can choose among," -to determine how to achieve the resulting goals. Social issues thus reduce to a matter of "technical coordination" by experts.11 Unlike the systemic vision, in which there are inherently conflicting uses because of multiplicities of conflicting values in the populace at large, in this rationalistic vision, select third parties can agree on what constitutes "needs," "waste," or the "spoiling" of the natural or man-made environment.

  In this perspective, there are not only social solutions but often obvious solutions-though not necessarily easy solutions, given the opposition of those with a vested interest in the status quo. "Truth, and above all political truth, is not hard of acquisition," according to Godwin. What is required is "independent and impartial discussion" by "unambitious and candid" people.12 "The nature of good and evil" was in Godwin's view "one of the plainest subjects" to understand.13 What is needed is for "good sense, and clear and correct perceptions" to "gain ascendancy in the world."14