On ethics, part V: Contractarianism

by Massimo Pigliucci

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[This post is part of an ongoing series on ethics in which Massimo is exploring and trying to clarify his own ideas about what is right and wrong, and why he thinks so. Part I was on meta-ethics; part II on consequentialism; part III on deontology; part IV on virtue ethics.]

After my meta-ethical introduction to this series, we have examined the obvious contenders in moral philosophy: consequentialism, deontology, and virtue ethics. An important distinction to remember among them is that the first two address the question of what is right/wrong, while the latter deals with the question of what sort of life we should live, or what kind of person we should aspire to be.

In the next two installments (before the grand finale!) we shift questions again, taking a look at contractarianism and egalitarianism, which are really political philosophical approaches, more than strictly speaking ethical: they deal with the question of how to build a just society. Of course, as Plato argued in the Republic, there is a tight relationship between morality at the individual level and justice at the level of society.

Speaking of Plato, he was actually the first to take up the idea of a social contract, in both the above mentioned Republic and in the Crito, one of the dialogues that deals with Socrates’ death penalty. Plato actually takes different positions in the two cases, though commentators have argued that they are not mutually contradictory, but should instead be seen in a hierarchical fashion. In the Crito Socrates explains why he has to accept Athens’ death sentence, even though he does have a chance to escape. He says that he owes his life and all he has been able to do to the fact that Athens is governed by the Laws, and that it would therefore be unfair for him to disobey the Laws when it is no longer convenient to follow them, even though the citizens of Athens are thereby about to commit an injustice. Essentially, Socrates is saying that he is party to a social contract, and that he is bound by it even when things don’t go well for him.

In the Republic, however, Socrates is somewhat more cautious about the idea of a social contract. In that dialogue, his friend Glaucon makes the argument that laws are put in place so that people are restrained from committing injustices, which they would naturally be inclined to do if there were no consequences to their behavior (this is the famous problem of Gyges’ ring). Socrates replies that justice is worth having for its own sake, and that just men are happy men (in perfect agreement with virtue ethic’s eudaimonism, which we saw in this series' previous post). I think it’s obvious why Socrates does not contradict himself between the two dialogues, as there is no logical inconsistency in saying that one is bound by the laws, and yet that justice is a good in its own right (though it does raise the question of what one is to do when confronted with unjust laws).

Still, social contract theory in philosophy doesn’t really get off the ground until the big three: Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau. This is obviously not the place for an even superficial examination of their respective philosophies (but follow the links if you want to get started in that direction), but a minimalist treatment is necessary.

Hobbes is, of course, famous for his view that life in the “state of nature” for humanity was “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short.” Consequently, Hobbes thought that people rationally decided to enter a social contract in order to be able to pursuit their life in safety (this, like most social contract theories, is a thought experiment, not an account of actual historical events). Hobbes also concluded that people need a strong power to keep them in order, the Sovereign. He thus managed to simultaneously undermine the theory of divine rights of kings while rejecting calls for power sharing between the monarchy and parliament in 17th century England. (He had witnessed the English civil war of 1642-1648, which pitted Charles I against Oliver Cromwell.)

For Locke, the state of nature was a very different affair from the one envisaged by Hobbes. According to Locke, pre-contract human beings were able to live in complete freedom without others interfering in the conduct of their affairs (you could think of this as a type of libertarian paradise). The problem, according to Locke, is that the state of nature can easily devolve into a state of war, as soon as disputes arise about private property. If that happens, might would make right, since there is no civil authority capable of resolving disputes. Hence the necessity of government. The kind of government envisaged by Locke however, was again very different from what Hobbes had in mind. Locke dramatically influenced the American founding fathers, particularly Jefferson, so it is no surprise to find out that he thought that a civil society had to be based on the kind of division of powers (legislative, judicial and executive) that was soon to be implemented in the American Constitution. Importantly, Locke also maintained that should the government devolve into tyranny, the people would have reason — and arguably even a moral duty — to revolt against it. Which, as we know, led to the original tea party (the one in Boston).

Rousseau had not just one, but two theories of social contracts, one actually meant to be an historical account, the other an argument for how things should be instead. The state of nature for Rousseau was characterized by peaceful, largely solitary and uncomplicated lives, with nature providing what people needed. Problems started to occur with population growth, because needs became more pressing, people started living in groups, and they introduced division of labor. The latter in turn made leisure time possible (horror!), which caused people to compare themselves to others and develop feelings of envy (as always, it’s hard to keep up with the Joneses). The coup de grace for the human species was the invention of private property (take that, libertarians), which further encouraged greed and inequality. A natural social contract emerged from this situation which, while claiming fairness, is actually an instrument of the powerful to maintain their privileged position (he’s got a point there).

So much for Rousseau’s ideas about the actual course of human history. What about his prescription? Rousseau famously argued that the way to achieve a fair social contract is by direct democracy, which can be practiced only in small groups. That is because people in small groups know each other and it is easier to hold individuals to their promises, as well as to make them accountable for their behavior. This means that the modern state is for Rousseau precisely the way human beings ought not to live.

After the big three contractarians, we arrive at the 20th century, with the towering figure of John Rawls. I have devoted other posts on Rationally Speaking to Rawls’ political philosophy, and I set aside for him an entire chapter of my forthcoming book (The Intelligent Person’s Guide to the Meaning of Life, BasicBooks, New York). So again only a sketch will be provided here.

Rawls’ conception of human nature is that we are rational and compassionate people. His emphasis on rationality (and on the concepts of duties and rights) have contributed to label his political philosophy as “Kantian,” though I really don’t think that too much of a big deal should be made of this (he is certainly no utilitarian, however). Rawls’ thought experiment in social contractarianism is exceedingly original: he invites us to imagine that we are about to enter a discussion on how to structure society while being positioned behind a “veil of ignorance.” That is, we don’t know anything about what sort of people we are going to be once the veil is lifted and society gets moving. We may be male, female, or transgender; black, white or some other ethnicity; smart or not so smart; physically powerful or weak; have access to a large inheritance or not; have a lucky genetic constitution or one prone to disease; and so forth. The question, then, becomes what sort of society would a rational human being agree to if s/he had no access to that sort of personal information.

Rawls concludes that we would want to build a society based on two fundamental principles: a) each individual should have as much liberty as possible, provided that everyone is granted the same liberties; and b) social-economic inequality is justified only if all have equal access to increased resources and if such inequality is advantageous for all, particularly for the least fortunate members of society. It is crucial to understand that the two principles are not on the same footing: the first one takes precedence because civil liberties are more important than economic advantages (China need not apply, for the moment). This theory is often referred to as the idea that justice is fairness. Incidentally, what Rawls describes is an awful lot like what international surveys indicate many people do indeed prefer.

The following table summarizes the crucial characteristics of the social contract theories discussed above:

philosopher	initial state	theory of human nature	type of contract
Hobbes	war of all against all	people are rational egoists	strong central power
Locke	complete liberty to pursue life	people seek freedom, but may act with force	division of legislative, judicial and executive powers
Rousseau	idyllic, simple life, few needs	people are accountable when they know each other	direct democracy in small groups
Rawls	veil of ignorance	people are rational and compassionate	society based on the two principles of justice

The first thing to note about contractarianism is that it usually begins with a particular theory of human nature. I consider this an advantage, as I do not think that ethics makes any sense outside of the specifics of biology and society (i.e., there is no “view from nowhere” in ethics). All ethical theories assume some theory of human nature, but contractarians (as well as virtue ethicists) are more explicit about it.

Second, the range of solutions proposed by contractarians to the question of what structures do we want to build into our society range widely, from Hobbes’ absolutism to Rawls’ egalitarianism, from Rousseau’s advocacy of direct democracy to Locke’s views about division of powers in representative democracies.

Third, in terms of actual implementation, Hobbes’ is still practiced in a large number of countries in the world, though the trend for the past couple of centuries has been away from autocratic governments (and we should note that authoritarian countries tend to have the lowest index of human development); Locke’s is at the basis of the American and most European systems; Rousseau’s was practiced in ancient Athens (and led, among other things, to the death of Socrates and the disastrous Sicilian expedition that determined the fall of Athens and the victory of Sparta); and Rawls’ is approximated by northern European countries.

There are, naturally, plenty of critiques of contractarianism as an approach (as opposed to critiques of individual contractarian proposals). Broadly speaking, they fall into two categories: those originating within feminist philosophy, and those arising from race-conscious approaches. Indeed, the two are actually related, as for instance in the race conscious work of Charles Mills (The Racial Contract, 1997), which was heavily influenced by the feminist Carole Pateman (The Sexual Contract, 1988).

I don’t have time to get into any of this, and frankly I have little interest in doing so. While both feminist and race conscious writers have exceedingly valid points when they argue that as a matter of fact many contractarians were writing from within a white-male dominated culture and largely speaking to white males, there is no reason in principle why the systems proposed by Locke, Rousseau or Rawls couldn’t accommodate both genders and all ethnicities (indeed, Rawls does that very explicitly). As for Hobbes, well, he thought everyone ought to submit to the Sovereign anyway, regardless of gender and race.

Next: egalitarianism.