John Stuart Mill ( ) Branch: Political philosophy ; Approach: Utilitarianism Over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign

Transcription

1 John Stuart Mill ( ) Branch: Political philosophy ; Approach: Utilitarianism Over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign IN CONTEXT BRANCH Political philosophy APPROACH Utilitarianism BEFORE 1651 In Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes says that people are brutish and must be controlled by a social contract John Locke s book, Two Treatises of Government, looks at social contract theory in the context of empiricism Jeremy Bentham advocates the greatest happiness principle. AFTER 1930s Economist J.M. Keynes, influenced by Mill, develops liberal economic theories John Rawls publishes A Theory of Justice, based on the idea that laws should be those everyone would accept. John Stuart Mill was born into an intellectually privileged family, and he was aware from an early age of the British traditions of philosophy that had emerged during the Enlightenment of the 18th century. John Locke and David Hume had established a philosophy whose new empiricism stood in stark contrast to the rationalism of continental European philosophers. But during the late 18th century, Romantic ideas from Europe began to influence British moral and political philosophy. The most obvious product of this influence was utilitarianism, which was a very British interpretation of the political philosophy that had shaped the 18th-century revolutions of both Europe and America. Its originator, Jeremy Bentham, was a friend of the Mill family, and he influenced John s home education.

2 Key works 1843 System of Logic 1848 Principles of Political Economy 1859 On Liberty 1861 Utilitarianism 1869 The Subjection of Women 1874 On Nature

3 Victorian liberalism As a philosopher Mill sets himself the task of synthesizing a valuable intellectual heritage with the new 19th-century Romanticism. His approach is less sceptical than that of Hume (who argued that all knowledge comes from sense experience, and nothing is certain) and less dogmatic than Bentham (who insisted that everything be judged on its usefulness), but their empiricism and utilitarianism informed his thinking. Mill s moral and political philosophy is less extreme than his predecessors, aiming for reform rather than revolution, and it formed the basis of British Victorian liberalism. After completing his first philosophical work, the exhaustive six-volume System of Logic, Mill turned his attention to moral philosophy, particularly Bentham s theories of utilitarianism. He had been struck by the elegant simplicity of Bentham s principle of the greatest happiness for the greatest number, and was a firm believer in its usefulness. He describes his interpretation of how utilitarianism might be applied as similar to Jesus of Nazareth s golden rule : do as you would be done by, and love your neighbor as yourself. This, he says, constitutes the ideal perfection of utilitarian morality. Legislating for liberty Mill supports Bentham s happiness principle, but he thinks it lacks practicality. Bentham had seen the idea as depending upon an abstract felicific calculus (an algorithm for calculating happiness), but Mill wants to find out how it might be implemented in the real world. He is interested in the social and political implications of the principle, rather than merely its use in making moral decisions. How would legislation promoting the greatest happiness of the greatest number actually affect the individual? Might laws that sought to do this, enacting a kind of majority rule, actually prevent some people from achieving happiness? Mill thinks that the solution is for education and public opinion to work together to establish an indissoluble association between an individual s happiness and the good of society. As a result, people would always be motivated to act not only for their own good or happiness, but toward that of everyone. He concludes that society should therefore allow all individuals the freedom to pursue happiness. Furthermore, he says that this right should be protected by the government, and that legislation should be drawn up to protect the individual s freedom to pursue personal goals. There is, however, one situation in which this freedom should be curtailed, Mill says, and that is where one person s action impinges on the happiness of others. This is known as the harm principle. He underlines this by pointing out that in these cases, a person s own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant. "It is better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied." John Stuart Mill

4 The good samaritan helps his enemy in a biblical parable that demonstrates Mill s golden rule: do as you would be done by. He believed this would raise society s overall level of happiness.

5 Quantifying happiness Mill then turns his attention to how best to measure happiness. Bentham had considered the duration and intensity of pleasures in his felicific calculus, but Mill thinks it is also important to consider the quality of pleasure. By this, he is referring to the difference between a simple satisfaction of desires and sensual pleasures, and happiness gained through intellectual and cultural pursuits. In the happiness equation he gives more weight to higher, intellectual pleasures than to baser, physical ones. In line with his empiricist background, Mill then tries to pin down the essence of happiness. What is it, he asks, that each individual is striving to achieve? What causes happiness? He decides that the sole evidence it is possible to produce that anything is desirable, is that people do actually desire it. This seems a rather unsatisfactory explanation, but he goes on to distinguish between two different desires: unmotivated desires (the things we want that will give us pleasure) and conscientious actions (the things we do out a sense of duty or charity, often against our immediate inclination, that ultimately bring us pleasure). In the first case, we desire something as a part of our happiness, but in the second we desire it as a means to our happiness, which is felt only when the act reaches its virtuous end. Practical Utilitarianism Mill was not a purely academic philosopher, and he believed his ideas should be put into practice, so he considered what this might mean in terms of government and legislation. He saw any restriction of the individual s freedom to pursue happiness as a tyranny, whether this was the collective tyranny of the majority (through democratic election) or the singular rule of a despot. He therefore suggested practical measures to restrict the power of society over the individual, and to protect the rights of the individual to free expression. In his time as a Member of Parliament, Mill proposed many reforms which were not to come about until much later, but his speeches brought the liberal applications of his utilitarian philosophy to the attention of a wide public. As a philosopher and politician, he argued strongly in defense of free speech, for the promotion of basic human rights, and against slavery all of which were obvious practical applications of his utilitarianism. Strongly influenced by his wife Harriet Taylor-Mill, he was the first British parliamentarian to propose votes for women as part of his government reforms. His liberalist philosophy also encompassed economics, and contrary to his father s economic theories, he advocated a free-market economy where government intervention is kept to a minimum.

6 A Softer Revolution Mill places the individual, rather than society, at the center of his utilitarian philosophy. What is important is that individuals are free to think and act as they please, without interference, even if what they do is harmful to them. Every individual, says Mill in his essay On Liberty, is sovereign over his own body and mind. His ideas came to embody Victorian liberalism, softening the radical ideas that had led to revolutions in Europe and America, and combining them with the idea of freedom from interference by authority. This, for Mill, is the basis for just governance and the means to social progress, which was an important Victorian ideal. He believes that if society leaves individuals to live in a way that makes them happy, it enables them to achieve their potential. This in turn benefits society, as the achievements of individual talents contribute to the good of all. In his own lifetime Mill was regarded as a significant philosopher, and he is now considered by many to be the architect of Victorian liberalism. His utilitarian-inspired philosophy had a direct influence on social, political, philosophical, and economic thinking well into the 20th century. Modern economics has been shaped from various interpretations of his application of utilitarianism to the free market, notably by the British economist John Maynard Keynes. In the field of ethics, philosophers such as Bertrand Russell, Karl Popper, William James, and John Rawls all took Mill as their starting point. JOHN STUART MILL John Stuart Mill was born in London in His father was the Scottish philosopher and historian James Mill, who founded the movement of philosophical radicals with Jeremy Bentham. John was educated at home by his father, whose demanding program began with teaching Greek to John when he was only three years old. After years of intense study, Mill suffered a breakdown at the age of 20. He left university to work for the East India Company, where he stayed until his retirement in 1857, as it gave him a living and time to write. During this period he met Harriet Taylor, advocate of women s rights, who after a relationship of 20 years eventually became his wife. Mill served as a Member of Parliament from 1865 to 1868, putting into practice his moral and political philosophy.

7

8

9