Thoughts on Freedom

THIS BLOG HAS MOVED

2006-10-08T20:10:00.000+10:00

...or has it? I'm still working out a few issues, like how to get a recent comments module working at Wordpress, but Thoughts on Freedom will now most likely be at

http://alsblog.wordpress.com

I am yet to send an email out to the existing contributors, but if you're reading this, save your posts for the new blog.

There's also a glitch that makes it appear as if every post on the new blog is written by me. I'm not really that much of a prolific writer, and I will change the author attribution in due course.

Update: We have definitely moved. See you at our new place!

The rabbit punch routine

2006-10-07T10:18:00.000+10:00

Once again Crikey has decided that Catallaxy is worthy of some added attention, in large part, I think, because I write there. I'm sure Jason doesn't mind the free advertising - and nor does Thoughts on Freedon, which got some nice advertising courtesy of news.com.au (link below). That said, I am heartily sick of what GMB & JC call 'the rabbit punch routine', where people are attacked, well, because it's cool to do the attacking. Not because of anything they may or may not have said. I made this comment in the relevant thread over at Catallaxy. I've put it here so everyone can see it as a main blog post.

I wondered why I couldn't get onto Catallaxy this morning while I was waiting for the jury's verdict. Yet another bit of Crikey dross explains it.

Disclosure
Unfortunately, some of this attention has come Catallaxy's way since I've been one of its writers. Much as libertarians may find Mark Davis' politics annoying, his analysis of the way the commentariat reacted to me in Gangland is pretty much on the money (see my Quadrant piece for details). Margaret Simons is a bit player in that commentariat, and people like me are clearly a threat. I'm not sure why, but I am.

These people simultaneously believe that blogs contain the collective (and meaningless) outpourings of Gen X/Gen Y, are no threat to the MSM, are never fact-checked, are populated by TEH EVIL GMB, and so on. Yet I start writing for Catallaxy and Thoughts on Freedom and that is news - more than Crikey, too - see this piece from news.com.au. I'd like to think these asshats can see that their days are numbered, but I suspect they don't want to see that far.

It's worth pointing out that Simons wrote a major piece for the Australian during the controversy over me winning the Miles Franklin. This piece - among ather things - made comments on my physical appearance and depended entirely for its cachet on gossip. Like Weathergirl, Simons claimed to have spoken to all sorts of shadowy - and not so shadowy - people in my past. Funnily enough, when I spoke to some of these people later, they claimed either (a) that they'd been misquoted or (b) that no-one by the name of Margaret Simons had ever approached them. The piece ran in late 1995 or early 1996. If people with access poke around on Factiva, they should be able to track it down.

Simons has significant appearance issues of her own - which I will not detail here - that do help to explain some of her obsessions. And it is characteristic of the left (and even the non-political commentariat) to 'pile on' (Les Murray uses this phrase, too, GMB) when someone doesn't fit the cookie-cutter model. Murray also makes the point that women are generally treated very badly - he has written some excellent stuff on this issue, excerpted here. This is actually a chapter-length excerpt from his biography, and details his views on exactly the issues Jason has flagged above. I highly recommend it if you've got some spare time.

For my part, I don't 'represent women', and I don't mind the sometimes rather masculine interactions on Catallaxy. Just as men stand to learn from how women manage interpersonal relations, I believe women also can learn from men on that score. I'm quite sure that if GMB or JC disagreed with me, I'd know about it. Instantly. And I'd probably get called a bunch of stuff. To which my response would probably be 'phooey'.

The commentariat, by contrast, goes behind my back, writing sneaky, smearing articles about both me and co-bloggers in forums where no-one from Catallaxy is granted a right of reply. To be quite frank, I prefer the 'blokey' in your face model, rather than the 'girly' stab in the back model. I always feel much happier when I know where I stand.

There, that's said it. Frankly, a large number of people in the commentariat need to get over themselves and get a life. I don't think Crikey is leftist, by the way (although the two recent attacks on Catallaxy were both from leftists). Rather, I think it is symbolic of a broader problem in Australia's commentariat - the substitution of personal attacks and smears for engagement with peoples' actual views. The staff writers at Catallaxy and Thoughts on Freedom - to a man and woman - write thoughtful, reasoned copy. People in the comments sometimes don't. This is the way the blogosphere works, folks. Get used to it.

A rule of thumb

2006-10-03T13:33:00.000+10:00

Jayant Bhandari, responding to the news that financial incentives will be offered by the Indian government to encourage inter-caste marriages:

"I cannot but shudder at the social corruption this policy will cause."

The more governments, with their powers of coercion, get involved in anything - be it the economy or our social lives - the more opportunity there is for corruption. This is another reason why plans like this aren't very bright.

Blog by a constitutional lawyer

2006-10-03T00:35:00.000+10:00

I have stumbled across the blog of Dr Simon Evans, an academic at the Melbourne University Law School who I will (hopefully) have the priviledge of being taught by for Constitutional Law next year. Go check out his site, and also his response to Peter Singer's deranged views on taxation.

The Government has a moral right to almost everything we own

2006-10-03T00:30:00.000+10:00

Well, that seems to be what Peter Singer thinks anyway:

The best justification of a right to private property is that we will all be better of if we recognise such a right. But if it is the common good that justifies the recognition of a right to private property, then the common good can also set limits to that right.

It's worth following the link and reading the whole extract word for word to get a taste of how utterly convoluted Singer's thinking really is. When I read Singer's work on animal rights I got the impression that he is a highly overrated 'philosopher'. This merely confirms my view. If this is how the Left thinks, then each and every one of us should be scared.

Not just for our property, but for our lives.

Apologies from skepticlawyer for lazy blogging

2006-09-29T19:35:00.000+10:00

I've only just noticed that people are still commenting on my Quadrant piece. I have no excuse for failing to notice apart from a tendency to only check recent blogposts.

Obviously, the link is all over the internet so of course people are still interested in stopping by and offering their thoughts. My apologies, then, to those people who dropped in and offered a comment expecting a response from me. I have now replied to your questions to the best of my ability.

...And I would really like to learn how to enable a 'recent comments' feature, like we have at Catallaxy...

Sukrit, is this even possible?

More politics of envy

2006-09-27T09:44:00.000+10:00

The role of government in education became controversial with the Australian Labor Party's Great Australian Schools education policy, released during 2004's election campaign. Aimed at freezing and cutting funding for a 'hit' list of primary and secondary schools whose fees were above a specified threshold, it attracted much criticism for stifling the hopes of aspirational voters.

In The Age today John Roskam depicts Labor's opposition to full-fee places for the 'rich' as more politics of envy:

"Unfortunately, it appears that envy is a key motivation behind Labor's promise to abolish full-fee places. At the last federal election envy motivated the ALP's "hit list" attack on wealthy private schools. Just as Mark Latham disappeared after the election, so too did his policy.

Hopefully, Labor's current higher education policy will go the same way as Mark Latham's schools policy."

Roskam makes a good comparison. Full-fee places are perceived by many people as a second chance to get into the course of their choice. And unfortunately for Labor, the FEE-HELP loan scheme makes full-fee places more affordable, increasing the liklihood that people will recognise Labor's politics of envy for what it is: blatant scare-mongering.

Contrary to popular opinion, the ALP's 2004 schools policy did not intend to take money from non-government schools and give to public schools. Rather, it outlined a view of taking money from a select group of non-government schools and giving to other non-government schools - about $378 million to Catholic systemic schools and $206 million to low-fee independent schools.

Few voters would have read the fine print on Labor's education policy under Latham. The Government's propaganda was too effective. I suspect many will form their opinion on Labor's universities policy in a similar fashion, mainly because it's so easy to point out the 'envy' involved.

Calling all Australians and silly folk!

2006-09-26T12:34:00.000+10:00

It has come to my attention that Erin and Mel have entered a video into GoogleIdol, and are representing Australia in the 'Pop Webcam Competition'. They are calling for support from down under:

"We need a little more support to remain secure in the eight entries that will proceed to the next round. We’re not sure how far we’ll get, but it would be nice to get our Aussie contribution through the preliminaries!

So, I am asking you this favour as a friend. If not a friend, as a fellow Australian (cue national anthem). If you’re not an Australian, or if you’re not particularly patriotic, I am asking you as a fellow idiot, or sucker for silliness. Please. If you have time, check out our video and rate us what you think we’re worth! NB:Rating in this round finishes on the 29th of September!"

Click here for the video, and turn your sound up - it's worth it ;)

The Oz Politics Blog

2006-09-24T10:46:00.000+10:00

Bryan has included Thoughts on Freedom - along with a tasty selection of other blogs - in his Oz Politics Blog feed. The full list is here, so you're encouraged to pay him a visit and check out the newcomers. Highlights among the additions include Andrew Norton and The Raving Wingnut, although there is plenty of bloggy goodness besides.

Education in a Free Society

2006-09-22T22:02:00.000+10:00

We live in one of the richest countries in all places and all times in the history of the world. It is normal for people in Australia to live in a free-standing house with hot and cold running water, three or more bedrooms, multiple bathrooms, surrounding yard and gardens, to have a car, to have television, video, stereo, radio, electric stove, kettle, microwave oven, telephones, mobile phones, x-box, bicycles, game-boys, to have as much meat, vegetables, bread, lollies, and chocolate biscuits as they would like (and more than is good for them), to eat from restaurants and take-aways. Cinemas, theatre, and all sorts of amusements and entertainments are common. Take a look as you drive around at the houses, renovations, factories, the cars, how new they are, the caravans, horse-floats, yachts, boats, surfboards, aromatherapy. All the toys. People who have travelled overseas are common. This wealth is not confined to some rich wicked class. It is normal.

Yet in the middle of all this plenty, the belief has somehow taken root among the population that paying for one's own child's education is something intrinsically unaffordable. It would be impossible, or improbable, or impracticable, for the people of society to be able to provide a decent education without the people of government threatening the whole population with imprisonment to confiscate the money.

'Free' compulsory state schooling began in the late nineteenth century, before the great rise in wealth that made all these goods and services commonplace. A justification based on a supposed general inability to pay for education services has long since expired, if indeed it was ever valid.

Putting aside for a moment the question of the disadvantaged and vulnerable, the effect of government education is simply to compel everyone in the population to subsidise everyone else's real estate, cars, gameboys, fast food, and chocolate biscuits.

As to the 'disadvantaged', the definition should surely exclude those who are spending the cost of their children's education on goods and services such as those mentioned above, which should rank lower in priority than education. A moment's reflection will show that this would exclude almost the whole population.

Why should someone who doesn't even own their own house or car be forced to subsidise someone else's house or car? And why should people whose position is approximately equal, have their common wealth degraded by having to subsidise each other's similar property-holdings by way of a vast government department? How can so-called public education, as it is now, avoid this perverse and unfair result?

But suppose we say that there remains a minority of truly poor people, defined as those who could not afford any of the goods and services less important than their children's education, and who still can't afford a decent education. I personally don't believe they exist because I have many times visited people who in our society are 'the poorest of the poor', and seen the televisions, videos, mobile phones, toys, carpets, computers, internet, take-away foods, lolly water, disposable nappies, biscuits, microwaves, and all the rest of it. But say for argument's sake…

Even if there is a truly poor class who cannot afford the education of their children, it still does not necessarily follow that the social provision of education services for that minority must be paid for by governmental confiscation. Libertarians are all in favour of education - we are just opposed to trying to achieve it by using coercion and producing a second-rate result at above the market cost. There is in fact widespread social agreement on the high value of education - that's where the policies of state education came from in the first place. It would be nonsense to suggest that all the people in society who are in favour of free education for the truly poor could not possibly find the value, the means, or the motivation to pay for it. It's a matter of taking responsibility for your own values. But if those who are in favour of providing free education for the truly poor are not willing to pay for it voluntarily, why should those against, have to pay for it under compulsion?

Even if the tiny proportion of society who are truly poor were to be worse off without state schooling, and charity not to make up the difference, which is unlikely, still, why should the far greater proportion of the rest of the population be so much worse off in their education as to be deprived of the benefit of private schooling tailored to their needs and forced into state schooling, just so the tiny minority can have free state schooling? Even on grounds of equity such an argument must fail.

Also the whole point of education is that it benefits the person who receives it. Some advantage no doubt accrues to others in society, so it is arguable that there should be a call on others to contribute. But still, why should all contributions be equal? Where is the equity in that? Why should other people be forced to pay for parents' decisions, and for their living expenses? Why should not the contribution of parents to their own child's education be greater than that of a complete stranger? The argument for state schooling is almost entirely built on grounds of equity, but on critical examination, even this core argument cannot be sustained.

And even if the government is to pay for education, that doesn't mean the government should provide and administer it - a recipe for waste and legal fraud. One possibility is to divide the education budget by the number of students, pay it in equal shares to parents in vouchers or cash, and abolish the state schools and their departments. Under a voucher system, different providers would compete to provide education services. Different providers would emphasise different values, according to the values in demand. Some might emphasise technical subjects like mechanics or computing, others might emphasise arts, or religion, or classics, or the outdoors, or law, or people skills, or investing. Some services might be in the form of schools as we know them, some might favour more practical form, or more theoretical form, or tutorial form, or peripatetic form. Still others might provide better forms unthought of yet because suffocated under the dead hand of government. The quality, diversity, and economy of schooling would all be much improved.

There could be no objection to such a reform on grounds of equity - what could be fairer? And not even the proponents of state schooling make the argument that it is defensible on the ground of the superior quality of its outcome.

The idea that governmental intervention is necessary to safeguard quality standards is nothing short of laughable. The biggest factor in the degradation of quality standards in education is caused by governmental intervention. For a recent example, one state primary school recently had 217 suspensions in one day. The Director-General and other senior officials of the NSW Education Department send their children to private schools - that just says it all, doesn't it? The two main forms of discipline in government schools seem to have become suspensions (ie ostracism) and psychiatric medication, a quite disgraceful state of affairs, while illiteracy and innumeracy among new entrants into high school are common.

The objection to such a reform of the state school system has got nothing to do with equity or quality, and everything to do with the system's functionaries preserving their accustomed position at the expense of the rest of society.

The state school system in the western world was built on the Prussian model of the late nineteenth century. The Prussian state education system was designed for the mass production of soldiers and employees - obedient and submissive to authority. States all over the world have adopted it because states love it. Each rising generation of human beings is drilled for years with the ideas of uniformity, conformity, 'one-size-fits-all' education, enforced mediocrity. Young adults are taught about the bio-chemistry of the cell, the physics of quasars, and the literature of the Victorian novelists, but nothing about happiness, sexual relationships, making money, investing or insurance - in fact, the real kinds of problems that will occupy most of their adult lives. They are filled to overflowing with a doctrine of 'entitlements' with no other moral basis than self-interested and forced confiscations by the state.

When you think about it, why should human beings be treated as property of the state, to recruit, and compel, and muster, and uniformise, and roll-call, regiment, discipline and punish them, and indoctrinate them with the creeds that their lives, liberty and property are what is left over after the state has done whatever it feels like? The most committed and reflexive totalitarians I have met are recent graduates of the state school system.

There are several fatal objections to the state school system.

First, as shown, the basic premises for its existence are false. It is not justified on equity grounds. The whole population of parents in Australia is already spending far more than the costs of state education on lower order priorities. The idea of a relevant population of 'disadvantaged' and 'vulnerable' is, quite simply, nonsense: a myth of the welfare state. The state education system represents an inane machination for the compulsory cross-subsidisation of lower-order priorities by everyone of everyone else.

Secondly, this circular re-distribution is done by pouring billions of dollars every year down the black hole of vast bureaucracies of government employees in league with a left-wing trade union specifically intended to further the interests of its own members at the expense of everyone else.

Government departments are notorious for their inefficiency. The idea that, on a dollar for dollar basis, they can compare with private organizations either in morale, efficiency, or academic achievements is nonsense. (And if they can, there can be no objection to their abolition.) In general, state education represents a depression in the moral and academic landscape.

Third, government runs a zero-sum game. In the market, those who want a religious school, and those who want a non-religious school, for example, can all get what they want. With government, it is always a case of one person being forced to do what another person wants. A government department can no more imitate the quality and variety of services that the market would and does produce, than the Soviet Union was able to imitate the quality and variety of goods in a free society - for exactly the same reasons. Government requires the restriction of individual liberty and still can't produce comparable results!

Fourth, the state's involvement creates a nest of parasites - vested interests whose first concern is to use the state's power of compulsion to further their own interests. A classic example is the way the Teacher's Federation has used its influence to promote laws to make it illegal for young people to leave school until 14 and 9 months. Many students after seven or eight years in state school still can't read and write and are tortured by boredom. But they are prevented from getting on with their lives, leaving and starting work, by laws which exploit them as 'assets' of the teacher's union. Their lives and freedoms are suspended in frustration to protect the members of the teacher's guild from having to provide any value in the market place that someone would actually willingly pay for.

Another example is the use of the state to outlaw teaching without the license of the state, thus effectively criminalising services which consumers would willingly pay for, but which might threaten the vested interests in the state.

If parents are too stupid or incompetent to be legally permitted the freedom for themselves to choose, through the market, their children's education providers, how can the same people have the competence to choose, through the ballot box, to put officials above them to restrict their choice in the same matters? How can a person appoint a person to 'represent' 'on his behalf' that he does not have the competence of a principal? The argument for state schooling involves a fatal self-contradiction.

Fifth, in the state system the syllabus cannot be something that parents and students choose for themselves. It becomes the prize of education 'experts' who have no accountability to any individual student or parent. It becomes the plaything of political movements who would like to impose their views on everyone else and can think of no better object than to have their creed entrenched in the state syllabus, in hopes of indoctrinating it in the rising generations as orthodoxy. (Such ideas almost always involve the expansion of state power at the expense of human freedom.) If you are a parent or student and don't like the syllabus, what are you going to do? In the market you simply don't buy the service. Under government, the line of authority would logically go from your local MP, to his party leader, to Parliament, to the Minister, to the Board of Studies. Your local principal and teachers are irrelevant. Good luck. Your power is effectively nothing.

Still, all these arguments only show technical reasons why the claims of the state education system cannot withstand critical scrutiny, and why a free market in education services would be better. However there is also an argument based on ethics, which I have not seen anyone refute. I challenge anyone to try.

All law and policy relies on force, that is, violence or the threat of violence: ultimately, if you don't submit to and obey the laws or policies, a group of men armed with weapons will come around and physically seize you. If you resist they will shoot you and if you don't, they will lock you up where you have a further risk of being violated and brutalised. That's how the government gets the money it uses to fund the state education system.

It's not like a threat of violence - it is a threat of violence.

Too often the arguments for state education proceed as if the only question were the desirability of this object or that, without regard to the prior ethical question. Yet there is a fundamental moral difference between violent and non-violent behaviour. Consensual exchanges and the libertarian approach are on the right side, and state education, with its forced payment, forced curriculum and forced attendance, is on the wrong side of the ethical divide. The ethical deficit is not, and cannot, be made up by a mere majority decision. The 'Darwinist' taunt proffered to libertarians is back-to-front. “I spit it bleeding in your high disgrace” (Shakespeare said that: pretty good eh?). We are not the ones advocating violence: our opponents are!

The ethical question cannot be made to go away - it can only be overridden, as power can be used to override principle. But the original ethical deficit contaminates everything it touches, and is ultimately responsible for all the technical problems which cause the second-rate character of state education.

Perhaps the most repulsive aspect of state education is the implicit notion that the value of other people is how far they can be forced under threat to serve your purposes. This ethical aspect is sometimes the most neglected, and leads to the defects in practice. We libertarians believe that the right place of the value of both the ethics, and of human freedom, is foremost.

Animal rights #4: on bestiality

2006-09-20T01:47:00.000+10:00

(This post continues the previous animal rights discussion: 1, 2 and 3.)

Steve Edwards (The Raving Wingnut) extends the logic of animals having no rights to reach the following conclusion:

“There are, of course, far more disturbing ramifications from my line of argument, but being a guy who generally feels an obligation to argue things through and countenance the inevitable implications of his logic, I shall have no choice but to admit the following: due to my reasoning, there can be no legal prohibitions on bestiality!”

One should recognise firstly that Steve is not arguing against extending consideration to animals. Indeed, I believe it is impossible for him to argue against affording animals some consideration as living beings.¹ It would be the social equivalent of arguing that the Earth is flat, or that paedophilia should be encouraged.² What he rightly argues is that animals have no a priori rights, nor can they be given rights (because animals cannot take on any accompanying responsibility).

Secondly, we should note that it is not entirely relevant to this discussion that bestiality is despicable. What is of main concern is the harm to the animal.³ This is a logical conclusion of my contention that it is impossible to argue against extending consideration to animals. To focus only on bestiality would be to become a member of the ‘moral police’. If legislation is needed to realise the common sense view that animal abuse is wrong then that legislation should be exclusively focused on preventing harm to the animal. Whether a ban is needed is more of an empirical question, and goes back to what happens when you legalise any previously illegal activity (you can now regulate it). Personally, I don’t think a ban is needed, for reasons I will outline in a later post.

While bestiality shouldn’t be the main issue, we do need to justify picking on bestiality in the first place. After all, couldn’t killing animals for food be said to be a form of abuse? There are a couple of reasons which I will elaborate on in my next post. For now let’s just say bestiality is less useful to society than meat-eating or other ways in which we use animals (eg. laboratory experiments). I freely admit there is a moral element to this discussion.

The issue is how best to achieve an accepted goal

Steve implicitly recognises two things by saying:

“So basically, if you want to torture your own dog to death for fun I'll call you a sick freak, but I'm afraid I cannot think of any particularly compelling reason to ban this kind of cruelty in itself.”

By calling an animal abuser a ‘sick freak’ Steve firstly indicates he is not prepared to argue that torture of animals, or bestiality for that matter, is a perfectly normal and acceptable activity. That is his admission bestiality is wrong. Second, and more importantly, his statement implicitly tells us that he does consider it ‘cruelty’ to torture an animal to death. What this means is he recognises that it is cruelty and therefore harm occurs. This is relevant to the second point I have made above (about disregarding the bestiality element and focussing on the harm to the animal).

Despite there being no logically justifiable position for animals having ‘rights’ (a position I agree with), Steve’s description of ‘cruelty’ tells us he, like every decent person on this planet, does not think animals are so beneath regard that they should be afforded no consideration whatsoever, even if they are private property. That is the hidden premise in his statement, and in all debate over animal welfare. Would he describe it as ‘cruelty’ if it were an inanimate object? I think not.

Why it’s impossible for Steve to argue 'against'

That animals should be afforded some consideration is a matter of common sense. The issue is how best to achieve this undeniable goal, and what competing interests need to be balanced. Steve’s own human nature tells him there’s something wrong. Either that, or he is not prepared to go on record as supporting bestiality even though there is no logical way to reach the conclusion that animal abuse is bad (since animals have no rights). The position opposed to affording some basic consideration to animals is an unarguable one, hence the frustration expressed in Steve’s second statement above. For elaboration on this line of argument, I would refer interested readers to Brian Scarlett's work.

A common logical problem?

Similar philosophical frustration occurs in formal logic. This is the problem with having a hidden, unarguable, premise. As an example⁴ take the argument:

The Prime Minister collects clocks.
Anyone who collects clocks has to be slightly mad.
Therefore, someone is slightly mad.

Here one can identify a couple of hidden premises.

1. You can’t be a Prime Minister without being a citizen (Sue v Hill tells us that much).
2. So the Prime Minister is a citizen.
3. If the Prime Minister is a citizen, then he’s a person (because you can’t be a citizen without being a person).

Even in these propositions I’ve made some hidden assumptions. For example, I’ve assumed the Prime Minister is a Member of Parliament. Everyone agrees with that. It’s an unarguable position. In philosophical logic hidden premises (which everyone agrees with, and which when added to the premises of an argument will render the argument valid) are dealt with by adding propositions known as enthymemes. Without going into all the symbolic mumbo jumbo, the basic point is that hidden, unarguable, premises need to be factored into discussions such as this. I think this is the best way to analyse this dilemma. If I’m wrong, I’m sure someone will smack me down accordingly.

Notes
[1] Two points: Firstly, I’m talking about humans abusing animals, not animals abusing other animals. The fact that we are superior beings allows us to have this discussion and change our response to undesirable behaviour. We can’t stop animals from sexually abusing other animals for fun. Second, I’m mostly referring to bigger beings. It would be quite difficult to abuse smaller beings such as termites, ants or snails, and few people own them. More common are farm animals such as horses.

[2] A more complex issue which I raised with Steve earlier is whether consensual cannibalism should be legalised.

[3] This is the main concern. You cannot argue against this position in today’s society. The very fact that Steve and I are writing articles on animal welfare indicates we care enough.

[4] Taken from Greg Restall's book on Logic.

The Welfare/Warfare State

2006-09-19T22:03:00.000+10:00

We who love Australia should be sad, but not surprised, to find that our troops have been abusing human rights in Iraq. A military has only two purposes: to threaten to shoot people, and to actually shoot them. If you wanted any other job done, you wouldn't send a military, would you? Pointing guns at people is what soldiers do - and that's when they're being relatively restrained!

If our troops had committed other or worse abuses, would we know about it?

To blame a few rogues is to miss the point. Our soldiers should not be there. Our good intentions have miscarried. After 9/11, in a wave of sympathy for our old allies the United States, we joined them in a military campaign in a foreign land broiling with chronic religious, ethnic and nationalist disputes. We now know that the reasons put forward for the war in Iraq were wrong. There were no weapons of mass destruction, and there were no Iraqi links to Al Qaeda. President Bush had his own reasons for making war on Iraq. But the point is, we have now joined in a war which has killed over 100,000 men, women and children. Australia. For what? The best reason, or excuse, that is now on offer is that we are helping to 'build democracy' in Iraq. It's a kind of welfare/warfare state, if you like. We take money from people who didn't consent, and give destructive 'benefits' to people who didn't ask, all in the name of 'democracy' and helping 'the disadvantaged'.

This teaches us a home truth. Democracy loses its value when it means nothing more than that the majority or the state can use force to violate other people's liberty and property rights. What's the point of having a government to keep down thieves and burglars, if those in government are free to take as much of your liberty and property as they feel like? Only when the law equally constrains all people - including those in government, - to respect other people's life, liberty and property, is democracy a guarantee of freedom or human dignity. This applies everywhere - as much in Australia as in Iraq.

The welfare/warfare state violates the values of life, freedom and property at every turn. It denies personal responsibility which is the foundation of morality, it involves everyone in the injustice of its own plunder, and it destroys social harmony. The government does not 'represent' us when it commits crimes and violates human beings.

The truth hurts, but we should still face it. It is wrong that the war in Iraq has any legitimacy in terms of the defence of Australia. It is wrong for Australia's military to be involved in a campaign that has destroyed the lives and the homes of thousands upon thousands of innocent people. The Iraqi people are not our enemies. It is wrong for the Commonwealth in this way to defame the good name of Australia.

A true friend helps his friend to see and do right, not to persist in wrong. We should withdraw our troops from Iraq immediately and urge our old allies the Americans to do the same.

Funding students and not schools (pirate style)

2006-09-19T13:33:00.000+10:00

In recognition of this special September 19, I offer my views on vouchers in pirate-speak:

Vouchers are in th' news again, with the Australia Institute stirrin' up th' pot in th' media recently. Fire the cannons! And hoist the mainsail! Vouchers have also bein' suggested fer disabled little sandcrabs and those with readin' difficulties but fer th' purposes o' this post I'll focus on ideas fer universal vouchers fer all school little sandcrabs that are funded by th' government. Aarrr!

In a nutshell, I am not advocatin' that government withdraw from fundin' education (at school level). Ahoy! I think this a pragmatic approach. Governments should withdraw from runnin' schools but provide everyone subsidised education at school level. Parents should have a choice as t' what school they send their child with th' 'X' amount o' dubloons th' government gives, but are free t' spend beyond that t' provide better quality. Aarrr! Fetch me spyglass!

Basic education at school level should be available t' all little sandcrabs who desire it because it confers positive social benefits on society as a whole. Society needs scallywags t' have a minimum standard o' literacy and mathematical ability, by Blackbeard's sword. Universities on th' other hand, produce graduates who solely capture th' value o' their degree.

It doesn't make sense fer low wage workers t' have their taxes redistributed t' subsidise th' university fees o' lawyers or doctors in-trainin', fer example. If there are shortages in these areas th' market will automatically and impersonally send out th' signals that attract th' desired workers (i.e. higher wages or salaries). Fetch me spyglass! Fetch me spyglass!

Where t' get th' funds fer free school level education? One idear is universities and colleges (there may be some possible exceptions in th' skills-based ones). Governments should (a) stop fundin' and runnin' them completely, and (b) divert funds gained t' parents/guardians who have school-age little sandcrabs. I'm not entirely sure vouchers should be means tested. Fetch me spyglass! I think 'tis better they weren't - th' notion is t' raise overall fundin' fer th' school sector, not just redistribute funds.

Givin' t' schools directly has not worked well. Give th' dubloons t' parents (if not through a voucher, perhaps through a tax credit) and watch schools compete and raise standards t' get students. More accountability and openness so parents could make informed choices regardin' actual performance wouldn't hurt either. If this means some bad schools go under, well, tough. Australian students deserve th' best. And th' best isn't necessarily what th' educational unions - who have a vested interest in th' system stayin' th' way it is - want.

Hat-tip: Andrew Leigh

Award rates not fair

2006-09-19T11:24:00.000+10:00

Kim Beazley provides ample evidence why he will probably never become prime minister. What's "fair" to him are the award rates that effectively price low-skilled migrant workers out of the job market.

The unions love minimum wages because they prevent other workers from taking the jobs of their members. It has nothing to do with helping the poor, because the poor can be helped through welfare payments. If Labor denies the evidence in favour of higher minimum wages causing increased unemployment, then it needs a crash course in basic economics.

Mr Beazley prides himself on standing up to bullies. Why not stand up to the unions for a change?

[The Chaser has more on another Beazley stuff-up.]

One for the dog lovers

2006-09-18T07:40:00.000+10:00

Are dogs' mouths really cleaner than humans'?

All dogs lick themselves. Some eat their own feces. Humans (most of 'em, anyway) do not. So how in the world can the mouth of a canine be cleaner than that of a person? Simple -- it can't. According to ABC News, this is basically an urban legend. However, unlike the one about the psycho killer with the hook, this story has a grain of truth. Although the mouth of a typical dog is full of bacteria, it's "species specific." So, if a dog were to lick a person, most of the germs wouldn't transfer. "Bottom line -- you're more likely to get a serious illness from kissing a person than kissing a dog."

The myth may have stemmed from the way pups lick their wounds. A dog's tongue gets rid of dead tissue so wounds heal faster. Perhaps folks concluded that dog saliva is "healthy." Hardly the case, but you shouldn't be afraid of licks. They might be gross, but they're not dangerous.

And here are a whole lot more things about dogs that you always wanted to know but were afraid to ask.

Husky puppies

2006-09-15T16:50:00.000+10:00

As promised, some husky pics. First up is a picture of the illustrious dad himself, looking like King Muck on the bed. This is a dog who genuinely thinks he's Christmas. Next, some puppy pics. Texas threw 7 puppies; They're nearly 5 weeks old, and the two show specimens have already been sold. The others (non-show) are still up for grabs, and come wormed, vaccinated and socialized.

You'll need to wait, though, as reputable husky breeders prefer to keep their puppies for 10 weeks so they're properly ready for their new home. The puppies come in a range of colours, consistent with both sire and dam colours. There are darker pups with 'masks', and lighter pups with tan highlights. All have blue eyes.

The first puppy pic shows two of the darker pups. The second pic shows two of the lighter pups contrasted with one mid-tone puppy.

If you've decided a husky is for you, then I highly recommend some research into the breed. These dogs like exercise, and if you're determined to stick to that new diet and exercise regime, one of these pups could be for you. If, however, you just want a pretty dog and you're not willing to exercise it, then expect to find holes in your backyard galore and one very stroppy animal. Huskies need to RUN.

Still interested? Contact rdiplock AT hotmail DOT com. Non show puppies are $400.00 each.

We are global citizens

2006-09-13T11:01:00.000+10:00

Mark Richardson wonders where liberalism stands on the nation state. The short answer, I think, is that classical liberals recognise the concept of ‘country’ as an artificial construct that is not inherently something of value to be preserved – because it is backed up by state force.

To take the line that there is something inherently special about being Australian is to place undue emphasis on a word. Politicians love inspiring this sort of nationalistic fervour because it wins them votes, and conservatives get sucked into their posturing.

If, in the future, globalisation sees the political merging of nations, there is no valid reason to prevent this from occuring. Apart from intangible value judgements on national identity, there are no compelling arguments for preventing Australia merging with another country.

In this way, conservatism differs from liberalism. Conservatives think ‘tradition’ ought to be preserved: for them, every change needs to be justified in light of the past. It can be an inflexible position bereft of substance, and is an example of the closed-mindedness Rafe Champion alludes to in this post about Popper. Too much nationalism contributes to conflict, whereas globalism minimises it.

Conservatives can however, mount a reasonable argument in favour of civic duty or obligation. I would argue we have an obligation to promote good deeds, and that liberalism supports such voluntary community initiative. But it supports it from a human angle. Not because it's a case of Australians helping other Australians, but because humans are helping other humans. Conservatives like Richardson don’t seem to understand that.

I am a practical person. When I found out I needed to take up Australian citizenship to get a very generous loan for higher education, I naturally took the appropriate steps. While I am completely opposed to HECS and would like to see it abolished (governments should not be involved financially in universities) I am, like everyone else, self-interested.

Some would say my attitude is very Australian!

Update: Mark responds.

War is bad for business

2006-09-13T10:11:00.000+10:00

I wrote previously on the link between democratisation and peace. Here is a good article by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. on how commerce has the potential to thaw relations between the United States and China:

"It was Bastiat who observed the trade-off between trade and war. When goods don't cross borders, he said, armies will. Without trade, there is less to lose from the mass destruction that war implies. Countries that trade have a mutual stake in the preservation of open, friendly relations. This is one reason that free commercial activities promote peace, and why protectionism and trade sanctions generate war tensions."

Economics is becoming increasingly important.

A friendly wager...

2006-09-12T00:09:00.000+10:00

I've had a little dispute that I need help resolving. Put simply, me and a friend can't agree on which of our rabbits is cuter. Please help us solve the dilemma by honestly voting on which you think is cuter.

The rabbit known as 'Alfie'

Video of Alfie.

The rabbit known as 'Jack'

Video of Jack.

Pictures (1, 2) of Jack.

VOTE NOW!

Nicholas Gruen talks in Melbourne

2006-09-11T07:06:00.000+10:00

Sorry for confusion, this is posted for Nicholas.

Invited by the indefatigable impresario of ideas Race Mathews to talk to the Fabian Society I’ll be doing so this Wednesday evening. The topic is the economic and social significance of open source software as a new mode of production, and I’m still working on the slides.

Please come if you’re interested, and it would be great to see any Troppodiles there. After the show we’ll retire to Toto’s pizza bar, so you’re invited if you want to come.

You have to pay the Fabians a small charge for entry to the talk - see over the fold. You can read this article I wrote on Open Source for Policy Magazine if you want to do a bit of pre-reading, though the talk will not assume any prior knowledge of what ‘open source’ software is. Please feel free to let me know you’re coming in comments or by email. And please let anyone else know who you think might be interested.

“New Models of Social Production: Open Source and its economic and social significance.”
Meeting details are 6 for 6:30pm to 8pm, Wednesday, 13 September, in Meeting Room 1, Trades Hall (Victoria Street Entrance), Cnr Lygon and Victoria Streets, Carlton. Australian Fabian Society members $6, non-members $8, concession $3.

The Libertarian State: Engagement or Isolation

2006-09-10T11:37:00.000+10:00

The role of the libertarian state is to ensure the freedom of the people. But which people, exactly? To be more precise, is the role of the libertarian state only to ensure the freedom of its people, its citizens. Or is it to ensure the freedom of all people internationally?

No-one has ever seriously argued that it is possible for any national government to ensure freedom for all people all over the world. However liberal leaders in history such as William Gladstone, Woodrow Wilson, and John F. Kennedy all believed that their nations should have a role in increasing freedom for other peoples around the world. For William Gladstone, his belief was galvanised by the Bulgarian Horrors perpetrated by the Ottoman Turks. Woodrow Wilson saw the disintegration of the European empires in World War I as an opportunity the United States should seize to ensure freedom for the smaller nations of Europe. The increasing soviet influence of the 1960s galvanised John F. Kennedy to attempt to oppose them (disastrously) in Vietnam.

In the past three decades, this impulse has increasingly been the catch-cry not of self-described liberals, but of a new breed who call themselves neo-conservatives. The neo-conservatives were mostly former liberals who were repelled from liberalism by the increased influence of the peace movement. They believed a muscular militarist foreign policy was necessary not just to protect freedom at home, but to extend freedom as well abroad. Their rhetoric is incredibly attractive:

Ours are not Western values. They are the universal values of the human spirit and anywhere, any time, ordinary people are given the chance to choose, the choice is the same. Freedom not tyranny. Democracy not dictatorship. The rule of law not the rule of the secret police.

The spread of freedom is the best security for the free. It is our last line of defence and our first line of attack.
- Tony Blair's Address to the United States Congress, 2003

The unspoken intellectual core of both old liberalism and neo-conservatism is that governments in free nations have a responsibility not just to ensure the freedom of their own people but to work for the freedom of other people around the world as well. As outlined by Tony Blair, sometimes this can be argued to be in the interests of those of us who are already free. At other times however, it seems to directly conflict with our interests. Overseas military operations impose enormous costs on free world taxpayers. Refugees fleeing oppressive regimes disrupt free societies, sometimes in positive ways, other times in negative ways; imposing themselves on free societies without prior permission and often bringing revolutionary intrigues, espionage and Old World rivalvries with them.

Recognising these conflicts, libertarian writers often adopt quite an isolationist approach to foreign policy in their writings. Possibly influenced by the beginning of the United States as a haven for Puritans fleeing England, Ayn Rand's utopian vision of a libertarian society in Atlas Shrugged is that of refugees from the rest of the world who isolate themselves and as much as possible refuse to engage with it. Yet is this example practical? In a world where the entire land-mass is already claimed by one nation or another, where bureacracy and the other petty tyrannies are manifest almost everywhere, is isolation really still the best course?

National Socialism in Australia Today

2006-09-09T21:32:00.000+10:00

John Howard showed what a cunning old fox he is this week by reinstating politicians' over-generous superannuation entitlements. And not a peep of protest from Kim Beazley and his cronies either. All in all, a quite disgusting episode, which shows in microcosm two defects of our system of government.

Try this thought experiment. Imagine each voter has an electronic 'black box' that enables him or her to vote directly on each proposed law. Once a proposal gets more than 50 percent of the vote, it becomes law.

Now, who honestly believes that a proposal to pay politicians extra superannuation would really get more than 50 percent of the vote? The idea is laughable, isn't it? We know it's false, and the politicians do too.

So the first defect of the so-called 'representative' system of government is that it can and routinely does misrepresent the people's will. The people have no ability to vote on any single issue, but have to vote (when they can vote at all) on a bundle of issues all mixed in together. They don't even vote for issues, they vote for people holding a mixed grab-bag of promises and bribes, each unprincipled party swapping votes with others equally unprincipled.

As an expression of what the people want, it is incoherent and incompetent: there is no real way of knowing whether the people actually want this, or that policy. Yet government can and does routinely claim that anything and everything it does 'represents' the will of the people, for no other reason than that the government does it. As you can see, it is more of a fraudulent racket, albeit a legal one, than it is a system truly representing the will of the people.

Now let us suppose that defect is remedied: suppose every voter has an electronic black box and can vote if they want, or not if they don't want, on every proposed law. Thus we are supposing the government now truly represents the will of the majority of the people when it makes a law. So it is now no longer possible for goernment to make laws which take from the majority and give to a minority, as it does now.

That leaves the second major defect of our system of government. A majority is still able to vote itself benefits by using state force to take them under compulsion from a minority. What or who will protect the minority?

The fundamental moral rule against violent behaviour is not somehow waived just because those in favour of using force happen to be in a majority. Suppose there are 12 men, and one woman, and they vote on whether to have sex. The men vote for, and the woman votes against. According to the 'democratic' logic of the majority decision that is common in Australia politics, if the majority now force the minority, not only is it not morally wrong, it's not even factually a violation!

According to the 'democratic' logic of the welfare state, theft magically becomes non-theft if the state does it under authority of a majority decision.

Thus the idea that 'democracy' means a majority decision justifies any use of law, and therefore any use of force, against the a minority, is actually a perversion of democracy.

Fundamental freedoms and rights such as freedom of religion, freedom of speech, freedom of association and assembly, the right to trial by jury, and so on, are often called democratic rights. But such fundamental rights and freedoms are not democratic in this sense: they consist of denying the right of the majority to override the freedoms of a minority. They insist that there are higher values than mere majority decisions to use force.

“The true democratic principle that none shall have power over the people, is taken to mean that none shall be able to restrain or to elude its power. The true democratic principle, that the people shall not be made to do what it does not like, it taken to mean that it shall never be required to tolerate what it does not like. The true democratic principle, that every mans' will shall be as unfettered as possible, is taken to mean that the free will of the collective people shall be fettered in nothing.” (Lord Acton)

So the second problem with our current system of government is that there is nothing in principle to restrain government from infringing the rights of minorities. The most abused minority in the last hundred years has probably been, believe it or not, business people. Being a minority, they make an easy target for the depredations of politicians prostituting the powers of the state to the grasping of greed. The population has got into the habit of voting itself favours to be paid for from the pockets of business people: forcing employers to pay their employees' tax, forcing them to pay the medical and income insurance ('workers compensation') of their employees, forcing employees to pay the retirement insurance (superannuation) of their employees, forcing employers to administer all these schemes, forcing them to pay special taxes that apply only to businesses, forcing them to pay labour costs over and above the market rate, and so on.

There is nothing in principle to distinguish this kind of majoritarian bullying and legal theft, from other majoritarian abuses in other times and places, such as the criminalisation of non-Christian religions in Dark Ages Europe, or the decision by the national socialists of Germany to exterminate the lives of Jewish citizens en masse.

The current Australian welfare state, and the national socialism of Germany under Hitler, rest on the same ethical basis, which is, that the majority have a right to use state power to force anyone else to sacrifice their values to comply with majoritarian opinion, whether religious, or political, or social. The underlying belief is unprincipled: 'might is right', without any true ethical basis - no matter what claims may be made in the name of the greater good.

Modern Australian national socialists such as Labor, Liberal, Democrats or Greens, faced with this truth, always react with indignant outrage, and resort to personal argument. That's because they have no better argument to rely on: there is no difference in principle between national socialists in Germany in the 1930s and national socialists in Australian in 2006: they believe in all the same sort of stuff requiring government control of everything, even including race-based laws for social engineering purposes!

No doubt the practical remedy of these evils is some way off yet. However that should not stop us from identifying the remedy in theory.

The libertarian remedy is, first, to understand the basic problem: people, whether in government or not, using violence or the threat of violence to get what they want. We challenge the cult of the all-knowing and all-wise state, and we challenge the pretensions to moral superiority, dressed up in appeals to 'social justice', 'the public interest', and such like, which are really no more than claims to be able to enforce opinion and to benefit vested interests.

Secondly, the libertarian remedy is to assert the fundamental right of individuals to be free from the use of force by other people, whether in government or not, unless its to stop force or fraud. This means that not only should freedom of religion be entrenched in constitutional law limiting governmental power, but so should every other human freedom, except only the freedom to initiate force or fraud against others.

This includes the right to own your own body, your own life, your own labour and the fruits of your labour, the right to make a living by consensual means without legal restriction, the right to undertake risky behaviours at your own risk, the right to price your goods and services as you see fit, and the right to consensual relations of any kind - without legal restriction by intolerant and paternalistic know-it-alls.

Native Title: a Hayekian analysis

2006-09-06T19:50:00.000+10:00

THE NATIVE TITLE ACT AND SPONTANEOUS ORDER:
HOW LEGISLATING IN PLACE OF THE COMMON LAW HAS UNDERMINED FORMAL EQUALITY AND THE RULE OF LAW

I ABSTRACT

Australia is a country where legislative solutions to social problems are very popular. ‘Someone should make a law against it’ and ‘they should do something about that’ are oft-repeated mantras on all sides of politics. They’re even commoner among ordinary citizens, who — as F A Hayek argued some sixty years ago — soon get used to authority taking personal choice out of their hands. Legislators pass more (and more complex) laws, laws under which the rest of us are supposed to live.

One of Hayek’s great insights was his understanding that governments are bad managers, especially when they seek legislatively to micromanage every possible outcome. The Road to Serfdom concerned the totalitarian abuse of power, but Hayek leaves us in no doubt that ends-directed, teleological legislation — even in a democracy — ultimately shares some of the same fascistic tendencies.

The ‘impenetrable thickets’ of the Native Title Act — as memorably described by Gaudron J — exhibit many of the qualities about which Hayek warned in The Road to Serfdom and Law, Legislation and Liberty. As an important contributor to classical liberal economic and jurisprudential theory, Hayek remained concerned throughout his life with formal equality, the dangers of arbitrary legislation and the risk that arbitrary legislation would derogate from the rule of law — and with it the formal equality he so prized.

In this paper, I argue that the NTA derogates from the formal equality that underpins all liberal democracies, and the manner in which it does so is arbitrary. This arbitrariness undermines the rule of law. Before turning to the Act, I outline Hayek’s evolutionary theory of law, particularly his discovery that the common law manifests the characteristics of a ‘spontaneous order’.

II WHAT IS SPONTANEOUS ORDER?

In Hayekian terms, the common law is end-independent, general and applicable to an indefinite number of future situations. Like the common law but unlike much legislation, our society is also a ‘grown’ one, not one crafted to some intelligent design. The detailed attempt to manage outcomes evinced in the NTA is characteristic of a belief underlying much legislation and explains many of its inadequacies. The NTA is symbolic of the delusion that it is possible for a single mind or a small group of minds to know everything about a large, complex system and then manage it accordingly.

Hayek demonstrates that the common law was not deliberately made; it is ‘grown’ law. One cannot trace it to a superhuman entity or design, or to some historic legislator. Anthropology and palaeontology contradict the proposition that all law emanated from the will of a known lawmaker. Law 'predated both society and legislation in all known civilisations'. It is possible for a small, indigenous culture to have ‘a government of laws, and not of men’ and yet have no obvious central authority. Hayek has some harsh words for social contract theorists, who try to pretend otherwise. Law for Hayek is both self-organising and complex.

Later theorists adduced Hayek’s ‘spontaneous order’ not from anthropology but from biology, deploying evolutionary epistemology’s key insight: human knowledge forms part of a continuum with biological evolution, having undergone heritable change over many generations in the same trial and error fashion. It is possible to discern selection for fitness and descent with modification within cultures, although it is important to distinguish adaptation from progress. Neither organisms nor cultures become ‘better’ in any absolute sense over time.

Similarly, even when much of our law is governed by positive legislation, it can still emerge spontaneously. Internet rules and the lex mercatoria (private international law) are two examples of this phenomenon. Positivists, Hayek argues, make the mistake of seeing law as a product of society. Instead, law is constitutive of society. We did not develop laws because we became civilised. We developed laws and then became civilised.

Hayek’s thesis posits an uncanny and generally unconscious collective intelligence working not by top-down diktat but rather in dynamically evolving arrangements. These arrangements are common in nature. Economist James Surowiecki discusses giant flocks of starlings evading predatory hawks. From the outside, the cloud of birds seems to move in obedience to one mind. In fact, each starling is acting on its own, following four simple rules: ‘1) stay as close to the middle as possible; 2) stay two to three body lengths away from your neighbour; 3) do not bump into any other starling; 4) if a hawk dives at you, get out of the way’. The result is safety, and an almost magical, organic coherence of motion: unconscious wisdom.

The judges in common law countries are not always aware of each other’s reasoning, and where they are aware, are not always bound by it. Instead, they are bound by simple, end-independent rules (distinguish between ratio and obiter; apply the law to the facts in the instant case; follow precedent, but not slavishly) in the same way as the starlings. What looks like teleological, organic unity from the outside is in fact highly individual and unguided.

III THE SYNOPTIC DELUSION

Although Hayek is refreshingly non-judgmental, he maintains that societies that evolve effective, end-independent rules of just conduct ‘will tend to prevail’ over those that do not. He does not question why some cultures develop a ‘more effective order’ than others do, although societies with clearly defined property rights tend to prosper:

"That men can use their own knowledge in the pursuit of their own ends without colliding with each other only if clear boundaries can be drawn between their respective domains of free action, is the basis on which all known civilisation has grown."

For this reason, Hayek favours abstract rules of just conduct like contract, tort and property law. That the NTA derogates from property rights — by treating interests in land unequally based on arbitrary distinctions — is of particular concern in this context.

Hayek argues that attempts to micro-manage individual outcomes (either through judicial discretion or legislation) not only undermine the spontaneous order but are — due to the complexity of that order — epistemologically impossible. We cannot know everything about a large, complex and purposeless system and then change it accordingly. Hayek describes this common belief as ‘the synoptic delusion’ and demonstrates that not even polymaths can design a perfect system, although plenty — including Karl Marx — have tried.

The synoptic delusion arises due to the tendency among humanities scholars to treat all complex cultural institutions as evidence of social engineering and deliberate planning. In the sciences, by contrast, complexity is evidence against design. The more complex a system, be it biological or social, the stronger the evidence against social engineering and deliberate planning. This means that complex and seemingly chaotic human interaction produces spontaneous order. Civilisation does not have a purpose, or end. Even if it does, it is not possible for us to discover that end without reliance on an unproven ‘revealed truth’.

The failure to appreciate spontaneous order has led legislatures to design end-dependent laws that characteristically produce unintended outcomes. In a noted study, John Jewkes discusses the spectacular failure of the post-war British Labour government’s ‘social justice’ reforms. Britain wilted under a mass of absurdly detailed regulations, civil service incompetence, shoddy goods of a kind later characteristic of the Warsaw Pact and a rampant black market.

Similarly, Onora O’Neill points out that the attempt to render bureaucracies and institutions more accountable through extensive regulation and administrative micro-management have had precisely the opposite effect. Instead of serving abstract, universal principles, institutions now serve the regulations. This means — in the case of those bodies meant to uphold the rule of law — that both law and its enforcement are undermined. She also cites empirical studies demonstrating that people trust government, lawyers and corporations less than they did 10 years ago. Further, 10 years ago, public trust had declined relative to the 10 years before that, and so on regressively until data is no longer available.

B Spontaneous Order and the ‘Synoptic Delusion’

Like many central European philosophers , Hayek developed a technical vocabulary to describe his theory. The labels are simply his way of pointing out that there are always two ways of thinking about law: one based on an acceptance of the spontaneous order and evolutionary epistemology, and the other based on purposive attempts to alter that order. He labelled these ‘evolutionary rationalism’ and ‘constructivist rationalism’.

Constructivist rationalism has its origins in Rene Descartes’ thought. It holds that we should accept only propositions that we can derive logically from known, explicit premises. Hayek contrasts it with evolutionary rationalism, which accepts we often follow practices adapted to the world we live in. We cannot demonstrate some useful practices to be true or rational – they simply ‘work’. These gave rise to principles of nomos – abstract rules of just conduct, which apply generally to an unknown number of persons and future events. They are not directed to specific outcomes, and exist for the simple scientific reason that people who observed them survived to reproduce.

The common law is nomos’ exemplar: developed by the courts, it relies on practices and reasonable expectations. Disputes before the courts emerge when reasonable expectations are defeated. Courts articulate the common law rule in the process of determining what expectations are reasonable. For Hayek, legislation can (and should) mimic the abstract, end-independent quality of the common law, but often doesn’t. He argues that legislation has four acceptable roles. These are:

(a) To correct the common law when it has gone up an evolutionary ‘blind alley’, like the Torrens improvement on Old System Title;

(b) To adapt the law to new situations engendered by rapid social change;

(c) To provide for administration of the state; and

(d) to provide for public services like social security.

Hayek argues that constructive rationalists suffer from the synoptic delusion — they think one mind can know all relevant facts, and that this mind can construct a desirable social system from that knowledge. He emphasised that the desire to ‘do good’ in society can also feed the synoptic delusion, often with disastrous consequences. As Lenin and Stalin’s capacity to direct their country to a particular purpose weakened, both did ‘more of the same’ in an attempt to cure the disease, trying desperately to plan their subjects’ lives in ever more minute detail. Hayek therefore counsels that humility is required when proposing changes to the legal order.

In Hayekian terms, the legislative creation that is the Native Title Act involves the synoptic delusion. Drafters and politicians — Hayek’s ‘planners’ — have attempted to micromanage every conceivable outcome, creating a document of staggering complexity. It is truly a ‘horse designed by a committee’ — in other words, a camel.

V THE NTA DEROGATION FROM FORMAL EQUALITY

A Substantive and Formal Equality

When considering the NTA’s derogation from the principle of formal equality in a liberal democratic context, it is worth recalling the distinction between it and substantive equality. Briefly, formal equality seeks to get everyone to the starting line on the same terms, and to make the race fair. Substantive equality attempts to ensure that everyone finishes the race together. Hayek’s research established that the achievement of formal equality is empirically possible, while substantive equality is not. Any attempt at the latter involves not only extensive planning and regulation, but also godlike omniscience.

The ‘main offenders’ in a Hayekian sense are the 1998 amendments, not the original 1993 legislation. This is not to pretend that the 1993 legislation was flawless — it wasn’t — but acknowledges that the earlier statute was somewhat closer to the Hayekian ideal. It mimicked the abstract, end-independent quality of the common law, arguably fulfilling Hayek’s second legislative role — that of adapting the law to new situations engendered by rapid social change. It also performed an important administrative function. The amendments — cobbled together in haste, amended and re-amended as John Howard and Brian Harradine danced around a legislative minefield — were clearly designed to fulfill a particular political purpose. Australia stood on the brink of a race election in 1998. Passage of the amendments averted such an election, but exacted a terrible price.

B Sui generis and ‘clear and plain’ intent

The derogation from formal equality lies in the High Court’s ruling that the source and substance of native title is to be found in the Act, not the common law. This has allowed native title to develop what the Court calls a sui generis character, making it uniquely ‘susceptible to extinguishment’. Unfortunately, native title’s susceptibility to extinguishment has its origins in Brennan J’s seminal judgment in Mabo (No 2), later enacted in s 223 (1) of the NTA.

Brennan J held that ‘the preferable rule equates the inhabitants of a settled colony with the inhabitants of a conquered colony in respect of their rights and interests in land’. However, s 223 (1) enacted his sourcing of native title in indigenous laws and customs, not in the common law. This is now coupled with the Ward Court’s use of the Act as the starting point when considering extinguishment. There is thus a coerced conformity between the statute and the common law. That the common law — in Wik and the Native Title Act Case — seemed to be heading in a different, less teleological direction before the 1998 amendments remains a moot point.

Normally, the extinguishment or impairment of property interests must be authorised by ‘clear and plain’ legislative intent:

"[T]here is no reason why the long-established principle, applied in respect of other Australians, obliging that a clear and plain intention in Parliament be established to deprive people of their rights (including rights to property interests), should not inure to protect the rights of indigenous Australians."

The presumption against taking away private property rights is of considerable antiquity, having been enshrined in both the US and Australian Constitutions in combination with a compensation requirement. In Mabo (No 2) Toohey J followed established House of Lords and High Court authority with respect to the legislative element. He noted the importance of unequivocal language if proprietary rights are to be abrogated without compensation. ‘In this regard’ he noted, ‘traditional title does not stand in a special position’.

Further to that point, Crown grants are executive acts, and inherently more difficult to review on their merits than legislative equivalents. For this reason, the Wik majority rejected the possibility that inconsistent executive grants would be sufficient to bring about extinguishment without clear legislative backing. Interestingly, in Mabo (No 2), Deane, Gaudron and Toohey JJ also held that the loss of native title rights was compensable, a finding only defeated by Dawson J’s dissent.

In Ward, the Court moved away from this principle towards an assessment based on ‘inconsistency of incidents’. The Ward test requires an ‘objective inquiry [that] requires identification and comparison between two sets of rights’. The court held that 'two rights are inconsistent or they are not. If they are inconsistent, there will be extinguishment to the extent of inconsistency; if they are not, there will not be extinguishment.'

Although the Ward Court discussed the clear and plain intention requirement, the majority shied away from any further consideration of it, arguing that ‘subjective thought processes’ are ‘irrelevant’.

In Wik, the majority echoed Toohey J’s judgment in Mabo (No 2), requiring clear and plain legislative intent. The dissenting judgment — which Brennan CJ wrote — argued that native title’s ‘weakness is that it is not an estate held from the Crown nor is it protected by the common law as Crown tenures are protected from impairment by subsequent Crown grant’. This meant that a ‘clear and plain intention to extinguish’ is required ‘only where no rights inconsistent with native title are otherwise created’. The judicial reverence for Brennan J’s judgments — coupled with changes in the bench’s composition and the enactment of the 1998 amendments — means that native title is now inherently ‘fragile’ or ‘uniquely vulnerable’ to extinguishment by inconsistent executive grant.

The High Court treats the NTA as the locus of all meaning with respect to content, proof and extinguishment of native title. This excises much subtle common law jurisprudence at a stroke and exposes a given class of plaintiffs’ property interests to unequal treatment at law. Native title (based on Hayek’s reasoning in Law, Legislation and Liberty) should be treated in the same way as any other interest in land, but is not. Treated instead as ‘sui generis’ — a term more flattering of than useful to Australia’s indigenes — it is not grounded in a secure common law principle. Instead, its substantive content is vulnerable to changes in the political climate and the not-so-gentle ministrations of political planners — those who seek to draft laws for purposes, rather than people.

C Formal equality and ‘Special Measures’

The ‘inequality of interests’ outlined above is confined to a class of plaintiffs definable by race, arguably a more serious derogation from core liberal democratic principles than simple unequal treatment of property interests. Nonetheless, there is no doubt native title’s critics may argue that what benefits conferred by the Act are solely conferred on the members of a particular racial group. This is acknowledged in the preamble, which states that the Act is a ‘special measure’ for the advancement and protection of Australia’s indigenous peoples.

Under the relevant international convention, a 'special measure' discriminates in favour of a disadvantaged group in order to further the achievement of fundamental rights and social justice. Like all ‘deeming’ provisions, it embodies a large measure of discretion and is fraught with danger for the rule of law. Race is once again used to define group membership, in contradiction of the colour-blind laws that should buttress rights in a liberal democracy.

Hayek remained opposed to all forms of differential treatment on the basis of race, noting the wide discretion such treatment inevitably embodied and its potential for abuse: ‘a recognised bias of some rule in favour of a particular group can[not] be corrected only by biasing it instead in favour of another’. The division that discretion causes — especially where exercised towards one racial subgroup when everyone in a given community is poor — is readily apparent to anyone who has spent significant time outside Australia’s capital cities.

However, if one recalls that Aboriginal people were deprived of their property rights on settlement, this difficulty may be at least partially overcome. Prima facie, those deprived of interests in property should be compensated under s 51(xxxi), at least with respect to compulsory acquisition since Federation. If this is not practical, then for Hayek, another set of analogous rights must be conferred on the deprived group in lieu. If native title is to be that alternative, then it must be placed on an equal footing with other property interests.

This leads us back, then, to my first argument. What ‘compensation’ regime there is (and I use that word in its broadest sense) is manifestly unfair. It denies standard legislative presumptions to indigenous Australians while granting them ‘to settlers and their descendents and successors’.

VI ARBITRARY PROVISIONS AND THE RULE OF LAW

Some of the rights derogation present in the NTA is plain on the face of the statute. That is, it provides for differential treatment to different classes of potential plaintiffs based on not only race but also the arbitrary fixing of particular dates. A notable example arises in the Act’s definition of categories of ‘acts’ with respect to extinguishment under Divisions 2 and 2A. Pastoral leases fall into Category A under the ‘past acts’ regime, which runs from 1975 to 1994. Category A irrebuttably extinguishes native title. By contrast, pastoral leases fall under Category B for the period prior to 1975 and the ‘intermediate period acts’ regime between 1994 and 1996. Category B does not extinguish native title, or does so only to the extent of inconsistency.

Ostensibly, this pastoral shape shifting reflects how the law was viewed before and after Wik. That is, pastoral leases were assumed to extinguish native title under both the 1993 version of the Act and in Mabo (No 2). Once the Wik Court found this was not the case, tremendous public confusion (and political opportunism) resulted. The 1998 amendments arbitrarily and unevenly apply the Wik ruling, forgetting that the Court ruled on all pastoral leases of that type across all historical periods without one eye on the economic implications of the Racial Discrimination Act.

H L A Hart observed that all judicial decisions in the common law world are essentially retrospective: they address the law as it has been until now. While parliament can prevent such rulings from binding the future, it cannot undo their effect on the past. In a roundabout way, this is what the Act attempts to do. It defines parties’ positions based on sets of incorrect assumptions rather than mimicking the abstract, end-independent and universal qualities of the common law (as articulated by the majority in Wik).

The universality of the common law — that it should be end-independent and ontological, rather than teleological and goal driven — is at the core of liberalism and in Hayek’s view is essential to preserve liberal institutions. The NTA’s extinguishment provisions undermine this universality. This arbitrariness — particularly in its application to members of a particular race — raises a rule of law issue. Central to the rule of law is the understanding that laws should apply equally to all. Aristotle famously asked whether it is best to be ruled by the best laws or the best men, and for a natural lawyer his answer is remarkably Hayekian. The best laws ‘speak in … general terms’, while ‘passion must ever sway the heart of man’.

The law should not allow the placing of given plaintiffs into different arbitrary categories based on fixed points in time or the interests those plaintiffs hold. As the legislation stands, pastoralists who received their grants between 1975 and 1994 enjoy better rights vis á vis Aboriginal claimants than do pastoralists with identical interests who obtained grants in other periods. The same situation pertains in reverse: should a grant have been made over your ‘mother’s country’ between the years 1975 and 1994, the chances of obtaining a native title ruling in your favour are nil. This is patently absurd.

VII CONCLUDING COMMENTS

According to Hayek’s student, Richard Epstein, we live in a world of ‘too many lawyers and too much law’. Many statutes — not just the NTA, although it is unusually bad — require simplification. Epstein provides a clear program for reform, based on the rationale that the best laws do not try to create outcomes, but merely facilitate citizens’ individual purposes.

Is this possible in Australian context? The NTA is not assisting Australia’s poorest ethnic group. It cannot in large part because it is a ‘plan’ with which no one was happy, a cobbled compromise between competing interests. The inevitable effect is a change in the composition of legal work. Australia’s law of property — traditionally the engine of wealth creation in any society — has moved away from commercial transactions (which produce wealth) towards politics (which transfer and diminish wealth simultaneously). Whether those who rule over us have the wisdom to see this is debateable. Politicians are likely irredeemable planners, unable to see that what we need is not a ‘better plan’, but better law.

Defining liberty

2006-09-04T16:24:00.000+10:00

The word liberty as I understand it has a specific meaning. It's expressed well by Bruce Smith - Australia's own Adam Smith! - in Liberty and Liberalism (first published 1887, republished by the Centre for Independent Studies):

What is Liberty? Where does it begin? And what are its limits, if it has any?

The word in its primary signification means "freedom to do as one wishes; freedom from restraint". It is evident that the kind or extent of liberty [that] is calculated to encourage industry and the accumulation of the necessities and luxuries of life, and which is essential to the mental and moral development of a people, is not that which is signified by the word in its primary meaning. We must look for the true signification in the same source, but subject to certain important limitations.

Liberty [as] I understand it means "the freedom to do as one wishes; freedom from restraint - subject to the same or equal freedom in our fellows" or, to use the words of Herbert Spencer, "the liberty of each, limited only by the like liberty of all."

So to be free means to acknowledge limits to freedom.

Government subsidised sex?

2006-09-04T12:41:00.000+10:00

The American Libertarian Party last year highlighted the following story:

Medicare - the government-run health care program - will soon cover Viagra, the impotence drug.

A spokesman for the Health and Human Services Department confirmed to Reuters on Tuesday that the cost of Viagra will be covered because erectile dysfunction is "an illness" - and that means that you, the taxpayer, are literally paying for other people to have sex.

How did it happen?

Our Republican president, George Bush, supported this dramatic, er..., enlargement of the Medicare program, and a majority of Congressional Democrats agreed.

For the two older parties, it's just business as usual. But for Libertarians, it's the outrage of the week. (Bob Dole, are you listening?)

But is this one of those 'only in America' things? Could it happen here? The Age ran a discussion on the topic fairly recently.

Quote of the week 3

2006-09-03T15:16:00.001+10:00

The great Ronald Reagan:

Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

Previous quotable quotes

Rafe Champion

Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes

A free press is an accountable press, right? Right?

2006-09-02T23:42:00.000+10:00

Over at Catallaxy, I've decided to have a big think-out-loud session on the parlous state of the media. This has largely been in response to the atrocious coverage of the most recent Middle-Eastern bust up. Rob at Better Part of Valour has done a super job of rounding up all the info, and a quick hop across to his site will tell you pretty much all you need to know, as well as provide a mass of links.

Now I'm a libertarian. I'm really, really suspicious of foreign policy adventurism, and am fairly sure that whatever happens in the Middle East (Israel, Lebanon, Iraq, Iran etc), it's likely to go badly. How badly is an unknown, however, because the ladies and gentlemen of the press have been very keen to make everything look worse than it actually is. I used to think making shit up was the preserve of novelists (I should know, I am one, and have made up my fair share), but some of this stuff is simply staggering.

With that in mind, I've put the legal beagle to work and tried to sketch out a few proposals. Check it out and let me know what you think.

OSE Condensed Chapter 25 Has History Any Meaning?

2006-09-02T18:00:00.000+10:00

History has no meaning, I contend. But this contention does not imply that all we can do about it is to look aghast at the history of political power, or that we must look on it as a cruel joke. For we can interpret it, with an eye to those problems of power politics whose solution we choose to attempt in our time. We can interpret the history of power politics from the point of view of our fight for the open society, for a rule of reason, for justice, freedom, equality, and for the control of international crime. Although history has no ends, we can impose these ends of ours upon it; and although history has no meaning, we can give it a meaning.

In this chapter Popper is revealed as something like an existentialist (without hysteria) with the message that history has no meaning but we can give it meaning!

Section I explains the importance of theories and/or points of view to organize our selection of facts from the vast amount of information that we collect if we are so inclined.

Section II is a more detailed account of the role of theories in scientific research and section III explains the role of problems, issues or points of view in compiling historical narratives.

Section IV focuses on the question of meaning and purpose in history.

In approaching the end of this book, I wish again to remind the reader that these chapters were not intended as anything like a full history of historicism; they are merely scattered marginal notes to such a history, and rather personal notes to boot.…This does not mean that much in this book is purely a matter of opinion; in the few cases where I am explaining my personal proposals or decisions in moral and political matters, I have always made the personal character of the proposal or decision clear. It rather means that the selection of the subject matter treated is a matter of personal choice to a much greater extent than it would be, say, in a scientific treatise.

He went on to suggest that the this difference is a matter of degree because even the data assembled in (natural) scientific research is not merely a ‘body of facts’, it is to some extent a collection that depends on the collector’s interests, that is, on a point of view. This would appear to open the door for the subjectivism and the sociology of science but that is not really the case.

So far, the position of history is analogous to that of the natural sciences, for example, that of physics. But if we compare the part played by a ‘point of view ‘in history with that played by a ‘point of view’ in physics, then we find a great difference. In physics, as we have seen, the ‘point of view’ is usually presented by a physical theory which can be tested by searching for new facts. In history, the matter is not quite so simple.

In a nutshell, the generalizing sciences search for general laws, and the historical sciences seek for explanation of particular events. For the generalizing sciences it is the laws that are problematic, and they are subjected to tests where the evidence is more or less “given”. Of course that is the “ideal type” situation and it is a serious over-simplification because experimental data and experimental results can be highly problematic.

Thus in the case of the so-called theoretical or generalizing sciences (such as physics, biology, sociology, etc.) we are predominantly interested in the universal laws or hypotheses. We wish to know whether they are true, and since we can never directly make sure of their truth, we adopt the method of eliminating the false ones. Our interest in the specific events, for example in experiments which are described by the initial conditions and prognoses, is somewhat limited; we are interested in them mainly as means to certain ends, means by which we can test the universal laws, which latter are considered as interesting in themselves, and as unifying our knowledge.

Points of view and interpretations.
For historians, unlike scientists, there are no general theories that can be used to select and organize facts.

We need further selective principles, points of view which are at the same time centres of interest. Some of these are provided by preconceived ideas which in some way resemble universal laws, such as the idea that what is important for history is the character of the ‘Great Men’, or the ‘national character’, or moral ideas, or economic conditions, etc…I shall call such historical theories, in contradistinction to scientific theories, ‘general interpretations’.

These general interpretations are more or less what others have called the themes or the problems, or the issues that provide the organizing principle and the continuity in a historical narrative.

But this does not mean, of course, that all interpretations are of equal merit. First, there are always interpretations which are not really in keeping with the accepted records; secondly, there are some which need a number of more or less plausible auxiliary hypotheses if they are to escape falsification by the records; next, there are some that are unable to connect a number of facts which another interpretation can connect, and in so far ‘explain’. There may accordingly be a considerable amount of progress even within the field of historical interpretation…

It is necessary to resolve the problem of different (and possibly incompatible) interpretations of history. One of the most problematic is the idea of progress itself. Are we making progress, are things getting better or worse? The simple answer is “It depends what you are talking about”.

For example, the interpretation that man steadily progresses (towards the open society or some other aim) is incompatible with the interpretation that he steadily slips back or retrogresses. But the ‘point of view’ of one who looks on human history as a history of progress is not necessarily incompatible with that of one who looks on it as a history of retrogression; that is to say, we could write a history of human progress towards freedom (containing, for example, the story of the fight against slavery) and another history of human retrogression and oppression (containing perhaps such things as the impact of the white race upon the coloured races).

Popper’s point is that these two histories are not logically inconsistent, rather they are complementary to each other, like two views of the same scene from different vantage points. He then went on to note the need for each generation to write its own history.

Since each generation has its own troubles and problems, and therefore its own interests and its own point of view, it follows that each generation has a right to look upon and re-interpret history in its own way, which is complementary to that of previous generations. After all, we study history because we are interested in it, and perhaps because we wish to learn something about our own problems. But history can serve neither of these two purposes if, under the influence of an inapplicable idea of objectivity, we hesitate to present historical problems from our point of view.

But this is not an invitation to relativism, new interpretations have to stand up to criticism.

The main thing is to be conscious of one’s point of view, and critical, that is to say, to avoid, as far as this is possible, unconscious and therefore uncritical bias in the presentation of the facts. In every other respect, the interpretation must speak for itself; and its merits will be its fertility, its ability to elucidate the facts of history, as well as its topical interest, its ability to elucidate the problems of the day.
To sum up, there can be no history of ‘the past as it actually did happen’; there can only be historical interpretations, and none of them final; and every generation has a right to frame its own. But not only has it a right to frame its own interpretations, it also has a kind of obligation to do so; for there is indeed a pressing need to be answered. We want to know how our troubles are related to the past, and we want to see the line along which we may progress towards the solution of what we feel, and what we choose, to be our main tasks. It is this need which, if not answered by rational and fair means, produces historicist interpretations. Under its pressure the historicist substitutes for a rational question : ‘What are we to choose as our most urgent problems, how did they arise, and along what roads may we proceed to solve them?’ the irrational and apparently factual question : ‘Which way are we going? What, in essence, is the part that history has destined us to play?’

The meaning of history
This question of destiny and our role in the great historical narrative brings us back to the starting point, with Popper’s criticism of the idea of historical determinism and the idea that there is any great plan.

In the final section of this chapter (and the book) Popper addressed the question. Is there a meaning in history?

I answer : History has no meaning. In order to give reasons for this opinion, I must first say something about that ‘history’ which people have in mind when they ask whether it has meaning. So far, I have myself spoken about ‘history’ as if it did not need any explanation. That is no longer possible; for I wish to make it clear that ‘history’ in the sense in which most people speak of it simply does not exist; and this is at least one reason why I say that it has no meaning.

There is no history of mankind, there is only an indefinite number of histories of all kinds of aspects of human life. And one of these is the history of political power. This is elevated into the history of the world. But this, I hold, is an offence against every decent conception of mankind. It is hardly better than to treat the history of embezzlement or of robbery or of poisoning as the history of mankind. For the history of power politics is nothing but the history of international crime and mass murder (including, it is true, some of the attempts to suppress them). This history is taught in schools, and some of the greatest criminals are extolled as its heroes.

A universal history of mankind would have to be the story of all men and women “the history of all human hopes, struggles, and sufferings” because nobody is more important than anyone else (a highly egalitarian view!). But that history cannot be written, it is far too rich, all narratives have to be selective and focussed.

"But with this we arrive at the many histories; and among them, at that history of international crime and mass murder which has been advertised as the history of mankind."

But why has just the history of power been selected, and not, for example, that of religion, or of poetry? There are several reasons. One is that power affects us all, and poetry only a few. Another is that men are inclined to worship power. But there can be no doubt that the worship of power is one of the worst kinds of human idolatries, a relic of the time of the cage, of human servitude. The worship of power is born of fear, an emotion which is rightly despised. A third reason why power politics has been made the core of ‘history’ is that those in power wanted to be worshipped and could enforce their wishes. Many historians wrote under the supervision of the emperors, the generals and the dictators.

This is a dangerous situation and it easily leads to the corruption of historians and to the propagation of uncritical, even worshipful, attitudes towards strong leaders, just because they were strong and successful, regardless of the harm they did.

This thought led Popper into some extended commentary on the Christian view of history and the extent to which this has helped or hindered good historical research and writing. It also led him to some criticisms of Hegel by Kierkegaard and Schopenhauer regarding the tone of historical writing especially among nationalistic German academics.

And, indeed, our intellectual as well as our ethical education is corrupt. It is perverted by the admiration of brilliance, of the way things are said, which takes the place of a critical appreciation of the things that are said (and the things that are done). It is perverted by the romantic idea of the splendour of the stage of History on which we are the actors. We are educated to act with an eye to the gallery.

The whole problem of educating man to a sane appreciation of his own importance relative to that of other individuals is thoroughly muddled by these ethics of fame and fate, by a morality which perpetuates an educational system that is still based upon the classics with their romantic view of the history of power and their romantic tribal morality which goes back to Heraclitus; a system whose ultimate basis is the worship of power. Instead of a sober combination of individualism and altruism (to use these labels again)—that is to say, instead of a position like ‘What really matters are human individuals, but I do not take this to mean that it is I who matter very much’—a romantic combination of egoism and collectivism is taken for granted. That is to say, the importance of the self, of its emotional life and its ‘self-expression’, is romantically exaggerated; and with it, the tension between the ‘personality’ and the group, the collective…
It is under the influence of such romantic ideas that individualism is still identified with egoism, as it was by Plato, and altruism with collectivism (i.e. with the substitution of group egoism for the individualist egoism). But this bars the way even to a clear formulation of the main problem, the problem of how to obtain a sane appreciation of one’s own importance in relation to other individuals. Since it is felt, and rightly so, that we have to aim at something beyond our own selves, something to which we can devote ourselves, and for which we may make sacrifices, it is concluded that this must be the collective, with its ‘historical mission’. Thus we are told to make sacrifices, and, at the same time, assured that we shall make an excellent bargain by doing so. We shall make sacrifices, it is said, but we shall thereby obtain honour and fame. We shall become ‘leading actors’, heroes on the Stage of History; for a small risk we shall gain great rewards. This is the dubious morality of a period in which only a tiny minority counted, and in which nobody cared for the common people. It is the morality of those who, being political or intellectual aristocrats, have a chance of getting into the textbooks of history. It cannot possibly be the morality of those who favour justice and equalitarianism; for historical fame cannot be just, and it can be attained only by a very few. The countless number of men who are just as worthy, or worthier, will always be forgotten.

The romantic historicist morality of fame, fortunately, seems to be on the decline. The Unknown Soldier shows it. We are beginning to realize that sacrifice may mean just as much, or even more, when it is made anonymously. Our ethical education must follow suit. We must be taught to do our work; to make our sacrifice for the sake of this work, and not for praise or the avoidance of blame. (The fact that we all need some encouragement, hope, praise, and even blame, is another matter altogether.) We must find our justification in our work, in what we are doing ourselves, and not in a fictitious ‘meaning of history’.

History has no meaning, I contend. But this contention does not imply that all we can do about it is to look aghast at the history of political power, or that we must look on it as a cruel joke. For we can interpret it, with an eye to those problems of power politics whose solution we choose to attempt in our time. We can interpret the history of power politics from the point of view of our fight for the open society, for a rule of reason, for justice, freedom, equality, and for the control of international crime. Although history has no ends, we can impose these ends of ours upon it; and although history has no meaning, we can give it a meaning.

OSE Chapter 24. The Revolt Against Reason

2006-08-31T04:37:00.000+10:00

“The conflict between rationalism and irrationalism has become the most important intellectual, and perhaps even moral, issue of our time.”

This is a big chapter, 26 pages, as befits a topic that has generated such a mountain of literature, much of it confused and confusing due to (a) the numerous meanings of “reason’ and ‘rationality’ and (b) the many and varied arguments and objections that are raised against the idea of using evidence and discussion to improve our plans and practices.

Section I spells out the kind of rationalism and rationality that Popper is prepared to defend, “an attitude that seeks to solve as many problems as possible by an appeal to clear thought and experience, rather than by an appeal to emotions and passions”. In case people get the idea that Popper had no time for the emotions it is helpful to note his comment (in this chapter) that a life without emotions such as love would hardly be worth living. Further, he suggested that a deal of passion is required to make an impact in any field of human endeavour, including science.

Section II scans the long history of the conflict between rationalism and irrationalism. Section III explains why Popper considered that the choice is not just an intellectual matter, or a matter of taste, but a moral decision, and section IV is his moral counter-attack on irrationalism. Section V is a critique of some modern thinkers who Popper regarded as major and influential promoters of irrationalism.

For some people this is the best chapter in the book, especially those with a practical turn of mind and a desire to solve problems, without much interest in the debates that go on about Popper’s interpretation of Plato and Marx.

Rationalism and irrationalism

Since the terms ‘reason’ and ‘rationalism’ are vague, it will be necessary to explain roughly the way in which they are used here. First, they are used in a wide sense; they are used to cover not only intellectual activity but also observation and experiment. It is necessary to keep this remark in mind, since ‘reason’ and ‘rationalism’ are often used in a different and more narrow sense, in opposition not to ‘irrationalism’ but to ‘empiricism’…when I speak here of ‘rationalism’, I use the word always in a sense which includes ‘empiricism’ as well as ‘intellectualism’; just as science makes use of experiments as well as of thought. Secondly, I use the word ‘rationalism’ in order to indicate, roughly, an attitude that seeks to solve as many problems as possible by an appeal to reason, i.e. to clear thought and experience, rather than by an appeal to emotions and passions.

It may be better to explain rationalism in terms of practical attitudes or behaviour.

We could then say that rationalism is an attitude of readiness to listen to critical arguments and to learn from experience. It is fundamentally an attitude of admitting that ‘I may be wrong and you may be right, and by an effort, we may get nearer to the truth.’ It is an attitude which does not lightly give up hope that by such means as argument and careful observation, people may reach some kind of agreement on many problems of importance; and that, even where their demands and their interests clash, it is often possible to argue about the various demands and proposals, and to reach — perhaps by arbitration — a compromise which, because of its equity, is acceptable. to most, if not to all…

The decision to consider the argument rather than the person arguing has many significant consequences. For example it means that we need to accept that anyone we communicate with can be a source of information and ideas, regardless of the level of agreement between us. It establishes what Popper called the ‘rational unity of mankind’. It is a highly egalitarian stance, quite unlike the elitest Platonic idea that reason is a kind of ‘faculty’ that people can have and develop in different degrees.

Admittedly, intellectual gifts may be different in this way, and they may contribute to reasonableness; but they need not. Clever men may be very unreasonable; they may cling to their prejudices and may not expect to hear anything worth while from others. According to our view, however, we not only owe our reason to others, but we can never excel others in our reasonableness in a way that would establish a claim to authority. Authoritarianism and rationalism in our sense cannot be reconciled, since argument, which includes criticism, and the art of listening to criticism, is the basis of reasonableness…

The irrationalist attitude may be developed along the following lines. Though perhaps recognizing reason and scientific argument as tools that may do well enough if we wish to scratch the surface of things, or as means to serve some irrational end, the irrationalist will insist that ‘human nature’ is in the main, not rational. Man, he holds, is more than a rational animal, and also less. In order to see that he is less, we need only consider how small is the number of men who are capable of argument; this is why, according to the irrationalist, the majority of men will always have to be tackled by an appeal to their emotions and passions rather than by an appeal to their reason…Leaving aside the lower aspects of human nature, we may look to one of its highest, to the fact that man can be creative. It is the small creative minority of men who really matter; the men who create works of art or of thought, the founders of religions, and the great statesmen. These few exceptional individuals allow us to glimpse the real greatness of man. But although these leaders of mankind know how to make use of reason for their purposes, they are never men of reason. Their roots lie deeper—deep in their instincts and impulses, and in those of the society of which they are parts. Creativeness is an entirely irrational, a mystical faculty ...

The moral dimension

The choice before us is not simply an intellectual affair, or a matter of taste. It is a moral decision. For the question whether we adopt some more or less radical form of irrationalism, or whether we adopt that minimum concession to irrationalism which I have termed ‘critical rationalism’, will deeply affect our whole attitude towards other men, and towards the problems of social life. It has already been said that ationalism is closely connected with the belief in the unity of mankind. Irrationalism, which is not bound by any rules of consistency, may be combined with any kind of belief…

Popper described in chapter 5 that evidence and arguments cannot determine fundamental moral decisions but choices need to be informed by arguments and often enough by some conception of the alternative outcomes.

Whenever we are faced with a moral decision of a more abstract kind, it is most helpful to analyse carefully the consequences which are likely to result from the alternatives between which we have to choose. For only if we can visualize these consequences in a concrete and practical way, do we really know what our decision is about; otherwise we decide blindly. In order to illustrate this point, I may quote a passage from Shaw’s Saint Joan. The speaker is the Chaplain; he has stubbornly demanded Joan’s death; but when he sees her at the stake, he breaks down : ‘I meant no harm. I did not know what it would be like .. I did not know what I was doing .. If I had known, I would have torn her from their hands. You don’t know. You haven’t seen : it is so easy to talk when you don’t know. You madden yourself with words .. But when it is brought home to you; when you see the thing you have done; when it is blinding your eyes, stifling your nostrils, tearing your heart, then—then—O God, take away this sight from me!’ There were, of course, other figures in Shaw’s play who knew exactly what they were doing, and yet decided to do it; and who did not regret it afterwards. Some people dislike seeing their fellow men burning at the stake and others do not. This point (which was neglected by many Victorian optimists) is important…an analysis of the concrete consequences, and their clear realization in what we call our ‘imagination’, makes the difference between a blind decision and a decision made with open eyes; and since we use our imagination very little, we only too often decide blindly.

Popper pursued some of the consequences of irrationalism.

The irrationalist who insists that emotions and passions rather than reason are the mainsprings of human actions is likely to refer to the weakness of ‘human nature’, the limited intelligence of most people, their unwillingness to learn more about complex problems and their obvious dependence upon emotions and passions.

He has some thought-provoking things to say about love and imagination. Flower children of the sixties and seventies may recall the vogue of saving the world by love – a la Beatles, Erich Fromm’s The Art of Loving etc.

I do not overlook the fact that there are irrationalists who love mankind, and that not all forms of irrationalism engender criminality. But I hold that he who teaches that not reason but love should rule opens the way for those who rule by hate. Those who do not see this connection at once, who believe in a direct rule of emotional love, should consider that love as such certainly does not promote impartiality. And it cannot do away with conflict either. That love as such may be unable to settle a conflict can be shown by considering a harmless test case, which may pass as representative of more serious ones. Tom likes the theatre and Dick likes dancing. Tom lovingly insists on going to a dance while Dick wants for Tom’s sake to go to the theatre. This conflict cannot be settled by love; rather, the greater the love, the stronger will be the conflict. There are only two solutions; one is the use of emotion, and ultimately of violence, and the other is the use of reason, of impartiality, of reasonable compromise. All this is not intended to indicate that I do not appreciate the difference between love and hate, or that I think that life would be worth living without love. (And I am quite prepared to admit that the Christian idea of love is not meant in a purely emotional way.) But I insist that no emotion, not even love, can replace the rule of institutions controlled by reason.

There are other argument against the idea of a rule of love. For example loving a person means wishing to make him happy, but, as Popper pointed out, the idea of trying to make people happy by means of political reforms is a road to ruin.

It leads invariably to the attempt to impose our scale of ‘higher’ values upon others in order to make them realize what seems to us of greatest importance for their happiness; in order, as it were, to save their souls. It leads to Utopianism and Romanticism. We all feel certain that everybody would be happy in the beautiful, the perfect community of our dreams. And no doubt, there would be heaven on earth if we could all love one another. But, as I have said before (in chapter 9), the attempt to make heaven on earth invariably produces hell. It leads to intolerance. It leads to religious wars, and to the saving of souls through the inquisition. And it is, I believe, based on a complete misunderstanding of our moral duties. It is our duty to help those who need our help; but it cannot be our duty to make others happy, since this does not depend on us, and since it would only too often mean intruding on the privacy of those towards whom we have such amiable intentions. The political demand for piecemeal (as opposed to Utopian) methods corresponds to the decision that the fight against suffering must be considered a duty, while the right to care for the happiness of others must be considered a privilege confined to the close circle of their friends. In their case, we may perhaps have a certain right to try to impose our scale of values—our preferences regarding music, for example. (And we may even feel it our duty to open to them a world of values which, we trust, can so much contribute to their happiness.) This right of ours exists only if, and because, they can get rid of us; because friendships can be ended. But the use of political means for imposing our scale of values upon others is a very different matter. Pain, suffering, injustice, and their prevention, these are the eternal problems of public morals, the ‘agenda’ of public policy (as Bentham would have said). The ‘higher’ values should very largely be considered as ‘non-agenda’, and should be left to the realm of laissez faire. Thus we might say: help your enemies; assist those in distress, even if they hate you; but love only your friends.

He then proceeded to another shibboleth that is put about by enemies of reason, namely that there is some kind of affinity between imagination and emotion, so that rationalism tends to promote unimaginative dry scholasticism.

I do not know whether such a view may have some psychological basis, and I rather doubt it. But my interests are institutional rather than psychological, and from an institutional point of view (as well as from that of method) it appears that rationalism must encourage the use of imagination because it needs it, while irrationalism must tend to discourage it. The very fact that rationalism is critical, whilst irrationalism must tend towards dogmatism (where there is no argument, nothing is left but full acceptance or fiat denial), leads in this direction. Criticism always demands a certain degree of imagination, whilst dogmatism suppresses it. Similarly, scientific research and technical construction and invention are inconceivable without a very considerable use of imagination; one must offer something new in these fields (as opposed to the field of oracular philosophy where an endless repetition of impressive words seems to do the trick). At least as important is the part played by imagination in the practical application of equalitarianism and of impartiality. The basic attitude of the rationalist, ‘I may be wrong and you may be right’, demands, when put into practice, and especially when human conflicts are involved, a real effort of our imagination. I admit that the emotions of love and compassion may sometimes lead to a similar effort. But I hold that it is humanly impossible for us to love, or to suffer with, a great number of people; nor does it appear to me very desirable that we should, since it would ultimately destroy either our ability to help or the intensity of these very emotions. But reason, supported by imagination, enables us to understand that men who are far away, whom we shall never see, are like ourselves, and that their relations to one another are like our relations to those we love. A direct emotional attitude towards the abstract whole of mankind seems to me hardly possible. We can love mankind only in certain concrete individuals. But by the use of thought and imagination, we may become ready to help all who need our help.

In the last section of the chapter Popper selected A J Toynbee as an example of a brilliant scholar who was capable of exemplary research in his chosen field but lapsed into irrationalism on larger topics beyond his area of special expertise.

I wish to make it clear that I consider Toynbee’s A Study of History a most remarkable and interesting book…I do not accuse him of irrationalism in his own field of historical research. For where it is a question of comparing evidence in favour of or against a certain historical interpretation, he uses unhesitatingly a fundamentally rational method of argument. I have in mind, for instance, his comparative study of the authenticity of the Gospels as historical records, with its negative results; although I am not able to judge his evidence, the rationality of the method is beyond question, and this is the more admirable as Toynbee’s general sympathies with Christian orthodoxy might have made it hard for him to defend a view which, to say the least, is unorthodox. I also agree with many of the political tendencies expressed in his work, and most emphatically with his attack upon modern nationalism, and the tribalist and ‘archaist’, i.e. culturally reactionary tendencies, which are connected with it.

Toynbee’s irrationalism is demonstrated by his cavalier attitude towards arguments and his tendency to identify, instead of arguments, deep and irrational motives, a process which Popper called “socio-analysis”.

As an example of the refusal to take serious arguments seriously, I select Toynbee’s treatment of Marx. My reasons for this selection are the following. First, it is a topic which is familiar to myself as well as to the reader of this book. Secondly, it is a topic on which I agree with Toynbee in most of its practical aspects. His main judgements on Marx’s political and historical influence are very similar to results at which I have arrived by more pedestrian methods; and it is indeed one of the topics whose treatment shows his great historical intuition. Thus I shall hardly be suspected of being an apologist for Marx if I defend Marx’s rationality against Toynbee. For this is the point on which I disagree : Toynbee treats Marx (as he treats everybody) not as a rational being, a man who offers arguments for what he teaches…

Regarding the points of similarity between Toynbee’s and my general views of Marx, I may remind the reader of my allusions, in chapter 1, to the analogy between the chosen people and the chosen class; and in various other places, I have commented critically upon Marx’s doctrines of historical necessity, and especially of the inevitability of the social revolution. These ideas are linked together by Toynbee with his usual brilliance.

Toynbee wrote:

The distinctively Jewish .. inspiration of Marxism, is the apocalyptic vision of a violent revolution which is inevitable because it is the decree .. of God himself, and which is to invert the present roles of Proletariat and Dominant Minority in .. a reversal of roles which is to carry the Chosen People, at one bound, from the lowest to the highest place in the Kingdom of This World. Marx has taken the Goddess “Historical Necessity” in place of Yahweh for his omnipotent deity, and the internal proletariat of the modern Western World in place of Jewry; and his Messianic Kingdom is conceived as a Dictatorship of the Proletariat. But the salient features of the traditional Jewish apocalypse protrude through this threadbare disguise, and it is actually the pre-Rabbinical Maccabaean Judaism that our philosopher-impresario is presenting in modern Western costume ..

Now there is certainly much in this brilliantly phrased passage with which I agree, as long as it is intended as nothing more than an interesting analogy. But if it is intended as a serious analysis (or part of it) of Marxism, then I must protest; Marx, after all, wrote Capital, studied laissez faire capitalism, and made serious and most important contributions to social science, even if much of them has been superseded. And, indeed, Toynbee’s passage is intended as a serious analysis; he believes that his analogies and allegories contribute to a serious appreciation of Marx; for in an Annex to this passage (from which I have quoted only an important part) he treats, under the title ‘Marxism, Socialism, and Christianity’, what he considers to be likely objections of a Marxist to this ‘account of the Marxian Philosophy’. This Annex itself is also undoubtedly intended as a serious discussion of Marxism, as can be seen by the fact that its first paragraph commences with the words ‘The advocates of Marxism will perhaps protest that ..’ and the second with the words : ‘In attempting to reply to a Marxian protest on such lines as these ..’ But if we look more closely into this discussion, then we find that none of the rational arguments or claims of Marxism is even mentioned, let alone examined. Of Marx’s theories and of the question whether they are true or false we do not hear a word.

Toynbee’s anti-rationalism is prominent in many other places. For instance, in an attack upon the rationalistic conception of tolerance he uses categories like ‘nobleness’ as opposed to ‘lowness’ instead of arguments. The passage deals with the opposition between the merely ‘negative’ avoidance of violence, on rational grounds, and the true non-violence of other-worldliness, hinting that these two are instances of ‘meanings .. which are .. positively antithetical to one another’…

I do not wish to be misunderstood. I feel no hostility towards religious mysticism (only towards a militant anti-rationalist intellectualism) and I should be the first to fight any attempt to oppress it. It is not I who advocate religious intolerance. But I claim that faith in reason, or rationalism, or humanitarianism, or humanism, has the same right as any other creed to contribute to an improvement of human affairs, and especially to the control of international crime and the establishment of peace. ‘The humanist’, Toynbee writes, ‘purposely concentrates all his attention and effort upon .. bringing human affairs under human control. Yet the unity of mankind can never be established in fact except within a framework of the unity of the superhuman whole of which Humanity is a part ..; and our Modern Western school of humanists have been peculiar, as well as perverse, in planning to reach Heaven by raising a titanic Tower of Babel on terrestrial foundations ..’ Toynbee’s contention, if I understand him rightly, is that there is no chance for the humanist to bring international affairs under the control of human reason. Appealing to the authority of Bergson, he claims that only allegiance to a superhuman whole can save us, and that there is no way for human reason, no ‘terrestrial road’, as he puts it, by which tribal nationalism can be superseded. Now I do not mind the characterization of the humanist’s faith in reason as ‘terrestrial’, since I believe that it is indeed a principle of rationalist politics that we cannot make heaven on earth. But humanism is, after all, a faith which has proved itself in deeds, and which has proved itself as well, perhaps, as any other creed. And although I think, with most humanists, that Christianity, by teaching the fatherhood of God, may make a great contribution to establishing the brotherhood of man, I also think that those who undermine man’s faith in reason are unlikely to contribute much to this end.

OSE Chapter 23. The Sociology of Knowledge

2006-08-31T04:17:00.000+10:00

This chapter signals what Ian Jarvie later called Popper’s “social turn”, his recognition that whatever objectivity and rationality we can achieve cannot be attributed to special qualities of mind but to the give and take of criticism in a community.

Two dangerous ideas were emerging in intellectual circles at the time: one was the idea of controlling social change by means of largescale central planning, the other was the theory of the social determination of scientific knowledge.

In our own time of still more rapid change, we even find the desire not only to predict change, but to control it by centralized large-scale planning. These holistic views (which I have criticized in The Poverty of Historicism) represent a ompromise, as it were, between Platonic and Marxian theories. Plato’s will to arrest change, combined with Marx’s doctrine of its inevitability, yield, as a kind of Hegelian ‘synthesis’, the demand that since it cannot be entirely arrested, change should at least be ‘planned’, and controlled by the state whose power is to be vastly extended.

Moving on to the subject of this chapter, Popper refers to the Marxist doctrine that our opinions, including our moral and scientific opinions, are determined by class interest, and more generally by the social and historical situation of our time. The main target is Karl Mannheim who apparently anticipated by some decades the strong sociology of science that came later in the wake of T S Kuhn.

The sociology of knowledge argues that scientific thought, and especially thought on social and political matters, does not proceed in a vacuum, but in a socially conditioned atmosphere. It is influenced largely by unconscious or subconscious elements. These elements remain hidden from the thinker’s observing eye because they form, as it were, the very place which he inhabits, his social habitat. The social habitat of the thinker determines a whole system of opinions and theories which appear to him as unquestionably true or self-evident. They appear to him as if they were logically and trivially true, such as, for example, the sentence ‘all tables are tables’.

Along with social determinism comes the idea of unveiling hidden motives, a ploy that is usually used as a weapon against opponents without noticing that the same approach could just as well be used in reverse!

In a previous chapter, when dealing with ‘Vulgar Marxism’ I mentioned a tendency which can be observed in a group of modern philosophies, the tendency to unveil the hidden motives behind our actions. The sociology of knowledge belongs to this group, together with psycho-analysis and certain philosophies which unveil the meaninglessness’ of the tenets of their opponents. The popularity of these views lies, I believe, in the ease with which they can be applied, and in the satisfaction which they confer on those who see through things, and through the follies of the unenlightened. This pleasure would be harmless, were it not that all these ideas are liable to destroy the intellectual basis of any discussion, by establishing what I have called a ‘reinforced dogmatism’. (Indeed, this is something rather similar to a ‘total ideology’.)

Popper objected to the tendency for sociological determinism and the sociology of knowledge to subvert the process of critical give and take that is essential to make progress by detecting and eliminating error. For a few paragraphs he played around with the idea to demonstrate what fun it could be to use apparently esoteric concepts to baffle opponents and would-be critics.

But, all joking apart, there are more serious objections. The sociology of knowledge is not only self-destructive, not only a rather gratifying object of socio-analysis, it also shows an astounding failure to understand precisely its main subject, the social aspects of knowledge, or rather, of scientific method. It looks upon science or knowledge as a process in the mind or ‘consciousness’ of the individual scientist, or perhaps as the product of such a process. If considered in this way, what we call scientific objectivity must indeed become completely incomprehensible, or even impossible; and not only in the social or political sciences, where class interests and similar hidden motives may play a part, but just as much in the natural sciences. Everyone who has an inkling of the history of the natural sciences is aware of the passionate tenacity which characterizes many of its quarrels. No amount of political partiality can influence political theories more strongly than the partiality shown by some natural scientists in favour of their intellectual offspring…

Two aspects of the method of the natural sciences are of importance in this connection. Together they constitute what I may term the ‘public character of scientific method’. First, there is something approaching free criticism. A scientist may offer his theory with the full conviction that it is unassailable. But this will not impress his fellow-scientists and competitors; rather it challenges them : they know that the scientific attitude means criticizing everything, and they are little deterred even by authorities. Secondly, scientists try to avoid talking at cross-purposes. (I may remind the reader that I am speaking of the natural sciences, but a part of modern economics may be included.) They try very seriously to speak one and the same language, even if they use different mother tongues. In the natural sciences this is achieved by recognizing experience as the impartial arbiter of their controversies. When speaking of ‘experience’ I have in mind experience of a ‘public’ character, like observations, and experiments, as opposed to experience in the sense of more 'private’ aesthetic or religious experience; and an experience is ‘public’ if everybody who takes the trouble can repeat it. In order to avoid speaking at cross-purposes, scientists try to express their theories in such a form that they can be tested, i.e. refuted (or else corroborated) by such experience…

To sum up these considerations, it may be said that what we call ‘scientific objectivity’ is not a product of the individual scientist’s impartiality, but a product of the social or public character of scientific method; and the individual scientist’s impartiality is, so far as it exists, not the source but rather the result of this socially or institutionally organized objectivity of science.

But it certainly has to be admitted that, at any given moment, our scientific theories will depend not only on the experiments, etc., made up to that moment, but also upon prejudices which are taken for granted, so that we have not become aware of them (although the application of certain logical methods may help us to detect them). At any rate, we can say in regard to this incrustation that science is capable of learning, of breaking down some of its crusts. The process may never be perfected, but there is no fixed barrier before which it must stop short. Any assumption can, in principle, be criticized. And that anybody may criticize constitutes scientific objectivity.

Scientific results are ‘relative’ (if this term is to be used at all) only in so far as they are the results of a certain stage of scientific development and liable to be superseded in the course of scientific progress. But this does not mean that truth is ‘relative’. If an assertion is true, it is true for ever10. It only means that most scientific results have the character of hypotheses, i.e. statements for which the evidence is inconclusive, and which are therefore liable to revision at any time. These considerations (with which I have dealt more fully elsewhere11), though not necessary for a criticism of the sociologists, may perhaps help to further the understanding of their theories. They also throw some light, to come back to my main criticism, on the important role which co-operation, intersubjectivity, and the publicity of method play in scientific criticism and scientific progress…

The only course open to the social sciences is to forget all about the verbal fireworks and to tackle the practical problems of our time with the help of the theoretical methods which are fundamentally the same in all sciences. I mean the methods of trial and error, of inventing hypotheses which can be practically tested, and of submitting them to practical tests. A social technology is needed whose results can be tested by piecemeal social engineering. The cure here suggested for the social sciences is diametrically opposed to the one suggested by the sociology of knowledge.

Sociologism believes that it is not their unpractical character, but rather the fact that practical and theoretical problems are too much intertwined in the field of social and political knowledge, that creates the methodological difficulties of these sciences. Thus we can read in a leading work on the sociology of knowledge : ‘The peculiarity of political knowledge, as opposed to "exact" knowledge, lies in the fact that knowledge and will, or the rational element and the range of the irrational, are inseparably and essentially intertwined.’ To this we can reply that ‘knowledge’ and ‘will’ are, in a certain sense, always inseparable; and that this fact need not lead to any dangerous entanglement. No scientist can know without making an effort, without taking an interest; and in his effort there is usually even a certain amount of self-interest involved. The engineer studies things mainly from a practical point of view. So does the farmer.

Practice is not the enemy of theoretical knowledge but the most valuable incentive to it. Though a certain amount of aloofness may be becoming to the scientist, there are many examples to show that it is not always important for a scientist to be thus disinterested. But it is important for him to remain in touch with reality, with practice, for those who overlook it have to pay by lapsing into scholasticism. Practical application of our findings is thus the means by which we may eliminate irrationalism from social science, and not any attempt to separate knowledge from ‘will’.

Another public event...

2006-08-30T21:27:00.000+10:00

For any locals who read this blog or Catallaxy, I'll be speaking as a guest of Rockhampton City Council on Thursday night from 7pm. Location is Northside Library, 154 Berserker St North Rockhampton. Once again drinks and nibbles are provided, although you'll need to RSVP to 4927 0955 for catering purposes if you want to attend. I'll be talking about the role of blogging in undermining traditional requirements for a physical cultural centre (a big city, that is) and how people in regional Queensland can go about joining the growing conversation.

Interview with Tim Foster

2006-08-30T13:28:00.000+10:00

This is an interview I did with Tim Foster, President of One Nation Victoria. Tim stresses that he wishes to end the ‘racist tarnish’ against the party, and hopes that the interview will be read in that light. It was conducted via email. Some spelling/grammar mistakes have been corrected while most are left as they were.

What is One Nation's policy on the preference deals that go on in Australian politics?

One Nation prefers to preference on policy of other parties as opposed to backdoor deals. One Nation Victoria especially chose to give preference to other minor parties that we trusted above the two major parties. The two other major parties seem to take too much advantage of the fact that they are the two major parties and this doesn't appear to help with the Australian community’s respect, pride and admiration of their government. This of course can only be achieved when and at what time the Australian people stand together, rid the two party deadlock and vote in a group of people that would do no more than make them proud of their own heritage, or new found heritage for New Australians (We at One Nation prefer to use the term New Australians as it gives what everyone else likes to call immigrants, an open door to become a part of and more importantly, feel a part of the Australian people and culture.)

Does the public know enough about the backdoor deals – like Labor's preferences going to Family First in the last federal election – that go on?

No way, I don't think that the Australian people know a lot about anything that goes on in that House in Canberra. It comes down to the fact that politics in this country is like a product and whichever manufacturer has the better sales pitch, then that party is sold to the public. It might not be a good product, but who cares as long as it sells? A perfect example is the fiasco with the kickbacks for wheat. Man, that is the most disgusting lowlife act that I have ever heard coming from what is meant to be the pride of our Nation. Corruption at its pathetically highest pinnacle. This isn't honourable behaviour, it is most certainly not knightly behaviour, and people are so apathetic in this country that they don't seem to care that John Anderson pulled the pin for a reason. Why pull the pin on being National Party leader just when you won your seat? Even us in One Nation heard last year before the election that something sinister and big was going to come out of Canberra this year. It disgusts me. At least we in One Nation have managed to hunt out a lot of the potentially corrupt. I can sit as State President and say, 'well, we might not have a big membership in Victoria, we might not have a big State Executive, but at least we know that those that are still here, love this Nation, love being Aussie and are not in it for the money.'

Australia's two-party system seems embedded with little scope for change. What do you believe to be the role of minor parties such as One Nation?

To open people's eyes, stay clear of the corruption and give people a more honest alternative. The more smaller parties pull together, the bigger the dent that they will make in the two party deadlock. The role is basically to support each other. We at One Nation are willing to do it, but they (the other smaller parties) still live with this fear that if they are seen to be siding with One Nation then they are supporters of racism, which is entirely unfair, especially considering the facts that an Italian man with are very strong accent comes to every One Nation meeting that I have attended myself in the past 12 months, as so does a Filipino girl. Why? Because they love being AUSTRALIAN. Nationalism and Racism are two completely different things and it is frustrating to have a community and a media that continually try and mold the two together.

What will be One Nation's presence in the upcoming Victorian state election?

Unfortunately Sukrit, it will be small. The fact is that we honestly don't have anyone willing to stand at the moment. At the most we might have one or two stand for Senate seats, but I am not in the habit of lying to people to make us seem bigger than what we are. We lost a lot of membership, mainly white supremacist types, which has left us a small group in Victoria, but at least I can sleep well at night knowing that I am the State President of a political movement that is living to every letter of its platform, 'Equality for ALL Australians, NO division, ONE NATION.' As simple as that. All in all we need more youth in the Party in Victoria. Nonetheless, the other states are going quite well.

In your experience, how often do you witness the 'political apathy' some commentators claim exists in Australia?

The truth is that I believe that there is a lot of political apathy in this country, and it is reflected in political party membership. People hate politics by and large. This comes back to what I was saying before; corrupt, lying, deceitful governments do nothing to counter attack this apathy. People are not interested in being apart of something that does not make them feel good in spirit and these sorts of low life attributes to politics are not welcoming spirit fuels.

OSE Chapter 22. The Moral Theory of Historicism

2006-08-29T22:17:00.000+10:00

It is this moral radicalism of Marx which explains his influence; and that is a hopeful fact in itself. This moral radicalism is still alive. It is our task to keep it alive, to prevent it from going the way which his political radicalism will have to go. ‘Scientific’ Marxism is dead. Its feeling of social responsibility and its love for freedom must survive.

Given that Marxism cannot provide either reliable prophecies (nothing can) or advice on the piecemeal reforms that might achieve desired outcomes (Marx regarded that as Utopian) what accounts for the power and impact of Marxism?

It seems that Marxism surfed at least three “waves” of thought. Each was immensely powerful in its own right, and working in synergy the combination was practically overwhelming. One of the “waves” was the immense authority of science among educated and progressive people 150 years ago. The other was the Judao-Christian moral imperative to promote justice and especially to help the poor and the weak. A third wave was the economic illiteracy of radicals and conservatives alike. This meant that the positive function of free markets (especially for the able-bodied poor) was never understood by enough people to resist the manifold interventions of the state which almost invariably aggravate the problems they are supposed to ameliorate.

Near the end of the previous chapter Popper wrote that “in Marxism the religious element is unmistakable. In the hour of their deepest misery and degradation, Marx’s prophecy gave the workers an inspiring belief in their mission, and in the great future which their movement was to prepare for the whole of mankind.”

In this chapter Popper outlined the moral theory that underpinned Marxism, a somewhat paradoxical situation given the official line on materialism and determinism which at least theoretically ruled out any attempt to think our away towards an improved social order by organized reforms. So how do we find the moral theory in Marxism?

But although Marx was strongly opposed to Utopian technology as well as to any attempt at a moral justification of socialist aims, his writings contained, by implication, an ethical theory… By laying such stress on the moral aspect of social institutions, Marx [implicitly] emphasized our responsibility for the more remote social repercussions of our actions; for instance, of such actions as may help to prolong the life of socially unjust institutions. But although Capital is, in fact, largely a treatise on social ethics, these ethical ideas are never represented as such….

Far from promoting an explicit moral theory, Marx excoriated those moralists, especially churchmen, who were in favour of the system that he regarded as the cause of misery and exploitation. Furthermore, the Marxist scheme did not provide for autonomous or freestanding moral principles.

Marx and Engels preferred to look upon their humanitarian aims in the light of a theory which explains them as the product, or the reflection, of social circumstances. Their theory can be described as follows. If a social reformer, or a revolutionary, believes that he is inspired by a hatred of ‘injustice’, and by a love for ‘justice’, then he is largely a victim of illusion (like anybody else, for instance the apologists of the old order). Or, to put it more precisely, his moral ideas of ‘justice’ and ‘injustice’ are by-products of the social and historical development. But they are by-products of an important kind, since they are part of the mechanism by which the development propels itself. To illustrate this point, there are always at least two ideas of ‘justice’ (or of ‘freedom’ or of ‘equality’), and these two ideas differ very widely indeed. The one is the idea of ‘justice’ as the ruling class understands it, the other, the same idea as the oppressed class understands it. These ideas are, of course, products of the class situation, but at the same time they play an important part in the class struggle—they have to provide both sides with that good conscience which they need in order to carry on their fight.

Marx’s moral theory is, of course, only the result of his view concerning the method of social science, of his sociological determinism, a view which has become rather fashionable in our day. All our opinions, it is said, including our moral standards, depend upon society and its historical state. They are the products of society or of a certain class situation. Education is defined as a special process by which the community attempts to ‘pass on’ to its members ‘its culture including the standards by which it would have them to live’, and the ‘relativity of educational theory and practice to a prevailing order’ is emphasized. Science, too, is said to depend on the social stratum of the scientific worker, etc.

In contrast to that rigid position on the “social determinism” of our ideas, there is usually a diversity of views available (at least in an open society as opposed to a closed or tribal society) and that diversity provides scope for choice, for critical discussion, for the opportunity to choose between options and, more important, there is space to create new options and opportunities.

Marx’s determinism was in conflict with his activism and his moralism, so the end result is that people who try to take on board the whole package are reduced to confusion and contradiction on moral issues. They cannot offer any way to think our way through moral problems, especially the most important task of all. That is the critical appraisal of the basic ideas that guide our efforts at social reform, just in case they are false with the result that the practical applications of our ideas produce the opposite of the intended outcomes.

Principled and humanitarian Marxists would have to be apalled at the outcome of the social revolutions that have been achieved under the red flag, but they seem to have huge problems in coming to grips with the gap between the rhetoric and the reality of radical reforms. The rascals!

OSE Chapter 21. An Evaluation of the Prophecy

2006-08-29T22:02:00.000+10:00

The arguments underlying Marx’s historical prophecy are invalid. His ingenious attempt to draw prophetic conclusions from observations of contemporary economic tendencies failed. The reason for this failure docs not lie in any insufficiency of the empirical basis of the argument. Marx’s sociological and economic analyses of contemporary society may have been somewhat one-sided, but in spite of their bias, they were excellent in so far as they were descriptive. The reason for his failure as a prophet lies entirely in the poverty of historicism as such, in the simple fact that even if we observe to-day what appears to be a historical tendency or trend, we cannot know whether it will have the same appearance to-morrow.

We must admit that Marx saw many things in the right light. If we consider only his prophecy that the system of unrestrained capitalism, as he knew it, was not going to last much longer, and that its apologists who thought it would last forever were wrong, then we must say that he was right. He was right, too, in holding that it was largely the ‘class struggle’, i.e. the association of the workers, that was going to bring about its transformation into a new economic system.

That is a serious misreading of the historical play: I don't accept the fundamental premise of exploitation and it is likely that militant trade unionism only slowed down the rate of growth in productivity and creamed off benefits for powerful unions at the expense of the unemployed, the low paid and community at large.

Since I am criticizing Marx and, to some extent, praising democratic piecemeal interventionism (especially of the institutional kind explained in section VII to chapter 17), I wish to make it clear that I feel much sympathy with Marx’s hope for a decrease in state influence. It is undoubtedly the greatest danger of interventionism—especially of any direct intervention—that it leads to an increase in state power and in bureaucracy. Most interventionists do not mind this, or they close their eyes to it, which increases the danger.

Popper considered that the most robust parts of the Marxist prophecy concerned increasing productivity and the potentially disastrous consequences of the trade cycle (boom and bust). He did not claim to know enough to improve on Marx’s analysis and he was left with the need for a theory to explain why the institution of the free market does not prevent depressions

Why it is that “such a very efficient instrument for equalizing supply and demand, does not suffice to prevent depressions, i.e. overproduction or underconsumption. In other words, we should have to show that the buying and selling on the market produces, as one of the unwanted social repercussions of our actions, the trade cycle.”

The answer is that the free market will minimize (or tend to correct) overproduction and underproduction, and will ensure a fairly rapid recovery from busts (for example the 1920/21 bust in the US). The crash of 1929 and the Great Depression of the 1930’s do not demonstrate the failure of free markets, they demonstrate what happens when many and varied constraints are put upon free markets, especially the market in labour.

Roughly speaking, Marx shared the belief of the progressive industrialist, of the bourgeois’ of his time: the belief in a law of progress. But this naive historicist optimism is no less superstitious than a pessimistic historicism like that of Plato and Spengler. And it is a very bad outfit for a prophet, since it must bridle historical imagination.
A faith like the progressivist optimism of the nineteenth century can be a powerful political force; it can help to bring about what it has predicted. Thus even a correct prediction must not be accepted too readily as a corroboration of a theory, and of its scientific character. It may rather be a consequence of its religious character and a proof of the force of the religious faith which it has been able to inspire in men. And in Marxism more particularly the religious element is unmistakable. In the hour of their deepest misery and degradation, Marx’s prophecy gave the workers an inspiring belief in their mission, and in the great future which their movement was to prepare for the whole of mankind. Looking back at the course of events from 1864 to 1930, I think that but for the somewhat accidental fact that Marx discouraged research in social technology, European affairs might possibly have developed, under the influence of this prophetic religion, towards a socialism of a non-collectivist type. A thorough preparation for social engineering, for planning for freedom, on the part of the Russian Marxists as well as those in Central Europe, might possibly have led to an unmistakable success, convincing to all friends of the open society. But this would not have been a corroboration of a scientific prophecy. It would have been the result of a religious movement—the result of the faith in humanitarianism, combined with a critical use of our reason for the purpose of changing the world.

But things developed differently. The prophetic element in Marx’s creed was dominant in the minds of his followers. It swept everything else aside, banishing the power of cool and critical judgement and destroying the belief that by the use of reason we may change the world.

Tampering With The Price System

2006-08-29T11:23:00.000+10:00

One of the most valuable gifts of economics to libertarians has been an understanding of how the price system transmits information in order to bring about efficient market outcomes. At its most basic, the theory is that people respond to the incentives (disincentives) created by higher or lower prices to change their patterns of production and consumption. In the realm of economic behaviour, while challenged from time to time by arguments relating to market failure and monopoly power, this is a fairly well held orthodoxy.

However much more controversial is whether or not the prices altered by government have an effect on social behaviour. Governments alter prices two ways: by changing the reward for producing a particular good, service or kind of behaviour; or by changing the cost a particular good, service or kind of behaviour. While central planning at the firm-level has gone out of fashion, central planning at the individual-level through welfare payments, etc. has steadily increased over the past decades.

In this light, it is fascinating to read the work of Australian economists Joshua Gans & Andrew Leigh on unusual days, which showed the way that one-off changes by government in the prices of death and birth had significant effects on social behaviour as individuals altered their choices in order to maximise their wealth (or, in the circumstance of the 1979 abolition of inheritance taxes, the wealth of their beneficiaries). In summary, Gans & Leigh found that half of those eligible to pay inheritance taxes in the week before their abolition delayed their deaths until after their abolition; and that up to 1,000 couples delayed the births of their children in order to be eligible for the baby bonus when it came into effect in 2004.

Virtual seminar on democracy and peace

2006-08-29T09:19:00.000+10:00

The democratic peace thesis (that democracies tend not to go to war against other democracies) is probably the closest thing to an empirical 'law' in political science. It has been extensively tested through empirical analysis - just type in 'democratic' and 'peace' on any reputable database for evidence of the copious amounts of literature on the topic. It is also a fundamental tenet of American foreign policy. President George W. Bush got it right when he issued the following challenge:

Our response involves far more than instant retaliation and isolated strikes. Americans should not expect one battle, but a lengthy campaign, unlike any other we have ever seen. It may include dramatic strikes, visible on TV, and covert operations, secret even in success. We will starve terrorists of funding, turn them one against another, drive them from place to place, until there is no refuge or no rest. And we will pursue nations that provide aid or safe haven to terrorism. Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists. From this day forward, any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime.

People like Erik Gartzke have argued there is a stronger link between peace and economic freedom, rather than political freedom alone. In reality, the promotion of both are worthy goals.

Emeritus Professor Rudy Rummel, one of the strongest supporters of the democratic peace proposition, is running a virtual seminar on this topic using Second Life. Second Life is a 3D computer game, and the seminar will be held in a 3D conference hall on September 2, California time. See his blog for further details. I doubt my computer will be good enough to run the program, but if anyone else is interested in asking questions of Professor Rummel in real time, it's certainly a novel way of doing so.

Update: I have uploaded my essay on the democratic peace question.

Update 2: A transcript of the virtual seminar run by Professor Rummel is now available online.

skepticlawyer's husky

2006-08-28T21:30:00.000+10:00

My husky, Texas, in virtual form. He's called Texas because he's a long, long way from snow...

Introducing (post)libertarianism

2006-08-28T00:59:00.000+10:00

I have been grappling since Sukrit invited me to join this blog with how to explain my thoughts about libertarianism. Having just finished The Beach, I thought I might try to explain a few of my thoughts by reference to the ideas expressed in The Beach.

The Beach was a high profile remake of the French movie La Plage. The essential plot is that Richard, (played by Leonardo di Caprio), a young American out to experience the world, gets given a map showing the location of a secret paradise unknown to the tourist trail. Setting out with a French girl he has the hots for and the boyfriend Richard wishes she didn't have, they find a tropical paradise inhabited by twenty or so young backpacker types from Europe and America (including the token black man, who in this case is a cricket mad Englishman) who are committed to one thing and one thing only: pleasure. Paradise is however threatened by the visitation of tragedy on the island, other backpackers who have heard the legend, and by marijuana farmers on the other side of the island. Richard is willing to kill to protect paradise, but even that is not enough, and eventually they all have to leave.

If you had to describe the society of The Beach, you would describe it as hedonistic, not libertarian. Hedonism and Libertarianism are different philosophies with different aims. One seeks to maximise pleasure, the other seeks to maximise freedom. However in reality, we often find them quite complimentary - two sides of the coin. Richard, the American, from the land of the free, uses his freedom to pursue pleasure. The libertarian philosophy of the West enables many individuals within the West to adopt a personal philosophy of hedonism.

Now freedom to choose how we live is at the core of our society. However when a large portion of our society choose to do that in a manner which sees them fail to reproduce, then freedom becomes terminal. What do I mean by "terminal"? It becomes an end point, an ending, its conclusion. And that thing which is concluding isn't just the generation in question, it's the freedom they enjoyed as well. When the free people die, and they haven't had children, haven't given someone else the opportunity to experience the world they have been enjoying, who replaces them?

What am I suggesting then? That we forsake freedom? No. That we forbid pleasure? No. Of all the political philosophies, I believe libertarianism is the least bad of them all. However the freedom sought by libertarianism is not enough on its own. Something more is needed in order to ensure not just that freedom exists in this generation, but that it is carried on into the next one, and the one after that, and after that again. That something else, that's what makes me (post)libertarian.

Postmodernists find it impossible to break away from the modernist paradism and form something completely new, so they signal both their bondage to and understanding of the weaknesses of modernism through the prefixation of "post". In the same way, I am both completely enthralled by, and acutely aware of the weaknesses of, Libertarianism. As part of this blog, I hope to share with you my thoughts, my questions, my musings, on these post-libertarian questions that occupy my mind.

My Life as a Young Australian Novelist - Quadrant May 2006

2006-08-27T20:18:00.000+10:00

This piece ran in the May issue of Quadrant and the Autumn issue of the Skeptic, and has attracted some attention around the blogosphere. There doesn't seem to be an electronic version available anywhere, so I thought I'd put it up here.

Three stories
1. It’s high summer; I’m 14, walking home from school. Sweat is pouring down my face and I almost miss it. There’s a furniture truck parked in the street outside my house. My first thought: oh shit, he’s done it again.

When the family lived up north, dad’s standard operating procedure was put the stuff on tic, then move before the debt collectors arrive. My siblings went to a jumble of schools as dad dodged the tallyman around Far North Queensland. One brother had eleven schools in two years.

This got harder once we shifted to Logan City, a sprawling outer-suburban development outside Brisbane. We’d see the furniture truck then – the collectors were starting to wise up, maybe by keeping better records. We’d be minus a telly, washing machine, stereo and bedroom furniture for a month or two; then dad would start the process over again. After one particularly keen lot turned up in a white pantech with the words COLLECTION AGENCY painted on the sides, kids at school started saying my old man was a ‘bum’ and a ‘gaolbird’.

2. It’s the end of year two, and I’ve failed to learn anything. Every time I write my name, it’s spelt differently. I spend my time at the back of the class manufacturing spitballs. I’m the archetypal holy terror, the kid who gives teachers blood pressure problems and makes them leave the profession. I’m an expert at both the funny (chewing gum on seats) and the macabre (massive stick insects hidden in the teacher’s desk drawers). On my report card, one young woman – first year out of teacher’s training college, equal parts terrified and fascinated by her proletarian charges – writes, ‘this child will never amount to anything’.

Some time later, I learn I’m dyslexic, and mum waits tables and cleans rich peoples’ houses to pay for one-on-one phonics tuition and occupational therapy. To this day, I’ve never really figured out how it worked, but it unlocked whatever was locked between my ears. I can still remember the eerie sensation of going from the bottom to the top of the class inside six months. Flowers for Algernon scared the bejesus out of me; I was worried the process might be reversible.

3. I’m in my second year of law school, and Suri Ratnapala, the eccentric genius who teaches us Constitutional Law A sets Polyukhovich v Commonwealth as our case study. Are you trying to set me up? I ask him after class. No, he says mildly. I’m trying to teach you that in this profession, thinking is actually a good thing.

I read the case, and find Brennan J saying things that get other people accused of anti-Semitism:

'The Act select[s] a specific group of persons from a long time past out of all those who have committed, or are suspected of having committed, war crimes in other armed conflicts.'

If the rule of law is based on general laws, impartial in their use of coercive power and supreme over all, then the danger posed by legislation that targets an unpopular minority is readily apparent.

I pour years of careful thought into that essay: the rumination that comes at night after copping a daily critical barrage. What if I’m completely wrong? What if people are right to ring their media mates up and make sure I’m not published again? What if we should prosecute these sleazy fucks, who hopped out to Australia after the war and just starting working on the Snowy, because that was deemed a Good Thing?

Brennan J’s magisterial judgment knocks me sideways. I’ve read only history and literature on this issue, never the law. I see a High Court split 4-3, with the sort of judicial bloodletting reserved only for the most famously disagreeable cases. Think Wik. Think Bank Nationalisation. I humbly learn Professor Ratnapala’s lesson. Thinking in this profession is actually a good thing.

Writing
Law is much more fun than writing, but it took me six years to learn that.

I’ve included the three stories above to make a small but important point: I haven’t lost the knack. Writing remains as easy as it was when I was twenty and producing The Hand that Signed the Paper. These snippets, although ‘true’, also employ the inevitable compression and scene shifting that characterises fiction. The year two teacher made the ‘never amount’ comment to mum’s face, rather than on paper. Professor Ratnapala gave us a choice of cases – half a dozen or so. Polyukhovich was only one. Memo to my critics: moving the furniture is a consequence of crafting and making. Even non-fiction writers do it.

I became one of those strange law students who took great pleasure in Property, Equity and Trusts, the Law of Companies and of Copyright. I’m heading towards a career in Commercial law, to debt and equity markets, capital raising and tax minimisation. It fascinates me and I’m good at it. I’m annoyed I spent all those years trying to join in literary Australia’s closed conversational circle when I could have played the stock market or developed a property portfolio.

History
In 1995, I won the Miles Franklin Literary Award for my first novel, The Hand that Signed the Paper. I was 23. I wrote the book when I was twenty and 21, winning The Australian/Vogel Literary Award for it at 22. This prize, for unknowns under the age of 35, carried with it a substantial lick of prize money and guaranteed publication. I couldn’t believe my luck. It also went on to win the Australian Literature Society Gold Medal.

Despite having a good English degree, my speciality was languages and grammar, not the sort of stuff destined to make me savvy about publishing and marketing. I knew nothing about how Australian literature worked. Marcus Westbury, an unusually perceptive critic, commented that I came from so far outside the establishment I didn’t know we had one.

I’d already decided I was going to write under a pseudonym. This had been formalised with the university, which issued my degree parchments and university medal in both names. It’s always a source of amusement to me that the Courier-Mail had received a press release from the university listing all the university medallists for 1994 early in 1995. My award was under both names, and a brief profile included my Australian/Vogel win. Come August 1995, the Courier-Mail made much of the ‘investigative journalism’ involved in blowing my cover.

I hadn’t intended the pseudonym to hold for very long. It was designed to last until my main source for the novel died. At the time, he had terminal bone marrow cancer and six months to live. I promised him that he wouldn’t be prosecuted under the War Crimes Act on my account. Shortly after I won the Australian/Vogel Award, his cancer went into remission and faced me with a real quandary. I decided to keep the pseudonym, although came perilously close to letting my publisher in on the secret. I only stopped from doing so after receiving an absolute stinker of an editorial report. It accused me of racism and called my novel propaganda and a pornography of violence. They would not divulge the editor’s name to me, only sending a photocopy of her report and refusing to answer questions when I rang. In a fit of immaturity, I figured that two could play that game. I tore up my half written letter and binned it. If a custard pie hits me in the face, I figured, it’ll get you lot as well.

Even so, I couldn’t work out how a book that had unanimously won a major literary award was suddenly a piece of junk. Sure, there were prize-winning books around that weren’t my cup of tea, but that didn’t make me hate them (or their authors). I’d simply put that book aside and read another. This principle held true for computer games, RPGs and various sports. An editorial report riddled with invective was my first inkling of the ridiculous pretension and self-importance with which many of Australia’s intellectuals view their role.

Australian literature is burdened with a level of ideological conformity that would do East Germany proud. I started out in life as a leftie, albeit an idiosyncratic one – Trotsky to their Stalin, for want of a better analogy. I found myself appalled – and still am – at the anti-Americanism, the pro-Jews as victims but anti-Jews as victors, the belief that only someone from a given gender or ethnic group can write about that gender or ethnic group, and much other ideological piffle. I remember being told with great solemnity at a writers’ festival that white people who wanted to write about Aborigines needed to ask Aboriginal permission in order to do so. I nearly had chronic conniptions trying to stifle my guffaws. Watching kindly and well-meaning people attempt to apply affirmative action to literature frightened me, especially when they were dishing out Australia Council grants. It struck me as inconceivable that critics and academics were trying to control authors’ output. It was an insidious form of censorship and needed to go for six at the MCG.

So I threw myself into ‘Helen Demidenko’ with gusto. I’d grown up with plenty of people from that sort of background and had a knack for languages, which made me a natural mimic. Unfortunately, the nasty editorial report – coming as it did so early in the publication process – had a knock-on effect in other respects. When my old high school attempted to take some credit for my achievements, I rebuffed them with rudeness and contempt. This was despite the fact that I’d had some good teachers there, including one who strongly encouraged me to attend university, something I may not have done otherwise. I viewed the school through the jaundiced prism provided by some of its students. My response was very unfair to the teaching staff, something I only realised later.

My journey through the upper reaches of the chattering classes as ‘Helen Demidenko’ was surreal. I’ll never forget being propositioned by both halves of an ‘open marriage’ at one function, or being invited to join the ‘Anti-Football League’ at another. Instead of being honest and pointing out that no, I actually like sport, I made a lame duck excuse about having insufficient money on me to join. The conversation forgotten, I fronted up to a panel next morning wearing a 1991 Wallabies jersey. The two sport haters were sitting in the front row and I copped an A-grade glare.

Members of the chattering classes took potshots for the moral ambiguity of my writing. Part of me wanted to shout at the top of my lungs if they’d ever read Céline. I watched stunned as Peter Craven wrote a positive review of my novel in The Age and short-listed it for one of the Victorian Premier’s Awards, only to dump on it when the Melbourne literary establishment decided I was persona non grata. People who were supposed to know about literature went all out to conflate my views with those of my characters (does that make Bret Easton Ellis a serial killer in his spare time?) and prove that I must have had some sort of sneaking association with the League of Rights (who are they?). This made me determined to humiliate a group I considered spineless, and my invented persona became ever more over the top. It was only a matter of time before my cover – such as it was – was blown.

Narrative
Let me begin with a girl, an ordinary Australian girl.

Fiona Kovalenko has an enfeebled, elderly uncle. She also has a less enfeebled (but still elderly) father. This besides the usual number of siblings, aunts and cousins. Fiona Kovelenko is at university, but unlike many of her peers is not particularly articulate. She is clever, but her cleverness does not extend into the realm of wisdom or reason. This is not because she is intrinsically incapable of these things but because she is only nineteen years old. Within her, this ordinary Australian girl carries a story incomprehensibly horrible yet eminently describable.

Fiona has known since childhood that three members of her family, a loving, close-knit immigrant Ukrainian family, were to greater or lesser degrees Nazi collaborators. She is unaware of the full import of the phrase ‘Nazi collaborator,’ is versed in neither the specific history of this collaboration nor in the history of collaboration per se. Instead, Fiona chooses to get by, largely unknowing. Missing the odd lecture. Not studying too hard. Living in one of Brisbane’s riotously tropical suburbs near the university. She smokes rollies and drinks hot chocolate. She listens to nightly current affairs bulletins and tut-tuts over the state of federal politics with her flatmate. It is only when one of her family members becomes a feature on those current affairs bulletins that she faces – is forced to face – the narrative of collaboration within her family. Her uncle is charged with war crimes, and that is news.

Australia – like many other western countries during the mid-eighties to early nineties – introduced legislation designed to allow the trial of postwar immigrants who were accused of collaboration with Nazi occupiers in eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. The debate that attended the legislation’s passage through federal parliament was one of the most acrimonious in recent Australian political history. Significantly, the intended targets were seldom German. Those who fell within the ambit of this legislation were immigrants from Eastern Europe (Ukraine, Lithuania and Latvia, for example), nations and peoples with grievous histories of oppression and genocide of their own. It is within the framework of this legislation that the fictional narrative of The Hand that Signed the Paper unfolds.

Fiona Kovalenko strives to own what she sees as her past, terrible as it is. Her older sister, organized and pragmatic, engages a lawyer and plans familial court appearances. For Fiona’s sister, Natalya, there is no doubt that loyalty resides with her family, protecting it from those who seek to do it harm. The past, for big sister, has no business haunting the present.

Fiona is neither as pragmatic as her sister nor as sure that her uncle should be protected. She has no idea how to begin the process of historical ownership so she simply asks questions. In their turn, father, uncle and aunt are badgered for narratives in a large yet intimate exercise in oral history. Sometimes Fiona interrogates the terms of these familial narratives, inserting her limited, young, late twentieth century ways of seeing. Sometimes she simply transcribes their narratives word for word into one of her big spiral notebooks. She neither judges her family nor sees her uncle as inherently evil. Implicated by her bloodtie to the accused, she simply sets the story down as it comes to her. In fragments. Compassion cheek by jowl with murderous indifference. Hope commingled with despair.

For Fiona, the received narrative of Nazism – as distinct from familial narratives of Nazi collaboration – is constructed wholly by the media of television and cinema. Apart from her family’s collection of fading black and white photographs, Nazism and its cruelties could just as easily be an episode of Australia’s Most Wanted: history based entirely on televisual re-enactment. She writes. She struggles to comprehend, but the only illumination available for her to cast on her narratives is television’s ‘cold, cathode light’. Her understanding of clarity is simply to make her narrative as cinematic as possible. If she is influenced at all beyond televisual reconstruction and appropriation, it is by trial reports that show how such-and-such a serial killer seemed the embodiment of normality to his neighbours.

The brutal, unseeing antisemitism that drove her uncle Vitaly to collaborate is scored across the narrative Fiona transcribes and inscribes. This narrative blames Jews within the Communist Party (and Jews per se) for the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-34. Vitaly describes an existence shattered by Communist and Nazi barbarities into the bleakest of Hobbesian fragments: truly ‘solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short’. Fiona’s aunt Kateryna, as bigoted in her own way as Vitaly, remembers Babi-Yar because she slept with handsome Hauptsturmführer Hasse, a man behind the butchery, in a nearby hotel. Vitaly liked Treblinka. During his time as a guard there he was warm and well fed. He ‘never falls psychologically outside the atmosphere of his age’. Fiona’s retelling means that she revisits – vicariously – a world where people are hermetically sealed inside the cruellest of closed systems. Since I’m uninterested in turning people into bug-eyed monsters, I took great care to make my one-time concentration camp guards recognisably human, even sympathetic. Their anti-Semitic motivations and values had substance. That said, I didn’t shy away from what they did. It’s just that to me, Osama is much more interesting if we know what makes him tick.

The language of Fiona’s familial storytellers is hateful and vicious. Fiona is an ordinary Australian girl, and for many years the language of her Australia has been neither hateful nor vicious. Fiona believes people can become Australian. If they ‘do the right thing’ (a slogan prominently displayed on municipal rubbish bins) in the new land, they will be rewarded with Australianness and all it entails. Fiona believes that becoming Australian means entry to an ordered polity, the rule of law and a public discourse set free from modalities that reify viciousness and hate. She can respond to the brutalities of history only in terms of lawyers, parliamentary debates and letters to the editor. This is her Australian world. Fiona comes to accept the ideal of a migratory rite of passage that reifies history but in so doing detaches it from its terrible consequences. For Fiona, immigrants shed the evils of the old country like a snake sloughing off dead skin, remaking themselves in the new country. They cross an invisible line drawn at an arbitrary point somewhere in the Indian Ocean, ceasing to be emigrants, becoming immigrants instead. ‘I’ve worked so hard to be Australian,’ Vitaly tells her. ‘I’m all Australian now’.

Media
Journalists have a remarkable talent for behaving like kiddy-fiddlers. At least, that was the view I formed after they repeatedly staked out my parents’ house and followed my primary school aged niece and nephew to school. There were so many of them – outside broadcasting vans, TV cameras and sound booms in tow – I had to sneak into mum and dad’s backyard via several neighbours’ fences, wearing dog bite and bee stings in the process. Mum was petrified – they’d been prowling up and down the verandah trying to photograph her through her bedroom window – and dad wanted to get his gun. Dad’s habit of getting involved in petty crime was another source of worry. On one occasion a Channel 7 reporter doing the rounds realized who dad was and tried to assemble a TV crew outside the Magistrates’ Court after he was convicted. Quick thinking on the part of the duty solicitor stopped an already nasty story becoming much worse.

The phrase ‘chequebook journalism’ hadn’t held any real meaning until one media outlet offered me $160,000 for an interview – after a rival offered $100,000. At the time I knocked it back, a decision I now regret. My head was full of high ideals, including ‘maintaining my integrity as a writer’. In reality, there’s not a great deal of difference between accepting a wad of cash from a media outlet in return for telling them what they want to hear and hanging off the taxpayers’ teat in return for telling the government what it wants to hear. I still maintain the press hammered me as hard as they would have done had I taken the money.

I learnt that nearly every journalist fancies himself as a writer, complete with novel stashed away in the attic/garage/trunk. Similarly, their collective certainty that Australia is populated by a mob of racist dills knows no bounds. Every time some media commentator tees off at ‘regional Australia’ or ‘the outer suburbs’, carrying on about ignorance, racism and lack of sophistication, I take it pretty personally. Not so long ago that was me. It’s still my siblings, all of whom are trades people. Many journalists also believe they can influence the outcome of everything from literary awards to elections, hence the concerted campaign to have me stripped of the Miles Franklin Award. This culminated in accusations of plagiarism, another thing that wasn’t worked out of my system until law school – when I earned a high distinction in Copyright law. Fortunately, Dame Leonie Kramer – one of the judges – was made of sterner stuff, and told them to piss off (in the nicest possible way, of course).

Only the sports journalists were appropriately humble, acknowledging the gap between their efforts and those of Australia’s sportsmen and women. I think Gideon Haigh is the best writer in Australia: a fine craftsman, aware of his limitations, devoted to his sport. One of the few highlights of my literary sojourn was meeting him and receiving a signed copy of Mystery Spinner as a gift.

A sure sign that many of Australia’s critics and journalists don’t have a life was the appearance – in rapid succession – of four books about the cause célèbre. All were longer than my novel. Robert Manne’s The Culture of Forgetting came in at nearly twice the length, riddled with errors and laced with bile. He sent a letter begging an interview shortly before publication. My solicitor read it and shook his head sagely. ‘Don’t touch this one, Helen. He’s already made up his mind’.

Reluctantly, I cooperated with Andrew Reimer in his effort, The Demidenko Debate. My publisher was behind the book and Professor Reimer had consistently argued that my novel was good, despite the controversy. We met in my solicitor’s office in the city and I tried to answer his questions. At this point, I really noticed that I just didn’t fit into ‘literary culture’. He was passionate about literature in a way I just couldn’t fathom, speaking about it as though it had the capacity to change the world. It’s a novel, I kept thinking: what people read on the train. We were talking at cross-purposes. Whatever I said obviously wasn’t too inspiring – he didn’t use a single quote in his book. Although he was kindly and well meaning, I spent most of the interview trying to ignore his constant fiddling with a cigarette packet in his pocket. As soon as we stepped outside, he lit up.

Work
Mark Davis’ study Gangland: Cultural Elites and the New Generationalism told me – in very precise terms – why I wasn’t able to work as a writer in Australia. Before Davis’ book came out, I already had a fair idea of what was going on. Davis’ research simply confirmed what I suspected. The ‘wall out’ ranged from attacks in the press that a wealthy person would be able to fight off with a defamation suit (one commentator compared me with Martin Bryant) to senior media and critical figures ringing their mates and encouraging them not to publish anything I wrote. I couldn’t afford litigation, and came into the system bereft of contacts, so had no means of fighting back. Writers – especially new ones – are very poorly paid. I made the princely sum of $1.39 a copy out of book sales, so even the tag ‘bestseller’ didn’t mean a great deal.

As a stopgap, I went teaching and threw myself into sport – martial arts, running and cricket. Sport kept me sane in my first year out, especially when my father managed to kill himself off in embarrassing circumstances. True to form, he’d been dabbling in the criminal underworld, and managed to die on the job in a local brothel whilst redeeming a favour. According to the copper who delivered the news, the prostitute in question swore off the ‘game’ for all time. I suppose you would.

Mum had always known that he was pretty much a bum, but that didn’t make dealing with the police and the possibility of media exposure any easier. We made sure there was no media presence, which meant no funeral notice in the paper. Sympathetic doctors and coppers ensured the exact location didn’t turn up on dad’s death certificate. The Courier-Mail somehow heard about the death, publishing a brief – and false – obituary. For the first time ever, we gave thanks. Mum also insisted on the cheapest possible funeral, which meant no service and a chipboard box. She was furious, bitter and humiliated, although people not in the know mistook it for grief. My enduring memory of the whole fiasco is sitting at Logan Funerals staring at dad’s coffin while an extremely uncomfortable funeral director fiddled with his shirt collar and tried to avoid eye contact with everyone in the room. He didn’t know the story – only the police, doctor, mum and the sibs did – although I suspect he guessed.

Unfortunately, I found some people in the teaching profession had also ‘formed a view’. One woman festooned the walls of her office with anti-me cartoons; she would make a point of ostentatiously reading Robert Manne’s book whenever I walked past. Soon enough, I realised that English staffrooms were the problem, as was staying too long in one place. From then on, I did nothing but month-long supply jobs and made a point of asking for a majority physical education timetable wherever I could. This ensured I wound up in HPE or Science staffrooms, where no-one gave a stuff. Literature was in its proper place – what people read on the train.

When someone formed a view to the extent of spitting on me in a school car park, I prepared to emigrate. I’m a dual national (dad was born in London), which meant a British passport and the right to permanent residency.

Living in the UK for just over two years was immensely liberating. I earned my Shodan (black belt) in Shotokan Karate with Sensei Enoeda, proved an effective teacher in some of London’s toughest schools and made some life-long friends. Added to the mix were an outrageously alcoholic landlady, a truly barmy Scientologist flat-mate, a funky Nigerian boyfriend and the opportunity to cover the David Irving libel trial. Life was good, and I had no desire to come home until I learnt mum’s health was failing.

Mum had developed a heart condition and was taking all sorts of medication, sometimes at the wrong times. I took slightly longer supply jobs – three months each, for stability – and did my best to look after her. Much to my later regret, I again started writing for the Courier-Mail, and found the peace and quiet I’d managed to achieve in the UK incompatible with writing.

Law
The one positive thing to occur during the brouhaha was meeting Andrew Greenwood, then a partner at Minter Ellison Lawyers. During 2005, he was elevated to the judiciary, and is now Justice Greenwood of the Federal Court. His new position did not surprise me in the slightest – he’s an adornment to the profession.

Andrew advised me with great acumen and care, and was the first outsider wholly on my side. Previously, I’d assumed my publisher or ‘friends’ I made through literature would fill this role, only to be disappointed (one wrote a ‘tell all’ book that would make Who Weekly proud). Andrew became my model, and if my decision to return to university aged 30 to study law is attributable to anything, it’s his example.

In August 2001, I wrote my last copy for the Courier-Mail. On October 1, 2001, I wrote my final piece for the Sydney Morning Herald. This latter was in response to 9/11 and the anti-Semitism and anti-Americanism of many Australian intellectuals. I took time to put a few of the more outrageous lies told about me out to pasture, and signed off on literature. I sold my Australian Literary Society Gold Medal (another of the prizes I’d won) to pay for law textbooks and worked at supply teaching two days a week to pay my way through law school.

Needless to say, the Courier-Mail wasn’t best pleased, and spent a good whack of my first year making life difficult. This involved using Queensland’s Freedom of Information legislation in a desperate bid to obtain any and every document the University of Queensland held that happened to mention me by name. The main instigator was a single journalist, Deborah Cassrels. At that time married to Chris Mitchell, the editor (they have since split), she had a series of odd vendettas against people; I was only one. Interestingly enough, Robert Manne was another. Once Mitchell left Queensland to edit The Australian and took up with Christine Jackman (another journalist), the frivolous FOI applications stopped.

Like living in the UK, studying at the University of Queensland’s T.C. Beirne School of Law was immensely liberating. Apart from the fact that I was good at it, law suited the combative side of my personality. I liked the idea of taking sides in a case, which led to me representing the law school in mooting competitions (mock trials). That said, while I was busily collecting scholarships and prizes, enjoying having my mind stretched in all sorts of interesting ways, I’d not noticed that mum was gradually getting frailer. I simply took on a greater care burden and assumed she’d ‘turn the corner’. For that reason, her death at the end of my second year caught me completely unawares.

My mother was an outstandingly good person. She’d done her level best to provide for the four of us kids while dad dragged the family from pillar to post, got sacked from various jobs and landed in front of the beak. Mum left school at thirteen and had no education to speak of, but she made sure we respected hard work and valued education. A tireless community worker, Logan’s Chinese community in particular felt they’d lost a special friend. We resolved that – regardless of the consequences – mum would get a public notice and a good send-off. The local Buddhist Temple organised her funeral, which was almost festive. People spilled out of the chapel onto the street outside, while my sister delivered the eulogy.

The Courier-Mail’s Tess Livingstone was considerably less vindictive in her harassment than Deborah Cassrels, and although irritating, her attempts (last year) to dredge up dirt were amusing rather than destructive. She learnt through an ‘anonymous tip-off’ (someone else with no life?) that I was lecturing at the University of Queensland, and was to start in the profession as a Judge’s Associate at the Supreme Court. She at least had the courtesy to email me, and although the two articles she wrote were full of the usual faux-controversial beat-up, by comparison with what had gone before, they were anodyne.

What really irritated me was the paper’s attempt to obtain an up-to-date photograph (all it had was my by-line pic, now several years old). Chris Griffith and a photographer bailed me up outside my class, after finding the location by pretending to be UQ students who’d lost their timetables. A naïve young scholar using the university’s wireless network was their target. Fortunately, I’d gotten pretty good at ‘lawyer’s bull’ and talked them out of trying to take pictures outside a lecture theatre where students were now congregating (luckily, my students saw the funny side).

The two of them sat outside for the rest of the class (memo to Chris Griffith: you should now know the principal exceptions to indefeasibility in the Torrens system) and afterwards I took great pleasure in losing them in the mass of complexity that is the UQ campus. I can still see Chris Griffith’s shiny, bald head reflecting light as he ran after me along the corridor in front of the Prentice building.

Skeptics
Why Skeptics, and why this tell-all piece in a magazine better known for debunking pseudoscience, puncturing religious pomposity and investigating paranormal claims?

There are two principal reasons.

First, I believe the media is characterised by sensationalism and falsehood, sometimes on a level that parallels Answers in Genesis or the folks who believe in crystals’ healing power. It prattles much about ‘accountability’, but when Queensland Premier Peter Beattie makes mild suggestions that mechanisms for administrative review – the Ombudsman and FOI, for example – be extended to the press, he is castigated.

Using the prestigious A N Smith Memorial Lecture in Journalism at Melbourne University to articulate his proposals, Premier Beattie outlined what most thinking people already know – journalists are held in singularly low regard among the wider community. In a market defined by lack of competition, he argued that it was ‘time for the media to embrace an accountability regime similar to that imposed on government, on parliament, and on other public institutions’. He stated that

'[M]embers of the public should be able to ask of newspapers and electronic media the same questions they can demand of their representatives: Why was this decision taken? Who was involved? What did it cost? What alternatives were considered?'

Few trouble to enquire whether freedom of speech and freedom of the press are cognate (they aren’t – imagine a Venn diagram with only a small overlap), or whether it is reasonable to demand a free press also be an accountable press. Media calumnies deny some people a fair trial and saddle others with false accusations. Juries are contaminated, businesses destroyed, lives ruined. There is a grim toll of those who have suicided after press exposés. Who remembers the Filipino TV repairman, or God forbid, the Paxtons? Persons who mislead and deceive in trade or commerce are caught by section 52 of the Trade Practices Act. Why is the media immune from the section’s operation? Are they some form of protected species? Sed quis custodiet ipsos custodes? Sure, it’s easy to argue that Beattie – a celebrated ‘media tart’ – is engaging in special pleading. It’s remarkably difficult to get information out of Government owned Corporations in Queensland, partly because they have been sheltered from some of the review mechanisms available under administrative law. That said, his central point remains valid. It is true that ‘some journalists are public figures’ while ‘all journalists enjoy extraordinary access to information’. Other public figures carry the risk of exposure. Why not the ladies and gentlemen of the press?

The catalogue of errors produced by media and critics alike in my case almost beggars belief. Despite the public availability of such things as a registry of births, deaths and marriages, the press could not get my date or country of birth correct or the location of my parents’ marriage (Mossman, Far North Queensland if you must know). For some reason they seemed to like Scunthorpe, Yorkshire; I have no relatives anywhere in Yorkshire. To these were added falsehoods about my family’s financial position and professional status. Many media outlets awarded my father an engineering degree. He actually left school at 15. Andrew Greenwood once suggested that for many among the chattering classes, the idea that ‘white trash’ could do what I had done was inconceivable. It therefore became imperative that my parents be awarded degrees they did not hold and riches they did not own. Worst of all were lies about my family’s political orientation. It seemed that because I had written about fascists and racists with some degree of humanity, I must therefore be their political kin. The fact that there were public records of my involvement in student politics as a Democrat – not to mention the distinguished participation by other family members in the union movement and Labor Party – did not seem to matter.

Of course, there is defamation. As I discovered, it is a rich man’s tort. The inexpensive processes of administrative law are denied to ordinary citizens traduced by our moral guardians. Only the very rich can defend themselves, and journalists like easy targets. This means the wealthy get off scot-free, while the press inflicts its silly moral vanities on the rest of us.

Then there is the refusal to be precise in written expression, sadly sometimes ideologically motivated. A personal bête noir is the media’s failure to use the word ‘terrorist’ to describe suicide bombers in Iraq and Israel. The lawyer in me contends it is better to describe the substantive content of all such actions as terrorism. This means that the people who blew up trainloads of German soldiers, raped many French women as collaborateurs post 1945 and had a happy knack of planting bombs in cinemas were also terrorists. This linguistic clarity would then force us to confront a painful question: can terrorism ever be justified?

The media needs Skeptics. It needs people to seek the evidence, challenge the claims and oppose uncritical sensationalism. I accept the questions I ask may have answers that ultimately favour the Fourth Estate. That said, we are entitled to reasoned responses and enlightened debate.

Second, I wrote this piece as a form of thanks to the people on the QSkeptics email group who formed their impression of me based on who I am, rather than what other people – media and critics – say I am. In my experience, this is extraordinarily difficult. Most people – even the very fair-minded – allow perceptions generated by the press to feed and inform their view of a public figure. The QSkeptics discussion group is the first large body I have encountered that to a man and woman did not do this. When Barry Williams first invited me to contribute to the Skeptic, I was unsure what I could write, especially as a lawyer among so many distinguished scientists and researchers. In the end, I opted to tell the story I refused to tell when offered all that cash some years ago.

Prime Minister John Howard has made much in recent times of our collective failure to respect others – in debate and elsewhere. My experience before my encounter with QSkeptics taught me that true respect is very difficult to achieve. Despite my personal views on the matter, I’ve caught myself failing to respect others, including a local Rockhampton journalist who took the time to investigate a story about me properly for the local paper. I assumed – automatically, because of my experience with and views of journalists – he would balls it up. He didn’t, and I had a humbling reminder of the importance of that cricketing principle regarding the ‘benefit of the doubt’. QSkeptics has taught me that respect must be worked at, but is nonetheless a goal both useful and worthy. It is much nicer to live in a country where people don’t get written off as ‘mad’ for their views and values – or what are reported to be their views and values.

I have learnt equal amounts from both observing and participating in QSkeptics discussions, which are always conducted with the utmost respect. They have allowed me to rediscover something of the sense of wonder and adventure that once made both writing and learning so enjoyable. Truly, they have set me free.

OSE Chapter 20. Capitalism and its Fate

2006-08-26T21:46:00.000+10:00

This chapter completes the chain of argument that ran through chapters 18 and 19. To recapitulate, the strategy was to start with a critical appraisal of the Marxist prophecy (the coming of socialism and the class-free society) in its strongest form, allowing a number of assumptions about the trajectory of the capitalist system. All of the assumptions (1 to 5 below) were allowed in chapter 18. Then in chapter 19 assumptions 4 and 5 were subjected to criticism while 1-3 were still accepted for the sake of the argument.

The assumptions are
1. Productivity increases (accepted in chaps 18 and 19).
2. Accumulation of the means of production increases (accepted in 18
and 19).
3. The workers are exploited and so their misery increases (accepted in 18 and 19)
4. All classes disappear except for the ruling bougeoisie and exploited
workers (accepted in 18).
5. Increasing tension leads to a social revolution (accepted in 18).
6. The victory of the workers leads to socialism, no classes and no
exploitation.

Chapter 18 argued that (6) did not have to follow from the previous assumptions.
Chapter 19 took issue with assumptions 4 and 5.

In this chapter we get back to the most basic assumptions (1 to 3), especially the assumption of suffering and exploitation of the workers under capitalism 100 years ago, which Popper was prepared to accept.

Organisation of the chapter

Section I, a sketch of the premises of Marx’s prophecy, the laws of capitalist production and accumulation, and the conclusion, namely the law of increasing wealth (on one side) and misery (on the other).
Then four sections devoted to some subsidiary assumptions that are required for the argument:
Section II, the theory of value.
Section III, the effect of surplus population on wages.
Section IV, the trade cycle.
Section V, the falling rate of profit.
Finally two sections of critical analysis.
Section VI, the error of the Marxist prophecy of increasing misery.
Section VII, the practical influence of the false prophecy on the tactics of the Marxist parties.

There are some very interesting passages where Popper noted the phenomenon of exploitation but insisted that no satisfactory explanation had been found, not in Marx and not subsequently, so far as he knew, writing circa 1940.

Just to make my own position clear, I think there was no systematic exploitation caused by market forces along the lines suggested by Marx (and practically everyone else since that time, including Popper). Of course there could have been any number of brutal and exploitive people in positions of power and influence but that is not the point, which is whether free trade in goods and services forced employers to exploit their workers. As to exploitation generally, in England there was legislation (the Combination Acts) designed to check exploitation if this was attempted by combinations of workers or anyone else, acting in conspiracy to force up the price of goods and labour.

Popper’s views on exploitation.

“With one stroke, he gave a theory of exploitation and a theory explaining why the workers’ wages tend to oscillate about the subsistence (or starvation) level”.

“All that remains is a moving description of the misery of the workers which prevailed a hundred years ago.”

“In order to show how completely wrong Marx was in his prophecies, and at the same time how justified he was in his glowing protest against the hell of unrestrained capitalism [length passage from Marx]…Marx’s terrible picture of the economy of his time is only too true…”

What is not so clear, and not explained by Marx either, is why the supply of labour should continue to exceed the demand. For if it is so profitable to ‘exploit’ labour, how is it, then, that the capitalists are not forced, by competition, to try to raise their profits by employing more labour? In other words, why do they not compete against each other on the labour market, thereby raising the wages to the point where they begin to become no longer sufficiently profitable, so that it is no longer possible to speak of exploitation? Marx would have answered—see section V, below—’ Because competition forces them to invest more and more capital in machinery, so that they cannot increase that part of their capital which they use for wages’. But this answer is unsatisfactory since even if they spend their capital on machinery, they can do so only by buying labour to build machinery, or by causing others to buy such labour, thus increasing the demand for labour. It appears, for such reasons, that the phenomena of ‘exploitation’ which Marx observed were due, not, as he believed, to the mechanism of a perfectly competitive market, but to other factors—especially to a mixture of low productivity and imperfectly competitive markets. But a detailed and satisfactory explanation of the phenomena appears still to be missing.

The most economical explanation for the absence of a satisfactory explanation is that the phenomenon did not exist, which is not to deny that individual examples of cruel and unjust treatment would not be hard to find. In addition, everyone was doing it comparatively tough by the standards of later decades, not to mention the present day.

“Low productivity and imperfectly competitive markets”! How did that explanation of ‘exploitation’ get into this analysis?

Of course anti-interventionists argue that advances in productivity driven by technology and the ingenuity of entrepreneurs (even down to relatively minor improvements in procedures and processes at the shop floor level) plus property rights and the elimination of constraints on trade (under the rule of law) were eliminating, or would have eliminated, exploitation, in so far as that is humanly possible.

From the top of the chapter

According to Marxist doctrine, capitalism is labouring under inner contradictions that threaten to bring about its downfall. A minute analysis of these contradictions and of the historical movement which they force upon society constitutes the first step of Marx’s prophetic argument. This step is not only the most important of his whole theory, it is also the one on which he spent most of his labour, since practically the whole of the three volumes of Capital (over 2, 200 pages in the original edition) is devoted to its elaboration. It is also the least abstract step of the argument since it is based upon a descriptive analysis, supported by statistics, of the economic system of his time—that of unrestrained capitalism. As Lenin puts it: ‘Marx deduces the inevitability of the transformation of capitalist society into socialism wholly and exclusively from the economic law of the movement of contemporary society.’

This is where the three basic assumptions about the outcome of capitalistic competition come in – (1) increasing productivity, (2) accumulation of the means of production (and wealth) and (3) increasing misery of the workers.

Popper accepted (1) without dispute, did not accept (2) as inevitable due to the possibility of various forms of intervention and went on to examine (3) as the most important prophecy (given the salience of minimizing suffering in his own scheme of things).

Three different trends of thought may be distinguished in his attempts to establish this prophecy. They will be dealt with in the next four sections of this chapter under the headings: II: the theory of value; III: the effect of the surplus population upon wages; IV: the trade cycle; v: the effects of the falling rate of profit.

The theory of value

Since the marginal revolution this would appear to have little interest but Popper did a highly nuanced appraisal. One wonders how much Colin Simkin contributed, the young economics professor who Popper befriended in Christcurch and recruited to assist with discussion and checking the English

Popper concluded that Marx’s value theory does not suffice to explain exploitation, but it is not necessary for that purpose, so it is redundant in this context.

Surplus population

After eliminating Marx’s labour theory of value and his theory of surplus value, we can, of course, still retain his analysis of the pressure exerted by the surplus population upon the wages of the employed workers. It cannot be denied that, if there is a free labour market and a surplus population, i.e. widespread and chronic unemployment (and there can be no doubt that unemployment played its role in Marx’s time and ever since), then wages cannot rise above starvation wages; and under the same assumption, together with the doctrine of accumulation developed above, Marx, although not justified in proclaiming a law of increasing misery, was right in asserting that, in a world of high profits and increasing wealth, starvation wages and a life of misery might be the permanent lot of the workers.

According to Popper’s analysis, Marx’s analysis was defective because he did not envisage the kind of interventions that would enable the workers to combine and improve their conditions. He could not imagine that political interventions and a legal framework could be created to defeat the iron laws of economics.

The commentary could be left at this point but I would like to suggest (following Hutt and others) that the intervention of the unions did not improve the lot of workers across the board (which was happening anyway) but merely set in concrete differences between more and less favoured workers, with the more favoured workers obtaining their benefits at the expense of the other workers, not the “capitalists”.

The trade cycle

The significance of Marx’s analysis rests very largely upon the fact that a surplus population actually existed at his time, and down to our own day (a fact which has hardly received a really satisfactory explanation yet, as I said before). So far, however, we have not yet discussed Marx’s argument in support of his contention that it is the mechanism of capitalist production itself that always produces the surplus population which it needs for keeping down the wages of the employed workers. But this theory is not only ingenious and interesting in itself; it contains at the same time Marx’s theory of the trade cycle and of general depressions, a theory which clearly bears upon the prophecy of the crash of the capitalist system because of the intolerable misery which it must produce.

Possibly the fundamental weakness of the Marxist analysis is the failure to consider the diversity of the economy and the capacity of new industries to spring up as soon as workers had any money to spend beyond the barest essentials of subsistence. It appears that Marx focused on factories and factory workers without any consideration of the additional spending money that buyers would have when they benefited from the cheaper factory-made goods (initially cotton and woolens but of course ever more products as the system developed). So there is supposed to be a reserve army of industrial workers but there is no attention to the development of other trades and industries to absorb the so-called reserve army.

Popper did not attempt detailed analysis of Marx’s theory of the trade cycle because he admitted that he did not know enough about the issues. On advice from Colin Simkin (at that stage something of a Keynesian and a great admirer of the Scandanavian countries) he mentioned the possibility of counter-cyclic intervention which of course Marx did not know about.

Popper noted that for Marx, the theory of increasing misery applied to the employed workers (that was the whole point of the analysis) and Popper made some interesting comments on subsequent developments, notably the way that employed workers actually improve their real incomes during times of depression.

Marx, as we have seen, believed that unemployment was fundamentally a gadget of the capitalist mechanism with the function of keeping wages low, and of making the exploitation of the employed workers easier; increasing misery always involved for him increasing misery of the employed workers too; and this is just the whole point of the plot. But even if we assume that this view was justified in his day, as a prophecy it has been definitely refuted by later experience. The standard of living of employed workers has risen everywhere since Marx’s day; and (as Parkes has emphasized in his criticism of Marx) the real wages of employed workers tend even to increase during a depression (they did so, for example, during the last great depression), owing to a more rapid fall in prices than in wages. This is a glaring refutation of Marx, especially since it proves that the main burden of unemployment insurance was borne not by the workers, but by the entrepreneurs, who therefore lost directly through unemployment, instead of profiting indirectly, as in Marx’s scheme.

Those last comments (along with those on productivity and imperfectly competitive markets) indicate that Popper may have been trembling on the brink of some fundamental criticisms of the Marxist and interventionist scheme but he did not have access to the books and the people who might have persuaded him to revise his analysis along “economic rationalist” lines.

The remainder of the chapter continues with “internal” criticism of the Marx’s economics, indicating that there were many potential developments that his analysis did not envisage, despite a measure of ingenuity in his conceptual apparatus.

OSE Chapter 19 The Social Revolution part 2

2006-08-25T14:21:00.000+10:00

This post continues Popper’s critique of the ambivalent attitude towards violence that is fostered by both the radical and moderate wings of the Marxist movement. These correspond roughly with the communist and social democrat parties as they existed in Europe at the time. Sometimes the issue is pushed aside, as though the Marxist in his capacity as a scientist is just concerned with predictions and not moral positions.

Radicals and moderates

The radical wing insists that, according to Marx, all class rule is necessarily a dictatorship, i.e. a tyranny. A real democracy can therefore be attained only by the establishment of a classless society, by overthrowing, if necessary violently, the capitalist dictatorship. The moderate wing does not agree with this view, but insists that democracy can to some extent be realized even under capitalism, and that it is therefore possible to conduct the social revolution by peaceful and gradual reforms. But even this moderate wing insists that such a peaceful development is uncertain; it points out that it is the bourgeoisie which is likely to resort to force, if faced with the prospect of being defeated by the workers on the democratic battlefield; and it contends that in this case the workers would be justified in retaliating, and in establishing their rule by violent means. Both wings claim to represent the true Marxism of Marx, and in a way, both are right. [due to the ambiguity in his formulations and changes in his position over his lifetime]

The radical position is more consistent with the apocalyptic tone of the prophecies. Marx wrote:

Along with the steady decrease in the number of capitalist magnates who usurp and monopolize all the advantages of this development, there grows the extent of misery, oppression, servitude, degradation, and exploitation; but at the same time, there rises the rebellious indignation of the working class which is steadily growing in number, and which is being disciplined, unified, and organized by the very mechanism of the capitalist method of production. Ultimately, the monopoly of capital becomes a fetter upon the mode of production which has flourished with it, and under it. Both the centralization in a few hands of the means of production, and the social organization of labour, reach a point where their capitalist cloak becomes a strait-jacket. It bursts asunder. The hour of capitalist private property has struck. The expropriators are expropriated.

So from the radical or hardline point of view, capitalism has to be eliminated by violence if it is to be eliminated at all. In contrast the moderate position appears to accept the possibility of non-violent expropriation of the capitalists by capturing the democratic process, a prospect that was realistic in England by the time Marx died.

If we try to construct such a modified argument in accordance with Marx’s later views and with those of the moderate wing, preserving as much of the original theory as possible, then we arrive at an argument based entirely upon the claim that the working class represents now, or will one day represent, the majority of the people. The argument would run like this. Capitalism will be transformed by a ‘social revolution’, by which we now mean nothing but the advance of the class struggle between capitalists and workers. This revolution may either proceed by gradual and democratic methods, or it may be violent, or it may be gradual and violent in alternate stages. All this will depend upon the resistance of the bourgeoisie. But in any case, and particularly if the development is a peaceful one, it must end with the workers assuming ‘the position of the ruling class’, as the Manifesto says; they must ‘win the battle of democracy’; for ‘the proletarian movement is the self-conscious independent movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority’.

The prophetic argument is untenable, and irreparable, in all its interpretations, whether radical or moderate. But for a full understanding of this situation, it is not enough to refute the modified prophecy; it is also necessary to examine the ambiguous attitude towards the problem of violence which we can observe in both the radical and the moderate Marxist parties. This attitude has, I assert, a considerable influence upon the question whether or not the ‘battle of democracy’ will be won; for wherever the moderate Marxist wing has won a general election, or come close to it, one of the reasons seems to have been that they attracted large sections of the middle class. This was due to their humanitarianism, to their stand for freedom and against oppression. But the systematic ambiguity of their attitude towards violence not only tends to neutralize this attraction, but it also directly furthers the interest of the anti-democrats, the anti-humanitarians, the fascists.

Two ambiguities: violence and the conquest of power

In this section and the next Popper described how the Marxists tended to undermine democracy their ambiguity towards violence and the conquest of power. Peace and freedom loving Marxists have not been helped by the more apocalyptic and bloodthirsty passages of Marx, nor by the irrational worship of violence by the revolutionaries in the adversary culture.

The essentialist theory of the state is also a major problem – the theory that the state is essentially a class tyranny. This makes it very hard for reasonable Marxists to adopt the language of political proposals (and the dualism of facts and standards) to work towards a functioning democracy, a protective state, the rule of law and the traditional form of equalitarian justice.

Popper was especially critical of the tactical doctrine promulgated by Engels along these lines:

We Marxists much prefer a peaceful and democratic development towards socialism, if we can have it. But as political realists we foresee the probability that the bourgeoisie will not quietly stand by when we are within reach of attaining the majority. They will rather attempt to destroy democracy. In this case, we must not flinch, but fight back, and conquer political power. And since this development is a probable one, we must prepare the workers for it; otherwise we should betray our cause. Here is one of Engels’ passages on the matter:

For the moment .. legality .. is working so well in our favour that we should be mad to abandon it as long as it lasts. It remains to be seen whether it will not be the bourgeoisie .. which will abandon it first in order to crush us with violence. Take the first shot, gentlemen of the bourgeoisie! Never doubt it, they will be the first to fire. One fine day the .. bourgeoisie will grow tired of .. watching the rapidly increasing strength of socialism, and will have recourse to illegality and violence.’ What will happen then is left systematically ambiguous. And this ambiguity is used as a threat; for in later passages, Engels addresses the ‘gentlemen of the bourgeoisie’ in the following way: ‘If .. you break the constitution .. then the Social Democratic Party is free to act, or to refrain from acting, against you—whatever it likes best. What it is going to do, however, it will hardly give away to you to-day!’

Popper argued that the Engels doctrine and the ambiguities of violence and of power-conquest make the working of democracy impossible if they are adopted by a major political party.

I base this criticism on the contention that democracy can work only if the main parties adhere to a view of its functions which may be summarized in some rules such as these:
(1) Democracy cannot be fully characterized as the rule of the majority, although the institution of general elections is most important. For a majority might rule in a tyrannical way. (The majority of those who are less than 6 ft. high may decide that the minority of those over 6 ft. shall pay all taxes.) In a democracy, the powers of the rulers must be limited; and the criterion of a democracy is this: In a democracy, the rulers—that is to say, the government—can be dismissed by the ruled without bloodshed. Thus if the men in power do not safeguard those institutions which secure to the minority the possibility of working for a peaceful change, then their rule is a tyranny.
(2) We need only distinguish between two forms of government, viz. such as possess institutions of this kind, and all others; i.e. democracies and tyrannies.
(3) A consistent democratic constitution should exclude only one type of change in the legal system, namely a change which would endanger its democratic character.
(4) In a democracy, the full protection of minorities should not extend to those who violate the law, and especially not to those who incite others to the violent overthrow of the democracy.
(5) A policy of framing institutions to safeguard democracy must always proceed on the assumption that there may be antidemocratic tendencies latent among the ruled as well as among the rulers.
(6) If democracy is destroyed, all rights are destroyed. Even if certain economic advantages enjoyed by the ruled should persist, they would persist only on sufferance.
(7) Democracy provides an invaluable battle-ground for any reasonable reform, since it permits reform without violence. But if the preservation of democracy is not made the first consideration in any particular battle fought out on this battle-ground, then the latent anti-democratic tendencies which are always present may bring about a breakdown of democracy.

It was Popper’s view that the Marxists too often pursued a course of making the workers suspicious of democracy. He quoted Engels “In reality the state is nothing more than a machine for the oppression of one class by another, and this holds for a democratic republic no less than for a monarchy.”

But such views must produce:
(a) A policy of blaming democracy for all the evils which it does not prevent, instead of recognizing that the democrats are to be blamed, and the opposition usually no less than the majority. (Every opposition has the majority it deserves.)
(b) A policy of educating the ruled to consider the state not as theirs, but as belonging to the rulers.
(c) A policy of telling them that there is only one way to improve things, that of the complete conquest of power. But this neglects the one really important thing about democracy, that it checks and balances power.
Such a policy amounts to doing the work of the enemies of the open society; it provides them with an unwitting fifth column. And against the Manifesto which says ambiguously: ‘The first step in the revolution of the working class is to raise the proletariat to the position of the ruling class—to win the battle of democracy’, I assert that if this is accepted as the first step, then the battle of democracy will be lost.

For instance, let us consider more closely the use made in the political struggle of the threat of revolution or even of political strikes (as opposed to wage disputes, etc.). As explained above, the decisive question here would be whether such means are used as offensive weapons or solely for the defence of democracy. Within a democracy, they would be justified as a purely defensive weapon, and when resolutely applied in connection with a defensive and unambiguous demand they have been successfully used in this way. (Remember the quick breakdown of Kapp’s putsch.) But if used as an offensive weapon they must lead to a strengthening of the anti-democratic tendencies in the opponent’s camp, since they clearly make democracy unworkable.

The remainder of the chapter sketched some of the ways that the Marxists doctrines played out in practical politics, culminating in the rise and triumph of fascism. While the social democrats lacked the will to resist effectively, the communists managed to convince themselves that there was no need to resist (ultimately) because fascism represented the last gasp of capitalism and it should be allowed to run its course.

They even hoped that a totalitarian dictatorship in Central Europe would speed up matters. After all, since the revolution was bound to come, fascism could only be one of the means of bringing it about; and this was more particularly so since the revolution was clearly long overdue. Russia had already had it in spite of its backward economic conditions. Only the vain hopes created by democracy were holding it back in the more advanced countries. Thus the destruction of democracy through the fascists could only promote the revolution by achieving the ultimate disillusionment of the workers in regard to democratic methods. With this, the radical wing of Marxism felt that it had discovered the ‘essence’ and the ‘true historical role’ of fascism. Fascism was, essentially, the last stand of the bourgeoisie. Accordingly, the Communists did not fight when the fascists seized power. (Nobody expected the Social Democrats to fight.) For the Communists were sure that the proletarian revolution was overdue and that the fascist interlude, necessary for its speeding up, could not last longer than a few months. Thus no action was required from the Communists. They were harmless. There was never a ‘communist danger’ to the fascist conquest of power. As Einstein once emphasized, of all organized groups of the community, it was only the Church, or rather a section of the Church, which seriously offered resistance.

Should Ryan Heath please just F* off?

2006-08-23T23:07:00.000+10:00

‘There are better things to do than validate other people’s marketing labels by talking up generational conflict,’ writes Ryan Heath, a 25-year old expatriate living in the UK. It’s a refreshing start to his book, simply because most criticism directed at Heath has argued he is doing precisely that. But that’s the trouble with penning a book about generational warfare isn’t it? You leave yourself open to accusations of lapsing into style at the expense of substance.

To an extent it’s true: Heath stringently avoids turning his work into an ‘academic treatise’, pointedly using words such as ‘inefficient, unfair and dumb’. Think cute, fashionable language with plenty of expletives thrown in.

Similar in gist to Tony Blair’s Fabian pamphlet The Third Way: New Politics for the New Century, this book urges us to harness capitalism to achieve socially just goals. Where the difference arises however, is in its focus. Detailed discussion on why, and how, Baby Boomers should be ‘held to account’ – and pushed aside – forms the core of Heath’s analysis.

The result of Heath’s foray into the genre is that he spends much of Please Just F* Off: It’s Our Turn Now attempting to abide by the unwritten rules of generational warfare, with memorable lines like ‘War is not 24/7 – there’s lots of dead time – but you have to be ready for the action.’ According to Heath, one can’t “allow Australia to believe that its 20-, 30-, or even 40-year olds are just ‘young people’ unworthy of contributing to public life – mired as ‘Generation Next’, stuck in a queue that doesn’t move, living in a generational tent city.”

If you believe Heath then young people are discriminated against in the media. If you believe Heath then droves of young people are fleeing Australia like they would flee a third-world nation that provides few opportunities for its young. Ouch. We’re so mediocre it hurts!

But, if you’re looking for a consistently substantiated argument to go along with that, you may as well look elsewhere. From his bemoaning of ‘property apartheid’ to his criticism of government under-funding of higher education to the adoption of green environmental arguments, Heath’s work is characterised by sweeping generalisations coupled with sporadic references to demographic research.

Where some proponents of change argue for a better lot for everyone, Heath is heavily biased in favour of young people, or to be more specific, towards those whom generational warriors would term Gen Y (people born after 1970). But is Gen Y the ‘most educated, skilled generation yet’ or the most overqualified and selfish?

Disregarding the stereotyping of Boomers, in the chapters where he condemns the shortage of opportunities for career development, he fails to indicate specific examples where one can objectively decide whether a meritocracy is in operation. More common is the usage of nasty anonymous quotes or interview subjects like Holly Lyons, who complains about the ‘ageist’ nature of the Australian television industry and how it was ‘impossible’ for her to get work heading a script department – no less – as a 22-year old.

Heath is, however, at his best when discussing how young people today are different from previous generations.

A lot is demonstrated by way of anecdotes: young people today are more sophisticated; they are flexible and adaptable; they are extremely comfortable with technology; and importantly, they are pro-capitalism. ‘We run web businesses before we’re done with Year 10 and teach ourselves the skills and knowledge to navigate the world.’

His own views on capitalism are not exactly favourable, judging by the denouncement of price signals in a market economy. First, they are driving Australians abroad, which in his polemic is necessarily a bad thing. And second, his disdain of market forces is evident in issues such as property speculation or corporate profit. As Ludwig von Mises wrote in his Omnipotent Government: ‘The market is a democracy in which every penny gives a right to vote and where voting is repeated every day.’ If his version of ‘ethically’ based capitalism is something Gen Y will bring to the table then that is surely not capitalism but something more value laden than capitalism – merely a means of structuring society – could ever be.

Effectively comparing old Boomer techniques with a variety of suggestions ‘for achieving lasting social change’, Heath argues social movements have to adapt to the 21st century with new methods of activism. It is an argument closely tied in with the decline of left-wing political groups in Australia. Whether this is because they have allowed themselves to lose relevance – as he argues in a later chapter – or whether this is a natural result of the right winning the battle of ideas is a matter for interpretation.

Part one of this three part book is an interesting sociological blend of perspectives on young people and is, in sections, very insightful. It is also a rare instance of Heath getting over Boomer bashing to document the areas where Gen Y is deficient. Parts two and three on the other hand, add little to the world’s wealth of knowledge. They pointedly illustrate how the original ideas in part one of the book were not carried over to the other parts.

The author also resorts to criticising Australian fashion:

…on a trip back to Australia in October 2005… I contemplated just how many beautiful people there are in (Sydney and Melbourne). But something was missing. Style. The people I was gawping at had an amazing appearance, but at the end of the day it was shallow. Beyond the great tans and toned limbs was a decisive lack of thought about what their dress sense said to the world.

If, as he claims, Boomers aren’t as smart or adaptable as Gen Y, his own snideness shows they are certainly more mature.

But that assumes his characterisation of ‘my generation’ is legitimate. In fact, Heath is not representative of, or even a representative, of Gen Y. He is an anomaly in the system, just as his narrow usage of interview subjects for the book’s chapter on ‘exiles’ – mostly professionals and those involved in media – are not representative of the wider population. ‘I readily accept the narrow pool of people interviewed in the chapter,’ he writes in response, ‘But the point is they are more important in this debate than people who work in bars – because they create more wealth.’

The numerous typographical errors in Please Just F* Off: It’s Our Turn Now could be seen as indicative of a book that has been carelessly slapped together. But what’s more damning is Heath’s sloppiness with sources. A random check of his assertions on pages 25 and 168 pointed to a UK poll as evidence of Australian youth opinion on unions as well as being indicative of international opinion on the Iraq war when the poll in question was about neither. Instead, the Guardian ICM poll of December 2004 was about voting expectations. Whether there is some legitimate reason for this particular referencing bungle is not as important as what it shows about his loose way with research.

For Heath, the book will have achieved its purpose of propelling generational warfare to centre-stage. I can sense the excitement and intelligence of ‘my generation’ and Heath is right in pointing out it is young people who will shape the future of this country – but hopefully not in the ill-thought out ways he advocates.

Surely throwing around labels isn’t all that’s needed to make Australia a better place?

A new member of the team

2006-08-23T14:07:00.000+10:00

Post Libertarian is someone I met on Monday while sitting in on the Catch the Fire case at the Victorian Supreme Court. He used to run a few other very good libertarian blogs. Because he's looking to get involved in politics (with the Liberal Party) he doesn't want his identity revealed, so he won't be revealing his personal details until he's good and ready.

I don't think the anonymity should be a problem in blogging as it's the ideas that count, and I trust he won't post anything that gets us into legal trouble!

OSE Chapter 19 The Social Revolution (part 1)

2006-08-22T23:32:00.000+10:00

This chapter contains six sections, and a lot of arguments are packed into 15 pages. I will not attempt to treat the whole chapter in a single post.

Section I treats the second step of Marx’s prophetic argument, specifically the prediction that the class war will end in a battle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat (the last classes standing, as it were).

Section II explores the question, whether the Marxist revolution has to be violent.

Section III compares the radical and moderate Marxist attitudes to revolutionary violence.

Section IV explores the ambiguity of Marxist attitudes towards violence and also political power and the legitimacy of opposition parties.

Section V outlines the various ways that Marxist rhetoric has undermined democracy and Section VI describes how that has tragically played out in practice in recent times, opening the way for fascism.

The second step of Marx’s prophetic argument has as its most relevant premise the assumption that capitalism must lead to an increase of wealth and misery; of wealth in the numerically declining bourgeoisie, and of misery in the numerically increasing working class.

So what are the conclusions that are supposed to follow from that premise? First the prophecy that only two classes will be left in competition at the end of that process, and second, that the outcome of the conflict will be a proletarian social revolution. It is argued that Marx’s arguments did not take account of other possible outcomes of the class war.

The bourgeoisie vs the proletariat

Marx wrote ‘Each capitalist lays many of his fellows low’, and so ‘the lower strata of the middle class’, the small tradespeople, shopkeepers, and retired tradesmen generally, the handicraftsmen and the peasants, all these sink gradually into the proletariat; partly because their small capital, insufficient as it is for the scale on which modern industry is conducted is overwhelmed in the competition with the bigger capitalists partly because their specialized skill is rendered worthless by new means of production. Thus the proletariat is recruited from all classes of the population.’

Popper thought that there was some truth in that account, especially so far as handicrafts are concerned but it neglects the rise of new occupations. He also argued that there was no guarantee that the rural proles and others who might be displaced in the course of new developments, would actually align their interests with the urban factory workers. For the purpose of the argument at this stage, Popper conceded the assumption of increasing misery of the masses but he argued that even this would not guarantee the solidarity of the oppressed.

Thus, as opposed to Marx’s prophecy which insists that there must develop a neat division between two classes, we find that on his own assumptions, the following class structure may possibly develop: (1) bourgeoisie, (2) big landed proprietors, (3) other landowners, (4) rural workers, (5) new middle class, (6) industrial workers, (7) rabble proletariat. (Any other combination of these classes may, of course, develop too.) And we find, furthermore, that such a development may possibly undermine the unity of (6). We can say, therefore, that the first conclusion of the second step in Marx’s argument does not follow.

The social revolution

Popper considered that this prophecy of a possibly violent revolution is the most harmful element in Marxism from the point of view of practical politics and the corruption of debate by romantic revolutionaries in the adversary culture.

When asked whether the term ‘social revolution’ implied a violent civil war between the two classes, Marx answered that this was not necessarily implied, adding, however, that the prospects of avoiding civil war were, unfortunately, not very bright. And he might have added further that, from the point of view of historical prophecy, the question appears to be perhaps not quite irrelevant, but at any rate of secondary importance. Social life is violent, Marxism insists, and the class war claims its victims every day. What really matters is the result, socialism. To achieve this result is the essential characteristic of the ‘social revolution’.

It is apparent from some of Marx’s rhetoric that he was quite unconcerned about the prospect of mayhem, bloodshed and murder, just as long as it was the bourgeoisie who lost at the end of the day. In fact he may even have reveled in the prospect, making him a forerunner of the romantic revolutionaries down to the present time who make heroes of psychopathic thugs like Che.

Popper raised some political and moral issues related to the prophecy of revolution and the probable need for this to be violent.

The characterization of the social revolution here proposed undoubtedly makes of it a violent uprising; for the question whether or not violence is actually used is less significant than the intention; and we have assumed a firm resolution not to shrink from violence should it be necessary for achieving the aims of the movement. [and] if a man is determined to use violence in order to achieve his aims, then we may say that to all intents and purposes he adopts a violent attitude, whether or not violence is actually used in a particular case.

Rules on the use of violence by democrats

Now I wish to make it quite clear that it is this prophecy of a possibly violent revolution which I consider, from the point of view of practical politics, by far the most harmful element in Marxism; and I think it will be better if I briefly explain the reason for my opinion before I proceed with my analysis.I am not in all cases and under all circumstances against a violent revolution.

I believe with some medieval and Renaissance Christian thinkers who taught the admissibility of tyrannicide that there may indeed, under a tyranny, be no other possibility, and that a violent revolution may be justified. But I also believe that any such revolution should have as its only aim the establishment of a democracy; and by a democracy I do not mean something as vague as ‘the rule of the people’ or ‘the rule of the majority’, but a set of institutions (among them especially general elections, i.e. the right of the people to dismiss their government) which permit public control of the rulers and their dismissal by the ruled, and which make it possible for the ruled to obtain reforms without using violence, even against the will of the rulers. In other words, the use of violence is justified only under a tyranny which makes reforms without violence impossible, and it should have only one aim, that is, to bring about a state of affairs which makes reforms without violence possible.

I do not believe that we should ever attempt to achieve more than that by violent means. For I believe that such an attempt would involve the risk of destroying all prospects of reasonable reform. The prolonged use of violence may lead in the end to the loss of freedom, since it is liable to bring about not a dispassionate rule of reason, but the rule of the strong man. A violent revolution which tries to attempt more than the destruction of tyranny is at least as likely to bring about another tyranny as it is likely to achieve its real aims.

There is only one further use of violence in political quarrels which I should consider justified. I mean the resistance, once democracy has been attained, to any attack (whether from within or without the state) against the democratic constitution and the use of democratic methods. Any such attack, especially if it comes from the government in power, or if it is tolerated by it, should be resisted by all loyal citizens, even to the use of violence. In fact, the working of democracy rests largely upon the understanding that a government which attempts to misuse its powers and to establish itself as a tyranny (or which tolerates the establishment of a tyranny by anybody else) outlaws itself, and that the citizens have not only a right but also a duty to consider the action of such a government as a crime, and its members as a dangerous gang of criminals. But I hold that such violent resistance to attempts to overthrow democracy should be unambiguously defensive. No shadow of doubt must be left that the only aim of the resistance is to save democracy. A threat of making use of the situation for the establishment of a counter-tyranny is just as criminal as the original attempt to introduce a tyranny; the use of such a threat, even if made with the candid intention of saving democracy by deterring its enemies, would therefore be a very bad method of defending democracy; indeed, such a threat would confuse the ranks of its defenders in an hour of peril, and would therefore be likely to help the enemy.

These remarks indicate that a successful democratic policy demands from the defenders the observance of certain rules. A few such rules will be listed later in this chapter; here I only wish to make it clear why I consider the Marxist attitude towards violence one of the most important points to be dealt with in any analysis of Marx.

OSE Chapter 18. The Coming of Socialism

2006-08-22T20:37:00.000+10:00

In this chapter and the two that follow, Popper tests the coherence of the chain of predictions that Marx made for the coming of socialism following the revolution. He identified three steps in the argument and his strategy was to start by accepting Marx’s assumptions regarding the first two steps and examine whether the third step followed. In this chapter he concluded that it did not.

In the next chapter he went back a step in the chain of argument, to see if the second step followed from the first. Again he concluded that it did not. In the chapter after that he critically examined the first step of the argument.

In the first step of his argument, Marx analyses the method of capitalist production. He finds that there is a tendency towards an increase in the productivity of work, connected with technical improvements as well as with what he calls the increasing accumulation of the means of production. Starting from here, the argument leads him to the conclusion that in the realm of the social relations between the classes this tendency must lead to the accumulation of more and more wealth in fewer and fewer hands; that is to say, the conclusion is reached that there will be a tendency towards an increase of wealth and misery; of wealth in the ruling class, the bourgeoisie, and of misery in the ruled class, the workers. This step will be treated in chapter 20 (‘Capitalism and its Fate’).

In the second step of the argument, the result of the first step is taken for granted. From it, two conclusions are drawn: first, that all classes except a small ruling bourgeoisie and a large exploited working class are bound to disappear, or to become insignificant; secondly, that the increasing tension between these two classes must lead to a social revolution. This step will be analysed in chapter 19 on The Social Revolution.

In the third step of the argument, the conclusions of the second step are taken for granted in their turn; and the final conclusion reached is that, after the victory of the workers over the bourgeoisie, there will be a society consisting of one class only, and, therefore, a classless society, a society without exploitation; that is to say, socialism.

The question at this stage is: can we assume that a classless society will emerge from a battle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, after these are the only two classes left and the increasing misery of the workers has driven them to desperation?

Is it true that the workers’ victory must lead to a classless society? I do not think so. From the fact that of two classes only one remains, it does not follow that there will be a classless society. Classes are not like individuals, even if we admit that they behave nearly like individuals so long as there are two classes who are joined in battle. The unity or solidarity of a class, according to Marx’s own analysis, is part of their class consciousness, which in turn is very largely a product of the class struggle. There is no earthly reason why the individuals who form the proletariat should retain their class unity once the pressure of the struggle against the common class enemy has ceased. Any latent conflict of interests is now likely to divide the formerly united proletariat into new classes, and to develop into a new class struggle.

The most likely development is, of course, that those actually in power at the moment of victory — those of the revolutionary leaders who have survived the struggle for power and the various purges, together with their staff—will form a New Class: the new ruling class of the new society, a kind of new aristocracy or bureaucracy; and it is most likely that they will attempt to hide this fact. This they can do, most conveniently, by retaining as much as possible of the revolutionary ideology, taking advantage of these sentiments instead of wasting their time in efforts to destroy them (in accordance with Pareto’s advice to all rulers). And it seems likely enough that they will be able to make fullest use of the revolutionary ideology if at the same time they exploit the fear of counter-revolutionary developments. In this way, the revolutionary ideology will serve them for apologetic purposes: it will serve them both as a vindication of the use they make of their power, and as a means of stabilizing it; in short, as a new ‘opium for the people’.

The assumptions of the first and second stops of the prophecy remain to be challenged. In fact, of course, the downward spiral of the workers did not happen as anticipated. On the contrary, their conditions improved, in parallel with a great deal of state regulation and intervention which is usually regarded as the driving force for progress. However (to anticipate a different argument) the really interesting question is how much of the workers’ gains can be attributed to state intervention and how much came from increased productivity and cognate advances (in transport and the mobility of the workforce, for example) that had nothing to do with regulations and interventions.

SBS Insight

2006-08-22T18:43:00.000+10:00

I'm a guest on tonight's episode of Insight, which goes to air at 7.30pm on SBS.

I'm not sure how much I'll finish up saying - these things are always vulnerable to editing - but it promises to be interesting. I have a general policy of not watching television shows in which I appear (I dislike being reminded that it makes me look fat), so readers will have to fill me in.

Enjoy!

UPDATE: The show will be repeated on Friday August 25 at 1pm and Monday August 28 at 2pm for those who missed it first time around.

OSE Chapter 17. The Legal and the Social System

2006-08-21T20:52:00.000+10:00

The impotence of politics (not the importance of politics)

This chapter should be called “The Legal, Political and Social System”. Popper described it as “probably the most crucial point in our analysis as well as in our criticism of Marxism; it is Marx’s theory of the state and—paradoxical as it may sound to some—of the impotence of all politics.”

Section I describes the theory of the state, section II describes the “grim reality” of social conditions for the workers at the time that Marx was working in England (dates), section III contains Popper’s arguments on the need to use political power to control economic power (contra the Marxian doctrine of the impotence of politics). Section IV (the central point) concerns the difference between historical prediction and rational social engineering. Section V defends the importance of “formal freedom” against radical critics who claim that freedom under the rule of law is not real freedom as long as some people are poor. Section VI notes how Marx and his followers failed to pay attention to the need to control political power because the abuse of power it is not supposed to be a problem under socialism. Section VII is about the need to use impartial rules rather than discretionary orders from politicians and bureaucrats for fair and effective public administration.

Marx’s theory of the state can be presented by combining the results of the last two chapters. The legal or juridico-political system—the system of legal institutions enforced by the state—has to be understood, according to Marx, as one of the superstructures erected upon, and giving expression to, the actual productive forces of the economic system.

‘Political power, properly so called,’ says the Manifesto, ‘is merely the organized power of one class for oppressing the other.’ A similar description is given by Lenin: ‘According to Marx, the state is an organ of class domination, an organ for the oppression of one class by another; its aim is the creation of an ‘order’ which legalizes and perpetuates this oppression ..’ The state, in brief, is just part of the machinery by which the ruling class carries on its struggle.

Popper wrote that this view of the state and the political system is partly a (rational) institutional analysis and partly an (irrefutable) essentialist theory.

It is institutional in so far as Marx tries to ascertain what practical functions legal institutions have in social life. But it is essentialist in so far as Marx neither inquires into the variety of ends which these institutions may possibly serve (or be made to serve), nor suggests what institutional reforms are necessary in order to make the state serve those ends which he himself might deem desirable. Instead of making his demands or proposals concerning the functions which he wants the state, the legal institutions or the government to perform, he asks, ‘What is the state?’; that is to say, he tries to discover the essential function of legal institutions. It has been shown before that such a typically essentialist question cannot be answered in a satisfactory way; yet this question, undoubtedly, is in keeping with Marx’s essentialist and metaphysical approach which interprets the field of ideas and norms as the appearance of an economic reality.

The most important (and dangerous) outcome of the Marxist analysis is that legal and political institutions as well as all political struggles, can never be of primary importance. In Popper’s words “politics are impotent”. This is a rather strange, even an incomprehensible finding in view of the massive amount of political activity that has been undertaken by Marxists. It suggests that must be something wrong with Marx’s ideas, or with the interpretation of Marx’s message by Marxists, or with Popper’s interpretation.

On Marx's account politics can never alter decisively the economic reality.

The main if not the only task of any enlightened political activity is to see that the alterations in the juridico-political cloak keep pace with the changes in the social reality, that is to say, in the means of production and in the relations between the classes.

Yet considering that few movements have done as much as Marxism to stimulate interest in political action, the theory of the fundamental impotence of politics appears somewhat paradoxical. (Marxists might, of course, meet this remark with either of two arguments. The one is that in the theory expounded, political action has its function; for even though the workers’ party cannot, by its actions, improve the lot of the exploited masses, its fight awakens class consciousness and thereby prepares for the revolution. This would be the argument of the radical wing. The other argument, used by the moderate wing, asserts that there may exist historical periods in which political action can be directly helpful; the periods, namely, in which the forces of the two opposing classes are approximately in equilibrium.

Another important consequence of the theory is that, in principle, all government, even democratic government, is a dictatorship of the ruling class over the ruled. ‘The executive of the modern state’, says the Manifesto, ‘is merely a committee for managing the economic affairs of the whole bourgeoisie ..’ What we call a democracy is, according to this theory, nothing but that form of class dictatorship which happens to be most convenient in a certain historical situation. (This doctrine does not agree very well with the class equilibrium theory of the moderate wing mentioned above.) And just as the state, under capitalism, is a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, so, after the social revolution, it will at first be a dictatorship of the proletariat. But this proletarian state must lose its function as soon as the resistance of the old bourgeoisie has broken down. For the proletarian revolution leads to a one-class society, and therefore to a classless society in which there can be no class-dictatorship. Thus the state, deprived of any function, must disappear. ‘It withers away’, as Engels said.

The "grim reality

Popper considered that the Marxist theory of politics was fatally flawed because it did not warn Marxists or socialists to be alert to abuses of power (other than economic power) and the need for institutional checks and balances on all forms of power after the revolution. However he was prepared to allow an excuse for Marx’s view, an excuse that exposes the Achilles heel of Popper’s position.

It must be admitted that behind these grim as well as ingenious theories, there stood a grim and depressing experience. And although Marx, in my opinion, failed to understand the future which he so keenly wished to foresee, it seems to me that even his mistaken theories are proof of his keen sociological insight into the conditions of his own time, and of his invincible humanitarianism and sense of justice.

It is clear from many of Marx’s passages that [his] observations confirmed him in his belief that the juridico-political system is a mere ‘superstructure’ on the social, i.e. the economic, system; a theory which, although undoubtedly refuted by subsequent experience, not only remains interesting, but also, I suggest, contains a grain of truth.

For Marx lived, especially in his younger years, in a period of the most shameless and cruel exploitation. And this shameless exploitation was cynically defended by hypocritical apologists who appealed to the principle of human freedom, to the right of man to determinate his own fate, and to enter freely into any contract he considers favourable to his interests.

Using the slogan ‘equal and free competition for all’, the unrestrained capitalism of this period resisted successfully all labour legislation until the year 1833, and its practical execution for many years more. The consequence was a life of desolation and misery which can hardly be imagined in our day. Especially the exploitation of women and children led to incredible suffering. Here are two examples, quoted from Marx’s Capital: ‘William Wood, 9 years old, was 7 years and 10 months when he began to work .. He came to work every day in the week at 6 a.m., and left off about 9 p.m ...’ ‘Fifteen hours of labour for a child 7 years old!’ exclaims an official report of the Children’s Employment Commission of 1863. Other children were forced to start work at 4 a.m., or to work throughout the night until 6 a.m., and it was not unusual for children of only six years to be forced to a daily toil of 15 hours.—’ Mary Anne Walkley had worked without pause 26½ hours, together with sixty other girls, thirty of them in one room .. A doctor, Mr. Keys, called in too late, testified before the coroner’s jury that “Mary Anne Walkley had died from long hours of work in an overcrowded workroom ..”. Wishing to give this gentleman a lecture in good manners, the coroner’s jury brought in a verdict to the effect that “the deceased had died of apoplexy, but there is reason to fear that her death had been accelerated by overwork in an overcrowded workroom”.’ Such were the conditions of the working class even in 1863, when Marx was writing Capital; his burning protest against these crimes, which were then tolerated, and sometimes even defended, not only by professional economists but also by churchmen, will secure him forever a place among the liberators of mankind.

In consequence of this, Marx was led to hold that the workers cannot hope much from the improvement of a legal system which as everybody knows grants to rich and poor alike the freedom of sleeping on park benches, and which threatens them alike with punishment for the attempt to live ‘without visible means of support’. In this way Marx arrived at what may be termed (in Hegelian language) the distinction between formal and material freedom. Formal or legal freedom, although Marx does not rate it low, turns out to be quite insufficient for securing to us that freedom which he considered to be the aim of the historical development of mankind. What matters is real, i.e. economic or material, freedom. This can be achieved only by an equal emancipation from drudgery. For this emancipation, ‘the shortening of the labour day is the fundamental prerequisite’.

The political control of economic power

What have we to say to Marx’s analysis? Are we to believe that politics, or the framework of legal institutions, are intrinsically impotent to remedy such a situation, and that only a complete social revolution, a complete change of the ‘social system’, can help? Or are we to believe the defenders of an unrestrained ‘capitalist’ system who emphasize (rightly, I think) the tremendous benefit to be derived from the mechanism of free markets, and who conclude from this that a truly free labour market would be of the greatest benefit to all concerned?

I believe that the injustice and inhumanity of the unrestrained ‘capitalist system’ described by Marx cannot be questioned; but it can be interpreted in terms of what we called, in a previous chapter, the paradox of freedom.

Popper believed that the suffering of the workers described by Marx was caused by the abuse of economic power that enabled the employers to exploit the poor by making appalling demands that they could not refuse. Hence he argued that the principle of non-intervention, of an unrestrained economic system, has to be given up.

If we wish freedom to be safeguarded, then we must demand that the policy of unlimited economic freedom be replaced by the planned economic intervention of the state. We must demand that unrestrained capitalism give way to an economic interventionism. And this is precisely what has happened. The economic system described and criticized by Marx has everywhere ceased to exist. It has been replaced, not by a system in which the state begins to lose its functions and consequently ‘shows signs of withering away’, but by various interventionist systems, in which the functions of the state in the economic realm are extended far beyond the protection of property and of free contracts’.

Questions have to be raised about the cases cited by Marx (1) whether they dated from earlier times, (2) whether they were at all representative of the conditions of workers at the time or they merely represented unusual and isolated incidents and (3) whether they could have been prevented by the kind of intervention that Popper envisaged.

The central point of the analysis

I should like to characterize the point here reached as the most central point in our analysis. It is only here that we can begin to realize the significance of the clash between historicism and social engineering, and its effect upon the policy of the friends of the open society.

Marxism claims to be more than a science. It does more than make a historical prophecy. It claims to be the basis for practical political action. It criticizes existing society, and it asserts that it can lead the way to a better world. But according to Marx’s own theory, we cannot at will alter the economic reality by, for example, legal reforms. Politics can do no more than ‘shorten and lessen the birth-pangs’. This, I think, is an extremely poor political programme, and its poverty is a consequence of the third-rate place which it attributes to political power in the hierarchy of powers. For according to Marx, the real power lies in the evolution of machinery; next in importance is the system of economic class-relationships; and the least important influence is that of politics.

A directly opposite view is implied in the position we have reached in our analysis. It considers political power as fundamental.

Popper envisaged a comprehensive legislative program to control economic power – laws to limit the working day, insurance for various form of disability, unemployment, old age

And when we are able by law to guarantee a livelihood to everybody willing to work, and there is no reason why we should not achieve that, then the protection of the freedom of the citizen from economic fear and economic intimidation will approach completeness.

Not only did Marx’s theories block the development of (possibly) helpful interventions, the Marxists also neglected the greatest potential danger to human freedom. Because of the doctrine that political power was impotent they did not see the need to control it after the revolution or to be alarmed at the prospect of the “dictatorship of the proletariat”.

The importance of “formal freedom”

Marx discovered the significance of economic power; and it is understandable that he exaggerated its status. He and the Marxists see economic power everywhere. Their argument runs: he who has the money has the power; for if necessary, he can buy guns and even gangsters. But this is a roundabout argument. In fact, it contains an admission that the man who has the gun has the power. And if he who has the gun becomes aware of this, then it may not be long until he has both the gun and the money.

The dogma that economic power is at the root of all evil must be discarded. Its place must be taken by an understanding of the dangers of any form of uncontrolled power. Money as such is not particularly dangerous. It becomes dangerous only if it can buy power, either directly, or by enslaving the economically weak who must sell themselves in order to live.

Of course, in practice Marxists never fully relied on the doctrine of the impotence of political power. So far as they had an opportunity to act, or to plan action, they usually assumed, like everybody else, that political power can be used for the control of economic power. But their plans and actions were never based on a clear refutation of their original theory, nor upon any well-considered view of that most fundamental problem of all politics: the control of the controller, of the dangerous accumulation of power represented in the state. They never realized the full significance of democracy as the only known means to achieve this control. As a consequence they never realized the danger inherent in a policy of increasing the power of the state.

This does not mean that the achievement of democracy (or universal sufferage) is the end of the problem of keeping power under control. Hayek pointed out that there was a tendency for complacency about limiting the powers of democratic governments because it was assumed that “the people” would not permit abuses to be inflicted on themselves by their (democratic) leadership.

I have criticized this Utopian and Romantic approach to social engineering in a previous chapter (chapter 9). But I wish to add here that economic intervention, even the piecemeal methods advocated here, will tend to increase the power of the state. Interventionism is therefore extremely dangerous. This is not a decisive argument against it; state power must always remain a dangerous though necessary evil. But it should be a warning that if we relax our watchfulness, and if we do not strengthen our democratic institutions while giving more power to the state by interventionist ‘planning’, then we may lose our freedom. And if freedom is lost, everything is lost, including ‘planning’. For why should plans for the welfare of the people be carried out if the people have no power to enforce them? Only freedom can make security secure.

We thus see that there is not only a paradox of freedom but also a paradox of state planning. If we plan too much, if we give too much power to the state, then freedom will be lost, and that will be the end of planning.

Such considerations lead us back to our plea for piecemeal, and against Utopian or holistic, methods of social engineering. And they lead us back to our demand that measures should be planned to fight concrete evils rather than to establish some ideal good. State intervention should be limited to what is really necessary for the protection of freedom.

Persons and institutions: rules and orders

The remainder of the chapter is concerned with the kind of legislative and administrative arrangements that are required for the state to intervene without allowing dangerous discretionary powers to be assumed by politicians or officials. Possibly influenced by correspondence with Hayek, Popper proposed that state intervention should proceed by way of protective laws and a legal framework instead of empowering organs or agents of the state to act as they see fit to achieve the ends laid down by the rulers at the time.

From the point of view of piecemeal social engineering, the difference between the two methods is highly important. Only the first, the institutional method, makes it possible to make adjustments in the light of discussion and experience. It alone makes it possible to apply the method of trial and error to our political actions. It is long-term; yet the permanent legal framework can be slowly changed, in order to make allowances for unforeseen and undesired consequences, for changes in other parts of the framework, etc. It alone allows us to find out, by experience and analysis, what we actually were doing when we intervened with a certain aim in mind. Discretionary decisions of the rulers or civil servants are outside these rational methods. They are short-term decisions, transitory, changing from day to day, or at best, from year to year. As a rule (the Budget is the great exception) they cannot even be publicly discussed, both because necessary information is lacking, and because the principles on which the decision is taken are obscure. If they exist at all, they are usually not institutionalized, but part of an internal departmental tradition.

But it is not only in this sense that the first method can be described as rational and the second as irrational. It is also in an entirely different and highly important sense. The legal framework can be known and understood by the individual citizen; and it should be designed to be so understandable. Its functioning is predictable. It introduces a factor of certainty and security into social life. When it is altered, allowances can be made, during a transitional period, for those individuals who have laid their plans in the expectation of its constancy.

As opposed to this, the method of personal intervention must introduce an ever-growing element of unpredictability into social life, and with it will develop the feeling that social life is irrational and insecure. The use of discretionary powers is liable to grow quickly, once it has become an accepted method, since adjustments will be necessary, and adjustments to discretionary short-term decisions can hardly be carried out by institutional means. This tendency must greatly increase the irrationality of the system, creating in many the impression that there are hidden powers behind the scenes, and making them susceptible to the conspiracy theory of society with all its consequences—heresy hunts, national, social, and class hostility.

OSE Chapter 16: The Classes

2006-08-21T20:21:00.000+10:00

Popper’s critique of Marx’s theory of the classes follows the lines taken up in the last chapter. He accepts that the formula ‘all history is a history of class struggle’ is valuable as a reminder to look into the important part played by class struggle in power politics as well as in other developments. But he went on to point out that dissention within the Marxian classes is at least as important as the conflict between the classes (even allowing the dubious assumption that there is some kind of fundamental conflict between the rich and poor, which I do not accept). Consequently the Marxist theory of classes is a dangerous over-simplification.

One of the dangers of Marx’s formula is that if taken too seriously, it misleads Marxists into interpreting all political conflicts as struggles between exploiters and exploited (or else as attempts to cover up the ‘real issue’, the underlying class conflict). As a consequence there were Marxists, especially in Germany, who interpreted a war such as the First World War as one between the revolutionary or ‘have-not’ Central Powers and an alliance of conservative or ‘have’countries—a kind of interpretation which might be used to excuse any aggression. This is only one example of the danger inherent in Marx’s sweeping historicist generalization. On the other hand, his attempt to use what may be called the ‘logic of the class situation’ to explain the working of the institutions of the industrial system seems to me admirable in spite of certain exaggerations and the neglect of some important aspects of the situation; admirable, at least, as a sociological analysis of that stage of the industrial system which Marx has mainly in mind: the system of ‘unrestrained capitalism’ (as I shall call it) of one hundred years ago.

This last statement signals a fundamental error that Popper has brought to his critique of Marx, namely his assumption that the so-called unrestrained capitalism of the mid-nineteenth century was indeed a system that exploited the workers. More on that later chapters.

Returning to the start of the chapter where Popper describes the Marxist theory, before his criticism; the most important function of the theory is to explain the increase in productivity which is an integral part of Marx’s story to account for the revolution and the advent of freedom under socialism.

An important place among the various formulations of Marx’s ‘historical materialism’ is occupied by his (and Engels’) statement: ‘The history of all hitherto existing society is a history of class struggle.’ The tendency of this statement is clear. It implies that history is propelled and the fate of man determined by the war of classes and not by the war of nations (as opposed to the views of Hegel and of the majority of historians). In the causal explanation of historical developments, including national wars, class interest must take the place of that allegedly national interest which, in reality, is only the interest of a nation’s ruling class. But over and above this, class struggle and class interest are capable of explaining phenomena which traditional history may in general not even attempt to explain. An example of such a phenomenon which is of great significance for Marxist theory is the historical trend towards increasing productivity. Even though it may perhaps record such a trend, traditional history, with its fundamental category of military power, is quite unable to explain this phenomenon. Class interest and class war, however, can explain it fully, according to Marx; indeed, a considerable part of Capital is devoted to the analysis of the mechanism by which, within the period called by Marx ‘capitalism’, an increase in productivity is brought about by these forces.

Popper did not accept the idea that class interest is a psychological phenomenon. He argued that Marx pursued an his institutional analysis (rejecting of psychologism).

We need not assume, as Vulgar Marxists do, that class interest must be interpreted psychologically. There may be a few passages in Marx’s own writings that savour a little of this Vulgar Marxism, but wherever he makes serious use of anything like class interest, he always means a thing within the realm of autonomous sociology, and not a psychological category. He means a thing, a situation, and not a state of mind, a thought, or a feeling of being interested in a thing. It is simply that thing or that social institution or situation which is advantageous to a class. The interest of a class is simply everything that furthers its power or its prosperity.

Marx gives some indication of how this process of determination works. As we learned from him in the last chapter, we can be free only in so far as we emancipate ourselves from the productive process. But now we shall learn that, in any hitherto existing society, we were not free even to that extent. For how could we, he asks, emancipate ourselves from the productive process? Only by making others do the dirty work for us. We are thus forced to use them as means for our ends; we must degrade them. We can buy a greater degree of freedom only at the cost of enslaving other men, by splitting mankind into classes; the ruling class gains freedom at the cost of the ruled class, the slaves. But this fact has the consequence that the members of the ruling class must pay for their freedom by a new kind of bondage. They are bound to oppress and to fight the ruled, if they wish to preserve their own freedom and their own status; they are compelled to do this, since he who does not do so ceases to belong to the ruling class. Thus the rulers are determined by their class situation; they cannot escape from their social relation to the ruled; they are bound to them, since they are bound to the social metabolism. Thus all, rulers as well as ruled, are caught in the net, and forced to fight one another. According to Marx, it is this bondage, this determination, which brings their struggle within the reach of scientific method, and of scientific historical prophecy; which makes it possible to treat the history of society scientifically, as the history of class struggle. This social net in which the classes are caught and forced to struggle against one another, is what Marxism calls the economic structure of society, or the social system.

The system evolves as the conditions of production change, so each historical period is characterized by the means of production and the consequent class system (according to Marx’s “economism”). Marx wrote:

“The hand-mill gives you a society with the feudal lord; the steam-mill gives you a society with the industrial capitalist ... In the social production of their means of existence, men enter into definite and unavoidable relations which are independent of their will. These productive relationships correspond to the particular stage in the development of their material productive forces. The system of all these productive relationships constitutes the economic structure of ociety” [i.e. the social system].

Only in so far as the capitalist is personified capital does he play a historical role ... But exactly to that extent, his motive is not to obtain and to enjoy useful commodities, but to increase the production of commodities for exchange’ (his real historical task). Fanatically bent upon the expansion of value, he ruthlessly drives human beings to produce for production’s sake ... With the miser, he shares the passion for wealth. But what is a kind of mania in the miser is in the capitalist the effect of the social mechanism in which he is only a driving-wheel ... Capitalism subjects any individual capitalist to the immanent laws of capitalist production, laws which are external and coercive. Without respite, competition forces him to extend his capital for the sake of maintaining it.

Back to Popper's commentary:

This is the way in which, according to Marx, the social system determines the actions of the individual; the ruler as well as the ruled; capitalist or bourgeois as well as proletarian. It is an illustration of what has been called above the ‘logic of a social situation’. To a considerable degree, all the actions of a capitalist are ‘a mere function of the capital which, through his instrumentality, is endowed with will and consciousness’, as Marx puts it, in his Hegelian style. But this means that the social system determines their thoughts too; for thoughts, or ideas, are partly instruments of actions, and partly—that is, if they are publicly expressed—an important kind of social action; for in this case, they are immediately aimed at influencing the actions of other members of the society. By thus determining human thoughts, the social system, and especially the ‘objective interest’ of a class, becomes conscious in the subjective minds of its members (as we said before in Hegelian jargon). Class struggle, as well as competition between the members of the same class, are the means by which this is achieved.

OSE Chapter 15. Economic Historicism

2006-08-21T19:56:00.000+10:00

Marx was not a Vulgar Marxist

The introduction to this chapter debunks the “Vulgar Marxist” idea that Marx is in competition with Freud and Adler in penetrating to the hidden springs of human motivation.

Marx, [Vulgar Marxists] think, taught the all-pervading influence of the economic motive in the life of men; he succeeded in explaining its overpowering strength by showing that ‘man’s overmastering need was to get the means of living’, he thus demonstrated the fundamental importance of such categories as the profit motive or the motive of class interest for the actions not only of individuals but also of social groups; and he showed how to use these categories for explaining the course of history. Indeed, they think that the very essence of Marxism is the doctrine that economic motives and especially class interest are the driving forces of history…The average Vulgar Marxist believes that Marxism lays bare the sinister secrets of social life by revealing the hidden motives of greed and lust for material gain which actuate the powers behind the scenes of history; powers that cunningly and consciously create war, depression, unemployment, hunger in the midst of plenty, and all the other forms of social misery, in order to gratify their vile desires for profit.

It must be admitted that he sometimes speaks of such psychological phenomena as greed and the profit motive, etc., but never in order to explain history. He interpreted them, rather, as symptoms of the corrupting influence of the social system, i.e. of a system of institutions developed during the course of history; as effects rather than causes of corruption; as repercussions rather than moving forces of history. Rightly or wrongly, he saw in such phenomena as war, depression, unemployment, and hunger in the midst of plenty, not the result of a cunning conspiracy on the part of ‘big business’ or of ‘imperialist war-mongers’, but the unwanted social consequences of actions, directed towards different results, by agents who are caught in the network of the social system.

Nor was he a vulgar materialist

Much has been said about Marx’s materialism that is quite untenable. The often repeated claim that Marx does not recognize anything beyond the ‘lower’ or ‘material’ aspects of human life is an especially ridiculous distortion…But in this sense, Marx cannot be called a materialist at all, even though he was strongly influenced by the eighteenth-century French Materialists, and even though he used to call himself a materialist, which is well in keeping with a good number of his doctrines. For there are some important passages which can hardly be interpreted as materialistic. The truth is, I think, that he was not much concerned with purely philosophical issues—less than Engels or Lenin, for instance—and that it was mainly the sociological and methodological side of the problem in which he was interested.

As a poet in his youth, an educated member of the cultured bourgeoisie, he did not denigrate things of the mind, even when he depicted the products of mind as part of the superstructure rather than the base of things. Popper’s “three world” theory could be applied to capture the interaction between material bodies, subjective minds and objective (public) ideas, though that was far in the future when Marx was at work.

There is a well-known passage in Capital, where Marx says that ‘in Hegel’s writing, dialectics stands on its head; one must turn it the right way up again ..’ Its tendency is clear. Marx wished to show that the ‘head’, i.e. human thought, is not itself the basis of human life but rather a kind of superstructure, on a physical basis. A similar tendency is expressed in the passage: ‘The ideal is nothing other than the material when it has been transposed and translated inside the human head.’ But it has not, perhaps, been sufficiently recognized that these passages do not exhibit a radical form of materialism; rather, they indicate a certain leaning towards a dualism of body and mind. It is, so to speak, a practical dualism. Although, theoretically, mind was to Marx apparently only another form (or another aspect, or perhaps an epiphenomenon) of matter, in practice it is different from matter, since it is another form of it. The passages quoted indicate that although our feet have to be kept, as it were, on the firm ground of the material world, our heads—and Marx thought highly of human heads—are concerned with thoughts or ideas. In my opinion, Marxism and its influence cannot be appreciated unless we recognize this dualism.

This is why we may describe Marx’s brand of historicism as economism, as opposed to Hegel’s idealism or to Mill’s psychologism. But it signifies a complete misunderstanding if we identify Marx’s economism with that kind of materialism
which implies a depreciatory attitude towards man’s mental life. Marx’s vision of the ‘kingdom of freedom’, i.e. of a partial but equitable liberation of men from the bondage of their material nature, might rather be described as idealistic. Considered in this way, the Marxist view of life appears to be consistent enough; and I believe that such apparent contradictions and difficulties as have been found in its partly determinist and partly libertarian view of human activities disappear.

In a passage of the third volume of Capital7, Marx very aptly describes the material side of social life, and especially its economic side, that of production and consumption, as an extension of human metabolism, i.e. of man’s exchange of matter with nature. He clearly states that our freedom must always be limited by the necessities of this metabolism. All that can be achieved in the direction of making us more free, he says, is ‘to conduct this metabolism rationally, .. with a minimum expenditure of energy and under conditions most dignified and adequate to human nature. Yet it will still remain the kingdom of necessity. Only outside and beyond it can that development of human faculties begin which constitutes an end in itself—the true kingdom of freedom. But this can flourish only on the ground occupied by the kingdom of necessity, which remains its basis ..’ Immediately before this, Marx says: ‘The kingdom of freedom actually begins only where drudgery, enforced by hardship and by external purposes, ends; it thus lies, quite naturally, beyond the sphere of proper material production.’ And he ends the whole passage by drawing a practical conclusion which clearly shows that it was his sole aim to open the way into that non-materialist kingdom of freedom for all men alike: ‘The shortening of the labour day is the fundamental prerequisite.’

The bearing of what I have called Marx’s dualism and his scientific determinism on his view of history is plain. Scientific history, which to him is identical with social science as a whole, must explore the laws according to which man’s exchange of matter with nature develops. Its central task must be the explanation of the development of the conditions of production. Social relationships have historical and scientific significance only in proportion to the degree in which they are bound up with the productive process—affecting it, or perhaps affected by it. ‘Just as the savage must wrestle with nature in order to satisfy his needs, to keep alive, and to reproduce, so must the civilized man; and he must continue to do so in all forms of society and under all possible forms of production. This kingdom of necessity expands with its development, and so does the range of human needs. Yet at the same time, there is an expansion of the productive forces which satisfy these needs.’ This, in brief, is Marx’s view of man’s history.

Critique – two aspects of historical materialism

If we now proceed to a criticism …then we may distinguish two different aspects. The first is historicism, the claim that the realm of social sciences coincides with that of the historical or evolutionary method, and especially with historical prophecy. This claim, I think, must be dismissed. The second is economism (or ‘materialism’), i.e. the claim that the economic organization of society, the organization of our exchange of matter with nature, is fundamental for all social institutions and especially for their historical development. This claim, I believe, is perfectly sound, so long as we take the term ‘fundamental’ in an ordinary vague sense, not laying too much stress upon it. In other words, there can be no doubt that practically all social studies, whether institutional or historical, may profit if they are carried out with an eye to the ‘economic conditions’ of society. Even the history of an abstract science such as mathematics is no exception.’ In this sense, Marx’s economism can be said to represent an extremely valuable advance in the methods of social science.

But, as I said before, we must not take the term ‘fundamental’ too seriously. Marx himself undoubtedly did so…For although the general importance of Marx’s economism can hardly be overrated, it is very easy to overrate the importance of the economic conditions in any particular case. Some knowledge of economic conditions may contribute considerably, for example, to a history of the problems of mathematics, but a knowledge of the problems of mathematics themselves is much more important for that purpose; and it is even possible to write a very good history of mathematical problems without referring at all to their ‘economic background’. (In my opinion, the ‘economic conditions’ or the ‘social relations’ of science are themes which can easily be overdone, and which are liable to degenerate into platitude.)

Bloggers come out to play!

2006-08-20T20:00:00.000+10:00

Regular readers of this blog who enjoy skepticlawyer's contributions may like to meet her in the flesh, if only to learn that not all bloggers are pale geeks and nerds (this one actually plays quite a bit of sport, and has a nice North Queensland tan).

On Thursday, August 24 I'll be a guest of Melbourne University and - I suspect - the Melbourne Writers' Festival. I'll be talking on taking a libertarian approach to publishing and writing... which means I should be able to get nicely warmed up on how the Australia Council's arts funding policies produce all sorts of market distortions, not to mention rent-seeking.

The event is free, drinks and nibbles are provided - you'll need to rsvp to rose.michael@unimelb.edu.au for catering purposes if you want to attend. It's at the Gryphon Gallery in the 1888 Building, corner of Grattan and Swanston Streets at 6:30 for 7:00 pm.

See you there!

OSE Chapter 14

2006-08-19T23:42:00.000+10:00

The Autonomy Of Sociology

This chapter contains an early statement of Popper’s ideas on explanation in the social sciences by “situational analysis”. He considered that this is the standard form of explanation used in neoclassical microeconomics and it is applicable to any kind of situation involving human action. Popper claimed that Marx was a pioneer in this approach because he rejected the idea that motives or psychological factors provide an adequate explanation of socioeconomic structures and historical events. In other words, the social sciences are not reducible to psychology. Popper called this latter approach “psychologism” and J S Mill was prime target on this topic.

The chapter opens with an example to demonstrate Marx’s view on the primacy of social existence over consciousness. This is the apparently universal fear of snakes.

This aversion has a greater semblance of being instinctive or ‘natural’ in that it is exhibited not only by men but also by all anthropoid apes and by most monkeys as well. But experiments seem to indicate that this fear is conventional. It appears to be a product of education, not only in the human race but also for instance in chimpanzees, since both young children and young chimpanzees who have not been taught to fear snakes do not exhibit the alleged instinct.

So it seems that social intervention and learning are required to produce what might be regarded as a universal psychological trait.

A concise formulation of Marx’s opposition to psychologism, i.e. to the plausible doctrine that all laws of social life must be ultimately reducible to the psychological laws of human nature’, is his famous epigram: ‘It is not the consciousness of man that determines his existence—rather, it is his social existence that determines his consciousness.’ The function of the present chapter as well as of the two following ones is mainly to elucidate this epigram. And I may state at once that in developing what I believe to be Marx’s anti-psychologism, I am developing a view to which I subscribe myself.

Against this doctrine of psychologism, the defenders of an autonomous sociology can advance institutionalist views. They can point out, first of all, that no action can ever be explained by motive alone; if motives (or any other psychological or behaviourist concepts) are to be used in the explanation, then they must be supplemented by a reference to the general situation, and especially to the environment. In the case of human actions, this environment is very largely of a social nature; thus our actions cannot be explained without reference to our social environment, to social institutions and to their manner of functioning. It is therefore impossible, the institutionalist may contend, to reduce sociology to a psychological or behaviouristic analysis of our actions; rather, every such analysis presupposes sociology, which therefore cannot wholly depend on psychological analysis. Sociology, or at least a very important part of it, must be autonomous.

Continuing this argument against psychologism we may say that our actions are to a very large extent explicable in terms of the situation in which they occur. Of course, they are never fully explicable in terms of the situation alone; an explanation of the way in which a man, when crossing a street, dodges the cars which move on it may go beyond the situation, and may refer his motives, to an ‘instinct’ of self-preservation, or to his wish to avoid pain, etc. But this ‘psychological’ part of the explanation is very often trivial, as compared with the detailed determination of his action by what we may call the logic of the situation; and besides, it is impossible to include all psychological factors in the description of the situation. The analysis of situations, the situational logic, plays a very important part in social life as well as in the social sciences. It is, in fact, the method of economic analysis. As to an example outside economics, I refer to the ‘logic of power’, which we may use in order to explain the moves of power politics as well as the working of certain political institutions. The method of applying a situational logic to the social sciences is not based on any psychological assumption concerning the rationality (or otherwise) of ‘human nature’. On the contrary: when we speak of ‘rational behaviour’ or of ‘irrational behaviour’ then we mean behaviour which is, or which is not, in accordance with the logic of that situation. In fact, the psychological analysis of an action in terms of its (rational or irrational) motives presupposes—as has been pointed out by Max Weber—that we have previously developed some standard of what is to be considered as rational in the situation in question.

One of the problems with psychologism is the need to explain the beginning of society, an approach that raises the same problems as the notion of the original social contract which is sometimes employed in political philosophy as the basis for theories of government and law.

Mill’s remark concerning the ‘first few terms of the series’ of social development is not an accidental slip, as one might perhaps believe, but the appropriate expression of the desperate position forced upon him. It is a desperate position because this theory of a pre-social human nature which explains the foundation of society—a psychologistic version of the ‘social contract’—is not only an historical myth but also, as it were, a methodological myth. It can hardly be seriously discussed, for we have every reason to believe that man or rather his ancestor was social prior to being human (considering, for example, that language presupposes society). But this implies that social institutions, and with them, typical social regularities or sociological laws, must have existed prior to what some people arc pleased to call ‘human nature’, and to human psychology.

Institutions of various kinds and also traditions are important aspects of the situation that need to be considered in explanations by way of situational analysis. In his approach to traditions and institutions Popper follows the ‘Austrian’ tradition founded by Carl Menger. After noting that these things are man-made “in a certain sense” he quickly went on to explain some important qualifications.

This does not mean that they are all consciously designed, and explicable in terms of needs, hopes, or motives. On the contrary, even those which arise as the result of conscious and intentional human actions are, as a rule, the indirect, the unintended and often the unwanted byproducts of such actions. ‘Only a minority of social institutions are consciously designed, while the vast majority have just “grown”, as the undesigned results of human actions’, as I have said before; and we can add that even most of the few institutions which were consciously and successfully designed (say, a newly founded University, or a Trade Union) do not turn out according to plan—again because of the unintended social repercussions resulting from their intentional creation. For their creation affects not only many other social institutions but also ‘human nature’—hopes, fears, and ambitions, first of those more immediately involved, and later often of all members of the society. One of the consequences of this is that the moral values of a society—the demands and proposals recognized by all, or by very nearly all, of its members—are closely bound up with its institutions and traditions, and that they cannot survive the destruction of the institutions and traditions of a society (as indicated in chapter 9 when we discussed the ‘canvas-cleaning’ of the radical revolutionary).

My arguments against psychologism should not be misunderstood. They are not, of course, intended to show that psychological studies and discoveries are of little importance for the social scientist. They mean, rather, that psychology—the psychology of the individual—is one of the social sciences, even though it is not the basis of all social science. Nobody would deny the importance for political science of psychological facts such as the craving for power, and the various neurotic phenomena connected with it. But ‘craving for power’ is undoubtedly a social notion as well as a psychological one: we must not forget that, if we study, for example, the first appearance in childhood of this craving, then we study it in the setting of a certain social institution, for example, that of our modern family.

Open Society condensed Chapter 13

2006-08-19T22:56:00.000+10:00

In order to press on with the core of volume 2 on Marx I will leave the additional work on essentialism that was planned and also bypass the long chapter 12 on Hegel. Recalling the architecture of the book:

Marx’s Method
Chapter 13. Sociological Determinism.
Chapter 14. The Autonomy of Sociology.
Chapter 15. Economic Historicism.
Chapter 16. The Classes.
Chapter 17. The Legal and Social System.

Marx’s Prophecy
Chapter 18. The Coming of Socialism.
Chapter 19. The Social Revolution.
Chapter 20. Capitalism and its Fate.
Chapter 21. An Evaluation.

Marx’s Ethics
Chapter 22. The Moral Theory of Historicism.

The Aftermath
Chapter 23. The Sociology of Knowledge.
Chapter 24. Oracular Philosophy and the Revolt against Reason.

Conclusion
Chapter 25. Has History any Meaning?

In the 1950 preface to OSE Popper wrote:

Marx has too often been attacked on personal and moral grounds, so that here the need is, rather, for a severe rational criticism of his theories combined with a sympathetic understanding of their astonishing moral and intellectual appeal. Rightly or wrongly, I felt that my criticism was devastating, and that I could therefore afford to search for Marx’s real contributions, and to give his motives the benefit of the doubt.

It appears that Popper was wrong in his assessment of Marx’s humanitarian intentions, and more significantly, he may have been wrong in his generous assessment of Marx’s role as a pioneer of social thought. In any case, my treatment of volume 2 will be more critical of Popper’s interpretations than was the case with the Plato volume.

Chapter 13: Marx’s Sociological Determinism has only eight pages, starting with a somewhat melodramatic blast at the enemies of the open society who penetrated the humanitarian under cover of various “trojan horses” such as Plato’s idea of (totalitarian) justice, the Christian authoritarianism of the middle ages, and Rousseau’s theory of the general will. Yet this method of penetrating, dividing and confusing the humanitarian camp and of building up a largely unwitting and therefore doubly effective intellectual fifth column achieved its greatest success only after Hegelianism had established itself as the basis of a truly humanitarian movement: of Marxism, so far the purest, the most developed and the most dangerous form of historicism.

It is tempting to dwell upon the similarities between Marxism, the Hegelian left wing, and its fascist counterpart. Yet it would be utterly unfair to overlook the difference between them. Although their intellectual origin is nearly identical, there can be no doubt of the humanitarian impulse of Marxism. Moreover, in contrast to the Hegelians of the right wing, Marx made an honest attempt to apply rational methods to the most urgent problems of social life. The value of this attempt is unimpaired by the fact that it was, as I shall try to show, largely unsuccessful.

Science progresses through trial and error. Marx tried, and although he erred in his main doctrines, he did not try in vain. He opened and sharpened our eyes in many ways. A return to pre-Marxian social science is inconceivable. All modern writers are indebted to Marx, even if they do not know it. This is especially true of those who disagree with his doctrines, as I do; and I readily admit that my treatment, for example of Plato and Hegel, bears the stamp of his influence.

One cannot do justice to Marx without recognizing his sincerity. His open-mindedness, his sense of facts, his distrust of verbiage, and especially of moralizing verbiage, made him one of the world’s most influential fighters against hypocrisy and pharisaism. He had a burning desire to help the oppressed, and was fully conscious of the need for proving himself in deeds, and not only in words. His main talents being theoretical, he devoted immense labour to forging what he believed to be scientific weapons for the fight to improve the lot of the vast majority of men. His sincerity in his search for truth and his intellectual honesty distinguish him, I believe, from many of his followers.

I think that is not a paragraph that would survive a serious revision of OSE although Popper allowed it to stand even after he read Schwarzchild’s book and stated that the evidence was shattering. Popper went on...

Marx’s interest in social science and social philosophy was fundamentally a practical interest. He saw in knowledge a means of promoting the progress of man. Why, then, attack Marx? In spite of his merits, Marx was, I believe, a false prophet. He was a prophet of the course of history, and his prophecies did not come true; but this is not my main accusation. It is much more important that he misled scores of intelligent people into believing that historical prophecy is the scientific way of approaching social problems. Marx is responsible for the devastating influence of the historicist method of thought within the ranks of those who wish to advance the cause of the open society.

But is it true that Marxism is a pure brand of historicism? Are there not some elements of social technology in Marxism? The fact that Russia is making bold and often successful experiments in social engineering has led many to infer that Marxism, as the science or creed which underlies the Russian experiment, must be a kind of social technology, or at least favourable to it.

What successful experiments in social engineering?

“The vast economic researches of Marx did not even touch the problems of a constructive economic policy, for example, economic planning.”

In other words Marx had no valid theory, so what does that make of his vast economic researches? The vast researches largely consisted of reading secondary sources.

As Lenin admits, there is hardly a word on the economics of socialism to be found in Marx’s work — apart from such useless slogans as ‘from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs’. The reason is that the economic research of Marx is completely subservient to his historical prophecy. But we must say even more. Marx strongly emphasized the opposition between his purely historicist method and any attempt to make an economic analysis with a view to rational planning. Such attempts he denounced as Utopian, and as illegitimate. In consequence, Marxists did not even study what the so-called ‘bourgeois economists’ attained in this field. They were by their training even less prepared for constructive work than some of the ‘bourgeois economists’ themselves.

The economics of Marx is a travesty, given that the complete works of Bastiat (1800-1851) were available to shred the many and varied forms of interference with markets that had been invented to that time. And other so-called bourgeois economists such as J S Mill had made signal contributions that were never answered by Marx or his followers.

Marx saw his specific mission in the freeing of socialism from its sentimental, moralist, and visionary background. Socialism was to be developed from its Utopian stage to its scientific stage; it was to be based upon the scientific method of analysing cause and effect, and upon scientific prediction. And since he assumed prediction in the field of society to be the same as historical prophecy, scientific socialism was to be based upon a study of historical causes and historical effects, and finally upon the prophecy of its own advent.

Marxists, when they find their theories attacked, often withdraw to the position that Marxism is primarily not so much a doctrine as a method. They say that even if some particular part of the doctrines of Marx, or of some of his followers, were superseded, his method would still remain unassailable. I believe that it is quite correct to insist that Marxism is, fundamentally, a method. But it is wrong to believe that, as a method, it must be secure from attacks. The position is, simply, that whoever wishes to judge Marxism has to probe it and to criticize it as a method, that is to say, he must measure it by methodological standards. He must ask whether it is a fruitful method or a poor one, i.e. whether or not it is capable of furthering the task of science. The standards by which we must judge the Marxist method are thus of a practical nature. By describing Marxism as purest historicism, I have indicated that I hold the Marxist method to be very poor indeed.

Marx himself would have agreed with such a practical approach to the criticism of his method, for he was one of the first philosophers to develop the views which later were called ‘pragmatism’. He was led to this position, I believe, by his conviction that a scientific background was urgently needed by the practical politician, which of course meant the socialist politician. Science, he taught, should yield practical results. Always look at the fruits, the practical consequences of a theory!

This stress on scientific prediction, in itself an important and progressive methodological discovery, unfortunately led Marx astray. For the plausible argument that science can predict the future only if the future is predetermined — if, as it were, the future is present in the past, telescoped in it — led him to adhere to the false belief that a rigidly scientific method must be based on a rigid determinism. Marx’s ‘inexorable laws’ of nature and of historical development show clearly the influence of the Laplacean atmosphere and that of the French Materialists. But the belief that the terms ‘scientific’ and ‘determinist’ are, if not synonymous, at least inseparably connected, can now be said to be one of the superstitions of a time that has not yet entirely passed away.

Adherence to determinism was the rule among the best scientists of the time so Marx could hardly be expected to anticipate future developments in the philosophy of physics in rejecting determinism.

It must be noted that it is not so much the abstract, theoretical doctrine of determinism which led Marx astray, but rather the practical influence of this doctrine upon his view of scientific method, upon his view of the aims and possibilities of a social science. The abstract idea of ‘causes’ which determine ‘social developments is as such quite harmless as long as it does not lead to historicism. And indeed, there is no reason whatever why this idea should lead us to adopt a historicist attitude towards social institutions, in strange contrast to the obviously technological attitude taken up by everybody, and especially by determinists, towards mechanical or electrical machinery.

The piecemeal tinkering approach to social and political institutions was ruled out of court in progressive circles by Marx’s insistence that this was “Utopian”

Marx’s thought was in many respects a product of his time, when the remembrance of that great historical earthquake, the French Revolution, was still fresh. (It was revived by the revolution of 1848.) Such a revolution could not, he felt, be planned and staged by human reason. But it could have been foreseen by a historicist social science; sufficient insight into the social situation would have revealed its causes. That this historicist attitude was rather typical of the period can be seen from the close similarity between the historicism of Marx and that of J. S. Mill.

Despite the similarities which Popper identified, Marx had no time for the “insipid bourgeois syncretism of bourgeois economists such as J S Mill”.

There are more similarities between Marx and Mill; for example, both were dissatisfied with laissez faire liberalism, and both tried to provide better foundations for carrying into practice the fundamental idea of liberty. But in their views on the method of sociology, there is one very important difference. Mill believed that the study of society, in the last analysis, must be reducible to psychology; that the laws of historical development must be explicable in terms of human nature, of the ‘laws of the mind’, and in particular, of its progressiveness.

The agreement between the views of Marx and of Mill is therefore the more striking. Thus when Marx says in the preface to Capital, ‘It is the ultimate aim of this work to lay bare the law of motion of modern society’, he might be said to carry out Mill’s programme: ‘The fundamental problem of the social science, is to find the law according to which any state of society produces the state which succeeds it and takes its place.’ Mill distinguished fairly clearly the possibility of what he called ‘two kinds of sociological inquiry’, the first closely corresponding to what I call social technology, the second corresponding to historicist prophecy, and he took sides with the latter, characterizing it as the ‘general Science of Society by which the conclusions of the other and more special kind of inquiry must be limited and controlled’. This general science of society is based upon the principle of causality, in accordance with Mill’s view of scientific method; and he describes this causal analysis of society as the ‘Historical Method’.

Mill, we can now say, believed in psychologism. But Marx challenged it. ‘Legal relationships’, he asserted, ‘and the various political structures cannot .. be explained by .. what has been called the general “progressiveness of the human mind”.’ To have questioned psychologism is perhaps the greatest achievement of Marx as a sociologist. By doing so he opened the way to the more penetrating conception of a specific realm of sociological laws, and of a sociology which was at least partly autonomous.

In the following chapters, I shall explain some points of Marx’s method, and I shall try always to emphasize especially such of his views as I believe to be of lasting merit. Thus I shall deal next with Marx’s attack on psychologism, i.e. with his arguments in favour of an autonomous social science, irreducible to psychology.

Robert Manne versus Andrew Bolt!

2006-08-17T15:45:00.000+10:00

In my tutorial on Wednesday for the notoriously biased and loony left-wing Indigenous People and the State subject I found out that the Melbourne Writer's Festival is holding a debate between Robert Manne and Andrew Bolt. It's on Sunday the 3rd of September. Details on how to buy tickets are at the official website.

Stolen Generations or hijacked history? - a debate

Over the last twenty years, the concept of the Stolen Generations, the abduction of thousands of Aboriginal children from their families by various state authorities up until the 1970s, has slowly gained acceptance. But did it happen at all? What is the evidence? Are we exaggerating a scant few cases into a long-term and widespread policy of destroying Aboriginal families?

This is a debate about history, truth and memory between Robert Manne and Andrew Bolt on the Stolen Generations. Professor of Politics at La Trobe University, Robert Manne has written extensively on the evidence for there being Stolen Generations and the attempt by others to down play it. A popular columnist with the Herald Sun, Andrew Bolt has consistently cast doubts on the idea, calling it a ‘myth’, a construction of certain ‘stolen generations activists’. The moderator will be historian John Hirst.

I think it should be quite a viewing event, given their extremely divergent views.

VSU: forcing efficiency or silencing students?

2006-08-17T08:06:00.000+10:00

Last year in Parliament, Labor Senator Penny Wong outlined the possible ramifications of the Government’s VSU legislation, which removes the dedicated funding stream previously provided to student organisations: “Health services, child care, sporting infrastructure, counselling, clubs and societies, orientation activities, financial services, housing services and legal support services are all hanging in the balance.”

Similar concerns are shared by some in the Nationals, the Democrats and the Greens. But are they right?

According to Jenny Macklin, Shadow Minister for Education, the “experience in Western Australia when they implemented the same legislation over there a few years ago” meant “many of the universities lost a wide range of different services...One of the university student associations actually went into liquidation.” Showing the important of perspective, the Liberals argue that the experience in Western Australia has actually shown that half-decent student organisations can attract financial members without compulsion.

What’s true is that most of the items outlined by Senator Wong can be provided at competitive rates by the marketplace. For some students removal of the compulsory fee will mean a saving in excess of $400 each year, which students might use to pay for on an individual basis services previously bundled together in the one fee. This adds a new dimension of accountability that previously didn’t exist.

However, the suggestion that students are being forced to join affiliated organisations as a condition of enrolment has been a furphy. Macklin contends “students have [already] had the right not to belong to their student associations if they don’t want to. We haven’t had universities insisting that students must join their student association.”

Rachel Hills, a recent graduate of Sydney University, feels many students support the Government, and not just because of politics or ideology. “A lot of students don't feel that student organisations are relevant to them anymore,” she notes. “…while most students recognise the benefits of things like subsidised legal aid and emergency loans, if they don't foresee themselves needing to use it, they may be reluctant to pay the fees.”

Yet it’s not just reluctance. Melbourne University Science/Law students Narthana Epa and Nicholas Liau find it difficult to see clear-cut benefits. “[T]o play soccer this year for the university would have cost me $220 plus the cost of a uniform and gear,” says Liau. “To play soccer for an outside club would have cost just $150 including uniform... our fees are not being spent prudently given the outrageously high cost of joining supposedly subsidised clubs.”

At Melbourne the amenities fee for 2006 was $392 says Epa. He finds it “hard to imagine anyone recouping this amount through free barbecues”, instead suggesting “free second hand textbooks” to the disadvantaged be the union’s main priority. The union does not focus on welfare, he argues, “it just provides various services most of which are recreational... I don't see why I need to fund the recreation of my fellow students”.

Both agree fees for extra-curricular services are a burden on poorer students. And Liau would not like to see the death of student clubs. “Hopefully these clubs will survive by charging more for membership,” he says. “This way clubs will still survive, and students will be able to choose how to spend their own money.”

These sorts of fees are only a barrier to study because they must be paid up-front. In addition to giving universities the choice of implementing VSU, some like Andrew Norton (a research fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies) have supported a compromise involving the merging of the amenities fee under the HECS loan scheme. This would improve equity as disadvantaged students could defer the fee.

The ALP remains undecided on whether it would support such a scheme, says Macklin. “What Labor said we’ll do is look at a variety of ways that we can make sure these services and the representation role that student associations play on our campuses can continue. So we haven’t finalised what our position will be or how we’ll do that but we have a very clear objective…”

Although some students have a vested financial interest in supporting VSU, according to Rick Kuhn of the Australian National University that shouldn’t be what drives good policy. “The idea of ‘voluntary student unionism’ is like that of ‘voluntary taxation’” he writes. “Student unions provide services… from which all students benefit…Making student union membership and fees voluntary is as much of a nonsense as making membership of the Australian political system and the payment of taxes voluntary.”

The impact of the legislation will be felt particularly, but not exclusively, in regional areas, warns Macklin. “There’s no doubt that regional universities are under very serious financial pressure… But it’s true in the city as well, many of the suburban city universities, they have facilities that are widely used and it’s going to have a very big impact both on the student population [and] the surrounding community.” Macklin concedes however, that “it’s a little too early to say what it’s going to be like exactly at each university.”

Sports and clubs will survive without subsidy, argues Norton, as they do in thousands of voluntary associations across Australia. “Health services, apart from dental services, are largely funded by Medicare anyway… Universities will pay for some other essential services.”

As far as financial models go, the Monash Association of Debaters is an interesting sample of what the future might be like. Its 275 members receive only a fraction of their budget through the union – most funding comes from the university itself, the law school and law firm Freehills.

That VSU has the potential to hurt the Government is clear: a Roy Morgan poll published in December 2005 showed a swing back to the Coalition, but largely because VSU had ceased to become a hot issue. Clearly, tentative support from the ‘silent majority’ does not translate to political immunity. For the Government’s sake, it should hope things turn out well on Australian campuses.

Interview with Nicholas Liau

2006-08-16T18:11:00.000+10:00

Nicholas Liau is another first year student of Science and Law at the University of Melbourne. These are his personal opinions on voluntary student unionism.

What does the government's VSU legislation mean to you personally, if anything? Are you financially affected by the $392 you were forced to pay?

Personally, I was not severely affected by the union fees which I had to pay on enrolment. However like many of the things we have to spend money on at the beginning of uni, like textbooks and course materials, this fee is another added burden and unlike the other purchases, I don’t see where my money is going when I hand it over to the student union.

Do you see the $392 up-front fee as a barrier to study for poorer students?

In comparison to the fees charged by the university (say around $6000 a year for a science degree) the union fees are relatively small. However with no loan scheme to cover the fee, many poorer students would find it hard to raise the funds to pay the fee upfront. While this probably won’t completely preclude students from attending university, it does make life harder for these students.

Would you rather spend the equivalent of the amenities and services fee on student services directly rather than having student politicians decide how your money should be spent?

I have little problem with the union deciding how to spend my money if I can see how it is relevant to me. For instance, it is clear that our taxes go to paying for education, road maintenance, healthcare – all services which are used by ourselves, and which clearly benefit others in the community. The union’s main contention against VSU is that our union fees are like taxes and pay for services which benefit everybody. Yet I don’t see how these fees go into services which I myself use. For instance, to play soccer this year for the university would have cost me $220 plus the cost of a uniform and gear, despite the union fee. To play soccer for an outside club would have cost just $150 including uniform. In short, it seems as though our fees are not being spent prudently given the outrageously high cost of joining supposedly subsidized clubs.

Is there any aspect of the government's legislation you disagree with or dislike?

I have no specific disagreements with the legislation but despite what I have said [above], I do fear that it may bring an end to many clubs, as is argued by anti-VSU activists. It would be a sad thing to see clubs shut down because of VSU, as they are an integral part of university life. Hopefully these clubs will survive by charging more for membership, which was the intended effect of VSU. This way clubs will still survive, and students will be able to choose how to spend their own money.

Test video

2006-08-15T11:52:00.000+10:00

If anyone has any sort of problem with viewing this let me know so I can make necessary adjustments for the future.

Open Society condensed Chapter 11 Essentialism

2006-08-11T19:40:00.000+10:00

“The problem of definitions and of the ‘meaning of terms’ does not directly bear upon historicism. But it has been an inexhaustible source of confusion”.

The second section of Chapter 11 is a detailed critique of the obsession with the definition of terms and the explication of concepts that Popper labeled essentialism.

Like timid seducers, essentialists are rarely found inside the bedroom when there is serious work to be done on social and political problems.

People who habitually address social issues with an imaginative and critical attitude to alternative policies and their likely outcomes will not benefit much from the following critique of verbalism and conceptual analysis. However they may have friends or relations who have picked up bad habits, perhaps at university, and they may need professional help.

It may be recalled that The OSE grew out of a modest-sized section on essentialism in another book The Poverty of Historicism.

The development of thought since Aristotle could, I think, be summed up by saying that every discipline, as long as it used the Aristotelian method of definition, has remained arrested in a state of empty verbiage and barren scholasticism, and that the degree to which the various sciences have been able to make any progress depended on the degree to which they have been able to get rid of this essentialist method. (This is why so much of our ‘social science’ still belongs to the Middle Ages.) The discussion of this method will have to be a little abstract, owing to the fact that the problem has been so thoroughly muddled by Plato and Aristotle, whose influence has given rise to such deep-rooted prejudices that the prospect of dispelling them does not seem very bright. In spite of all that, it is perhaps not without interest to analyse the source of so much confusion and verbiage.

In a nutshell, essentialism claims that true belief (knowledge) results from either (a) an intuitive grasp of the essence of things, or (b) clarification or explication of the concept of the (various) things.

Like Plato, Aristotle believed that we obtain all knowledge ultimately by an intuitive grasp of the essences of things. ‘We can know a thing only by knowing its essence’, Aristotle writes, and ‘to know a thing is to know its essence’. A ‘basic premise’ is, according to him, nothing but a statement describing the essence of a thing. But such a statement is just what he calls a definition. Thus all ‘basic premises of proofs’ are definitions.
What does a definition look like? An example of a definition would be: ‘A puppy is a young dog.’ The subject of such a definition-sentence, the term ‘puppy’, is called the term to be defined (or defined term); the words ‘young dog’ are called the defining formula. As a rule, the defining formula is longer and more complicated than the defined term, and sometimes very much so. Aristotle considers the term to be defined as a name of the essence of a thing, and the defining formula as the description of that essence. And he insists that the defining formula must give an exhaustive description of the essence or the essential properties of the thing in question; thus a statement like ‘A puppy has four legs’, although true, is not a satisfactory definition, since it does not exhaust what may be calico the essence of puppiness, but holds true of a horse also; and similarly the statement ‘A puppy is brown’, although it may be true of some, is not true of all puppies; and it describes what is not an essential but merely an accidental property of the defined term.

But the most difficult question is how we can get hold of definitions or basic premises, and make sure that they are correct—that we have not erred, not grasped the wrong essence. Although Aristotle is not very clear on this point, there can be little doubt that, in the main, he again follows Plato. Plato taught that we can grasp the Ideas with the help of some kind of unerring intellectual intuition; that is to say, we visualize or look at them with our ‘mental eye’, a process which he conceived as analogous to seeing, but dependent purely upon our intellect, and excluding any element that depends upon our senses. Aristotle’s view is less radical and less inspired than Plato’s, but in the end it amounts to the same. For although he teaches that we arrive at the definition only after we have made many observations, he admits that sense-experience does not in itself grasp the universal essence, and that it cannot, therefore, fully determine a definition. Eventually he simply postulates that we possess an intellectual intuition, a mental or intellectual faculty which enables us unerringly to grasp the essences of things, and to know them. And he further assumes that if we know an essence intuitively, we must be capable of describing it and therefore of defining it.

Summing up this brief analysis, we can give, I believe, a fair description of the Aristotelian ideal of perfect and complete knowledge if we say that he saw the ultimate aim of all inquiry in the compilation of an encyclopaedia containing the intuitive definitions of all essences, that is to say, their names together with their defining formulae; and that he considered the progress of knowledge as consisting in the gradual accumulation of such an encyclopaedia, in expanding it as well as in filling up the gaps in it and, of course, in the syllogistic derivation from it of ‘the whole body of facts’ which constitute demonstrative knowledge.

In order not to prolong this digression unduly, I shall criticize two only of the essentialist doctrines; two doctrines which are of significance because some influential modern schools are still based upon them. One is the esoteric doctrine of intellectual intuition, and the other the very popular doctrine that ‘we must define our terms’, if we wish to be precise.

Aristotle held with Plato that we possess a faculty, intellectual intuition, by which we can visualize essences and find out which definition is the correct one, and many modern essentialists have repeated this doctrine. Other philosophers, following Kant, maintain that we do not possess anything of the sort. My opinion is that we can readily admit that we possess something which may be described as ‘intellectual intuition’; or more precisely, that certain of our intellectual experiences may be thus described. Everybody who ‘understands’ an idea, or a point of view, or an arithmetical method, for instance, multiplication, in the sense that he has ‘got the feel of it’, might be said to understand that thing intuitively; and there are countless intellectual experiences of that kind. But I would insist, on the other hand, that these experiences, important as they may be for our scientific endeavours, can never serve to establish the truth of any idea or theory, however strongly somebody may feel, intuitively, that it must be true, or that it is ‘self-evident’.

In science, we take care that the statements we make should never depend upon the meaning of our terms. Even where the terms are defined, we never try to derive any information from the definition, or to base any argument upon it. This is why our terms make so little trouble. We do not overburden them. We try to attach to them as little weight as possible. We do not take their ‘meaning’ too seriously. We are always conscious that our terms are a little vague (since we have learned to use them only in practical applications) and we reach precision not by reducing their penumbra of vagueness, but rather by keeping well within it, by carefully phrasing our sentences in such a way that the possible shades of meaning of our terms do not matter. This is how we avoid quarrelling about words.
The view that the precision of science and of scientific language depends upon the precision of its terms is certainly very plausible, but it is none the less, I believe, a mere prejudice. The precision of a language depends, rather, just upon the fact that it takes care not to burden its terms with the task of being precise. A term like ‘sand-dune’ or ‘wind’ is certainly very vague. (How many inches high must a little sand-hill be in order to be called ‘sand-dune’? How quickly must the air move in order to be called ‘wind’?) However, for many of the geologist’s purposes, these terms are quite sufficiently precise; and for other purposes, when a higher degree of differentiation is needed, he can always say ‘dunes between 4 and 30 feet high’ or ‘wind of a velocity of between 20 and 40 miles an hour’. And the position in the more exact sciences is analogous. In physical measurements, for instance, we always take care to consider the range within which there may be an error; and precision does not consist in trying to reduce this range to nothing, or in pretending that there is no such range, but rather in its explicit recognition.
Even where a term has made trouble, as for instance the term ‘simultaneity’ in physics, it was not because its meaning was unprecise or ambiguous, but rather because of some intuitive theory which induced us to burden the term with too much meaning, or with too ‘precise’ a meaning, rather than with too little. What Einstein found in his analysis of simultaneity was that, when speaking of simultaneous events, physicists made a false assumption which would have been unchallengeable were there signals of infinite velocity. The fault was not that they did not mean anything, or that their meaning was ambiguous, or the term not precise enough; what Einstein found was, rather, that the elimination of a theoretical assumption, unnoticed so far because of its intuitive self-evidence, was able to remove a difficulty which had arisen in science. Accordingly, he was not really concerned with a question of the meaning of a term, but rather with the truth of a theory. It is very unlikely that it would have led to much if someone had started, apart from a definite physical problem, to improve the concept of simultaneity by analysing its ‘essential meaning’, or even by analysing what physicists ‘really mean’ when they speak of simultaneity.

I think we can learn from this example that we should not attempt to cross our bridges before we come to them. And I also think that the preoccupation with questions concerning the meaning of terms, such as their vagueness or their ambiguity, can certainly not be justified by an appeal to Einstein’s example. Such a preoccupation rests, rather, on the assumption that much depends upon the meaning of our terms, and that we operate with this meaning; and therefore it must lead to verbalism and scholasticism. From this point of view, we may criticize a doctrine like that of Wittgenstein51, who holds that while science investigates matters of fact, it is the business of philosophy to clarify the meaning of terms, thereby purging our language, and eliminating linguistic puzzles. It is characteristic of the views of this school that they do not lead to any chain of argument that could be rationally criticized; the school therefore addresses its subtle analyses52 exclusively to the small esoteric circle of the initiated. This seems to suggest that any preoccupation with meaning tends to lead to that result which is so typical of Aristotelianism: scholasticism and mysticism.
Let us consider briefly how these two typical results of Aristotelianism have arisen. Aristotle insisted that demonstration or proof, and definition, are the two fundamental methods of obtaining knowledge. Considering the doctrine of proof first it cannot be denied that it has led to countless attempts to prove more than can be proved; medieval philosophy is full of this scholasticism and the same tendency can be observed, on the Continent, down to Kant. It was Kant’s criticism of all attempts to prove the existence of God which led to the romantic reaction of Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel. The new tendency is to discard proofs, and with them, any kind of rational argument. With the romantics, a new kind of dogmatism becomes fashionable, in philosophy as well as in the social sciences. It confronts us with its dictum. And we can take it or leave it. This romantic period of an oracular philosophy, called by Schopenhauer the ‘age of dishonesty’, is described by him as follows53: ‘The character of honesty, that spirit of undertaking an inquiry together with the reader, which permeates the works of all previous philosophers, disappears here completely. Every page witnesses that these so-called philosophers do not attempt to teach, but to bewitch the reader.’

A similar result was produced by Aristotle’s doctrine of definition. First it led to a good deal of hairsplitting. But later, philosophers began to feel that one cannot argue about definitions. In this way, essentialism not only encouraged verbalism, but it also led to the disillusionment with argument, that is, with reason. Scholasticism and mysticism and despair in reason, these are the unavoidable results of the essentialism of Plato and Aristotle. And Plato’s open revolt against freedom becomes, with Aristotle, a secret revolt against reason.
As we know from Aristotle himself, essentialism and the theory of definition met with strong opposition when they were first proposed, especially from Socrates’ old companion Antisthenes, whose criticism seems to have been most sensible. But this opposition was unfortunately defeated. The consequences of this defeat for the intellectual development of mankind can hardly be overrated. Some of them will be discussed in the next chapter. With this I conclude my digression, the criticism of the Platonic-Aristotelian theory of definition.

Let's get a bit serious

2006-08-11T06:38:00.000+10:00

In order to lift the intellectual tone of this site above the pedestrian and humdrum, I am introducing a series of interviews with major thinkers, conducted by Harry Mackenzie, the little known brother of Barry (Bazza) Mackenzie.

As we speak, Mr Mackenzie is seeking suitable candidates for interview, both live and dead. The series is expected to include Plato, Wittgenstein, Sartre, Ron Barassi and Jack Gibson (a rugby league coach, not related to Mel).

For an introduction to Harry Mackenzie and the series, this is a link to a rather old interview that Mr Mackenzie conducted with a (then) living treasure of liberalism.

Interview with Andrew Norton

2006-08-09T19:54:00.000+10:00

Here’s a longish interview I did via email with Andrew Norton, who many readers may know from his writings at Catallaxy. Andrew is a research fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies and also works for the University of Melbourne. He wrote a paper on VSU that was published in August 2005.

You not only argue against the Higher Education Support Amendment (Abolition of Compulsory Up-front Student Union Fees) Act 2005, but also against the status quo. Could you summarise your position?

The whole VSU debate assumed that we needed these separate amenities or student union fees to provide student services. But this was increasingly becoming untrue even without VSU. Historically, the separate amenities fee was necessary because universities were not allowed to charge for tuition. If they were, they could have just combined the two charges. After all, what’s the point in having two fees for one bundle of services, some of which were academic, and others non-academic? But from 1974 to 2004 universities could not charge Commonwealth-subsidised students for tuition – HECS went to the government, rather than universities. The amenities fee was the only way to fund student services. In 2005, HECS was replaced with a student contribution amount that went to universities. In principle, universities could then merge all their fees into one. None of them did, because the maximum student contribution amount was too low. If the student contribution amount had been higher, the VSU bill would have had little impact.

I prefer the merging of the two fees because separate amenities fee funds have been quarantined from proper internal university budget scrutiny. While teaching has been starved of resources, student unions have kept their inefficiencies. We would not get these muddled priorities if all parts of the university had to compete for the revenue raised from students.

It has been suggested that students get to vote on whether VSU will be implemented on their campus. What do you make of this?

This was a fall-back position for Education Minister Brendan Nelson, when he thought his VSU bill as going to be rejected in the Senate. As it has turned out, his bill passed and VSU will be implemented at every university, regardless of what students think.

In any case, voting on VSU wasn't a good policy. We need to think of universities as marketing services to students, most of which are academic, but some of which are non-academic. Some universities, generally those with relatively young and mostly full-time student populations, offer a large number of non-academic services. Their students have the time and inclination to use them.

Universities need to make long-term commitments to students. The shortest undergraduate bachelor degrees take 3 years. Many undergraduates will be at university for five or six years. But how can universities commit to providing services over all that time, if the services can be voted out within that period?

A far better way of dealing with this is to have markets. Those students who want services will go to universities that have them, and pay more. Those students who do not want services will go to universities that don't have them (or don't have many), and pay less. That way, everyone gets their choice - rather than having something they don't want imposed on them politically, possibly half-way through their course.

The Senate’s Employment, Workplace Relations and Education Legislation Committee has in its report criticised the impact of VSU in Western Australia. Labor South Australian Senator Penny Wong has said that “Health services, child care, sporting infrastructure, counselling, clubs and societies, orientation activities, financial services, housing services and legal support services are all hanging in the balance”. Will the impact be this widespread?

This is an exaggeration. Sport and clubs and societies will manage without subsidy, as they do in thousands of voluntary associations around Australia. Health services, apart from dental services, are largely funded by Medicare anyway. If student associations are half-competent they will attract some members without compulsion, as they did in Western Australia when it had VSU. Universities will pay for some other essential services. And don’t forget that students will have hundreds of dollars more in their pockets each year from not having to pay the amenities fee at the start of the year, which they can use to buy services they used to get as part of the amenities package.

Leaving aside the allegations that Canberra is deliberately crippling a “breeding ground” for ALP candidates, do you believe student unions can be trusted to manage student funds?

Only a small minority of student union office-holders are dishonest, but few have the management skills needed to run large organisations, or to make good judgments on the recommendations of permanent student union staff. I think most student services should be run by the university or private contractors.

Your suggestion is to allow university administrators the choice of whether they will implement VSU. As a long-term solution you also recommend the raising of student contribution amounts to cover the loss of the amenities fee. Is up therefore the only direction prices for a tertiary education can go these days?

I think universities should be able to decide what services they offer and what prices they charge. I don’t think there is any place for compulsory membership of student organisations, though whether the government should do anything about it is another matter. Prices for tertiary education are more likely to go up than down. Commonwealth-supported students are getting their education at well below cost, so their fees will have to go up over the medium term. Prices for full-fee students sometimes go down, in real terms at least, reflecting the competitive global market they operate in.

Does America’s higher education system contain lessons for Australia?

America doesn't have a higher education “system” in the way Australia does. Here, there is a lot of conformity imposed from Canberra. While there is some federal funding in the US, public universities are primarily state institutions. Also, there is a large private higher education sector, which includes most of America's (and the world's) top universities. In Australia, the private higher education sector is very small, and largely operates in niche areas rather than competing with the public sector.

The great strength of American higher education is its diversity. Almost all Australian universities are conceptually roughly equivalent to the state public universities in the US. But to that the Americans add: elite research universities, teaching-only universities, liberal arts colleges, religious universities, community colleges, corporate universities, and for-profit universities. The Americans cater to a much wider variety of educational needs and possibilities than we do, and are much more innovative.

In Australia diversity is diminished by two main things: funding restrictions and price control in the public sector, and rules against setting up teaching-only universities. Both these obstacles to diversity ought to be removed.

If mass student protests have minimal impact, then what is the political way forward?

Arguments are more likely to work if the government has trouble rejecting them. They have no in-principle reason for rejecting a higher student contribution amount. They wanted a higher amount in their original 2003 reform package, and they already support complete deregulation for full-fee students. This is the only argument with a realistic chance over the next two years.

Interview with Narthana Epa

2006-08-08T14:11:00.000+10:00

Narthana Epa is currently a first year student of Science and Law at the University of Melbourne.

What does the government's VSU legislation mean to you personally, if anything? Are you financially affected by the $392 you were forced to pay?

Personally it means little to me in a direct sense as I don't pay it myself, however, indirectly it is an additional burden on my parents and hence on me.

Do you see the $392 up-front fee as a barrier to study for poorer students?

Maybe, it is not difficult to envisage such a situation, especially if the student is forced to pay it him/herself. $392 is a fairly large amount and I find it hard to image anyone recouping this amount through free barbecues. However free second hand textbooks to the disadvantaged would be a powerful argument against such a notion. However, such activities do not seem to be the main focus of the Union's operation despite the fact that many students find them worthwhile subsidising.

Would you rather spend the equivalent of the amenities and services fee on student services directly rather than having student politicians decide how your money should be spent?

Most definitely, there are a myriad of clubs and societies that are being subsidised by my fees that I would not have even heard let alone considered joining. Without sounding too selfish, I am not too pleased to fund activities that I will never benefit from. The Student Union does not provide welfare, it just provides various services most of which are recreational, and I don't see why I need to fund the recreation of my fellow students. I have no problem with the student union's existence - I just believe that it should charge the users of its services and not the whole student body. In short, I would not be too perturbed by fund[ing] genuine assistance to the student body, even if I do not benefit from it. It is the other operations that have no welfare benefit that I do not feel content to pay for.

Is there any aspect of the government's legislation you disagree with or dislike?

I'm not fully aware of the VSU legislation's exact provisions, but if it is true the general taxpayer is to fund university amenities as a temporary compromise, then I think that it is an unfortunate one. This is obviously a bigger breach of the user-pays ideal than Compulsory Student Unionism itself. People who are not University Students have zero chance of benefiting from a Student Union's activities (unless they are fortunate enough to enter into a very favourable contract with it for leasing student apartments) and therefore they should [not] be forced to do so through tax.

The Open Society condensed, Chapter 11

2006-08-07T19:24:00.000+10:00

The condensed version of The Open Society and its Enemies continues with chapters 11 to 24 in volume 2. The first volume had ten chapters on Plato and this volume moves on to Aristotle, Hegel and Marx, with chapters on Reason and the Meaning of History.

Chapter 11, “The Aristotelian Roots of Hegelianism” has three sections after a short introduction explaining that the full history of historical determinism and related intellectual errors would need more than two volumes.

Section I contains a brief sketch of Aristotle’s political philosophy and some other aspects of his work.

Section II is an extended critique of the methodology and epistemology that involves the quest for true definitions and detailed conceptual analysis which Popper labeled essentialism. The notes attached to this section contain full-fledged essays on a range of topics, including Wittgenstein’s earlier philosophy.

Section III consists of brief notes on some episodes in the ancient battle between authoritarian rule and the relatively democratic spirit of Pericles and the Great Generation of Athens.

Essentialism will be examined in a separate post and this piece will deal with the first and third sections of the chapter.

Section I describes Aristotle’s ambivalent attitude to democracy and his apparent resignation to the need to compromise with a system that he found distasteful. He followed Plato in endorsing the idea that some men are slaves by nature and his theory of the best state combines elements of Platonic aristocracy, feudalism and some elements of democracy. With the revival of interest in Alexander the Great it may be important to note that Aristotle was a courtier (hanger-on) at the Macedonian court and he was a tutor to the young Alexander. Apparently Alexander was a very apt pupil although the friendship of the two men became strained as time went by and it is likely that Aristotle’s life would have been in grave danger if Alexander himself had lived longer.

Aristotle’s thought is entirely dominated by Plato’s. Somewhat grudgingly, he followed his great teacher as closely as his temperament permitted, not only in his general political outlook but practically everywhere. So he endorsed, and systematized, Plato’s naturalistic theory of slavery: ‘Some men are by nature free, and others slaves; and for the latter, slavery is fitting as well as just ... A man who is by nature not his own, but another’s, is by nature a slave ... Hellenes do not like to call themselves slaves, but confine this term to barbarians ... The slave is totally devoid of any faculty of reasoning’, while free women have just a very little of it. (We owe to Aristotle’s criticisms and denunciations most of our knowledge of the Athenian movement against slavery. By arguing against the fighters for freedom, he preserved some of their utterances.) In some minor points Aristotle slightly mitigates Plato’s theory of slavery, and duly censures his teacher for being too harsh. He could neither resist an opportunity for criticizing Plato, nor one for a compromise, not even if it was a compromise with the liberal tendencies of his time.

Thus he teaches with Plato that the working classes must not rule and the ruling classes must not work, nor earn any money. (But they are supposed to have plenty.) They own the land, but must not work it themselves. Only hunting, war, and similar hobbies are considered worthy of the feudal rulers. Aristotle’s fear of any form of money earning, i.e. of all professional activities, goes perhaps even further than Plato’s. Plato had used the term ‘banausic’ to describe a plebeian, abject, or depraved state of mind. Aristotle extends the disparaging use of the term so as to cover all interests which are not pure hobbies. In fact, his use of the term is very near to our use of the term ‘professional’, more especially in the sense in which it disqualifies in an amateur competition, but also in the sense in which it applies to any specialized expert, such as a physician. For Aristotle, every form of professionalism means a loss of caste. A feudal gentleman, he insists5, must never take too much interest in ‘any occupation, art or science ... There are also some liberal arts, that is to say, arts which a gentleman may acquire, but always only to a certain degree. For if he takes too much interest in them, then these evil effects will follow’, namely, he will become proficient, like a professional, and lose caste.

One of Aristotle’s legacies is the idea of the Final Cause which is associated with his biological interests and also with the notion of teleology, that is, action with a purpose. One of the great achievements of modern science was to shed the idea of teleology in nature, including biology (the plant root does not grow towards the water, but the roots that reach water live while those in dry soil die).

Stones and earth fall because they strive to be where most stones and earth are, and where they belong, in the just order of nature; air and fire rise because they strive to be where air and fire (the heavenly bodies) are, and where they belong, in the just order of nature. This theory of motion appealed to the zoologist Aristotle; it combines easily with the theory of final causes, and it allows an explanation of all motion as being analogous with the canter of horses keen to return to their stables. He developed it as his famous theory of natural places. Everything if removed from its own natural place has a natural tendency to return to it.

Aristotle modified Plato’s theory of ideal forms or essences to eliminate the idea that they live in a world of their own and exist prior to their earthly copies. For Aristotle the forms are internal to the objects of perception and instead of being perceived by intellectual intuition they are found by observation and classification of the objects in the world.

For the purpose of Popper’s criticism of historical determinism, Aristotle is important because Hegel took up his doctrine that movement, change or evolution reveal the essence of the object. Thus it follows that social events can only be understood by applying the historical method in order to penetrate beneath the surface of things to locate their hidden essence.

Change, by revealing what is hidden in the undeveloped essence, can make apparent the essence, the potentialities, the seeds, which from the beginning have inhered in the changing object. This doctrine leads to the historicist idea of an historical fate or an inescapable essential destiny.

On the face of it, the historical approach would appear to be far from dangerous and indeed it could be regarded as essential to avoid the repetition of past mistakes, however the devil is in the detail of the methods used by Hegel, and after him, by Marx, as explained later.

Moving on to the third section.

The conflict between the Platonic-Aristotelian speculation and the spirit of the Great Generation, of Pericles, of Socrates, and of Democritus, can be traced throughout the ages. This spirit was preserved, more or less purely, in the movement of the Cynics who, like the early Christians, preached the brotherhood of man, which they connected with a monotheistic belief in the fatherhood of God. Alexander’s empire as well as that of Augustus was influenced by these ideas which had first taken shape in the imperialist Athens of Pericles, and which had always been stimulated by the contact between West and East. It is very likely that these ideas, and perhaps the Cynic movement itself, influenced the rise of Christianity also.

The early Christians achieved moral authority when they resisted persecution and stood firm in their faith and their mission to help the poor, the suffering and the downtrodden. However their credibility and indeed the very morality of the church were undermined when Christianity became the official religion of Rome and then most of the west. Popper was especially scornful of the nostalgic yearning for the “lost unity” of the Middle Ages.

It is one of the characteristic reactions to the strain of civilization in our own time that the allegedly ‘Christian’ authoritarianism of the Middle Ages has, in certain intellectualist circles, become one of the latest fashions of the day [citing Aldous Huxley]. This, no doubt, is due not only to the idealization of an indeed more ‘organic’ and ‘integrated’ past, but also to an understandable revulsion against modern agnosticism which has increased this strain beyond measure.

Men believed God to rule the world. This belief limited their responsibility. The new belief that they had to rule it themselves created for many a well nigh intolerable burden of responsibility. All this has to be admitted. But I do not doubt that the Middle Ages were, even from the point of view of Christianity, not better ruled than our Western democracies. For we can read in the Gospels that the founder of Christianity was questioned by a certain ‘doctor of the law’ about a criterion by which to distinguish between a true and a false interpretation of His words. To this He replied by telling the parable of the priest and the Levite who both, seeing a wounded man in great distress,’ passed by on the other side’, while the Samaritan bound up his wounds, and looked after his material needs. This parable, I think, should be remembered by those ‘Christians’ who long not only for a time when the Church suppressed freedom and conscience, but also for a time in which, under the eye and with the authority of the Church, untold oppression drove the people to despair. As a moving comment upon the suffering of the people in those days and, at the same time, upon the ‘Christianity’ of the now so fashionable romantic medievalism which wants to bring these days back, a passage may be quoted here from H. Zinsser’s book, Rats, Lice, and History, in which he speaks about epidemics of dancing mania in the Middle Ages, known as ‘St. John’s dance’, ‘St. Vitus’ dance’, etc. (I do not wish to invoke Zinsser as an authority on the Middle Ages—there is no need to do so since the facts at issue are hardly controversial. But his comments have the rare and peculiar touch of the practical Samaritan—of a great and humane physician.) ‘These strange seizures, though not unheard of in earlier times, became common during and immediately after the dreadful miseries of the Black Death. For the most part, the dancing manias present none of the characteristics which we associate with epidemic infectious diseases of the nervous system. They seem, rather, like mass hysterias, brought on by terror and despair, in populations oppressed, famished, and wretched to a degree almost unimaginable to-day. To the miseries of constant war, political and social disintegration, there was added the dreadful affliction of inescapable, mysterious, and deadly disease. Mankind stood helpless as though trapped in a world of terror and peril against which there was no defence. God and the devil were living conceptions to the men of those days who cowered under the afflictions which they believed imposed by supernatural forces. For those who broke down under the strain there was no road of escape except to the inward refuge of mental derangement which, under the circumstances of the times, took the direction of religious fanaticism.’ Zinsser then goes on to draw some parallels between these events and certain reactions of our time in which, he says, ‘economic and political hysterias are substituted for the religious ones of the earlier times’; and after this, he sums up his characterization of the people who lived in those days of authoritarianism as ‘a terror-stricken and wretched population, which had broken down under the stress of almost incredible hardship and danger’. Is it necessary to ask which attitude is more Christian, one that longs to return to the ‘unbroken harmony and unity’ of the Middle Ages, or one that wishes to use reason in order to free mankind from pestilence and oppression?

PREVIOUS POSTS ON VOL ONE

Introduction to the condensed Open Society series.

Open Society - the architecture of the two volumes.

Introduction, Chapter 1 and Chapter 2.

Chapter 3 Plato's theory of forms.

Chapter 4 Plato's program to arrest social change.

Chapter 5 Moral philosophy, nature and convention.

Chapter 6 Totalitarian justice.

Chapters 7 and 8 on leadership.

Chapter 9 The disasters of utopian "canvas cleaning" social reform.

Chapter 10 The concept of the open society and the strain of civilisation.

Interview with Rachel Hills

2006-08-07T07:51:00.000+10:00

To bring a young perspective to the debate over VSU here’s Rachel Hills. Rachel graduated from Sydney University’s media and communications program and now writes for a variety of publications including The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.

As a relatively recent university graduate what does the government's VSU legislation mean to you personally?

I was deeply saddened both when the VSU legislation was tabled, and when it was passed by the Senate.

I personally benefited hugely from my involvement in the student union when I was at university. On a personal level, I met many wonderful people I never would have come across if it weren't for the union. One of my best friends, for example, studied Computer Science – I never would have met her if it weren't for us both signing up to show new students around at O Week.

I also benefited a lot from my involvement on a professional level. To be honest, I think I learnt more through my involvement in the union than I did through anything I studied in my actual degree. And I certainly wouldn't be equipped to do the work I do now if it weren't for student publications, union committees, volunteer activities, and all those other programs that open your mind to new ideas and perspectives as much as any textbook. It really saddens me to know that so many future students won't have access to the same opportunities – even if they do elect to join, student organisations will have to cut programmes and corners to ensure their future survival.

That being said, there is a lot of support for VSU amongst university students, and I don't think it's only because of politics or ideology. A lot of students don't feel that student organisations are relevant to them anymore – what with the increase in part time and mature aged students, and even most full time students forced to work at least a couple of days a week. Many students come to uni only to attend class and leave straight after, so don't even use the subsidised buildings and food all that much, let alone the other programmes. And while most students recognise the benefits of things like subsidised legal aid and emergency loans, if they don't foresee themselves needing to use it, they may be reluctant to pay the fees. So student organisations are certainly going to have a challenge on their hands getting students to continue to join post-VSU, especially if services start to decay.

Interview with Rick Kuhn

2006-08-06T19:47:00.000+10:00

Here’s another interview about VSU, this time with Rick Kuhn who is an academic working at the Australian National University.

It was reported in the Green Left Weekly that, "...ANU academic Rick Kuhn and Resistance activist Leigh Hughes were enthusiastically received by the crowd when they condemned the VSU legislation as a political attack on the basic right of students to organise a fight-back against regressive Coalition policies."

Could you elaborate on your views in this regard?

Student unions, SRCs and Students Associations, exist to represent the collective interests of students. They mean that students democratically decide how to respond together to government policies of different kinds, actions by university administrations as well as a range of political and social issues.

Over the past 40 to 50 years they have tended to be critical of the Coalition (although there have been periods at some campuses when the right has dominated student unions). That is why the Howard government has introduced VSU. It wants to silence critical voices.

The idea of "voluntary student unionism" is like that of "voluntary taxation". Student unions provide services, especially that of democratically representing students to government, uni[versity] administrations and the wider society, from which all students benefit. Governments also provide services for the whole community. Making student union membership and fees voluntary is as much of a nonsense as making membership of the Australian political system and the payment of taxes voluntary.

An aristocracy of effort

2006-08-06T12:46:00.000+10:00

From time-to-time, work travel finds me in Qantas' rather exclusive Chairman's Lounge. I'm not a member, but several work colleagues are. If we're travelling together, the less senior staff get added to the mix. The Chairman's Lounge is an invitation only exercise in exclusivity. It's free, but only a select few ever get past the gate. In that sense, it's different from the Qantas Club, which anyone may join after stumping up the required fee.

On Friday - for whatever reason - the Chairman's Lounge was closed. This meant the good members of the Chairman's Lounge were instructed to proceed to the Qantas Club. The latter is much larger, has less plushy chairs, and noxious coloured carpet. 'Oh dear,' one senior colleague commented. 'This is all a bit slummy, isn't it?'

I didn't agree. In fact, I didn't say anything. My aspirational, liberarian antennae were tingling. The Qantas club was full of people. Busy people. My sort of people. Thrusting businessmen cutting deals on mobile phones. People in jeans talking up property developments. Two tradies with pocket levels and tape measures hanging from their belts haggling over a set of plans. Many women. Many young people. All races, even a fairly obvious Aborigine (one of the tradies). Yes, there was bling. Yes, the combination of free alcohol and Friday afternoon meant voices were loud, hand gestures expansive. But this place was clearly full of the people who power Australia's economic engine room.

In the Chairman's lounge, old white men sit and read high falutin' newspapers and talk in hushed tones. Obsequeious staff attend to their every whim. Its members are an aristocracy of the invited. The vulgar hoi polloi of the Qantas club, by contrast, are an aristocracy of effort, of aspiration, of risk.

My colleague repeated the 'slummy' comment as we left. Emboldened by the free booze I'd consumed, I replied.

'It must be awfully difficult to share with people who have to pay their way, the aspirational hoi polloi'.

He looked at me, shocked. 'I think I'd have rather stayed out here, with the non-Qantus Club people.'

I didn't say anything, but this is what I thought: 'The poor and the invited aristocrats are all right, then. But not the achieving bourgeoisie'.

Quote of the week 2

2006-08-05T18:35:00.000+10:00

This week’s quote comes from our very own Rafe Champion, who had this to say in a Catallaxy thread about ‘churning’:

Part of the problem is the body of opinion that thinks a dollar is somehow sanctified and made into a better kind of thing by passing in and out of the Treasury. So a dollar spent in public education is magically better than a dollar spent by an act of choice in a private school. And so on across the whole range of public provisions.

Interview with Andrew Bartlett

2006-08-01T13:54:00.000+10:00

Andrew Bartlett is a member of the Australian Democrats and a Queensland Senator in the Federal Parliament. This is the transcript of an interview regarding the effects of Voluntary Student Unionism that I conducted this year in preparation for an article published in The Big Issue.

Why do the Democrats think VSU will "silence student voice"?

Student Unions play an important role in supporting students during their time at university. They achieve this by providing a range of services from sporting facilities to legal advice, advocacy and child care. Without active and dynamic services, students - particularly those who do not have the financial resources - are effectively restricted from full participation in university life. They can essentially become voiceless.

Isn't it true that student elections are poorly attended and student politicians have themselves not been able to capture the interest of students?

Student elections do have a habit of being poorly attended and many students do ignore student politics but this does not mean that the services provided by the unions are not worthwhile and should be done away with nor does it mean that student politics is a basket case. A certain amount of malaise would be evidenced if Australia adopted voluntary voting, but that would not mean that the government should stop providing services to the people.

If these student organisations are so important in protecting student rights, surely indirectly supporting mismanagement (the likes of which led to the dissolving of the Melbourne University student union) is not the right path?

I would agree that supporting mismanagement is not the right path, but neither is throwing the baby out with the bath water. While the system was far from perfect it most certainly wasn't in a state of terminal decline. Recognition of the problems that existed and the implementation of initiatives to reform the system would give a much better outcome than abolishing student unions altogether.

Why is the government's legislation, which bans the up-front financial cost of an amenities fee being extracted from students, unfair? The hefty amenities fee, unlike HECS, cannot be deferred – hurting poorer students even more.

Poorer students, particularly poorer students attending our regional campuses will now be unable to access the diverse range of facilities which have, until now, been available to them.

Child care services, financial help and legal assistance for example, have been provided by the money derived from these up-front fees. They have made it easier for people from low socio-economic backgrounds to attend university without the added financial hardship of seeking these services privately. The up-front fee ensured that all students had equal access to services provided by the student body and without the money coming in to support these services, they will close.

In some regional areas, services provided by the student unions are an integral part of the wider community in which they operate not just the university campus and, therefore, their closure will have financial ramifications well beyond the university campus.

Quote of the week

2006-07-30T10:57:00.000+10:00

‘…we need education in the obvious more than investigation of the obscure.’ -- Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes

How libertarian are you?

2006-07-27T13:51:00.000+10:00

Libertarianism is pretty much the same as European classical liberalism: the separate term was coined to differentiate it from the left-wing meaning of the word ‘liberal’ in the United States. If you’re interested in finding out how ‘pure’ or ‘hardcore’ your libertarianism is then take this test, or, if you’re pressed for time, this one. On the other hand, if you just want a general indication of where you stand in an Australian context, take the Palmer quiz instead.

When I took the ‘purity’ quiz last year I scored 57, probably because I resisted the questions supporting cuts in military budgets or propagating the withdrawal of a global American military empire. So the test leaves no room for complexities. My score makes me...‘a medium-core libertarian, probably self-consciously so. Your friends probably encourage you to quit talking about your views so much.’

But since then I’ve learnt a thing or two about the non-aggression principle, anti-trust laws and free banking. Thus, when I took it again last week, I scored 67. Hmmm.

One question (‘Is bombing civilians in an enemy country morally equivalent to murder?’) is phrased in such a way that it’s almost impossible to legitimately choose from the two options. Unless you like eating babies.

Another - ‘Should we abolish public schools and universities?’ - doesn't leave a choice. What if you want to stop universities being reliant on the public purse but keep public schools?

Not to mention “Is it morally permissible to exercise ‘vigilante justice,’ even against government leaders?” Well, as the question is asking for a moral - or value - judgement rather than a legal one, I guess it depends on the circumstances. However, I certainly wouldn’t advocate the type of vigilante justice depicted in the movie Summer of Sam.

P.S. If there are any communists reading this blog please do set aside a few minutes for the purity test and post your result here.

The ant and the grasshopper

2006-07-24T13:59:00.000+10:00

Classic Version

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks he's a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away.

Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The grasshopper has no food or shelter so he dies in the cold.

Modern Version

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks he's a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away.

Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.

BBC, CNN, NDTV show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food.

The world is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can it be that this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?

Arundhati Roy stages a demonstration outside the ant's house. Amnesty International and Kofi Annan criticise the government for not upholding the fundamental rights of the grasshopper.

The Internet is flooded with online petitions seeking support for the grasshopper. Opposition MPs stage a walkout from Parliament.

Left parties call for a Bharat Bandh in West Bengal and Kerala demanding a judicial enquiry.

Finally, the Judicial Committee drafts the Prevention of Terrorism Against Grasshoppers Act (POTAGA) with effect from the beginning of winter.

The ant is fined for failing to comply with POTAGA, and having nothing to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the government and handed over to the grasshopper in a ceremony covered by BBC, CNN and NDTV.

Arundhati Roy calls it "a triumph of justice".

Postscript

The ant dies of starvation, and the grasshopper dances away the winter and summer. Come next winter the grasshopper knows nothing about building or maintaining a home. He searches for the ant, but there are not ants anymore. So the grasshopper dies too.

Arundhati Roy comes back to claim an award for predicting the environmental collapse that contributed to the extinction of the ant, and then the grasshopper. She donates the money to build a centre for environmental justice.

(Thanks to Seetha Parthasarathy)