Ask Shenyang: wasn't Hobbes a libertarian?

Isn't Hobbes a Libertarian? : On a Core Value of Liberal Theory --Review of Qian Yongxiang's "Wasn't Hobbes a Liberal? : On a Necessary Ingredient of Liberalism" (1) By Shen Yang (Jiangsu Deyuan Cultural Research Institute, Researcher) Abstract: As the pioneer of liberal theory, Hobbes created the basic cognitive framework of the modern view of the state, and his conception of conservative liberalism has been far-reaching. Leviathan must preserve individual liberty, and authoritative politics must be transformed to constitutional democracy, or else both may have to lead to the disintegration of the political ****same body. Leviathan answers the first point; the second is not taken into account, but has been implemented by subsequent history. Hobbes's political philosophy was itself unsophisticated, with a good deal of naivety and self-contradiction, and his exposition of the science of nations can hardly be called a success. Some scholars, represented by Mr. Qian Yongxiang, have made their evaluation of Hobbes precisely through the feature of Hobbes's immature and unsuccessful political science. On this issue, the author discusses with Mr. Qian: the core value of liberal political ideal is to have the government uphold basic human rights, and liberalism itself as a political ideal needs to be upgraded to achieve a middle-of-the-road dialectic in the balance between freedom and order, so as to develop into the idea and system of constitutional democracy. Keywords: Hobbes, Individualism, Statism, Freedom and Order, From Liberalism to Constitutionalism I. PREFACE Thomas 61 Hobbes (Hobbes T.), the most controversial political philosopher of all time. He has been the subject of much debate and controversy. Strauss argued that Hobbes was a libertarian (2), Oakeshott argued that Hobbes' political philosophy was itself anti-authoritarian (3), while McClelland argued that Hobbes' political philosophy argued for authoritarian legitimacy (4), and many more euphemistically said that Hobbes was the pioneer or founder of libertarianism (5). In the Chinese-speaking world, many people disagree with the assertion that Hobbes was a liberal. Qian Yongxiang can be regarded as a representative in this regard. In his article "Was Hobbes a Libertarian? A Necessary Ingredient of Liberalism", he argues that "asserting the absolute natural rights of the individual is not enough to give a theory a certain libertarian character and qualification" and that "Hobbesian tentative agreements" are not compatible with Hobbes's own conception of social integration. integration concept does not fit Hobbes's own views, it is concluded that Hobbes is not a libertarian (6). The fact that there are such different interpretations of the same philosopher may have as much to do with the values and ways of knowing held by different interpreters as it does with the intrinsic temperament of Hobbes's political philosophy. It should be noted that Hobbes's political philosophy is itself unsophisticated, with many naiveties and contradictions, and his account of the science of the state can hardly be considered a success. It is through this characterization of Hobbes's political science as less mature and successful that some scholars have made their assessment of Hobbes. Similarly, this particular factor cannot be excluded from the context of misrecognizing Hobbes as an authoritarian. In this paper, the author introduces the concept of "conservative liberalism" into Hobbes' philosophy and tries to re-read the text of Leviathan. The purpose of this paper is to show that Hobbesian political philosophy succeeds in fully articulating the idea that Leviathan must preserve individual liberty, an idea that has not received sufficient attention from many Hobbesian researchers, while it fails in that it does not provide even the most basic insights into the fundamental direction of modern political development, which must be addressed, such as "constitutional democracy". The shortcoming of Hobbesian political philosophy is that it does not discuss even the most basic aspects of "constitutional democracy" as a fundamental direction that modern political development must face. But by making the defense of basic human rights the cornerstone of his political philosophy, Hobbes was a great forerunner of liberalism. The Foundation of Leviathan: The Instincts of Security and Fear (7) Hobbes was born into a clergyman's family in the south of England in 1588 AD. Rumor has it that his mother gave birth to Hobbes amidst the fearful cannon fire coming from the war between the West and England. After becoming tutor to the Earl of Cavendish, Hobbes visited the continent three times. While in France, he witnessed the murder of Henry IV by crazed Catholics and the resulting political chaos. In turn, the tumultuous recurrence of the English Revolution caused Hobbes to spend almost his entire life in fear. It was this particular experience in this context that led Hobbes to make an extremely strong appeal for order and security in a society. It is not difficult to see that behind Hobbes' Leviathan lies a deep fear of "chaos" and "disorder". Hobbes' political philosophy is the son of "fear", and on the other hand, it can also be said to be the "son of natural science". Influenced by the natural science ideas of his time, Hobbes transposed geometrical methods into his system and claimed that his system of political science was a new "political science". But the truth of the matter may be more complex, as Strauss says on the title page of Hobbes' Political Philosophy: Its Origins and Foundations: Hobbes' political philosophy did not come from an acceptance of natural science, but from an experience and understanding of human nature and morality (8). In this sense, we cannot read the text of Leviathan without returning to something more foundational like this. Like other thinkers, Hobbes begins his exposition of the problem with the assumption of human nature (9). In his view, human nature is all self-interested, and there is no objective standard by which man judges right and wrong, good and evil. "The object of any man's desire is called good as far as he is concerned, while the object of hatred or dislike is called evil; and the object of contempt is called worthless and insignificant. For the usage of the terms good, evil, and contemptible condition is never related to the user, and nothing can be purely and absolutely so. (L.P. 39) "Hobbes also lists many of these desires and emotions that influence one to make moral judgments (L.p. 41). In his opinion, the strongest of these desires and emotions are the fear of death and the extreme concern for security. Here Hobbes clearly reverses the traditional concepts of "goodness" and "justice" that have existed since the time of the ancient Greek city-states, so that the moral judgment of a society is based solely on the desires, emotions, and considerations of profit and loss of the individual, without any concern for ****samaritanism and God. The first person in the history of thought to make profit, rather than goodness, the basis of political science was Machiavelli. Hobbes deepened this proposition by stating that the only purely legitimate relationship between human beings is that of interest: "The value or worth of a man, like the value of all other things, is only his price; that is, what will be paid to him for the use of his powers. Hence the worth is not absolute, but depends on the needs and evaluations of the next person. (L.P. 63) " The main reason why interest has become the basis of political science, the only mediator between men and their relations, is the scarcity of resources. Human desires are unlimited and in order to compete for resources, people have to struggle. Hobbes says, "In the nature of mankind we then find that three causes of strife exist. The first is rivalry, the second suspicion, and the third honor. (L.P. 88) "This mutual struggle of men always fails to be a win-win situation, and instead produces "hateful things", and "the worst of all is that men are in continual fear and danger of violent death, and that their lives are lonely, poor, vile, cruel, and short-lived. ". (L.P. 89) This war of "every man against every man" has all the potential to destroy mankind itself, and thus reason tells mankind that it must find new ways of preserving itself in order to realize its own best interests. Thus, the great law of nature, the "maxim of reason," began to be recognized. The first rule of the law of nature is that "men are forbidden to do what destroys their lives or deprives them of the means of preserving them, and are forbidden not to do what they think is most conducive to the preservation of their lives. (L.P. 91)", and the other rule is "that a man will voluntarily renounce this right to everything when he deems it necessary for the purposes of peace and self-defense, on condition that others will do the same; and will be content with the equivalent of the right of liberty which he has allowed others to have over him in respect of the right of liberty of others. (L.P. 92)" "When a man relinquishes his own right and transfers it to another, the decree of natural law imposes upon him "the obligation or constraint not to prejudice the enjoyment of that interest by the recipient of the right which he has relinquished or promised to relinquish. (L.P. 92)". There are just some people who do not want to promise, and people have to live in a state of war. What is to be put in its place? All the people contracted with each other and agreed to transfer their own right to inflict harm on others to a great personality. In order to ensure the validity of the contract, this personality does not participate in the formation of the contract, and unless the personality relinquishes its sacred function of protecting the signatories, the contract is valid forever and the people cannot unilaterally break it. "The designation of one person or a collective of persons to represent their personality, and the recognition by each of them of any act authorized to be done, or ordered to be done by others, by the person assuming his own personality, in relation to the peace or safety of the commons * * *, is an act in which all submit their own wills to his, and their own judgments to his. (L.P. 120)" In this way, this personality monopolizes the entire legitimacy of violence. At this point, Hobbes seems to have found a quick way to "enforce rights" and guarantee peace and tranquility for mankind: political authority, originating from the consent of the people, replaces natural authority in guaranteeing the security of the subjects (what we often refer to as the social contract). The idealistic tradition in political philosophy has been strong since ancient Greece. In this tradition, "man is by nature a political animal," and "what is noble and just is essentially different from what is pleasing, and by its very nature preferable to the latter" (10). Hobbes's social contract theory rejects this tradition and reaffirms the hedonistic belief that man is not a natural political animal, but a pure beast, not so different from the wolves of nature; that man's most fundamental beliefs are utilitarian, and are desires. More importantly, Hobbes believed that Leviathan was naturally just because it emphasized respect for human desires, insisted on moderation, the rule of law, and the obligation of the sovereign to protect the inalienable natural rights of his subjects as its ultimate goal. Leviathan in no way seeks to use abstract reason to transform human desires and control them, and the spirit of Leviathan is clearly alien to authoritarianism in this respect. By deriving the concept of man's natural rights through the affirmation of man's altruism, emotions, desires, and interests, Hobbes completes the transition of political science from the traditional to the modern. It should be said that the shift from the analysis of "interests" of political behavior to the perspective of "rights" of political development is the key link in the formation process of modern political science centered on "rights". Without this process, there would be no modern political science. The affirmation, emphasis, and defense of the natural rights of human beings not only placed Hobbes among the ranks of individualist thinkers, but also dealt a major blow to many non-rights and anti-rights political philosophies of the pre-modern era. Since then, a completely new force has arisen in the arena of Western political thought, and the old political philosophy, founded on holism and ****syncretism, cannot but quietly recede to the margins of the history of thought. III The Function of the Leviathan: to Safeguard the Rights of its Subjects to Freedom Out of fear, a powerful Leviathan safeguards the freedom and security of its subjects. The Leviathan was formed by contract, and the subjects transferred all their rights to the Leviathan. The Leviathan is temperate in character and faithful in his duty to preserve the liberty of his subjects. By liberty, Hobbes "means the state of being unimpeded" and "unimpeded to do what he will, in the things which are in his power and wisdom to do" (L.P. 145). In his opinion, "there is no country in the world that can lay down sufficient regulations to govern all that men say and do, and such a thing is impossible. ...... In all that is not regulated by law, men are free to do what their reason deems to be most conducive to their own good. (L.P. 147) "Clearly, liberty here has become a "right" of the subjects, and the legitimacy of sovereignty lies in the protection of these rights held by the subjects. According to Hobbes, in order to better fulfill his obligations to his subjects, the sovereign must fully consolidate his supreme authority. In order to accomplish this, the sovereign should first ensure the integrity of his powers, for "it would be contrary to his duty to alienate or renounce any of them". The sovereign should let the people know "the grounds and reasons of his fundamental rights". Secondly, the sovereign should forbid his subjects to rebel; rebellion, so-called, is a revolt of the subjects against the fundamental rights of the sovereign. Hobbes believed that subjects were always irrational and liable to be deceived, so "it is not only his duty, but his interest, to have them so instructed; and it is a security against the dangers of rebellion to his natural person" (L. CHAP. XXX.). With the power of the sovereign extended to such an extent, one inevitably wonders how much room is left for the liberty of the subject? We know that political states throughout history have always seemed to expand their power until they could expand no further. Hobbes did not seem to be worried about this. In his view, "In fact, the power in all forms of government, so far as it is complete enough to safeguard the subjects, is all such, and human affairs can never be without a little fault (L.P. 128)." With such an understatement and dismissal of the threat of an unchecked expansion of the power of the state, it is no wonder that he left the impression that he was an advocate of absolutism. In fairness, however, such an impression is questionable. Hobbes was not, in fact, unaware of the dangers of Leviathan's unchecked expansion of power. As a philosophical skeptic, Hobbes denied not only the reasoning power of the natural man, but also the reasoning power of the political man, including the Leviathan sovereign. His negative, even dark, understanding of human nature (Taiwan's Chang Hao called it "dark consciousness") could not have led him to have unrealistic expectations and fantasies about the personality and rationality of the sovereign. In this regard, Hobbes points out that Leviathan "like all other earthly creatures is subject to death and decay. At the same time, because he has no object to fear on earth, but in heaven, whose laws he ought to obey" (L.P. 221). Hobbes clearly sees the limitations of sovereigns: sovereigns may violate their consciences by ordering many things to be done in an attempt to satisfy their passions, which undermines the trust and violates the natural law at the same time. He points out that there are two kinds of abuses in the Leviathan, one is that "the whole property of any subject may be deprived of it by the power of a sole proprietor to fatten the favorites or slanders of the monarch", and the other is that sovereignty, in succession, "may pass into the hands of a child or one who does not discern what is good or evil. " (L.P. 132). It is just that despite its limitations, Leviathan is a relatively tolerable "evil" compared to the total loss of life and safety in a state of social disorder. Considering that Hobbes, who had experienced the pain of rapid social upheaval, could not let go of the disloyalty of his subjects, and was eager to preserve their lives and safety, it is understandable that he was tolerant of the high authority of the sovereign. What is more, a strong government is not necessarily naturally opposed to natural rights; a weak government that is never strong enough to threaten them is never strong enough to protect them. In this sense, Leviathan is a necessary alternative in its particular context, especially when the power of the state is insufficient to provide for the safety and security of its citizens. It is, after all, a powerful, but restrained, government that aims to secure the rights of its subjects. Historically, absolutists have assumed that the reason of one person or group of people is supreme, and that they can substitute for others in the impartial exercise of their "wise" and "noble" wills to stabilize and enrich the ****ing community. Hobbes, however, realizing that the sovereign may become tyrannical and corrupt due to the limitations of his own understanding and the infinity of his own desires, repeatedly warned the sovereign to observe such and such obligations, and in particular, not to divide his sovereignty and infringe upon such natural rights as the right to property of his subjects. Even when he speaks of alienating all rights, Hobbes holds natural rights such as the life and property of citizens to be sacrosanct. On the idea that human liberty cannot be violated unless limited by law, he is similar to Montesquieu's classic judgment on liberty: "Liberty is the right to do all things permitted by law; and if a citizen could do what the law forbids, he would no longer be free, because other men have the same right. (11) "Hobbes adhered to Montesquieu's negative view of liberty, stating that the sole duty of the sovereign is to protect this natural right of his subjects, thus laying the foundation for the modern concept of "liberty..." The foundation of the concept of "liberty..." was laid. Cong Riyun once pointed out that "at the end of the Christian dualistic political outlook, one sees a new dualistic political outlook surfacing, which is the dualistic political outlook of modern liberalism. ...... In the political realm, liberalism insists on the distinction between man's inner and outer worlds, between his private and public life, between the private and public domains, between the private and public domains, and between the private and public domains, between the inner and outer worlds. life, the private domain and the public domain, civil society and the state, the individual and society, freedom and authority, and individual rights and state (or government) power." Finally, Cong Riyun also points out that "this binary split and tension is the essence of modern liberalism (12)." Hobbes inherited this tradition of dualistic political outlook and incorporated it into the liberal vision. In contrast to Rawls, Hobbes was at an early stage in the development of liberalism. In today's view, Hobbes's personal liberties are rather pathetic: almost all of them are limited to personal and economic liberties; and even then, these liberties are greatly discounted, not to mention political liberties. In Hobbes's view, "it is within the sphere of sovereignty to determine what persons, under what circumstances, and to what extent, shall be trusted in speaking to the people, and by whom the doctrines of all books shall be examined before they are published (L. p. 124)." Modern forms of political participation such as large-scale press publishing were almost unimaginable things to him (13). The limitations of time and understanding prompted Hobbes to deliberately emphasize the centralization of power and to make his institutional proposals embody strong authoritarian overtones (14). Between liberty and authority, Hobbes's ideological differences with his contemporary, the patriarchal theorist Feldman, were clearly much greater than those with Locke. After transferring all the rights of his subjects to the sovereign, Hobbes repeatedly emphasizes that "nothing that the sovereign's representative can do to his subjects, under any pretense whatsoever, can with certainty be called iniquitous or infringing; for every subject is the authorizer of every act of the sovereign, and therefore he has no right to anything else, except that he is God's subject, and therefore bound to obey the law of nature (14). There is no lack of right (L. p. 148)." Considering the connotations of the "law of nature" in question, Hobbes was not an absolute sovereignty theorist as Y.C. Chin suggests. Hobbesian political philosophy gives far more room to authority than to freedom. This often upsets many moderns, and often makes one wonder where Hobbes' ass really sits. "Giving authority far more room than freedom leaves" is indeed not very comforting, and it's far less inspiring than the kind of slogans that demand the right to full freedom. But in a paradoxical twist of history, where the loudest slogans sometimes lead to the deepest depths of misery, Hobbes' "freedom of the smallest space" has left a deep mark on the history of the development of liberty. In our view, it was the emergence of this freedom of the smallest space as a natural right of man in the history of ideas that delegitimized any authoritarian government that ignored the rights of the individual, and the idea that the individual has inalienable basic human rights, regardless of the government and the reason for it, began to take hold in the minds of men. It is perhaps in appreciation of this role that Hobbes played in the history of the development of liberty that Oakeshott has repeatedly pointed out that Hobbes was too individualistic to allow something like the public will to appear even for the briefest of moments. As an authoritarian (and by no means an absolutist), Hobbes's view of remaining skeptical of the workings of reason and insisting on individualism has been highly influential on libertarian philosophy.