Political Theory Papers A- J

Bruce Buchan

The Australian National University

PUNISHING THE POOR:

EARLY ‘LIBERAL’ ARGUMENTS FOR PENAL AND POLICE REFORM

ABSTRACT

Alongside the emphasis on human rights, protection, and the preservation of property, liberalism has emerged as a discourse of managed public authority incorporating a measured approach to the problem of punishment. There is however, some confusion in both public and academic debate as to the nature and purpose of recent moves in some liberal-democratic nations to institute programs of mandatory sentencing or zero tolerance policing, most notably in some states in the United States and the Northern Territory in Australia. While its defenders have tended to portray liberalism, not without justification, as a doctrine of penal reform, moves toward more draconian measures of policing and punishment would appear to sit rather awkwardly alongside its reformist credentials. It will be argued here however, that through an examination of early arguments for penal reform and policing we can see mandatory sentencing as well as zero tolerance policing as consistent with the liberal tradition.

Arguments for penal reform in the work of early-modern political theorists has not always received the attention it deserves. With some notable exceptions however, where it is spoken of it tends to take the form of a celebration of the ‘humanisation’ of punishment associated with the development of liberalism. In other words, the development of liberalism is associated with the extension of more humane, carefully regulated and proportioned method of punishment, based as one writer put it, on the "liberal" recognition of "the fullest extent of liberty possible" and the necessity of "protecting the rights of the accused". Rosen is explicit in deploying this interpretation against that of Michel Foucault, whom he charges with merely arguing that early penal reformers ‘replaced’ "one system of tyranny and terror with a worse one", or one that was at least "as oppressive as the one it succeeded." Both Rosen and Carrithers reject this view by contending that liberal theories of punishment were designed primarily to deter crime by according a fair and humane proportion between punishment and offence. This interpretation of both ‘liberal’ penal reform and Focuault’s critique overlooks the fact that Foucault largely accepted the claim that early-modern penal reform did replace the terror of the gallows with more humane disciplines of ‘correction’. This paper will not be concerned with the ‘humanisation’ of penal practices per se, but with how this ‘humanisation’ came to be construed as coeval with the effort to extend and refine the reach of punishment within and without the prison walls.

As the defenders of the liberal tradition of penal reform represent it, the most important feature of these early arguments reforms was that they enshrined the central liberal concern to "devise a system of punishment which sought to protect the individual within society, prevent the criminal from committing crime, deter others" and by humane punishments "protect the liberty of the criminal." It will be argued in this paper however, that early-modern arguments for penal and police reform should be interpreted as retributive rather than corrective strategies directed against those whose ‘unruly’ and ‘undisciplined’ conduct posed the greatest threat to the security of civil society. This understanding of the rationale of penal theory (and to some extent, penal practice) was related to the emergence of new forms of government and relations of power which redefined crime, criminality and its solution. As Skinner argues, a key feature of this development, and one that Foucault tended to obscure, was the rise of state sovereignty, and especially the idea that "maintaining" the state involved dominating "the institutions of government and means of coercive control" within its jurisdiction. State sovereignty thus meant control of political and governmental institutions, but such control that aimed at creating flourishing market or commercial economies, and that these were best secured by civil societies characterised by interactions between independent, autonomous citizens. Consequently, one of the ways in which state sovereignty was manifested was an increased focus on ‘criminality’. This referred to forms of behaviour that threatened the security of citizens, the health of the economy, and the wealth of civil society; namely property crimes, vagabondage, masterlessness, begging and idleness.

It was in this light that John Locke turned his attention to the problem of begging and masterlessness throughout the country, and Henry Fielding stipulated that "the Strength and Riches of a Society consist in the Numbers of the People..." and that social well-being required, inter alia, the elimination of the burden of the poor. Fielding moreover counselled the need to focus attention on the "Customs, Manners, and Habits of the People" in order to prevent "Disorder", stimulate trade and commerce by which the poor may be disciplined to shake off "their Vassalage" and became independent citizens shunning wasteful habits such as drunkenness and gambling. Informing such views was an assumption that the role of government was to arrange social, economic and political institutions in such a way that individuals themselves could manage their own conduct without the need for direct supervision. It is this view that provides an answer to the dilemma that current moves toward seemingly more draconian penal and policing practices apparently conflict with the liberal tradition. In other words, ‘liberal’ conceptions of how the power to punish should be exercised, remain tied to an implicit distinction between those who can be relied upon to manage themselves, and those who could not.

With these words Montesquieu pointed to what he considered an incontrovertible fact, that the more despotic a state, the more its rulers undisciplined passion reigned, and thus the more severe was its style of punishment. Consequently, the more moderate the state, the more limited its powers, the more its citizens are free to arrange their own affairs, the more gentle are its mores, its manners, its laws and its punishments. In recommending moderate punishments however, Montesquieu was suggesting more effective ways of punishing. Other reformers were animated by precisely this spirit, by the attempt to devise more effective types of punishment. The Italian reformer Cesare Beccaria (1738-1794) for instance, railed at what he called the "useless prodigality" of established punishments, which merely hardened criminals, and impeded the orderly exercise of the law. A motivation in moderating the severity of punishment was the reform or correction of the offender, which capital punishment as Pufendorf (1632-1694) noted, plainly failed to achieve "since a dead man cannot be reformed." Part of the problem with public manifestations of the power to punish was that they quite regularly did not achieve the desired result of instilling fear and awe. As many historians have observed, the ritual of public execution was a complex affair in which the forces of law, the crowd, and the offender receiving punishment each had a specific role to play. Such roles however, did not always run to script and what was intended as a solemn procession of the majesty and awesome power of the state could easily descend into farce, or even riot. Hence, the ‘severity’ of established punishments were sometimes much less terrifying than it is often assumed.

Contemporary reformers, not all of whom could be called ‘liberal’, were acutely aware of this problem. As the Puritan divine Richard Baxter (1615-1691) noted of placing offenders in the stocks, "their companions get about them and feast them openly… so that they are never so jovial as in the stocks and justice made an open scorn." Henry Fielding (1707-1754) turned this attitude toward the reform of the "Dress and Apparatus" of capital punishment, which he thought, could be made more solemn and dreadful if conducted ‘privately’,

William Paley’s (1743-1805) tendentious defence of the Georgian ‘Bloody Code’, which came to be called ‘Paley’s net’, was based on the idea that public capital punishment was more effective if applied to a great many crimes. Such crimes could be swept "into the net" of capital offences, but only carried out in a few exemplary cases ensuring that "few actually suffer death, whilst the dread and danger of it hang over the crimes of many." In seeking a form of punishment that was universal in reach, Paley – though himself not animated by liberal reformist sentiments - expressed one of its chief objectives.

One of the obstacles to reaching this end was the inconsistency of punishment, the frequency with which offenders escaped punishment or, like Jack Sheppard, acquired legendary and folkloric status by continually cheating the hangman and making an ass of the law. Hence arguments for penal reform addressed themselves to the "elastic measure of mercy" as well as the "differential enforcement of new and old penalties" complicated by various privileges and exemptions, such as ‘benefit of clergy’. Beccaria, for instance, argued that to be effective, the penal system must be based on the "inevitability" and "certainty" of punishment unmitigated by places of sanctuary or asylum. He opposed the death penalty because he thought its effect was "transient", whereas "imprisonment for life", in which the offender must ‘pay’ for the offence "by labours resembling those of a beast of burden", would be at least as terrifying a prospect for the potential criminal. Indeed, for punishment to be effective he concluded that it must "never be an act of violence committed by one or many against a private citizen", its severest penalties must be used sparingly, but most importantly, it must be both "proportionate to the crime, and established by law." Beccaria here expressed two of the central principles of penal reform, that it be both proportionate and consistent. In doing so, the aim was not merely to correct or reform the offender by ‘humanising’ punishment, but to eliminate the inconsistencies of punishment that militated against the inculcation of patterns of autonomous self-conduct within the citizenry itself.

This particular view is most clearly seen in the work of Montesquieu, who, as both Rosen and Carrithers argue, was at the forefront of the drive for proportionality and regularity of punishment. Montesquieu argued that excessive punishments merely hardened criminals, and were ineffective because the fear they instilled was dissipated the more the punishment was used. Punishments should be proportionate because it was "essential that the greater crime be avoided rather than the lesser one", and that potential offenders be given some incentive to choose the latter. What Montesquieu had in mind was a system of punishment based on the dictates of ‘rational’, instrumental calculation of the costs and benefits of conduct by eliminating inconsistency and ambiguity. The chief idea here was that in moderate states, individuals learn to subject themselves to the discipline of calculated self-interest. The laws themselves for example, reflected the mores of the populace and were not obeyed through fear or awe, but simply because they embodied their own interests. This was also the idea behind Beccaria’s desire for a "moderate" but "continuous punishment" dedicated to the idea that all citizens "regulate their conduct in response to the repeated action of the disadvantages they know…". Hence, a system of laws and punishments known to all, in which penalties are inexorably meted out according to the severity of the crime, was the ideal. These penalties were designed to be more effective in their application and thereby to offer would-be offenders a clear and unambiguous choice requiring rational calculation of the costs of breaking laws, for which apprehension was likely, and punishments sternly, inexorably, and universally applied.

Concerns such as these fuelled the impetus toward the refinement of the prison as the institution charged with both the reform of offenders and the standardisation of punishment. This of course was Foucault’s view, illustrated by Jeremy Bentham’s infamous Panopticon, a proposed prison designed on the basis of perpetual observation and surveillance; an institution of universal and rigorous punishment. Foucault has also been taken to task, not unreasonably, for making too much of both Bentham’s influence and the Panopticon itself, which after all was never built as Bentham planned. Such criticisms however, fail to acknowledge that Bentham’s work on prison reform and design – regardless of its actual influence – grew from a context of increasing dissatisfaction with existing forms of punishment, especially transportation, and represented "the architectural form", if not the actual blueprint for the reform movement.

III. REFORM: OF OFFENDERS AND PRISONS

As Kant so neatly described it, the purpose of transportation was to "purge our country of depraved characters, [while] at the same time affording the hope that they or their offspring will become reformed in another continent (as in New Holland)." In Britain however, even conservatives such as Paley were attacking transportation on the grounds of its ineffectiveness, because though "the convict may suffer" by it, "his sufferings are removed from the view of his countrymen: his misery is unseen" and thereby it fails to inspire fear in others. Bentham also availed himself of this argument in his review of the Hard-Labour Bill in 1778, in which he argued for a "general plan of punishment… in which solitary confinement might be combined with labour", viewing transportation as an "unexemplary" and disproportionate form of punishment. Thus, when Bentham came to compose his work on the Panopticon in the late 1780’s, it was in the context of trying to develop an alternative and more effective form of punishment.

Bentham saw the plan as a multipurpose establishment, not just a prison but a "new mode of obtaining power of mind over mind" equally applicable to factories, hospitals, schools, and mad-houses. The central principle that made the plan so versatile was that it offered a form of control and power over both inmates and warders, a form of control that was all seeing but unseen, based on surveillance and solitary confinement. Although widely practiced in British houses of correction, the twin principles of reform by solitude and surveillance were not systematically applied. Bentham’s plans however, developed them to new heights,

Histories of the prison in Britain illustrate the role they were designed to play in providing discipline and industry to inmates. In earlier models, discipline was linked to gradations of corporal punishments as in John Locke’s proposal to revive the system of poor houses in conjunction with measures such as compulsory impressment into the navy, transportation, and flogging to ensure "idle vagabonds" were "inured to work" and made "sober and industrious all their lives after". By the 1750’s, attention had shifted to the design of institutions of regimented industry in which the routine of activity replaced the need for corporal penalties. Thus Henry Fielding’s proposal of a system of county-houses where the poor and vagrants may be lodged, forced to work, and prevented from wandering, was premised on "correction" which he described as an "Endeavour to persuade the Offender that he is corrected only for his own Good." Interestingly, Fielding thought this best accomplished by solitary incarceration,

By the 1780’s, William Paley could write of solitary incarceration that it offered the best chance of ‘reform’, but that the duration of confinement was to be measured by the "quantity of work" accomplished by the offender which would, he thought, "excite industry, and… render it more voluntary."

As enthusiasts such as Patrick Colquhoun (1745-1820) observed, Bentham’s Panopticon would employ surveillance and solitude to make inmates industrious and profitable. Importantly however, the whole institution was designed to do away with the need for corporal punishments, irons and shackles. The whole building was designed to facilitate the "apparent omnipresence of the inspector" who oversees both inmates and warders "without being seen" and thus encourages the strict self-management of conduct because each person in the institution feels as though they are under surveillance. Alone in their cells, with no way of seeing or communicating with others, the inmates would have nothing else to do but to labour and thereby earn some little wage to improve their conditions. While his model was never actually built, Bentham’s work is illustrative of the ongoing effort to refine punishment, to make it more effective, and this meant not simply targeting the offender, but using the prison as a presence to guide the conduct of those on the outside. In his letter of 1802 entitled Panopticon Versus New South Wales, Bentham once again applied himself to the task of recommending the advantages of his institution over transportation to the penal colony of New South Wales, Australia. One of the chief advantages he identified was that incarceration in the Panopticon sited "in the vicinity of the metropolis" was more exemplary than transportation affording all citizens a clear view of the penalty for crime.

Thus the Panopticon was designed not just as an institution for reforming the offender; it manifested a form of political power exerted without recourse to violence or savagery. The governmental power represented by and embodied in this ideal penitentiary was designed to appear less brutal, but was made thereby a more constant and unrelenting power inducing all to conduct themselves in such a way as to avoid its penalties. The foundation of such arguments was that punishments must be such that they offered a clear, consistent and unambiguous penalty so that all citizens may be induced to engage in autonomous calculations of the costs of running foul of the law. Early arguments for penal reform were thus directed to the augmentation of the capacity for autonomous action of those who committed no crime, but who were continually and more effectively reminded of the consequences of breaking the law due, in part, to a more vigorous system of policing.

The art of government in early-modern Europe became increasingly concerned with the management of populations by developing more precise knowledge of its dynamics. One version of this new art of government, stronger in Continental Europe but not unknown in Britain during the seventeenth and eighteenth-centuries, centred on the activities of ‘police’ in regulating areas of social and economic life representing a "great effort of formation of the social body". The rationale of this art of government was that the pursuit of the health, wealth and well-being of society required the efficient regulation of areas of social life by an exhaustive policy of investigation, supervision and control. In this conception of government, police authorities were invested with the power to carry out such functions in order to "produce a well ordered civic or territorial community." For Kant, police were to regulate public "security, convenience and also propriety" making it "much easier for the government to perform its business of governing the people", by suppressing "begging, uproar in the streets, offensive smells and public prostitution". The police moreover, should be charged with the "right of inspection" into any and every "association which could influence the public welfare".

Contrasting with this view of police as a strategy of government, in Anglo-Scottish thought the health, wealth and well-being of society could best be achieved by ensuring that individuals themselves, rather than police could regulate their own conduct. It was in this sense that William Blackstone could refer to "public police and oeconomy" by which he meant the "due regulation" of society "whereby the individuals of the state… are bound to conform their general behaviour to the rules of propriety, good neighbourhood, and good manners… to be decent, industrious, and inoffensive in their respective stations." Instead of seeing police as a strategy of government, it became a subsidiary arm of government concerned with the task of monitoring the boundaries between self-regulated and non-self-regulated conduct. In seeing police as a strategy of government or an activity of integration and command, extensive areas of society were identified as requiring regulation. As Beccaria put it "the sciences, education, good order, security and public tranquillity, objects all comprehended under the name of police". Within early liberal thought by contrast, the chief task of government was to produce a society in which significant areas of self-regulation were achieved through a variety of disciplinary structures. Some of these structures (such as the army) operated under more direct government control, while others (such as churches, schools, and work places) were relatively autonomous. The organisation and regulation of the police was thus an important part of this activity of government, but the attempt to define police powers was also an attempt to confine them. The ‘liberal’ strategy of government through self-conduct thus entailed a form of policing premised on significant areas of self-regulation.

It was with the prospect of a government by police in mind that William Paley defended the frequent use of capital punishment in Britain. Because "the liberties of a free people" and the "jealousy" with which they are defended "permit not those precautions and restraints, that inspection, scrutiny, and control" in "arbitrary governments", a government by "police with… discretionary powers" would not be tolerated. As Paley saw it then, the problem for a government based on the liberty of citizens was that crime was more difficult to prevent, because the activities of police would have to be curtailed. For early liberals then, it was vital to establish that self-regulation and self-government could be relied upon to maintain public tranquillity. The primacy of this concern can be identified for instance, in Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments in which he aimed to demonstrate how to "restrain our selfish, and to indulge our benevolent affections" and to regulate their effects by appealing to self-interest in the maintenance of society. In giving form to this prescription, Smith implicitly adopted a conception of the self, the essential elements of which were the "reason" and "self-command" of the provident and industrious man of business, one who practiced "frugality, industry, and application" in the "acquisition of fortune", pursued "remote advantage" by giving up "all present pleasures", and enduring "the greatest labour both of mind and body" to win a general "approbation". Such was the conduct of one who could be relied upon to behave appropriately, in effect to police themselves; the function of the institutions of police therefore was to regulate the conduct of those who could not police themselves.

In his Lectures on Jurisprudence of 1763, Smith developed a conception of police appropriate to British society, noting that the term ‘police’ had originally referred to "the regulation of government in general" but should now be "confind" [sic] to the "inferior parts of it." In his discussion of the duties of police Smith maintained that its chief duty was to promote the "opulence of the state" through regulating "trade, commerce, agriculture, manufactures" and ensuring regular supply and cheapness of goods. He contrasted this view to the more extensive reach of police in France arguing that this did not produce greater security, but showed merely that the French needed stricter regulation because the number of disorders there was greater owing to the greater number of "retainers and dependents". Smith’s view was that disorders were occasioned by the practice of keeping a large retinue of servants which rendered them entirely dependent and "altogether depraved both in mind and body", unable to earn a living when cast out other than by "crimes and vices." The transition to a commercial economy provided the means by which such individuals could be subjected to the new mastery of a firm and unforgiving yet also voluntary discipline of labour. Above all else this new discipline afforded to former retainers an independence which was the most effective form of protection from crime and vagabondage,

Consequently, the police were to provide "security" and "safety" of possession, "maintain the rich in possession of their wealth against the violence and rapacity of the poor", and thereby "preserve" the inequalities that resulted from "the various degrees of capacity, industry, and diligence". According to this conception, police existed to patrol the regulations under which commerce was conducted and to protect those who profited most by it. As Colquhoun conceived it in his A Treatise on the Police of the Metropolis, the chief function of the police was to protect commerce and private wealth by targeting the dealers and receivers of stolen goods thereby removing the incentive to engage in crime.

Colquhoun’s and Smith’s conceptions of police was thus concerned with the inculcation of patterns of self-discipline and self-policing, but the shift that occurred in the nineteenth-century was one of tactics for accomplishing that end. While eighteenth-century policing can be broadly described as a process of shaping conduct by regulating commerce, early nineteenth-century policing, particularly after the introduction of Peel’s constabulary, was concerned above all with protection from the organised masses. Here the danger to be circumvented was that posed by the indiscipline of ‘the mob’, the elimination of riot, and the other public disturbances caused by that "dangerous class… of criminals, paupers and persons whose conduct is obnoxious to the interests of society… [as well as] that proximate body of people who are within reach of its contagion, and continually swell its number." The activities of this police were therefore centred not simply on the protection of property, but on shaping society through the elimination and prevention of crime, thereby protecting a sphere within which commerce could regulate itself, and mould the conduct of those engaged in it. In fulfilling this function the police were (and still are) charged with the task of monitoring the boundaries between acceptable and unacceptable conduct or, as the first Metropolitan Police handbook put it, of "watching the conduct of loose and disorderly persons". It was within the realm protected by this vigilance to which the ‘liberal’ idea of a society constituted by autonomous individuals whose conduct was underwritten by disciplines of ‘self-policing’ applied. This was the accomplishment of a form of government in which policing was involved with securing the social space in which these ‘co-operative’ ventures could flourish. As such policing and punishment was conceived as a retributive strategy for dealing with those sections of society who showed that they would not conduct themselves autonomously. It was their improvidence, ill-discipline, ‘violence and rapacity’ that harboured the greatest threats to commerce and its benefits.

In this paper, it has been argued that a liberal approach to the problem of punishment and police is one distinguished by its emphasis on the self-regulation of conduct. Such conduct was to be carefully disciplined, but the most effective methods for doing so were those which made the discipline seem ‘voluntary’, rather than coercive. Hence the liberal appeal to commerce was an appeal to just such a method of ‘voluntary’ discipline. Liberals also realised however, that some form of coercive discipline was required because not all people were capable of self-regulation. The purpose of policing was to identify those who were incapable of autonomy, who resorted to ‘crime’ and thus deserved punishment. It was in this sense that those without property were identified as the greatest danger to the security of those with property. Poverty was thus associated with crime and a punitive attitude was founded on the view that the poor were to blame for their condition due to their undisciplined behaviour, lack of thrift, vagrancy, idleness, lewdness, or drunkenness.

As Salter has observed, Smith adopted this punitive approach to the poor because he believed that the "universal opulence" of commercial economies meant that poverty should be an easy condition to avoid so long as one made the effort to develop the habits of industry, frugality and prudence. The assumption here is that because the poor are improvident, they require strict regulation and instruction; if such regulation is not applied, crime will be the result. This punitive approach to poverty has a long ancestry, and I do not claim that it belongs to liberalism alone, merely that it is fully consistent with the liberal tradition of thought. In arguing so, it is possible to appreciate the continuity between the liberal tradition of penal and police reform and current trends toward mandatory sentencing and zero tolerance policing.

The central idea behind zero tolerance policing for example, is that police target offences that mark out and define the boundaries of legitimate conduct, to enforce standards of self-discipline in the interests of personal security and public tranquillity. In the United States zero-tolerance policing has been used to target specific groups, most notably activists and protesters, as well as those who live on the streets, but particularly racial minorities such as the Hispanic, African and Haitian communities. Together these communities constitute the least favoured socio-economic sectors in American society, those in which rates of poverty are greatest, and those from which the greatest number of victims of zero-tolerance can be found. In Australia’s Northern Territory, mandatory sentencing has had a similar effect on the indigenous Aboriginal community, members of which are more likely to be targeted by the police and to end up in prison. In proposing a form of sentencing that is clear and consistent however, mandatory sentencing is consistent with the liberal tradition of penal strategy. Consider for example the main arguments employed in its defence,

Such arguments for mandatory sentencing thus encompass the appeal to the instrumental rationality of the offender, with the inexorability and immediacy of punishment so cherished by earlier penal reformers. In targeting those whose position in civil society is marginal, zero tolerance policing and mandatory sentencing target those most likely to re-offend. This results in a retributive attitude to punishment, a view that persistent re-offenders deserve strict punishment because they have failed to discipline themselves.

Liberal approaches to punishment should be seen as a retributive strategy for delineating the boundaries of acceptable and appropriate conduct from unacceptable and inappropriate conduct. Many of the early arguments for reform were designed to separate those whose actions and whose very presence within civil society threatened the security and property of those who so prudently and providently governed themselves. The institutions of punishment and policing thus acted as institutional bulwarks to the boundaries separating realms in which citizens could be relied upon to govern themselves, from those in which they could not. In this way, the development of modern punishment and policing can be located within the context of state-formation, as strategies of power employed by states in the process of forming productive civil societies. One of the objectives of this ‘governmental’ state power was to shape the ‘sensibilities and mentalities’ of the (prison and non-prison) population in such a way that savagery and overt violence were no longer the primary mechanisms of its authority. The purpose of punishment then, was not simply reform or correction of the offender, nor the management of delinquency (though each have played their part), but the delivery of deserved punishment on those whose indiscipline and improvidence threatened the peace and productivity of civil society, those who were deemed incapable of autonomous action. In this light, zero tolerance policing and mandatory sentencing, both of which are applied most severely to those sectors of the community that have always been identified in liberal thought as harbouring the greatest threat to the security and productivity of civil society – the poor, the itinerant, the dispossessed, the undisciplined and uncivilised - can be seen as entirely consistent with the liberal tradition.

Paul Corcoran

Associate Professor of Politics

University of Adelaide

'Isn't It Embarrassing?' The Affective Basis of Australian Political Language & Identity

Shame is the emotional cognate of a threatened or damaged bond, just as threatened bonds are the source of shame. Normal shame is an essential building block of relationships and of community.

Introduction

'Isn't it embarrassing?' Politically aware Australians will be familiar with this commonplace rhetorical question. Although the emphatic interrogatory can easily be understood as a remonstration that invites detachment from an object of odium, I want to explore quite a different implication. My aim is to show how the invocation of the negative emotions of shame and embarrassment is a mode of strong national identification.

In a world of increasingly unstable identities, the recognition of nationality, along with a host of other cultural markers (race, religion, ethnicity, gender), becomes at once a more risky and more important concern. Recognition in the sense in which I use it here is not simply a theoretical or legal concept, but is rather a perceptual, moral and aesthetic task - very difficult to achieve - with which we all struggle every day. This paper endeavours to uncover such efforts precisely where Australian identity appears on the surface to be undermined by powerful emotional factors which discourage or deny recognition.

Approaches

My approach to these issues acknowledges, but purposely leaves to one side, the questions of 'nation' and nationalism that have been accorded salience among political theorists in recent years. This is a debate that has fruitfully begun to re-examine Herder and Renan, and now plays an important part in scholarly conversations about liberalism, communitarianism, theories of justice, multi-culturalism, post-colonial theory and communication theory (Eisenberg, 2001). The reader will have to decide whether I have erred by omitting a review of this growing body of literature and deciding not to use its vocabularies or engage with its theoretical lineaments.
Conventional approaches to the study of national identity focus on positive evidence as reflected in literature, works of art, political discourse, social patterns of affiliation and, in the past several decades, attitudinal surveys. Such efforts look for symbolic and literary representations of patriotism, institutional memberships, chauvinism, xenophobic movements and deeply embedded ethno-cultural solidarity. By contrast, this paper approaches the question of national identity by negative or 'contrastive' affective phenomena. The focus will be on rhetorical expressions of embarrassment, shame, humiliation and, by implication, a discourse ranging in tone and content from the insecure to the acrimonious and condemnatory.

The study of 'affects' relies upon rather technical concepts and methods of analysis which evolved several decades ago in experimental, clinical and applied psychology (Tomkins, 1963; Edelman, 1987). The present analysis has also been influenced by a highly diverse range of literature. These include the concepts and interpretative applications stemming from the appropriation of Freudian psychoanalytic theory in cultural analysis; historical studies, both empirical and theoretical, of the evolution 'civilities and courtesies' in social manners (Norbert Elias, 1978); the psychology of emotions (Harré & Parrot, 1996); applied psychological research in criminology and mediation (Braithwaite, 1989; Scheff & Ratzinger, 1997); the sociology of emotions (Barbalet, 1998; Scheff, 1994, 1997); and philosophical reflection (Griffiths, 1997; Elster, 1999; Wollheim, 1999). Many of these studies are candid in stating that the human emotions are (like the influences I have named) 'heterogeneous,' in so far as emotions defy classification according to any comprehensive system of behavioural, psychological or physiological coordinates, though many attempts have been made (Elster, 1999, 141-45; 239-44).

Negative Emotional Discourse

Australian public discourse is vehement, contentious and polarised. Most, if not all, 'divisive' issues (as they are commonly described) are spoken about and represented in the media as calling into question the legitimacy of political institutions, the nation itself, and the meaning of Australia's historical experience. Party political rhetoric, with some degree of paradox, is vehemently criticised and condemned for being abusive and condemnatory.

This rhetoric, to a striking degree, is what a psychologist of emotions would call 'inwardly directed.' Several standard explanations, not at issue here, have been advanced as to why this should be so: the 'convict past,' vestiges of British colonialism and class division, demographic contrasts between rural and urban populations, or the supposed psychic pressures attendant upon economic globalisation. This paper is primarily concerned with the effects rather than the cause of the heat. I merely note in passing - although the observation is crucial to my central argument - that these ideological schisms in Australian society do not demarcate degrees or strengths, much less the presence or absence, of patriotic national identification.

Embarrassment and shame are commonplace declarations by politicians, professional commentators and 'ordinary' people in letters to the editor and talk-back media. These expressions, presumably to reveal feelings in the most public way, routinely take the form of a 'confession' of dastardly misdeeds by a person or group, normally the prime minister or the government of the day, but also sporting celebrities, sports announcers inter alia. The typical occasion of this self-acknowledged shame is that either a horrible truth or a horrible falsehood has been revealed to 'the world' (ABC, 1999; Brunton, 1999; Kelly, 2001; Murray, 2001; Price, 2001.)

The assumptions of such revelations are quite extraordinary. A declaration of shame effects a kind of sanctification which morally elevates the speaker above the misdeed. The public confession of shame is a rite of sacrifice which purifies, propitiates and seemingly both exonerates and capacitates the speaker to judge and sentence the malefactors. By this confessional act, the emotional distress of the malefaction is transmuted from the speaker to 'Australia.' The personal shame elides into an exposure of the nation's integrity and honour to general embarrassment, with the wound to one's own deepest feelings registered as a betrayal of the nation. Thus the rhetorical expression of a personally disorienting shame enables a recovery in the enactment of emotional identity with the nation.

There is something of the 'family feeling' in this. The intimacy and complicity of membership affords a position from which to castigate something of one's own. A common metaphor in such rhetoric is the shame of having one's own dirty linen 'exposed' to the wider community of nations. Thus one acknowledges and 'owns' this disgrace, even though it is opposed and hated. Vehement opposition is at the same time an expression of identification. One cannot be shamed and outraged, one cannot feel disgust, embarrassment or moral revulsion, unless one has a very strong sense of identity that threatens to be threatened, sullied, destroyed.

I want to notice two large paradoxes about acrimonious public discourse, and look more closely at only one. The one I analyse at some length is the surprising paradox that Australia's discourse of mutual recrimination is a contest between rivals for recognition as the truest, best, most loyal citizens: most in love with their country, most loyal to its heritage, most prescient of its future and best guardians of its destiny. For example, Australia's progressive, leftward-leaning political party - the party most 'uncomfortable' with the nation's historic failures and injustices - nevertheless passionately boasts of its elder tradition, identifies itself with the nation's political and social history and takes pride in its 'true believers.'

A paradox I note in passing is how, in the face of this strange and fractious consensus, the mass media interpret contemporary Australian reality in a rhetoric of war, division, fragmentation, criminal violence, hatred, racism and irreconcilable difference. The national newspaper, The Australian, presents itself as the clarion of republicanism and champion of reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples. Yet in the saturation coverage of the Australian Reconciliation Convention in 1997 and subsequent feature coverage of Reconciliation Commission celebrations and events, the newspaper marshalled its artists, cartoonists and page-editors to depict the public events with graphic metaphors of war, racial hatred, axe-blades dripping blood and a continent riven by tectonic schisms. There was a total absence of any recognition of this presentation as paradoxical, tragic or ironic. The Australian's imagery of racial strife is not atypical of other spheres of public discourse and its representation in the popular media (ABC, 1999; Kelly, 1999; Steketee, 1999).

The intentional and unintentional instances of the paradox to which I am drawing attention - an emotional display of contempt and hatred between rivals to represent 'Australia' - is characteristic of a desperate, perhaps dysfunctional, love of country. Nowhere is this more explicit than in Ausflag's perennial scorn for the nation's primary emblem, the national flag. Ausflag's advocacy revolves around the proposition that the nation's flag is an embarrassment and its retention is a symbol of humiliation (Kelly & Scruby, 2001). Contempt and scorn are meted out to those opposing its views. No less than in dysfunctional families, where powerful emotions threaten havoc and breakdown, Australian political and patriotic discourse exhibits a similar range of negative emotions.

The Emotional Terrain of Identity

The embarrassment, humiliation and shame expressed in Australian political rhetoric and media commentary are manifestations of what psychologists of emotion have long called the 'looking glass self.' Technically speaking they are expressions and displays of the self-regarding, negative, social emotions arising from inwardly experienced mental and physiological responses to stress, anxiety, exposure and perceived defect or failure. These markers of emotion are employed to indicate and give voice to 'moods,' the motions, in other words, of our inner feelings. Not thoughts, but feelings. Not facts or probabilities, but the inward feeling, the emotional sense of ourselves and of our presentation to others. (Elster, 1999, 244-50; Goffmann, 1956, 1959; Harré & Parrott, 1996, 39-56).

The ritualistic use of embarrassment, humiliation and shame in Australian public discourse draws attention not only to their apparent use as performatives of moral condemnation, but as rhetorical strategies to enable the speaker to declare his or her own guilt. It is degradation by association with the act or person being condemned. This psychologically charged use of the terms I designate as dissociative or contrastive identity.

The terms not only describe and express feelings as experienced, but also have the clear rhetorical purpose of engendering similar feelings in others. Listeners or readers are not simply informed of the speaker's feelings vicariously. Rather, they are enjoined to share empathetically, and thus experience, a shared actual shame and embarrassment. Thus one does not just oppose a particular politician or a piece of legislation. We do not merely dislike the person or the proposed policy. Rather, we proclaim ourselves to be embarrassed or shamed by that person or that policy. We are humiliated, suffering a loss of esteem and competence in our own eyes. We confess to a sense of guilt in the eyes of some larger world.

These strong emotions may be expressed outwardly to a presumed world audience (for example in the case of the treatment of refugees and immigrants); inwardly (in the case of 'shameful' events, policies and leaders); or generally (in relation to indigenous issues and racial reconciliation). Whether the issue is grave (in the case of refugees or indigenous issues) or utterly trivial (the selling and delivery of tickets to the Olympics), Australians are likely to react with extraordinary reports of severe embarrassment and shame.

A relatively minor but familiar example will illustrate the play of self-regarding emotions in political discourse.

Australian politicians are continually criticised for behaving in parliament like school yard bullies. They give every appearance of being spoiled, wilful, abusive, profane and undisciplined boys throwing calculated tantrums and generally behaving badly. The typical critique of parliamentary invective - the tone, attitude and moral concepts employed - is reminiscent of the nanny in the nursery or the stern schoolmarm attempting to bring the naughty boys back into line. Of course we now have naughty girls too. With Pauline Hanson, Bronwyn Bishop and Cheryl Kernot in mind, there is shame enough to mete out with a degree of equity.

These unhappy metaphors for the place and persons intended to represent the nation - occasionally someone will observe that, uncannily, perhaps they do - leads to a paradoxical conflation of what is naughty and nice. On the one hand, parliamentary bad behaviour is a linguistic archaism, reflecting a nostalgia harkening to old traditions of formal speech and highly stylised public oratory. For these mainly older, desk bound, committee-plagued men with large egos, parliamentary shouting matches enable them to glory in the ancient citizen-soldier's example of heroism and the feudal knight's courtly metaphors of military combat (now only partly transmuted into the cognates of sport). Is it entirely bad of them to enact, however artificial and unconvincing the performance, a ceremonial tribute to truth-telling, honour and dignity?

On the other hand, the criticism of parliamentary behaviour is an instance of the shaming devices at work. The schoolmarm and nanny subdue their charges not with the rod, and certainly not with sweet reason, knowing too well how powerless that is in the case. Rather they wield more profound weapons, whose inflicted bruises are psychological: shame and self-disgust meted out to the perpetrator. The opportunity for ridicule, self-righteousness and a familiarity with shame is also generously extended to all the other children. The vituperative rhetoric - 'Shame on you!' - apportions scorn to the bullies, but also assigns a general shame for the unruliness of the whole playground. The idea of using shame to ameliorate the moral level of a nation's public life is neither very happy nor convincing. It seems no more likely to work than the schoolmarm's scolding will create a classroom full of happy, well-adjusted, diligent pupils.

Nevertheless, the schoolmarm's righteous indignation resounds in the daily emotional pulse of Australian public discourse. An 'outrage' will dominate the media leads for a period of time, then subside in the wake of an apparently inexhaustible fund of new outrages. Generally it is a politician's cupidity, but it might be someone or something else that seems, on the basis of daily news reports, to have the national in a paroxysm of moral indignation. Interest or action on any other front is treated as gross negligence of the need for rectification of the current crisis, compounding the shame of it all.

Something like this moral indignation animated the reaction to John Howard's first, fateful reference in 1996 to his hoping to govern in a way that would make Australians feel 'relaxed and comfortable.' What smugness and temerity! What oafish complacency! What callous and philistine indifference! How dare he say such a thing?

It seems, upon reflection, that anyone feeling, thinking and speaking with such vehemence has to be profoundly secure - a devout patriot with a moral sense that is deeply identified with the welfare of the nation. Whereas by contrast, John Howard's platitude was experienced as disgusting: a betrayal of the needs, aspirations and desire for an arduous justice which can only be won by vigilance, ceaseless striving and sacrifice.

My point here is not about policy or electoral majorities. I simply draw attention to a process of strong national identity at work, confidently expressed. Yet it is highly unlikely that those who experienced such feelings, as well as those who were or wanted to be relaxed and comfortable, could define in words a generally agreed 'national identity' or agree on a symbolic means of representing it. Both silence and antagonism have an eloquence of intention that may be missed or mistaken unless one listens with special care.

So complex a phenomenon as national identity, therefore, may be expressed as much by conflictual, dissociative and contrastive emotional outbursts as by positive emotional and attitudinal consensus. Strong negative feelings about persons or things, indeed even strong negative ('abreactive') feelings about 'Australia,' may well demonstrate, a forteriori, the robust expression of identification.

The Formation of Identity

Many commentators have emphasised the difficulty of defining or identifying a 'true' Australian national identity (Crough & Wheelright, 1982; Hudson & Carter, 1993; Melleuish, 1998; Spillman, 1997; Whitlock & Carter, 1992; White, 1981; Willis, 1993.) Recent evidence of this identity crisis is superabundant: the 1999 referendum (proposing a preamble to the constitution and a republican 'head of state'), the perennial campaign to design and adopt a new national flag, and the fraught policy of 'reconciling' indigenous, Anglo-Celtic, European and non-European 'communities.' It has been often suggested that Australians are simply confronted with an intractable dilemma in this regard. This has led some to conclude that there is no such thing as an Australian identity, thus the task is pointless and doomed to failure (McQueen, 1998).

The virtual consensus of academic and journalistic despair (or postmodern ironic celebration) with regard to this conclusion invites a counter-proposition. 'Australia' is, despite the absence of a sharply defined national identity, an object of interest, feeling, passion and value. This proposition, certainly in the public domain of rhetorical evidence, is at least sufficiently intuitive to warrant the following hypothesis: If interests, passions and values associated with 'Australia' are contentious and inflammatory, the apparent contradiction of a missing identity implies not the absence but rather the presence of a powerful process of identification. Something so emotionally encompassing, historically bound and personally resonant as a national identity surely cannot be merely 'documented' by an explicit, singular, positive definition. Even less should it be expected to be easily and happily reduced to a static (much less statutory) form of words or a cleverly inventive logo. It is fatuous to imagine that an Australian identity does not exist because, even with the aid of Les Murray and several poll-conscious assistants, John Howard's literary powers proved unequal to the task of expressing it in a neat paragraph. The proposed preamble text was a 'statement of definition' of Australia sold as a 'best on offer' poll-driven product which conceived the nation as a collection of niche-market consumers. The failed referendum was not evidence of a weak or non-existent national identity but a rejection of the craven reduction of emotional recognisance to a mosaic of platitudes and brittle stereotypes.
Nevertheless, a 'reductive' expression of national identity is undoubtedly appealing for media-savvy governments. An 'official definition' and recognisable visual symbols are crucially important for purposes of accessible identification, even when this serves the paltry convenience of 'branding.' (One thinks of the 'mascot' symbols, slogans and colours of football clubs.) But there is a great difference between a lack of consensus about a reductive definition of national identity, which is only a form of words, and a psychologically complex powerfully felt, dynamically experienced 'identification.' Of course it is possible to be strongly attached to a form of words if those words identify and resonate directly with stronger, more deeply engaging 'forms' which animate, personify and bind the emotions.
The 'trouble' is that Australia is far from having a reductive, simply defined or positive identity. The nation's several meanings and rival symbols, its common and disparate identities, are hotly contentious. If this is a problem - and there is no reason to deny that in various ways it is - it would seem that the only reasonable path would be to reduce the heat, but certainly not try to put out the fire.
Emotional Control & National Self-Identity
A relatively recent but significant body of literature in the humanities and social sciences has given serious reconsideration to the emotions as important social phenomena. Edelman (1987, ix), for example, states that
the very experience of embarrassment can have a very dramatic effect on our day-to-day lives. It is systematically built into our social system, controlling and occasionally inhibiting our everyday behavious and in particular our social behaviour.

Spread across several traditional disciplines - mainly psychology, sociology, history and philosophy - this scholarship has in common a focus upon the emotions in relation to social structure and function, and as mechanisms of differentiation and control. Even scientific treatises on the neurophysiology and chemistry of emotions, taking their cue from Charles Darwin's foundational study of 1872, reflect an appreciation of the evolutionary, social and relational context and adaptive functions of emotional behaviour (Panksepp, 1998).

Typically cited in the recent literature are the landmark studies of the historical evolution of the 'affectivity of human behaviour' by Norbert Elias (1939/1978) and the socio-psychological studies of Erving Goffman (1956, 1959) which delineate the importance of embarrassment and shame in shaping and constraining the 'presentation of the self.' What is significant for present purposes is that the 'negative emotions' of embarrassment, shame, guilt and anger are specified as 'social emotions.' These emotions have functional and adaptive effects in prescribing and regulating behavioural norms and preserving cultural values supportive of honour, esteem, status and moral appraisal (Gross & Stone, 1964).

What is especially powerful about the negative emotions is their dual capacity of self-enforcement and social enforcement. We experience embarrassment for a real or imagined faux pas when our blunder is seen by an observer, whereas we may feel shame quite privately as we acknowledge our guilt and the consequence of lowered self-esteem.

In an area of inquiry that even specialists routinely describe as murky because of its mental and subjectively experienced nature, it is not surprising to find a number of controversies and divergent classifications and interpretations. Nevertheless, it is encouraging to see scholars moving beyond obligatory 'critiques of rationalism' and 'Cartesian mind/body fallacies' to examine bodily self-awareness and self-control, intimate as well as public presentation, social norms and constraints, and the integration of emotional dispositions in relation to public markers of status, effectiveness and esteem.

This is not to say that perennial philosophical and theoretical issues have been solved or dismissed. Students of human emotion grapple with the question of what is universal and what is socially constructed in the range of emotional phenomena, what is epistemologically coherent or empirically verifiable when classifying or comparing emotional experiences, or measuring their intensity within or between individuals. Nevertheless, one cannot deny that the emotions constitute an important phenomenological range of personal, relational and social experience.

It is perhaps not too bold a premise - a premise, indeed, that one may evaluate intuitively at a personal level - to say that the emotional self is the personal self. It is possible to imagine a creature entirely lacking, or incapable of, emotions. But that being would not be a person in the sense of possessing a 'self' - that is, having an identity communicable or reciprocal to other selves. It is interesting that psychologists link the inability to be emotionally self-aware - to 'have feelings' and to show emotion - directly to the inability to disclose ourselves to others. A therapist (Swiller, 1988) quoted such a patient: 'I don't naturally express my feelings. I don't know what to talk about; I have no strong feelings, either positive or negative.' This patient's 'emotional flatness' was diagnosed as alexithyma, a Greek term meaning 'lack of words for emotion,' a condition given its first description in 1972 (Sifneos, 1991).

It will be readily granted that participants in Australian public discourse who declare their embarrassment, shame and humiliation do not suffer from alexithyma. My present point, of course, is that their emotional identity is sound. The complementarity is that their social identification is strong and, in an important sense, secure. Even though the negative emotions signify a response to challenges to one's sense of security, worth or esteem, 'shame signals' are properly understood as reinforcing rather than subversive of the 'social bond.' That is to say, the emotional response is a 'reply' - a parry to the thrust made against one's personal safety and well-being. Hence, for example, the blush of embarrassment is an appeal, an act of obeisance, regret, apology and contrition. Thus it is a means of recovery in the wake of a faux pas. A manifest display of shame and guilt is a moral penance, and may be a public token of punishment, atonement and supplication for restoration and reintegration. This is why shame has been described (Scheff, 1994, 53) as the 'master emotion.'

Shame seems to arise from our need to feel the right degree of connectedness with others. Shame is the emotion that occurs when we feel too close or too far from others. When too close, we feel exposed or violated; when too far, we feel invisible or rejected …. [T]he basic shame contexts - transgressing morally, making a mistake in public, being ridiculed or rejected - all involve the potential for exclusion or incorporation or the anticipation of exclusion or incorporation. The basic pride contexts - achievement or success, admiration or love - all involve notice or acceptance.

All societies train their members to balance closeness and distance, the interests of self and others….

Just as [the emotion of] fear automatically signals a that to the safety of our physical self (our bodies), so shame automatically signals a threat to our social self, the person that we think we are and expect others to think that we are. We need to feel connected because the self is a social product, just as the body is a biological one. (Scheff, 1994, 40-41, 51; italics in original).

These 'affective' responses or 'abreactions' typically reflect an intensity of emotion expressive of having been soiled or damaged by something monstrous, repugnant, repulsive, disgusting. It takes us to the emotional terrain bordering deeply embedded cultural and psychological taboos. Rhetorical expressions of shame, humiliation and disgust have the effect of analogising how one is soiled by the 'dirt' of politics with the psychological imagery and repressive forces associated with a person's 'abject' or debilitating response in the presence of horror: of forbidden, repellent and degrading things at the borders of birth, sexual acts, other 'lower' bodily functions, and death (Kristeva, 1982). To acknowledge, much less to be identified with, the figure of taboo is to invite horror and disgust. To be identified with the taboo is to become it.
These extreme affective expressions are associated with other experiences and expressed by wider emotional responses such as 'pathos' - the negative, extreme, passionate emotions we have on occasions of anger, grief, sorrow or revulsion. But these are not 'pathological' human responses. Emotional experiences and expressions have highly beneficial and adaptive effects in domestic and social life. This seems to be true for our own species as well as others (Moussaieff & McCarthy, 1996).
There is a long tradition of philosophical 'opposition' to the power of emotions. Since Aristotle they have not been treated as an intellectual 'faculty,' and therefore the emotions have been regarded as subordinate and essentially antithetical to reason. Indeed this is one of the 'prejudices' that Aristotle holds against rhetoric, since the rhetor must necessarily 'lower' himself to persuasion by acting upon the audience's emotions. Powerful emotion, especially love, has been treated with disdain by political thinkers, who tend to ignore it, propose careful legal and social constraints upon its expression, or (with many poets) dismiss it as a debilitating 'sickness,' a particularly intractable, if common, form of insanity (Duggin, forthcoming).

Triumphant Opposition

With apologies to Lewis Carroll, words have an uncanny way of meaning exactly the opposite of what we mean to say. As noted above, Australians are commonly described as having a laid-back indifference to politics and a larrikin irreverence for politicians and other persons of rank. We are said to be casually vulgar of speech, ironic in the face of sentiment and cynical toward established conventions. Yet these stereotypical characteristics nevertheless exist side by side with passionate patriotism, prideful aspirations and a jealous regard for Australia's rightful place in the overall scheme of things. Godzone, not to put too fine a point on it.

The myth of politically apathetic Australians has been eroded for a quarter of a century by another myth, or at least a political talisman. Those who solemnly vowed to 'maintain the rage' appear to have done so with little sense of the ironic. This historic sound-byte from November 1975 has evolved into something like an article of faith - a staunch 'manly virtue' in the classical sense to 'stand up' in a heroic display of emotive outrage. To argue that something is wrong, illegal or unconventional is insufficient condemnation. Rather, emotional satisfaction is attainable only by a proclamation of 'outrage.' It would be a mistake to dismiss this cliché as merely the hyperbole of people overused to having an ABC microphone shoved in their faces. It is, I suggest, manifest evidence of passionate, confident, vigorous national identification. There is something in it of Shakespeare's account of the downfall of Julius Caesar, and the need for all parties, especially the dying Caesar, to recognise that there is a higher loyalty, consecrated by travesty, broken trust and the stain of blood publicly spilled that is of far greater worth than mere craven ambition or a lack of friends in the Senate.
Is there in all of this something noble about Gough Whitlam's refusal of exile from Canberra, and his life-long commemoration of November 25th? Who would deny that his 'rage' exceeds in purity and strength that of all others - the true aristocrat of outrage? It might be said that his is some ultimate form of patriotism even in this quarter-century and more of opposition, repudiation and probably - at some sublime level to which mere mortals may not be admitted - profound and consuming shame. Yet he has now survived, in the midst of friend and foe, as the great living spolia opima - to see his conqueror stand beside him as a companion at arms in the service of a new republic.

Paul Corcoran

George Crowder

School of Political and International Studies

Flinders University

VALUE PLURALISM AND THE VIRTUES OF LIBERALISM

Abstract

Does Berlinian value pluralism assist or impede the justification of liberalism? In contrast with recent commentators such as John Gray, I argue that a reasoned case for liberal universalism is not only compatible with value pluralism but can be derived from it. Pluralism implies that there are many different legitimate conceptions of the good, and it might seem that the liberal good is only one such among others. But pluralism also implies that reasoned choices among conflicting plural and incommensurable values in particular cases require a particularist form of practical reasoning which is supported by certain pluralist ‘virtues.’ These, in turn, overlap or are reinforced by the civic virtues distinctive of liberal forms of politics. The value-pluralist outlook thus endorses liberalism (the liberal virtues) as an ethical framework for the best lives under pluralism, hence it endorses a perfectionist liberal state in which such lives are actively promoted.

VALUE PLURALISM AND THE VIRTUES OF LIBERALISM

What is the relation between liberalism and value pluralism? This question is attracting a rapidly growing literature.¹ Its starting point is the political philosophy of the late Isaiah Berlin, who was both a pluralist and a liberal.² Berlin’s pluralism consists in the view that fundamental human values are irreducibly plural, potentially conflicting, and incommensurable. His liberalism is signalled by a defence of human rights and personal liberty as fundamental to any decent or humane form of politics. Berlin evidently thinks that value pluralism and liberalism are compatible. Moreover, in some places he seems to go further, arguing that pluralism justifies liberalism. In the seminal ‘Two Concepts of Liberty’ he argues that if values are plural and incommensurable, then when such values come into conflict we cannot escape making radically hard, perhaps tragic, choices among them; in which case we must value the freedom to make such choices, a freedom best promoted by liberal political institutions (Berlin 1969, 168).

The claim that value pluralism and liberalism are compatible, even mutually supportive, has been increasingly challenged in recent years, most prominently by John Gray.³ For Gray, the political implications of Berlin’s pluralism are much more radical and much less sympathetic to liberalism than Berlin himself realised. If values really are plural and incommensurable, then none is inherently superior or inferior to any other, each makes its own distinctive claim. Rankings of such values in particular cases must then be the result not of universal reason but merely of subjective preferences or at best of local cultural inheritance. It seems to follow that liberalism itself represents no more than one such subjective or local ranking of values among others. The universal priority accorded by Berlin and other liberals to goods such as human rights and personal liberty cannot be defended in the rational and universal terms characteristic of the liberal tradition. At best, the truth of value pluralism is compatible with what Gray calls an ‘agonistic’ liberalism, clear-sighted in its modest claim to being only one solution among others to the problem of conflicting incommensurables, with no pretensions to universal superiority (Gray 1995b, Ch. 6).

In this paper I shall respond to Gray’s argument not by tackling it head-on, but by the more oblique strategy of setting up an alternative view of the political implications of value pluralism, showing how pluralism itself can generate a distinctive and powerful case for liberalism. How is this possible? It is hard to deny the weakness of many attempts to argue from pluralism to liberalism, Berlin’s included. From the fact of value plurality and incommensurability it does follow that people must make hard choices when plural and incommensurable values conflict, but it does not follow that we must value such choices or (therefore) the freedom with which to make them (Crowder 1994, 298). Pluralism does not imply a case for liberal freedom of choice in the direct way that Berlin seems to suppose.

However, even if the pluralist-liberal arguments offered by Berlin and others are unsuccessful as they stand, that does not show that there could be no successful argument of the kind.⁴ While such a case may be supported by several lines of argument, here I shall focus on one in particular. Pluralism implies that there are many different legitimate conceptions of the good, and it might seem that the liberal good is only one such among others. But pluralism also implies that reasoned choices among conflicting plural and incommensurable values in concrete cases require a particularist form of practical reasoning which is supported by certain pluralist ‘virtues.’ These, in turn, overlap or are reinforced by the civic virtues distinctive of liberal forms of politics. The value-pluralist outlook thus endorses liberalism (the liberal virtues) as an ethical framework for the best lives under pluralism, hence it endorses a perfectionist liberal state in which such lives are actively promoted. Moreover, this argument is universal in scope, since it rests on a view of moral experience that applies universally. Far from yielding the modestly agonistic liberalism favoured by Gray, there is good reason to believe that value pluralism implies a case for liberalism in a robustly universalist and perfectionist form.

1. Value pluralism and practical reasoning

I begin by sketching the main conceptual elements of value pluralism before drawing out its implications for moral and political thinking. ‘Value pluralism’ is a highly contentious idea, and I have space here to do no more than offer my own working interpretation.⁵ Nor shall I attempt to pursue in detail the difficult question of why, if at all, we should believe value pluralism to be true.⁶ My overall question will be, supposing pluralism to be true, what are its implications for liberalism? In this section I set out the idea of value pluralism in a degree of detail sufficient for my purposes.

I take the idea of value pluralism to consist of four main elements: universality, plurality, conflict, and incommensurability. First, pluralists claim that there are certain fundamental values that are universal in the sense that they contribute to the flourishing of any human life (Berlin 1992, 79-80; Kekes, 1993, 17-19, 38-44; Nussbaum 1990, 1992a, 1992b, 2000). These values range from the satisfaction of survival needs, such as the need for food and shelter, to benefits required for any human life to count as a good life, such as friendship and intimacy, to the social and political values that frame the potentialities and limits of individual lives, including values such as justice, liberty and equality. Such values may be understood or instantiated in different ways in different cultural or material circumstances. They are also objective in the sense that these things make any human life go better than it would otherwise, even if particular individuals or societies do not recognize this.

Secondly, the things that are valuable for human beings - including both universal and local values - are plural or several. They cannot be reduced to a single good or narrow range of goods, unless this is a trivial or empty category such as ‘happiness’ understood as meaning no more than ‘what is good for human beings.’ Furthermore, values are themselves internally complex, containing distinct components (also subject to material and cultural variation in particular instantiations) that add further to moral diversity.

Thirdly, these plural values may in particular cases come into conflict with one another. That is, they may be incompatible or mutually exclusive, such that one may be realizable only at the cost of sacrificing or curtailing another - as for example if ‘liberty’ may be increased only by sacrificing some degree of ‘equality’.

The fourth component of pluralism is the most distinctive. This is that values are not only potentially incompatible, they may also be incommensurable with one another. An ethical monist could allow that there are many different values and that these may clash, but add that such conflicts can be resolved by reference to a universal ranking procedure. Such a procedure would set up either a super-value to which all other goods are subordinate, or a common denominator in terms of which all goods could be quantified. Classical Benthamite utilitarians, for example, hold that all values are quantifiable, and therefore rankable in particular cases, in terms of their capacity to produce ‘pleasure.’ For the value pluralist, however, no basic value is inherently superior to any other, and none embraces or summarizes all other values. Rather, there are many different values, all bearing their own unique character and force, and none is always subordinate or reducible to any other. In contrast with classical utilitarians, for example, value pluralists will regard pleasure as merely one value among others, a value grounding claims of its own which are no more fundamental or authoritative than claims based on, say, liberty or justice. (More accurately, on the value-pluralist view there will be no single good of ‘pleasure’, but many different pleasures, each with its own character and ethical force.)

It follows from the notion of incommensurability in particular that value pluralism is opposed to value monism, the view that a single super-value or narrow range of such values overrides or serves as a common denominator for all others. Berlin observes that monism has been the dominant view of the nature of value, in one version or another, throughout the history of Western thought (Berlin 1992, 4-7). In one version the monist structure of morality is thought to be contained in the will of God or the fabric of the universe, yielding a natural law that human beings could discover by the use of their reason. Alternatively a monist system might be implied by the nature of human wants or preferences, as in the case of utilitarianism. What is common to all monist views is the idea that in some sense human morality forms a unified or harmonious whole. Its practical implication is that all moral conflicts can be solved, at least in principle, by reference to a single ranking of values, or method of commensurating them, that applies in all cases.

For pluralists like Berlin, value monism is false because moral conflict goes deeper than this. ‘The world that we encounter in ordinary experience is one in which we are faced with choices between ends equally ultimate, and claims equally absolute, the realisation of some of which must inevitably involve the sacrifice of others’ (Berlin 1969, 168). Monism need not deny moral conflict altogether. But according to value pluralists, monism (like relativism) underestimates the depth of moral conflict, regarding it as a superficial or temporary phenomenon, or as at least in principle surmountable by a clearer conception of the essential unity of moral values and principles. Value pluralism, on the other hand, takes actual ethical conflicts as an accurate sign that the moral fissures we regularly experience run all the way down.

Many people will find the pluralist picture of the nature of values persuasive and even attractive. It fits with salient aspects of modern moral experience: our sense of the multiplicity of values, and of the distinctness of those values which shows up, in particular, in those cases where we have to choose among them. Value pluralism seems to explain why we sometimes find that even a decision that is the best possible in the circumstances still leaves us with a sense of uncompensated loss or regret. As Bernard Williams puts it, ‘that there is nothing that one decently, honourably, adequately, can do in a certain situation seems a kind of truth as firmly independent of the will or inclination as any truth of morality seems’ (Williams 1979, 225). The idea of value pluralism, of goods as not merely plural and conflicting but incommensurable, answers to this experience.

But here we come to the central problem: if goods are plural and incommensurable, then how can we decide what to do in cases where they conflict? Some philosophers believe that if values are incommensurable then we can choose among them only in some non-rational way: by ‘plumping’ arbitrarily for one or another, by relying on preference or desire or intuition, or by employing some random decision-procedure like tossing a coin.⁷ The better view is that value pluralism need not exclude reasoned value judgement. True, there may be cases where conflict between plural values yields no resolution that is decisively more rational than the alternatives. The truth of value pluralism certainly does not exclude the possibility of genuine moral dilemmas; on the contrary it helps to explain how such dilemmas can occur. But to allow that there may be no uniquely right answer in some situations is not to deny the possibility of such an answer in others. The claim that pluralism excludes reasoned value judgement altogether depends on a false assumption, namely that rational choice requires commensurability (Richardson 1997, 89). Pluralists can account for the possibility of rational choice despite the incommensurability of values.

What account of practical reasoning can pluralists give that does not depend on commensurability of values? I believe they can give two such accounts. Both of these, moreover, generate arguments for broadly liberal forms of politics (pace Gray). The first is a universalist account, according to which certain ethical or normative principles are implicit in the notion of value pluralism itself. If we reflect on the four elements of pluralism, we find that they suggest a set of normative criteria applicable to judging moral and political arrangements. First, the claim that there are at least some universal goods implies that these ought to be respected universally: an embryonic account of human rights (Riley 2000). Secondly, to emphasize the plurality of legitimate human goods is to commend the pursuit of a diversity of goods and ways of life, the accommodation of which is a natural goal of liberalism. Thirdly (a point stressed by Berlin), the notions of plurality, conflict and incommensurability, taken together, suggest the unavoidability of significant value conflict in human affairs, and consequently of reasonable disagreement about how one should live. They point, that is, to a form of politics which accepts such conflict as permanent and tries to manage rather than transcend it. Again this reinforces a liberal politics of accommodation rather than, on the one hand, a conservative or strongly communitarian politics of cultural orthodoxy or, on the other hand, a radical politics of transformation and perfectibility (classical Marxism or anarchism, for example). The value-pluralist case intersects at this point with neutrality-based arguments for liberalism familiar from Rawls (1971, 1993), Dworkin (1977, 1985) and others.

I want, though, to focus here on a different route from pluralism to liberalism, one resting on a second account of practical reasoning under pluralism. This is a particularist account, according to which reasons to choose among plural values are generated by attention to the context of the choice. It takes as its starting point the observation that although value pluralism appears to make more abstract or general rankings of values problematic, there seems to be less difficulty in choosing rationally among plural values in particular cases or contexts. How does attention to context enable rational choice among plural values? The short answer is that specification of context reveals the values that are most important to us, hence the values that guide choice. Conversely, to get clearer about the values guiding my choice in a particular case involves my specifying the choice situation or context.

This picture of ethical judgement may be at odds with commensurating accounts like those of the utilitarians, but it is supported by a powerful and subtle tradition of moral philosophy, namely that of Aristotle. Martha Nussbaum (1986, 1992b, 1993, 1995) provides an especially useful interpretation of Aristotle for my purposes because she emphasizes the extent to which his account of practical reasoning is conditioned by an implicit notion of value pluralism.⁸ According to Nussbaum, Aristotle’s starting point is his rejection of the ‘scientific’ conception of moral knowledge found in Plato. For Plato, the Good is like any other object of knowledge in that it can be understood from a detached, ‘god’s-eye’ standpoint as a single entity with an essence, the implications of which can be formulated as law-like rules of universal application. Aristotle, by contrast, sees ethical thinking as phronesis, or ‘practical wisdom’, the making of ‘concrete situational judgments of a more informal and intuitive kind’ (Nussbaum 1992b, 66). Moreover, Aristotle sees the good not as a seamless unity but as irreducibly plural. Its component parts each raise distinct considerations among which there is no common denominator - goods are plural and incommensurable. Choices among such goods must therefore be qualitative rather than quantitative: ‘choice among alternatives will involve weighing these distinct natures as distinct items, and choosing the one that gets chosen for the sake of what it itself is’ (Nussbaum 1992b, 59).

Such choices will be strongly particularist, primarily informed by the demands of a situation rather than being merely one application of a general rule. For Aristotle, practical wisdom is concerned with ‘ultimate particulars’, concrete situations that cannot be subsumed within universal principles ‘but must be grasped with insight through experience’ (Nussbaum 1992b, 68). This point is connected with incommensurability, since attention to the particularity of goods leads to attention to the particularity of cases. Rules may still play an important role, but only as rules of thumb or convenient summaries of experience, useful for those who lack experience themselves or for situations where there is insufficient time for proper reflection. Rules should not be normative for experience. It follows that the question of how one should choose among conflicting plural values cannot be given a wholly general or rule-based answer. The nearest approach to a general rule on this account is: ‘choose as the person of practical wisdom would choose.’

Nussbaum denies, however, that Aristotle’s particularist ethic is empty. The Aristotelian agent cannot rely wholly on antecedently formulated rules, but that does not mean that anything goes. Nussbaum draws an analogy between Aristotelian practical judgement and improvisation in the theatre or in music. The improvisor does not merely follow a prepared script or score, but neither is her performance random or arbitrary: she must attend and respond to the evolving situation and to other performers (Nussbaum 1992b, 94). Attention and responsiveness to the concrete context might thus be advanced as a general guideline, even a rule, on the Aristotelian view. Furthermore, attention to context will include attention to the agent’s own background values and concerns. ‘The perceiver brings to the new situation a history of general conceptions and commitments, and a host of past obligations and affiliations (some general, some particular), all of which contribute to and help to constitute her evolving conception of good living’ (Nussbaum 1992b, 94). It is not that the Aristotelian account leaves us without guidance in choosing among plural values. Rather, that guidance is supplied not by abstract rules alone, but by a combination of rules, attention to context, and (as part of context) reflection on one’s background values and concerns, in particular one’s conception of the good life.⁹

2. Pluralist virtues

Particularist ethical reasoning requires, as Aristotelians are well aware, certain skills or excellences or ‘virtues’. Taking Nussbaum’s version of Aristotle as my model, I list four of these as follows: generosity, realism, attentiveness, and flexibility.

In order to reason successfully under value pluralism we must first have an appreciation of something of the great range of values that are part of human experience, and so potentially available to be pursued. This appreciation may be termed (following Walzer 1995) generosity. A person who can conceive of no more than a narrow range of values, or who has only a vague notion of all but a few limited ends, cannot cope well with the demands of rational choice under value pluralism. Such a person would be unaware of, or would ignore, genuinely valuable options (Macedo 1990, 219).

The person of practical wisdom under pluralism consequently needs to have an awareness of the diversity and incommensurability of universal values, and of the forms taken by those values in different ways of life. This awareness includes, first, a basic notion of the generic human goods, that is, of those goods that contribute to any form of human flourishing. Secondly, the pluralist chooser must also appreciate that the values from which one must choose are not only multiple but radically distinct from one another - that is, incommensurable. Pluralist choosers must therefore have a capacity to appreciate each value in its own right and for its own sake. Thirdly, some understanding would be needed of the multiplicity not only of human goods but also of legitimate ways of life in which those goods are instantiated. Value pluralism does not imply a duty to endorse existing ways of life to the same extent as it implies respect for generic human values. The general principles which I mentioned earlier as derivable from value pluralism itself (universality, incommensurability, and diversity) all place limits on what can count as a legitimate form of life from a pluralist point of view. But within those limits an appreciation of the range of legitimate forms taken by human life must be part of the pluralist outlook, if only as a consequence of the necessary grasp of the plurality of goods.

It follows that the pluralist person of practical wisdom will need those qualities or dispositions of mind that enable him or her to achieve the necessary appreciation of the diversity of values and ways of life. These qualities will include knowledge, experience, and what may be called ‘moral imagination’, or the ability to conceive of goods or forms of life as valuable even when one does not pursue them oneself. Pluralist persons of practical wisdom must therefore be generous in the sense that they are capable of envisaging a range of values and ways of life as genuinely good, and as comprising a number of irreducibly distinct goods, even though these are not their own values or ways of life.

A second set of virtuous dispositions necessary for good choice under pluralism can be labelled the virtues of realism. When incommensurable values come into conflict, one of the senses in which choices among them are ‘hard’ is that there can be no complete compensation for whatever value or combination of values is chosen against. Where such values are very important, pluralist choices can be genuinely tragic; even in less momentous cases inescapable choices among competing plural values can be cause for regret despite one’s best efforts. The clear-headed pluralist is thus, as Nussbaum observes, faced with the experience of ‘vulnerability to loss’: in having to choose among important plural values, we cannot escape forgoing some genuine good. ‘Aristotelianism fosters attention to the ways in which the world can impede our efforts to act well; it indicates that caring about many things will open us to the risk of these terrible situations’ (1992b, 67, 64).

The quality of mind required for this aspect of the pluralist outlook is honesty or even courage. Those who genuinely adopt a pluralist point of view cannot fool themselves that conflicts of this kind can be resolved without ultimate, perhaps tragic, cost. Rather, they must face the depth and permanence (as well as the pervasiveness) of value conflict and the absolute nature of the losses that result from it. They are ‘realists’, in contrast with ‘utopians’ who deal in final solutions and complete compensations.

Thirdly, rational choice under value pluralism requires attentiveness. We have seen that particular decisions in cases of conflict among incommensurables must be determined by a particularist approach, one in which close attention is paid to the particulars of the concrete situation. It is only by specifying the precise facts and values that constitute the context for choice that the pluralist chooser can specify what is most important to him or her in the situation. Only then can the chooser arrive at reasons to subject the contending considerations to some kind of ranking.

The idea of particularist attentiveness can be seen to have different aspects or levels, three of which can be distinguished as follows. First, attention must be paid to the distinctive character of the different goods involved in a choice situation. ‘The Aristotelian agent scrutinizes each valuable alternative, seeking out its distinct nature’ (Nussbaum 1992b, 63). Secondly, the agent must attend to the distinctive particularity of the situation, which is constituted partly by the values at stake but also by the relevant facts. For the pluralist or Aristotelian chooser, ‘the subtleties of a complex ethical situation must be seized in a confrontation with the situation itself’ (Nussbaum 1992b, 69). Thirdly, again closely connected with the first two aspects, we must attend to the individual persons involved in the situation, to their claims and needs. As Nussbaum reminds us, we should beware of losing sight of the human reality behind conflicts of values, and of allowing ‘numbers and dots’ to take the place of real men and women (1992b, 101).

The final virtue required for pluralist practical reasoning is flexibility. Having attended to the particulars of the concrete situation in which she finds herself, the pluralist chooser must be able to respond flexibly. That is, she must not insist on trying to resolve the situation by rigid application of a general rule, but rather be prepared to reach a balance between general rule and particular judgement tailored to the circumstances. Illustrating the idea of ethical flexibility, Nussbaum recounts Aristotle’s metaphor of the ‘Lesbian Rule.’ The person who persists in choosing according to a rigidly predetermined standard is like an architect who tries to apply a straight ruler to a fluted column. The architect who knows his business will use the Lesbian Rule, a flexible ruler that ‘bends to the shape of the stone and is not fixed.’ Nussbaum concludes that ‘good deliberation’, like the Lesbian Rule, accommodates itself to to the shape that it finds, responsively and with respect for complexity’ (1992b, 70).

Again, this does not mean that rules are irrelevant and that pluralist choices must be arbitrary or ad hoc. Even in the strongly particularist account of practical reasoning presented by Nussbaum, general rules have an important role to play as useful summaries of decision-making experience. But rules will not by themselves determine particular decisions. Rather, such decisions will require a process of ‘interplay’ or ‘conversation’ between general rules and concrete particulars in which each may be modified by the other (Nussbaum 1992b, 94-95). Especially important here is the ‘evolving picture of the good or complete human life’ that the agent brings to the situation. ‘She views the good particular judgement as a further articulation of this evolving conception of the human good - or as a revision of it, if it should seem defective. Nothing is unrevisable’ (1992b, 95).

The habit or cast of mind necessary for thinking and choosing in this way is that of flexibility. The pluralist chooser must be prepared to balance background commitments, including those summarized in the form of general principles or a conception of the good life, against considerations brought forward by attention to the concrete situation. Achieving such a balance means being open to reconsidering and revising either principles or particular judgments. The pluralist chooser must be flexible enough to consider changes in either direction.

Having shown how pluralist practical reasoning requires certain virtues, I shall now argue that those virtues flourish best under a broadly liberal form of politics. Liberalism promotes values and attitudes, indeed virtues, that in various ways complement or support the pluralist virtues identified in the previous section. I shall proceed by reviewing each of the pluralist virtues and articulating its connections with attitudes distinctively promoted by liberalism.

First, the generosity required by the pluralist outlook is virtually identical with the kind of broad-mindedness encouraged by liberalism at its best. We have seen that to be genuinely conscious of the plurality of values is to acknowledge as legitimate and valuable something of the range of distinct (incommensurable) goods and ways of life pursued not only by oneself but also by others. The same sort of generosity is a virtue of liberalism. It is true, as Galston points out, that liberals can sometimes be ‘decidedly ungenerous when faced with traditional ways of life they regard as stultifying and benighted’ (1999, 777). But at its best liberalism is guided in part by its foundational commitment to the peaceful accommodation of multiple forms of life. The attitude encouraged by this commitment is one ‘receptive to a wide although not unlimited range of value-based claims. It will be generous to ways of life that reflect unusual but not indefensible choices among, or orderings of, basic values’ (1999, 777). A similar point is made by Macedo: ‘the character that flourishes in a liberal, pluralistic social milieu, will have broad sympathies’ (1990, 267). This is because a liberal politics is one which balances the acceptance of disagreement with the acknowledgement of human commonalities. Liberals will acknowledge that although others may pursue different substantial goods and ways of life from their own, those others are still, like themselves, moral agents worthy of respect and therefore that their choices are also worthy of respect, at least prima facie. ‘As we come to realize that those who engage in lives different from our own are nevertheless like us in important ways, we may come to sympathize not only with these persons but also with their projects and commitments’ (Macedo 1990, 267). Liberal respect for persons leads at least to toleration of other cultures, and perhaps to a more positive celebration of cultural diversity.

Liberal broad-mindedness will not be unlimited, since it cannot embrace those choices and ways of life that are themselves hostile to toleration and respect for persons. But on the score of broadness of mind the liberal outlook is likely to be superior to the viable alternatives. This connects with the general pluralist principle of diversity. From the point of view of pluralist diversity, liberalism is superior to those conservative or strongly communitarian approaches that sanction the political enforcement of a single local tradition. The politics of postmodernism or ‘difference’ may be in a sense even more broad-minded than liberalism, but that is only because it lacks the limits that would make it coherent.¹⁰

The second virtue required for pluralist reasoning, realism, overlaps and is supported by the liberal virtue of moderation. Pluralists accept that incommensurable values will sometimes come into conflict and that such conflict will result in uncompensated, perhaps tragic, losses. Consequently, pluralists are realists in the sense that they accept that the harmonious realization of all genuine values is not to be achieved in human life, either the life of an individual person or a society. Liberals, similarly, accept the inevitability of conflict, loss, and personal and social imperfection – the theme emphasized by Berlin. The good political system, for liberals, is one that accommodates and manages conflict rather than trying to transcend it. It follows that the liberal outlook is moderate in two senses. First, liberalism is not excessively demanding or ambitious; it does not expect moral or social perfection. Secondly, those principles to which liberals are committed are themselves held and pursued subject to revision rather than with single-minded fanaticism.

In these senses moderation is a virtue for both citizens and leaders in a liberal society, and for both citizens and leaders moderation is underscored by pluralist realism. In his virtues-based defence of liberalism, Galston lists several ‘virtues of citizenship’, among which is the requirement that liberal citizens ‘be moderate in their demands and self-disciplined enough to accept painful measures when they are necessary’ (1991, 224-5). According to Galston, this virtue is especially important in counteracting a besetting vice of popular governments, namely their ‘propensity to gratify short-term desires at the expense of long-term interests and the inability to act on unpleasant truths about what must be done’ (1991, 224). The insistence that ‘unpleasant tuths’ about the costs of our decisions be faced honestly is precisely the message of pluralist realism. Moderation in the demands of liberal citizens must be complemented by moderation in the conduct of their leaders: the citizenry must not ask for too much, but the leadership must not promise too much. In addition, Galston argues that liberal leaders must exhibit virtues of patience in accepting the limitations of a diverse society, and integrity in resisting the temptation to curry favour ‘by pandering to immoderate public demands. Against desire liberal leaders must counterpoise restraints; against the fantasy of the free lunch they must insist on the reality of the hard choice...’ (1991, 226). Here again, in the emphasis on ‘the reality of the hard choice’, liberal moderation and pluralist realism overlap.

Another dimension of overlap between pluralist realism and liberal moderation is the provisional nature of liberal commitment. The experience of value conflict and loss that results from value pluralism may be ‘internalized’ (to borrow a term from Macedo 1990, 238) at either of two levels. First, it may be internalized by a society as a whole, with the effect already discussed, namely moderation in the sense of realistic social and political expectations. Secondly, value conflict and loss may be internalized by individual persons. The effect of this is also to encourage moderation, this time in the sense of moderating or qualifying the nature of one’s commitments. If pluralism means that the particular way a person ranks goods is only one legitimate way among others, then to appreciate that is to see that one’s preferred ranking might have been otherwise, and may yet be open to revision. To see this is to be discouraged from regarding one’s commitments as incontestable absolutes, and so to make it less likely that those commitments will be held fanatically, to the detriment of every other concern and to the concerns of others. Pluralist realism will thus lead again to liberal moderation. Conversely, living in a liberal society characterized by diversity and toleration encourages the thought that such features are justified by an underlying value pluralism: liberal moderation in this sense reinforces pluralist realism.

We come now to the third of the central virtues implied by pluralist practical reasoning, namely attentiveness. Due regard to value pluralism means that reasoned choices among conflicting plural values cannot be wholly determined by general rules, since these imply abstract rankings of values that pluralism renders questionable. Pluralist practical reasoning must be particularist, or attentive to the particularity of the case in hand. I distinguished three aspects of this attentiveness, namely attention to the particularity of values, of situations, and of persons.

Is pluralist attentiveness promoted by liberalism? At first sight it may seem that attention to particularity is not one of liberalism’s strong points. Liberal thought places a strong emphasis on the acceptance of general rules, derived by abstraction from particular cases and uniformly applicable across a range of such cases. One thinks immediately of principles such as the rule of law and universal rights. But while liberal commitments to rules and to generality cannot be denied, that does not mean that liberalism neglects the virtue of attentiveness altogether. In fact liberalism promotes attentiveness in all three of the respects listed earlier.

First, attention to the range and distinctiveness of values is already implied by the ‘generosity’ or broad-mindedness common to both pluralism and liberalism. Secondly, attention to the particularity of concrete situations is present in the liberal outlook in two ways. To begin with, general rules, whether liberal or non-liberal, are usually themselves the product of reflection on concrete situations. As Nussbaum points out, Aristotelian particularism can accept a universal rule as authoritative ‘insofar as it is a summary of wise decisions’ (1992b, 69). Many liberal principles are defensible in just this way. For example, the notion of human rights can be defended as encapsulating many particular judgments made in the past to the effect that in concrete situations more good comes of allowing people certain claims and liberties than of witholding these (Lukes 1993). This aspect of rules is not, of course, peculiar to liberal rules. More distinctive of liberalism is the way rules are applied in particular situations – the second sense in which the liberal outlook implies attention to concrete situations - but this involves the notion of personal autonomy, which I shall come to in a moment.

The third aspect of pluralist attentiveness was attention to the individual persons affected by a decision. In this respect liberal attentiveness is perhaps at its strongest, since the idea that individual persons matter, and matter equally, is the most fundamental of all liberal commitments. Among pluralist liberals, the ideal of respect for persons is seen, for example, in Berlin’s attack on those versions of positive liberty that make it possible for leaders ‘to ignore the actual wishes of men or societies, to bully, oppress, torture them in the name, and on behalf, of their "real" selves’ (1969, 133). Nussbaum’s warning against treating individual human beings as if they were ‘numbers and dots’ is another powerful expression of an attitude that is both pluralist and liberal (1992b, 101). Note also the link between liberal attention to persons and pluralist realism. What motivates attention of this kind is the ‘vulnerability to loss’ that pluralism implies, in this case the sense that each human being is something both valuable and irreplaceable.

It might be objected that what is being respected here is not so much the particularity of the persons concerned as the universal attributes of which persons are merely bearers. But this objection has more force against some versions of liberalism rather than others. The Kantian notion of respect for persons, it is true, takes as the focus of respect the capacity for moral autonomy that is possessed by all normal mature adult human beings equally. For Mill, on the other hand, liberty is to be defended in part as instrumental for ‘individuality’, the sense that as well as possessing a common humanity each individual human being is unique (1974, Ch. 3). In this notion of the human person as valuable in a way that is irreplaceable because incommensurable with the value of any other human being, the liberal view once more coincides with the pluralist.

So far I have argued that the pluralist virtues of generosity, realism and attentiveness are promoted by liberalism through the corresponding liberal virtues or attributes of broadmindedness, moderation and respect for persons. The question arises whether forms of politics other than liberalism may have the same effect. I believe that the points already made are sufficient to show that the claims of liberalism in this regard are superior to those of any rivals. This is true, for example, of a comparison between liberalism and conservatism (Kekes 1993, 1997, 1998). Conservatism may run liberalism close on the score of realism and moderation, but on the remaining criteria liberalism clearly has the stronger claim. The conservative stress on local tradition makes it less generous or broad-minded towards different goods and ways of life, and perhaps less attentive to the particularities of different situations.

If any doubt remains, however, liberalism decisively shows its advantages over its rivals in relation to the fourth of the pluralist virtues, namely flexibility. If pluralism requires that we attend to the particularities of concrete situations rather than insisting always on the application of general rules, whether universal or local, then we need to be able to respond flexibly to those situations. Corresponding to pluralist flexibility is the liberal celebration of personal autonomy. Since autonomy is the most distinctive of liberal virtues, a link between autonomy and flexibility will be the strongest of links between pluralism and liberalism.

The idea of personal autonomy is that of making one’s own life, judging and acting for reasons that one has not merely received uncritically from others, but rather endorsed through a process of critical reflection (Mill 1974, Raz 1986, Benn 1988). For liberals, autonomy is a virtue, perhaps the paramount virtue, the principal distinguishing mark of a developed personality. As Mill puts it, ‘it is the privilege and proper condition of a human being, arrived at the maturity of his faculties, to use and interpret experience in his own way’ (Mill 1974, 122). To be autonomous contrasts with being coerced or manipulated. It also contrasts with the uncoerced and unmanipulated acceptance of what Mill calls ‘the despotism of custom’, the unquestioning reception of prescriptive tradition as one’s ethical standard (1974, 136). To be autonomous is to act on standards that are ‘one’s own’ in a strong sense. It is to deny that value conflicts can be resolved simply by the mechanical application of traditional or other rules. Thus far autonomy, in its opposition to unquestioning adherence to custom, is immediately on the side of flexibility against rigidity in ethics.¹¹

The link between the liberal idea of personal autonomy and the pluralist requirement of flexibility in practical reasoning turns on the demanding nature of rational choice under pluralism. To adopt the pluralist outlook is to recognize that in a particular situation one may have to choose among several incommensurable goods. Such choices are hard, in part because they cannot be determined by the universal application of simple rules such as those proposed by utilitarians and other monists. Pluralist choosers must therefore be flexible in their practical reasoning, attending and responding to the particulars of the situation. Rules may be useful as rough summaries of wise decision making in past experience, but they cannot be regarded as decisive. Still less can pluralists allow their unexamined desires to decide value conflicts for them, since that would amount to treating the satisfaction of de facto preferences as commensurating all other values - another essentially monistic approach. Rather, pluralist choosers are obliged to adopt a critically reflective attitude towards both their own desires and those rules and traditions that come to them from their social milieu. They are obliged, that is, to be autonomous.

4. Pluralist liberalism

To summarize, I have so far argued the following. Practical reasoning under value pluralism involves the exercise of certain ‘pluralist virtues’, namely generosity, realism, attentiveness, and flexibility. These pluralist virtues are promoted by liberalism through the cognate or overlapping liberal virtues of broad-mindedness, moderation, respect for persons, and personal autonomy. Liberalism is superior to rival forms of politics in its support for the pluralist virtues, especially through the link between pluralist flexibility and the key liberal commitment to autonomy. There is an especially strong link of mutual support between pluralism and liberal autonomy because of the distinctively demanding nature of pluralist choice.

What kind of liberalism does this argument commend? To focus on two major fault-lines in contemporary liberal thought, will it be neutrality-based or perfectionist, and will it be universalist or particularist? First, pluralist liberalism will, I believe, be ‘perfectionist’ (following Rawls’s definition: 1971, 25, 325-332) rather than neutralist. That is, the pluralist liberal state may legitimately promote liberal values as part of the best life for all of its citizens, rather than attempting to remain neutral on questions of the good. It is true that the universalist arguments I outlined briefly – those based on the elements of value pluralism itself – are broadly accommodationist in character, advocating liberalism as a framework for managing diversity and conflict among rival goods and ways of life. But the particularist argument that has been my main concern goes beyond this by deepening the sense in which, on the pluralist view, liberalism should enter into people’s lives. The effect of the virtues argument is that liberalism is presented as not merely a container for rival conceptions of the good, but in addition as involving values which ought to be part of those conceptions of the good. To live well under pluralism requires choosing well (i.e. for good reason) when plural values conflict, which in turn requires the practice of liberal virtues, including personal autonomy. In short, the best lives under pluralism are liberal lives. This is not to say that under pluralism there is only one way to live. Rather, there are many different legitimate conceptions of the good on the pluralist view, but the best of these have liberal components, namely the virtues required for pluralist choice. In other words, liberalism provides not only a political framework for a pluralist society, but also an ethical framework for the best ways of life under pluralism. The best lives under pluralism are liberal lives, but these come in many varieties.

Given that, on this argument, liberalism is justified not merely as a neutral framework for containing rival conceptions of the good, but as itself part of the best form of life under pluralism, the role of the state should reflect this. A liberal state, on this view, has a right, even a duty, to promote a certain (liberal) range of conceptions of the good: it will be a ‘perfectionist’ state in Rawls’s terminology. However, it does not follow that the best way of fulfilling that right or duty will be heavy-handed enforcement. That the massive use of force can be both a cruel and unproductive way of advancing a vision of the good is itself an insight of pluralism: as Berlin insisted, the doctrine that ‘the end justifies the means’ fits more comfortably with the monist view that certain ends can override all others absolutely. Pluralist liberal perfectionism, in other words, need not be identified with coercion and imperialism, indeed it ought not to be so. More consistently with the principles of liberalism, the liberal good is better pursued through argument, education and lived examples of actual liberal lives. Pluralist liberalism, then, although tending towards the more militant end of the liberal spectrum, should not be thought of as ruthless and aggressive. It will nevertheless be staunch in defence of liberal values in contrast with the claims of anti-liberal or non-liberal ways of life. This will be a form of liberalism that dares speak its name.

Secondly, value pluralism will be universalist rather than particularist. This may seem surprising given my emphasis on particularist practical reasoning under pluralism, but the point is that this kind of reasoning, together with its concomitant virtues, is required universally because it answers to a universal feature of ethical experience. Value pluralism is an account of the objective nature of values and the relations among them: its central thesis is that some human values are plural and incommensurable independently of the contingent beliefs of particular individuals and groups. If that is true, it follows that conflicts among such values are themselves objective phenomena – as observed by Bernard Williams, quoted earlier (1979, 225). People may be faced with pluralist choices whether or not they recognize them as such. The concept of value pluralism may be modern, but the experience it describes is as old as ethical experience: the Greeks’ awareness of dramatic tragedy is strong evidence of this (Nussbaum 1992b; cp. Larmore 1996). If so, then the virtues necessary to make such choices well also apply regardless of whether those concerned are clear-headed pluralists. Pluralist choices may arise under any way of life, and so the qualities of mind requisite to coping well with those choices will always be desirable, even if not recognized as desirable, and even if not always realizable in practice. So far as the pluralist virtues overlap liberal virtues, the latter must, on the pluralist view, be part of the best life for any human being. I do not wish to say that a life that lacks the pluralist or liberal virtues, or that does not acknowledge the plurality and incommensurability of values, cannot be a good life in some, perhaps many, respects. There are good lives other than liberal and self-consciously pluralist lives, and good lives lived in ignorance of significant truths. If value pluralism is true, however, such lives will not be among the best possible.

Further questions remain, of course, about the kind of liberalism that fits best with the value-pluralist outlook. For example, will pluralist liberalism take a classical or egalitarian form, and will it be monocultural or multicultural? Briefly, I believe that pluralist liberalism will be broadly ‘egalitarian’ or redistributive rather than ‘classical’ or laissez-faire in form, since the pluralist ideals of value diversity and personal autonomy, in particular, are better served by redistribution than by a regime in which the goods of the market dominate all others (Walzer, 1983, Ch. 4; Bellamy 2000, 190-191). It also seems to me that a pluralist polity will be moderately multicultural, that is, that it will offer official recognition and special rights to certain disadvantaged minority cultures, subject to the protection of civil liberties for all citizens. This is in line with the demands both of pluralist diversity (of ways of life as well as goods) and of the pluralist-liberal virtues. Personal autonomy, in particular, requires an adequate cultural basis (Kymlicka, 1989, 1995; Raz, 1986, 1995). But full discussion of these issues must wait for another time.

Notes

1. Recent publications include: Bellamy, 1999, 2000; Crowder, 1998, 1999, forthcoming; Galston, 1999a, 1999b; Gray, 1998, 2000a, 2000b; Dzur, 1998; Kenny, 2000; Newey, 1998, Riley 2000.

2. See in particular Berlin 1969, 1980, 1981, 1992, 1996, 1997, 2000. For a comprehensive and continually updated bibliography of writing by and about Berlin, see The Isaiah Berlin Virtual Library, a website maintained by Berlin’s editor, Henry Hardy: <http://berlin.wolf.ox.ac.uk/.>

3. See Gray, 1989, 1993, 1995a, 1995b, 1998, 2000a, 2000b.

4. I depart here from my own earlier (1994) view that (1) past attempts to argue from value pluralism to liberalism have been unsuccessful, and (2) no such attempt is likely to succeed. I still maintain that (1) is true, but now believe that (2) was too precipitant.

5. My understanding of value pluralism is influenced by the following sources in particular: Berlin, as above, note 2; Chang, 1997; Galston, 1999a, 1999b, Gray, as above, note 3; Kekes, 1993, 1997, 1998; Lukes 1991; Nagel 1991; Nussbaum, 1986, 1990, 1992a, 1992b, 2000; Raz, 1986, 1995; Richardson, 1997; Stocker, 1990; Williams, 1980.

6. For recent discussions of this question, see MacKenzie, 1999; Newey, 1998.

7. Berlin, for example, sometimes seems to believe this, as when he refers to our being ‘faced with choices between ends equally ultimate, and claims equally absolute’, and to our ‘irrational and disordered lives’ (Berlin 1969, 168-169). Elsewhere, however, he repudiates that view, insisting that we do in fact make rational choices among plural values all the time, at any rate in particular cases (Berlin and Williams 1994). Gray’s position on this issue is similarly ambiguous: compare 1995b, 70 with 1995a, 154.

8. This value-pluralist reading of Aristotle is contested by Larmore 1996, Ch. 7. But even if Nussbaum’s reading is rejected as an accurate interpretation of Aristotle, it may still stand as a persuasive account of practical reasoning under pluralism.

9. For similarly particularist accounts of rational choice under pluralism, see Chang 1997; Kekes 1993, Ch. 5; Richardson 1997.

10. See Crowder forthcoming, where I argue that the kind of moral diversity that is desirable from a value-pluralist point of view involves coherence as well as sheer multiplicity, since multiple goods and ways of life may otherwise conflict.

11. This is not to say that custom or culture has no role to play in the autonomous life, merely that that role must be subject to critical assessment by the autonomous person: Caney 1992; Kymlicka 1989, 1995; Raz 1986, 1995.

References

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Bellamy, R. 2000. ‘Liberalism and the Challenge of Pluralism’, in Rethinking Liberalism. London and New York: Pinter.

Benn, S. I. 1988. A Theory of Freedom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Berlin, I. 1969. Four Essays on Liberty. London: Oxford University Press.

Berlin, I. 1980. Concepts and Categories: Philosophical Essays, ed. H. Hardy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Berlin, I. 1981. Against the Current: Essays in the History of Ideas, ed. H. Hardy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Berlin, I. 1992. The Crooked Timber of Humanity: Chapters in the History of Ideas, ed. H. Hardy. New York: Vintage.

Berlin, I. 1996. The Sense of Reality: Studies in Ideas and their History, ed. H. Hardy. London: Chatto & Windus.

Berlin, I. 1997. The Proper Study of Mankind: an Anthology of Essays, ed. H. Hardy and R. Hausheer. London: Chatto & Windus.

Berlin, I. 2000. Three Critics of the Enlightenment: Vico, Hamann, Herder, ed. H. Hardy. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press.

Berlin, I., and Williams, B. 1994. ‘Pluralism and Liberalism: a Reply’, Political Studies 42: 306-309.

Caney, S. 1992. ‘Liberalism and Communitarianism: a Misconceived Debate’, Political Studies 40: 273-289.

Chang, R. 1997. ‘Introduction’, in R. Chang (ed.), Incommensurability, Incomparability, and Practical Reason. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press.

Crowder, G. 1994. ‘Pluralism and Liberalism’, Political Studies 42: 293-305.

Crowder, G. 1998. ‘John Gray’s Pluralist Critique of Liberalism’, Journal of Applied Philosophy 15: 287-298.

Crowder, G. 1999. ‘From Value Pluralism to Liberalism’, in R. Bellamy and M. Hollis (eds), Pluralism and Liberal Neutrality, London: Frank Cass.

Crowder, G. forthcoming. Liberalism and Value Pluralism. London and New York: Continuum.

Dworkin, R. 1977. Taking Rights Seriously. London: Duckworth.

Dworkin, R. 1985. A Matter of Principle. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University

Dzur, A. 1998 ‘Value pluralism versus political liberalism?’, Social Theory and Practice 24: 375-392.

Galston, W. 1991. Liberal Purposes: Goods, virtues, and diversity in the liberal state. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Galston, W. 1999a. ‘Expressive Liberty, Moral Pluralism, Political Pluralism: Three Sources of Liberal Theory’, William and Mary Law Review 40: 869-907.

Galston, W. 1999b. ‘Value Pluralism and Liberal Political Theory’, American Political Science Review 93: 769-778.

Gray, J. 1989. Liberalisms: Essays in Political Philosophy. London and New York: Routledge.

Gray, J. 1993. Post-Liberalism: Studies in Political Thought. New York and London: Routledge.

Gray, J. 1995a. Berlin. London: Fontana.

Gray, J. 1995b. Enlightenment’s Wake: Politics and culture at the close of the modern age. London and New York: Routledge.

Gray, J. 1998. ‘Where Pluralists and Liberals Part Company’, International Journal of Philosophical Studies 6: 17-36.

Gray, J. 2000a. ‘Pluralism and Toleration in Contemporary Political Philosophy’, Political Studies 48: 323-333.

Gray, J. 2000b. Two Faces of Liberalism. Cambridge: Polity.Hardy, H. 2001. The Isaiah Berlin Virtual Library. <http://berlin.wolf.ox.ac.uk/.>

Kekes, J. 1993. The Morality of Pluralism. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Kekes, J. 1997. Against Liberalism. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

Kekes, J. 1998. A Case for Conservatism. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

Kenny, M. 2000. ‘Isaiah Berlin’s Contribution to Modern Political Theory, Political Studies 48: 1026-1039.

Kymlicka, W. 1989. Liberalism, Community, and Culture. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Kymlicka, W. 1995. Multicultural Citizenship. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Larmore, C. 1996. The Morals of Modernity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Lukes, S. 1991. ‘Making Sense of Moral Conflict’, in Moral Conflict and Politics. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Lukes, S. 1993. ‘Five Fables About Human Rights’, in S. Shute and S. Hurley, eds, On Human Rights: the Oxford Amnesty Lectures. London: Basic Books.

Macedo, S. 1990. Liberal Virtues: Citizenship, Virtue, and Community in Liberal Constitutionalism. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

MacKenzie, I. 1999. ‘Berlin’s defence of value-pluralism: clarifications and criticisms’, Contemporary Politics 5, 325-337.

Mill, J. S. 1974. On Liberty, ed. G. Himmelfarb. Harmondsworth: Penguin.

Nagel, T. 1991. ‘The Fragmentation of Value’, in Mortal Questions. Cambridge: Canto.

Newey, G. 1998. ‘Value-Pluralism in Contemporary Liberalism’, Dialogue 37: 493-522.

Nussbaum, M. 1986. The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and ethics in Greek tragedy and philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Nussbaum, M. 1990. ‘Aristotelian Social Democracy’, in R. B. Douglass, G. Mara and H. S. Richardson (eds), Liberalism and the Good. New York and London: Routledge.

Nussbaum, M. 1992a. ‘Human Functioning and Social Justice: In Defense of Aristotelian Essentialism’, Political Theory 20: 202-246.

Nussbaum, M. 1992b. Love’s Knowledge: Essays on Philosophy and Literature. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Nussbaum, M. 2000. Women and Human Development: the Capabilities Approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Rawls, J. 1971. A Theory of Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Rawls, J. 1993. Political Liberalism. New York: Columbia University Press.

Raz, J. 1986. The Morality of Freedom. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Raz, J. 1995. ‘Multiculturalism: A Liberal Perspective’, in Ethics in the Public Domain: Essays in the Morality of Law and Politics. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 170-191.

Richardson, H. S. 1997. Practical Reasoning About Final Ends. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Riley, J. 2000. ‘Crooked Timber and Liberal Culture’, in M. Baghramian and A. Ingram, eds, Pluralism: the philosophy and politics of diversity. London and New York: Routledge.

Stocker, M. 1990. Plural and Conflicting Values. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Walzer, M. 1983. Spheres of Justice. Oxford: Martin Robertson.

Walzer, M. 1995. ‘Are There Limits to Liberalism?’, New York Review of Books, 19 October.

Williams, B. 1979. ‘Conflicts of Values’, in A. Ryan, ed., The Idea of Freedom: Essays in Honour of Isaiah Berlin. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Williams, B. 1980. ‘Introduction’ to I. Berlin, Concepts and Categories, ed. H. Hardy. London: Oxford University Press.

Kate Feros

Challenging the Australian national political identity: Les Murray’s Fredy Neptune

Following a brief outline of the political dimensions of the construction of a national identity, I argue that Les Murray’s Fredy Neptune can be read as challenging such a construction. I argue that the use of both prose-poetry and the picaresque mode of writing in Fredy Neptune are particularly appropriate for this project. Prose-poetry has the potential to validate and empower repressed voices, perspectives and values within the nation and therefore helps to disrupt the false unity of the official discourse. The picaresque’s articulation of the main protagonist, story and style also function to render ambivalent any certainty that a particular narrative can achieve an unmediated representation of reality. Such formal techniques of writing, therefore, allow Murray’s text to be read counter-discursively in relation to the dominant conception of the Australian national political identity.

At its most basic, an identity is a category of social division, a means of marking boundaries, of distinguishing ‘us’ from ‘them’, ‘in-group’ from ‘out-group’. Indicating the boundaries between one group and another often involves delineating a core of shared attitudes, values and/or behaviours that mark people as belonging to a particular group. Hodge and Mishra (1991: ix) suggest that there are certain "characteristic patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving that arise out of the social and political conditions of Australian life". In defining Australia as a distinct and separate cultural entity, it is to be expected that a limited repertoire of national characteristics will be called into service. Ward (1966: 81), for instance, identifies the basic elements of the Australian type as independence, an anti-authoritarian and egalitarian outlook, "adaptability, toughness, endurance, activity and loyalty to one’s fellows". These ‘characteristic’ patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving are repeated so often in Australia, that they have taken on the mantle of ‘common sense’ and allegedly capture the ‘essence’ or ‘reality’ of Australian national life and identity.

A national identity is, however, "a people’s idea of itself" (Ward 1966: 2). This implies that there is no ‘real’, ‘fixed’ or ‘true’ Australia to be revealed (White 1981: viii). The common sense definition of the Australian national identity is influential, not because it is ‘true’ or ‘real’, but "because it is currently accepted as the construction, the mode of signification, of nationalism in Australia" (Turner 1993: 123). The limited repertoire of patterns of cultural representation of Australia that are assumed to be ‘common sensical’ are, rather, simply "the discourses through which Australians currently agree to represent themselves and their country" (Turner 1993: 123).

Delineating the Australian national identity in literature, therefore, has political ramifications. Definitions of the national identity draw boundaries around what is ‘normal’ and achievable within the culture; they define who is included as an Australian citizen, and they help to create national unity by discouraging internal antagonisms (Brydon and Tiffin 1993: 64, 67). This creation of a sense of commonality is both fundamental and beneficial to the creation and maintenance of the nation. An identity, however, is "determined not only by what members share but by what the members recognise that ‘significant others’ do not share" (Babcock 1978: 28). Other nations are obviously excluded from the national identity, but "the exclusions operate internally as well" (Gunew and Longley1992: xvi). Australia’s national identity, then, is defined as much by what Australians are not, as by what Australians are. The typical Australian is "not female, not urban, not middle-class, not non-white" (Dibble 1994: 112).

There is a danger implicit in creating consensus on the nature of the national identity of oversimplifying the variety of ethnicities, cultures and values within a nation in order to achieve cohesion. As Brydon and Tiffin (1993: 64) argue, the nation "depends on the suppression of oppositional voices and the smoothing over of differences for its construction of a unified identity". To the extent that definitions of Australia and the Australian character are uniform, or become ossified or consolidated, they do not represent the diverse nature of the national experience or the national culture. Once national identity categories become reified, they effectively exclude those people who or experiences which do not ‘fit’ the stereotyped definition of the nation. The creation of ‘absolute’ or ‘definitive’ accounts of the Australian experience and character-type could be seen to have the political effect of marginalising those groups who do not ‘conform’ to the unitary construction of the nation.

Australian literature, then, has a dual focus – it combines both the dominant discourse of Australian nationalism and a significant strand of oppositional writing. The legend of Les Murray, of course, would suggest that his work functions to bolster the dominance of one set of terms or images as the ‘common sense’ and prevalent way of representing the Australian national identity. I argue, however, that his writing is also capable of challenging essentialist and stereotypical representations of Australianness by exposing these archetypes as constructions. This counter-discursive impulse in Les Murray’s work is particularly evident in Fredy Neptune.

There are, of course, a number of ways I might go about demonstrating Murray’s counter-discursive tendencies in Fredy Neptune. I could look at the ways in which Murray explicitly engages with and then throws doubt on some of the key dimensions of the Australian national identity, such as the concepts of mateship, independence and egalitarianism. I could look at the ways in which Murray highlights the constructed nature of the dominant Australian national identity, through his references to performance and the various creative mediums through which identities are constructed, such as photography, poetry, narrative and film. Alternatively, I could look at the ways in which Murray highlights and acknowledges those elements of Australian society which are excluded from the limited conception of the national identity. Recognising the existence of these repressed voices, perspectives and values within the nation helps Murray to disrupt the apparent conclusiveness of the official discourse. I could look at Murray’s dismissal of notions that would cast dissent only in terms of demonstrating masses and rebellions and his suggestion that it is by focusing on the local and daily lives of otherwise insignificant individuals that we can challenge the artificial unity of official discourses.

I would suggest, however, that Murray’s ability to challenge the Australian national political identity takes place not only thematically through overt or substantive comments but also through the particular formal characteristics he employs. This is, in essence, an argument that form and substance cannot be separated. An engagement with the dominant discourse in an oppositional way, in other words, need not come only from marginalised groups within the society (cf. Ashcroft et al. 1989: 144; Schaffer 1988: 13). Mainstream techniques, in the hands of white males, can also be counter-discursive. Even those writers most deemed to be the major exponents of the Australian myth, do not always support the construction of a single definition of Australian nationalism. I would argue that in Fredy Neptune Murray rethinks current definitions of Australian national identity by employing both poetic prose and the conceits of the picaresque mode of writing.

When we read a romance novel, for instance, all readers share basic expectations about what the story will entail. We expect a story in the vein of boy-meets-girl, boy and girl fall in love, experience some difficulty that must be overcome and live happily ever after. This basic story line is repeated ad nauseam in a variety of mediums. Through repetition, this basic convention tends to abolish a variety of diverse social relations. Homosexual relations, for instance, are excluded by the traditional romantic storyline, as are heterosexual interactions that do not end in a permanent ongoing relationship. The conventions of the romantic genre function, therefore, to naturalise particular social interactions. Similarly, each ‘valid’ or ‘authentic’ assertion of national identity or character functions to naturalise and privilege particular social relations. In doing so, they also serve to fix social possibilities. They constitute the field of ‘truth’ through the imposition of specific knowledges, disciplines and values. These social conventions establish "one authoritative position which fixes and maintains, as if natural, all the relations within a society" (Blaber and Gilman 1990: 4). They are, however, only one of a number of possible ways to order reality. Texts which comment on their own processes of construction work to ‘de-naturalise’ both literary and cultural conventions. By calling attention to their own construction and the processes of interpretation involved in reading, both prose-poetry and the picaresque are potentially disruptive of any overarching, unified discourse.

In order to provide a context for my discussion of Fredy Neptune as a counter-discursive picaresque prose poem, it is worthwhile outlining the basic plot. Fredy Neptune is a dense poem, one that attempts to summarise the horrific and absurd history of both Australia and the world in the first half of the 20^th century (Pierce 1998: 66; Riemer 1998: 34 among others). The title of the poem is the stage name of the narrator and protagonist, Friedrich Boettcher, a bilingual German-Australian merchant seaman from Dungog. Fredy recounts his (mis)adventures as he wanders around the world, observing the major events and coming into contact with some of the more remarkable individuals in the history of the early 20^th century.

Fredy’s travels are precipitated by witnessing an horrific event. On shore leave from the Turkish Navy in Trabzon, Fredy watches, helpless and horrified, as a group of Armenian women, drenched in kerosene, are humiliated and then burnt to death. As a result of witnessing the first recorded genocide of the century, Fredy develops a psychosomatic disorder that leaves him incapable of sensation ("My body’s mad. It’s turned its back on me./ Won’t tell me it hurts, won’t tell me it’s cold; tells me nothing,/ obeys but don’t answer" (FN 147 s3)) but also in possession of immense physical strength.

The poem, told in five books of eight line stanzas, "relies on a flexible blank verse line with occasional internal rhyme or rhyming couplets" (Hewett 1998: 34). As Bleiker (2000: 271) points out, however, the essence of poetry is "not to be found primarily in its formal aspects, such as rhyme or line breaks. The key, rather, lies in the self-consciousness with which a poem engages the links between language and socio-political reality". Both prose-poetry and the picaresque function in a number of ways but, fundamentally, they tend to raise questions about the relationship between fiction and ‘reality’ (see Blaber and Gilman 1990: 27). They foreground the ‘fictionality of fiction’ and therefore call into question the manner in which we construct other representations, histories and evaluations, including the definitions of national identities (see Blaber andGilman 1990: 27).

The combination of verse and novel in Fredy Neptune seems to have precipitated both confusion and distaste on the part of reviewers (see e.g. Grant 1999: 75; Page 1998: 22; Riemer 1998: 34). Many of the criticisms of Murray’s choice of form centred on the fact that as a verse-novel the text disrupted the expectations created by the use of each form individually (see especially Page 1998: 22). I would argue, however, that this very disruption of normal expectations is one of the political objectives/ outcomes of the text. Combining two otherwise contradictory methods of understanding the world and ordering social reality in the one text allows Murray to highlight and relativise the constructedness of a single social discourse with claims to the ‘truth’.

Prose-poetry functions to represent the world differently. It "is about searching for a language that provides us with different eyes, different ways of perceiving what we already know. It is about unsettling, about making strange that which is familiar to us" (Bleiker 2000: 281). It is, therefore, a form of writing that is ideally suited for rethinking current definitions of Australian national identity. Poetic images can give voice to and validate ideas, emotions and perspectives that are otherwise repressed by the more prevalent accounts of national identity. Poetry can, therefore, function also to make familiar that which is marginalised by the limited conceptions of the national identity of the official discourse. This idea of giving voice to repressed perceptions and points of view is addressed substantively in Fredy Neptune when Murray includes Fredy’s and other characters’ ‘dream sequences’ (e.g. FN 74 s2-5; FN 114-5 s4-1; FN 120 s3-5; FN 135-6 s3-5,1; FN 150-1 s5,1). These ‘dream sequences’ are often attempts to explain, order or make sense of the conscious world in the realm of the unconscious. Shortly after witnessing the burning women and developing his psychosomatic disorder, Fredy dreams, for instance, "my body was made of fire,/not hurting me, but no flesh could come near. It was tough flowing orange, glaring hard gold/ out through its buttonholes and gaps; the clothes weren’t affected" (FN 32 s3). In this alternate order, then, inconsistencies and contradictions as well as extremely complex social occurrences are accepted as being ‘normal’. Murray’s use of the prose-poem understands irregularity, unpredictability and even ambiguity as "inevitable aspects of our effort to make sense of social phenomena" (Bleiker 2000: 276).

Like other counter-discursive forms of writing, poetry does not, then, bring certitude or closure. Individual poetic images can be read in a number of different ways, depending on the readers’ standpoint. As van Toorn (1992: 99) explains, the readers’ "existing verbal and ideological predilections – their ‘position’ – determines how they hear, voice and confer semantic value on the words of a text". Similarly, if a reader does not share Murray’s encyclopaedic knowledge of recondite facts, their appreciation of the poetic metaphors he uses will be small. Hulse (1998: 11) argues that Murray’s inclusion of esoteric and obscure information and facts about the world express a "joy in the variousness of the world". The substantive inclusion of the variousness, diversity or ‘difference’ of the world is replicated in Murray’s counter-discursive use of poetry. In Fredy Neptune, poetry functions to expose the cultural specificity and bias of all claims to the ‘truth’.

Using poetry in Fredy Neptune highlights the fact that there is no neutral or unbiased way of representing the world. Because poetry is aware of its own construction, it "points to the cultural and ideological codes which inform the construct called reality" (see Hutcheon 1988: 5). This is not to suggest that all poetry is counter-discursive. Indeed, similar sorts of arguments can and have been made about the non-closed nature of some forms of prose writing (see, for example, Bakhtin 1981). As Bleiker (2000: 278) argues, "there will never be a language that does not exclude, that can safeguard the pluralities of life". Replacing one ‘official’ word, whether the axioms of academic writing, specific genres or the dominant conception of the Australian national identity, with poetry that claims to represent the ‘truth’ is simply to reach closure and certainty by another means. The goal is to constantly interrogate the dominant discourse and dismantle its underlying assumptions about its axiomatic status by highlighting its ‘specificity’ or ‘situatedness’ from the standpoint of the ‘other’.

There is no single strategy or mode of counter-discourse. I have argued that in Fredy Neptune Les Murray uses poetic language in order to relativise the dominance of other forms of writing. Providing other, conflicting discourses makes it possible to recognise the constructedness of a single social discourse with claims to the ‘truth’. Ultimately, calling into question the way in which certain forms of writing appropriate authority and ‘truth’, challenges the construction of a single Australian national political identity.

Murray, however, also casts doubt on the construction of a homogenous and prevalent Australian national identity in Fredy Neptune by utilising the picaresque mode of writing. The picaresque also draws attention to the construction of the text and therefore casts doubt on the unity, ‘truth’ or authority of any text. The particular protagonist type, story and style of the picaresque provide a means of exposing inconsistencies or contradictions within dominant discourses.

The picaresque is identified primarily by the existence of a central protagonist with certain attributes. As a picaro, the protagonist is usually male; unheroic in appearance; behaviour and class origin; resorts to trickery in order to survive and recounts his own life, but is an unreliable narrator (Riggin 1981: Chapter 3). In short, the picaro is a marginal figure because in background, behaviour, values and personality, he does not fit society’s categories for respectable status. He is, therefore, inherently situated as ‘other’ to the dominant discourse. The picaresque serves to disrupt the dominant discourse by making such a marginal and otherwise excluded figure both the central protagonist and the narrator of the text.

Fredy Boettcher conforms to the characteristics of the picaro. Throughout the text, Fredy holds varied, menial and low-paying jobs. He works as a merchant seaman, a storeman and packer, a drogher hand, fisherman, furniture removalist, circus performer, builder, bounty hunter, bit part actor in Hollywood films, night watchman, furniture polisher, bouncer at the fights and gets "into black market petrol" (FN 249 s4). He impersonates a German officer (FN 48 s1) and a Reuters journalist (FN 41 s1). While Fredy is, therefore, consistently of the working class, his professional identity itself is extremely changeable and functions to challenge the creation of a fixed, stable Australian national identity.

Murray emphasises the fact that the picaro usually recounts his own life or a portion thereof in his own voice and in a conscious act of writing in Fredy Neptune. Fredy continually draws attention to the fact that a story is being told: he employs hindsight (e.g. FN 14 s1); anticipates events (e.g. FN 54 s4, 5); puts events in context for his readers (e.g. "This was later that same year" FN 19 s2); explains photographs (e.g. FN 13 s1) and even does actions (e.g. He "blew the flies (pheg! Like that) off my cheek" (FN 30 s5). The tone of the poem is colloquial and face-to-face. While the format of a first-person autobiographical reminiscence means that everything in the poem is coloured with Fredy’s sensibility, Fredy’s voice is also multivoiced. He not only relates the life stories of other characters he comes into contact with (e.g. FN 29 s1- 3; FN 106 s1; FN 258 s3 -260 s2 among others), but he also impersonates other voices and dialects (e.g. FN 21 s2; FN 25 s3; FN 184 s1 among others). The diversity of speech types, languages and stylistic variety present in the nation is, of course, one of the dominant concerns of Murray’s text. His focus on the vernacular, as opposed to official, ‘academic’ language, incorporates this linguistic variety. Fredy also speaks not only English, German and "a bit of French" (FN 42 s5), but he also speaks German through English (e.g. FN 66 s2). The picaro’s narrative therefore seeks to heighten our awareness of the fundamental sociolinguistic diversity of national languages.

The picaro is also, however, an unreliable narrator. As Riggin (1981: 5) argues, the "norms propounded and exemplified by the narrator through his words and actions are at variance with those norms held by the implied author of the work and expected by him to be comprehended and largely shared by the readers of the work". Such a discrepancy arises in Fredy Neptune in relation to the social acceptability of killing in warfare. Murray highlights the fact that while society assumes a single moral order, what is considered immoral or moral actually changes with context. Fredy does not behave with heroic fortitude during warfare and, indeed, refuses to take part in the killing (FN 23 s1). His shocked reaction to the horrors of warfare functions to ridicule the supposed ‘warrior code’ of war. The picaro, however, reflects the actions and attitudes of the communities he lives in and moves through. This means that Fredy also displays these same ‘warrior’, heroic behaviours. Curiously enough, Fredy mostly behaves in a heroic fashion – rescuing people from death (e.g. FN 83 s2, 3; FN 148 s2, 3; FN 150 s3; FN 160 s5) or violence (e.g. FN 88 s3; FN 89 s5) for instance – during ‘peacetime’, when society would not deem warrior heroism necessary. This is perhaps most clear when Fredy rescues a mentally-disadvantaged man, Hans, from the Nazi’s eugenics program, which even Hans’ family accept as morally and socially justifiable (FN 204 s5). Fredy’s behaviour, then, is ‘unheroic’ in the sense that he is not admired for his noble qualities because he displays these qualities when, in the opinion of others, he should not. Because what is considered socially acceptable behaviour changes with context, Fredy both reflects and ridicules the inherent contradictions implicit in trying to impose a single blanket moral order.

The picaresque story structure disrupts normal expectations of narrative by being extremely episodic. These episodes usually involve the picaro coming into contact with a gallery of human types in his attempts to achieve inclusion in society. The story is composed of a number of repetitive incidents in which the picaro attempts to move into mainstream society when a potential social change appears realisable. The story structure of the picaresque therefore highlights the fact that society is in a constant state of flux, as different groups of people are included and excluded, assimilated and rejected. Because of the picaro’s inherent inconsistency of personality, society becomes a crucial determinant of his experiences and nature – suggesting that if the picaro himself has no single overarching personality, then neither does society. The focus of the picaresque text is on the exposure of reality through the use of the picaro, and not on reaching a resolution of the picaro’s situation. As such, the story itself is composed of a number of interpolated digressions, adventures, anecdotes, recapitulations and foreshadowing or anticipating key events. This multitude of possible narratives suggests that a society has an almost endless capacity for generating stories, events and new ideas. The picaresque is, therefore, a highly appropriate mode for suggesting alternative definitions of the Australian nation to the dominant one.

The picaresque is also characterised by its implied parody of other fictional types and even of the picaresque itself. Parody is inherently contradictory because it uses and abuses the conventions of the discourse it sets out to challenge. There is a possibility, therefore, that by invoking the dominant discourse, the picaresque reinforces it. I would argue, however, that the central protagonist, story and style of the picaresque work to problematise authoritative narratives by highlighting their constructed nature. In other words, the picaresque functions in a counter-generic manner, by relativising "other narrative modes exhibiting greater tendencies toward closure" (Blaber and Gilman 1990: 105). The picaresque traditionally parodies the travel book, the confessional and the romance (Blaber and Gilman 1990: 21). Its style, therefore, tends towards the post-modern pastiche of pre-existing motifs and citations. This polysemic tendency, however, is also tied to political objectives in Murray’s use of the mode. In other words, the affirming and deconstructing of genre codes in the picaresque is not simply a literary game, but also serves to reveal the ossification of social and political discourses of the nation as well.

Through parody, the picaresque functions to "investigate the arbitrariness, the fictionality of privileged forms of social life" (Blaber and Gilman 1990: 18). As a narrative mode that incorporates and challenges other narratives, the picaresque exposes any single perspective as necessarily limited. It "calls attention to the ‘as-if’ nature of all structures, all institutions by playing one mode of arrangement off against another" (Babcock-Abrahams 1974: 920). As such, any ‘absolute’ truth – whether literary, political, or cultural – is relativised (Ryan-Hayes 1995: 67). The formal characteristics of the picaresque mode of writing therefore provide a means of raising questions about the construction of national identities by highlighting the arbitrariness or constructedness of all narrative.

Murray targets the formation of unitary, monologic assertions of the Australian national identity, with claims to the ‘truth’. Such a consensus on the nature of the national identity works to promote national unity, but can also calcify into a rigid discourse which not only excludes some members of the society, but also limits understandings of the possibilities for social action within the nation. Prose-poetry and the picaresque are particularly appropriate modes to use for targeting this dominant discourse. Prose -poetry provides a different language with which to construct our image of the Australian reality and as such it can function to validate voices that are otherwise repressed by the more prevalent accounts of the national identity. The picaresque’s particular articulation of the main protagonist, story and style functions to foreground the artificiality of narrative. The picaresque is inherently resistant to closure and renders ambivalent any certainty that a particular narrative can achieve an unmediated presentation of reality.

Reference List

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van Toorn, Penny. 1992. "Bakhtin and the Novel as Empire: Textual Politics in Robert Drewe’s The Savage Crows and Rudy Wiebe’s The Temptations of Big Bear" Journal of Commonwealth Literature 27(1): 96-109.

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MD FLETCHER

UTOPIAS AND DYSTOPIAS IN CONTEMPORARY AUSTRALIAN LITERATURE

In this essay I discuss utopian and dystopian tendencies in Unknown Industrial Prisoner (1971), Bliss (1981) and Republic of Women (1999). No real utopias are discussed here, as none of the works addressed deal directly with ideal forms of political institutions and procedures. In Unknown Industrial Prisoner (UIP) the workplace extends to encompass and poison all aspects of life, and in Bliss Harry Joy's perception that he is in Hell colours all his thinking, but the focus in all three novels is partial. UIP focuses on the factory, Bliss assumes a broader political structure and explores the sub-communities of suburbia and commune. Republic of Women (RW) looks at a community based on neighbourhood friendship and a cultural history of women, but also assumes broader political arrangements. Although it is feminist, its partial nature means that it does not, for example, address the mundane issue of the sexual division of domestic labour, often central to feminist utopias (e.g., Davis, 1984; Nielsen, 1984). In these novels, then, there is not a question of utopia as not needing politics, because the overarching political structure is assumed.

While there clearly is a utopian strain to Australian political thinking (Hughes, 1994; Melleuish, 1994), there also is a sceptical strain of "taking the piss". In addition, liberal democracy generally claims a difference from other political ideologies in that by avoiding utopianism it avoids the worst political outcomes and is even able to present itself as "least bad". Australia, then, has been seen as a new place for a new start, less infected with European status hierarchies and offering the opportunity for a society of autonomous people and even, perhaps, offering better opportunities for workers. Later, community has been sought to escape industrial and post-industrial mass society, especially in the manifestations of the widespread phenomena of suburbia and communes, while Australian literature has been quick to expose the failures of those promises, Robin Gerster (1990) also reminds us that Australian literature has regularly preferred the artistically bohemian or the vibrantly working class inner city to dull suburbia. Ireland attacks the idea of Australia as working man's paradise while Carey explores the heights and depths of suburbia and the commune and Finley lauds the friendship amidst eccentricity that constitutes urban chic.

UIP

Although Australia has been seen traditionally as the workers' paradise, UIP (1971) follows previous novels in presenting workers' lives dystopically. The entire novel is devoted to depicting misery in every aspect of factory life. Both particularly Australian and universal aspects are emphasised. Pons (1980), for example, has focussed on the depicted role of technology and worker obsolescence under conditions of advanced industrialisation, while Daniel (1982), for example, focuses on the penal colony analogy. My strategy here is to indicate Ireland's characterisation of the Puroil factory and, then, the men's responses. I then look at techniques and conclude this section with summary comments on the "political" nature of Ireland's depiction.

As Daniel (1982: 46) notes, Ireland's overt presentation of the Puroil factory in UIP is as a continuation of Australia as a penal colony. It is a penal colony now, not just exhibiting Australia's penal colony legacy, and it is literally a prison, not simply a Foucauldian case of prison technologies spreading to all institutions (contra Gelder, 1993: 33). The factory is clearly identified as a prison, referring to "the other prisoners" (1) with their "inherited ankle scars" (2) behind "massive blue steel gates" (7) where strike penalties have replaced the lash (4). The title of the book and of the first chapter ("One Day in a Penal Colony") emphasise this connection, and this emphasis is noted in the text. The first Australian factory was "a place of correction", it is stated (20). In addition, while much of the terminology in the early pages is Marxist ("surplus value" (12), "alienated from their true selves" (15)) and religion is dismissed as an opiate, it is expressly stated that communism is not an answer (212).

Pons is also correct to emphasise the role of industrial technology and the manner in which it makes most workers obsolete (Pons), and most of them have neither the mental capacity or interest to be useful under modern conditions. Contributing to these problems are the circumstances that the owners are anonymous; that the owners are overseas; that the employer has total control over the workers, backed by the political system; and that both stupidity and malice are at work in the running of the factory, leading to a degree of the unpredictability often associated with totalitarian political dystopias.

Because the owners are anonymous they cannot be held responsible for decisions concerning the factory. In practice, however, this seems to have less effect than the fact that the owners are overseas, that British, French and Americans own the plant (48, 259). This means that they are distanced psychologically from what happens in the factory, and that they are distanced in their lack of first-hand knowledge about the plant when decisions are made about policy. The building was designed in and for the northern hemisphere (116), and the workers are consistently at the mercy of American technology (76, 171, 319) and work patterns (180). It also means that the surplus value lost by the workers does not even aid Australia, adding emphasis to their sense of dependence.

In addition, the employers have total control over the workers (3), as demonstrated by arbitrary sackings. The employers are backed by the formal political system. While wage claims are resisted, unlimited profits are acceptable (14), "price fixing plus advertising" is called competition (12), and the factory pollutes without regulation (e.g., 117, 173). The police are corrupt (66), penalties are higher for crimes against property than for murder and rape (67), and judges side with the employers in industrial disputes (209). Just as the enterprise owners are anonymous, politics is run by "unknown political figures" (370). Democracy is generally bogus and specifically involves the right to starve in different ways (3; also 193-194).

These macro problems are intensified by local ones. The complete split between the offices and the plant floor result in heavy paper supervision with no knowledge of the equipment being used. Middle managers are transferred before they become familiar with individual plants (249), and younger workers will not nurse the ancient equipment as their older predecessors would (188). Money is wasted on emergency measures to keep the plant running (and head office satisfied), but will not be spent on rational wage increases or other improvements. Because of false economies nothing works properly (207), safety is lacking (150-151) and the plant is frequently down. Inefficiencies are passed on to consumers (181), but this logic is not applied to expenditures for increased efficiency.

Part of the atmosphere in which the workers function is deliberate. The workers are seen as machines - basically interchangeable - so that the sick are sacked and safety is given little priority (e.g., 60-61, 98). Supervisors act simply to maintain the upper hand, regarding the workers as animals or slaves (201). Beyond this indifference, supervisors such as the Python take a malicious pleasure in tormenting and frustrating the workers, and the personnel section works to the goal of thwarting all worker claims (for example, for compensation payments - Chapter 2; pp. 53, 221, 373).

The other side of this story is the nature and response of the men themselves. On this point Ireland suggests conflicting explanations. In one sense, the men are simply redundant, due to the advanced technology of industrialisation. It is stated that the factory could run with "two men and an instrument mechanic", and that the men are only employed to keep them off the streets where they might cause political problems (90-91). They are not very bright or effective, the Great White Father notes (334-335). In this context, it is correct but of limited relevance that hire purchase commitments weaken the position of individual workers (324, 331). At the same time, Ireland argues (again via the Great White Father) that the workers are prisoners of their own view of themselves and their inability to cooperate, and their various strategies are depicted as ineffective. As Gelder (1993: 34) notes, they disappoint the Australian myth of male rugged individualism.

There is camaraderie among the workers, but it is not consistent, and it is often based on cynicism (e.g. 137) or victimising some workers for the amusement of others (e.g. 233-237). Basically the workers are isolated, with Ireland's vignette style emphasising both isolation and fragmentation (cf. Daniel). Even the clerks cannot stick together (262). Playing the game to seek company approval and possibly even promotion divides the workers and is not generally effective in this context, although those who are "weak and cunning" have the best chance (22). Neither does the union provide unity or direction, because the union leaders are more concerned with competing unions and with avoiding trouble (264, 324).

Other responses are forms of escape and/or compensation rather than strategies. Daniel suggests that the ubiquitous nicknames reduce the men to functions, but in fact the nicknames relate to personal characteristics rather than factory functions, further indicating the men's divorce from their work. These responses include the organised rotation of sleeping on shift, petty thievery and vengeful petty sabotage. One systematic alternative is the Great White Father's establishment of the Home Beautiful, providing beer and prostitutes. This is elevated to a strategy by Great White Father's "existentialist" insistence that defiance gives meaning (334-335), but it is clear that only a brief escape and forgetting is possible (e.g., 286).

While the focus of this work is almost entirely on male workers, the lives of others are dystopic as well. The men are incapable of treating women except as sex objects - from Playboy picture (176) to prostitutes at the Home Beautiful to consistently sexist comments. Women are identified as sex prisoners (99), just as the men are industrial prisoners.

There is obviously, then, a lack of community among the men. In addition, as Gelder (1993: 24-5) argues, the three main characters - the Great White Father, the Samurai, and the Glass Canoe - for individual reasons, are unable to develop community or initiate collective action against he Puroil "system". There is no community and no hope, as there is no love nor any children on which community might be built in future.

TECHNIQUES

I already have mentioned the fragmenting use of vignettes in this novel, which obviates our usual summary of plot line, and the techniques of the penal colony analogy and of the individual inadequacies of the three main characters for building community. In addition, Catch-22 (1961) is used as intertext, and, as

susan Parr (1980: ) has argued, Catch-22 itself is structured around the (dystopian) perception that the contemporary world is the antithesis of Eden. There are a number of direct references to Heller's novel. Having a safety officer named Macabre (218) is one example, and reference to "Nat's girl" (176), a Playboy bunny picture, directly invokes "Nately's whore" and "Nately's whore's sister" in Catch-22. The Good Shepherd in UIP parallels the ineffectual chaplain in Catch-22, finding in an emergency that ladders and stretchers have been pilfered (357) reminds us of Milo Minderbinder, and the Great White Father rigged up with catheter and big glass bottle obviously reproduces the soldier in white.

UIP also participates in the logic of catch-22. No one is responsible for factory policy, because the locals are too junior to decide and the overseas directors cannot be bothered with details (107). To have Python assign you a day shift, you must convince him you want a night shift (127). One Eye cannot convince Doctor Death to give him a certificate, and he cannot leave with his full long service leave entitlement without a certificate of dismissal, but not dismissal for misconduct (46-47). When the plant is down, all workers must stay on (and thus be paid), because if the worst are kept on they will not be able to start the plant up properly, and if the best are kept on the union will take everyone out (the best are not active in the union) (99-100). These are particular cases, but the entire logic of plant management is similar: money is spent to keep the plant going so overseas directors can be told it is operating, but economy measures create problems that lead to the plant going down which leads to great extra costs.

Finally Ireland tries to do too much, as did Heller, and this leads to confusion. He depicts stupidity and malice, and while they are not incompatible, there is confusion over the basic analysis. Similarly, there are clear references to Australia's penal colony legacy, but at other times, industrial technology seems to be the problem and these two views are not reconciled. The question of whether the problem is exploitation or industrialisation per se is not fully resolved.

The dystopia depicted in UIP is a political dystopia not only in the sense that formal politics is depicted as in collaboration with the central industrial enterprise, Puroil, but also in the sense that the factory both exhausts the workers' lives and employs them only to prevent the "political" problems of their being on the streets (90-91). There also is the post-colonial dimension of an awareness by these workers that they are prisoners in their own land, albeit with no identified recourse. The central problem is not political, but the politics invoked is as totally negative as the factory. In addition, of course, no political solutions are proposed.

BLISS

Both suburbia and communes have been seen as either utopia or dystopia from different perspectives, and in Bliss, Peter Carey explores each from both perspectives. While his depiction of suburbia is primarily negative, he does also suggest its temptations. On the other hand, while emphasising the idyllic aspects of a rural commune, it is not a "hippy" commune that he praises.

In this section I summarise the general plot line of Bliss, then indicate ways in which Carey interrogates utopian/dystopian ideas, discuss briefly the role of formal politics in this novel, and finally discuss techniques. Bliss is about Harry Joy and his wife Bettina and their children David and Lucy. Harry is a happy "good bloke" who owns an advertising agency and unreflectingly enjoys life. Suffering a heart attack, he believes he has died and gone to Hell and is being observed by "Captors" disguised as his family members. Thus the usual sanctuary of the family is experienced as ominous, and while this is to some extent a parody of dystopias such as Nineteen Eighty-Four, it does suggest the manner in which families may be used to socially control individuals. In addition, Harry's son David, with the connivance of the rest of the family, does have him committed to a mental hospital,in a reversal of the control traditionally exercised over women by fathers, husbands and brothers.

As tensions mount, Harry moves to a hotel where he meets Honey Barbara, commune health freak and occasional prostitute. Committed to a mental institution by his son, Harry negotiates his release with Bettina and returns to his suburban house bringing Honey Barbara with him. Bettina has a passion and a genius for advertising but has been excluded as a woman, and now insists on Harry's help to sell her superb advertisements. As relations sour, Honey returns to her Bog Onion commune. Bettina, on the brink of advertising fame, discovers she has cancer from proximity to petrol and uses a presentation to business executives to blow them and herself up. Harry escapes the police to Honey's commune, but only years later will she speak to him.

SUBURBIA

The first notion of utopia examined in Bliss is suburbia, or what Fishman (1987) has labelled "bourgeois utopia", a type of utopia based on two combinations - prosperity combined with the ability to live well away from one's work, and community combined with an emphasis on individual families. In Australia (and elsewhere) the idea of suburbia has included everyone's aspiration to own their own home (Thompson, 1994). Suburbia was perhaps always a flawed notion of utopia, however, and Robin Gerston (1990) has argued that in Australian literature suburbia has quite consistently been seen as Hell or as a "metonym for death", compared to either the testing and character-building bush or the aesthetically inspiring or at least vibrantly working class inner city.

One problem with suburbia has been that the geographical distancing from the work place, prized on the one hand, also has isolated women from access to work and participated in the re-"domestification" of Australian women in the 1950s (Kingston, 1975:1). Chambers (1997: 87) calls it "a material and cultural expression of the ideology of feminine domesticity". This is true at least symbolically of Bettina, and she considers men a "brotherhood of frauds" (14) and feels that she is being "patronised by idiots" (18) in her efforts to break into advertising. Youth also are trapped and bored in suburbia, according to its critics and in Carey's depiction, and pop, rock and punk all have been counter-suburbia (e.g., Silverstone 1997: 23-24; Lebeau, 1997).

As a second problem, suburbia is the site of consumption, not production. Before his "death", Harry is a happy consumer, and even after his return to suburbia he is tempted by the luxury of silk shirts and fine wine. He is tempted also by Bettina's advertising genius, and advertising itself emphasises the difference between production and consumption. Carey has spoken positively about his own short career in advertising, and in Bliss he shows us the artistic aspect of advertisements, but the point still holds.

A third problem is that families may become dysfunctional under the pressure of suburban life. Thinking his family are imposters, and therefore watching them closely for the first time in his life, Harry discovers the artificial nature of his family, their lack of real affection for each other. Lucy accuses Harry of never having hugged the family as he now hugs Honey Barbara (222), but the general malaise is epitomised when we see the family at play through Harry's eyes: Just before they all assemble as if for a family portrait, we see Lucy giving David a blow-job in return for dope and we see Bettina with Joel (110-112).

By staying in the city Harry becomes poisoned, poisoned to the point of attempting to buy Honey's love (231); and Honey becomes poisoned to the point of letting David fool her into sexual relations (242). Thus their life in the city really does become the Hell that Harry previously projected (231), as they loose sight of their love for each other.

THE COMMUNE

When Harry Joy does arrive at Bog Onion Commune the 1960s stereotype of communal utopia also is undermined. The participants are individually occupied and preoccupied, and Harry himself is only there hiding from the police (280). As Honey knows this, she is not happy to see him and does not speak to him for years. Eventually, however, Harry comes to love the trees he plants and helps to create real community through telling stories he has come to understand. When the trees he has been planting for years finally mature enough to provide Honey Barbara with quality honey all year around, she capitulates.

In the end there is a kind of utopia, if not in the form of a hippy commune, then in the degree of community that Harry has helped to build, along with the love finally admitted and accepted between Harry and Honey Barbara. In a final twist, it is revealed that the narrators of the story of this book are the children of Harry and Honey Barbara, adding another dimension of hope to the ending. While the commune, like suburbia, is middle class (and racially homogenous), and in this case characterised by nuclear families, it is anti-consumerism and environmentally friendly.

POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS

Suburbia and commune are not formal political institutions, and even in Carey's discussion of Bog Onion Commune there is little reference to decision-making. Carey does not consider, for example, whether more general access to participation might lead to different outcomes. There are, however, public and political institutions that feature in this novel, entirely in a negative way. A mental institution plays a similar but even more central role than the police, the government itself is negatively portrayed, and American imperialism looms in the background.

Both Harry and Honey spend time in the mental institution and have to learn the rules of survival there. There is no question of therapy, but rather simply of power being exercised. The director, Mrs. Dalton, knows incontrovertibly that Harry's name is not Harry Joy (152) and is able to define him by controlling his identification (154, 159, 163, 174). More dangerous than prison because they may take your mind, mental institutions share with totalitarianism the attempt to change human nature. The cardinal rule is never to claim sanity, because in the logic of mental institutions that is the most obvious proof of insanity. Ultimately only money can get Harry released. Mrs. Dalton has previously expressed her intention of "demystifying the treatment of mental illness" by reducing it to a business like any other (147), thus anticipating the more extreme forms of privitisation and economic rationalism that have since over-taken Australian society.

With the police, also, it is necessary to make one's story interesting rather than telling the truth. When Harry's car is squashed by an elephant, the police cannot believe it, even when seeing the car, because they already know this old joke (73); they let him go after he fabricates a story they cannot understand, having roughed him up in the meantime (the ability to tell stories effectively is politically important, in the manner of The Arabian Nights).

The government does not act to control advertising for cancer causing goods, or even to inform citizens about the dangers of carcinogens in common usage (252), but it does positively act to prevent protests against the relevant companies (256). In keeping with elite theories of democracy, access is not provided for active political participation. Rather, people experience government as subjects, especially as recipients of police attention. Bettina accepts the whole myth (226), and eventually takes the terrorist action of petrol bombing her advertising presentation after learning that she has cancer from her early contact with petrol.

American neo-imperialism also is evident. The conceit that dominates Bliss is the telling of stories, and many of the stories that are told involve America as the centre of the desirable world. While Harry Joy tells his father's stories without understanding them, they are vital to Bettina - deprived of the opportunity to demonstrate her genius at advertising - and her belief that America is where reality happens. Like the luxuries of suburbia, the American dream is tempting as well as lethal. In the meanwhile, Australia is in the shadow of American culture, "on the edge of the empire" (24, 13), represented specifically by the dreadful "ugly American" (15) Joel - Harry's partner and Bettina's lover. Empire is linked to the domestic scene by multi-nationals that sell various kinds of death, primarily products involving ingredients that cause cancer.

TECHNIQUES

A major technique in this novel involves the telling of stories and link between Harry's progress as a person and his increasing ability to tell meaningful stories (Natale 1994: 342). As Hassall (1989: 643, 645) has argued, there also is satiric anger here, signalled by such names as Joy and Honey Barbara on one side and Krappe Chemicals, Detective Herpes, and the Free Enterprise Mental Hospital on the other. In a fine article, Hassall also notes the intertext of Blake's Infant Joy pointing to Harry as ingenue (1989: 645, 648). Here, however, I emphasise that there is both a Quixotic logic and a Catch-22 logic to Bliss. There is in Bliss, for example, evidence of the most basic logic of catch-22 - that they can do to us whatever we cannot stop them from doing - when Jimmy calls Honey Barbara to take her bath in the asylum, with clear sexual suggestiveness (177), or when Harry is pushed around and referred to as "it" by the police (75), but it occurs in its less overt forms as well: so many things cause cancer that people are now less worried when a new one is announced, because no one can believe there are so many (124); Alex thinks Harry has been placed in the asylum as a final test to discover that he (Alex) is not really insane, but of course this must be denied by all concerned or it would not be a test, so denials cannot convince him otherwise (154); the police accept Harry's fabricated story but not the truth.

Especially it appears in Honey Barbara's survival rules concerning the police and mental institutions: never admit that you think anyone is after you, especially if they are, because paranoia is a committable offence (132); never claim sanity while in a mental institution because in the logic of mental institutions that is the ultimate symptom of insanity (150). This strategy also relates to the Catch-22 theme of madness. Being good is crazy (106, 155), not to say frightening (91), as people cannot cope with goodness. David thinks Honey is crazy because she talks about food being shit and vice versa (212), and Bettina thinks Honey is "looney" about carcinogens (218), but of course Honey is correct (252).

Heller also incorporated the quixotic into his notion of catch-22 in ways that reappear in Bliss. It is quixotic as originally employed (in Don Quixote), for example, to perceive everything through the coloured glasses of an idee fixe. Harry's belief that he is literally in hell conditions his interpretation of everything, and all contradictory events can be interpreted in terms of that belief. The behaviour of his family and of his employee, Alex Duval, for example, are interpreted by him completely through that perception. He believes that Alex is also in hell, being punished (87) and that part of his own punishment is being in hell with keepers disguised as his family.

In addition, it is quixotic as defined by common usage to think that writing can change reality, and it is quixotic to pursue goodness as Harry does after his conversion. Indeed, the Quixotic in traditional satire is the quester after justice who thereby exposes reality as well as exposing their own foolishness for even looking for justice (Fletcher 1987).

Carey depicts suburbia as tempting but dystopic and he depicts the commune as problematic but ultimately utopic. There is not, finally, a "political" solution or utopia as political arrangement, but rather essentially an escape from the negative consumerism of suburbia and the non-participatory politics of the city. It is positive, but a sub-community within the larger society. Nonetheless, Carey does seem to want stories and story-telling to matter, and they do form a participatory manifestation of community.

The Republic of Women

RW is utopic, in a partial and sub-community way, based on the relationships among the major characters as informed by the stories of goddesses and heroic women over the centuries. The title, then, refers to those relationships among three women and their friends, lovers and others in St Kilda, and it refers also to the collectivity of goddesses and women over time as partially identified in the side stories that constitute much of this novel. The message comes from the characters and the separate but linked stories, not from a single plot line. In this section I identify the main female characters and the bases of their relationships with each other and with others, indicate the inter-weaved stories and note the role of formal politics in this novel. I then comment on techniques and conclude the section.

THE WOMEN

The character Marie expresses her desire to imagine a utopia that she would like to live in, unlike those articulated by Plato and Corbusier (246-7), that would be characterised by "life" and "passion" (2). Relationships and culture are central, not technology, and even nature is secondary, despite an interest in the environment, contrary to the association of women with nature in many traditional feminist and mainstream utopias and dystopias.

The main characters are Marie, an academic architect and cellist; Lillian, an older, Jewish feminist scholar, from St Kilda old money and identified as sensuous (65) and carnal (63, 90); and Elle, a rock singer, postgraduate student and single mother. Sophie is Elle's young daughter, and Abelard is Lillian's dog. Sokrates is Lillian's lover, although he lives in Greece; Denis is their gay and outrageously camp friend, whose partner is the war-game playing Heinrich. Ursula Upstairs teaches opera, Daphne lives Downstairs, and Mary White is an Aboriginal St. Kildarian.

St Kilda itself also is a character in the novel. It epitomises the multi-cultural nature of Australia (237) in its cultural richness (249), and real variety (16-18, 110), and it even has scenery (85). It is inner-city interesting, then, as in Gerster's comparisons with suburbia, with the ironic danger being from developers and gentrification (104, 248-249).

The relationships among the women are based on friendship, traditionally an important key to feminist utopias. All of the women are hetero, although they insist on independent living arrangements as part of their autonomy. Shared cultural pursuits, rather than sexual arrangements or political procedures, are central. People are the source of problems, but they also are the basis of solutions, according to Marie. When Elle cautions against grand narratives, with her own Italian background in mind (185), Marie agrees but thinks they are really just a boy thing anyway (186).

Lillian is mentor and patron to both Marie and Elle. She experiences Sophie as a surrogate grandchild, telling her stories about her collection of goddess dolls, and Sophie also romps gleefully with Abelard. Lillian also has a very loving and intellectual relationship with Sokrates, perhaps because they live far apart. Marie has an easy relationship with Sophie, while Marie and Elle share stories and music, talk about their experiences, and play pool, work together building Marie's bed, and shop together.

Marie also has a close friendship with Denis. He is gay and HIV positive, and when he believes he is declining he decides to commit suicide so that his partner, Heinrich, will be proud and not have to watch him degenerate physically and mentally (210-211). Heinrich is embarrassed to cry, but is so upset that Denis knows he is loved (203; 210, 241) and therefore realises that men also can be loving people (242). At his request Marie organises Elle and Ursula and herself to play bits from La Traviata at his funeral. But the major focus in on women, and Denis' story only partially counters the bifurcation between men and women.

The focus on culture finds expression partially via the stories that interweave throughout the book. In addition, specific paintings are mentioned and music is prominent, partly involved in telling the stories (through opera, for example) but also in Marie's cello playing, Elle's singing, and a secondary reference to Sufi flutes (65). There also is an appreciation of good coffee (20), beautiful flowers (54) and interesting books and art objects (64). When Marie and Elle combine to build Marie's bed there are strong aesthetic dimensions, with beautiful wood (3) and fine tools (7), and Marie later declares beauty to be a moral imperative (221).

THE STORIES

The stories feature either men and war, on the one hand, or, on the other hand, women as victims or women and reproduction and women and culture. The stories are linked, and they begin with frames within the novel - e.g., Heinrich's war games frame stories about the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides while Lillian's stories to Sophie about her doll goddesses frame stories about the great myths of the goddesses. In all these cases, however, the stories eventually slip out of those frames and into the general narrative. There are two types of stories. One type is the male stories about the Peloponnesian War, Garibaldi's attempted liberation of Italy, and Plato's attempts to implement his political theory. The other type includes the female stories of Greek goddesses set against Plato and Thucydides and Anita Garibaldi's story set against Garibaldi's. It also includes a variety of versions of the story of Marie Duplessis.

Heinrich and his (anonymous) friends, not including Denis, re-enact the Peloponnesian War, which provides a male/history/war counterpart to Lillian's stories about the goddesses. Like Lillian's stories, stories from Thucydides become part of the general narrative. The anonymity accords with Australian masculinity, which avoids the personal as well as poetry (104). In the games, conflicts lead to trade disputes, which lead to war (51-52). War Decimates the trees (35) and leads to starvation and plague (57, 101-102) and to slavery (97). War is supported by the rich male elite of the Athenian demos (77-78), including the war-boom rich (139), while the indigenous population is kept down in the name of freedom (77) and the costs of war are passed on in taxes (127). As the novel progresses, the war games become interspersed with more contemporary tales - CNN reports of millions killed in Africa (144-145) and mighty Athens is defeated by "primitives" (155-157) perhaps invoking the US defeat in Vietnam. As war moves toward Demeter's sacred site (92) and the Olympic Games are celebrated (107-109) these stories link to those of the Greek myths and Lillian's goddess stories.

The war games are mirrored by Terminator pin-ball games where Marie and Elle play pool (52), and the theme of war as rape is introduced: the history of Sicily is described as rape (5) and bayoneting and raping are merged in a scene from Verdi's infancy (10). Marie is later "raped" by an acquaintance, "Sydney", who rushes ahead without her consultation and cooperation (142) and turns out to have an undisclosed wife and children (150-151). Elle sympathises that it has happened to her as well (143).

The frame for Garibaldi's story is that Elle is researching it for her MA. It also involves rebellion and retribution and attempts to secure "freedom" against despotic government and the Church. It links to the opera stories via Verdi and his participation in Italian nationalism (113) and to the story of Marguerite Gautier through Dumas pere, who wrote about Garibaldi (114-115). It links to the women's stories through Anita Garibaldi and via Marie and Elle's observation that once again women's (and the workers') side of history is largely left out (69).

Plato's story emphasises the difficulties involved in running public affairs correctly (116-118) and teaching rulers to be philosophers (196). In the battle between might and ideals, his efforts to realise his utopia ended in disaster for all concerned.

The goddess stories emphasis fertility and motherhood, and Lillian contends that genital intimacy is the source of life and love (188-189). Demeter and Persephone play a prominent part, from Persephone's abduction and rape by her uncle, Hades, to Demeter's blackmail of Zeus in his guise as a modern CEO (168, 176-177). This story crosses over to the war game stories in detail when, for example, Alcibiades is impeached for mimicking Demeter and Persephone (166), having already raped a flute girl and called her Sicily (162), or when the story of Rhea Silvia's giving birth to Romula and Remus merges into the story of Verdi's national defence of Italy (115-116). They cross over in essence when the gods kill their mother goddesses and then turn on each other, causing the rise and fall of earthly empires (193). They have forgotten, Lillian says, that Aphrodite is older than time and love is not for understanding or mastering (221-223).

There also are variations on the theme of Marie Duplessis, famous courtesan who died young of TB, denied social acceptance or a respectable relationship with her aristocratic lover despite her beauty, culture, and even courage. Initially sold by her father for sex, she only escaped a devastating work life by becoming a mistress (66-68, 71-75, 80-82). These stories include Marie's incarnations as Marguerite Gautier in Dumas fils' La Dame Aux Camelias and as Violetta Valery in Verdi's opera, La Traviata, based on the play based on Dumas' novel. Similar stories are told about Giuseppina Strepponi, opera singer and later Verdi's wife, and about Nellie Melba, who famously sang the part of Violetta and was also denied the love of Duc D'Orleans. Ursula Upstairs does not have her story told, but lives the La Traviata that she teaches, interposing herself into the story (132-133). Marie, on the other hand, fights against La Traviata, and although she at times finds herself humming bits from it (93) and playing her cello to it (160), she also plays her cello to counter it (125). She cannot understand why men such as Verdi work to liberate Italy but cannot see how women are treated (124). She complains about the sentimentality of the opera (103) and denounces Violetta for always giving in and making all the sacrifices (160, 186).

Anita Garibaldi's story is similar. She fights bravely by Garibaldi's side and dies for the cause of Italian independence, but she also had been forced into an early marriage by her mother for causing trouble by reporting an attempted rape by a rich boy (200). The goddess stories, then, tell us about the importance of women while the women's stories tell us about persistent injustice to women.

FORMAL POLITICS

The men's stories talk about rebellions and wars for freedom, at least for (some) men or at least against Athenian hegemony, and Tom Paine, Thomas Jefferson and William Blake are all invoked on the theme of freedom (8-9). Australia was recognised as the new, free place, but the need for a government license to dig for gold provoked the Eureka Stockade episode, Australia's version of rebellion against taxation without representation (9, 8). Women, it is noted, are often left out of history when it is written about such events, including the woman who sewed the stars on the Southern Cross for the Eureka rebellion (10) or those involved in the Italian resistance with Garibaldi (62, 69), or women generally in fifth-century Athens (148). They also are left out by modernist architecture (220).

Contemporary Australia also comes in for questioning, with Elle suggesting that Australian citizenship is defined in terms of consumerism (105) and that life here is all too shallow and easy without people believing in anything (106). On the other hand, Lillian contradicts the statement of a nostalgic participant that there were real ideals in 1968, now lost: "As far as I can see, the main difference is that young people today are smart enough to know that barricades and good graffiti are not enough!" (137)

TECHNIQUES

A number of minor techniques contribute to presenting the message in this novel. The opinions of the erudite Lillian, for example, are further bolstered by references to authoritative sources. Thus, her general argument for the importance of passion and love is re-enforced by her own rational abilities and academic reputation and also by reference to an article in New Scientist that argues that rational argument and economic tools have failed to change human nature (218). Broad interlinks are mirrored by minor interlinks, such as the case of the Jewish restaurant, Scheherazade's, "named for a nightclub in Paris named for Rimsky-Korsakov's symphonic suite named for a Muslim woman" (231-232).

The linkages also are much broader, as indicated above, and the interweave of stories is the major technique. Thus, the war game stories, the goddess stories, and variations of the story of Marie Duplessis all slip their leads and intermix with the stories of the contemporary "fictional" characters - Lillian, Marie, Elle, Denis and others, a development commented on in the text itself (182).

PROBLEMS

Findley presumably attempts to avoid what Kitch (2001:5) calls the metonymic fallacy of utopianism, that what suits some will suit everyone. That is, ability to accommodate difference and even eccentricity is part of the appeal of St Kilda, and even Elle's criticism of Australia assumes freedom from despotism in the broader political system. The novel sticks closely to reality. It is especially unfair, then, to label it utopic and then criticise it for not meeting the conditions of that label. Marie is appalled that something like "Sydney's"

behaviour could still go on, and Elle talks about the need to make St Kilda better as well as about its strengths (249), and at the very most a sub-community is involved. Nonetheless, the title Republic of Women and other references do have weight. Some of the contradictions, then, perhaps deserve mention.

It seems somewhat strange that Denis' funeral is the climax to the novel, that the appearance of the historical collectivity of women, referred to as "the very pulse of the universe", occurs during that event, and that the impetus for their appearance is the music of the re-orchestrated music from La Traviata (262-264). This seems contrary to Marie's earlier impatience with that opera and with Violetta's behaviour, even associating it with her episode with "Sydney". It seems somewhat strange also that despite the reasons why the female friends love St Kilda and fear its gentrification, their passage is eased by Lillian's "old money", and that their "republic of women" in that suburb is essentially a cultural and middle class one. Finally, and as mentioned above, it is Elle who sees a shallow Australia, lacking strong beliefs (106), but it is also Elle who warns against the solutions offered by grand narratives such as fascism (185). Thus, the issue of positive freedom, often seen as the strength and/or the weakness of utopianism, is finally raised but in a confused manner.

Dr Lisa Hill

Department of Politics

University of Adelaide

Adam Ferguson: Radical or Conservative?

Adam Ferguson's interest in the decline of civilisations and the concomitant onset of political corruption is linked to his doubts about the benefits of progress and industrial expansion. For this reason, it is commonly suggested that Ferguson's work represents the first sustained critique of capitalism and market society based on the detection of alienation effects and a theory of class exploitation. Marx himself quoted Ferguson approvingly, acknowledging his debt to the latter's insightful critique of modernity and industrial expansion.

Yet Ferguson's failure to provide any practical clues as to how corruption could be prevented is at odds with the general tone of his writing; indeed, it has led to charges of inconsistency and moral dereliction on his part. This paper seeks to explain Ferguson's omission by aligning his conservatism with key aspects of his social thought, namely his prior commitments to Stoic-Christianity and the theory of spontaneous generation.

Adam Ferguson: Radical or Conservative?

The decline of civilisations and the concomitant onset of political corruption is virtually the major theme of Adam Ferguson's social and political science. His published purpose in setting out his thoughts on the subject, not only in the Essay on Civil Society, but in almost all his assorted publications and pamphlets, was to record the effects of industrial modernity upon social and affective life, or in his own words, 'to describe that remissness of spirit, that state of national debility, which is likely to end in political slavery'.

Because of his scepticism about the benefits of industrial expansion, it is commonly suggested that Ferguson's work represents the first sustained critique of capitalism and market society based on the detection of alienation effects and a theory of class exploitation. Indeed, Peter Gay once wrote that 'Ferguson's pages on the division of labour are a minor triumph of eighteenth century sociology'. Ferguson was less interested than Smith in the economic effects of specialisation, focusing instead on its social ramifications. In this regard the Essay breaks new ground and probably constitutes the first fully developed sociological account of the effects of specialisation.. Marx also quoted Ferguson approvingly and declared that he had been inspired by the latter's treatment of the dehumanising effects of the division of labour.

Ferguson believed that civic virtue was the cost of modernity and its loss via increased specialisation, over-extension and hedonism inevitably led to national ruin wherever the signs of moral decay were not detected early enough. '[N]ations cease to be eminent', he declared, when the citizen's active nature is deprived of 'objects which serve[d] to excite (his) spirit.' Accordingly, governments must do more than administer and secure material prosperity; they must also seek actively to enlist the participation of citizens in public affairs since history has shown that nations characterised by high levels of political apathy are extremely susceptible to corruption and despotic rule. Yet Ferguson's failure to provide any practical clues as to how corruption should be prevented is completely out of step with the general tone of his writing; indeed, it has led to charges of inconsistency and moral dereliction on his part. This paper seeks to explain Ferguson's omission and defend him, in part at least, against his critics by aligning his conservatism with key aspects of his social thought, namely his prior commitments to spontaneous generation and Stoic-Christianity.

Though a cautious progressivist, Ferguson perceived in the march towards modernity many threats to civic life and the overall stability of the polity. For example, specialisation in task functions is a key source of corruption. Not only do rank distinctions and class and property inequalities flow directly from specialisation, as manual work becomes increasingly uninteresting and mind-numbing the intellectual and moral faculties of labourers become stunted. Eventually, those who work become individuated, isolated, politically withdrawn, and indifferent to all aspects of public life. But by far the worst consequence of specialisation is that it inevitably extends to martial functions. The national interest tends to become obscured wherever there is over-reliance on mercenaries since a populace accustomed to reliance upon professionals for their defence is always ineffectual, timid and 'effeminate'.

Industrialisation also brings with it increased prosperity, which, in turn, generates an ever-widening gap between rich and poor. The community becomes polarised; at one extreme, a class of prodigal rich, at the other a 'supine' class of alienated poor removed from public life by specialisation and centralised rule and infected with the political 'servility' of those who rule them.

Finally, prosperous nations are susceptible to the errors of imperialism and over-extension, errors which have politically enervating effects. In proportion as nations become larger and increase their territories, people become more and more alienated, both physically and psychologically, from the affairs of government. Government itself becomes ever more centralised, bureaucratised, and therefore less 'democratic'. Imperial expansionism is particularly disastrous. Empires inevitably collapse because colonies tend to be ruined by the rule of the despots who ordinarily govern them. In such cases decay, unrest and 'revolution' are now not only unavoidable but 'necessary'.
Ferguson tells us that in order to avoid these trends governors must devise the appropriate political arrangements by which inactive and apathetic citizens will be distracted from their narrow, self-regarding concerns and redirect their attention to the public sphere and more solidary forms of activity. But what is most curious about Ferguson's thinking here is an almost complete lack of recommended reforms to effect this process. Despite his emphasis on popular participation in municipal affairs there are no calls for a universal franchise or for any other significant institutional changes which might offset the problems of apathy, civic demobilisation and political corruption. This has resulted in accusations of fecklessness and irresponsibility on his part. For example, David Kettler has interpreted Ferguson's conservatism as a kind of wilful neglect of his duty as a moralist; namely, to challenge an unjust political order. He writes that Ferguson was 'completely unable or largely unable to challenge the prevailing distribution of power ' and that 'in his capacity as ally and supporter of the status quo, he could rest content with applying a rationalising gloss over the problems of his time'. William Lehmann also notes that there is 'no revolutionary activism' in Ferguson and, like Kettler, perceives Ferguson's lack of suggested reforms as symptomatic of either some kind of philosophical disability or a moral unwillingness to follow his analysis through to its logical conclusion. 'Why', he asks rhetorically, 'was Ferguson unable or unwilling to follow through the logic of his intellectual analysis and of his moral feelings by demanding more than merely a moral appeal to right the more flagrant wrongs incident to the existing system?'

Some explanations for Ferguson's apparent willingness to gloss over of what was, effectively, the problematic centrepiece of his corpus will be given presently but for the moment it may be worthwhile to note that Ferguson was not completely neglectful of his 'responsibilities' here; he does in fact suggest a few constitutional and social reforms to address the problems which absorbed him so much. Granted, his presentation of these was extremely vague and disjointed and have to be culled out by the reader, nevertheless, the pattern which does finally emerge is in the classic mould of civic humanism to the extent that Ferguson recommends greater popular participation in public life, the introduction of a citizen militia, the insertion of a civics education programme into the existing school curriculum and the maintenance of constitutionally limited government.

Activism and Pluralism: It has been noted that Ferguson held to the view that civic moral character (and therefore political freedom) is preserved by an active, informed and highly factious citizenry. Where a citizenry is vigilant degeneration may be side-stepped altogether, therefore the best way to avoid impending political slavery is to enhance civic competence, awareness and mobility. Mass participation also guards against the fatal weakness of simple forms of rule: 'the error that results from the freedom of one person is best corrected by the wisdom that results form the concurring freedom of many'. Institutions that 'engage the minds of citizens in public duties...tend to preserve and cultivate virtue'. Conversely, corrupt institutions 'tend to beget tyranny and insolence in the sovereign, servility and vileness in the subject...and to fill every heart with jealousy or dejection'. The relationship between civic temper and the political order is intimately symbiotic; civic virtue will lead to the just political order and the pursuit of the just political order will, in turn, preserve and enhance civic virtue. The edifice of a just political order itself represents both the matrix for and object of creative civic exertions. The main goal of these efforts is 'to guard against the abuses of power, and procure to individuals equal security in their respective stations'. Regardless even of the existence of sound 'political establishments' the integrity of a constitution lies ultimately in the hands of the public and in its 'firm and resolute spirit'.

Far from being a sign of stability political quiescence hides a sinister truth: '(T)he turbulence of free states is contrasted with the seeming tranquillity of a despotical government'. The appearance of disturbance and conflict indicates the existence, rather than lack of rule of law and the protection of such rights as free speech and right of protest. Contrary to Hume's view that faction is pernicious , Ferguson regards party faction fighting as both beneficial and virtuous. For this reason John Robertson suggests that Ferguson favoured the institutionalisation of 'a permanent party system' as a means of entrenching factional conflict within the political culture.
The ideal political order is one that is characterised by the protection of such civil and political rights as political 'redress', right of 'resistance' and 'freedom of speech as well as thought'; Ferguson judges their existence as symptomatic 'of just as well as of vigorous government'. But typically he fails to stipulate just how extensive these rights should be or how they would be achieved and protected.

Militia Scheme: While Ferguson is a perfectibilist committed to progress he is also a kind of nostalgic moralist alarmed at the damage done to the moral personality by that same, presumably natural, progress. His practical solution to the wealth/virtue problem lay in recommending the institution of a citizen militia believing this to be the best chance of restoring restore civic virtue while in no way impairing productivity. The beacon of this model was the Swiss system which Ferguson praised enthusiastically: 'the only People in Europe who are regularly (armed) are the most Industrious and the most Peaceable Citizens.' The Swiss example demonstrated that, contrary to the claims of critics, an armed citizenry did not threaten internal security. He is thus committed, simultaneously, to wealth and virtue, apparently believing that it is possible, after all, to accommodate the two primary goals of a state: security and prosperity.

Soldiering should be singled out and exempted from the normal course of task specialisation. Deploring the separation of political, civil and military 'departments' which render practitioners mere 'tradesmen' Ferguson recommends instead a 'union of departments' to avoid the 'ruinous ignorance' which always leads to corruption. But his resolve seems weak here: significantly, he stresses that the military must be dominated by the upper classes, in order to prevent rebellion against the established social order. People of high rank are 'best educated' and therefore 'have the greatest interest in (the state's) preservation.' Initially Ferguson notes that, ideally, it is preferable that 'every citizen ought to have the advantage and the security which the spirit and capacity of self-defence tends to give' but he later goes on to make the important qualification that this is impossible in a modern, large scale, differentiated nation like Britain where citizens were not 'nearly upon a footing of equality' that would otherwise prevent rebellion and threats to the existing order. The next best thing, then, is the limitation of arms to persons of 'a certain condition' (the words 'to exclude the rabble' were later crossed out by Ferguson).

Educational Programme: Ferguson also suggests that governments could justifiably insert some kind of remedial educational programme into the existing school curriculum. Acutely aware of this intrusion into the system of 'natural liberty' (as Smith referred to it) Ferguson explicitly cites the argument used by Smith in the Wealth of Nations that though education is a strictly private concern we may 'except' from 'this general rule...every case in which defence or publick safety is at stake'. Therefore, Ferguson takes the unprecedented step of recommending that a

...committee of Parliament or other publick authority might no doubt with great advantage be interposed to report from Age to Age what regulations might be required in publick schools to prepare the rising generations for that part which necessity might impose on every individual for the safety of his country.

Ferguson implies that this might be some kind of citizenship training with an emphasis on martial skills for the passage which immediately follows stresses that a person 'who cannot defend himself is not a Man and he who cannot take part in the defence of his country is not a Citizen'.

Apart from this and the limited militia scheme there are no positive recommendations whatsoever for institutional or constitutional reforms to accommodate the high levels of civic interest and participation Ferguson seems to be demanding. And there are certainly no remedial suggestions for the problem of elite rule and mass exclusion. His preferred constitution is always the existing one (except, of course, in the case of despotism) since, to his mind, it has evolved naturally via the various processes and operations of spontaneous order (to be discussed). In Britain's case, this led him to recommend the retention of its existing constitutional monarchy. Contrary to the opinions of some scholars Ferguson distrusts, in practice, 'popular or republican' governments, regarding them as little more than 'mob rule' and as practically inferior to his preferred model, the 'mixed monarchy'. Popular rule is a threat to liberty, says Ferguson. After all: '[w]hen all the powers of the Roman Senate were transferred to the popular assemblies, the Liberty of Rome came to an end.' Clearly 'the power of the people is not the good of the people.' Ferguson applauds attempts in Rome 'to prevent, as much as possible...ill-informed assemblies of people from deliberating on matters of state' and deplores moves to reduce the powers of the aristocracy in favour the 'poor' who 'were not qualified... to be raised to a state of equality'. Their influence, he cautioned, would be 'ruinous to government'. Commercial nations characterised by a well developed system of rank distinctions, even where of 'a small extent' are 'best fitted to aristocratical government or to mixed republic' though absolute monarchies are resoundingly condemned especially where they are hereditary. Of course, mixed or constitutional monarchies are not entirely antithetical to the civic tradition which is not, as is commonly thought, reducible to republicanism; they can be accommodated within the tradition so long as they represent regularly constituted government which is precisely what Ferguson had in mind.

Mixed monarchies are endorsed because they are at least one way of preventing degeneration. Polybius had argued that single types of polities were instable and doomed to collapse thus Ferguson endorses a kind of neo-Polybian model with its system of checks and balances, and division of powers: 'In our government, King, Lords and Commons are not one power, but three collateral powers, any one of which may stop the motions of the rest.' Any attempt to introduce a pure or unitary constitutional form would result in either tyranny or anarchy. Conversely one of the 'beauties' of the mixed constitution is that 'it can withstand many evils without being overthrown'.

Discussion. We have seen that despite his sustained and intensive critique of industrialisation, political elitism, bureaucratic centralisation and the mercenary spirit of the modern age, there is little or no spirit of revolution or dramatic reform in Ferguson. Despite his persistent rhetorical enthusiasm for mass political mobilisation, the absence of calls for reforms such as universal suffrage (or even a modest broadening of the franchise), mass representative institutions, a universal militia scheme or a devolvement in specialisation functions seems at odds with his enlightened critique of British social arrangements. Accordingly, Kettler and Lehmann both seem justified in their condemnation of Ferguson's conservatism and his apparent willingness to pay only lip service to the ideal of mass political participation.

It is fair to say that Ferguson was averse to radical innovation of any kind. He never recommended the devolvement of any of the institutions or developments he identified as destructive agents of civil society because ultimately, he was a defender of commerce and the status quo. Though he led the campaign to secure a Scottish militia, Ferguson rallied to the government side in defence of the union. In addition, Christopher Wyvill's efforts to secure Ferguson's support for the Parliamentary Reform movement which sought a broadening of the franchise was fruitless.

And whereas Ferguson ordinarily condemned imperialism and asserted the right of all nations to self-determination, in the case of the American revolt he defended Britain's right of imperial rule. Indeed, he acted as secretary to a commission to Philadelphia to effect conciliation (only to be thwarted by his refusal of a passport to the capital). Ferguson's opposition to American independence is expressed most vehemently in a pamphlet (for which he was commissioned by the British government) entitled 'Remarks on a Pamphlet Lately Published by Dr Price'. In it he defends the status quo against what he regards as the Americans' ill-considered attempts at democracy and social equality.

Explanations. Discrepant as it first appears, in fact Ferguson's conservatism can be traced easily to his prior theological and sociological commitments. The most important of these is his loyalty to the spontaneous order arrangement. Reacting against the kind of rationalist and contractarian views of history which flourished up to and around his time, Ferguson posited instead a non-cognitive, irrationalist theory of history and social order, presaging structural functionalist explanations of the development and maintenance of social institutions, patterns and mores. His approach was also anti-individualist; the achievement of order and change are social processes which occur over time, reflecting the unconscious wisdom of generations rather than the conscious intentions of planners, legislators or influential actors. The propagation of the species, the origin and maintenance of the family, the division of labour, language, technological and artistic advances, and the emergence of the modern state are just some of the unintended consequences of actors pursuing their limited goals. Rationality, explicit contract and long term planning are displaced by sub-rational drives as the generators of our complex social structures, historical progress and the general equilibrium of society.

Ferguson emphasises the polygenesis of our key institutions and the absence of any long-term human design in their development. The symmetry and complexity of government, the harmonious accommodation of its various components, could not conceivably have been the work of a single legislator, however sagacious. Ferguson shares in Burke's view that fit and good constitutions always embody the collective wisdom of generations of actors who have shaped it piecemeal and dialectically through centuries of conflict and compromise. Institutions wrought over time by successive generations ought to be protected from the interventions of both reformists and revolutionaries therefore Ferguson condemns all forms of rapid change and revolutionary spirit. Such would disrupt 'Nature' whose modus operandi is exclusively subrational and evolutionistic: 'No constitution is formed by concert, no government is copied from a plan'. Rather, people 'proceed from one form of government to another, by easy transitions'. To expose them to the caprices of intemperate reformers would be nothing short of a recipe for disaster. 'The Americans', he suggested gloomily, 'may not know what they are doing.' History has taught us 'that there is no time of more danger than those times of... enthusiastic expectation, in which mankind are bent on great and hazardous change.'

In the Principles Ferguson poses the rhetorical question: 'To what government we should (sic) have recourse, or under what roof should we lodge?' In reply he declares emphatically: 'The present!' Our greatest achievements do not arise overnight; a major purpose of Ferguson's writing was to demonstrate that the incrementalism of developments is precisely what fits them to human needs. Our wisdom and competence grow with and through our institutions which are simultaneously the product and matrix of spontaneous order. Revolutions bring rapid institutional changes with which we are ill-equipped to cope because we have not evolved with them: 'sudden innovations of any sort precipitate men into situations in which they are not qualified to act.' Each age must be permitted to make its own contribution to the species' development and since all innovations are time bound 'no age can with advantage Legislate unalterably for the Ages that follow.'

Ferguson's support for the existing order and his reluctance to play the role of the 'Great Legislator' was not, therefore, based on weakness of resolve but on a genuine commitment to an order he conceived as already scientifically perfect and, morover, divinely ordained. His investigations as a moral philosopher and historian revealed to him a complex pattern of seemingly irrefutable evidence confirming the existence of a social system which was designed to be self-ordering, self-adjusting and self-perpetuating. Ferguson's faith in a spontaneous order is based on his sincere belief in an omniscient, omnipotent and benevolent 'Creator' whom we must trust to look after our best interests and to whom we should resign our will. Practically, this means that we should attend only to our daily concerns and restrict our efforts to objects within our immediate control. This rule applies especially to those with rationalist constructivist ambitions and delusions of legislative grandeur.

Ferguson sought to avoid revisionism in any of the causes of corruption he identified because they were the products of our otherwise positive and progressive spontaneous order drives. The study of nature's laws shows us that history has its own rationale; the laws of spontaneous order demonstrate the naturalness and inevitability of gradual progress and the corresponding inadvisability of radical reform. While conceding that in most cases 'the present government may have its defects, as the walls or roof of the building in which we lodge may be insufficient', he sternly admonishes revolutionaries to '(b)eware you take not away so much of the supports at once as that the roof may fall in.'

But Ferguson is not absolute in his conservatism, admitting that there are instances where, under conditions of tyranny, the people have a right to 'reclaim' their sovereignty. He was prepared to advocate change and even revolution but only if it could be shown that the existing regime was a state of political slavery which suppressed civic virtue. Ferguson finds himself on the same problematic ground as Burke in attempting (not very successfully) to reconcile the Whig principle of freedom with Tory notions of order. Despotism may sometimes inspire a kind of revolutionary madness, resulting in justifiable tumults:

When the multitude, whose interests so much it is to have settled government, tear down the power by which themselves are protected, we must suppose that they are either seized by madness, or that by wrongs they are driven to despair.

And yet this was the most extreme scenario. Ferguson's endorsement of Francis Hutcheson's earlier defence of the right to resistance contains the important qualification that the present order, however seemingly intolerable, is almost always preferable to 'innovation', which, no matter how minor, brings on unforeseen changes which may be not be welcome. Innovation should only be a 'last remedy'.

Kettler argues that the significance of this last remark is that it was written during the French revolution and published by Ferguson during the great anti-Jacobin hysteria in Britain. But Ferguson's position here had been established long before this period and remained stable regardless of changing events. To his mind, the Americans were attempting to erect a constitution in a cultural vacuum. He did not consider the American case to be analogous to those of Roman provinces like Macedonia or Syria (for whom he reserved the right to revolt) because he regarded America as a kind of terra nullius with no history or traditions (other than those conferred upon it by Britain) to distinguish it as either fit for or deserving of independence. It was not a proper nation, merely a plantation and Britain could not be expected to forego its enormous investment in settling, 'nursing' and 'protecting' it without a fight. In addition, aside from his objection to revolution, the whole idea of American democracy alarmed Ferguson who strongly believed that large-scale republics were unstable.

Aside from the spontaneous order constraint, Ferguson also wrote from the perspective of Whig-Presbyterian conservatism which conceived its role, philosophically, as one of justifying 'support for the existing institutional order' and of equating this support with civic virtue. Though the Moderates were liberal on questions of religious and intellectual freedom they were generally conservative on social and political issues. Similarly, Stoic apatheia is harnessed in the service of Fergusonian conservatism: resignation to the established order is equated with wisdom and a dedication to the universal good:

I am in the station which God has assigned me, says Epictetus. With this reflection, a man may be happy in every station; without it he cannot be happy in any. Is not the appointment of God sufficient to outweigh every other consideration? This rendered the condition of a slave agreeable to Epictetus, and that of a monarch to Antoninus. This consideration renders any situation agreeable to a rational nature, which delights not in partial interests, but in universal good.

Accordingly Ferguson considered as unsociable any disturbance to the social fabric: '(W)e are ill members of society, or unwilling instruments in the hand of God' when 'we do our utmost to counteract our nature, to quit our station, and to undo ourselves.' Ferguson's conservatism was thus bolstered by the twin supports of a philosophical commitment to spontaneously generated order and to his Christian/Stoic beliefs.
Conclusion.
Any reader of Ferguson will quite sensibly be puzzled by his failure to suggest any institutional mechanisms for generating the new civic realm he seems so anxious to promulgate. There is little to inspire optimism beyond his relatively modest calls for a selective citizen militia scheme, a single allusion to a civics education programme, the protection (by undisclosed means) of such liberties as free speech, right of 'resistance' and right of protest and the maintenance of the existing constitution. The most glaring omission, perhaps, is his abandonment of the principle of political equality which, confusingly, he both defends and repudiates in turn.

Though Ferguson was profoundly concerned about existing trends he did not appear to believe that the system needed a major overhaul. It seems that a little judicious tinkering was more what he had in mind. Like Burke, he thought that a few minor reforms were sometimes permissible in order to prevent a degenerative trend which might in all likelihood otherwise lead to complete revolution or 'innovation'.

The lack of concrete solutions to address the problems which Ferguson made his life's work are partly symptomatic of a paralysed philosophical position. As a moralist with both sociological sensibilities and a social conscience, he was alarmed at the state of industrialising Britian, but as a perfectiblist, anti-contractarian committed to defending the laws of spontaneous generation, he could encourage neither radical reform nor a return to primitive conditions.

Ferguson seemed to believe that the warning he was delivering to the British public, and especially its statesmen, would be incentive enough to bring about the appropriate modifications: This was his particular contribution to the social problems of his day. The textual warning was, itself, a civic act. Describing himself in a letter to Christopher Wyvill as 'a sincere friend of the Constitution' he reflected that since he was 'so little able to serve it in practise' he was at least enabled 'to pay it all due respect in (his) speculations.'
Notwithstanding the awkward corner into which he had painted himself, Ferguson's conservatism, while at times disappointing, should not be be interpreted so much as a sign of irresponsibility, insincerity or even philosophical inconsistency but rather, as a logical function of his attachment to a mature set of philosophical and moral precepts, namely his dual commitment to Stoic-Presbyterianism, and perhaps more importantly, the spontaneous order arrangement.

Jim Jose

Department of Economics

The University of Newcastle

Abstract

Several influential nineteenth century philosophers (namely James Mill, John Stuart Mill, Charles Fourier, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels) articulated a trope that linked the idea of women’s emancipation with the idea of social emancipation or social progress. This paper examines the use of this trope in the context of the writings of these philosophers. It is argued that to interpret it, as some historians of political thought have done, as a means of establishing these philosophers’ feminist credentials, and hence their contribution to the history of feminist thought, legitimizes the patrilineal descent of feminist thought.

With the resurgence of reinvigorated feminist ideas in the late 1960s, feminist writers and historians re-examined the history of western political and philosophical thought to recover the contributions of women writers. This was a decidedly political act undertaken in face of the prevailing prejudices and received wisdom of twentieth century scholars who simply assumed that if such thought had been of any significance it would have been preserved within the existing canon. The objectives appear to have been two-fold. On the one hand, the aim was to show that feminist ideas had a significant, though unrecognised, presence that needed to be recovered. On the other, there was a concern with establishing the legitimacy of feminist political thought by showing that they were in fact a part of various political traditions.

This latter objective, presupposing and building on the former objective, traced feminist thought back to the well-known luminaries of the various political philosophies. Indeed, many of these men philosophers came to be seen as fountainheads of feminist political thought. For the liberal political philosophers, the mantle fell variously to James Mill (Ball 1980a, 1980b, 1980c, 1984), Jeremy Bentham (Boralevi 1980, 1984, 1987; Williford 1975), and John Stuart Mill (Okin 1979; Rossi 1970). Altman (1976) and Goldstein (1982) found significant feminist ideas in the works of the so-called utopian socialists (eg Saint-Simon and Fourier), with Goldstein (1982, 107) remarking on "their seminal role in the history of feminism". For Mitchell (1971) and Rowbotham (1974), Marx and Engels, if not directly positing specific feminist ideas, were at least providing the theoretical framework for the realization of feminist goals. In effect, the fountainhead of feminist political thought was to be found in the works of various radical men philosophers.

Granted, feminist interrogations of the canons of political theory have moved considerably further in the decades since these writers made their pronouncements. There has been, and continues to be, considerable debate about the places of these particular men philosophers within the genealogy of feminist thought (eg Jaggar 1983; Pateman & Gross 1986; Kennedy & Mendus 1987; Coole 1988; Nye, 1988; Di Stefano, 1991; Gatens 1991; Shanley & Pateman 1991; Zerilli 1994). In that respect, this paper too contributes to that debate. However, the principal concern here is not so much with revisiting the specific question of whether this or that man philosopher should be considered a feminist. Rather the focus is on a particular trope articulated in common by several of these radical philosophers, specific differences between their respective political philosophies notwithstanding.

This trope concerns the linking of the idea of women’s emancipation with the idea of social progress, with social emancipation generally. Though their views on, or definitions of, social progress differed according to their particular philosophical position, the fundamental linkage was held in common. What is of interest for this paper is that this trope has been used by a number of writers (eg Ball 1980a, 1984; Mitchell 1971; Rowbotham 1974; Altman 1976; Goldstein 1982) to establish the place and significance of these men philosophers within the development of feminist political thought

This paper examines this trope in the context of the writings of the two Mills, Fourier, and Marx and Engels. It is argued that this trope, far from marking out a discursive space within these various political philosophies to enable a distinctively feminist signification to emerge, reproduces the masculinist signification and symbolism of the theories in which it is articulated. The deployment of this trope within their philosophies does not necessarily make feminists of these men philosophers. If this trope turns out to be the only basis for their status as feminists, or at least their contribution to feminist political thought, then those philosophers would certainly have no such claim on either status. And even where other evidence might lead one to attribute to them an affinity with feminist thought, a critical analysis of their use of this trope reveals the limits of their feminism.

II

In his influential History of British India, James Mill (1817, 293) declared that:

From this it is clear that Mill used the perceived treatment of women as a measure to ascertain whether a society should be recognised as civilized. But as important, is the causal link made by Mill; that as a society progresses towards what he takes to be a civilized status its women receive better treatment, somewhere along the continuum of "degraded" to "exalted". The improvement to women’s lot is caused by whatever social and political dynamics are at play at the time. In Mill’s view, women’s improved social position is not the cause but the result, and hence a measure, of that progress

In making his comments about the condition of Indian women Mill (1817 I, 293; 1820 I, 279 n. 13; 1826 I, 383 n. 2) appealed to the authority of John Millar’s Observations Concerning the Distinction of Ranks in Society, which was first published in 1771. Millar argued that as society progressed in terms of its arts and manufactures, there emerged "a tendency to remove those circumstances which prevented the free intercourse of the sexes" such that "the fair sex... are more universally respected on account of their useful or agreeable talents which they are capable of acquiring" (Millar 1771, 63-4 and also 74). Millar was alluding not just to social progress as such, but to that which was associated with emerging commercial society of the late eighteenth century England. It was this specific form of society, coming into its own in Britain by the late eighteenth century, that Millar and his contemporaries such as Adam Smith and David Hume, and successors like James Mill and Jeremy Bentham, meant by the term "civilization". Mercantile and, later, industrial capitalism exemplified social progress and civilized society.

In Millar’s (and Mill’s) view, the particular dynamics of this sort of society made it possible for men to "attain a proportionate degree of refinement", in terms of their manners and customs. Only in such a society, would men "be led" (by whom is not stated but presumably he is referring to men’s self-interest) to promote a similar refinement in their women by having "a suitable regard to those female accomplishments and virtues which have so much influence upon every species of improvement, and which contribute in so many different ways to multiply the comforts of life" (Millar 1771, 65). Such a society would then be one worthy of the name "civilization". But this "suitable regard" had to be tempered by caution in pushing such improvements too far lest it result in "licentious and dissolute manners, inconsistent with good order, and with the more important interests of society" (Millar 1771, 77). Thus women were to be afforded a greater social space, but not to the extent or level enjoyed by men. The ideal relations between women and men, and especially wife and husband, would recognise the wife as "friend and companion", as the one "who soothes and alleviates his misfortunes, who doubles all his joys, and who is capable of taking part in the care and labour to which he is subjected" (Millar 1771, 65). Thus women would be "exalted" as managers of the households, as nurturers of children and husband, as upholders of "modesty and diffidence" (Millar 1771, 65-7).

These were the values informing Millar’s and Mill’s understanding of the relationship between women’s and society’s "improvement" or "social progress". Women were to be the help-mates of men, and in this way would gain a degree of social recognition and freedom similar to that which accrued to men. But this was not the same as advocating the unqualified political emancipation of women from all sorts of domination, nor was it asserting anything like the dismantling of patriarchal social relations. In this respect, Mill’s use in his History of British India of the trope in question was not an indicator of his feminist sensibilities as has been argued by Ball (1980a; 1984). Nor was that Mill’s intention. Rather than signifying a space within which feminist sensibilities could be articulated, Mill’s use of this trope aimed to signify the lack inherent in Indian society, a lack that justified, even necessitated, the continuation of British rule (Jose 2000). In Mill’s hands the trope was never in danger of losing its masculinist underpinnings. It positioned women as the signifiers within a self-satisfied liberalism, whereby men’s sense of progress was defined by women’s relations to men.

III

With Fourier’s use of this trope it is evident, at least on the surface, that a very different approach was being pursued. While he too saw the level of women’s emancipation as a measure of social progress (Fourier 1808, 130), he completely inverted the trope.

It is evident from this that Fourier was not talking about "exalting" women. Nor was he equating "social progress" and the idea of "civilization" in the same way as Millar and Mill. Rather he was redefining the issue in terms of women’s liberty in a context in which the problem was civilization. That is, Fourier regarded what passed for civilization in his own day was merely a stage in human development, an evil in itself, that was best left behind as quickly as possible. So fervent was he on this point that he has been described not just a critic of society, "but its enemy" (Beecher & Bienvenu 1972, 23).

In order to place Fourier’s use of this trope in context it is necessary to elaborate briefly some aspects of his utopian vision. Fourier envisaged a new social order, New Harmony, that was based on what he called "the progressive Series" (Fourier 1808, 12-3, 289-304), which in turn embodied in practice his theory of passionate attraction (Fourier 1808, 15). Moreover, his vision was based on that he saw as a necessary correspondence between a natural or cosmic order (as given by God) and the social order in which humans organised their lives. However, the civilization of his own day "was organised around some reversal of the natural order, that it operated perhaps in a way that was contrary to God’s designs, and that the persistence of many scourges could be attributed to the absence of some form of organisation intended by God but unknown to our scholars" (Fourier 1808, 7). Civilization was beset by the problem of "industrial incoherence which is the antithesis of God’s design" (Fourier 1808, 20, his emphasis).

The problem as Fourier saw it was that societies built themselves around organisational structures and social relations that repressed or stifled human passions. Fourier reasoned

The progressive Series would provide the means to enable all passions to be satisfied in such a way as to ensure a harmonious social order, both within itself and with Nature. But it also needs to be stressed that Fourier was not advocating and egalitarian social order. As he put it, ‘philosophical chimera of that sort … are incompatible with the progressive Series, which demand the opposite, a scale of inequalities" (Fourier 1808, 59). What he envisaged required the existence and multiplication of differences and inequalities between people. New Harmony was to be a unity through diversity, a harmonising of differences something like a vocal ensemble or orchestra.

Central to this social vision of New Harmony were the relations between the sexes. Fourier believed that these had been perverted by civilization through its attempts to deny the passions in love and sex, especially for women. The sexual double standard and the patriarchal social relations that enshrined it (as assumed in the works of likes of Millar and Mill) was a key target for Fourier’s critical analysis. In his view, civilized society denied women the liberty to acknowledge and exercise their passions. Rather, women could only realise these legitimately, if at all, through marriage, an institution that Fourier argued reduced women to the status of chattels to be bought, sold or traded. A flavour of his critique can be seen from the following:

By any standards this was quite a critical position on patriarchal relations. This was the context in which Fourier articulated the trope linking women’s liberty and social progress. It is largely on the basis of this trope, coupled with his scathing critiques of patriarchal practices governing love and sex, that his feminism has been adduced and for which his "seminal role in the history of feminism" is asserted as deserving acknowledgment (Goldstein 1982, 108).

An examination of Fourier’s solutions to the above problems reveal the limits of the emancipatory meaning of his trope as well as the limits of his feminism. Fourier suggested that immediate action could be taken in his own day that would provide women with a degree of autonomy. He suggested that women be granted "an age of amorous majority" at eighteen so that they would be free "from the humiliation of being offered for sale, and of being obliged to deprive themselves of men’s company until some unknown man haggles over them and marries them" (Fourier 1808, 132). He argued that if women were truly free to choose their sexual or marital partners then the vices of adultery, cuckoldry and prostitution would wither away. In other works (eg The New Amorous World) Fourier went into great detail about the sexual freedom that would emerge in New Harmony (Beecher 1985). Whether his solutions would have produced the outcome that he envisaged is debatable. What is of significance for this discussion, however, is that his preoccupation was with articulating the basis for women’s (and by extension men’s) sexual freedoms (Goldstein 1982, 102).

Goldstein (1982, 102) has suggested that Fourier was "writ[ing] exclusively of sexual repression or its absence". While Goldstein may be over-stating the case in terms of the exclusiveness of Fourier’s focus, the fact remains that his conception of "liberty" in his trope was of amorous liberty. While this might have been a step forward in terms of undermining patriarchal privileges and the sexual double standard, at least in principle, it is doubtful whether this would have brought about consequential improvements in women’s economic and political liberty. The experiences of waves of "sexual liberation" at different times during the twentieth century, the 1960s, would suggest that increased sexual liberty had mixed benefits for women (Rossi 1970; Morales 1996). This is because the advent of the sort of sexual liberty for women envisaged by Fourier, without a concomitant shift in men’s social and political power, leaves women vulnerable to just the sorts of scourges that he was concerned to challenge and eliminate. On these grounds alone it is evident that there are limitations to the degree of feminism inscribed within his trope.

However, there are other considerations to be taken into account. The first of these concerns the oft-noted habit (see eg Beecher 1985; Goldstein 1982) of Fourier to reproduce uncritically the prevailing assumptions about women’s nature that were prevalent in his time. He regularly describes women as the "fair sex", the "weaker sex". Moreover, his tendency to assume that most women would continue to take up their so-called "natural roles" of home-maker, or at least as help-mates to men, positions his views on women closer to those of Millar and Mill than would have been apparent at first glance. Secondly, even in terms of the discourses about women in the new French republic following the revolution (Scott 1989) Fourier’s views are not too far out of step, despite his opposition to much of what they stood for. For example, at one point in the New Amorous World he "interrupts himself to observe that he has doubtless failed to make the issues intelligible to his female readers because he lacks the ability to satisfy what Diderot calls the taste of women for ‘flowers of rhetoric’ and ‘the dust of butterfly wings’" (Beecher 1985, 129). Consequently, it must be concluded that the extent to which his trope contained feminist sentiments must be severely qualified by the context of his writings in which his views were inscribed with much the same masculinist prejudices as his predecessors and contemporaries.

IV

While Marx and Engels did not accept Fourier’s sexual theories, especially where they involved such a radical departure from monogamous sex-love pairing, they nevertheless accepted the idea that women’s emancipation provided a measure of the degree of social emancipation. In The Holy Family (1844/1975, 230), they cited with approval the idea that "the degree of emancipation of woman is the natural measure of general emancipation". In the Philosophical and Economic Manuscripts of 1844 there exists a distinctly Fourierian emphasis in the discussion of the relations between women and men where Marx pointed out that "[i]t is possible to judge from this relationship the entire level of development of mankind" (Marx 1844/1975, 347). Once again, the measure of social emancipation is conceptualised in terms of the level of women’s emancipation. Similarly, in his Anti-Duhring, Engels repeated word for word the translation of Fourier’s version of this trope that Marx provided in The Holy Family. Engels repeated that Fourier "was the first to declare that in any given society the degree of woman's emancipation is the natural measure of the general emancipation" (1978, 297 and 450 fn. 154).

On this basis subsequent Marxists have made the case that Marxism was therefore sympathetic to, if not a source of, feminist political thought. Yet when Marx and Engels’ endorsement of them is placed in the context of their writings it is not at all clear that such an endorsement entails a feminist interpretation. Neither Marx nor Engels addressed the liberation of women in a direct fashion until Engels’ essay, On the Origins of the Family, Private Property and the State, which was published in 1884, a year after Marx’s death. In that work Engels stated that he and Marx had discussed this issue, and that Marx had intended to publish something similar to Engels’ study. However, Marx's own discussion on women is piecemeal – scattered throughout his writings. His most explicit discussion of the relations between the sexes is in The Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844, in the passage already noted. After that, it was just the odd mention, more often than not to reinforce a point concerning the iniquities of capitalism. In many respects these comments by Marx were explicitly gendered in that they reproduced many of the prevailing assumptions about women’s supposed nature and their place within family relations (Di Stefano 1991, MacKinnon 1989).

In nearly all of their works written prior to On the Origins of the Family, the story begins by presupposing the sexual division of labour as a natural starting point, a fact of nature. That is, the division of labour on the basis of sex, into men’s work and women’s work, is simply assumed. The specificity of family arrangements is acknowledged to be historical, but not until Engels addressed this in his book was an attempt made to demonstrate this. This is the major significance of his work. The institutions and social relations that have developed to enable men and women to procreate and rear children, to enable men to "daily re-create their own life, begin to make other men, to propagate their kind" (Marx & Engels 1845-6/1976, 48), have varied across and between different historical societies. For Engels the strategy was to bring women into the domain of the social where history is made, where social relations are constructed and nature is transformed. By controlling and transforming nature, to go beyond the domain of necessity (cf Marx, 1894/1978, 820; Marx 1844/1975), men made history and, in so doing, emancipated women to the freedoms enjoyed by men.

In many respects, Engels analysis was quite a step forward. However, while the family could be understood as a part of history, the internal dynamics were taken for granted by Engels in that he, like Marx, still assumed that the sexual division of labour was a fact of nature, not of society. And even when women were to be brought out of the private sphere of the family into the public sphere of the social, where history is supposedly to be made, the sexual division of labour remained constitutive of family life. As MacKinnon (1989) has argued, if social relations are historical, if they are the product of particular material conditions, then why are the personal and sexual relations between women and men, the social relations of the family, not social relations? Why is this division of labour treated as natural, as a fact of nature, rather than social? Neither Marx nor Engels challenged the so-called natural-ness of the division of labour by sex for reproductive purposes.

Marx’s discussion about the relations between the sexes in the Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, and in which he waxed lyrical over the prospects of a truly human set of social relations, was predicated on a view that conflated women with Nature. The sexual division of labour was never challenged by Marx as a possible social construction. It was assumed to be given by Nature. In various places in both The German Ideology and Volume I of Capital, Marx claimed that the sexual division of labour "springs up naturally", it "is a division that is based on a purely physical foundation", the "physiological division of labour is the starting point".

But it also remained Marx’s and Engels’ end point. When either human reproduction or housework was discussed it was treated as a consequence of the sexual division of labour, a fact of Nature. Neither human reproduction nor domestic work were treated as instances of appropriation of raw materials subjected to a human labour process to be modified in accordance with human wants and needs (Di Stefano 1991; O’Brien 1980). Granted, the actual mechanics of fertilisation, gestation and childbirth might have very minimal instances of human control and manipulation. The fact remains, however, that these phenomena take place within historical relationships that are not given by nature. Marx and Engels’ account of the oppression of women remains troublesome because their assumptions about the sexual division of labour place it outside the domain of productive labour where history is supposedly made – it remains grounded in nature rather than the society.

Using the trope of linking women’s emancipation with social emancipation in general does not leave their analyses any less masculinist or gender-blind. Marx in particular seemed to have distinctly bourgeois attitudes to the role of women, at least in terms of marriage and the family. Unlike Fourier, Marx did not support the radical transformation of bourgeois family relations, irrespective of the their fundamentally patriarchal quality. Despite his concern that men and women should work towards transforming their existing world to create a better, less exploitative world, one in which classes would not exist and hence class position would no longer be a determinant of men’s and women’s personal power, Marx’s assumptions about men’s and women’s personal relations remained confined within the very bourgeois thinking that he had critiqued so effectively in the field of political economy.

IV

In his essay The Subjection of Women, first published in 1869, John Stuart Mill echoed his father by using a similar version of this trope.

Like his father, Mill shared some of the views and values that saw civilization as being amply exemplified in English commercial society. And furthermore, he understood "civilization" to be a progressive unfolding of material benefits and developments in the sciences and the arts that he described as " the growth of man’s power over nature" (Mill 1848/1970, 56; cf Millar 1771). However, and more significantly, unlike his father, the younger Mill did not accept, either as a principle or a practice, the political subordination of women. The opening sentence of his 1869 essay made this explicit: "the legal subordination of one sex to the other … is wrong in itself", and that it is "one of the chief hindrances to human improvement". (Mill 1869/1983, 1).

This was not a new view for Mill. Nor was the linking of women’s social and political emancipation with the general improvement of society. In his Principles of Political Economy published twenty-one years earlier Mill had expressed similar sentiments, namely that

The chief difference between the two statements lay in Mill’s shift in emphasis. In the earlier work he had been somewhat tentative, merely expressing a hope that the injustice would "ere long be recognised" and that something would then be done about it. By 1869, he had become more forceful and direct, asserting not just the fundamental wrong-ness of such a principle, but that "it ought to be replaced by a principle of perfect equality, admitting no power or privilege on the one side, nor disability on the other" (Mill 1869/1983, 1).

The advocacy of a "principle of perfect equality" was a defining feature of Mill’s analysis. It distinguished his liberalism from that of his father and Bentham, and underpinned his conception of human improvement, of social progress (Morales 1996, 42 & 64). He applied this principle throughout the Subjection of Women to provide a telling critique of the relations between the sexes, particularly in marriage. Borrowing heavily from William Thompson and Anna Wheeler, Mill recognised that women were trained to subordination, to accede to the power of men, whether husband or father, and to be happy and willing to do so. Mill’s principle of perfect equality led him to argue that the aim should not be to enable women to replicate men’s power, because that would simply result in women developing the same crippling values and characteristics of the tyrant, since men, in Mill’s view, were as corrupted by their power over women, as women were oppressed by that power. Rather, the social, legal and political basis for men’s power should be removed so that the relations between the sexes in marriage "should be a school of sympathy in equality, of living together in love, without power on one side and obedience on the other" (Mill 1869/1983, 82). This was the key issue for Mill – the removal, or at least radical diminution, of men’s power and privilege. In this respect his critique of marriage appears every bit as radical as those made by socialists such as Fourier, Marx and Engels. Indeed it was to the early socialist thinkers that he owed his conception of perfect equality (Mill 1873/1969, 142). Yet despite the intention to challenge and transform men’s power, he ends up with a masculinist model of the family that leaves women’s prospects for emancipation only marginally improved.

When he turns to discussing what marriage might be like under conditions of "perfect equality", his masculinist assumptions emerge. Despite his view that all occupations should be available equally to women and men alike because "the power of earning is essential to the dignity of a woman" (Mill 1869/1983, 89; 1848/1970, 324-5), women would still choose marriage over paid work.

In making their choice women’s political and economic status was being treated the same as men’s (Gatens 1991, 46). Women choose what has traditionally been seen as women’s work whereas men choose any work that takes their fancy, a seemingly limited choice indeed (Di Stefano 1991, 171). Furthermore, Mill goes on to allow that the husband, who he assumes for the sake of argument to be older than his wife, could be expected to exercise greater authority in decision-making (Mill 1869/1983, 90). By allowing effective power in the relationship to be returned to the man, Mill moved well away from the "perfect equality" of his original position. In so doing, he returned the discussion closer to that of his predecessors than he might have cared to admit. The model of domestic relations under "perfect equality" was not so different from that articulated by Millar nearly one hundred years earlier.

Other criticisms could also be made of aspects of Mill’s feminism, such as his failure to address adequately "the political implications of the sexual division of labour" in the family (Di Stefano 1991), his fuzziness over the idea of "nature" (Annas 1977), his masculinist assumption that to be human is to transcend one’s "animal function" (Gatens 1991; Zerilli 1994), and his tendency to essentialism (Tulloch 1989; MacKinnon 1987). Even so, these criticisms do not negate the fact that, of the men philosophers under discussion, only Mill accepted as a given the necessity to oppose the principle of the legal subordination of one sex to the other. But he was not able shed, to any great extent, the embedded masculinist assumptions of his liberal heritage. What he challenged with the one hand, he reinforced with the other, to paraphrase one of Mill’s sympathetic feminist interpreters (Morales 1996, 152).

In the preceding sections it has been demonstrated that the trope linking women’s emancipation with that of social emancipation in general did not shake off the conceptual patriarchal conceptual baggage of its original context. The use of this trope exemplifies what Zerilli (1994) described as the way in which women are signified within political theory, namely as "the radical social other against whom theorists define men as citizens; … [and] the radical sexual other against whom they define men as men". The two Mills, Fourier and Marx and Engels used the idea of women’s emancipation as a signifier of social progress. Within that trajectory, women themselves were signified as the means to measure that progress, and in some senses were in fact signified as the bearers of social progress. The potentially feminist implications simply melted under the bright sun of the masculinist assumptions firmly embedded within those thinkers’ respective political philosophies.

For these particular men philosophers, this trope does not imply, of its own accord, a feminist position. To use it as a means to signify their feminist credentials, and hence their contribution to the history of feminist thought merely legitimizes the patrilineal descent of feminist thought. It obscures what women thinkers at the time might have had to say and, as importantly, ends up subordinating feminist political theory to the "real" history of political theory. It perpetuates the idea that political theory is really men’s business, a continuous conversation with and between men philosophers (cf Zerilli 1991), so that women’s or feminist contributions, where they appear, are treated as either derived subsets of men’s political theory. In the rich tapestry of political thought, feminist political thought contributes its own distinctive strands. It is not an occasional footnote to the history of political theory.

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