Democracy and Freedom

A Response to "What Kind of Person Runs for Public Office?"

A Talk From Doug French
http://mises.org/daily/4739
Mises Daily: Monday, October 04, 2010 by Doug French

This argument, it seems to me, is not so dissimilar from the usual Classical Liberal position of government. Both acknowledge, axiomatically, "something" ill-tending in the human condition. Likewise, both acknowledge that it ought to be counter-balanced. The Classical Liberal thinks the ill-tending aspects which damage "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" are counterbalanced by permanent mandates in law applicable to all. The anarchist position is that even such initially sensible a mandate will give way to more and more coercion. Also, enshrining anything in permanent law invariably binds one person to the will of another. Thus private law, between consenting individuals, is thought ideal since, by nature, it only involves consenting parties. This seems sensible but also seems to me to create three problems: 1) How do you prevent the rise of a state, and 2) on what grounds without implicating others and placing them under your private law. Also, 3) how does one address the problem of third parties, for example how would you punish a breach of contract? Of course ideally you would spell it out ahead of time but people being fallible, there will be vagaries, differences of opinion, and omissions. Arbitration seems a plausible solution, but how would you compel him to arbitration?

Of course over time there could be conventions and procedures which, while nonbinding, might be able to smooth private dealings. This brings us to Mr. French's points, via Hayek, about democracy, which seems to me to be novel. Heretofore I have understood the nature of government to be the central issue to the anarcho-capitalists, i.e. that its coercive monopoly of the law is the their primary complaint. Yet French cites three additional problems of a democratic nature which Hayek, who was not an anarchist, outlined in The Road to Serfdom.

1. People of higher intelligence have different tastes and views. So, as Hayek writes, "we have to descend to the regions of lower moral and intellectual standards where the more primitive instincts prevail," to have uniformity of opinion.
   
2. Second, those on top must "gain the support of the docile and gullible," who are ready to accept whatever values and ideology is drummed into them. Totalitarians depend upon those who are guided by their passions and emotions rather than by critical thinking.
3. Finally, leaders don't promote a positive agenda, but a negative one of hating an enemy and envy of the wealthy.

These are cited axiomatically and I shall take them as such, not endeavoring to prove them. Let us keep this discussion theoretical. Now these features are those of a democratic state, let us say. Yet in an anarchist society, one free of coercion, these forces would be just as free to play out as they would in a democracy. The intelligent would have to seek a way to appeal to the foolish, perhaps condescending to "primitive instincts," and they would be free to promote a negative agenda. Thus it is possible for such undesirable things to occur in both anarchist and democratic societies. What difference would there be? First, not everyone would be implicated. If you didn't want to follow you wouldn't have to. Second, unlike in a democracy which implicitly relies on a sanction of majoritarianism, in an anarchist society what they did would not have any particular sanction except 1) that the parties involved gave their permission, and 2) that only parties who gave their permission were involved. This sounds like a significant improvement. But what if the majority wanted your land? To what authority or counterbalance of force would you appeal? I don't think anyone would suggest such an example of theft would not occur simply because it was illegal. It could of course happen quite suddenly: the Athenians famously voted to execute all the adult men of the island of Melos during the Peloponnesian War.

Now let us also assume Hoppe's statement is true also, that the best naturally rise to the top, that is if the law is not rigged against them and/or in favor of others. French continues:

On the other hand, democracy affords the opportunity for anyone to pursue politics as a career. There is no need for the masses to recognize a person as "wise" or "successful," as Hoppe's natural order would require. Nor does one have to be born into the ruling family, as in the case of monarchy.

This does not seem to follow, to me. French attributes as unique to democracy a feature which is not a feature of government but of public life in a free society and thus one which is common also to an anarchist society. A fool can get up in a democratic or anarchist assembly and speak. Is he more likely to be accepted in one of these forms than the other? Why? It does not seem one is more likely than the other. Also, it is not a question of incompetence. Rather it is a question of the ill-tending we spoke of earlier. Indeed unless government jobs are apportioned at random in the democracy there is equal incentive for competence, the question is what else is there incentive for? One may be highly proficient at his job and still be a criminal and use his position for great evil. One might also say competence is not the greatest prerequisite for a position. There are in fact other characteristics which people, even rational people, prize, such as charisma. Famously and lamentably, brilliant men have been taken in by charismatic leaders.

French also quotes approvingly of Hoppe's notion that "natural elites" have some better quality than "democratic elites," i.e. elites voted to be elites by a majority. French goes on to write:

On the other hand, in democracy politicians demand attention, seeking acclaim for anything they do, continually taking credit for policies they say have made our lives better when in fact these interventions make our lives worse. There is no need to list the names of politicians who have committed crimes or ethics violations — it would take all day. The point is made.

Even if we take the dichotomy as axiomatic, this contrast is not persuasive. There is just too much assumed here: does the demand for attention translate into something more tangibly and demonstrably bad? Is the intervention in question actually worse? Plenty of people, government officials and private citizens alike, commit crimes and ethics violations. Also, sometimes members of both groups get off without just punishment. The question is about the nature of power and whether someone with authority will misuse it. Earlier this year we examined this question and saw that Hobbes, Alexander Hamilton, and Benjamin Franklin had, quite appropriately, ask the question too.[1] Simply put, who is more likely to be corrupted by power (and toward what kind of corruption would he tend), a rich man or a poor man?

French, paying due credit to Judge Andrew Napolitano for the insight, appropriately quotes Augustine's conception of libido domini — the lust for domination — which "entices men towards waging wars and committing all manner of violence." If I may speculate, French and also many anarchists would suggest that the state is what enables people with such desires to dominate. Eliminate the state, and you will eliminate the domination. Eliminate the means and you prevent the end. Yet, and we return to what we asked before, how do you eliminate the state and moreover how do you prevent it from coming into being? Moreover, how do you prevent it from coming it being without coercion and without creating public mandates, i.e. common law? Additionally, what would become of the desire? It would undoubtedly persist, and is it not possible for a demagogue to gain a willing majority in any population of people in a free society?

Regarding Maslow's "morality pyramid" it certainly seems as if any successful person would fit the characteristics of a "self-actualizer." Since I don't know how Maslow defines morality I cannot comment on it, but even tyrannical leaders would fit his bill insofar as they undoubtedly think they are moral. Yet French's point is that these people desire fame, which brings us back to our observation from the previous paragraph: what's stopping them from acting on this desire in an anarchist society? French seems to assume that such power-hungry people are incompetent and thus a free market would mean they would fail in competition with the non-power-hungry leaders who are competent. In contrast, power-hungry people are often quite competent and indeed they are often the most effective, for good or ill, in the long term.

Mr. French via Maslow, has already said only 2 percent of people are self-actualizing: we might wonder then, what percent of people know that when they see it?

The question any student of politics asks, and which everyone from Plato and Aristotle has asked is, how does a society get the people who are good at doing something doing that thing they are good at? It is another, though closely related, question as to how to deal with the human desire to control. It seems to me Mr. French's argument interpolates these questions and such is why the result is ultimately not persuasive. Undoubtedly the similarities to the Classical Liberal position demonstrate why the two groups are often in the same camp on issues. Untangling the two positions is surprisingly difficult work and probably seems like hairsplitting to firm statists.

It would seem though, that if one assumes what we have discussed about human nature to be true, some state is inevitable even if it is not wholly desirable. Liberalism presents all liberals with a problem, since what destroys it is not the state or a particular ideology (though the means of repression is the state and it is concentrated in certain ideologies) but in human nature. The liberal paradox is that freedom exists naturally and is destroyed naturally, or if not naturally cyclically. (Might one say what is cyclical is natural?)

I agree with Mr. French that many ardently pro-democracy people lose sight of freedom and some do offer the mantra that "we just need to elect the right people." Yet this essentially the same question as "how does a society get the people who are good at doing something doing that thing they are good at?" Yet doing the good always requires people who can do the good. There does not seem to be any guarantee to me of having such people. It is unjust to force people and people can be quite irrational and unreasonable, and unpredictably so. Now I'm not saying a government cannot be inherently unjust. They most certainly can be, often are, and often governments turn unjust.

French continues:

. . .it can safely be predicted that the democratic welfare state will collapse, according to Hoppe, and what is necessary besides a crisis is ideas — correct ideas — and men capable of understanding and implementing these ideas once the opportunity arises.

Well why haven't they yet implemented such ideas or attempted to? Perhaps because the government has a monopoly on the law. Yet Mr. French's points have all been about democracy, in particular points which cannot be undone without force. Likewise he writes, "So the natural elites have an obligation to make sure the truth is spread." Perhaps it would be more useful to suggest they become the democratic elites. Unless, of course and in the paradigm of Hayek, whatever is popular is "of lower immoral standards." But that observation is much wider implications as one might notice. One must be wary of casually uttering maxims. Nonetheless Mr. French ought to be lauded for suggesting people personally support people they think are doing good.

At the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin said that even good government "is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall be come so corrupted as to need despotic government, being incapable of any other."

Maybe that's so, maybe it's not, but it seems more plausible than endlessly fingering the state either as the cause or solution to all problems.

–

[1]See Part II of Thoughts on the American Executive.

Robert Simpson: Neglected Composer

Since I mentioned Robert Simpson in my previous post, I thought it was not inappropriate to highlight one of his compositions, in this case, his 7th symphony.

Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

Further Information

• Robert Simpson Society
• ROBERT SIMPSON: A conversation with Bruce Duffie
• Simpson on Anton Bruckner

Hans Keller on Mozart

Hans Keller (1919-1985) was an Austrian-born English music critic and musician, fanatically devoted to the chamber repertoire. In 1959 he joined the Music Division of the BBC, remaining there until his retirement some twenty years later. Like his colleague the composer Robert Simpson (who famously resigned from the BBC only months before he was due to retire with a full pension), Keller bitterly lamented the declining musical standards of the BBC. Keller is author of a chatty, amateur musician-oriented book on the Haydn quartets. In these recordings, he discusses the string quartets and quintets of Mozart.

The Progressive Family

More on progressivism in the news today, this time from Phillip Longman at Big Questions Online. His article, Demography and Economic Destiny, discusses the indebted welfare states and falling birthrates of the West. My thoughts on this article will be brief. Like last week's article on progressivism my point is not to moralize but to tease out the premises and logical consequences of the attempts to define progressivism and the arguments used in favor of it.

First consider the title, Demography and Economic Destiny: it's a rather cold title considering what the article is about: taking care of both children and the elderly. Second, the article is fourteen paragraphs long and one word is absent until the final. That word is family. Considering the subject matter, its absence is a little odd, don't you think?

Also revealing is the context it comes up it, "Government programs designed to smooth the tensions between work and family." So working and family are inherently in tension and the government tries to fix this "natural" tension. That sounds odd, since for most of human history the family was considered a very efficient economic unit. People once got married in part to pool their resources, yet yesterday in the WSJ I read that allegedly young people were putting of marriage until they were better off financially. I have yet to make sense of this development though there are undoubtedly other factors involved.

The author goes on to write:

And in countries both rich and poor, we see a rise in religious fundamentalism and patriarchy, which are the old-fashioned (and proven) means of keeping birthrates above replacement rates.

It certainly seems that the author equates family with "fundamentalism and patriarchy." (I wonder how many husbands in the West today would consider themselves "patriarchs.") We ought to note that if he doesn't equate these things then he considers a "traditional" family completely off the radar as a solution to taking care of people, since he has posed that problem and won't have mentioned "traditional family" at all. ("Traditional" is another word noticeably absent.) In that case the alternatives are the state or "fundamentalism and patriarchy," the former of which he concedes has failed and the latter of which certainly seems unfavored by him. So it is impossible for a non religiously-fundamentalist or patriarchal family to exist? What about without the "help" of the state?

The author truly seems to lament the days in which the welfare state was thought to have been discovered as a perfect means of taking care of people:

As the Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Samuelson once proclaimed, in defense of America’s Social Security system, “a growing nation is the greatest Ponzi scheme ever contrived. And that is a fact, not a paradox.” But Samuelson was writing in 1967, when it looked as if the Baby Boom would go on forever.

Obviously in this context then, the welfare state was seen as the substitute for the family for taking care of the elderly. No more did a couple potentially* have to save and take care of their parents (up to four for the couple.) They didn't have to sacrifice a room that could have been a den or even stayed in the neighborhood where their parents lived to take care of them, potentially passing up job offers in other states. As long as we had enough "young workers" a new "generation of retirees" could partake in Social Security et al and the "young workers" could be "liberated" from the demands of. . . family.

I haven't read E. F. Schumacher's "Small Is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered" but after reading this article I very much sympathize with the title.

–

* I say potentially because, obviously, many could and did plan for their retirement. Once all you had to do was put some money aside from your paycheck each week. Remember when you didn't have to speculate to avoid losing your money? I don't. (See here: If you don't watch the video, read the summary and anecdote below it.)

Autumnal Reflections, II

Bach and Vivaldi: Baroque Voices on Death and Bounty


[Updated: See below.]

I. Bach

Yesterday Mr. Northcutt thoughtfully reflected on the aesthetic and theological profundity of the cantatas of Johann Sebastian Bach. The corpus of Bach's cantatas (and chorales) astounds in its size as a whole as well as in the size and complexity of each work. Still it has been estimated that only about 200 of a potential 500 cantatas were preserved. Each has its own character and each of the sacred cantatas reflects the context of its place in the Christian liturgical year. We have mentioned here already Sir John Eliot Gardiner's Bach Cantata Pilgrimage, his journey through Bach's Europe to play the cantatas on their appropriate day.

The cantata for this past Sunday, the 17th Sunday after Trinity, Ach, lieben Christen, seid getrost, BWV 114, has to me an appropriate autumnal quality and such is what brought it into this series of reflections.


Summary of Movements:

1. Chorale Fantasia: Ach, Lieben Christen, Seid Getrost
2. Aria: (Tenor) Wo Wird In Diesem Jammertale
3. Recitative: (Bass) O Sünder, Trage Mit Geduld
4. Chorale: (Soprano) Kein Frucht Das Weizenkörnlein
5. Aria: (Alto) Du Machst, O Tod
6. Recitative: (Tenor) Indes Bedenke Deine Seele
7. Chorale Finale: Wir Wachen Oder Schlafen Ein

German Text | English Translation | Complete Score | Lectionary Readings

Video: Sections 1, 3, 4 | Section 2 | Sections 5, 6, 7

1. The opening choral fantasia expresses an admission of sin and a welcoming of punishment, senses expressed with great potency in three themes: 1) the rather despondent opening theme on the oboes and 1st violin,  2) the contrasting figure in the lower strings urging us to "keep heart," and 3) the trilled, trembling dotted quaver figure. The contrasting and appearances of these themes, in different voices, modulated, in imitation, make a richness of both musical texture and theological expression: it is not the sorrowful but the joyful theme which accompanies the final phrase, "Niemand darf sich ausschließen/Let no one be excepted" [from punishment] and with which the chorale ends.

2. The following recitative for tenor is intensely personal. Following the journey of the wandering flute theme would make for a wonderful meditation and I recoil from dissecting it. We might simply say this recitative in D minor is in two parts: a peregrinate and somber opening on "Wo wird in diesem Jammertale Vor meinen Geist die Zuflucht sein?/Where will within this vale of sorrow my spirit find its refuge now" and an almost-sprightly passage, vivace in 12/8, on "Allein zu Jesu Vaterhänden/Alone in Jesus' hands paternal."

4. The striking and transporting effect of this soprano choral is ingenious in its simplicity: the gently lilting, almost declamation of the text over the "scattering" continuo figures.

Kein Frucht das Weizenkörnlein bringt, Es fall denn in die Erden; So muss auch unser irdscher Leib Zu Staub und Aschen werden, Eh er kömmt zu der Herrlichkeit, Die du, Herr Christ, uns hast bereit' Durch deinen Gang zum Vater.

No fruit the grain of wheat will bear Unless to earth it falleth; So must as well our earthly flesh Be changed to dust and ashes, Before it gain that majesty Which thou, Lord Christ, for us hast made Through thy path to the Father.

5. Here is one of Bach's most beautiful and tender melodies and in perfect character in the voices of the oboe and alto. Sublimely intertwined as none other would be for some time, they travel together. We are protected and in death not destroyed but transformed (Verklärt) and pure (rein.)

7.

Wir wachen oder schlafen ein, So sind wir doch des Herren; Auf Christum wir getaufet sein, Der kann dem Satan wehren. Durch Adam auf uns kömmt der Tod, Christus hilft uns aus aller Not. Drum loben wir den Herren.

In waking or in slumbering We are, indeed, God's children; In Christ baptism we receive, And he can ward off Satan. Through Adam to us cometh death, But Christ frees us from all our need. For this we praise the Master.

What strength, invention, vision, and beauty Bach poured into all of his creations. Here is an autumn-tide reflection on death and new life, on man's state and redemption. It is a meditation from a man who knew much death throughout his life, losing both his parents within a year when he was ten, his wife Maria Barbara, and seven young children. Here is a world tinged with sadness at its fallen state, but vivified and made significant through a most profound and glorifying faith.


II. Vivaldi

Where Bach's cantata relentlessly looked beyond this world Vivaldi's concerto is of a decidedly earthly nature. It is a jocular celebration of not just the autumn harvest bounty but of all the uniqueness of the season. One risks making Vivaldi and this work seem frivolous by placing it in direct comparison with the Bach cantata above, but the works are of a different nature and character. Bach was writing a musical expression of not autumnal ideas specifically but theological ideas with similar notions of seasonal motion and generation and corruption. Vivaldi was writing a programmatic concerto about the character and joys of Autumn and as such is a wonderful and contrasting companion to the Bach cantata. (Coincidentally, both pieces date from around 1724.)  A poem accompanies the concerto, perhaps also by the composer.

Op. 8, Concerto No. 3, 'Le quattro stagioni: L'autunno'

The Poem | Complete Score

The first movement is notated, ballo, e canto de vilanelli, that is, with dancing and singing and in a rustic style, and del felice raccolto il bel piacere, i.e. the joy of a good harvest. We hear the rippling dance rhythms, piano and forte, the descending scalar figures of falling down tired, twirling triplets mixed with the dance rhythm, and racing scales. The festivities conclude with a contented sleep: piano and larghetto, cautious little figures in the first violin over repeated quavers in the others. It's like tiptoeing through a room of passed out revelers: don't wake anyone.

The slow movement is ubirachi dormienti, in a drunk sleep. Nature calls us to cease and invites rest. The atmosphere remains as the end of the fast movement, though we transition to the relative, D minor. Here the mood is dominated by the figure of a dotted half note and an either ascending or descending crotchet triplet. The bass chords are arpeggiated throughout the movement and with the timbre of the harpsichord the effect is that of a chill setting in, an icy stillness settling over a landscape.

The final movement is in the old style of the caccia, the hunt. Even in Vivaldi's time the caccia was an old Italian form (though French in origin) which commonly included rustic themes of fishing and fires, and particularly, of course, hunt. The form may be in canon, but here we have two characters introduced by the tutti one after the other. The first figure is a smooth and striding choriambic figure, i.e. its metrical quantity is long-short-short-long, following by a descending semiquaver figure in the lower voices. The second figure is a scampering little thing of semiquavers. The soloist then takes up the second theme for a few bars followed by the tutti with the first theme for a few more. Now the chase ensues, the beast flees to a flurry of triplets, dogs chase to a rush of thirty-second-notes, and with rising and falling figures they chase here and there. With a dazzling array of virtuosity we experience the frenzy of the hunt before it suddenly ends, the pursued overcome, as the first theme trots to a halt.

Whereas Bach's cantata was sobered by, even preoccupied with, the notion of death, Vivaldi's L'autunno' brims with the joys of a happy and healthy life. In Part I we read Horace stress balance and these two views of the Autumn and all of its associations neatly contrapose and make for a healthy disposition.


Update: This interview (in two parts: Part I | Part II) with Trevor Stephenson is a great introduction to the stylistic differences between German and Italian Baroque composers like Bach and Vivaldi. It nicely elucidates some of the reasons for the contrast we discussed here.

A Modest Proposal: Bach of a Sunday

"Musical training is a more potent instrument than any other, because rhythm and harmony find their way into the inward places of the soul, on which they mightily fasten, imparting grace, and making the soul of him who is rightly educated graceful, or of him who is ill-educated ungraceful."

--- The Republic of Plato, tr. by Benjamin Jowett

Of all the extraordinary human achievements in the arts, few can compete, in grandeur of conception and perfection of form, with the collected cantatas of Johann Sebastian Bach. In the past, it was customary to overlook the cantatas in favor of the Passions and Oratorios, to relegate Bach's work-a-day cantatas to second place. Needless to say, I think that's a forced dichotomy: the cantatas ought to be studied for their own sake, not as also-rans but as integral part of Bach's musical cosmos.

When I lived in New York, I was fortunate enough to hear several cantatas in their proper liturgical context and as prescribed by the Lutheran church year. This fine opportunity was the work of Holy Trinity Lutheran Church (ELCA). (Holy Trinity's Bach Vespers were, incidentally, my conversion, or the beginning of my conversion, to authentic performance.)

As a believing and practicing catholic Christian, I never cease to wonder at the profundity of Bach's Incarnational art: any Christian could profitably meditate on both the libretto and the musical setting. And to do so would be as fine a Christian education as any man could procure today. (I leave to one side the question of how a non-believer could relate to the music, a vexing inquiry that cannot easily be answered either with pious platitudes or secular-aesthetic ratiocination.) In concert with the day's lectionary appointments, Bach's cantatas are a potent reflection on and elaboration of the Christian life. And as such, they might be commended to ordinary believers and clergy alike.

To that end and to show the way, I have vowed to listen, every Sunday and festal day, to one of the appointed cantatas.

It's a project that will take several years to complete. I may not have the opportunity or time to reflect on the experience here, every Sunday, but I will do so as often as I can. And with an eye to elucidating the theological significance of the work in question. Unhappily, I can't boast the theoretical knowledge of my co-blogger.

Today's cantata, appointed for the 17th Sunday after Trinity (lectionary readings are here), is BWV 114 Ach, lieben Christen, seid getrost (Ah, fellow Christians, be consoled). The English translation can be found here. I will be using Alfred Dürr's Cantatas of J.S. Bach as the source for my English translations and textual commentary.

And for the all-important recordings, I will be listening to Ton Koopman's Amsterdam Baroque Choir and Baroque Orchestra. Koopman is a fine and faithful interpreter of Bach's music: I am particularly impressed by the clarity and strength of tone he gets from his instrumentalists. An early (and not entirely unjustified) complaint about authentic practice performers was the weak sound: Koopman's ensemble is entirely innocent of such shortcomings, however. And his own personal enthusiasm for Bach's music is infectious.

The Great Pablo Casals

Cellist Pau Casals i Defilló, known as Pablo Casals, on Bach, simplicity, and beauty. In both videos Casals, 1876-1973, comes off good-natured, good-humored, and most humble about his craft and the world.

Autumnal Reflections, I

Horace, Schubert, Baldung: Memento mori

The sentiment of memento mori or, remember you will die, has probably its strongest association with the Epicurean notion of ataraxia, or imperturbability. It's most beautiful expression is certainly in the third poem of Horace's second book of odes:

Aequam memento rebus in arduis seruare mentem, non secus in bonis   ab insolenti temperatam     laetitia, moriture Delli,

seu maestus omni tempore uixeris, seu te in remoto gramine per dies   festos reclinatum bearis     interiore nota Falerni.

Horace in particular seems to suffer terribly in translation, thus I refrain from doing so and kindly refer you to the "crib" translation in Michael Gilleland's thorough discussion here. The Roman concept was characterized by a forbearance of suffering and an admonition against hubris. Such a concept beautifully compliments and reinforces the sentiments of carpe diem and nunc est bibendum, now is [the time] for drinking, both of which also received potent expression in Horace (1.1 and 1.37, respectively.) Don't torment yourself trying to discover the future, don't trust it. Yet there are things worth celebrating. Now this is no specific philosophy, but a practical and general one of aphorisms meant to inform decisions and temper life's pangs, little and great alike. This temperate state is reflected in the structure of the opening stanzas: the separation of memento and moriture places the latter in the center of the ideas, intensifying the preceding admonition and casting a shadow over the second stanza. Horace's beautiful imagery is all tempered by the fact that we enjoy such things only at the permission of the Fates, and that ultimately it is the heir who enjoy the riches. No matter what station you enjoyed in life, everyone is equal victim to Orcus. So when the poplar and the pine make some shade for you, sit with your choice wine and enjoy it.

What culminates in a manly composure and a temperate serenity in the Roman world, though, gets quite different treatment in later eras. Two of them seem to be particularly close kin. In the hands of Hans Baldung the concept takes on a morbid character. A student of the great Albrecht Dürer, Baldung, writing during the German Renaissance captured and emphasized the sense of loss of spirit, of decay, of being doggedly pursed and drained of the life energy. Look at the horror of his, Death and the Maiden (c.1518-20.) (right) Notice the disturbing quasi-musculature of death and also his embrace, caressing a particularly tender area with his left hand and supporting her head and tresses with his right. Their faces make a horrid scene: an embrace subverted. She's pale, "white as leprosy" to borrow from Coleridge, and most curious of all, more saddened and aghast than afraid.

Left, in The Knight, the Young Girl, and Death (1505) Baldung emphasizes the pursuit. Here the arresting palette generates the shock more than any actual sense of motion. The foreground grass receives more detail than the horse, whose tail is in just one bold stroke, but draws your attention. The eye moves from the man to the woman, to the tail, to the leftmost center: the frightful contrast of the skull chomping at her hem. Here death, falling apart and leaking entrails, struggles for the woman. The flashy prince, with the help of his steed, looks as if he might succeed. . . today.

Romantic composer Franz Schubert would pick up these two themes in nearly identical terms about three hundred years later. In Death and the Maiden, Schubert sets Matthias Claudius' poem to  music which seizes us with us somberness and apparent simplicity. The theme of death, slow and soft and without large intervals, is all the more disturbing for its relaxed nature, a nature it shares with the Baldung's death-lover above. "Softly shall you sleep in my arms" he ends.

Der Tod und das Mädchen, D.531

In Die Erlkönig Schubert takes up the pursuit theme which was present but less physical in the second Baldung we looked at above. This is a triumph of characterization both for Goethe and Schubert. The "elven" king is ever calm, his attention roused from its dryadic slumber by the presence of the child. Schubert makes the flight from death, the incessant clack of horse-hooves, the focus of the piece. Our horror intensifies as the elf king appeals directly to the child, "softly promising to him" and again at the child's increasingly terrified cries.  The final cadence ends the piece with a startling sense of finality.

Die Erlkönig, D.328

Every era, every people, every person even has his own response to the urgency created by mortality. The indomitable character praised in the Roman view was most appropriate for such a sober and practical people, and Horace's cautions are not surprising for a people who, at the time, endured much political uncertainty. Baldung's audience too knew strife through plague, war, and schism. The Romantic reaction is somewhat curious and inverse: a reminder despite success. Though not over war or strife, man had conquered nature with industrialization, but not death, as the supernatural nature of Schubert's songs remind us.

Horace's odes emphasized order with each thought, each word in exquisite balance. Baldung emphasized certain a morbid curiosity at the contrasts of generation and corruption. Schubert's musical expression gave new strength to the frightful sensuous and the shock of immediacy. They all emphasized the poignancy one's ultimate end bestows on every moment.

Around the Web

For Saturday, August 28 through Friday, September 24.

1-2) Roger Scruton:

• On pessimism [The Guardian]
• On the Idea of A University [American Spectator]

3)  The Progressive Theory of History by Murray N. Rothbard [Mises Daily]

4) Albert Jay Nock and the Libertarian Tradition [Mises Daily]

5) Roger Kimball on “Wrecking the Cathedrals” [Right Network]

6-7) On A new edition of H.L. Mencken’s Prejudices:

• from Edward Cline [Capitalism Magazine]
• from Damon W. Root [Reason]

8) On J. R. R. Tolkien, Map-making, and 'Subcreation' [The One Ring]

9) Richard Brookhiser on James Madison: Father of American Politics and media-savvy activist [WSJ]

10) Randy E. Barnett and William J. Howell on the case for a "Repeal Amendment" [WSJ]

11) David Gordon reviews "Justice: What's the Right Thing to Do" by Michael J. Sandel [Mises Daily]

12) Diverging Tastes of Pre-Raphaelites

• The Pre-Raphaelites and Italy, [Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archeology, Oxford University]

13) Bach, Bedrock and Catalyst: João Carlos Martins and the Orchestra Filarmônica Bachiana at Avery Fisher Hall [WSJ]

14) A first-time-ever exhibition at London's Victoria & Albert Museum is displaying four of Raphael's Sistine Chapel tapestries. [WSJ]

15) Electronic distribution from The Metropolitan Opera [WSJ]

16) An exhibit titled "The Art of Ancient Greek Theater," is on view now at the Getty Foundation in Los Angeles [WSJ]

17) Restoring DaVinci: Leonardo in a new light [Art Newspaper]

18-19) Tons of fun: The Met's new production of Der Ring des Nibelungen [NY Post]

• See a teaser of the production [YouTube] (H/T Wagner Opera)

Defining Progressivism

I tend not to talk practical politics here and more importantly I tend not to talk about polemical political articles. In this case, though, indulge me because I would like to wrangle over a definition. In Dissent Magazine, Conor Williams defends Progressivism.

Let me say it does not instill confidence when someone starts defining something by what it is not. Also, let us bear in mind two points from our discussion of argumentation a few weeks ago. 1) "a definition is a thesis." [Post. An. I.ii. 72a] 2) one may attempt to fashion a definition for rhetorical purposes, excluding all of the negative aspects of a word from your particular use of it and ascribing them to an opposing idea, instead of attempting to discover the essence of your subject.

Mr. Williams seems already to be off to a shaky start on point #1 with his non-definition.

I'll simply address some of his addressings of concerns in turn.

Much of modern progressivism is founded upon American pragmatism, a homegrown school of political thought.

Hmmm. Interestingly, the definition of pragmatism has interesting implications here. Since it means, in brief, that if an idea is practical, i.e. if it works, then it is moral to that extent. Ironically, built into that definition is a lot of wiggle room. What constitutes "working?" Williams adds, "a homegrown school of political thought." What do its origins matter? Does he mean to suggest that pragmatic ends are subordinate to some other considerations? It feels like he's saying that pragmatism is American and that somehow it can't be at odds with anything else which is American. That's quite cleverly written, I must say, since he does not say as a proposition, what he thinks someone who is not progressive would like to hear, "pragmatism is subject to finite values like liberty, freedom of speech, et cetera." Yet those who disagree are meant to read that into the statement. Very clever!

Mr. Williams in the same paragraph:

Rights are not “natural,” but they are still meaningful and extremely important. The pragmatists recognized that rights mean different things in different historical contexts. The meanings of “freedom of speech,” “citizenship,” the “right to vote,” and “property” have changed over time in the United States because of important shifts in public understanding.

This is a very interesting way to continue the line of thought. Again, he seems to be saying something so obvious as to be incontrovertible: the values come from the people. In fact he is capitalizing on his definition of pragmatism; this is logically honest but less so given his presentation. We asked above, "Does he mean to suggest that pragmatic ends are subordinate to some other considerations?" Now we have our answer: No. Political values are the arbiter of the good, and if they change, they change. Then he says, "Much of modern progressivism is founded upon American pragmatism, a homegrown school of political thought." He leaves himself more wiggle room with "much." Clearly some of progressivism is founded upon something else. This is a very handy definition of pragmatism: whatever you want plus the authority to do it "if it works."

We ought to note the obvious distinction between "Rights are not 'natural,'" vs. "We hold these truths to be self-evident." Yet by Mr. Williams' definition, clearly the former has precedent.

Mr. Williams goes on to say:

Thus, for most progressives, rights represent a wager we have made as a political community, a wager with our fellow citizens as to the sort of life we aim to live.

Notice the lack of distinction between society and politics. I postulated a few weeks ago that somehow some people seem to relate to one another without relationship to public law. As a result, manners, which are impossible to legislate, fell by the wayside because they weren't proscribed. Mr. Williams prompts me to a similar diagnosis. According to this proposition, there is no appeal to anything other than popular considerations.


Williams continues, consistently not appealing to natural rights:

In the United States, the right to vote has expanded over time to include American citizens of all races and of both sexes, because Americans came to believe that this was a better way to live as a political community.

Also:

 Progressives only argue that calling rights “natural” artificially fixes their meaning, often in troubling ways. After all, the “natural” right to property once meant a right to own other humans, and the “natural” right to vote originally was limited to white male citizens with a sufficient amount of property. Sanctifying rights as “natural” makes them convenient tools for justifying outrageous injustices.

This is the crux of the matter, the heart of "progressivism." His point is that pinning something down, defining it finitely, means you cannot change it, and you need to change things, according to pragmatism, when people think things need to be changed. This lack of acknowledgment of a finite end is what has caused and will continue to cause non-progressives to label progressives as nihilists. As defined, progressivism is nothing more than a broad appeal to "the good" without appeal to anything more definite.

Williams continues:

Progressive philosopher John Dewey asked Americans to consider the meaning of individual freedom through the following thought experiment: imagine an individual without property, education, or employment. Is this individual free to amass property? Would it matter if she was?

This hypothetical is significant because in Williams' argument it appears to flow from his discussion of pragmatism, but in fact it stems from a different definition of "freedom." We are meant to understand that the political status quo is a failure because the constitution wants to guarantee liberty and this woman cannot "amass property." The actual point is that our the founding principles of the United States rest on a different definition of freedom: the pursuit of happiness unencumbered by the government, not happiness as guaranteed by the government. This is a very clever slight by the author.

Williams continues:

PROGRESSIVES’ WILLINGNESS to challenge the hegemony of “neoliberal” interpretations of property rights law often prompts the most vituperative reactions from conservatives. They charge that reconsidering the meaning of various sections of the American Constitution represents a grave threat to its original intent. Against this accusation, Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. maintained that the law was meaningful as a source for ongoing interpretation, not as a set of fixed principles. While the Constitution does not permit infinite interpretation, he argued that “in a civilized state it is not the will of the sovereign that makes lawyers’ law, even when that is its source, but what a body of subjects, namely the judges, by whom it is enforced, say is his will.” If progressives revisit the meaning of American ideals, principles, or rights in response to structural changes, they are only continuing in a long-running project of American self-critique and matching legal and political revision.

This is just another example of pragmatism: the people want to change the law and they change the law. Look at that last sentence: he's appealing to the tradition of "revisiting" American ideals for the right to revisit them. Again, this is consistent with his position, but notice the frightful trend in this article: there is no delimiting principle.

Williams puts forth a common objection to progressivism but does not seem to understand the nature of the objection:

. . . conservatives frequently claim that acceptance (and qualified endorsement) of changes in political meanings reflects the utopian optimism at the heart of the progressive intellectual tradition. If past meanings of individual liberty are constantly superseded by new and improved versions, doesn’t this imply eventual arrival at political perfection?

The second sentence is simply baffling. It would prompt one to say, "Of course not, not if they are being constantly superseded." Aside from also implying that all change is good change, i.e. progress, it implies an expects an undefined and unknown final end, which will come about by constant change. So apparently we won't know it when we see it, but when we see it we'll love it. In case we doubted the contradiction, Mr. Williams continues:

To be a progressive is to admit that dogmatic certainty has no place in a complex world with many moving parts, and that the best we can offer each other is a commitment to engage, experiment, and reevaluate our choices.

Wouldn't claiming to have found "political perfection" be very. . . dogmatic? So apparently we won't know perfection when we see it and we won't love it.

That would not seem to be the best argument for progressivism.