2001 Nigel Ashford and the Jarl Hjalmarson Foundation
Reprinted by the Institute for Humane Studies, 2007
Second edition, third printing
Cover by Susanne Linder
ISBN 91-85816-22-1
Contents
1. Civil society 4
2. Democracy 11
3. Equality 20
4. Free enterprise 28
5. Freedom 35
6. Human rights 42
7. Justice 51
8. Peace 62
9. Private property 69
10. The rule of law 76
11. Spontaneous order 82
12. Toleration 89
- 3 -
Civil society
“Among the laws that rule human societies there is one which seems to be
more precise and clear than all others. If men are to remain civilised or to
become so, the art of associating together must grow and improve in the same
ratio in which the equality of conditions is increased.”
Alexis de Tocqueville
What is civil society?
Civil society is all those voluntary organisations that exist between the
individual and the state such as the family, churches, sports and music
clubs, and charities. The idea of civil society is a product of civilisation.
What Tocqueville called the art of association is a result of the modern
practice of men co-operating with others they do not know for the purpose
of achieving their ends. This need simply did not exist in the huntergatherer
societies of our ancestors, where everyone was known to one
another and the survival of the species was dependent upon communities
sharing a common aim. With the advent of the division of labour and a
society of laws in which people could use their separate property for their
particular purposes, that art of association became the foundation of peace
and prosperity among men. The concept of civil society is inseparable
from the idea of freedom. It is a common mistake to suppose that an individual
existing alone can be free, and that freedom is the absence of
restraint. The theory of civil society reminds us that a state of freedom is
one in which just restraints are applied to men and that it is by their association
with one another that the condition of each is improved.
A French thinker, Benjamin Constant, articulated the meaning of civil
society when he pointed out that the idea only made sense in the modern
world, where the individual exercised only an imperceptible influence
on his fellow man. In a speech outlining two different types of liberty
of the ancients and of the moderns, Constant argued that it was the
freedom to associate with one another, rather than the freedom to participate
in government, that marked out man’s most important freedom
as an invention of the modern world. This idea of civil association, and
the institutions to which it gave rise, was discussed systematically by an
- 4 -
Irishman, Edmund Burke, and a Frenchman, Alexis de Tocqueville, as
they observed the workings of England and America in their time. The
great insight of Tocqueville was that progress in society was a by-product
of human co-operation which in turn could not take place unless society
was free, ruled by what the Enlightenment thinkers had called “a government
of laws, not of men.”
While Tocqueville described the myriad ways which Americans had
developed the art of association on his travels there in the 1830s, Burke
articulated the role of intermediary institutions - the product of that
association - in the affairs of men. He gave them the name of little platoons.
These mediating institutions of family, church and community
assisted the functioning of society as a whole. As Burke wrote: “To be
attached to the subdivisions, to love the little platoon we belong to in
society, is the first principle (the germ as it were) of public affections. It
is the first link in the series by which we proceed towards a love to our
country and to mankind.” For Burke, these institutions played a key
role in shaping human personality and, by fulfilling a deep human need
to belong, gave rise to a vast network of associations which strengthened
the ties that bind us together.
The ties that bind
It is in these little platoons, what the conservative philosopher Michael
Oakeshott later called civic associations, that we find the instincts and
the spirit which form and shape the communities of men which are the
building blocks of society. By easing the path of social co-operation,
these civic associations allow us to benefit from, and so to cherish, the
existence of those who are closest to us. The loyalty we feel towards family
and friends, local community and nation are nurtured by our need to
associate with others. Civil associations are therefore part of the social
glue that holds society together. Far from the atomised individuals of
which the critics of free societies speak, civil associations strengthen our
ties to the heritage and common interests we share with others and
makes society as a whole stronger as a result. The civil society is a
humane society because it enhances and encourages our human feelings
of sympathy for our fellow man.
- 5 -
Government versus civil society
The enemy of civil society is not individual liberty, but government.
Government tears up the bonds that connect us to each other because
it collects and centralises power and resources, and undermines our civil
loyalties by making demands on our time, our money and our compassion.
These demands loosen the ties that bind us together by depriving
us of the material and emotional resources we would normally invest in
one another. When Tocqueville visited America from Napoleonic
France, he was initially surprised by the proliferation of voluntary associations
which supported every conceivable cause and point of view. His
native France which laboured under a centralised government could not
support such a patchwork of individual effort because so much more
human energy was absorbed by the needs of the state. This is the basic
reason why communities flourish in conditions of freedom. Government
creates barriers to the art of association because it disempowers individuals.
In totalitarian societies, the state stops individuals co-operating with
each other to achieve common ends, because all of society’s ends are
directed towards achieving the aims of the state.
The wheels of commerce turn civil society
Commerce promotes civility. Montesquieu credited trade with the
spread of sweet manners to the people of Northern Europe whom the
Romans had once called barbarians. David Hume promoted the idea
that the spread of commerce was critical to the refinement of society and
the advancement of the arts and sciences. Because commerce made it
possible to “do a service to another without bearing him real kindness,”
he argued it created a society in which it was in the “interest even of bad
men to act for the public good.”
Traders require the trust and confidence of those with whom they
trade, and so contribute to a climate in which promises are kept.
Francis Fukuyama has demonstrated the significance of trust in successful
societies and the contribution of trade and exchange in creating
the trust that allows civil society to develop.
- 6 -
Altruism and self-interest
The American economist, Ronald Coase, has described how various
individuals, stockholders, workers, customers and others come together
to create what we call the firm. But whereas self-interest motivates these
disparate groups to co-operate, altruism, concern for others, is the basis
of other forms of social co-operation, such as the family. Whilst appropriate
in different spheres, we know that our altruistic impulses would
not get us very far in business, just as selfishness achieves little in family
life. The strength of the intermediary institutions of civil society lies precisely
in their ability to nurture and develop our human instincts where
they can be used to best effect. Civil society channels our feelings to
their appropriate outlets where otherwise they may cause much harm.
The family as a subversive institution
Of all the institutions of civil society, perhaps the most important is the
family. Its role as an educator, provider and rearer of children is
unequalled by any other institution. The family is such a unique source
of moral values and focus for human feelings that Ferdinand Mount has
labeled it a subversive institution. It stands between humanity and the
nightmare vision of Brave New World, or even of Plato’s republic in
which children are wards of the state. As a transmitter of values from generation
to generation, the family with its strong claim on human feelings
is a far more powerful moral teacher than the most pervasive propaganda
of a totalitarian state. The family is the place where future citizens learn
to distinguish right and wrong. It is in those societies where the family is
strongest, where decisions are made by families rather than the state, that
its members have the greatest appreciation of the difference between right
and wrong. Families in free societies have that advantage because their
adult members are not treated like children by government.
A buffer zone between the individual and the state
A key function of civil society in free societies is to act as a counterbalancing
force to the power of government. Where individuals are atomised
and not accustomed to the ways of human co-operation they are
- 7 -
easier prey for the totalitarian temptations of those who offer security in
place of freedom. These little platoons stand in the way of tyrannical
government because they lay claim to the loyalties of their members, in
opposition to the demands of totalitarians for the un-conditional loyalty
of citizens to the state. The family, religious affiliations, private enterprises,
voluntary organisations and free trade unions undermine that loyalty
and transmit values that are antithetical to the obedience and acquiescence
required by totalitarians. That is why every totalitarian society
ever created by man has attempted to undermine them, and it is also
why the degree to which these institutions thrive and prosper is an indication
of how safe our freedoms are.
The enemies of civil society
It is no accident then that fascist and communist regimes throughout
history have declared war on the family, and tried to set children against
parents, wife against husband, and generation against generation. The
reason for this is that the state wants access to information to serve its
own purposes and needs to claim a prior and higher loyalty than that
which people naturally feel to their family. These institutions are subversive
in such societies because the affection and allegiance which they create
is productive of resistance to the demands of the state. A strong civic
society acts as a barrier against tyranny because it maintains a moral
order which protects and sustains the values of freedom. By undermining
civic institutions, big government strips the individual of protective
layers which stay the hand of intrusive government. When those layers
between government and individual are shed, the individual is left
defenceless against the enemies of the open society who would subordinate
the freedom of the individual to the authority of the state.
A complex web of mutual obligation
This network that sustains social power by restraining political power
creates a web of reciprocal rights and duties that allow society to govern
itself. Society is a great compact between not only each of its members,
but those who are no longer alive and generations as yet unborn. We act
in the interests of others whom we do not know and in some cases can-
- 8 -
not know because we are driven by a moral sense that tells us what we
must do. These moral instincts push us to perform roles better and to
greater mutual benefit than any government ever could. Parents and
children have both rights and responsibilities towards each other. Each
generation has a responsibility to those that have gone before it, and
those which will come after it. Marriage, friendship, and even man’s relationship
with the animal kingdom are governed by these obligations, which
give birth to the bonds of society and guide us to fulfill our duties to others
as we hope and believe they will be done to us. It is because the state cannot
replace this network that cruelty results when it tries.
Rebuilding civil society
There is perhaps no more vital task today than rebuilding the civil order
in those societies where the omnipotent state has left that order in ruins.
It would be an error to suppose that government can achieve that task.
Civil society is the result of the spontaneous human actions of a free
people. It requires that government get out of the way of people’s
endeavours and leave them free to associate with one another. It is easier
for the moral fabric of society to be destroyed than it is for it to be carefully
built up and passed down through the generations. There can be
no doubt that freedom will not last long unless that task is begun. That
means that the people must be free, in their economic affairs, in their
religious activities and in their family lives.
- 9 -
Reading
Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France, London,
Penguin, 1968.
Benjamin Constant, Benjamin Constant: Political Writings, Cambridge,
Cambridge University Press, 1988 (1833), pp.309-328.
Francis Fukuyama, Trust: the Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity,
New York, Free Press, 1995.
Ernest Gellner, Conditions of Liberty: Civil Society and Its Rivals, London,
Hamish Hamilton, 1994.
David Green, Reinventing Civil Society, London, Institute of Economic
Affairs, 1993, Part 1.
Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, New York, Fontana,
1968 (1840), Volume 2, Part 2.
Questions for thought
1. Why is a strong civil society valuable?
2. To what extent can civil society fulfill many of the responsibilities
of government, for example, in helping drug addicts or the poor?
3. How should government try to encourage civil society?
No comments:
Post a Comment