FW: your Mill paper
Arneson, Richard
Thanks for your inquiry. I can put a copy of the paper in the Department Library.
It's printed in the Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 1979, so maybe available online somewhere.
But I don't now recommend it. My more recent essays "Perfectionism and Politics" (2000)
and "Egalitarianism and the Undeserving Poor" (1997) and even "Meaningful Work and
Market Socialism" (Ethics, 1984) are more relevant, though not crucial. The first two are available
at my ucsd faculty web page and the last from JSTOR.
Some questions that arise for me in reading Mill's Principles of Political
Economy (it raises lots of issues, you may find other questions more pressing):
1. Does Mill's perfectionist utilitarianism imply plausible views about economic
organization and distributive justice?
Here one might worry about the implications of (a) his perfectionism, (b) his
utilitarianism, or (c) the combination.
One (a) question: Why wouldn't Milll's doctrine properly applied lead us to
favor economic arrangements that ignore or downgrade the interests of those people
who aren't going to be able to achieve much perfectionist good in any event, whatever
arrangements are put in place? If so, is that indicative of a defect in his view?
Moreover, one might worry that the combination of
perfectionism and utilitarianism heightens this worry.
2. What exactly is the status of the value of individual liberty
in Mill's views on morally desirable economic arrangements? Shouldn't the
consistent utilitarian regard individual liberty neutrally--more or less of it
in particular circumstances is good or bad, depending on the consequences
for aggregate utility of increasing or decreasing it? Compare Book II, ch. 1, sect 3:
He's talking about the choice between econiomic systems, and says: "If a conjecture may be hazarded, the
decision will probably depend mainly on one considration, viz. which of the two systems
is consistent with the greatest amount of human liberty and spontaneity." Why so?
3. In Bk. IV, ch. 7, Mill looks with favor on the prospect of a capitalist market economy gradually
being transformed into a market economy of worker-owned and worker-managed cooperative firms
as more competent workers gradually flee the status of hired laborer. Many questions arise here. One is:
From Mill's standpoint, what is so bad about working for a boss, in the private or public sector? To address this,
it seems Mill needs (we need) a normative theory of bureaucracy and also an account of the goods (and bads)
to be obtained from economically productive employment, bureaucratic or otherwise.
4. According to perfectionist utilitarianism, what taxation policies would be ideally just?
(OK, this is just a subquestion under question 1.)
5. Although Mill's discussion of the stationary state is driven by his Ricardian
empirical theory, it raises issues about justice to future generations, which become
pressing when we think about a world like ours with limited and degradeable resources, some nonrenewable,
a world in which current economic activity confers a mix of goods and bads on future people. Mill's
latent views on these questions appear to be shaped by his views on population control--views not obviously consistent
with his utilitarianism, unless his ultimate principle is the maximization of average utility.
6. In Book II, ch. 2, and elsewhere (eg Chapters on Socialism), Mill tends to link
the idea of private ownership to norms to the effect that economic reward should be in proportion
to economic contribution, that producers should egt what they make, and so on. Trying to locate
the essence of private ownership, he remarks, "The foundation of the whole is, the right of producers
to what they themselves have produced." Why think this? It seems to me that here and elsewhere Mill
asociates the device of private ownership with a norm that is not especially tightly linked to it, and one might
query both the attractiveness of the norm and why a utilitarian should have any truck with it.
7. In Book V, ch. 11. sect. 13, Mill considers the issue of public charity or what we would call welfare-state
policy. He takes an interesting tough line, and the question arises, what mix of normative and empirical premises
underlies his policy proposals. He suggests a norm of lesser eligibility--charitable aid to the ablebodied poor
should provide less assistance than one could get by taking the worst available private sector employment. He seems to think lesser
eligibility tightly constrains the generosity of govrnment aid to the ablebodied poor. I don't see why lesser eligibility is tightly
constraining as he supposes and at any rate I don't see why a perfectionist utilitarian must embrace lesser eligibility.
(OK, this is another subquestion under question 1 above.)
5.
________________________________________
From: Nanhee Byrnes [nby...@ucsd.edu]
Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 5:40 AM
To: Arneson, Richard
Subject: your Mill paper
Dear Professor Arneson,
Is there a way to access an online version of your paper "Mill's Doubts
about Freedom under Socialism"?
Thanks,
Nanhee
Nanhee Byrnes
I found Bruce Baum's " J.S. Mill and Liberal Socialism" on the web.
Baum, responding to your 1979 paper (p.20), argues that Mill's own
cooperative socialism is at least as good as (or as bad as) the
unrestrained capitalism in guarding individuality and liberty. I am
wondering whether you would be interested in responding to that.
And thanks to the references!
Nanhee
Arneson, Richard
where is the bruce baum essay to be had?
best, dick
________________________________________
From: phi...@googlegroups.com [phi...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Nanhee Byrnes [nby...@ucsd.edu]
Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 9:55 AM
To: phi...@googlegroups.com
Subject: your response to Baum?