Essay for History

Issues I am going to deal with:

(1) Locke would argue that Machiavelli represents the interests of monarchs who rule without the consent of the people. Why would he reach that conclusion?

Marx would argue that Locke represents the ideology of capitalism even before the emergence of modern industry. Why would Marx reach that conclusion?

At the beginning of this essay I would like to find the thread of reasoning which would most likely reach the conclusion that Marx would argue that Locke represents the ideology of capitalism even before the emergence of modern industry. To better evaluate this conclusion I would go further to present different definitions of the word “represent” and that of the word “ideology”. And to evaluate to which extent, in what sense, we are able to claim that Marx would reach his conclusion and whether it’s plausible to draw such conclusions. Secondly, I would try to dissolve to validity of the question of why Locke would argue that Machiavelli represents the interests of monarchs who rule without the consent of the people.

Locke’s idea directly criticized monarchy and highlighted the legitimacy of government established by consent. A ruler should be agreed upon by the people the ruled and his authority is formed by this agreement. Thus, the rightness of the government is by people’s willingness. He claimed that “hence it is evident that absolute monarch, which by some men is counted for the only government in the world, is indeed inconsistent with civil society, and so can be no form of civil government.” (John Locke, 50) “And thus, that which begins and actually constitutes any political society is nothing but the consent of any number of freedoms capable of majority, to unite and incorporate into such a society. And this is that, and that only, which did or could give beginning to any lawful government in the world.” (John Locke, 56) History shows that Locke idea laid foundation for the legitimacy of the War of Independence in the North America and was represented in the American Declaration of Independence.

In The Manifesto of the Communist Party (MCP), Marx first assumption is presented at the beginning of the book that in any society, people can be divided into different antagonistic gradations—oppressor and oppressed. They were “Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeyman” (Marx, 9). There ideologies are antagonistic.

The second assumption is that the establishment of political, spiritual structure and ideology are based on and determined by the production capacity and social relations. “Your very ideas are but the outgrowth of the condition of your bourgeois production and bourgeois property, just as your jurisprudence is but the will of your class made into a law for all, a will who essential character and direction are determined by the economic conditions of existence of your class.” (Marx, 26) Those who dominate the production of the society would invent theories and ideas to defend the existing social structure and their interest and indoctrinate the oppressed people, because the dominant classes are self-regarding and even self-interested. “The selfish misconception that induces you to transform into eternal laws of nature and of reason, the social forms springing from your present mode of production and form of property-historical relations that rise and disappear in the progress of production-this conception you share with every ruling class that has preceded.” (Marx, 26)

Locke theory argues that the legitimacy of the government lies on the consent of people, emphasizing the freedom of everyone. Thus, according to Locke doctrine the capitalism governments in Marx time were exactly right and legitimate, since they gave enough freedom to people the ruled. Thus we people should do is to support the current government by consent. However, for Marx, the concept of freedom (freedom of trading, freedom to own their property) was exclusive to the bourgeoisie and actually most of the people in the society, especially the working class, were unable to exercise the so-called freedom. “But in your existing society, private property is already done away with the nine-tenths of the population; its existence for the few is solely due to its non-existence in the hands of those none-tenths”(Marx, 25). Thus, he criticized that, “the freedom is meant, under the present bourgeois conditions of production, free trade, free selling and buying.” In this sense, Marx would claim that Locke theory is defending freedom of a small group of people in the capitalism society.

However, when John Locke wrote his Treatise on Government at 1679, the society in which he lived was a government of monarchy. It was only in 1688 that the new nobles and bourgeoisie established a government dominated by bourgeoisie. However, according to the above arguments, Locke would not be able and willing to represent the idea of capitalism, since he was not living in society of capitalism.

Another stand point might support Marx conclusion, I think. Marx claims that besides the antagonism between opposing classes, antagonism among the same class also exists. In another words, the ruling class, for instance, aristocrats in the feudal society or bourgeoisie in the society of capitalism, might divide into different sectors because of the intensity of the antagonism among them. As a result, someone among the ruling class might betray the class to which they belong and join the ruled or oppressed class, because of their education and foresight. Marx himself seems to be such an example. He said,

“Finally, in times when the class struggle nears the decisive hour, the process of dissolution going on within the ruling class, in fact within the whole range of old society, assumes such a violent, glaring character, that a small section of the ruling class cuts itself adrift, and joins the revolutionary class, the class that holds the future in its hands. Just as, therefore, at an earlier period, a section of the nobility went over to the bourgeoisie, so now a portion of the bourgeoisie goes over to the proletariat, and in particular, a portion of the bourgeois ideologists, who have raised themselves to the level of comprehending theoretically the historical movement as a whole.”( Marx, 19)

That is to say, at the transitional period between the new society and the old society, antagonism and rivalry between opposing gradations would produce someone who are foresighted and represent the interest of the oppressed class. Thus, Locke seems to be such a pioneer of his society, one of “a section of the nobility went over to the bourgeoisie”, who belonged to aristocrat and betrayed his class and write to serve for the interest of the oppressed. However, according to John Locke’s biography, even though the bourgeoisie had not overturned the monarchy, his family was not an aristocrat one (his father is a country lawyer), and he himself belonged to the bourgeoisie class. So the above argument still cannot explain why Locke was able produced ideology of capitalism.

The last argument would be that, in the transitional period between the feudal society and the capitalism society, conditions for the emergence of them is developing and the bourgeoisie class has appeared because of their foresight, even though their interests were not dominating the society and the modern industry which characterizes the capitalism society hadn’t emerged. This argument is to some extent compatible with the preceded argument. Both arguments assume the foresightedness of the pioneers: their mind and thought were, in a sense, going beyond their constraint of their society in which they live and they delivery new ideology.

Another argument is that, the overturn of the old regime was not the watershed between the old society and the new society, and the modern industry is not the necessary indication of a capitalism society. It is possible that, even though the old regime was not overturned until 1688 by the Glorious Revolution and the modern industry had not emerged, the interest of the bourgeoisie has dominate the society and the society he lived in has already been a capitalism society.

To sum up this part, we can find out Marx argument step by step to support Marx conclusion that Locke was representing the ideology of capitalism even before the emergence of modern industry. Now, it is time to evaluate those arguments by presenting two definitions of term “represent” and the definition of the term “ideology”.

By the word “represent”, we can mean either that

1) A’s judgments and arguments bias to B’s or B group of people, even though A think’s that his points of view are morally wrong or logically invalid. Thus sense of “represent” assumes that the writers are crooked and disingenuous, they are driven by the personal interests of their group or attachment to their group they belong to. Thus they take advantage of their intellectual rhetoric to defense their interests, basing on crooked and arbitrary assumptions. Or,

2) that A thinks sincerely that it is morally and logically right that B group of people or B deserve what they have and what they going to have. Thus, according to  A’s judgments, B should have what they have. This definition assumes that A is impartial and integral. For instance, let’s assumes that X is a football referee and that team Y is much stronger than team Z, according to his unbiased judgments, the score is 3 to 0 and team Y wins. In this sense X represent Y’s interest and it is morally right.

For the definition of ideology, according to the Oxford dictionary of Politics, “The term has had very variable connotations, and at least in its dominant sense it has been necessarily pejorative, a term always to be used of the ideas of others, never of one's own. For some, notably Marxists, ideology has generally been used to describe the world-view of the dominant.” (Oxford dictionary of Politics)

Obviously, the first definition of the term “represent” and the word “ideology” share the assumption that intellectuals or writers whose judgments support some particular policy or regime are crooked and disingenuous, while the second definition of the term “represent” assumes that intellectuals or writers go beyond personal interests and attachment, and present ideas that they think to be just and moral.

Thus, when Marx claims the Locke’s doctrine represented the ideology of the capitalism, he was claiming that Locke idea was determined be his personal interests. In my point of view, this argument is too hasty, since it is quite possible that Locke truly believe that what politically right is to rule according to the willingness of their people. Well, Marx would argue that, even assuming Locke did believe his ideas as impartial and true, Locke’s belief itself was determined by the production capability and social relations of his society, subconsciously. However, this argument could not be verified. Even assuming his assumption is true, how could Marx verify that his judgments about a legitimate political order and economy system were not biased by his personal attachment and the production capability of his society?

When it comes to the issue why Locke would argue that Machiavelli represents the interests of monarchs who rule without the consent of the people, I think the first step is to examine whether Locke have develop any ideas judging intellectuals’ thoughts. The question assumes without any proof that Locke would do such a thing and requires us to figure out the thread of his argument. However, this question is quite different from Marx’s problem, since though Marx did not refer to Locke’s doctrine in his book, he did deliver a comprehensive doctrine of judging other writers’ thoughts and ideas so that we can infer from his doctrine that he might think others’ doctrine represent some group of people. However, in Locke’s book, he delivered merely what he think is right without any regard to others’ doctrine and a comprehensive doctrines to judge others’ doctrine.

Truly, when Locke was writing his First Treaty on Government, he did have some body’s doctrine (the doctrine of the Divine Right of the King) in mind and tried to refute it. However, we could not find any thread that he was trying to refute someone’s doctrine in the Second Treatise on Government, not to mention that of Machiavelli. Truly, Machiavelli’s doctrine is sharply in contrast with that of Locke. While Machiavelli suggested the prince many strategies that were severely violate people’s willingness and consent, Locke claims that a legitimate government lies in the fact that it is agreed upon by its people. Nonetheless, they were dealing with different issues. While the former assumed the legitimacy of the government and try to rule efficiently, what the latter did was to deal with the issue of the legitimacy. Thus, we could not infer that Locke’s doctrine would argue that Machiavelli represents the interests of monarchs who rule without the consent of the people.

To conclude, while the second issue is meaningful and valid and I have provide proof the make critical assessment on this issue, the second issue is not valid and I have provide proof to show reasons why it is invalid.

Works cited:

John Locke, the Second Treatise on Government. New York: Prometheus Books

Machiavelli, Niccolò. The Prince. New York: Bantam Books, 1981

Manifesto of the Communist Party, Karl Mars and Frederick Engels, 1888