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. 5 Justiceis more than just another value.It provides the framework that regulates the 3118 Ch-11.qxd 11/13/03 9:39 AM Page 115The Procedural Republic and the Unencumbered Self 115play of competing values and ends; it must therefore have a sanctionindependent of those ends.But it is not obvious where such a sanction couldbe found.Theories of justice, and for that matter, ethics, have typically founded theirclaims on one or another conception of human purposes and ends.ThusAristotle said the measure of a polis is the good at which it aims, and evenJ.S.Mill, who in the nineteenth century called justice the chief part, andincomparably the most binding part of all morality, made justice an instru-ment of utilitarian ends.6This is the solution Kant s ethic rejects.Different persons typically have dif-ferent desires and ends, and so any principle derived from them can only becontingent.But the moral law needs a categorical foundation, not a contingentone.Even so universal a desire as happiness will not do.People still differ inwhat happiness consists of, and to install any particular conception as regu-lative would impose on some the conceptions of others, and so deny at leastto some the freedom to choose their own conceptions.In any case, to governourselves in conformity with desires and inclinations, given as they are bynature or circumstance, is not really to be self-governing at all.It is rather arefusal of freedom, a capitulation to determinations given outside us.According to Kant, the right is derived entirely from the concept of free-dom in the external relationships of human beings, and has nothing to dowith the end which all men have by nature [i.e., the aim of achieving happi-ness] or with the recognized means of attaining this end. 7 As such, it musthave a basis prior to all empirical ends.Only when I am governed by prin-ciples that do not presuppose any particular ends am I free to pursue myown ends consistent with a similar freedom for all.But this still leaves the question of what the basis of the right could possi-bly be.If it must be a basis prior to all purposes and ends, unconditionedeven by what Kant calls the special circumstances of human nature, 8where could such a basis conceivably be found? Given the stringentdemands of the Kantian ethic, the moral law would seem almost to requirea foundation in nothing, for any empirical precondition would undermineits priority. Duty! asks Kant at his most lyrical, What origin is there wor-thy of thee, and where is to be found the root of thy noble descent whichproudly rejects all kinship with the inclinations? 9His answer is that the basis of the moral law is to be found in the subject,not the object of practical reason, a subject capable of an autonomous will.No empirical end, but rather a subject of ends, namely a rational being him-self, must be made the ground for all maxims of action. 10 Nothing otherthan what Kant calls the subject of all possible ends himself can give riseto the right, for only this subject is also the subject of an autonomous will.Only this subject could be that something which elevates man above him-self as part of the world of sense and enables him to participate in an ideal,unconditioned realm wholly independent of our social and psychologicalinclinations.And only this thoroughgoing independence can afford us the 3118 Ch-11.qxd 11/13/03 9:39 AM Page 116116 Contemporary Political Theorydetachment we need if we are ever freely to choose for ourselves, unconditionedby the vagaries of circumstance.11Who or what exactly is this subject? It is, in a certain sense, us.The morallaw, afterall, is a law we give ourselves; we don t find it, we will it.That is howit (and we) escape the reign of nature and circumstance and merely empiricalends.But what is important to see is that the we who do the willing are not we qua particular persons, you and me, each for ourselves the moral lawis not up to us as individuals but we qua participants in what Kant calls pure practical reason, we qua participants in a transcendental subject.Now what is to guarantee that I am a subject of this kind, capable of exer-cising pure practical reason? Well, strictly speaking, there is no guarantee;the transcendental subject is only a possibility.But it is a possibility I mustpresuppose if I am to think of myself as a free moral agent.Were I wholly anempirical being, I would not be capable of freedom, for every exercise of willwould be conditioned by the desire for some object.All choice would be het-eronomous choice, governed by the pursuit of some end.My will couldnever be a first cause, only the effect of some prior cause, the instrument ofone or another impulse or inclination. When we think of ourselves as free, writes Kant, we transfer ourselves into the intelligible world as membersand recognize the autonomy of the will. 12 And so the notion of a subjectprior to and independent of experience, such as the Kantian ethic requires,appears not only possible but indispensible, a necessary presupposition ofthe possibility of freedom.How does all of this come back to politics? As the subject is prior to itsends, so the right is prior to the good.Society is best arranged when it is gov-erned by principles that do not presuppose any particular conception of thegood, for any other arrangement would fail to respect persons as being capa-ble of choice; it would treat them as objects rather than subjects, as meansrather than ends in themselves.We can see in this way how Kant s notion of the subject is bound up withthe claim for the priority of right.But for those in the Anglo-American tra-dition, the transcendental subject will seem a strange foundation for a famil-iar ethic [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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. 5 Justiceis more than just another value.It provides the framework that regulates the 3118 Ch-11.qxd 11/13/03 9:39 AM Page 115The Procedural Republic and the Unencumbered Self 115play of competing values and ends; it must therefore have a sanctionindependent of those ends.But it is not obvious where such a sanction couldbe found.Theories of justice, and for that matter, ethics, have typically founded theirclaims on one or another conception of human purposes and ends.ThusAristotle said the measure of a polis is the good at which it aims, and evenJ.S.Mill, who in the nineteenth century called justice the chief part, andincomparably the most binding part of all morality, made justice an instru-ment of utilitarian ends.6This is the solution Kant s ethic rejects.Different persons typically have dif-ferent desires and ends, and so any principle derived from them can only becontingent.But the moral law needs a categorical foundation, not a contingentone.Even so universal a desire as happiness will not do.People still differ inwhat happiness consists of, and to install any particular conception as regu-lative would impose on some the conceptions of others, and so deny at leastto some the freedom to choose their own conceptions.In any case, to governourselves in conformity with desires and inclinations, given as they are bynature or circumstance, is not really to be self-governing at all.It is rather arefusal of freedom, a capitulation to determinations given outside us.According to Kant, the right is derived entirely from the concept of free-dom in the external relationships of human beings, and has nothing to dowith the end which all men have by nature [i.e., the aim of achieving happi-ness] or with the recognized means of attaining this end. 7 As such, it musthave a basis prior to all empirical ends.Only when I am governed by prin-ciples that do not presuppose any particular ends am I free to pursue myown ends consistent with a similar freedom for all.But this still leaves the question of what the basis of the right could possi-bly be.If it must be a basis prior to all purposes and ends, unconditionedeven by what Kant calls the special circumstances of human nature, 8where could such a basis conceivably be found? Given the stringentdemands of the Kantian ethic, the moral law would seem almost to requirea foundation in nothing, for any empirical precondition would undermineits priority. Duty! asks Kant at his most lyrical, What origin is there wor-thy of thee, and where is to be found the root of thy noble descent whichproudly rejects all kinship with the inclinations? 9His answer is that the basis of the moral law is to be found in the subject,not the object of practical reason, a subject capable of an autonomous will.No empirical end, but rather a subject of ends, namely a rational being him-self, must be made the ground for all maxims of action. 10 Nothing otherthan what Kant calls the subject of all possible ends himself can give riseto the right, for only this subject is also the subject of an autonomous will.Only this subject could be that something which elevates man above him-self as part of the world of sense and enables him to participate in an ideal,unconditioned realm wholly independent of our social and psychologicalinclinations.And only this thoroughgoing independence can afford us the 3118 Ch-11.qxd 11/13/03 9:39 AM Page 116116 Contemporary Political Theorydetachment we need if we are ever freely to choose for ourselves, unconditionedby the vagaries of circumstance.11Who or what exactly is this subject? It is, in a certain sense, us.The morallaw, afterall, is a law we give ourselves; we don t find it, we will it.That is howit (and we) escape the reign of nature and circumstance and merely empiricalends.But what is important to see is that the we who do the willing are not we qua particular persons, you and me, each for ourselves the moral lawis not up to us as individuals but we qua participants in what Kant calls pure practical reason, we qua participants in a transcendental subject.Now what is to guarantee that I am a subject of this kind, capable of exer-cising pure practical reason? Well, strictly speaking, there is no guarantee;the transcendental subject is only a possibility.But it is a possibility I mustpresuppose if I am to think of myself as a free moral agent.Were I wholly anempirical being, I would not be capable of freedom, for every exercise of willwould be conditioned by the desire for some object.All choice would be het-eronomous choice, governed by the pursuit of some end.My will couldnever be a first cause, only the effect of some prior cause, the instrument ofone or another impulse or inclination. When we think of ourselves as free, writes Kant, we transfer ourselves into the intelligible world as membersand recognize the autonomy of the will. 12 And so the notion of a subjectprior to and independent of experience, such as the Kantian ethic requires,appears not only possible but indispensible, a necessary presupposition ofthe possibility of freedom.How does all of this come back to politics? As the subject is prior to itsends, so the right is prior to the good.Society is best arranged when it is gov-erned by principles that do not presuppose any particular conception of thegood, for any other arrangement would fail to respect persons as being capa-ble of choice; it would treat them as objects rather than subjects, as meansrather than ends in themselves.We can see in this way how Kant s notion of the subject is bound up withthe claim for the priority of right.But for those in the Anglo-American tra-dition, the transcendental subject will seem a strange foundation for a famil-iar ethic [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]