Modern Political Thought: Hobbes I: The Human Condition (Leviathan)

How does Hobbes arrive at his account of human nature?

• In describing the state of nature, Hobbes intended to convey the idea of an unpleasant condition. (E & T)
• The unpleasantness of human nature derives from three places; the self-centred, competitive and irrational nature of human individuals, the more particular goods that these individuals pursue, the structured condition of life without sovereign power. (E & T)

Do you think he offers a convincing description that is either (a) valid for certain kinds of people at a particular stage of history, or (b) a universally valid account?

Why is a theory of human nature important to Leviathan? What is its political significance?

• According to Hobbes there’s three main principals in the nature of man that make them fight; competition, diffidence & glory. (Hobbes Chapter XIII). Without a common political power, these attributes will be unrestrained and thus cause Hobbe’s state of ‘Warre’.
• Human nature made men equal, and differences are not so considerable when considered as a whole. From this equality of ability, arises the equality of hope in attaining our ‘Ends’/goals. (Hobbes Chapter XIII). By Hobbes stressing the ultimate equality of man, he is showing that their response to a state of nature will also be equal?

What is Hobbe’s view of power? Do you think he successfully deduces it from his account of human nature?

• Gauthier & Tuck treat authorisation as carrying more weight than the bare covenant to transfer rights. Hobbesian subjects have empowered their sovereign to make judgements on all matters, on their behalf. They are therefore the authors of the sovereign’s acts. (E & T)
• All political & juridical power is located one single point in the system, with the sovereign. (E & T)
• BUT Hampton holds that Hobbe’s argument fails to establish absolute sovereignty since subjects retain the right to judge when obedience may threaten their own preservation – thus is perpetually in the position to decide whether or not to obey. (E & T)
• The sovereign is only sovereign so long as his de facto power remains and is used to provide protection for his subjects. (E & T)

What is the state of nature? Do you find Hobbe’s description of it convincing? Do you think this is what would happen in the absence of the state?

• Wootton describes Hobbe’s ‘state of nature’ as a logical account of how any rational person would behave in the absence of knowledge of a life after death, and in the absence of an existing political authority capable of imposing order.
• During the time men live without a common power they are in a condition which Hobbes calls ‘Warre’. It not only denotes the act of fighting, but consists of a tract of time. (Hobbes Chapter XIII).
• During the period of Warre, Hobbes believes that nothing can be unjust. This is because the notions of right and wrong and of justice and injustice have no place. When there is no common power, there is no law, and with no law, no injustice. (Hobbes Chapter XIII).

Notes on Edwards & Townshend:

• Hobbe’s chief concern is with the nature of political authority and its role in maintaining social order.
• Nearly all contemporaries were unwilling to accept an argument that appeared Godless and the most potent rejection of Hobbes centred on his (wrongly) alleged atheism.
• Hobbe’s aim was a complete and integrated account of politics, human nature, the physiological roots of human action, including an appraisal of human knowledge itself.
• Hobbe’s basic argument; most fundamental & overriding desire of each individual is for self-preservation.
• Scarcity & competition must always be a feature of life. Even those whose desires are modest must strive endlessly in order to ensure their continued possession of the small amount that would satisfy them.
• There are no natural limits to what people may do to protect themselves.
• This lack of natural limit to the quest for power leads to continual conflict, ‘a war against all’, which is to the disadvantage of everyone.
• ‘Laws of nature’ enjoin men to create & abide by artificial obligations, such as promises – if men are to live in peace then they must agree limits to their conduct and abide by these.
• The maximum advantage can be gained where they continue to act completely free from constraint while others limit their actions.
• However, if there are no natural limits, then there are no natural reasons for abiding by artificial arrangements.
• Only solution is to create an artificial power capable of enforcing these agreed limits.
• Hobbes anticipated the world-view of a class still being born at his time of writing.
• Interpreters with a keen interest in the history of moral philosophy seem to be most ready to identify Hobbes as a key figure in the move from traditional natural law theory to more modern Kantian constructions.
• Some have tried to identify Hobbes as the provider of the essence of British legal sovereignty (Baumgold), others have tried to establish Hobbes as an important component of the liberal tradition (Ryan).
• Leo Strauss identifies Hobbes as a writer at the cusp of modernity, and that he recognized aspects of political virtue, notably the desire for glory, as a problem. The glory of public honour had become a self-seeking pride in material success.
• The public ideal of civic virtue was thus replaced by the private ideal of competitive prowess, the state was intended only to provide robust protective framework for this competition – duty was replaced by individual right.
• For Strauss, Hobbe’s role was degenerative. He was part of a modern world’s abandonment of spiritual values in favour of purely material pursuits.
• Macpherson built an account of Hobbes as an ideologist for the emerging bourgeoisie. The need for success in market competition was unrestrained by any natural moral feelings; a man’s value was his ‘price’ determined by the market. (seen in Chapter X).
• For him, Hobbe’s natural condition of mankind was a picture of bourgeois man left unprotected by the removal of political & social institutions.
• Warrender believes that the right of nature proceeds from the dominant motives of self-interested individuals (self-preservation), whereas the law of nature states the duties of mankind in general (to preserve life).