File spoon-archives/marxism-international.archive/marxism-international_1997/marxism-international.9711, message 103


Date: Wed, 5 Nov 1997 20:15:27 -0500
Subject: M-I: Re: So, the nanny's "guilty"?)
From: farmelantj-AT-juno.com (James Farmelant)


I do think that both Yoshie and James H. are onto something here.
My own thinking on this issue has been influenced by my reading of
American/British philosopher Ted Honderich (a non-Marxist who is
apparently a good friend of G.A. Cohen).  Honderich is among other
things a noted defender of determinism and a critic of belief in Free
Will.  Honderich sees the criticism of belief in Free Will as having
important moral and political consequences.  Among these
consequences are the discrediting of notions of retribution as
a justification of punishment.  He also sees the rejection of belief
in Free Will as undermining justifications of social and economic
inequalities in terms of the notion of merit or desert.
Honderich presents his views on these subjects in his books:
*How Free Are You? The Determinism Problem*  and in
*Conservatism*.  

At the end of *How Free Are You?*  Honderich suggests:

	Is the Left Wing in politics less given to ideas of individual
	desert and more given to ideas of individual need?  Is it
	then less given to attitudes and policies which have
	something of the assumption of Free Will in them?  So
	you may suppose.  If that is so, should one part of the
	response of affirmation be a move to the Left in
	politics?  I leave you with that bracing question.

I think that Honderich's comments are apt here for a reconsideration
of the roles that such notions as free will and of individual moral
responsibility play in the ideology of individualism.

		James F.

On Tue, 4 Nov 1997 21:59:59 -0500 Yoshie Furuhashi <Furuhashi.1-AT-osu.edu>
writes:
>Louis G wrote in reply to Charlotte:
>>I think cases like this illustrate very well the success with which 
>capital
>>has widened its social base to drag the intermediate social layers 
>into
>>support for its reactionary adventures.  We have a huge "jury pool" 
>of
>>stupified, passive "citizens", each with the reasoning capabilities 
>of the
>>average 9 to 12 year-old, susceptible to the most hegemonic and 
>reactionary
>>ideas, and possessing an almost heroic capacity to be swindled.  
>Their
>>impulse is to vote "guilty" under practically any circumstances, 
>precisely
>>because that is what they are told to do on TV.
>
>Obsessions with crime and punishment seem to be a key link in the
>ideological chain. As Louis G. notes, the law and order mentality and 
>"get
>tough on crime" attitudes have become hard-wired into many people's 
>minds
>by the media and political rhetoric. Fear of crime and desire to 
>punish
>criminals are way out of proportion to the actual incidence of crime 
>in
>America. (Those who are the least likely to become victims of violent 
>crime
>are also often the most vocal in calling for longer sentences and 
>other
>measures to control the population.)
>
>Bombarding people with the stories of crime and detection of guilt 
>also
>serves to reinforce individualism: it is individuals who are "guilty" 
>(or,
>as the case may be, "innocent"), not the totality of social relations 
>that
>produce the individuals and their acts. So even in the case where 
>justice
>is done (regarding the determination of guilt and innocence of a given
>individual), capitalism may still benefit from mass preoccupation with
>crime. (One may enlist Freud and Foucault to explain the role that the
>ideas of guilt + innocence have played in the production of modern
>individuals who must learn to become "moral" in a way that is 
>compatible
>with capitalist social relations.)
>
>Yoshie
>
>
>
>
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>---
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