What do you think?
Rate this book
賮賷 丕賱丨賰賲 丕賱賲丿賳賷
賷賳丕賯卮 賴匕丕 丕賱賰鬲丕亘 丨賷丕丞 噩賵賳 賱賵賰貙 賵鬲胤賵乇 兀賮賰丕乇賴貙 賵丕賱氐乇丕毓丕鬲 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 賮賷 丕賱賯乇賳 丕賱爻丕亘毓 毓卮乇 亘丕賳噩賱鬲乇丕 賲賲丕 兀丿賶 亘噩賵賳 賱賵賰 廿賱賶 賰鬲丕亘丞 賲賯丕賱鬲賷賳 賮賷 丕賱丨賰賲 丕賱賲丿賳賷 (賰鬲丕亘賳丕 賴匕丕) 亘丕賱廿囟丕賮丞 廿賱賶 乇爻丕賱丞 丕賱鬲爻丕賲丨 丕賱卮賴賷乇丞貙 賵丕賱匕賷 賷丨鬲賵賷 毓賱賶 兀賮賰丕乇 噩賵賳 賱賵賰 丕賱賲乇賰夭賷丞 丨賵賱 丕賱丨賯賵賯貨 丕賱丨賰賵賲丞貨 賵丕賱孬賵乇丞貙 賵丕賱匕賷 賷賵賱賷 丕賱丕賴鬲賲丕賲 丕賱禺丕氐 亘賳馗乇賷丞 噩賵賳 賱賵賰 丨賵賱 丕賱賲賱賰賷丞 丕賱賮乇丿賷丞貙 賵丕賱鬲賷 兀孬乇鬲 毓賱賶 丕賱賯丕賳賵賳 賵丕賱丨賰賵賲丞 賱兀賰孬乇 賲賳 賯乇賳賷賳 賲賳 丕賱夭賲丕賳.
賯賷賱 兀賳 賴丕鬲賷賳 丕賱賲賯丕賱鬲賷賳 賮賷 丕賱丨賰賲 丕賱賲丿賳賷 賴賲丕 亘賲孬丕亘丞 鬲亘乇賷乇 賱孬賵乇丞 爻賳賴 1688貙 賵丕賳鬲氐丕乇 賱賱賲亘丕丿卅 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 丕賱鬲賶 賰鬲亘鬲 賱賴丕 丕賱睾賱亘丞 毓賱賶 丕孬乇 賮賵夭 丕賱丨夭亘 丕賱亘乇賱賲丕賳賷 毓賱賶 兀賳氐丕乇 丕賱賲賱賰賷丞 丕賱賲胤賱賯丞 賵丕賯氐丕丿賴 丕爻乇丞 爻鬲賵乇丕鬲 毓賳 丕賱毓乇卮 爻賳賴 1688 貙 賵鬲賯賷賷丿 丕賱賲賱賰賷丞 賮賷 亘乇賷胤丕賳賷丕 亘丕賱賯賷賵丿 丕賱丿爻鬲賵乇賷丞 丕賱鬲賷 賲丕 夭丕賱鬲 賯丕卅賲丞 丨鬲賶 丕賱賷賵賲 .
賯賷賱 兀賳 賴丕鬲賷賳 丕賱賲賯丕賱鬲賷賳 賮賷 丕賱丨賰賲 丕賱賲丿賳賷 賴賲丕 亘賲孬丕亘丞 鬲亘乇賷乇 賱孬賵乇丞 爻賳賴 1688貙 賵丕賳鬲氐丕乇 賱賱賲亘丕丿卅 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 丕賱鬲賶 賰鬲亘鬲 賱賴丕 丕賱睾賱亘丞 毓賱賶 丕孬乇 賮賵夭 丕賱丨夭亘 丕賱亘乇賱賲丕賳賷 毓賱賶 兀賳氐丕乇 丕賱賲賱賰賷丞 丕賱賲胤賱賯丞 賵丕賯氐丕丿賴 丕爻乇丞 爻鬲賵乇丕鬲 毓賳 丕賱毓乇卮 爻賳賴 1688 貙 賵鬲賯賷賷丿 丕賱賲賱賰賷丞 賮賷 亘乇賷胤丕賳賷丕 亘丕賱賯賷賵丿 丕賱丿爻鬲賵乇賷丞 丕賱鬲賷 賲丕 夭丕賱鬲 賯丕卅賲丞 丨鬲賶 丕賱賷賵賲 .
330 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1689
637 people are currently reading
18915 people want to read
About the author
John Locke
1,793听books1,386听followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name.
John Locke was an English philosopher. He is considered the first of the British Empiricists, but is equally important to social contract theory. His ideas had enormous influence on the development of epistemology and political philosophy, and he is widely regarded as one of the most influential Enlightenment thinkers and contributors to liberal theory. His writings influenced Voltaire and Rousseau, many Scottish Enlightenment thinkers, as well as the American revolutionaries. This influence is reflected in the American Declaration of Independence.
Locke's theory of mind is often cited as the origin for modern conceptions of identity and "the self", figuring prominently in the later works of philosophers such as David Hume, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Immanuel Kant. Locke was the first Western philosopher to define the self through a continuity of "consciousness." He also postulated that the mind was a "blank slate" or "tabula rasa"; that is, contrary to Cartesian or Christian philosophy, Locke maintained that people are born without innate ideas.
John Locke was an English philosopher. He is considered the first of the British Empiricists, but is equally important to social contract theory. His ideas had enormous influence on the development of epistemology and political philosophy, and he is widely regarded as one of the most influential Enlightenment thinkers and contributors to liberal theory. His writings influenced Voltaire and Rousseau, many Scottish Enlightenment thinkers, as well as the American revolutionaries. This influence is reflected in the American Declaration of Independence.
Locke's theory of mind is often cited as the origin for modern conceptions of identity and "the self", figuring prominently in the later works of philosophers such as David Hume, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Immanuel Kant. Locke was the first Western philosopher to define the self through a continuity of "consciousness." He also postulated that the mind was a "blank slate" or "tabula rasa"; that is, contrary to Cartesian or Christian philosophy, Locke maintained that people are born without innate ideas.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 301 reviews
August 8, 2022
Even though the Two Treatises of Government was published anonymously in the year 1689, the Editor of this book's edition, Peter Laslett, argues that the two Treatises were written between the years of 1679-1683, well before the publishing and The Glorious Revolution of 1688-89. Furthermore, Laslett claims that the Second Treatise was written first, and the First Treatise, second, while there remains a possibility of a missing, third part. Challenging times for writers and freethinkers.
The First Treatise is devoted to refuting Sir Robert Filmer's defense of monarchy and patriarchalism, in which property, women, and children are subjects of a father, and the father's subjects of the King. This is all in line with Filmer's central argument, loosely based on Scriptural writings, that God created Adam and the world at his disposal, which makes Adam our first king and the sole proprietor of everything, and all rights can only be inherited through his lineage, namely through a male descendant.
However, in Locke's view, all men and women are born free and lived before the first established civil societies in accord with the laws of nature, in what John Locke (1632-1704) refers to as the State of Nature. Where by he believes that the only reason the people are to enter, by mutual consent, into a political community is to better preserve their liberty and secure their property as the property is insufficiently regulated in the State of Nature. Nevertheless, these Civil Societies should be in harmony with the natural rights enjoyed in the State of Nature. Locke goes on further to discuss the necessity of the separation of the legislative and executive powers, the people's rights to retain instruments to overthrow governments, and that an individual's "labor of his body and the work of his hands" are to remain in their possession.
Locke, a philosopher, and a physician began studying and writing about government and politics once he came under the influence of the first earl of Shaftesbury (Anthony Ashley Cooper).
Spinoza's and Descartes' impact on Locke's philosophy is evident but his philosophy remains original. A great book with a lengthy biographical introduction of John Locke who is today commonly known as the Father of Liberalism. Worth reading.
The First Treatise is devoted to refuting Sir Robert Filmer's defense of monarchy and patriarchalism, in which property, women, and children are subjects of a father, and the father's subjects of the King. This is all in line with Filmer's central argument, loosely based on Scriptural writings, that God created Adam and the world at his disposal, which makes Adam our first king and the sole proprietor of everything, and all rights can only be inherited through his lineage, namely through a male descendant.
However, in Locke's view, all men and women are born free and lived before the first established civil societies in accord with the laws of nature, in what John Locke (1632-1704) refers to as the State of Nature. Where by he believes that the only reason the people are to enter, by mutual consent, into a political community is to better preserve their liberty and secure their property as the property is insufficiently regulated in the State of Nature. Nevertheless, these Civil Societies should be in harmony with the natural rights enjoyed in the State of Nature. Locke goes on further to discuss the necessity of the separation of the legislative and executive powers, the people's rights to retain instruments to overthrow governments, and that an individual's "labor of his body and the work of his hands" are to remain in their possession.
Locke, a philosopher, and a physician began studying and writing about government and politics once he came under the influence of the first earl of Shaftesbury (Anthony Ashley Cooper).
Spinoza's and Descartes' impact on Locke's philosophy is evident but his philosophy remains original. A great book with a lengthy biographical introduction of John Locke who is today commonly known as the Father of Liberalism. Worth reading.
July 26, 2007
Those of us living in liberal democracies owe tremendous intellectual debt to John Locke. His "Second Treatise" in particular helped lay the foundation for a political system that emphasized "life, liberty, and property." The First Treatise is interesting to skim through, though it is in the second where the Locke is most substantive. His Theory of Private Property, which could also be construed as a theory of value, is an unmistakable revolution in political thought. It is, as Locke contends, when man applies his labor to nature that he is entitled to it. Questions about environmental ethics or indegenous rights aside, this observation, made in a still heavily ecclesiastical society, is a brilliant one. Furthermore, Locke's understanding of the formation of government is based on a hypothetical "state of nature" account. Locke's arguments are intellectually pleasing, and his social-scientific models make intuitive sense. Given that, perhaps the only weakness of the work is its failure to adequately analyze such concepts as the social contract or his theory of labor-property relations. For example, Locke fails to seriously consider what we should do with states that are clearly formed by mere force. Indeed, he doesn't adequately address the possibility that such a state could justify its existence on the grounds that "better tyranny than nothing." While Locke believes that a state that doesn't respect private property cannot last for very long, history says otherwise. Of course, in retrospect it is easier to criticize Locke in these regards, but with Machiavelli before him it was not as though these ideas were not known. There are admittedly other inconsistencies, such as his view on taxation later in the book and on who "owns" the grass his serf cuts. Interestingly enough, Locke is unwilling to expound on the distinction between property garnered for the sake of personal enjoyment (possessions) and property garnered for the sake of profit. Nevertheless, the work is a passionate defense of a liberal government, and the points are persuasively argued. As long as the reader, as Locke himself urges, keeps a skeptical attitude, this work has much to offer.
June 15, 2023
John Locke's "Essay Concerning Civil Government" is a seminal work in the history of political and social philosophy, and its influence extends far beyond the boundaries of politics and society. It corresponds to one of the masterpieces of the Enlightenment, the cultural and social movement that transformed the way people saw the world in the 18th century. Beyond its political implications, John Locke's "Essay Concerning Civil Government" has also had an enormous influence on modern psychology.
Locke speaks from a rationalist and comprehensive perspective of the idea of power, establishing a strong critique of the medieval belief that power is a divine and absolute right granted by God to monarchs or to the Church. Instead, Locke argues that power is the result of the general consensus of society and that it is based on the social contract that arises between the population and the government.
In his work, Locke establishes that human consciousness is formed through experience and reason, and that, therefore, society plays a fundamental role in the formation of the human mind.
In this sense, Locke's concepts are essential to understand the psychology of people. The author understands the human mind as something that is formed and structured through experience and education. Learning is essential and is promoted by the social environment in which the person develops. In this sense, Locke places great emphasis on the influence of the environment on the formation of human character and on how our experiences can change over time.
Locke also introduces the idea that people are born with a "blank slate", that is, an empty mind without predispositions. This conception implies that there is no innate human nature, but rather that the individual is shaped by experiences, which is why it is a theory totally opposed to essentialist approaches that, with an evolutionary or creationist vision, defend that human nature is establishes in symbiosis with biology from birth.
On the other hand, Locke supports the idea that each person has a natural tendency towards justice and natural law, and insists that there must be a separation between church and state, as a guarantee of individual freedom and decision-making. decisions based on critical thinking and personal ethics.
These concepts have proved fundamental in modern psychology, as they have played a significant role in the evolution of the understanding of developmental psychology. Locke establishes that people are shaped by their life, their environment and their social relationships, which leads some academics to consider him one of the precursors of constructivism, a learning theory widely used in psychology and education.
Likewise, the fact that Locke considers that people are capable of reasoning and making ethical decisions based on justice and natural law is also a point of reference for subsequent schools of thought. This idea is related to the notion of agency, fueling the belief that people have the power to make active decisions to change their situation and their lives.
In addition, Locke's work shows that individual liberty and the separation of church and state are fundamental to maximizing individual well-being. These concepts are especially relevant in modern psychology, where the importance of individual well-being and personal autonomy is valued as a key element of mental health and psychological well-being.
In short, John Locke's book "Essay Concerning Civil Government" has had a tremendous influence on modern psychology, providing insight into the role of environment and experience in shaping the individual, as well as the relevance of freedom. individual and autonomy to maximize psychological well-being. Locke's work is a significant contribution to both political philosophy and psychology, and is essential for anyone interested in these areas of knowledge.
Locke speaks from a rationalist and comprehensive perspective of the idea of power, establishing a strong critique of the medieval belief that power is a divine and absolute right granted by God to monarchs or to the Church. Instead, Locke argues that power is the result of the general consensus of society and that it is based on the social contract that arises between the population and the government.
In his work, Locke establishes that human consciousness is formed through experience and reason, and that, therefore, society plays a fundamental role in the formation of the human mind.
In this sense, Locke's concepts are essential to understand the psychology of people. The author understands the human mind as something that is formed and structured through experience and education. Learning is essential and is promoted by the social environment in which the person develops. In this sense, Locke places great emphasis on the influence of the environment on the formation of human character and on how our experiences can change over time.
Locke also introduces the idea that people are born with a "blank slate", that is, an empty mind without predispositions. This conception implies that there is no innate human nature, but rather that the individual is shaped by experiences, which is why it is a theory totally opposed to essentialist approaches that, with an evolutionary or creationist vision, defend that human nature is establishes in symbiosis with biology from birth.
On the other hand, Locke supports the idea that each person has a natural tendency towards justice and natural law, and insists that there must be a separation between church and state, as a guarantee of individual freedom and decision-making. decisions based on critical thinking and personal ethics.
These concepts have proved fundamental in modern psychology, as they have played a significant role in the evolution of the understanding of developmental psychology. Locke establishes that people are shaped by their life, their environment and their social relationships, which leads some academics to consider him one of the precursors of constructivism, a learning theory widely used in psychology and education.
Likewise, the fact that Locke considers that people are capable of reasoning and making ethical decisions based on justice and natural law is also a point of reference for subsequent schools of thought. This idea is related to the notion of agency, fueling the belief that people have the power to make active decisions to change their situation and their lives.
In addition, Locke's work shows that individual liberty and the separation of church and state are fundamental to maximizing individual well-being. These concepts are especially relevant in modern psychology, where the importance of individual well-being and personal autonomy is valued as a key element of mental health and psychological well-being.
In short, John Locke's book "Essay Concerning Civil Government" has had a tremendous influence on modern psychology, providing insight into the role of environment and experience in shaping the individual, as well as the relevance of freedom. individual and autonomy to maximize psychological well-being. Locke's work is a significant contribution to both political philosophy and psychology, and is essential for anyone interested in these areas of knowledge.
February 7, 2022
Un po' noiosina, forse per l'eccesso di precisione e di tecnicismo legale, la prima parte, quella in cui Locke, Bibbia alla mano, demolisce le teorie assolutistiche di Robert Filmer, che nel suo Il Patriarca legittimava il potere assolutistico dei monarchi giacch茅 derivato, per mano di Dio, direttamente da quello di Adamo. Molto pi霉 interessante la seconda parte, quella in cui l'autore viene a delineare, nei minimi dettagli, lo Stato liberale che ancora conosciamo e i principi che hanno poi ispirato la Costituzione americana, francese, italiana. Un filosofo che sapeva indubbiamente guardare avanti.
April 19, 2018
Inoffensive, agreeable, well written, but also rather dull and useless.
February 21, 2020
As its title states, John Locke鈥檚 鈥淭wo Treatises on Government鈥� are two separate treatments on the basis of just and legitimate government; the first of which is structured as a rebuttal to the notion, as articulated in Robert Filmer鈥檚 鈥淧atriarcha, or The Natural Power of Kings鈥�, of monarchical power authorized by 鈥渄ivine right鈥� whereas the second is a positive articulation of concepts and principles locating the source of authority for any legitimate government within the consent of the governed.
The essential argument that Locke rebutted in the first treatise was that of a king鈥檚 right to rule his subjects derived from divine authority 鈥� the divine right of kings. In 鈥淧atriarcha鈥� Filmer asserted that the right of a king to rule over subjects was absolute, bestowed by God to Adam, the original patriarch, and has been passed down to successive rulers ever since by the dominion, Filmer asserts, God gave to all fathers over their own children. Locke sets down an almost line for line refutation of Filmer鈥檚 assertions, arguing, essentially, that God bestowed no such right to Adam and even if he had, that right certainly did not pass to successive generations by virtue of any divine grant of patriarchal authority. Not having read Filmer, there was a great temptation to skip over Locke鈥檚 first treatise; however, through various sly and interesting means throughout his refutation of Filmer, Locke lays the groundwork for his second treatise, namely, that whatever right a ruler has to rule comes exclusively from the consent of the governed. Although this, in itself, is enough to warrant the first treatise a full read, as a bonus, Locke provides a wonderful example of a trained rhetorician鈥檚 rebuttal of the absurd through logic and reason that makes the read worthwhile. Moreover, in expressing his argument, Locke鈥檚 capacity for urbane, condescending humor leaches out through every line as he takes obvious delight in ridiculing the absurdities of Filmer鈥檚 arguments.
The crux of Locke鈥檚 second treatise is fascinating in that although it was written over 300 years ago, it will resonate with anyone familiar with traditional American notions of 鈥減olitical common sense.鈥� Locke argues that by nature, all men are born equal and subject to no obligation of obedience to anyone. However, notwithstanding this, living this equality carries the risk that those with greater strength can, through force, compel a free man to do whatever the strong man wants, including surrendering his property. To forestall this risk, Lock argues, mankind has assented to surrendering a portion of his individual liberty to the extent that he is prepared to adhere to mutually agreed upon laws of the community in exchange for the protections afforded by common government whose laws and rules serve to protect him and his possessions. Government, therefore, derives its power and authority not from any ancient grant bestowed by God upon Adam, but only by the consent of the governed.
While none of this is particularly revolutionary to a contemporary reader, it is nonetheless fascinating to read ideas that today we all take for granted structured as propositions that, in Locke鈥檚 time, had to be persuasively argued. Moreover, Locke鈥檚 ideas are not necessarily a one to one match to those of contemporary democratic philosophy. In particular, the centrality of property in Locke鈥檚 thesis is striking relative to the way we think of government today. The purpose of any government, Locke assures us, is to protect the sanctity of individual property from unjust appropriation by others. What鈥檚 interesting is the way he takes for granted either that everyone has property to be defended, or, what is more likely, the only people whose rights matter are those with property to protect.
His assumption, of course, is that there is a level playing field and that the only path to wealth accumulation is through dint of hard work. Imagine, he argues, that there is a common forest full of acorn trees. A man, seeing an acorn on the ground, picks it up. The acorns are the common property of the community, but in the moment the man expends his labor to pick it up, the right to that acorn reverts to him who expended the labor to harvest it. It is, he continues, a crime to pick up more acorns than he can consume as the excess will go to rot; however, if he is able to trade his excess for the excess of some other entrepreneur the fact that he鈥檚 harvested more than he personally needs goes from being a public evil brought about by waste to a public good brought about by plenty accessible to a greater number of community members. What he ignores, of course, is that when the acorn guy grabs up all the acorns such that he and he alone has all the food there is to be had in the commons, people, faced with starvation, will do anything (including bartering away their own freedom) to get a share of the man鈥檚 horded wealth. Throughout his discourse, Locke is silent about how property is accumulated 鈥� if you have property, regardless of the means by which you鈥檝e acquired it, you deserve the protection of the law, including, presumably, protection from the masses of starving people who will, in their desperation, attempt to rob from you in order that they might eat. Locke鈥檚 cannon is 鈥渓ife, liberty and property,鈥� 鈥� it took a different hand and a hundred years for this to become the famous, 鈥渓ife, liberty and the pursuit of happiness鈥� so dear to Americans.
It was not, as one can probably imagine, a light read 鈥� especially the first treatise. Yet it is interesting to go back and read about the ideas that changed the world that were written at a time then those ideas were fresh, new and highly controversial.
The essential argument that Locke rebutted in the first treatise was that of a king鈥檚 right to rule his subjects derived from divine authority 鈥� the divine right of kings. In 鈥淧atriarcha鈥� Filmer asserted that the right of a king to rule over subjects was absolute, bestowed by God to Adam, the original patriarch, and has been passed down to successive rulers ever since by the dominion, Filmer asserts, God gave to all fathers over their own children. Locke sets down an almost line for line refutation of Filmer鈥檚 assertions, arguing, essentially, that God bestowed no such right to Adam and even if he had, that right certainly did not pass to successive generations by virtue of any divine grant of patriarchal authority. Not having read Filmer, there was a great temptation to skip over Locke鈥檚 first treatise; however, through various sly and interesting means throughout his refutation of Filmer, Locke lays the groundwork for his second treatise, namely, that whatever right a ruler has to rule comes exclusively from the consent of the governed. Although this, in itself, is enough to warrant the first treatise a full read, as a bonus, Locke provides a wonderful example of a trained rhetorician鈥檚 rebuttal of the absurd through logic and reason that makes the read worthwhile. Moreover, in expressing his argument, Locke鈥檚 capacity for urbane, condescending humor leaches out through every line as he takes obvious delight in ridiculing the absurdities of Filmer鈥檚 arguments.
The crux of Locke鈥檚 second treatise is fascinating in that although it was written over 300 years ago, it will resonate with anyone familiar with traditional American notions of 鈥減olitical common sense.鈥� Locke argues that by nature, all men are born equal and subject to no obligation of obedience to anyone. However, notwithstanding this, living this equality carries the risk that those with greater strength can, through force, compel a free man to do whatever the strong man wants, including surrendering his property. To forestall this risk, Lock argues, mankind has assented to surrendering a portion of his individual liberty to the extent that he is prepared to adhere to mutually agreed upon laws of the community in exchange for the protections afforded by common government whose laws and rules serve to protect him and his possessions. Government, therefore, derives its power and authority not from any ancient grant bestowed by God upon Adam, but only by the consent of the governed.
While none of this is particularly revolutionary to a contemporary reader, it is nonetheless fascinating to read ideas that today we all take for granted structured as propositions that, in Locke鈥檚 time, had to be persuasively argued. Moreover, Locke鈥檚 ideas are not necessarily a one to one match to those of contemporary democratic philosophy. In particular, the centrality of property in Locke鈥檚 thesis is striking relative to the way we think of government today. The purpose of any government, Locke assures us, is to protect the sanctity of individual property from unjust appropriation by others. What鈥檚 interesting is the way he takes for granted either that everyone has property to be defended, or, what is more likely, the only people whose rights matter are those with property to protect.
His assumption, of course, is that there is a level playing field and that the only path to wealth accumulation is through dint of hard work. Imagine, he argues, that there is a common forest full of acorn trees. A man, seeing an acorn on the ground, picks it up. The acorns are the common property of the community, but in the moment the man expends his labor to pick it up, the right to that acorn reverts to him who expended the labor to harvest it. It is, he continues, a crime to pick up more acorns than he can consume as the excess will go to rot; however, if he is able to trade his excess for the excess of some other entrepreneur the fact that he鈥檚 harvested more than he personally needs goes from being a public evil brought about by waste to a public good brought about by plenty accessible to a greater number of community members. What he ignores, of course, is that when the acorn guy grabs up all the acorns such that he and he alone has all the food there is to be had in the commons, people, faced with starvation, will do anything (including bartering away their own freedom) to get a share of the man鈥檚 horded wealth. Throughout his discourse, Locke is silent about how property is accumulated 鈥� if you have property, regardless of the means by which you鈥檝e acquired it, you deserve the protection of the law, including, presumably, protection from the masses of starving people who will, in their desperation, attempt to rob from you in order that they might eat. Locke鈥檚 cannon is 鈥渓ife, liberty and property,鈥� 鈥� it took a different hand and a hundred years for this to become the famous, 鈥渓ife, liberty and the pursuit of happiness鈥� so dear to Americans.
It was not, as one can probably imagine, a light read 鈥� especially the first treatise. Yet it is interesting to go back and read about the ideas that changed the world that were written at a time then those ideas were fresh, new and highly controversial.
Read
August 13, 2019This book is almost as dense as I am.
October 26, 2018
賴賳丕 賵噩丿鬲 兀氐賵賱 丕賱賮賱爻賮丞 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 丕賱丨丿賷孬丞 亘賲禺鬲賱賮 廿鬲噩丕賴丕鬲賴丕 賮賲賳 賰鬲丕亘 賱賵賰 賴匕丕 賷賲賰賳賰 兀賳 鬲乇賶 廿賳亘孬丕賯 丕賱丿賷賲賵賯乇丕胤賷丞 賵丕賱卮賷賵毓賷丞 丕賵 丕賱賲賱賰賷丞 丕賱丿爻鬲賵乇賷丞 賮賶 賲賴丿賴丕 賵賲賳 賳丕丨賷丞 兀禺乇賶 鬲噩丿 丕賱兀乇爻鬲賯乇丕胤賷丞 賵丕賱賲賱賰賷丞 丕賱賲胤賱賯丞 賮賶 胤賵乇 丕賱廿丨鬲囟丕乇 賮賴賰匕丕 賰丕賳鬲 丕賱廿鬲噩丕賴丕鬲 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 賮賶 毓氐乇 賱賵賰 賵丕賱賰鬲丕亘 賮賶 丨丿 匕丕鬲賴 孬賵乇丞 毓賱賶 丕賱鬲丿丕禺賱 丕賱賲乇賷毓 丕賱匕賶 丨丿孬 胤賵丕賱 丕賱賯乇賵賳 丕賱賵爻胤賶 賵丨鬲賶 毓氐乇 丕賱廿氐賱丕丨 丕賱丿賷賳賶 亘賷賳 丕賱賲賮丕賴賷賲 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 賵丕賱鬲賮爻賷乇丕鬲 丕賱丿賷賳賷丞 賱賴丕 賰賲丕 賷賲孬賱 孬賵乇丞 毓賱賶 賰賱 胤睾賷丕賳 鬲乇爻禺 賮賶 兀賵乇賵亘丕 賲賳匕 賯乇賵賳 賵兀氐亘丨 卮賷卅丕 賲賯亘賵賱丕 賵廿毓鬲賷丕丿賷丕賸 丨鬲賶 兀氐亘丨 丨噩乇 毓孬乇丞 賮賶 胤乇賷賯 丕賱鬲賯丿賲 丕賱廿賳爻丕賳賶 .
賷鬲賳丕賵賱 賴匕丕 丕賱賰鬲丕亘 賯爻賲賷賳 兀賵賱賴賲丕 廿賯鬲氐乇 毓賱 賳賯丿 兀丨丿 丕賱賰鬲丕亘 丕賱賲毓丕氐乇賷賳 賱賱賵賰 賵賴賵 丕賱爻賷乇 乇賵亘乇鬲 賮賱賷賲乇 賵丕賱匕賶 賰丕賳 賱賴 賰鬲丕亘丕 賷丿毓賲 賮賷賴 丨賯 丕賱爻賱胤丞 丕賱賲胤賱賯丞 丕賱廿賱賴賶 賱賱賲賱賵賰 毓賱賶 兀爻丕爻 廿賳亘孬丕賯 匕賱賰 丕賱丨賯 賲賳 丨賯 丕賱胤丕毓丞 丕賱兀亘賵賷丞 丕賱匕賶 亘丿兀 賲毓 丌丿賲 賵丕賱賵丕賯毓 兀賳 匕賱賰 丕賱噩夭亍 賰丕賳 爻丕匕噩丕賸 賲賲賱丕賸 亘丕賱賳爻亘丞 賱毓賯賵賱 賴匕賴 丕賱兀賷丕賲 賵賱丕 賷賲賰賳 兀賳 賷鬲賵賯毓 賲賳賴 兀丿賳賶 廿賮丕丿丞 丕賱賱賴賲 廿賱丕 亘毓囟 丕賱賲毓賱賵賲丕鬲 丕賱鬲丕乇賷禺賷丞 賵丕賱丿賷賳賷丞 賲賳 鬲丕乇賷禺 丕賱賲爻賷丨賷丞 丕賱兀賵賱賶 賵丕賱賷賴賵丿 賵亘毓囟 兀賯丕氐賷氐 丕賱賰鬲亘 丕賱賲賯丿爻丞 賱丿賷賴賲 .
兀賲丕 丕賱噩夭亍 丕賱孬丕賳賶 賮賷鬲賳丕賵賱 賮賱爻賮丞 賱賵賰 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 賵丕賱鬲賶 鬲亘丿兀 亘鬲賵囟賷丨 丕賱賮乇賵賯 亘賷賳 丕賱爻賱胤丞 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 賵丕賱兀亘賵賷丞 孬賲 賲賳賴丕 賷賳鬲賯賱 廿賱賶 丕賱胤賵乇 丕賱胤亘賷毓賶 賱丿賶 丕賱廿賳爻丕賳 賮鬲賵噩亘 毓賱賷賴 兀賳 賷賳鬲賯丿 賮賶 毓噩丕賱丞 賲匕賴亘 賴賵亘夭 賮賶 丨丕賱丞 丕賱胤亘賷毓丞 丕賱鬲賶 鬲賲孬賱 丨丕賱丞 丨乇亘 丕賱賰賱 囟丿 丕賱賰賱 . 兀賲丕 賱賵賰 賮賷毓鬲賯丿 兀賳 丨丕賱丞 丕賱胤亘賷毓丞 賰丕賳鬲 丨丕賱丞 賷毓鬲賲丿 賮賷賴丕 丕賱廿賳爻丕賳 毓賱賶 毓賯賱賴 賵賷鬲賵氐賱 賮賷賴丕 廿賱賶 丕賱賯丕賳賵賳 丕賱胤亘賷毓賶 賲賳 丨賷孬 丨賯 賰賱 賮乇丿 賮賶 丕賱丿賮丕毓 毓賳 丨賷丕鬲賴 賵丨乇賷鬲賴 賵廿賯鬲賳丕毓賴 亘兀賳 賲賳 賷鬲毓乇囟 亘丕賱噩賵乇 毓賱賶 賲賳 毓丿丕賴 賮廿賳賴 賷鬲賵賯毓 毓丿賵丕賳 賵噩賵乇 賲賲丕孬賱 賲賳 丕賱丌禺乇賷賳 廿匕丕亍賴 賮賷鬲噩賳亘 亘丕賱鬲丕賱賶 賴匕賴 丕賱兀賮毓丕賱 丕賱毓丿賵丕賳賷丞 . 賵賴匕丕 亘丕賱賳爻亘丞 賱賴 賴賵 丨丕賱 丕賱兀睾賱亘賷丞 賲賳 丕賱亘卮乇 賮賶 丕賱胤賵乇 丕賱胤亘賷毓賶 .
賵賲賳賴丕 賷賳鬲賯賱 廿賱賶 丨賯 丕賱賲賱賰賷丞 賵丕賱賲毓乇賵賮 毓賳丿 賱賵賰 兀賳賴 賷賳卮兀 毓賳 丕賱毓賲賱 亘毓丿 兀賳 賰丕賳鬲 丕賱胤亘賷毓丞 賰賱賴丕 賲卮丕毓丕 賱亘賳賶 丕賱亘卮乇 毓賱賶 丕賱爻賵丕亍 亘丨賷孬 鬲賰賮賶 兀睾乇丕囟賴賲 賵賲賳丕賮毓賴賲 噩賲賷毓丕賸 賵賲賳 丨賯 丕賱廿賲鬲賱丕賰 賷賳卮兀 丨賯 丕賱丿賮丕毓 毓賳 丕賱兀賲賱丕賰 丕賱鬲賶 亘鬲乇丕賰賲賴丕 賵賰孬乇鬲賴丕 賵鬲毓丿丿 丕賱賮賵丕乇賯 亘賷賳賴丕 賲賳 廿賳爻丕賳 廿賱賶 丌禺乇 賵噩亘 丕賱鬲賮賰賷乇 賮賶 丕賱鬲毓丕賷卮 賮賶 噩賲丕毓丕鬲 丕賱鬲賶 鬲賮賵囟 爻賱胤丕鬲賴丕 丕賱胤亘賷毓賷丞 丕賱賶 賮乇丿 賲丕 兀賵 毓丿丞 兀賮乇丕丿 賷賯賵賲賵賳 亘爻賳 賵丨賲丕賷丞 賵鬲賳賮賷匕 丕賱賯賵丕賳賷賳 丕賱鬲賶 爻賷噩鬲賲毓賵丕 賮賶 馗賱賴丕 丨賮丕馗丕賸 毓賱賶 匕賵丕鬲賴賲 賵賲氐丕賱丨賴賲 賵兀賲賱丕賰賴賲 .
賵賲賳 賴賳丕 賷鬲噩賴 賱賵賰 賱賱丨丿賷孬 毓賳 兀賳賵丕毓 丕賱爻賱胤丕鬲 丕賱賲鬲亘丕賷賳丞 賵賲丿賶 毓賱丕賯丞 賰賱 賲賳賴丕 亘丕賱兀禺乇賶 賵丨丿賵丿 賰賱 賲賳賴丕 賵廿賷噩丕夭丕 賮廿賳賴 賷囟毓 賲氐賱丨丞 丕賱卮毓亘 賵禺賷乇賴 丨丿丕賸 賮丕氐賱丕賸 賮賶 卮乇毓賷丞 丕賱爻賱胤丕鬲 賵丨丿賵丿 爻賱胤鬲賴丕 賵賷丨乇賲 丕賱爻胤賵 毓賱賶 兀賲賱丕賰 丕賱丌禺乇賷賳 賰賱 丕賱鬲丨乇賷賲 賲賴賲丕 賰丕賳 丕賱噩乇賲 丕賱賲乇鬲賰亘 孬賲 賵賷噩毓賱 丕賱丨丿 丕賱賮丕氐賱 賮賶 卮乇毓賷丞 丕賱丨丕賰賲 賴賵 廿爻鬲禺丿丕賲賴 賱賱賯賵丞 囟丿 卮毓亘賴 賱兀賶 爻亘亘 賰丕賳 . 賵賷賲賷夭 賴賳丕 亘丕賱匕丕鬲 亘賷賳 丕賱賲睾鬲氐亘 賵丕賱胤丕睾賷丞 賵賴賵 鬲賲賷賷夭 匕賵 丿賱丕賱丞 賮賶 賮賰乇 賱賵賰 丕賱爻賷丕爻賶 .
賰賳 賴匕丕 丕賱賯爻賲 丕賱孬丕賳賶 賲賳 丕賱賰鬲丕亘 卮賷賯丕賸 廿賱賶 兀亘毓丿 丕賱丨丿賵丿 賰賲丕 兀賳賴 亘丕賱睾 丕賱兀賴賲賷丞 賱賰賱 賲賴鬲賲 亘丕賱賮賱爻賮丞 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 兀賵 丕賱爻賷丕爻丞 丕賱賲噩乇丿丞 .
賷鬲賳丕賵賱 賴匕丕 丕賱賰鬲丕亘 賯爻賲賷賳 兀賵賱賴賲丕 廿賯鬲氐乇 毓賱 賳賯丿 兀丨丿 丕賱賰鬲丕亘 丕賱賲毓丕氐乇賷賳 賱賱賵賰 賵賴賵 丕賱爻賷乇 乇賵亘乇鬲 賮賱賷賲乇 賵丕賱匕賶 賰丕賳 賱賴 賰鬲丕亘丕 賷丿毓賲 賮賷賴 丨賯 丕賱爻賱胤丞 丕賱賲胤賱賯丞 丕賱廿賱賴賶 賱賱賲賱賵賰 毓賱賶 兀爻丕爻 廿賳亘孬丕賯 匕賱賰 丕賱丨賯 賲賳 丨賯 丕賱胤丕毓丞 丕賱兀亘賵賷丞 丕賱匕賶 亘丿兀 賲毓 丌丿賲 賵丕賱賵丕賯毓 兀賳 匕賱賰 丕賱噩夭亍 賰丕賳 爻丕匕噩丕賸 賲賲賱丕賸 亘丕賱賳爻亘丞 賱毓賯賵賱 賴匕賴 丕賱兀賷丕賲 賵賱丕 賷賲賰賳 兀賳 賷鬲賵賯毓 賲賳賴 兀丿賳賶 廿賮丕丿丞 丕賱賱賴賲 廿賱丕 亘毓囟 丕賱賲毓賱賵賲丕鬲 丕賱鬲丕乇賷禺賷丞 賵丕賱丿賷賳賷丞 賲賳 鬲丕乇賷禺 丕賱賲爻賷丨賷丞 丕賱兀賵賱賶 賵丕賱賷賴賵丿 賵亘毓囟 兀賯丕氐賷氐 丕賱賰鬲亘 丕賱賲賯丿爻丞 賱丿賷賴賲 .
兀賲丕 丕賱噩夭亍 丕賱孬丕賳賶 賮賷鬲賳丕賵賱 賮賱爻賮丞 賱賵賰 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 賵丕賱鬲賶 鬲亘丿兀 亘鬲賵囟賷丨 丕賱賮乇賵賯 亘賷賳 丕賱爻賱胤丞 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 賵丕賱兀亘賵賷丞 孬賲 賲賳賴丕 賷賳鬲賯賱 廿賱賶 丕賱胤賵乇 丕賱胤亘賷毓賶 賱丿賶 丕賱廿賳爻丕賳 賮鬲賵噩亘 毓賱賷賴 兀賳 賷賳鬲賯丿 賮賶 毓噩丕賱丞 賲匕賴亘 賴賵亘夭 賮賶 丨丕賱丞 丕賱胤亘賷毓丞 丕賱鬲賶 鬲賲孬賱 丨丕賱丞 丨乇亘 丕賱賰賱 囟丿 丕賱賰賱 . 兀賲丕 賱賵賰 賮賷毓鬲賯丿 兀賳 丨丕賱丞 丕賱胤亘賷毓丞 賰丕賳鬲 丨丕賱丞 賷毓鬲賲丿 賮賷賴丕 丕賱廿賳爻丕賳 毓賱賶 毓賯賱賴 賵賷鬲賵氐賱 賮賷賴丕 廿賱賶 丕賱賯丕賳賵賳 丕賱胤亘賷毓賶 賲賳 丨賷孬 丨賯 賰賱 賮乇丿 賮賶 丕賱丿賮丕毓 毓賳 丨賷丕鬲賴 賵丨乇賷鬲賴 賵廿賯鬲賳丕毓賴 亘兀賳 賲賳 賷鬲毓乇囟 亘丕賱噩賵乇 毓賱賶 賲賳 毓丿丕賴 賮廿賳賴 賷鬲賵賯毓 毓丿賵丕賳 賵噩賵乇 賲賲丕孬賱 賲賳 丕賱丌禺乇賷賳 廿匕丕亍賴 賮賷鬲噩賳亘 亘丕賱鬲丕賱賶 賴匕賴 丕賱兀賮毓丕賱 丕賱毓丿賵丕賳賷丞 . 賵賴匕丕 亘丕賱賳爻亘丞 賱賴 賴賵 丨丕賱 丕賱兀睾賱亘賷丞 賲賳 丕賱亘卮乇 賮賶 丕賱胤賵乇 丕賱胤亘賷毓賶 .
賵賲賳賴丕 賷賳鬲賯賱 廿賱賶 丨賯 丕賱賲賱賰賷丞 賵丕賱賲毓乇賵賮 毓賳丿 賱賵賰 兀賳賴 賷賳卮兀 毓賳 丕賱毓賲賱 亘毓丿 兀賳 賰丕賳鬲 丕賱胤亘賷毓丞 賰賱賴丕 賲卮丕毓丕 賱亘賳賶 丕賱亘卮乇 毓賱賶 丕賱爻賵丕亍 亘丨賷孬 鬲賰賮賶 兀睾乇丕囟賴賲 賵賲賳丕賮毓賴賲 噩賲賷毓丕賸 賵賲賳 丨賯 丕賱廿賲鬲賱丕賰 賷賳卮兀 丨賯 丕賱丿賮丕毓 毓賳 丕賱兀賲賱丕賰 丕賱鬲賶 亘鬲乇丕賰賲賴丕 賵賰孬乇鬲賴丕 賵鬲毓丿丿 丕賱賮賵丕乇賯 亘賷賳賴丕 賲賳 廿賳爻丕賳 廿賱賶 丌禺乇 賵噩亘 丕賱鬲賮賰賷乇 賮賶 丕賱鬲毓丕賷卮 賮賶 噩賲丕毓丕鬲 丕賱鬲賶 鬲賮賵囟 爻賱胤丕鬲賴丕 丕賱胤亘賷毓賷丞 丕賱賶 賮乇丿 賲丕 兀賵 毓丿丞 兀賮乇丕丿 賷賯賵賲賵賳 亘爻賳 賵丨賲丕賷丞 賵鬲賳賮賷匕 丕賱賯賵丕賳賷賳 丕賱鬲賶 爻賷噩鬲賲毓賵丕 賮賶 馗賱賴丕 丨賮丕馗丕賸 毓賱賶 匕賵丕鬲賴賲 賵賲氐丕賱丨賴賲 賵兀賲賱丕賰賴賲 .
賵賲賳 賴賳丕 賷鬲噩賴 賱賵賰 賱賱丨丿賷孬 毓賳 兀賳賵丕毓 丕賱爻賱胤丕鬲 丕賱賲鬲亘丕賷賳丞 賵賲丿賶 毓賱丕賯丞 賰賱 賲賳賴丕 亘丕賱兀禺乇賶 賵丨丿賵丿 賰賱 賲賳賴丕 賵廿賷噩丕夭丕 賮廿賳賴 賷囟毓 賲氐賱丨丞 丕賱卮毓亘 賵禺賷乇賴 丨丿丕賸 賮丕氐賱丕賸 賮賶 卮乇毓賷丞 丕賱爻賱胤丕鬲 賵丨丿賵丿 爻賱胤鬲賴丕 賵賷丨乇賲 丕賱爻胤賵 毓賱賶 兀賲賱丕賰 丕賱丌禺乇賷賳 賰賱 丕賱鬲丨乇賷賲 賲賴賲丕 賰丕賳 丕賱噩乇賲 丕賱賲乇鬲賰亘 孬賲 賵賷噩毓賱 丕賱丨丿 丕賱賮丕氐賱 賮賶 卮乇毓賷丞 丕賱丨丕賰賲 賴賵 廿爻鬲禺丿丕賲賴 賱賱賯賵丞 囟丿 卮毓亘賴 賱兀賶 爻亘亘 賰丕賳 . 賵賷賲賷夭 賴賳丕 亘丕賱匕丕鬲 亘賷賳 丕賱賲睾鬲氐亘 賵丕賱胤丕睾賷丞 賵賴賵 鬲賲賷賷夭 匕賵 丿賱丕賱丞 賮賶 賮賰乇 賱賵賰 丕賱爻賷丕爻賶 .
賰賳 賴匕丕 丕賱賯爻賲 丕賱孬丕賳賶 賲賳 丕賱賰鬲丕亘 卮賷賯丕賸 廿賱賶 兀亘毓丿 丕賱丨丿賵丿 賰賲丕 兀賳賴 亘丕賱睾 丕賱兀賴賲賷丞 賱賰賱 賲賴鬲賲 亘丕賱賮賱爻賮丞 丕賱爻賷丕爻賷丞 兀賵 丕賱爻賷丕爻丞 丕賱賲噩乇丿丞 .
Read
October 23, 2021-Primo trattato sul governo ***
-Secondo trattato sul governo ***
-Secondo trattato sul governo ***
January 29, 2018
As I was finishing Locke and beginning to put this review together, a news story came to my attention which, in a circuitous manner, reminded me of why I felt the need to do some (re)reading about liberalism this year.
A FRIVOLOUS DIGRESSION
An American woman was going through security at Frankfurt International Airport when she was taken aside and told that her carry-on bag contained too many liquids, and that she would have to either dispose of a stick of deodorant in her bag or put it in her checked luggage. While a reasonable person would likely have parted with their deodorant without much fuss, this woman decided to have a debate with the German federal police as to whether her rub-on deodorant was a solid or a liquid. According to the police report, the woman was adamant, uncooperative, and increasingly belligerent; apparently having chosen to fight and die on Speed Stick Hill rather than suffer the minor inconvenience of conforming to a quite standard airport security regulation. Then she did something really stupid. She called them Nazis. Now I鈥檝e never been to Germany before, but even I know that references to Nazism, in speech or in symbol, are treated with extreme seriousness by German law. The woman was forced to pay a preliminary fine at the airport before continuing on her way. She now faces criminal charges for slander.
The story could have ended here; but it鈥檚 a testament to the peculiar 鈥渃haracter鈥� of our protagonist that it didn鈥檛. This woman was not just some ignorant American tourist; one of those stock-and-trade 鈥渦gly Americans鈥� who routinely bring shame and dishonor upon my nationality through feats of international asshattery. She鈥檚 an associate professor of Peace and Security Studies at the foreign service school of Georgetown University. For those unaware, Georgetown was founded by the Jesuit Order, and is famous for providing a high-quality education in international affairs, and for training a good portion of America鈥檚 foreign service officers.
A professor at this prestigious institution, suffice it to say, should be one of the last people one would expect to make so unsightly a spectacle of herself in a foreign airport. But the spectacle having been made, her reaction was even more galling. Did she apologize? Did she do damage control? Did she quietly move on with her life and let the incident be forgotten? Negatory! She鈥檚 an American, silly goose! She wrote a political hit piece in the Huffington Post.
鈥�No!鈥�, I screamed to myself, alone in my car, reading the story on my phone during a work break and seeing a link to the HuffPost article. 鈥淚鈥檓 not going to read it! No! Never!鈥�
But I had already clicked the link, like a man possessed. Like that lecherous lactophile from A Clockwork Orange, my eyes felt like they were being held open, my retinas burned by this woman鈥檚 idiocy. The article is fascinating in a number of ways; none of them positive. For one, it reads as if it were written by a precocious middle schooler with a thesaurus close at hand. This is a woman who never met an adverb she didn鈥檛 like, or a metaphor she wasn鈥檛 willing to use, whether or not it makes sense. Superfluous description abounds, as well as oracular vocabulary plucked from the scriptures of Merriam-Webster; words that amateurs use to make their writing feel more 鈥済rown up鈥�, but which have the ironic effect of highlighting the whole piece as a shallow contrivance.
But even more damning than the style of the piece is its content, which is, in two words, preposterously typical. So rote and predictable and mindless is the procedure by which she checks every requisite box of a progressive liberal diatribe that it occurred to me that the entire article could have been composed by a computer algorithm.
By her telling, not only were the German police 鈥渢huggish鈥� fascists; they were misogynists as well: Agent Smiths of the Matrix of Patriarchy terrified by the 鈥渁ssertiveness鈥� (i.e. insolence) of a woke woman鈥攄espite the fact that at least one of the officers was a woman herself. She asserts that while she did use the word 鈥淣azi鈥�, she was not directing it at the police officers, but at a young American man in line behind her, whose haircut, in her eyes, made him look like a member of 鈥渢he Hitler鈥檚 Youth.鈥� In an article about her, a white woman, being stopped by police in Germany, she finds a way to invoke the specter of 鈥渨hite privilege鈥� in the United States. She wonders whether a Muslim woman wearing a hijab would receive even worse treatment than she did. She makes an obligatory quip about Donald Trump鈥檚 self-description as a 鈥渟table genius鈥�. Check, check, check, check, and check.
The article should be stored in the Smithsonian. It's a pristine example of the shitshow of furious intellectual wheelspinning that American liberalism has become in the year 2018.
LIBERALISM AS TABOO
Liberalism has always been the political religion of the United States; if not the actual, theological one as well. John Locke was not only the greatest influence on the Founding Fathers; his writings established the parameters and the very language of our political discourse. Anyone with clout in American politics is a Lockean. The Democratic and Republican parties are best described as representatives of progressive and classical liberalism, respectively. Partisan animus is so acute not because of their ideological differences, but because of their overwhelming, stifling uniformity. The superficial differences must be accentuated to give the illusion that political debate in the United States is robust and thriving, when it is anything but. When you strip away the snark, the cultural prejudices, and the bandying of slogans, clich茅s, and soundbites that constitute the American electoral process, you find that the subject of politics, how best to organize and improve our life together under this constitutional order, is hardly ever broached.
When real political discussion disappears in a liberal democracy, the language of liberalism remains, but functions only like a religious artifact that has been taken from an Indigenous American tribe and placed in a museum. It has a certain natural beauty and elegance to it鈥攐ne suspects that it represents something important鈥攂ut outside of its original social context it is a dead thing, disconnected from the roots of its spiritual power.
Like the professor in our story, our liberalism, which was once the subject of intense, high-stakes physical and rhetorical combat among the midwives of our republic, has devolved into an endless regression of clich茅s, which are waved about like incense. The professor ran into an embarrassing situation of her own making, but as an acolyte of our ritualized liberalism, she could only write about her experience by invoking the fashionable controversies of American politics as if they were animistic deities. She has a vague sense that her rights and autonomy were violated; that she is perpetually victimized by 鈥渇ascists鈥� who are all around her, desperate to deprive her of her self-ownership, which is constantly under threat by people who want to tell her what to do. As a woman, she identifies herself with other groups of people who she believes are deprived of their 鈥渞ights鈥� like she is; African-Americans, Muslims, and so on.
But it鈥檚 clear that, like most of us, she is not thinking critically about the historical and intellectual roots of the 鈥渇reedom鈥� that her intuition tells her is so existentially threatened in the age of The Donald. This way of (not) thinking, of praying to our ideals instead of wrestling with them, is draining the blood of our civil society. We need to do something about it.
It鈥檚 not enough anymore to lay flowers at Locke鈥檚 tomb, to light candles at his altars, or to collect relics of his to try and piece them together like Frankenstein鈥檚 monster. We must dare to attempt more than an incantation. It鈥檚 time for a conjuration. Let鈥檚 put on our necromancer鈥檚 robes and try to resurrect Locke wholesale. The master must be summoned. Arise, Lazarus!
FIRST TREATISE OF GOVERNMENT
Okay, so when you crack open Locke鈥檚 First Treatise of Government, it doesn鈥檛 seem to promise much in terms of contemporary relevance. It is a refutation (more like a demolition) of Sir Robert Filmer鈥檚 Patriarcha; a Biblical defense of absolute monarchy by divine right. Sir Robert believed that absolute monarchy was established by God from the creation of Adam, and that this right to absolute, patriarchal authority had been passed down through all the generations of human history, right down to the absolute monarchs of Sir Robert鈥檚 day. Monarchical power passed from Adam down to Noah, and from him to his three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, each of whom, according to Sir Robert, was given absolute power over a continent of the eastern hemisphere after the Flood. All legitimate monarchs are descendants of one of these three, and thus exercise total, private power by dictate of God.
Contrary to republican thought, Sir Robert held that laws were derived from the persons of kings, rather than the other way around. Laws were instituted to serve as symbolic expressions of the king鈥檚 personal will; they were to be consulted in order to get an idea of the king鈥檚 will when the king鈥檚 personal presence was unavailable.
Locke takes this theory apart piece by piece through his own exegesis of the book of Genesis. It deserves mentioning that the Hebrew Bible had taken on a critical importance for virtually all the political theorists of the seventeenth century; historians have nicknamed it the 鈥淏iblical Century鈥� for this reason. New rabbinical sources allowed intellectuals to look upon the familiar scriptures with fresh eyes. Political theorists came to believe that the Hebrew Bible contained a total blueprint for God鈥檚 ideal human government, and that the perfect political system, through a proper application of reason, could be extracted from it.
Locke cuts off Sir Robert鈥檚 argument at the roots. Contrary to his claim, there is no evidence in scripture that God gave Adam authority over other people. God gives Adam dominion over the natural environment and the lesser animals, but never over another person. Sir Robert cited scripture where God tells Eve that she is to be subordinate to Adam, but Locke counters that this occurs after their fall from grace, and so does not reflect on the original condition of mankind. Locke points out that it鈥檚 a bit silly to say that Adam was given 鈥減aternal鈥� authority over mankind when he didn鈥檛 even have any children over which to exercise this authority. Sir Robert believed that he possessed this power in potentiality; but Locke, humorously, wonders whether this means that Sir Robert became an author before he wrote his book.
And even if Adam had been given this power, there鈥檚 no indication that it passed down to Noah and his sons. If Noah were an absolute monarch, he would have had absolute authority over the life and death of his sons; but scripture doesn鈥檛 attest to this. After the flood, God gives the new world to Noah and his sons to share in common. Sir Robert apparently argued that when God gave the likes of Adam and Noah power over the 鈥渂easts鈥� of the earth, the meaning of the Hebrew word for 鈥渂easts鈥� could be extended to include their human subjects as well. If this is so, says Locke, then God gave Noah the power to eat his sons after the flood, and thus the absolute monarchs who now rule the world in his stead have the power to consume their subjects as a healthy midnight snack. And this doesn鈥檛 even begin to address the issue of how such an original lineage of absolutism could have survived unbroken through the Egyptian and Babylonian captivities.
Sir Robert鈥檚 theory is easy to ridicule, as Locke鈥檚 rebuttals demonstrate. Given that there鈥檚 virtually no one left in the world who believes what he believed (if you know someone who does, please introduce us), is there anything we can learn from Locke鈥檚 takedown? I think you can rehabilitate Sir Robert a little by reading him non-literally. His argument derives from a simple inversion of the republican theory we鈥檙e accustomed to: that good governments are governed by laws, and not by men. Sir Robert is arguing that good laws are derived from the example of good men; that the norms established through history, by well-adjusted people living real lives, make a more beneficial model for good government than any abstract legal principles. Reading it this way, Sir Robert might be described as taking a more traditionalist, Catholic view, while Locke is rebutting him from a legalistic, protestant view. Even back then, after all, Anglicans were trying to be both Catholic and protestant at the same time.
If you want to be really irresponsible (I do), you could even map their comparative positions onto the debate between 鈥渆volutionism鈥� or 鈥淒arwinism鈥�, on the one side, and 鈥渃reationism鈥� or 鈥渋ntelligent design鈥� on the other. Sir Robert is an 鈥渆volutionist鈥� because he believes that the concept of rulership has been established by rulers themselves, demonstrating through historical trial, error, and adaptation, how power and legitimacy is acquired and maintained. Locke, conversely, is more of a 鈥渃reationist鈥�, because he believes that God created nature and humanity through abstract reason, and so good government consists merely in adhering to the timeless natural law that God has handed down. Locke鈥檚 humanity owes nothing to the past; Sir Robert鈥檚 humanity is constituted by it.
Neither position鈥攖hat of traditionalism or that of legalism鈥攊s unassailable. A Filmerian monarch who rules merely by dictate of tradition can still be a corrupt bastard who brings ruin to the people under his protection. Good norms may be derived from good men, but it鈥檚 just as true that bad norms can be derived from bad ones. A state founded by a Frederick the Great is not invulnerable to the later ravages of a Caligula. A Lockean legalism can become dehumanizing when its precepts fail to align with actually-existing human nature but are still forcibly imposed over it. Traditionalism can turn over into tyranny, while legalism can turn over into fundamentalism.
SECOND TREATISE OF GOVERNMENT
Having demolished Sir Robert鈥檚 political theory, Locke now has the task of advancing a positive conception of his own. His basic ideals are hinted at apophatically in the first treatise, but now he makes them explicit. From the days of Genesis until now鈥攅ternally, providentially鈥擥od has written the law of reason into the fabric of creation. Man鈥檚 capacity for reason is what separates him from the animals, and an individual鈥檚 reasoning mind is what guarantees his access to equal rights in the commonwealth. Just as Adam was given authority over nature by God, so each man鈥檚 reasoning consciousness entitles him to the same endowment. Reason allows man to possess nature and make it his property (and his 鈥減roperty鈥�, by the way, includes his own body).
In the state of nature, every individual has an inalienable right to their own property; to dispose of themselves and their possessions as they see fit. Locke鈥檚 model for life in the state of nature is the Biblical patriarchs, who go out into the world, dominate nature, and proliferate the species. God intended every man to be a Noah, an Abraham, an Isaac, a Jacob, or a Joseph. Nor is prosperity a zero-sum game; God created nature in such abundance that the enlargement of one man鈥檚 estate does not need to come at the expense of another鈥檚. Jacob and Esau, though rivals, went their separate ways, built separate livelihoods, and had an emotional reunion later in life, having both sired prosperous dynasties quite independently of one another.
In such a free and non-competitive state, there is a natural peace and equality among all people, because there is no impetus for envy or interpersonal domination. War is thus an aberration and an imposition on individual rights under natural law. According to Locke, a state of war is what happens when one person or group is trying to take away the natural rights of another person or group. It is not necessarily a matter of explicit, physical violence. In war, the aggressor is trying to assert their power over the defender. By attempting to take the defender鈥檚 life, the aggressor is first and foremost claiming the power to deprive the defender of his right to his life, which is naturally his alone. All injustices stem from the usurpation of an individual鈥檚 natural rights. A legislature that passes a law depriving you of your property is as much an enemy combatant as a guy trying to hack through your door with an axe.
Everyone having these natural rights, each individual in a state of nature also has a natural executive power which allows him to protect those rights and restore them when they are encroached upon. You have the right to kick someone鈥檚 ass if they鈥檙e trying to take your property; whether that property is your life or any of your possessions. Locke even thinks that men in the state of nature have the right to kill someone who is just trying to steal money or goods from them. Before he is trying to steal from you, a thief is trying to usurp your natural right to your own stuff, making you the subject of his arbitrary will. Once he has established this power over you, who is to say that he will use it only to deprive you of your money? A threat to liberty is a threat to life, so both must be defended with the sword.
Having established an individual鈥檚 right to property, how does a person legitimately claim property as his own? For Locke, people gain a right to property by using it. Their legitimate domain consists precisely of everything they鈥檙e able to make use of and improve without letting it go to waste. Nature is originally the common property of mankind, but when people use it, it becomes an extension of their person.
Governments are instituted not to limit the rights of the individuals of whom it is composed, but rather to protect those rights. To be legitimate, a government must be based in natural law, and thus to make no further impositions on individual autonomy than those strictly necessary in order to more fully secure that autonomy from outside forces. In the Lockean liberal state, government and personal property are not adversaries; they in fact buttress each other.
Now there鈥檚 something your progressive Democrat and your small-government Republican would do well to learn; each party being inheritors of part of the Lockean legacy. The liberal state and the individual accumulation of wealth through the 鈥渇ree market鈥� are deeply reliant upon one another. Statism and individualism are two halves of an arch; you cannot expand one without expanding the other. It is common for American political commentators to say that the left won the culture war, while the right won the economic war. It is more accurate to say that liberalism won both wars, liberalizing both social relations and economic ones, and now stands unchallenged over American life like a colossus.
For the discontents of neoliberal American life, wary of the darkness brooding beneath its grinning exterior but at a loss to formulate a coherent response to it, the way forward may be to look beyond the boundaries of liberalism itself.
A FRIVOLOUS DIGRESSION
An American woman was going through security at Frankfurt International Airport when she was taken aside and told that her carry-on bag contained too many liquids, and that she would have to either dispose of a stick of deodorant in her bag or put it in her checked luggage. While a reasonable person would likely have parted with their deodorant without much fuss, this woman decided to have a debate with the German federal police as to whether her rub-on deodorant was a solid or a liquid. According to the police report, the woman was adamant, uncooperative, and increasingly belligerent; apparently having chosen to fight and die on Speed Stick Hill rather than suffer the minor inconvenience of conforming to a quite standard airport security regulation. Then she did something really stupid. She called them Nazis. Now I鈥檝e never been to Germany before, but even I know that references to Nazism, in speech or in symbol, are treated with extreme seriousness by German law. The woman was forced to pay a preliminary fine at the airport before continuing on her way. She now faces criminal charges for slander.
The story could have ended here; but it鈥檚 a testament to the peculiar 鈥渃haracter鈥� of our protagonist that it didn鈥檛. This woman was not just some ignorant American tourist; one of those stock-and-trade 鈥渦gly Americans鈥� who routinely bring shame and dishonor upon my nationality through feats of international asshattery. She鈥檚 an associate professor of Peace and Security Studies at the foreign service school of Georgetown University. For those unaware, Georgetown was founded by the Jesuit Order, and is famous for providing a high-quality education in international affairs, and for training a good portion of America鈥檚 foreign service officers.
A professor at this prestigious institution, suffice it to say, should be one of the last people one would expect to make so unsightly a spectacle of herself in a foreign airport. But the spectacle having been made, her reaction was even more galling. Did she apologize? Did she do damage control? Did she quietly move on with her life and let the incident be forgotten? Negatory! She鈥檚 an American, silly goose! She wrote a political hit piece in the Huffington Post.
鈥�No!鈥�, I screamed to myself, alone in my car, reading the story on my phone during a work break and seeing a link to the HuffPost article. 鈥淚鈥檓 not going to read it! No! Never!鈥�
But I had already clicked the link, like a man possessed. Like that lecherous lactophile from A Clockwork Orange, my eyes felt like they were being held open, my retinas burned by this woman鈥檚 idiocy. The article is fascinating in a number of ways; none of them positive. For one, it reads as if it were written by a precocious middle schooler with a thesaurus close at hand. This is a woman who never met an adverb she didn鈥檛 like, or a metaphor she wasn鈥檛 willing to use, whether or not it makes sense. Superfluous description abounds, as well as oracular vocabulary plucked from the scriptures of Merriam-Webster; words that amateurs use to make their writing feel more 鈥済rown up鈥�, but which have the ironic effect of highlighting the whole piece as a shallow contrivance.
But even more damning than the style of the piece is its content, which is, in two words, preposterously typical. So rote and predictable and mindless is the procedure by which she checks every requisite box of a progressive liberal diatribe that it occurred to me that the entire article could have been composed by a computer algorithm.
By her telling, not only were the German police 鈥渢huggish鈥� fascists; they were misogynists as well: Agent Smiths of the Matrix of Patriarchy terrified by the 鈥渁ssertiveness鈥� (i.e. insolence) of a woke woman鈥攄espite the fact that at least one of the officers was a woman herself. She asserts that while she did use the word 鈥淣azi鈥�, she was not directing it at the police officers, but at a young American man in line behind her, whose haircut, in her eyes, made him look like a member of 鈥渢he Hitler鈥檚 Youth.鈥� In an article about her, a white woman, being stopped by police in Germany, she finds a way to invoke the specter of 鈥渨hite privilege鈥� in the United States. She wonders whether a Muslim woman wearing a hijab would receive even worse treatment than she did. She makes an obligatory quip about Donald Trump鈥檚 self-description as a 鈥渟table genius鈥�. Check, check, check, check, and check.
The article should be stored in the Smithsonian. It's a pristine example of the shitshow of furious intellectual wheelspinning that American liberalism has become in the year 2018.
LIBERALISM AS TABOO
Liberalism has always been the political religion of the United States; if not the actual, theological one as well. John Locke was not only the greatest influence on the Founding Fathers; his writings established the parameters and the very language of our political discourse. Anyone with clout in American politics is a Lockean. The Democratic and Republican parties are best described as representatives of progressive and classical liberalism, respectively. Partisan animus is so acute not because of their ideological differences, but because of their overwhelming, stifling uniformity. The superficial differences must be accentuated to give the illusion that political debate in the United States is robust and thriving, when it is anything but. When you strip away the snark, the cultural prejudices, and the bandying of slogans, clich茅s, and soundbites that constitute the American electoral process, you find that the subject of politics, how best to organize and improve our life together under this constitutional order, is hardly ever broached.
When real political discussion disappears in a liberal democracy, the language of liberalism remains, but functions only like a religious artifact that has been taken from an Indigenous American tribe and placed in a museum. It has a certain natural beauty and elegance to it鈥攐ne suspects that it represents something important鈥攂ut outside of its original social context it is a dead thing, disconnected from the roots of its spiritual power.
Like the professor in our story, our liberalism, which was once the subject of intense, high-stakes physical and rhetorical combat among the midwives of our republic, has devolved into an endless regression of clich茅s, which are waved about like incense. The professor ran into an embarrassing situation of her own making, but as an acolyte of our ritualized liberalism, she could only write about her experience by invoking the fashionable controversies of American politics as if they were animistic deities. She has a vague sense that her rights and autonomy were violated; that she is perpetually victimized by 鈥渇ascists鈥� who are all around her, desperate to deprive her of her self-ownership, which is constantly under threat by people who want to tell her what to do. As a woman, she identifies herself with other groups of people who she believes are deprived of their 鈥渞ights鈥� like she is; African-Americans, Muslims, and so on.
But it鈥檚 clear that, like most of us, she is not thinking critically about the historical and intellectual roots of the 鈥渇reedom鈥� that her intuition tells her is so existentially threatened in the age of The Donald. This way of (not) thinking, of praying to our ideals instead of wrestling with them, is draining the blood of our civil society. We need to do something about it.
It鈥檚 not enough anymore to lay flowers at Locke鈥檚 tomb, to light candles at his altars, or to collect relics of his to try and piece them together like Frankenstein鈥檚 monster. We must dare to attempt more than an incantation. It鈥檚 time for a conjuration. Let鈥檚 put on our necromancer鈥檚 robes and try to resurrect Locke wholesale. The master must be summoned. Arise, Lazarus!
FIRST TREATISE OF GOVERNMENT
Okay, so when you crack open Locke鈥檚 First Treatise of Government, it doesn鈥檛 seem to promise much in terms of contemporary relevance. It is a refutation (more like a demolition) of Sir Robert Filmer鈥檚 Patriarcha; a Biblical defense of absolute monarchy by divine right. Sir Robert believed that absolute monarchy was established by God from the creation of Adam, and that this right to absolute, patriarchal authority had been passed down through all the generations of human history, right down to the absolute monarchs of Sir Robert鈥檚 day. Monarchical power passed from Adam down to Noah, and from him to his three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, each of whom, according to Sir Robert, was given absolute power over a continent of the eastern hemisphere after the Flood. All legitimate monarchs are descendants of one of these three, and thus exercise total, private power by dictate of God.
Contrary to republican thought, Sir Robert held that laws were derived from the persons of kings, rather than the other way around. Laws were instituted to serve as symbolic expressions of the king鈥檚 personal will; they were to be consulted in order to get an idea of the king鈥檚 will when the king鈥檚 personal presence was unavailable.
Locke takes this theory apart piece by piece through his own exegesis of the book of Genesis. It deserves mentioning that the Hebrew Bible had taken on a critical importance for virtually all the political theorists of the seventeenth century; historians have nicknamed it the 鈥淏iblical Century鈥� for this reason. New rabbinical sources allowed intellectuals to look upon the familiar scriptures with fresh eyes. Political theorists came to believe that the Hebrew Bible contained a total blueprint for God鈥檚 ideal human government, and that the perfect political system, through a proper application of reason, could be extracted from it.
Locke cuts off Sir Robert鈥檚 argument at the roots. Contrary to his claim, there is no evidence in scripture that God gave Adam authority over other people. God gives Adam dominion over the natural environment and the lesser animals, but never over another person. Sir Robert cited scripture where God tells Eve that she is to be subordinate to Adam, but Locke counters that this occurs after their fall from grace, and so does not reflect on the original condition of mankind. Locke points out that it鈥檚 a bit silly to say that Adam was given 鈥減aternal鈥� authority over mankind when he didn鈥檛 even have any children over which to exercise this authority. Sir Robert believed that he possessed this power in potentiality; but Locke, humorously, wonders whether this means that Sir Robert became an author before he wrote his book.
And even if Adam had been given this power, there鈥檚 no indication that it passed down to Noah and his sons. If Noah were an absolute monarch, he would have had absolute authority over the life and death of his sons; but scripture doesn鈥檛 attest to this. After the flood, God gives the new world to Noah and his sons to share in common. Sir Robert apparently argued that when God gave the likes of Adam and Noah power over the 鈥渂easts鈥� of the earth, the meaning of the Hebrew word for 鈥渂easts鈥� could be extended to include their human subjects as well. If this is so, says Locke, then God gave Noah the power to eat his sons after the flood, and thus the absolute monarchs who now rule the world in his stead have the power to consume their subjects as a healthy midnight snack. And this doesn鈥檛 even begin to address the issue of how such an original lineage of absolutism could have survived unbroken through the Egyptian and Babylonian captivities.
Sir Robert鈥檚 theory is easy to ridicule, as Locke鈥檚 rebuttals demonstrate. Given that there鈥檚 virtually no one left in the world who believes what he believed (if you know someone who does, please introduce us), is there anything we can learn from Locke鈥檚 takedown? I think you can rehabilitate Sir Robert a little by reading him non-literally. His argument derives from a simple inversion of the republican theory we鈥檙e accustomed to: that good governments are governed by laws, and not by men. Sir Robert is arguing that good laws are derived from the example of good men; that the norms established through history, by well-adjusted people living real lives, make a more beneficial model for good government than any abstract legal principles. Reading it this way, Sir Robert might be described as taking a more traditionalist, Catholic view, while Locke is rebutting him from a legalistic, protestant view. Even back then, after all, Anglicans were trying to be both Catholic and protestant at the same time.
If you want to be really irresponsible (I do), you could even map their comparative positions onto the debate between 鈥渆volutionism鈥� or 鈥淒arwinism鈥�, on the one side, and 鈥渃reationism鈥� or 鈥渋ntelligent design鈥� on the other. Sir Robert is an 鈥渆volutionist鈥� because he believes that the concept of rulership has been established by rulers themselves, demonstrating through historical trial, error, and adaptation, how power and legitimacy is acquired and maintained. Locke, conversely, is more of a 鈥渃reationist鈥�, because he believes that God created nature and humanity through abstract reason, and so good government consists merely in adhering to the timeless natural law that God has handed down. Locke鈥檚 humanity owes nothing to the past; Sir Robert鈥檚 humanity is constituted by it.
Neither position鈥攖hat of traditionalism or that of legalism鈥攊s unassailable. A Filmerian monarch who rules merely by dictate of tradition can still be a corrupt bastard who brings ruin to the people under his protection. Good norms may be derived from good men, but it鈥檚 just as true that bad norms can be derived from bad ones. A state founded by a Frederick the Great is not invulnerable to the later ravages of a Caligula. A Lockean legalism can become dehumanizing when its precepts fail to align with actually-existing human nature but are still forcibly imposed over it. Traditionalism can turn over into tyranny, while legalism can turn over into fundamentalism.
SECOND TREATISE OF GOVERNMENT
Having demolished Sir Robert鈥檚 political theory, Locke now has the task of advancing a positive conception of his own. His basic ideals are hinted at apophatically in the first treatise, but now he makes them explicit. From the days of Genesis until now鈥攅ternally, providentially鈥擥od has written the law of reason into the fabric of creation. Man鈥檚 capacity for reason is what separates him from the animals, and an individual鈥檚 reasoning mind is what guarantees his access to equal rights in the commonwealth. Just as Adam was given authority over nature by God, so each man鈥檚 reasoning consciousness entitles him to the same endowment. Reason allows man to possess nature and make it his property (and his 鈥減roperty鈥�, by the way, includes his own body).
In the state of nature, every individual has an inalienable right to their own property; to dispose of themselves and their possessions as they see fit. Locke鈥檚 model for life in the state of nature is the Biblical patriarchs, who go out into the world, dominate nature, and proliferate the species. God intended every man to be a Noah, an Abraham, an Isaac, a Jacob, or a Joseph. Nor is prosperity a zero-sum game; God created nature in such abundance that the enlargement of one man鈥檚 estate does not need to come at the expense of another鈥檚. Jacob and Esau, though rivals, went their separate ways, built separate livelihoods, and had an emotional reunion later in life, having both sired prosperous dynasties quite independently of one another.
In such a free and non-competitive state, there is a natural peace and equality among all people, because there is no impetus for envy or interpersonal domination. War is thus an aberration and an imposition on individual rights under natural law. According to Locke, a state of war is what happens when one person or group is trying to take away the natural rights of another person or group. It is not necessarily a matter of explicit, physical violence. In war, the aggressor is trying to assert their power over the defender. By attempting to take the defender鈥檚 life, the aggressor is first and foremost claiming the power to deprive the defender of his right to his life, which is naturally his alone. All injustices stem from the usurpation of an individual鈥檚 natural rights. A legislature that passes a law depriving you of your property is as much an enemy combatant as a guy trying to hack through your door with an axe.
Everyone having these natural rights, each individual in a state of nature also has a natural executive power which allows him to protect those rights and restore them when they are encroached upon. You have the right to kick someone鈥檚 ass if they鈥檙e trying to take your property; whether that property is your life or any of your possessions. Locke even thinks that men in the state of nature have the right to kill someone who is just trying to steal money or goods from them. Before he is trying to steal from you, a thief is trying to usurp your natural right to your own stuff, making you the subject of his arbitrary will. Once he has established this power over you, who is to say that he will use it only to deprive you of your money? A threat to liberty is a threat to life, so both must be defended with the sword.
Having established an individual鈥檚 right to property, how does a person legitimately claim property as his own? For Locke, people gain a right to property by using it. Their legitimate domain consists precisely of everything they鈥檙e able to make use of and improve without letting it go to waste. Nature is originally the common property of mankind, but when people use it, it becomes an extension of their person.
Governments are instituted not to limit the rights of the individuals of whom it is composed, but rather to protect those rights. To be legitimate, a government must be based in natural law, and thus to make no further impositions on individual autonomy than those strictly necessary in order to more fully secure that autonomy from outside forces. In the Lockean liberal state, government and personal property are not adversaries; they in fact buttress each other.
Now there鈥檚 something your progressive Democrat and your small-government Republican would do well to learn; each party being inheritors of part of the Lockean legacy. The liberal state and the individual accumulation of wealth through the 鈥渇ree market鈥� are deeply reliant upon one another. Statism and individualism are two halves of an arch; you cannot expand one without expanding the other. It is common for American political commentators to say that the left won the culture war, while the right won the economic war. It is more accurate to say that liberalism won both wars, liberalizing both social relations and economic ones, and now stands unchallenged over American life like a colossus.
For the discontents of neoliberal American life, wary of the darkness brooding beneath its grinning exterior but at a loss to formulate a coherent response to it, the way forward may be to look beyond the boundaries of liberalism itself.
June 22, 2022
Originally published in the wake of the Glorious Revolution these two essays were neglected due to a glut of tracts and treatise in support of the events of 1689-90, it wasn鈥檛 until the 1760s that they become important in political discourse. Two Treatise of Government by John Locke were a refutation of absolute monarchy and the theory of the state of nature and how government is created.
The less famous First Treatise is a straight line for line critique of Sir Robert Filmer鈥檚 divine right absolutist monarch supporting tract, Patriarcha, the conclusion of which Locke examines the Bible and history to demolish Filmer鈥檚 hypothesis. In the Second Treatise Locke turns from Filmer鈥檚 work into his own theories of the state of nature and how it eventually led to the formation of a government by contract between individuals. Overall, the First Treatise is slog with Locke apparently having to repeat the same evidence to refute Filmer and essentially isn鈥檛 needed to understand its follow-up. On the other hand, the Second Treatise begins slowly as Locke references Filmer until transition to his own theory of the state of nature that leads to his own contract theory that is thought-provoking and historically influential.
Two Treatise of Government while being connected as a refutation and then opposing argument, the latter work by John Locke this is more profound not only as political theory and from an historical perspective.
The less famous First Treatise is a straight line for line critique of Sir Robert Filmer鈥檚 divine right absolutist monarch supporting tract, Patriarcha, the conclusion of which Locke examines the Bible and history to demolish Filmer鈥檚 hypothesis. In the Second Treatise Locke turns from Filmer鈥檚 work into his own theories of the state of nature and how it eventually led to the formation of a government by contract between individuals. Overall, the First Treatise is slog with Locke apparently having to repeat the same evidence to refute Filmer and essentially isn鈥檛 needed to understand its follow-up. On the other hand, the Second Treatise begins slowly as Locke references Filmer until transition to his own theory of the state of nature that leads to his own contract theory that is thought-provoking and historically influential.
Two Treatise of Government while being connected as a refutation and then opposing argument, the latter work by John Locke this is more profound not only as political theory and from an historical perspective.
December 31, 2009
John Locke's major work of political philosophy is often referred to as a major source for the Declaration of Independence, The Second Treatise of Civil Government. This work, authored in 1690, is a major statement of liberalism. Like Thomas Hobbes, Locke begins with humans living in a state of nature, a situation before the development of the state and government. The Lockeian state of nature was not an unpleasant place. Human reason led people to tend to leave one another alone in their respective pursuits.
Natural law guides people's actions in the state of nature and their reason allows them to apprehend the essence of these laws. Thus, Locke expressed great confidence in human reason. However, inconveniences did result in the state of nature. If disagreements rose between people, it was not always easy to resolve these. If one person stole something from another, it was up to the victim to redress the injustice. And these shortcomings in the state of nature made individuals ultimately, rationally, decide that they should give up some of their freedom in order to secure order and protection of the fruits of their labor. Locke said: "[T:]he enjoyment of the property he has in his state is very unsafe, very unsecure. . . . The great and chief end, therefore, of man's uniting into commonwealths and putting themselves under government is the preservation of their property."
As a result, people contract with one another to form civil society and government in order to preserve their rights under natural law, with the dominant right being termed property. And what happens if government does not protect rights under natural law? Revolution is thereby allowable. For instance, Locke notes one justification for suspending an existing government: "Whenever the legislators endeavor to take away and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, they put themselves into a state of war with the people who are thereupon absolved from any further obedience, and are left to the common refuge which God hath provided for all men against force and violence. . . .[I:]t devolves to the people to have a right to resume their original liberty, and by the establishment of a new legislative, such as they shall think fit, provide for their own safety and security, which is the end for which they are in society."
Locke's work well illustrates basic tenets of liberalism, among which are:
1. Individualism (and its concomitants of limited government and certain rights, such as the right to property and to certain freedoms, and equality);
2. Materialism (material incentives are important; acquisition and enjoyment of material goods is altogether proper);
3. Faith in human reason;
4. Faith in the market as a way of distributing wealth and goods.
Is Locke the philosopher of the American Revolution? Probably not. But he well articulated many of the major themes accepted by the Founders of the revolutionary movement in the 1770s.
Natural law guides people's actions in the state of nature and their reason allows them to apprehend the essence of these laws. Thus, Locke expressed great confidence in human reason. However, inconveniences did result in the state of nature. If disagreements rose between people, it was not always easy to resolve these. If one person stole something from another, it was up to the victim to redress the injustice. And these shortcomings in the state of nature made individuals ultimately, rationally, decide that they should give up some of their freedom in order to secure order and protection of the fruits of their labor. Locke said: "[T:]he enjoyment of the property he has in his state is very unsafe, very unsecure. . . . The great and chief end, therefore, of man's uniting into commonwealths and putting themselves under government is the preservation of their property."
As a result, people contract with one another to form civil society and government in order to preserve their rights under natural law, with the dominant right being termed property. And what happens if government does not protect rights under natural law? Revolution is thereby allowable. For instance, Locke notes one justification for suspending an existing government: "Whenever the legislators endeavor to take away and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, they put themselves into a state of war with the people who are thereupon absolved from any further obedience, and are left to the common refuge which God hath provided for all men against force and violence. . . .[I:]t devolves to the people to have a right to resume their original liberty, and by the establishment of a new legislative, such as they shall think fit, provide for their own safety and security, which is the end for which they are in society."
Locke's work well illustrates basic tenets of liberalism, among which are:
1. Individualism (and its concomitants of limited government and certain rights, such as the right to property and to certain freedoms, and equality);
2. Materialism (material incentives are important; acquisition and enjoyment of material goods is altogether proper);
3. Faith in human reason;
4. Faith in the market as a way of distributing wealth and goods.
Is Locke the philosopher of the American Revolution? Probably not. But he well articulated many of the major themes accepted by the Founders of the revolutionary movement in the 1770s.
Read
November 12, 2024A basic work in political theory and the growth of democracy in the West. Not always very clear thinking, and not always very consistent (e.g. no tolerance towards catholics).
March 14, 2024
rousseau and hobbes sweep
June 29, 2022
效懈褌邪胁 锌芯 3 褋褌芯褉褨薪泻懈 胁 写械薪褜. 袩械褉褕邪 泻薪懈卸泻邪, 褟泻褍 胁蟹褟胁 写芯 褉褍泻 褨 锌芯褔邪胁 褔懈褌邪褌懈 锌褨褋谢褟 锌芯褔邪褌泻褍 锌芯胁薪芯屑邪褋褕褌邪斜薪芯谐芯 胁褌芯褉谐薪械薪薪褟 褉芯褋褨褩 胁 校泻褉邪褩薪褍. 袛芯胁芯写懈谢芯褋褜 褔褍褌懈 胁 褍薪褨胁械褉褋懈褌械褌褨, 褖芯 袛卸芯薪 袥芯泻 - 褑械 斜邪褌褜泻芯 斜褉懈褌邪薪褋褜泻芯谐芯 谢褨斜械褉邪谢褨蟹屑褍. 袦邪斜褍褌褜, 褑褟 褌械蟹邪 褨 蟹褉械蟹芯薪褍胁邪谢邪 褍 锌械褉褕褨 写薪褨 锌芯胁薪芯屑邪褋褕褌邪斜薪芯褩 胁褨泄薪懈 鈥� 谐械褌褜 胁褨写 屑芯褋泻胁懈, 写邪泄芯褕 袆胁褉芯锌褍. 袘褍褌懈 褖械 斜谢懈卸褔械 写芯 袆胁褉芯锌懈, 写芯 斜褉懈褌邪薪褋褜泻芯谐芯 锌褉懈薪褑懈锌褍 薪械谐邪褌懈胁薪芯褩 褋胁芯斜芯写懈 - 泻芯谢懈 褍 谐褉芯屑邪写褟薪懈薪邪 褦 褎褍薪写邪屑械薪褌邪谢褜薪褨 锌褉邪胁邪, 褟泻-芯褌, 蟹芯泻褉械屑邪, 薪邪 褋胁芯斜芯写褍, 褨 谐褉芯屑邪写褟薪懈薪 屑芯卸械 褉芯斜懈褌懈 褖芯 蟹邪胁谐芯写薪芯, 褟泻褖芯 褑械 薪械 锌芯褉褍褕褍褦 褋胁芯斜芯写懈 褨 锌褉邪胁邪 褨薪褕懈褏 谐褉芯屑邪写褟薪. 袧邪泄斜褨谢褜褕械 薪械斜邪卸邪薪薪褟 斜褍谢芯 薪邪 褌芯泄 屑芯屑械薪褌 芯锌懈薪懈褌懈褋褟 锌褨写 芯泻褍锌邪褑褨褦褞 褉芯褋褨褩 (薪械 斜褍谢芯 褋褌褉邪褏褍 褋屑械褉褌褨, 薪邪锌褉懈泻谢邪写), 褨 胁褨写褔褍褌懈 薪邪 褋芯斜褨 芯褑械 芯褌 芯斜屑械卸械薪薪褟 褋胁芯斜芯写, 褖芯 斜褍谢芯 胁 褋芯胁褦褌褋褜泻芯屑褍 褋芯褞蟹褨. 孝芯卸 "袛胁邪 褌褉邪泻褌邪褌懈 锌褉芯 锌褉邪胁谢褨薪薪褟" 褋褌邪谢懈 褌邪泻芯褞 褋芯斜褨 褋锌褉芯斜芯褞 褨薪褌械谐褉邪褑褨褩 薪邪 芯褋芯斜懈褋褌褨褋薪芯屑褍 褉褨胁薪褨 写芯 蟹邪褏褨写薪芯谐芯 (屑芯卸谢懈胁芯, 斜褍写械 写芯褉械褔薪褨褕械 薪邪锌懈褋邪褌懈 芦斜褉懈褌邪薪褋褜泻芯谐芯禄) 褋胁褨褌褍.
March 7, 2024
Die Kommentarreihe ist mMn Gold wert.
February 23, 2024
A must-read for anyone interested in modern political philosophy and liberalism. Locke persuasively argued for the majority rule as the best way to protect individual rights. It also far-sighted that he rightly supported the legitimate right to political resistance, which still has important implications for today鈥檚 politics.
About the three essays:
The first one is a critical review of Locke by John Dunn. It compares how we view Locke from a contemporary perspective with Locke鈥檚 implications for modern politics. Very hard to read, and I have to say that I didn鈥檛 understand the whole text thoroughly.
The second is an essay on how Locke is liberal from feminist鈥檚 perspective by Ruth Grant. From today鈥檚 perspective, liberalism is very much limited in feminist鈥檚 sense. However, Locke鈥檚 view is remarkably liberal for his time. His arguments include political community is made up of individuals not families, that marriage is a voluntary contract between two individuals and that obedience from wife to husband does not extend to granting a husband any political authority over his family. In this sense, classical liberalism is indeed a progressive force in history, as represented by Locke.
The third essay is written by the editor Ian Shapiro. (Just a note, I was prompted to read this book after I took Shapiro鈥檚 course Moral Foundations of Politics on Coursera. I recommend this course for anyone interested in politics and political philosophy.) In this essay, he demonstrated how Locke used theological evidence to support the ideal of individual rights and human equality. And that in order to ensure equality and protect individual rights, majority rule is the best way to practice this ideal in politics. Shapiro argues that Locke is a supporter for both individual rights and 鈥榙emocratic legitimacy.
Link to the Coursera course by Ian Shapiro:
About the three essays:
The first one is a critical review of Locke by John Dunn. It compares how we view Locke from a contemporary perspective with Locke鈥檚 implications for modern politics. Very hard to read, and I have to say that I didn鈥檛 understand the whole text thoroughly.
The second is an essay on how Locke is liberal from feminist鈥檚 perspective by Ruth Grant. From today鈥檚 perspective, liberalism is very much limited in feminist鈥檚 sense. However, Locke鈥檚 view is remarkably liberal for his time. His arguments include political community is made up of individuals not families, that marriage is a voluntary contract between two individuals and that obedience from wife to husband does not extend to granting a husband any political authority over his family. In this sense, classical liberalism is indeed a progressive force in history, as represented by Locke.
The third essay is written by the editor Ian Shapiro. (Just a note, I was prompted to read this book after I took Shapiro鈥檚 course Moral Foundations of Politics on Coursera. I recommend this course for anyone interested in politics and political philosophy.) In this essay, he demonstrated how Locke used theological evidence to support the ideal of individual rights and human equality. And that in order to ensure equality and protect individual rights, majority rule is the best way to practice this ideal in politics. Shapiro argues that Locke is a supporter for both individual rights and 鈥榙emocratic legitimacy.
Link to the Coursera course by Ian Shapiro:
May 18, 2018
I figured that at some point or another it would be a responsible thing to read through some of the foundational documents and ideas that founded America - which is why I picked this up and dove into it. It's fascinating to read from this vantage point in history, where our nation and its constitution have been around for so long. Many of the ideas in the book seem self-evident, or commonsensical, and so it was a fascinating exercise to try and put ones mind into the arena of the day it was written, and to understand how radical the ideas in this slim volume really were. Additionally the letter concerning toleration was just a fascinating look into the way that the church ought to be and behave--and yet doesn't. The ideas that Locke gives here are so straightforward and ought to be the way that the Gospel and the church function, and yet it is clear in our world today that there are so many who have forsaken the true mission and motives of the gospel for their own ends. This is tremendously sad, and Locke really hits home hard for those who seek to practice their religion faithfully in that concluding chapter.
Overall an interesting and useful historical read that also provided a fresh sense of perspective on some modern religious and political issues.
Overall an interesting and useful historical read that also provided a fresh sense of perspective on some modern religious and political issues.
March 12, 2008
I was already familiar with Locke before reading this, but I'm blown away at his clarity and insight. Most Americans think they know Locke, but really don't. We're vaguely familiar with the ideas, but can't articulate them, and frequently scorn them.
The First Treatise is kind of tedious, aimed at knocking down the then-recent concept of the divine right of kings. He tackles it from every single angle possible.
The Second Treatise is astoundingly clear, refreshing, and compelling. Many ideas are familiar to people, particularly those living in abundance and productivity. These are important ideas that some wish to sweep under the rug so that they can rule over us.
The only difficulties that I see people having thus far are (1) English has changed (including the meanings of some key words), and (2) the language has a strong legal slant.
I'm working around these with:
(1) Noah Webster's 1828 Dictionary (on-line version ). It's 138 years later than Locke, but 180 years more recent than modern dictionaries.
(2) Black's Law Dictionary
The First Treatise is kind of tedious, aimed at knocking down the then-recent concept of the divine right of kings. He tackles it from every single angle possible.
The Second Treatise is astoundingly clear, refreshing, and compelling. Many ideas are familiar to people, particularly those living in abundance and productivity. These are important ideas that some wish to sweep under the rug so that they can rule over us.
The only difficulties that I see people having thus far are (1) English has changed (including the meanings of some key words), and (2) the language has a strong legal slant.
I'm working around these with:
(1) Noah Webster's 1828 Dictionary (on-line version ). It's 138 years later than Locke, but 180 years more recent than modern dictionaries.
(2) Black's Law Dictionary
October 6, 2016
One of the volumes that helped our founders form the Republic in the Convention of 1787. I highly recommend that anyone who wishes to understand what principle we started out to live under were and therefore better understand what we've become in ignorance of them.
April 8, 2008
yes . . . ive read it, and you should too . . . this dude was thomas jefferson's BFF!!!!
July 12, 2015
Had to read this for one of my classes this semester, if you guys wonder...*hides in a corner*
January 29, 2020
Locke was a monstrous evil that made the world a far worse place. He was really clever tho
May 4, 2021
If I'm being honest, the First Treatise is more fun. Locke is a witty writer, and he rarely misses the mark when poking fun at authoritarianism, but his tone is more barbed when dealing with the absurdity of Divine Right than when developing his own system. (That said, one joke in 2:235 about how an author who demands 'reverence' from rebels "deserves for his pains a civil, respectful cudgelling wherever he can meet with it" definitely made me chuckle.)
Regardless, the Second Treatise is the important one, being a founding text of Liberalism, and there is genuinely a lot to recommend in it. Locke's system is - aside from some bizarre internal contradictions - an elegant one, and his common sense style is immensely appealing to a modern reader. Tyrants are brought low, revolutions defended, and hard work praised above birthright and feudal privilege. For anyone raised in a capitalist society it's enough to tickle all the boxes of our pre-packaged ideology by showing one of the first places where our intuitively held beliefs were first formulated.
Unfortunately, this is part of the problem. Locke, the great Empiricist, betrays his own epistemology with a speculative history that presumes what he wants to prove, which means that much of his treatise (despite its ingeniousness) does not stand up to serious scrutiny. Moreover, there is something rather monstrous about Locke's thinking, both in his reductive view of human potential and in his avaricious defence of exploitation, especially considering the historical context in which he was writing.
As Ellen Meiksins Wood points out in her fantastic , the unique social relations of 17th century England saw the rise of a body of literature concerned with agricultural 'improvement' - a phrase originally drawn from Old French meaning 'into profit'. This movement was not just concerned with new technologies, such as the wheel-plough, but also with new forms and conceptions of property. These ideas were designed to promote the concentration of landholdings into the hands of landlords and their capitalist tenants who (it was imagined) could produce more wealth than the so-called lazy peasantry currently on it. This required the elimination of old rural customs and practices that interfered with an expansion of private wealth.
Put simply, peasants had developed too many defences of their traditions, domestic industries, and leisure time, so new ways were required to enclose the common land and thereby force them to engage in wage-labour for capitalist masters or starve. The historical result of these enclosures was a mass rise in 'Vagrancy' as peasants were forced off their land, many subsequently migrating to cities where they became the new proletariat class, whilst others turned to crime, rebellion, or simply died. Capitalism as a unique form of social relations was enabled by a vast seizure of common land into private hands, the suffering and violence of which is difficult to quantify, though even the monarchy found itself trying to slow down enclosure due to the massive public disorder it caused. But in 1688 the 'Glorious Revolution' marked, in Woods' opinion, a clear victory for the capitalist class, whereupon John Locke appears on the scene in 1690 to defend the principles of the new government.
This is the cynicism that underpins the majority of Locke's treatise. When he talks about freedom, he does not really mean the freedom of every man, but the freedom of men of property. The State of Nature, in his eyes, is one in which property already existed, with proto-capitalists coming together to form governments merely so that they can appoint impartial judges in property disputes. The Medieval notion of 'Natural Law' is recruited as a desperate naturalisation of capitalist ideology as some innate part of human nature, rather than a culturally contingent mode of behaviour. God is said to have given land not to be held in common but for "the use of the industrious and rational" (2:33), with rationality scornfully assumed to mean capitalistic. Even the word 'improve' (which frequently appears) is given God's backing by Locke linking it to the biblical injunction for us to 'Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth' (1:33) (though I will concede that it is nice of Locke to include art and science as 'improving' the world!)
Locke's theory of labour is a prime example of his problematic thinking. Contrary to what you might have heard, he actually begins with the assumption that humans are all property of God (2:6), and hence we do not have full ownership of ourselves. This means we are forbidden from committing suicide (2:22), and hence, because we cannot hand over a power that we do not possess, governments (which are only legitimate if consensual) do not have the right to murder us. This is a clever argument, but it does not work in a secular setting, and it also contradicts his later (more famous) assumption that "every man has a 'property' in his own 'person'" (2:26). This is crucial to his justification of property since we "mix" our labour with the world and put a part of ourselves into what we modify. This is then further complicated by Locke only selectively recognising the property that people have in their own labour, since he claims that "the grass my horse has bit, the turfs my servant has cut, and the ore I have digged in any place, where I have a right to them in common with others, become my property without the assignation or consent of anybody." (2:28)
There are three problems with this model. The first is simple contradiction - do we own ourselves, or does God? The second is how the servant's labour (and, for that matter, the horse's!) is treated as an extension of Locke's bodily exertions. Even if we buy the notion that we possess what our hands alter, how has Locke managed to coerce the servant into giving up (or 'alienating') his labour unless some pre-existing social conditions are there to enforce that hierarchy? Thirdly, do we really want to imagine that our bodies can ever be property? Perhaps it is overly romantic of me, but I would rather think that my own body is utterly excluded from the very category of ownership, self or otherwise. Even to say that I own my limbs is to open a door to the question of selling those rights and entering by contract into slavery. Locke, as suggested by his frequent refutations of this idea (1:42, 2:22-3, 2:135) must surely have noticed this potential in his model and been disconcerted by it.
Nevertheless slavery casts a shadow over his work that cannot be ignored. John Locke, by virtue of his medical training, saved the life of Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury, and the two subsequently became life-long friends - or, perhaps, (if one is not feeling charitable) Locke became his crony. Shaftesbury secured Locke a job as Secretary of the Board of Trade and Plantations, i.e., a ministry for slave camps. Should we then be surprised when Locke asserts that "The great and chief end" of people creating government "is the preservation of their property" (2:124)?
Locke's notions of improvement play a key part in his defence of colonialism. He refuses to recognise any idea of land ownership if the occupants are not 'improving' their land. He vacillates between imagining America as empty, such as in his infamous "in the beginning, all the world was America" (2:49) and in condemning the natives as lazy, being "rich in land and poor in all the comforts of life" (2:41). Exchange value, not use value, is the basis of Locke's judgement as he imagines "all the profit an Indian received from it to be valued and sold here" (2:43) which allows him to discount all non-market based forms of economy. Growth, expansion, and 'improvement' is the metric by which everyone is judged and condemned. In Meiksins Wood's words:
Is there a more humanely worded defence of genocide? Locke gestures to the starvation and suffering in the feudal world around him, and would hold those who protest colonial exploitation and capitalist expansion as responsible for that deprivation. 'Do you not want to see the world improved?' he asks slyly. 'Do you hate progress that much?'
This problem is made worse by Locke's rather lousy empiricism. When he isn't busy making an argument-from-authority by quoting Hooker on some topic, he can usually be found making up random statistics. In defence of 'Improvement' he asserts that "'tis labour indeed that puts the difference of value on everything" (2:40) and that
Well, Locke, which is it? Nine tenths or ninety-nine hundredths? I appreciate that statistics was a new field at the time, but he blatantly invents random figures to prove his argument with no supporting evidence before the reader's eyes, and uses these fake figures as a stick to beat the 'unproductive' into submission. And yet here is a man so often praised for his empiricism!
This culminates in Locke's most egregious offence against rationality: his ahistoricism. I have already touched on how his 'State of Nature' presumes that capitalist culture is innate to human behaviour, with Locke paradoxically using the lack of written evidence for his hypothesis as evidence of how well he understands the past (2:101). This rhetorical sleight of hand, however, is secondary to to Locke's general conception of human behaviour. To him, all humans are atomised individuals looking out for their 'rational' self-interest (2:93) who make the decision to join together under a government merely to make the accumulation of property more convenient. Though he later tempers this by saying that later generations, by choosing to engage in property relations and inherit goods are giving their "tacit consent" (2:119) to the social contract, he nevertheless seems to treat this thought experiment as a literal truth, rather than a mere intellectual narrative for sorting out what political rights we should invent for ourselves.
Locke does not appreciate our social character, and can only explain it as resulting from a coercive edict by God who arbitrarily ("in His own judgement") thought it good "to drive [man] into society" (2:77). Should we detect resentment here?
I do not understand this conception of humanity, born, apparently, out from the void before utilising some rational calculus to develop a society from scratch. Humans just don't work like that. We are born in the middle of pre-existing communities, and our ideologies are created by the socialising effect of our upbringing. Our conceptions of selfhood, morality, desire, and the philosophical frameworks we use to understand our experiences are moulded by the culture in which we grow up. Though there is immense variation between individuals, this socialising process is key to any serious understanding of societal development and Locke, despite his 'Tabula Rasa' writings, betrays that framework for his political theorising. He has to assume that "the law of Nature be plain and intelligible to rational creatures" (2:124) so that his artificial bourgeois ideology can be naturalised, rather than ideas of personal and private property, money, exchange value and theft being culturally contingent categories.
This is made worse by the underlying implication being that only people with property are actually involved in the process of making governments (since they need something to want to protect after all). Are the nameless thieves in Locke's model lazy layabouts, or other capitalists greedy to grow a little faster whilst still genuinely working their own land? The specifics of Locke's model cannot hold up here because he invents a scenario that is not historically plausible. It is a rationalisation of the society he wants, not a description of how it really came to be.
And yet, despite all this, there is still something genuinely radical about Locke. His First Treatise in particular is full of great moments, such as his attack on Robert Filmer's Eurocentric notion that all civilized rulers try to link their ancestry back to Noah:
As a result of all this, it is difficult to know on what grounds one can ever definitively critique Locke, since his method, motives, and assumptions are all open to question. In spite of this there are many arguments he makes that I admire on both a rhetorical and moral level. Sure he may be raging against autocratic government because it interferes with private profits, but that doesn't mean he's wrong . Locke's liberalism is so feisty when fighting feudalism that it almost hurts to see the limitations of his theory and the boundaries of his compassion.
It is perhaps best to conclude on the most surprising passage, in which Locke qualifies his notion of property by making it conditional on communal necessity. Here, God "has given [a man's] needy brother a right in the surplusage of his goods, so that it cannot justly be denied him when his pressing wants call for it [...] so 'charity' gives every man a title to so much out of another's plenty as will keep him from extreme want, where he has no means to subsist otherwise." (1:42)
Sure this draws on Medieval notions of 'Noblesse Oblige', but perhaps Locke isn't that bad after all...
Then again, in 'An Essay on the Poor Laws' (found in ) he also advocated press-ganging, mutilating, and enslaving beggars (pg 186), as well as forcing 3 year old children into unpaid labour so that they might "from infancy be inured to work" for the profit of the state (pg 190-1), so maybe not.
Liberals, never meet your heroes. Their breath stinks of blood.
Regardless, the Second Treatise is the important one, being a founding text of Liberalism, and there is genuinely a lot to recommend in it. Locke's system is - aside from some bizarre internal contradictions - an elegant one, and his common sense style is immensely appealing to a modern reader. Tyrants are brought low, revolutions defended, and hard work praised above birthright and feudal privilege. For anyone raised in a capitalist society it's enough to tickle all the boxes of our pre-packaged ideology by showing one of the first places where our intuitively held beliefs were first formulated.
Unfortunately, this is part of the problem. Locke, the great Empiricist, betrays his own epistemology with a speculative history that presumes what he wants to prove, which means that much of his treatise (despite its ingeniousness) does not stand up to serious scrutiny. Moreover, there is something rather monstrous about Locke's thinking, both in his reductive view of human potential and in his avaricious defence of exploitation, especially considering the historical context in which he was writing.
As Ellen Meiksins Wood points out in her fantastic , the unique social relations of 17th century England saw the rise of a body of literature concerned with agricultural 'improvement' - a phrase originally drawn from Old French meaning 'into profit'. This movement was not just concerned with new technologies, such as the wheel-plough, but also with new forms and conceptions of property. These ideas were designed to promote the concentration of landholdings into the hands of landlords and their capitalist tenants who (it was imagined) could produce more wealth than the so-called lazy peasantry currently on it. This required the elimination of old rural customs and practices that interfered with an expansion of private wealth.
Put simply, peasants had developed too many defences of their traditions, domestic industries, and leisure time, so new ways were required to enclose the common land and thereby force them to engage in wage-labour for capitalist masters or starve. The historical result of these enclosures was a mass rise in 'Vagrancy' as peasants were forced off their land, many subsequently migrating to cities where they became the new proletariat class, whilst others turned to crime, rebellion, or simply died. Capitalism as a unique form of social relations was enabled by a vast seizure of common land into private hands, the suffering and violence of which is difficult to quantify, though even the monarchy found itself trying to slow down enclosure due to the massive public disorder it caused. But in 1688 the 'Glorious Revolution' marked, in Woods' opinion, a clear victory for the capitalist class, whereupon John Locke appears on the scene in 1690 to defend the principles of the new government.
This is the cynicism that underpins the majority of Locke's treatise. When he talks about freedom, he does not really mean the freedom of every man, but the freedom of men of property. The State of Nature, in his eyes, is one in which property already existed, with proto-capitalists coming together to form governments merely so that they can appoint impartial judges in property disputes. The Medieval notion of 'Natural Law' is recruited as a desperate naturalisation of capitalist ideology as some innate part of human nature, rather than a culturally contingent mode of behaviour. God is said to have given land not to be held in common but for "the use of the industrious and rational" (2:33), with rationality scornfully assumed to mean capitalistic. Even the word 'improve' (which frequently appears) is given God's backing by Locke linking it to the biblical injunction for us to 'Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth' (1:33) (though I will concede that it is nice of Locke to include art and science as 'improving' the world!)
Locke's theory of labour is a prime example of his problematic thinking. Contrary to what you might have heard, he actually begins with the assumption that humans are all property of God (2:6), and hence we do not have full ownership of ourselves. This means we are forbidden from committing suicide (2:22), and hence, because we cannot hand over a power that we do not possess, governments (which are only legitimate if consensual) do not have the right to murder us. This is a clever argument, but it does not work in a secular setting, and it also contradicts his later (more famous) assumption that "every man has a 'property' in his own 'person'" (2:26). This is crucial to his justification of property since we "mix" our labour with the world and put a part of ourselves into what we modify. This is then further complicated by Locke only selectively recognising the property that people have in their own labour, since he claims that "the grass my horse has bit, the turfs my servant has cut, and the ore I have digged in any place, where I have a right to them in common with others, become my property without the assignation or consent of anybody." (2:28)
There are three problems with this model. The first is simple contradiction - do we own ourselves, or does God? The second is how the servant's labour (and, for that matter, the horse's!) is treated as an extension of Locke's bodily exertions. Even if we buy the notion that we possess what our hands alter, how has Locke managed to coerce the servant into giving up (or 'alienating') his labour unless some pre-existing social conditions are there to enforce that hierarchy? Thirdly, do we really want to imagine that our bodies can ever be property? Perhaps it is overly romantic of me, but I would rather think that my own body is utterly excluded from the very category of ownership, self or otherwise. Even to say that I own my limbs is to open a door to the question of selling those rights and entering by contract into slavery. Locke, as suggested by his frequent refutations of this idea (1:42, 2:22-3, 2:135) must surely have noticed this potential in his model and been disconcerted by it.
Nevertheless slavery casts a shadow over his work that cannot be ignored. John Locke, by virtue of his medical training, saved the life of Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury, and the two subsequently became life-long friends - or, perhaps, (if one is not feeling charitable) Locke became his crony. Shaftesbury secured Locke a job as Secretary of the Board of Trade and Plantations, i.e., a ministry for slave camps. Should we then be surprised when Locke asserts that "The great and chief end" of people creating government "is the preservation of their property" (2:124)?
Locke's notions of improvement play a key part in his defence of colonialism. He refuses to recognise any idea of land ownership if the occupants are not 'improving' their land. He vacillates between imagining America as empty, such as in his infamous "in the beginning, all the world was America" (2:49) and in condemning the natives as lazy, being "rich in land and poor in all the comforts of life" (2:41). Exchange value, not use value, is the basis of Locke's judgement as he imagines "all the profit an Indian received from it to be valued and sold here" (2:43) which allows him to discount all non-market based forms of economy. Growth, expansion, and 'improvement' is the metric by which everyone is judged and condemned. In Meiksins Wood's words:
"Locke's point, which not coincidentally drips with colonialist contempt, is that unimproved land is waste so that any man who takes it out of common ownership and appropriates it to himself - he who removes the land from the common and encloses it - in order to improve it has given something to humanity, not taken it away." (The Origin of Capitalism, pg 111)
Is there a more humanely worded defence of genocide? Locke gestures to the starvation and suffering in the feudal world around him, and would hold those who protest colonial exploitation and capitalist expansion as responsible for that deprivation. 'Do you not want to see the world improved?' he asks slyly. 'Do you hate progress that much?'
This problem is made worse by Locke's rather lousy empiricism. When he isn't busy making an argument-from-authority by quoting Hooker on some topic, he can usually be found making up random statistics. In defence of 'Improvement' he asserts that "'tis labour indeed that puts the difference of value on everything" (2:40) and that
"I think it will be but a very modest computation to say that, of the products of the earth useful to the life of man, nine-tenths are the effects of labour. Nay, if we will rightly estimate things as they come to our use [...] - what in them is owing to Nature and what to labour - we shall find that in most of them ninety-nine hundredths are wholly to be put on the account of labour." (2:40)
Well, Locke, which is it? Nine tenths or ninety-nine hundredths? I appreciate that statistics was a new field at the time, but he blatantly invents random figures to prove his argument with no supporting evidence before the reader's eyes, and uses these fake figures as a stick to beat the 'unproductive' into submission. And yet here is a man so often praised for his empiricism!
This culminates in Locke's most egregious offence against rationality: his ahistoricism. I have already touched on how his 'State of Nature' presumes that capitalist culture is innate to human behaviour, with Locke paradoxically using the lack of written evidence for his hypothesis as evidence of how well he understands the past (2:101). This rhetorical sleight of hand, however, is secondary to to Locke's general conception of human behaviour. To him, all humans are atomised individuals looking out for their 'rational' self-interest (2:93) who make the decision to join together under a government merely to make the accumulation of property more convenient. Though he later tempers this by saying that later generations, by choosing to engage in property relations and inherit goods are giving their "tacit consent" (2:119) to the social contract, he nevertheless seems to treat this thought experiment as a literal truth, rather than a mere intellectual narrative for sorting out what political rights we should invent for ourselves.
Locke does not appreciate our social character, and can only explain it as resulting from a coercive edict by God who arbitrarily ("in His own judgement") thought it good "to drive [man] into society" (2:77). Should we detect resentment here?
I do not understand this conception of humanity, born, apparently, out from the void before utilising some rational calculus to develop a society from scratch. Humans just don't work like that. We are born in the middle of pre-existing communities, and our ideologies are created by the socialising effect of our upbringing. Our conceptions of selfhood, morality, desire, and the philosophical frameworks we use to understand our experiences are moulded by the culture in which we grow up. Though there is immense variation between individuals, this socialising process is key to any serious understanding of societal development and Locke, despite his 'Tabula Rasa' writings, betrays that framework for his political theorising. He has to assume that "the law of Nature be plain and intelligible to rational creatures" (2:124) so that his artificial bourgeois ideology can be naturalised, rather than ideas of personal and private property, money, exchange value and theft being culturally contingent categories.
This is made worse by the underlying implication being that only people with property are actually involved in the process of making governments (since they need something to want to protect after all). Are the nameless thieves in Locke's model lazy layabouts, or other capitalists greedy to grow a little faster whilst still genuinely working their own land? The specifics of Locke's model cannot hold up here because he invents a scenario that is not historically plausible. It is a rationalisation of the society he wants, not a description of how it really came to be.
And yet, despite all this, there is still something genuinely radical about Locke. His First Treatise in particular is full of great moments, such as his attack on Robert Filmer's Eurocentric notion that all civilized rulers try to link their ancestry back to Noah:
"How many do most of the civilest nations amount to, and who are they? I fear the Chinese, a very great and civil people, as well as several other people of the east, west, north, and south, trouble not themselves much about this matter. All that believe the Bible (which I believe are our author鈥檚 鈥榤ost of the civilest nations鈥�) must necessarily derive themselves from Noah; but for the rest of the world, they think little of his sons or nephews." (1:141)
As a result of all this, it is difficult to know on what grounds one can ever definitively critique Locke, since his method, motives, and assumptions are all open to question. In spite of this there are many arguments he makes that I admire on both a rhetorical and moral level. Sure he may be raging against autocratic government because it interferes with private profits, but that doesn't mean he's wrong . Locke's liberalism is so feisty when fighting feudalism that it almost hurts to see the limitations of his theory and the boundaries of his compassion.
It is perhaps best to conclude on the most surprising passage, in which Locke qualifies his notion of property by making it conditional on communal necessity. Here, God "has given [a man's] needy brother a right in the surplusage of his goods, so that it cannot justly be denied him when his pressing wants call for it [...] so 'charity' gives every man a title to so much out of another's plenty as will keep him from extreme want, where he has no means to subsist otherwise." (1:42)
Sure this draws on Medieval notions of 'Noblesse Oblige', but perhaps Locke isn't that bad after all...
Then again, in 'An Essay on the Poor Laws' (found in ) he also advocated press-ganging, mutilating, and enslaving beggars (pg 186), as well as forcing 3 year old children into unpaid labour so that they might "from infancy be inured to work" for the profit of the state (pg 190-1), so maybe not.
Liberals, never meet your heroes. Their breath stinks of blood.
February 14, 2023
Locke believes that in the state of nature a man is born free and independent, an individual: he associates with others only for the defense of his property. Therefore for Locke society is nothing but a mutual defense pact between individuals. If you accept this premise, everything Locke says makes a lot of sense. But how can you accept this premise? If you were cast in the wilderness alone, naked and without tools made by other humans, you would last only a few days (especially in England in the winter). Now think of a pregnat woman, how could she deliver babies?
Locke's essays are just mental gymnastics to try to justify the mentality of a spoiled teenager who wants to smoke pot. Locke has to admit that parents have duty towards their children (but that's not a political society, he assures us), and that originally governments were extended families with the father in charge (but they don't count), and so on. Apparently the parents' duty over their children ends the moment in which the children become adults, when they are able to freely choose their government and their religion (...wait, what?).
Locke's idea of sociey revolves around maintaining property, hence it is pure materialism. Not only society is just a bunch of individuals, the only goal of said individuals is to keep their property (which they acquired on their own in the wilderness I guess) and that's the only reason they enter an association with other free individuals. Locke quotes a lot from the Bible but it doesn't cross his mind that the history of humanity is the history of tribes with tribe members working together for a common goal (often not a materialistic one). History is not about free voluntary associations. A Canaanite couldn't walk up to Moses and say "I would like to join into your self-defense pact so that you'll defend my property". Speaking of the Bible, Locke denies that a woman is subject to her husband according to the Scriptures but this is wrong. The New Testament says multiple times that a woman must submit to her husband (e.g. Ephesians 5:22-24). This seems a very odd mistake to make (it's in the first Essay where Locke attacks another philosopher for misinterpreting the Bible).
Could it be that Locke found it convenient to ignore this, because a woman being unequal to her husband would debunk the idea of society being founded on individuals (it would be founded on the family at least)? Locke's vision of marriage doesn't correspond to reality: if marriage was a voluntary association between two individuals, it would cease to exist the moment in which these two individuals decide to end it. But even in today's society divorce is not automatic, because society at large has a stake on a man and a woman being together.
Another odd thing was that in the Letter Locke is very repetitive in talking about freedom of religion, but in a few lines he mentions that Muslims and Atheists are not ok. His position is not really explored. Could it be that Muslims or atheists are incompatible with his vision of society based on individuals wanting to keep their property? Perhaps society needs something more, like a common set of values that needs to be defended? I really got the feeling that Locke was ignoring the topics that would be inconvenient to his ideology.
Lastly, Locke's ideology is also based on equality between individuals, at least political equality. This causes the usual problems that liberals have, for example that they need to come up with an arbitrary number of years after which a human becomes "emancipated". Locke mentions an age of 21. Modern science found that the brain finishes its development only at the age of 25, therefore completely rejecting Locke's assumption that every adult is equally capable. The fact that in most countries people vote at 18, and in some countries at 16, is pure science denial; but this was just an extension of Locke's ideas that "everybody" is equal, where the definition of "everybody" keep expanding and soon even 5-year-olds will be given the right to vote in the name of liberalism.
This book also comes with 3 essays by random authors. Here's my comments on them (again, these are NOT Locke's essays):
1) Just useless blah blah blah.
2) A woman nagging about being oppressed. Note that she doesn't talk about women in Locke's time, but she claims that women are subordinated NOW and she tries to use Locke to find weapons for her political goals. The addition of a feminist essay is even more grating considering that Locke discusses how originally political power came from war. This woman of course ignores this inconvenient bit: men had exclusive political power because they were exclusively required to go die in wars (or enslaved, like British men (and not women) forced to work in coal mines during WWII).
Feminism is rooted in Locke's idea that society is based on individuals, as it only makes sense within this assumption. Locke demolishes the concept of paternal authority (by lying about the Bible as I mentioned above), also denying that the family is a political union. Locke's mindset of individual conflict was then exploited by feminists to claim that women are in conflict with their men, allowing one of the most destructive alien ideologies to take hold in White people's civilization.
3) The third essay is interesting. It argues that Locke was a precursor of democracy, because while Locke didn't talk about political representation his ideology of (political) equality would naturally lead to a democratic system. Locke also discusses that the only check against government power is the majority, while individuals who feel treated unjustly by their government has no recourse (I think this contradicts what Locke had said elsewhere about society being a voluntarily association). I believe this is Locke being practical, rather than him giving some political legitimacy to the majority (in addition to the political legitimacy of the individuals) so I don't quite agree with this essay's author but this was a good read nonetheless.
In summary, I found Locke's ideology to be full of holes, with him avoding difficult topics that would have been hard for him to tackle. I also found a few contradictions. I feel less liberal after reading Locke than I was before; this either means that the author did a bad job, or it means that liberalism is wrong.
Locke's essays are just mental gymnastics to try to justify the mentality of a spoiled teenager who wants to smoke pot. Locke has to admit that parents have duty towards their children (but that's not a political society, he assures us), and that originally governments were extended families with the father in charge (but they don't count), and so on. Apparently the parents' duty over their children ends the moment in which the children become adults, when they are able to freely choose their government and their religion (...wait, what?).
Locke's idea of sociey revolves around maintaining property, hence it is pure materialism. Not only society is just a bunch of individuals, the only goal of said individuals is to keep their property (which they acquired on their own in the wilderness I guess) and that's the only reason they enter an association with other free individuals. Locke quotes a lot from the Bible but it doesn't cross his mind that the history of humanity is the history of tribes with tribe members working together for a common goal (often not a materialistic one). History is not about free voluntary associations. A Canaanite couldn't walk up to Moses and say "I would like to join into your self-defense pact so that you'll defend my property". Speaking of the Bible, Locke denies that a woman is subject to her husband according to the Scriptures but this is wrong. The New Testament says multiple times that a woman must submit to her husband (e.g. Ephesians 5:22-24). This seems a very odd mistake to make (it's in the first Essay where Locke attacks another philosopher for misinterpreting the Bible).
Could it be that Locke found it convenient to ignore this, because a woman being unequal to her husband would debunk the idea of society being founded on individuals (it would be founded on the family at least)? Locke's vision of marriage doesn't correspond to reality: if marriage was a voluntary association between two individuals, it would cease to exist the moment in which these two individuals decide to end it. But even in today's society divorce is not automatic, because society at large has a stake on a man and a woman being together.
Another odd thing was that in the Letter Locke is very repetitive in talking about freedom of religion, but in a few lines he mentions that Muslims and Atheists are not ok. His position is not really explored. Could it be that Muslims or atheists are incompatible with his vision of society based on individuals wanting to keep their property? Perhaps society needs something more, like a common set of values that needs to be defended? I really got the feeling that Locke was ignoring the topics that would be inconvenient to his ideology.
Lastly, Locke's ideology is also based on equality between individuals, at least political equality. This causes the usual problems that liberals have, for example that they need to come up with an arbitrary number of years after which a human becomes "emancipated". Locke mentions an age of 21. Modern science found that the brain finishes its development only at the age of 25, therefore completely rejecting Locke's assumption that every adult is equally capable. The fact that in most countries people vote at 18, and in some countries at 16, is pure science denial; but this was just an extension of Locke's ideas that "everybody" is equal, where the definition of "everybody" keep expanding and soon even 5-year-olds will be given the right to vote in the name of liberalism.
This book also comes with 3 essays by random authors. Here's my comments on them (again, these are NOT Locke's essays):
1) Just useless blah blah blah.
2) A woman nagging about being oppressed. Note that she doesn't talk about women in Locke's time, but she claims that women are subordinated NOW and she tries to use Locke to find weapons for her political goals. The addition of a feminist essay is even more grating considering that Locke discusses how originally political power came from war. This woman of course ignores this inconvenient bit: men had exclusive political power because they were exclusively required to go die in wars (or enslaved, like British men (and not women) forced to work in coal mines during WWII).
Feminism is rooted in Locke's idea that society is based on individuals, as it only makes sense within this assumption. Locke demolishes the concept of paternal authority (by lying about the Bible as I mentioned above), also denying that the family is a political union. Locke's mindset of individual conflict was then exploited by feminists to claim that women are in conflict with their men, allowing one of the most destructive alien ideologies to take hold in White people's civilization.
3) The third essay is interesting. It argues that Locke was a precursor of democracy, because while Locke didn't talk about political representation his ideology of (political) equality would naturally lead to a democratic system. Locke also discusses that the only check against government power is the majority, while individuals who feel treated unjustly by their government has no recourse (I think this contradicts what Locke had said elsewhere about society being a voluntarily association). I believe this is Locke being practical, rather than him giving some political legitimacy to the majority (in addition to the political legitimacy of the individuals) so I don't quite agree with this essay's author but this was a good read nonetheless.
In summary, I found Locke's ideology to be full of holes, with him avoding difficult topics that would have been hard for him to tackle. I also found a few contradictions. I feel less liberal after reading Locke than I was before; this either means that the author did a bad job, or it means that liberalism is wrong.
February 15, 2022
Jefferson called Locke's 2nd Treatise a "perfect little book" and Locke's ideas permeate the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution. His brilliant articulation of the necessary components of civilian-led government - from the social contract to the separation of powers and the respective roles of the judiciary, legislature, and executive is pretty mind-blowing, this persuasive, logical conceptualization of how we might organize ourselves politically so as to reduce predation while protecting production and quality of life.
Of course, the prioritization of private property and individual liberty is at the foundation of liberal theory and it is the driving influence for how Locke wanted government to function - it promised security from brutes and criminals, but also from the state itself and any overweaning power claimed by individuals who could act arbitrarily and capriciously (or even viciously and destructively) in their own interests. This idea that society must be organized first and foremost for defense from people within it was rooted in experience and is the context for politics to this day. The idea that it must be balanced with freedoms and rights predates Locke, but was also baked into his treatises.
Locke was also a man of his time and his depictions of the State of Nature and of indigenous people in North America are racist and grotesque. This matters because his logic - not unique to him, but effectively purveyed by him - was used to justify colonization and colonial practices not just in the western hemisphere but worldwide.
Of course, the prioritization of private property and individual liberty is at the foundation of liberal theory and it is the driving influence for how Locke wanted government to function - it promised security from brutes and criminals, but also from the state itself and any overweaning power claimed by individuals who could act arbitrarily and capriciously (or even viciously and destructively) in their own interests. This idea that society must be organized first and foremost for defense from people within it was rooted in experience and is the context for politics to this day. The idea that it must be balanced with freedoms and rights predates Locke, but was also baked into his treatises.
Locke was also a man of his time and his depictions of the State of Nature and of indigenous people in North America are racist and grotesque. This matters because his logic - not unique to him, but effectively purveyed by him - was used to justify colonization and colonial practices not just in the western hemisphere but worldwide.
December 8, 2020
No primeiro livro, Locke critica a formula莽茫o de Robert Filmer que defendia o absolutismo mon谩rquico com base em uma interpreta莽茫o do texto b铆blico. Basicamente, o primeiro Tratado 茅 uma exegese b铆blica contr谩ria 脿 interpreta莽茫o de Filmer. 脡 um texto teol贸gico-pol铆tico.
J谩 no segundo Tratado, Locke apresenta sua teoria social liberal em que defende a necessidade do governo e das leis imparciais na prote莽茫o dos indiv铆duos e de sua propriedade. Em Locke, propriedade abrange direitos personal铆ssimos e direitos das coisas.
Sua argumenta莽茫o 茅 que Deus deu tudo em comum a todos, mas por seu trabalho o ser humano transforma, produz e se apropria legitimamente dos bens e, pelo dinheiro, pode acumular valor. Essa formula莽茫o te贸rica que, para Locke, tem respaldo b铆blico, 茅 fundamental na consolida莽茫o do Estado de Direito de primeira gera莽茫o. 脡 uma obra fundamental na defesa da liberdade em Estados modernos, ainda que pass铆veis de revis玫es cr铆ticas posteriores.
J谩 no segundo Tratado, Locke apresenta sua teoria social liberal em que defende a necessidade do governo e das leis imparciais na prote莽茫o dos indiv铆duos e de sua propriedade. Em Locke, propriedade abrange direitos personal铆ssimos e direitos das coisas.
Sua argumenta莽茫o 茅 que Deus deu tudo em comum a todos, mas por seu trabalho o ser humano transforma, produz e se apropria legitimamente dos bens e, pelo dinheiro, pode acumular valor. Essa formula莽茫o te贸rica que, para Locke, tem respaldo b铆blico, 茅 fundamental na consolida莽茫o do Estado de Direito de primeira gera莽茫o. 脡 uma obra fundamental na defesa da liberdade em Estados modernos, ainda que pass铆veis de revis玫es cr铆ticas posteriores.
February 18, 2019
Definitely shows some very fundamental ideas that have shaped our country to this day! I had to read this for class, heavily focusing more so on the Second Treatise. Although, I didn't read the entire thing, what we did read consisted of things I mostly agreed with (inalienable rights and whatnot). Following this up after reading Leviathan was a bit boring, though. I had more fun disagreeing with Hobbes, than I did agreeing with Locke.
December 19, 2023
"Onde a lei termina, come莽a a Tirania, se a lei for transgredida em preju铆zo de outrem, e quando o detentor da autoridade excede o poder que lhe foi conferido pela lei, e se serve da for莽a que tem ao seu dispor para conseguir do s煤bdito aquilo que a lei n茫o autoriza, deixa, por esse mesmo acto, de ser um magistrado, e quando o magistrado actua sem autoriza莽茫o 茅 leg铆timo oferecer-lhe resist锚ncia, 脿 semelhan莽a de qualquer homem que viole o direito de outrem."
Displaying 1 - 30 of 301 reviews
Can't find what you're looking for?
Get help and learn more about the design.