Читать книгу Liberalism and Capitalism Today - Paul-Jacques Lehmann - Страница 12

Equality is inherent in human nature. When the main activity of individuals is limited to hunting or fishing, no inequality can appear in relation to one’s neighbor since there is no visible sign that can show the superiority of one of them or of their family over another individual or over another family. For de Tocqueville (1997), “savages are equal because they are equally weak and ignorant”. He adds that even if inequality had established itself at some point, this indication could not have been transmitted to their descendants. In the following section, we will see that it was the establishment of private property that made inequalities possible.

This French politician wanted a system of authority that promotes three types of equality of human conditions: political equality, which implies the rule of law, a balance of power that guarantees the sovereignty of the people and the participation of every citizen in public life; equality of opportunity; and equality of considerations. He considered that only democracy is compatible with liberalism, which must succeed in establishing these vital forms of equality in a country, insofar as the state avoids the drifts of absolute liberalism by not facing up to its obligations as a legislator.

In his very detailed historical analysis, de Tocqueville begins by asserting that equality of conditions is inevitable because of the successes it has achieved over seven centuries: no institution is capable of stopping it. He explains the differences between aristocratic society and democratic society in the area of inequality and then equality. While inequality reigns in aristocratic society, with the rich in charge of political power, formal equality exists in democratic society, with fundamental consequences.

Social rules must be the same for everyone: individuals must be equal before the law. Beyond its moral consequences, this condition is essential for economic activity to become the main human activity. It leads to the elimination of inequalities, natural or otherwise, resulting from inheritance, birth, function and status. Thus, again, for de Tocqueville (1997), “highly civilized men can all become equal because they all have at their disposal similar means of attaining comfort and happiness. Between the two extremes is found inequality of conditions, wealth, knowledge – the power of the few, the poverty, ignorance, and weakness of all the rest”.

Equality must be based on the role that each person plays in society, which means that there are fair inequalities – for example those arising from skills, responsibilities and the merits of work, talent, effort and innovation – which are sources of progress that benefit everyone. Therefore, “reasonable” inequalities can be seen as a spur: when people see that some of their counterparts enjoy a higher standard of living than they do, they are led to make the necessary efforts to achieve the same result. Inequality is therefore indispensable as an engine of production and growth. For example, it is normal that remuneration varies if it is justified according to the influence or efficiency of the responsibilities exercised by each individual. What is necessary is equality of dignity among persons, equality of all before freedom, therefore equity and equality of opportunity, while accepting unequal merit. Otherwise, it is normal to qualify liberalism as cynicism and selfishness.

A distinction must be made between equality and egalitarianism: the latter notion has the major disadvantage of leading to a leveling down that can even be a handicap to achieving equality.

Aristocratic society is simultaneously stable, organized, closed and characterized by a permanent inequality of conditions. Inequalities are inscribed in its morals. Social mobility is almost non-existent, due to a society of order where a very strong hierarchical spirit reigns. Distinctions of birth and occupation create a permanent and impassable separation between individuals. As a totally hierarchical system reigns around them, based on obedience and authority in perpetuity, the poor know from childhood that they will be dependent on others for their entire lives and that they will therefore not be able to leave their subordinate situation. This submission goes beyond the mere stage of action; it permeates thoughts and opinions. It is all the more significant as it passes from father to son: a family of servants remains at the disposal of the same family of masters from generation to generation.

De Tocqueville (2010) explained that the master has a high rank and substantial wealth that they know they cannot lose, and considers their servants as an inferior and secondary part of themself. Curiously, servants adopt the same point of view, sometimes identifying themselves as someone who belongs to their master, almost becoming an accessory to them, in their own eyes as well as in theirs. This feeling borders on the ridiculous, for it can go so far as to confuse two existences, the poor boasting of the situation of the rich, perhaps even more so than the latter. Thus, “these passions of masters, when they pass into the souls of menials, assume the natural dimensions of the place they occupy – they are contracted and lowered. What was pride in the former becomes puerile vanity and paltry ostentation in the latter. The servants of a great man are commonly most punctilious as to the marks of respect due to him, and they attach more importance to his slightest privileges than he does himself”.

Equality, then, exists only between peers. The only links established between social classes are of the order of precedence or reciprocal obligations, rank to be held and obedience and/or command.

Democracy is, above all, a political regime. De Tocqueville insisted in particular on the influence of this system when it is presented in parliamentary form, and on the equalization of human conditions: all citizens participate, through voting in elections, in political decisions, which means that thanks to democracy the rules governing society are not arbitrary, if they still exist, but correspond to what citizens really want. The risk of abuse of power is then minimized. Weber added that as a process of formal rationalization, democracy makes it possible to substitute negotiation for violent conflict. It is through the development of education for as many people as possible that democracy can be achieved.

The consequences go even further if the privileges of aristocratic society are withdrawn and everyone is allowed access to culture and education. Democracy is also a guarantee of political stability, thus of order, which gives political authorities the necessary legitimacy to vote, and subsequently to apply the laws vital to the existence of economic liberalism. In fact, governments elected by the people have the duty to protect by all means the freedom of each person by preventing the interference of anyone in the private domain.

In de Tocqueville’s view, democracy also corresponds to a fundamental change in the economic environment. The principles on which it is based quickly impose themselves on all economic actors and allow economic liberalism to function harmoniously. Conversely, political freedom is impossible without economic freedom, in particular without the freedom to undertake: it is only when economic need is freely expressed and satisfied that democracy can take hold since it is a source of individual responsibility and mutual respect, given that people are now obliged to live at their own risk. The result is a gradual elimination of the instability of the social hierarchy by reducing the differences in wealth and the fluidity of the structure of society.

Thanks to the equality of their conditions, the situation of master and servant changes in nature and new relationships are established between them. This type of society offers individuals the possibility of continually attaining a higher social position, and thus a higher level of well-being. “The two ranks mingle; the divisions which once severed mankind are lowered, property is divided, power is held in common, the light of intelligence spreads, and the capacities of all classes are equally cultivated; the State becomes democratic, and the empire of democracy is slowly and peaceably introduced into the institutions and the manners of the nation. […] Equality of conditions turns servants and masters into new beings, and places them in new relative positions”. It is no longer the same individuals and, above all, the same families that make up the two social classes.

Each social class has a different view of its positions: subordination and domination are no longer suffered and are all the better accepted as every individual, as we have just said, can, if they give themself the means, access any social status. Indeed, the democratic “social state” includes in its very nature a social mobility that is limitless in principle, whereas such a possibility is unlikely in aristocratic society governed by hereditary differences.

This evolution is normal, for there is no reason to think that servants form a separate people. They are the equals of their masters. They can, moreover, become, in their turn and at any time, masters. De Tocqueville believes that servants and masters are like officers and soldiers: apart from the army, which imposes a hierarchy, they are all citizens with no specific customs or morals, especially since there is no hierarchy in their ranks. If some have the right to command and others are forced to obey and serve, it is only by virtue of an agreement of their wills, in the form of a freely established contract that sets out the conditions of command and obedience and from which it is almost impossible for them to deviate. Moreover, this contract is limited in time and can be terminated. However, when he speaks of the labor contract, Weber is careful to emphasize that the existence of a formally free agreement between the employer and the workers does not in any way exclude a “relationship of domination“ that is manifested in work orders and directives.

While they remain equal as people and as citizens, they become inferior to one another by the effect of this contract, which is the determining element in the situation of each one who, by this very fact, commits to it: the master finds in it the origin of their power and the servant the only cause of their obedience. Indeed, there are still inequalities, but those that remain are better accepted, because at least in theory, one can take the place of the other. De Tocqueville (2010) then asserts that the members of homo democraticus benefit from statutory equality, as “men are born and remain free and equal in law. Social distinctions can only be based on common utility”.

Moreover, equality is progressive, because as it is applied at the level of the law and as morals and public opinion become convinced of its relevance, it encourages citizens to see and live as equals. “The spirit of equality that characterizes democracy allows citizens to see themselves as equal, or at least as similar, regardless of the real inequalities of their situation. They internalize equality as a norm of which the democratic unconscious makes an essential value!”

De Tocqueville took this opportunity to explain the difference between the democratic regime and the socialist regime. On the one hand, “Democracy extends the sphere of personal independence; socialism confines it. Democracy values each man at his highest; socialism makes of each man an agent, an instrument, a number”. On the other hand, with reference to the word “equality”: “Democracy aims at equality in liberty. Socialism desires equality in constraint and in servitude”⁴.