Progressive Liberalism's Dialectic

The last thing Condorcet wrote was a long book, entitled Outlines of an historical view of the progress of the human mind. It was published in 1795 and was for a while the most influential thing Condorcet produced (I think nowadays his probabilistic studies of democratic reasoning probably came to overshadow this). It expresses a remarkable optimism about the pattern and inevitability of human progress - an optimism no wise belied by the fact that shortly after its completion Condorcet was arrested and would die under somewhat unclear circumstances a prisoner of the French revolutionary forces, a revolution he himself had supported. It seems he anticipated some such fate, for here is the note on which he ended the piece

Such are the questions with which we shall terminate the last division of our work. And how admirably calculated is this view of the human race, emancipated from its chains, released alike from the dominion of chance, as well as from that of the enemies of its progress, and advancing with a firm and indeviate step in the paths of truth, to console the philosopher lamenting the errors, the flagrant acts of injustice, the crimes with which the earth is still polluted? It is the contemplation of this prospect that rewards him for all his efforts to assist the progress of reason and the establishment of liberty. He dares to regard these efforts as a part of the eternal chain of the destiny of mankind; and in this persuasion he finds the true delight of virtue, the pleasure of having performed a durable service, which no vicissitude will ever destroy in a fatal operation calculated to restore the reign of prejudice and slavery. This sentiment is the asylum into which he retires, and to which the memory of his persecutors cannot follow him: he unites himself in imagination with man restored to his rights, delivered from oppression, and proceeding with rapid strides in the path of happiness; he forgets his own misfortunes while his thoughts are thus employed; he lives no longer to adversity, calumny and malice, but becomes the associate of these wiser and more fortunate beings whose enviable condition he so earnestly contributed to produce.

That he himself would fall victim to some fatal "vicissitude", and evidently knowing as much himself, failed to dampen his belief that in the long run human happiness and liberation were inevitable. In this post I just want to briefly outline at the highest level what I think was supposed to underlie that optimism, before evaluating it in my closing remarks.

The structure of the book is a series of sketches of "stages" of human development, focussing especially  on the arts and sciences. He starts from hunter gatherer bands, goes through small pastoral societies and early urban societies and arrives at then-contemporary France; which naturally enough represented the highest stage of civilisation -- so, yes, the French have always been That Way. Before concluding he allows himself an extremely optimistic picture of the world to come, which ends with the passage quoted above.

While there are a lot of claims made throughout the book I want to focus on the following core elements that I think play an especially important role. There are something like two archetypical villains in every era, one archetypical mistake, and three archetypical progressive forces.

The Villains

Despots -- from the earliest stage of society Condorcet notes the necessity of specialisation for various tasks; in fact he seems to think warmaking, and the necessity of having some coordination for defensive purposes requiring a leadership cadre composed of experienced warriors, is the original specialisation. Coming as it does with the ability to command,  and the requirement that some give over their surplus to maintain those not engaged in the production of essentials, this division of labour leads to inequalities of wealth and power. He does not think the effects of this entirely baleful but he does think that it allows some groups to usurp power to no good general end. 

A constant of every social age excepting that which he anticipates is to come is that some person or cadre of persons will be actively trying to acquire as much power over their fellows as possible. More or less this is because: until certain goods, and a certain degree of freedom from constant wearying labour, are very widely dispersed, there will always be some with more time to scheme and more resources to devote to seeing their schemes through. Some persistent grasping tendency ensures that at least some will always answer this call. And where eventually inequality is sufficient for some to maintain armies and employ priests, they may convert their passing superiority into a more lasting despotism of established hierarchy and authority.

Priests -- Just as while there are always people willing to grasp power where the division of labour gives them time to scheme and resources to execute those schemes, so too there will always be sycophants. These are people who the division of labour has allowed to dedicate their time to intellectual pursuits, and in particular the subset thereof who realise (or are convinced by those who have realised and foolishly replicate) they can use their greater knowledge and eloquence to bamboozle people. The manner in which Condorcet introduces this idea from the very first epoch of mankind is worth quoting at length:

Meanwhile there is presented to us in this epoch one fact of importance in the history of the human mind. We can here perceive the beginnings of an institution, that in its progress has been attended with opposite effects, accelerating the advancement of knowledge, at the same time that it disseminated error; enriching the sciences with new truths, but precipitating the people into ignorance and religious servitude, and obliging them to purchase a few transient benefits at the price of a long and shameful tyranny.

I mean the formation of a class of men the depositaries of the elements of the sciences or processes of the arts, of the mysteries or ceremonies of religion, of the practices of superstition, and frequently even of the secrets of legislation and polity. I mean that separation of the human race into two portions; the one destined to teach, the other to believe; the one proudly concealing what it vainly boasts of knowing, the other receiving with respect whatever its teachers condescend to reveal: the one wishing to raise itself above reason, the other humbly renouncing reason, and debasing itself below humanity, by acknowledging in its fellow men prerogatives superior to their common nature.

This distinction, of which, at the close of the eighteenth century, we still see the remains in our priests, is observable in the least civilized tribes of savages, who have already their quacks and sorcerers. It is too general, and too constantly meets the eye in all the stages of civilization, not to have a foundation in nature itself: and we shall accordingly find in the state of the human faculties at this early period of society, the cause of the credulity of the first dupes, and of the rude cunning of the first impostors.

I like this passage as it nicely encapsulates Condorcet's duel attitude to the division of labour. On the one hand he is under no illusions that some such division was necessary to give some people the time to be professional intellectual workers or artisans, both of which he thinks vital to human progress. On the other hand it's evident he thinks the very same ability also enables chicanery, and that this continues to his day via the social role of priests.

And thus we have the first of our two archetypical villains. There are the despots, people enabled and actively pursuing the acquisition of ever more power and wealth. Then there are priests, people whose superior knowledge enables them to secure a position whereby they are believed, and who enter into a kind of alliance with the tyrants by using their authority to commend obedience, in exchange for protection and patronage from the tyrants. Every age Condorcet discusses has its own version of these, invested in reducing others' liberty on the one hand and willing to assist in the endeavour so long as they are paid on the other hand. Given this somewhat pessimistic anthropology, why does he none the less have such an optimistic overall take?

The Mistake

Modal confusion -- to answer this I think it is necessary to know exactly what ignorance the priests exploit in order to buttress the position of the despots. By my read (Condorcet is not explicit on this) they exploit our lack of modal knowledge. They turn contingencies into necessities, and thereby discourage change. For instance Condorcet says of the first age:

The errors that distinguish this epoch of civilization are the conversion of vengeance and cruelty towards an enemy into virtue; the prejudice that consigns the female part of society to a sort of slavery; the right of commanding in war considered as the prerogative of an individual family; together with the first dawn of various kinds of superstition.

My read on this is something like - because it turns out to be necessary to have a leadership structure to coordinate warfare and defence, and typical that in fact when one is engaged in violent activities one will feel enmity for one's foes, these are turned into social and moral necessities of broader scope. They become not just a response to a particular circumstance but the natural right of some family or group (and always exclusively the men thereof) to command in all circumstances. We come to think we just have to have an elite telling us what to do whatever the circumstance,  that this general elite must be drawn from this warrior elite, and in the fashion described above the priests quickly convert the superstitions of the day into doctrinal support for this error. The particular errors a society may engage in will change over time (the composition of our despot class changes as command gradually becomes dissociated from ability to herd most cattle and bash the most skulls in, for instance) but the basic pattern that we are tricked into necessitating our contingent social circumstances seems to me Condorcet's constant complaint.

The Progressive Forces

Love of Liberty - if there is some grasping force within us that prompts tyrants to exploit the division of labour so as to turn their superior wealth and time into ever greater power, and which prompts priests to sell their ideological wares for a cut of the spoils, then there exists a counter-veiling tendency. This is the plain fact that we each of us enjoy our own freedom. In Condorcet's words, there are "sweets annexed to [a] state of almost complete independence". What exactly he means by this is somewhat unclear, but I think at essence it's something like - we each of gain some intrinsic joy from being able to allocate our time as we see fit. This makes us highly ingenious in coming up with labour saving technologies where they might allow us to do just that. One might recall here Smith mentioning the superior method of maintaining a steam engine come up with a boy tasked with watching over the engine, all in order to have more time to play with his friends. It also plants in us the seeds of resistance to despots and their priests - in the end they will always require of us onerous observances in order that we labour to produce for them in addition to meeting our own needs. And no matter how persuasive the ideology or charismatic the despot, something in us will always respond... yeah but I don't wanna. 

Knowledge and Technique - this love of liberty, prompting as it does invention among intellectuals and artisans on the one hand, and resistance by the people to conquerers and despots on the other, leads to the improvement of knowledge and technique. So long as circumstances allow us to benefit from the fruit of our own labours (he acknowledges that a social system can be so despotical, or an ideological system so obscurantist, as to basically make innovation not worth it or to seem possible at all) then we will tend to come up with new ways of doing things, either technically or at the level of social arrangement. And what does that amount to? It amounts to the discovery of new possibilities! It is breaking the modal confusion, revealing in the present through some new practice that the old way of doing things. If what grants Priests their power to bamboozle is a false necessitation, what makes the love of liberty so powerful is that it tends towards the demonstration that limitations are contingent. Since, in the end, we are many and they are few, the despots really do rely on us being bamboozled in this way, and once a people truly come to understand that they can expect better it becomes just a matter of time before they secure for themselves some right to enjoy whatever fruit of time new discoveries have made available.

Historical memory -- And most importantly of all there is a kind of asymmetric lock in. We have means of preserving ideas and patterns of behaviour, through writing, tradition, ritual, patterns of norms and expected behaviour, that will asymmetrically preserve and lock in the things that succeed in satisfying our want of liberty. Of course despots and their priests will tend to set up counter-veiling institutions designed to suppress the process of knowledge. But they are swimming against the tide, because it is the great mass of us all independently striving after our own liberty and you only have so many fingers to plug into the gaps before the dam wall is cracked all the way through. Once we disperse an idea or technology it can become part of a widespread pattern of behaviour or fixed expectations about what is permissible and possible, and at that point it is very difficult indeed for even the most skilful despot or persuasive priest to make us give it up. And finally as our wealth increases so too does our ability to acquire free time for ourselves, and devote some of this to thinking about things. Our productive capacities likewise have a similar effect - Condorcet naturally enough devotes a lot of time to how the printing press made the spread of knowledge possible on a scale hitherto unimaginable. So by such means does the gap between the knowers and the believers lessen, and we are each able to make our own contribution to the stock of ideas through which society can be organised. Our natural love of liberty is so powerful, and we are so many and all independently driven by it to innovation both technical and social, that in the end tyranny must bow before an enlightened people.

So there then is the basis of our story. At first as we gain just a little bit of surplus, the necessity of dividing labour allows some to usurp power and others to exploit their intellectual advantage into a cut of the warrior elite's hoard. This they do by ever convincing us that however things are is how they must be, and that whatever degree of liberty and knowledge has been attained it is this far and no further. But our natural love of liberty prompts us to look for ways out of whatever status quo we find ourselves in, and so long as circumstances are not unlucky (interestingly one unlucky circumstance Condorcet mentions is -- another nation has got further in this process than yours but become an imperialist tyrant nation in its turn, thus associating progress with despotism in one's mind and discouraging it) we will tend by our collective efforts to generate and lock in social and technological advancements that grant us more liberty. Condorcet foresaw a time to come when wealth and knowledge would be so widespread that none would be able to bamboozle the other, or enjoy such advantage over them as to be able to coerce them into labours purely to the benefit of an exploitative party. One imagines us going fishing in the morning, doing some theatre criticism in the evening, and cetera.

This is, in the Marxist sense, a very idealist notion of progress. Ultimately what holds us back is ignorance (of course this ignorance is enforced by means that may be excruciatingly material) and what shall liberate us is the dispersal of new and better ideas. It seems a matter of faith to Condorcet that as we discover more this shall tend to make us like and respect our fellows as equals, he never really defends this so much as explains away divergences from this pattern as the operation of despots and priests. I do not know if I can bring myself to believe in this dialectic. But I thought it a sufficiently interesting idea to write up and share!