American billionaire Marc Andreessen noted that the public discourse of US politics appears to have been taken less rational turn than when the federalist papers were published. To help understand this, he refers to a 1943 book by James Burnham that looks at the pitfalls of mass democracy.
James Burnham is an American philosopher. A Marxist-Trotkist in the 1930s, his activism gave rise to a correspondence, then a friendship with Trotsky. He rebranded himself as a conservative in the 1940s and published two seminal books:
The managerial revolution (1941)
The Machiavellians, defenders of freedom (1943)
In that second work, he describes the evolution of the political theater and explains the drift of democracies towards irrational policies based on appeals to emotion, and the risks of authoritarian drifts. He advocates a political science based on facts rather than on metaphysical values.
Prologue: From Dante's Monarchia
Before discussing Machiavelli, Burnham summarizes a political work written by Dante on political theory.
Dante explains that the purpose of government is to ensure the salvation of souls and the realization of all human potentials
He justifies the temporal and religious power must be separated by citing the holy scriptures and the fathers of the Church
He explains that Emperor Hohenstaufen residing in Luxembourg should rule over the whole world
After explaining Dante's position, Burnham becomes impatient and explains the real situation that drives this reasoning. Dante has been exiled and expropriated because he took the wrong side in the civil war between the Guelphs and the Ghibelines.
A quarrel between two sons of powerful families leads to a brawl and an injury.
The head of the family asks his son to go see the father of the other family and apologize for the injury
The father of the other family refuses the apology, has the son seized by his servants (to humiliate him), and has his hand cut off in a stable. He sends him back to tell his father that a wound is better repaired by an amputation than by words.
The two families reunite their factions (the Bianci and the Neros) and the city enters into civil war
To flee the destruction and find reinforcements, a member of the Bianci leaves for Florence. A member of the other faction will do the same and find the support of a no less powerful family in Florence.
Florence enters into civil war and Dante, who was a minor notable, must flee as his faction sides with the Ghibellines (pro-emperor) against the Guelphs (pro-pope)
Thus Burnham explains that Dante wrote a work of political theory for the sole purpose of furthering his personal interests. In practice, the book justifies his betrayal of the Italian nation in favor of a Hohenstaufen emperor living in Luxembourg in the hope of reigniting a civil war in Italy and regaining his position in Florence.
According to Burnham, most works of political theory propose an abstract formula (monarchy by divine right, representation of the people, dictatorship of the proletariat) in order to justify the established order or a regime that would be advantageous to the author of the speech.
Machiavelli: politics as science
While Dante's speeches are based on utopias, lofty goals and metaphysical values, Machiavelli's writings focus on correlating facts. When there is a goal, Machiavelli states it clearly rather than describing abstract or supernatural principles.
Burnham defines three criteria for a rational policy following Pareto:
It must be possible to formulate the objective in such a way as to define success
Success must be possible
The policy implemented should go towards achieving the objectives and not go in the opposite direction
These three criteria often fail. According to Burnham this is to be expected as the goal of public discourse is symbolic legitimization, like Dante’s work. However, political science like Machiavelli’s is interested in facts.
Machiavelli defines two archetypes of elites:
Lions: they are outspoken, conservative, defenders of traditional values. They do not hesitate to use force and do not like to reason.
Foxes: they are calculating, able to reason and opposed to the use of force, they delight in evaluating combinations and taking advantage of a changing environment.
These are the conservatives and progressives. The political situation is always subject to compromise and evolution, whether the conservatives like it or not.
There are three types of government depending on the number of people who hold power. Machiavelli considers good and bad form for each of these governments.
Monarchy and Tyranny
Aristocracy and Oligarchy
Democracy and Anarchy
Even though his preference was for the aristocracy, Machiavelli saw the Monarchy as the easiest way to achieve the goal of unifying Italy. A prince must be opportunistic and adapt to his times, rather than trying to apply principles that are no longer appropriate.
Civilization carries within it the seeds of its own destruction. Wealth is opposed to military force, freedom which according to him is guaranteed by the State, and the institutions come from a balance of powers constantly questioned.
Sovereignty depends on strength. It faces external (military) and internal (illegal activities) attacks.
The external form of force is the defense of a country that must rely on armed citizens and not mercenaries who are less reliable.
The internal form of force corresponds to the legal system. Machiavelli advises that the laws be applied consistently. The state must prevent too much inequality due to privilege or wealth.
If we take for granted the statement of Aristotle at the beginning of his metaphysics that every man seeks knowledge, we imagine that knowledge is always welcome. However, it seems to us that hypocrisy is a distinctive Western quality, and hypocrisy always eludes the truth.
For this reason, the philosophers of official thought, the jurists, the priests and the demagogues, all must defame Machiavelli. Machiavelli talks about the ambition of men and their will to power, but the powerful, they tell you, are there only to rule you for your own good.
The powerful have the ability and practice to assess their adversary and oppose them effectively, even if their adversary is an abstract treatise of political science. Because Machiavelli writes during the development of science. His method is scientific even though he is often intuitive.
Gaetano Mosca: the theory of the ruling class
Gaetano Mosca (1858-1941) was one of three members of the elitist liberal Italian political school. Senator for life of the Italian monarchy, he will oppose fascism in 1925 and will be relieved of his functions by Mussolini in 1926. He examines in detail three theories: geographical theory, racial theory, and materialist economic theory. According to him, none of these three causes is sufficient to determine political functioning. Social determinism does not fit the facts.
Sticking to the facts, Mosca arrives at a political observation: society is split into two classes: the rulers and the ruled. The former is always a small minority. In particular, he refutes two ideas that are often encountered:
in tyranny, the tyrant alone would rule
in a democracy, the majority mass would have the power to decide for itself
However, in both cases, an elite is in power. Power can neither be concentrated in a single person nor diffused in a mass. A hundred well-tuned men will get the better of 1000 men who don't get along and pull in different directions.
A second constant is the existence of a "formula" used to justify the government. It can be the monarchy by divine right, democracy, or the dictatorship of the proletariat of communism. Different countries may use a similar formula that corresponds to variations on the same theme.
A change in the formula must be gradual. Sudden change destroys society. This is why societies seem to cling to old formulas, even though the knowledge and information available mean that educated men can no longer literally believe them.
When the liberal system rests on a broad base, which is the case of universal suffrage, the candidates for the highest offices exploit the retrograde sentiments of the masses. It is, invariably, a question of monopolizing and exploiting their sympathy by castigating the selfishness and the opulence of the richest by denouncing their real and imaginary vices.
The conservative politician Burke observed that a regime that assumes the existence of heroic or superhuman virtues leads to vice and corruption. According to Mosca, the freest country is the one where one is best protected against the arbitrariness and whims of the rulers.
According to Mosca, freedom of expression is the best defense against tyranny, and the law is the best protection. These are not legal practices, and not legal texts: Hitler never abrogated the Weimar Constitution, and Stalin endowed his country with a constitution that he wanted to be the most democratic in the world. Tyranny is the loss of legal rights.
The triumph of one group over all others leads to tyranny. Thus, democratic Jacobinism leads to tyranny because power is not shared enough. The weak parliamentary democracies of the 19th century were the freest according to Mosca.
In his analysis, an abrupt change in formula, a revolution, often leads to the seizure of power by a single group, which is a cause of tyranny.
Mitchells: The Limits of Democracy
Robert Mitchells (1876-1936) was an Italian political scientist of German origin, friend, and disciple of Max Weber and Sombart. Elitist and non-liberal unlike Mosca and Pareto, he adheres to fascism which he perceives as a soft alternative to socialism, he is also a eugenicist and opposed to the First World War and democracy. He is known for his iron law of the oligarchy.
In his book on political parties published in 1911, he explains that any organization involves an oligarchy. Even in an organization with an egalitarian goal like a Communist Party or a trade union, administrative officials have an informational and decision-making advantage that they use to establish their power. The masses are incapable of exercising power and desire to be led by strong leadership.
According to him, representative democracy is a contradiction in terms. If the mass transfers its power to representatives, it abdicates its sovereignty to a restricted political class. The end of democracy is confirmed by the expectation for the representative to be reappointed and the appearance of a class of professional politicians.
There is an authoritarian form of democracy: Bonapartism. Napoleon was elected consul for life, and Napoleon III was acclaimed emperor of the French. In this case, the leader identifies with the will of the people, and any divergent opinion is denounced and suppressed as coming from pressure groups even if it would be the expression of the diversity of interests in a plural society. Any criticism of the leader is identified as a threat to democracy.
Trade unionism shows a similar evolution. The anarchists are the individuals who, having avoided the corruption of power, have the most nobility. Nevertheless, anarchy is incompatible with any form of organization and remains divorced from facts.
Georges Sorel: a note on myth and violence
Sorel (1847-1922) cannot be considered a Machiavellian because he was a political extremist who evolved into Marxism. His analysis, however, seems sufficiently factual for Burnham to mention this thinker who inspired socialists, anarchists and trade unionists.
Sorel saw the state as a political instrument of mass oppression. As a revolutionary, he proposes that the whole program be reduced to the myth of the general strike.
The myth of the general strike is formulated as an eschatological event: the proletarians among all on strike and society and the established order collapse. The proletarians then resume free and uncontrolled work. A new era begins.
A myth is not the description of facts but a desire for action. It makes a social movement something serious and heroic. It justifies and gives rise to violence, which feeds it. According to him, the recognition of the potential violence of social conflicts makes it possible to reduce violence.
Sorel was writing before the First World War when pacifism was an important movement and it was thought that the workers would go on a general strike to stop the war rather than allow themselves to be mobilized.
Pareto: the nature of social action
Vilfredo Pareto (1848-1923) was an Italian economist and political scientist. He is often associated with the rise of fascism because of his elitism, but he was fundamentally liberal.
In his main work the treatise on general sociology published in 1916, he disavows any objective other than to correlate social facts.
Human action makes sense when (1) it is undertaken in pursuit of a goal, (2) the goal is attainable, and (3) the action is appropriate to achieve the goal.
Principles like Liberty, Fraternity, and Equality from the Declaration of Human Rights can mean anything and everything. All men are different in some ways and all are equal in others. These three words appeared on the frontispieces of prisons, Mitchel reminds us.
The Atlantic Charter of Churchill and Roosevelt declared as the goal for all men freedom from want, a situation which is only achieved when a man is dead.
In 1940, when the United States proclaimed the principle of freedom of navigation, it was not a question of the freedom of American ships to go to Germany, nor that of German ships to navigate.
In some American states, the Seventh Commandment justifies capital punishment while in others it prohibits it.
Logical thoughts do not in general determine social evolution. Man is not a rational animal. While it is apparent that man does not behave rationally, many still write about theoretical principles that would logically justify action. These are often rationalizations.
Many preach to others what they should do without caring about what people are actually doing. According to Pareto, social facts can be reduced to certain residues, while their justification is called a derivation.
He distinguishes 6 residues even if the first two have a preeminent political role.
instinct for combinations: it is the human tendency to combine different elements drawn arbitrarily from experience. Magic, but also financial speculations, and ideologies are the product of this residue.
group persistence: once a combination is achieved forces build up in favor of the status quo.
need to express emotion through an action: When humans experience a strong emotion, they are driven to act regardless of whether the action accomplishes a goal.
residue connected to sociability: individuals are ready to conform to the group in order to better belong to it.
the integrity of the individual and his property, according to Pareto, this residue leads men to keep their property and the conditions of their existence. According to him, he also intervenes in egalitarian claims.
sexuality: this residue corresponds to the reproductive instinct as well as all the religious norms and taboos associated with sexual practices.
Derivations are doctrines, beliefs, or theories that feature in social struggles, democratic principles and other social justifications. Pareto offers four types:
assertion: the derivation is simply asserted
authority: the derivation appeals to an authority (individual, divinity, …)
agreement with feelings: with the help of the 2nd residue, men convert feelings into abstractions and enduring principles.
verbal evidence: these are derivations that depend on ambiguities of fallacious evidence and emotional appeals
Divine right power is ridiculous, and yet many defenses of this theory have been written, and it is not clear that knowing that this derivation is ridiculous is desirable.
Individuals marked with class 1 are Machiavelli foxes, while individuals marked with class 2 are lions.
Athens, an opportunist city which, upon its victory against Persia, established a merchant maritime empire is ruled by foxes. The philosophers of Athens ridicule the gods of the city as superstitions.
Sparta, a city where innovation was forbidden was ruled by lions.
If the elites take power by force initially when the society is young, they avoid fights with an unpredictable outcome and prefer compromise and stratagems in their period of maturity. Thus, the elite initially composed of lions will be populated by foxes.
A similar phenomenon is observed with elites who become pacifists and balk at conflicts other than when the balance of power makes the outcome of the conflict obvious.
The elite must be opportunistic and adapt to change. According to Pareto, the most stable social form is one where the mass is made up of conservative lions and the elite of foxes. The opposite guarantees a revolution.
The object of political science is the study of the struggle for power in its open or hidden forms. The opposite view would be that the goal of politics is the common good. Political laws cannot be deduced from discourses on political theory.
Logic is rationality does not play an important role in politics. The opposite view is that history is the consequence of rational actions.
Social processes are best understood in terms of the division between elites and non-elite. The goal of the elite is to retain their power and privileges. The opposite ideology is that the elite serve the masses.
The power of the elite is maintained by force and fraud. Violence is normally only threatened if the rules are broken, and fraud need not be a conscious lie. A political formula supports the regime in place. It is a generally accepted religion, ideology or myth.
An elite can govern more or less in the interest of the population. We cannot rely on theoretical formulas like democracy, but on factual comparisons, like (a) the power of a community relative to others, (b) the degree of civilization, and (c) the standard of economic living. mass.
The elite faces two currents: (a) the need to remain exclusive, to close themselves to the hoi poloi, and to guarantee a place for their children. (b) the need to preserve the possibility of circulation and integration of the most distinguished members of the mass. Elite circulation is needed as a safety valve that prevents explosion and social discontinuity.
In the long term, the second trend always ends up prevailing. We never arrive at a static state of equilibrium. There is no stable communist or democratic utopia. Sometimes there is a rapid change in the composition of the elite. These are revolutionary times. These kinds of changes happen under the following conditions:
rapid technical evolution to which the elite cannot adapt
the elite becomes idle and disinterested in the exercise of power
inability or unwillingness to assimilate the brightest non-elites
the elite no longer believes in the formulas that legitimized its power
the government has abandoned the use of force and uses only corruption and fraud
In 1940, technical developments since the industrial revolution made private capitalism and post-renaissance nationalisms obsolete. Members of the capitalist elite have abandoned the government for idle cultural pursuits. The elite has abandoned its faith in capitalism at the same time as it abandons force for humanitarian reasons. We prefer to reform rather than punish criminals, to arbitrate rather than break social conflicts. Imperialism is abandoned.
Nevertheless, the theory of democracy is a myth that must be abandoned if we want to understand political evolution. The extension of suffrage was in the interest of the new elites but does not lead to a stable situation. This period sees an increased risk of Bonapartism.
In all democratic countries, we see an elite that claims to speak on behalf of the people. It is impossible to decide whether the United States is more democratic than Germany or Russia because the problem is entirely fictitious.
That there is more freedom in the United States than in Germany or Russia is a fact, as is the fact that freedoms in the United States have been undermined for the past 15 years (between 1925 and 1940).
The Machivellians present the most explanatory interpretation of political facts. The elite is more concerned with consolidating its power than with the common good. When an opposition exists, it is also part of the elite, but it limits power. The destruction of the opposition leads to unlimited tyranny.
The myth of mass self-determination is counterproductive, and the real measure of political advancement is the degree of freedom the regime allows in practice. Totalitarian democrats, according to Burnham, claim to serve the people and concentrate more power in the state apparatus. Anyone who disputes the legitimacy of such an expansion would be suspected of being anti-democratic. They identify their will with that of the sovereign people and their practice as a logical consequence of the great democratic principles that sustain the current social order.
A final question that Burnham deals with is the possibility of a science policy.
According to him, this covers three questions: is there a political science? Can the masses understand politics scientifically? Can the elite govern scientifically?
He answers the first question in the affirmative. The second question has long been unanswered: it was observed that the degree of development and possible democracy increased with the literacy rate. The socialists in 1850 had great hopes in education, and it took until 1900 to realize that the masses had neither the time, nor the skill, nor the inclination to take an interest in politics. The speech directed towards the masses is constantly diverted by appeals to myths, to emotion and to the great questions of destiny. The 20th century only confirmed this fact.
According to Burnham, elites can govern scientifically, and that means lying about their beliefs. In a democratic state, elites who believe in the myths of legitimizing discourse have the advantage of not having the cognitive load of a lie. We thus see naive people coming to power who are able to deceive themselves to better deceive the masses.
Typically, these democratic elites promote policies with irrational goals while being thoroughly scientific in their approach to propaganda and manipulation of the masses.