Proudhon, the last Hobbesian or first Anarchist?
Proudhon; One or Many Forces
In Proudhon, there is nothing more fundamental than the first law of existence itself, namely that of force and movement.
The idea of a simple being is contradictory. Atomism is a fiction. […] I generalize further, and I say: Existence implies force. These two ideas, like those of unity and collectivity, are correlative and inseparable, in nature as in the understanding. An existence without force is a contradiction. [1]
As can be seen here, for Proudhon to Be is to fundamentally be composed of forces; Both internally in the sense of individuals being composed of radiant and animistic forces, and externally in the plurality of social forces that constitute us. For Proudhon, we are always a unit of collective forces. (Unity-Collectivities)
With the notion of the laws of force(s) being a primary condition in our constitution, Proudhon then gives us the laws of how these forces operate.
For Proudhon, forces necessarily are in eternal motion, thus existence is synonymous with the affirmation of movement, which is the Principle of Progress with the law Movement if you will.
Movement exists: this is my fundamental axiom. […] The idea of direction, inherent in the idea of movement, being acquired, the imagination takes hold of it and divides it into two terms: A, the side from which movement comes, and B, the side where it goes. […] The idea of a principle or aim is only a fiction or conception of the imagination, an illusion of the senses. A thorough study shows that there is not, nor could there be, a principle or aim, nor beginning or end, to the perpetual movement which constitutes the universe. [2]
Progress, once more, is the affirmation of universal movement, consequently the negation every immutable form and formula, […] it is the negation of every permanent order, even that of the universe, and of every subject or object, empirical or transcendental, which does not change. [3]
Here we can see these two facts as downstream from our primordial law of force, Proudhon tells that by virtue of these forces, they must always be in movement.
If movement is the axiomatic law of operation for force, then Progress is the impersonal principle that it adheres to, namely the overcoming of Absolutes (Fixed ideals).
There is no trajectory or teleology for Proudhon’s law of force and operation of movement as seen above to impose a direction or purpose onto movement is fictive, the only purpose of movement is the affirmation of movement itself.
Progress is thus a creative and affirmative act, one in which the movement of forces ascends out of the Absolute (Fixed ideal), to produce something New.
Creation is the ascending movement of existences; the chain of beings has no end: the universe, always changing, is eternal. [4]
As a result, forces are never entirely set, they are constantly in disharmony, and changing, attracting and repelling each other reciprocally, and this is how unity in difference occurs, in other words, Groups, Assemblages or Collectives, whatever term we choose.
All beings, by virtue of the personal, radiant energy that constitutes them, attract and repel one another reciprocally, tend to unite to form other groups or to be absorbed and dissolved, by the centralization and dispersion of their forces. [5]
For Proudhon this principle of mutual repulsion and attraction leads to the formation of forces coming together, we can call this sociability if you’d like, but nonetheless the tendency manifest itself in the practical principle of force not as a Platonic ideal to be achieved.
There exists between men a tendency or attraction that pushes them to group and act, for their own great interest and the most complete development of their individuality, collectively and as a mass. [6]
This leads us to our primary basis for Proudhon’s unity of heterogeneous forces, through the aforementioned principles of mutual attraction and repulsion leading to group formation, but what exactly is the characteristic of this Collective?
For Proudhon this constitutes the base quality of socially constituted forces, that being when individual forces attract to create a sum greater than its parts, the Collective Force. In which there is a quantitative sameness in the number of heterogeneous forces, but a qualitative difference in their expressive character. (i.e. 100 men in unity generating the force of 500 men in isolation)
From the formation of individuals into a group there results a force, numerically equal to the sum of the individual forces that make it up, but which is, by virtue of its unity, very superior in its application, and which must for this reason must be considered as the soul of the group, its own essential energy, its life, its mind. [7]
This concludes the base ontology for Proudhon’s conception of Force, there is more to be said of course but this is the necessary knowledge.
Proudhon; Genealogy of War and the Antinomy
If the law of force is the ontology of existence in-itself, then the law of conflict is the metaphysics of force, and the antinomy is the method that expresses this.
Proudhon understands the law of conflict to be a metaphysical implication of force.
Such is also the first law that I proclaim, in agreement with religion and philosophy: it is Contradiction. Universal Antagonism. [8]
The law of conflict may also be read as the law of differentiation, law of fragmentation, law of individuation, or the law of entropy. For Proudhon, there is nothing more absurd than the Absolute, a fixed identity, for the law of difference precedes law of identity.
Individuation is the primordial fact for Proudhon’s metaphysics, this ties into why, conflict at a point reaches balance {JUSTICE}. Proudhon doesn’t consider the harmony and disharmony of forces to be disjunct poles of two separate substances, rather they constitute one immanent expression of the substance of Nature.
This substance of difference, conflict, antagonism is of course never totally reconciled, but can only ever approach a reconciliation, if individuation [division] is the fact of humans then association is our complement that balances us.
instead of considering the dissidence and harmony of the human faculties
as two distinct periods, clean-cut and consecutive in history, you would consent to view them with me.Simply as the two faces of our nature, ever adverse, ever in course of reconciliation, but never entirely reconciled.
In a word, as individuation is the primordial fact of humanity, so association is its complementary term. [9]
If conflict is the metaphysical character of force, then for Proudhon ‘War is God.’
The law of conflict thus contains within it the conscience, the phenomenology most sublime to our experience, that being War.
The same conscience which produces religion and justice produces war as well; [10]
Thus, it goes without saying for Proudhon, War [Conscious expression of conflict] is a necessary endeavor in our condition to discover justice and balance. War universalizes BALANCE and moves man into a reciprocal association of forces. If existence is force, and conflict is the metaphysics of force, then War is how we express our existence. Pacifism is death for Proudhon.
According to Aaron Noland, Proudhon’s ‘Phenomenology of War’ it directly ties into the law of antinomy and our condition.
Nothing remains the same, in which everything changes, flows, and is in a state of becoming”- a universe in which “everything relates to everything else, is linked up with it; consequently, everything is in mutual opposition, balance, and equilibrium. […] “the eternal dance” of life; and in his description of it such words as struggle, conflict, contradiction, antinomy, disharmony, equilibrium, tension, and reconciliation appear again and again [11]
As noted here Proudhon these universal laws form the way in which Man is conditioned, they do not merely exist externally; but internally shape us, according to Proudhon:
Man is an illogical and contradictory being . . . an inharmonious creature, an incoherent assemblage.” […] Man is composed at one and the same time of “spirit and matter, spontaneity and reflection” he is “an automaton and a free being, an angel and a brute,” an “animal made up of antinomies and contradictions, love and hate-in truth, “un animal desordonne {A messy animal}.” [12]
Proudhon is in agreement with Hobbes that man is at war not just with his fellow men, but at war with himself, but unlike Hobbes who mistakes this war as a repulsive and negative force of alienation due to the simple atomism of his analysis. Proudhon saw this War as a positive attraction of forces that encounter reciprocally to bring about BALANCE of forces, as the tendency of the sociability of forces mentioned earlier.
As man is constantly at war with his fellow men, he is also yearning for them because his needs are complex and insatiable in isolation.
Proudhon says these natural laws are what organized the first social units (families, groups, collectivities), similar to individuals who were “contradictory beings” these social units were also according to Noland
composed of antagonistic forces in movement, with the life of the groups and societies characterized by a dialectic of oppositions, reconciliations, antinomies, equilibriums, clashes, and accommodations, incessantly in a state of flux and endlessly modifying their forms and structures both within each particular group, collectivity, and society and amongst them all. [13]
For Proudhon these social forms were the Heraclitan world of dynamic conflict ‘writ small.’
Proudhon asserts that these social formations had micro-conflicts for territory, necessitating small territorial control over time as the law of expansion occurred these micro-states were reduced in flexibility and dynamism, larger states were to form out of this stagnation of independence, the question for Proudhon is what state legitimately absorbs another?
For Proudhon without a higher mediator the only other determination is, ‘the right of force’ this to Proudhon was considered a “repugnant justice” but nonetheless still a rational expression of force to command.
It is war, therefore, that plays the central role in the creation of states and in their development, determining which are to survive and expand and which are to be absorbed following a “judgment” of arms. War, as an expression of the right of force, itself “the first and most irrefutable of rights,” was, therefore, to Proudhon, “progressive and conservative . . . the first form of justice in society . . . legitimate in its essence, sainte et sacree,” and the dynamic element “which animates society” and which “has made it what it is.” [14]
This should be seen as historically contingent as War is a primordial fact, not a right of entitlement, moreso an expression of will. The question for Proudhon was whose will rightfully predominates?
However, even though Proudhon argues that force is historically, sociologically and analytically the fi rst of all rights, it is nevertheless ‘the last in rank’. Since humans have evolved both morally and intellectually, our capacity to change our ways of rationalising and circumscribing this right of force has resulted in historically evolved forms of social equilibrium encapsulated in law and tradition but supported by force. Law thus represents the constitutional status quo between the antagonistic forces within and between societies. [15]
The right of force is the first right, but also the most repugnant in rank.
War is the essential component in the creation of the state and the primary law by which absorption and expansion are dictated. War is the form in which the content of conflict appears to us. It is an irrefutable right, because it is a right of a primordial law, that being ‘force’. It is both the regressive expression of ‘repugnant justice’ but simultaneously the condition for its existence. War is the animistic force which consciously activates society to take a particular form. Proudhon will remind us the form of this right of force has differed over history, with different social equilibria, Anarchy may be the ultimate war, where War becomes reconciled in JUSTICE.
As Cormac McCarthy states in his book ‘Blood Meridian’;
war is the truest form of divination. It is the testing of one’s will and the will of another within that larger will which because it binds them is therefore forced to select. War is the ultimate game because war is at last a forcing of the unity of existence. War is god (261).” [16]
There is no positive feedback without war.
“Peace itself, finally, cannot be understood without war. It retains nothing positive or true; it is deprived of value and meaning: it is Nothing. However, humanity makes war and strains with all its strength towards peace. Contradiction between the fundamental data and the authentic aspirations of society.” [17]
Subsection on the Antinomy; No more dialectic!
In his Magnum Opus ‘What is Property’, Proudhon lays out his premise of antinomization when discussing the conflict between economical categories.
Antinomy, that is, the existence of two laws or tendencies which are opposed to each other, is possible, not only with two different things, but with one and the same thing. […] All is opposition, and disorder is born of this system of opposition. Hence, the sub-title of the work, — “Philosophy of Misery.” No category can be suppressed; the opposition, antinomy, or contretendance, which exists in each of them, cannot be suppressed.” [18]
For Proudhon, “The antinomy does not resolve itself…” which is to say there is never a synthesis in which conflict is done away with, it is only ever dissolved or hastened to a varying scale, the best we can hope for is BALANCE {Justice}.
difference is pure heterogeneity that differs from itself, in itself and by itself, or — better said — it is the continuous process of “heterogenization,” alteration and not alterity, immediate difference and not mediate difference, and so on [19]
Giacomo Pezzano expresses the ontology of difference as such “pure heterogenization” in a continuous process. For Proudhon this is the aim of his analyses, an intensity in the production of conflict and difference until a balance is reached. The proper Proudhonian term for the law of antinomy, would not be homeostasis (the absorption of difference into a singularity of the Same) rather a heterostasis (the intensity of difference between forces until a reciprocal antinomy is formed).
So one will not be surprised by Proudhon’s extreme hostility to the Hegelian dialectical method, which he criticises as much in its substance as in its applications. […] ‘The antinomic terms do not resolve any more than the opposite poles of an electric battery destroy each other. The problem consists of finding not their fusion, which would be their death, but their continuously
unstable equilibrium, variable according to the very development of society [20]
Proudhon in the fashion of ontological differentiation, rejects the dialectic on the ground that it exhausts difference. The very law most essential to our existence.
As Pezzano reminds us
Hegelianism, it happens that (a) identity “overlaps” difference, and (b) contradiction “exhausts” difference. a) Every particular difference is what it is only if it is referred to the general identity of the concept, or to the specific identity of another difference (which, in turn, is different from that identity, and so on). b) Every particular difference is negated from the general identity of the concept, or from the specific identity of another difference (which, in turn, is everything it is not, and so on). This implies that, according to Deleuze, difference is not difference from, neither simply of, but it is difference for, with, between, or — better, as it will become clearer — difference in-between [21]
In this sense, Proudhonian antinomy should not be understood as a synthesis of opposites in the Hegelian sense of a Totality, rather an assemblage of heterogeneous irreconcilable forces in conflict with each other. As Pezzano says on differential ontology (in a Deleuzian fashion)
the difference could be no more confused with negativity (difference of a thing from everything it is not), neither with diversity (external difference of one thing from another), nor with identity (difference of things sharing a common element or ground) [22]
Differentiation is difference in and between-itself . Difference here is not difference from (external difference), difference of identity, nor a negative difference of what it is not.
Hobbesianism or Anarchism; the states of nature
In the Hobbesian milieu the primary function of Man is said to be his quest for power, that being his ability to procure the actualization of a future desire (Power is our ability to attain a future good). For Hobbes, we desire things, life is desire, this is all fair so far. We desire things according to Hobbes, and thus desire the means to obtain that good in future.
For Hobbes power is thus not something sought in itself, but rather for the satiation of individual desire. We do not seek merely primary desires, but explicitly the eminence of our desires, our placement of desire above others [23], as Hobbes says, ‘For if all things were equally in all men, nothing would be prized’.
We must however to understand Hobbes, make some core assumptions about his usage of desire for eminence. Hobbes contends that man seeks more of the desirable things than those who share that desire, in other words man wants his desire for the same things as others to be greater. But this would necessitate a mode by which we can compare the two individual desires for the same good.
Hobbes however does have in mind what he takes as a goods all men desire commonly, those being; Preservation, Eminence in intellect, Eminence in Prudence and strength, and finally Capital (Wealth, Status, Connections). These are considered ‘Instrumental power[s] of desire’ to Hobbes.
However, this problem is solved, there is at the core the assumption that:
[1] Every affair in which individual choice exists there are payoffs, [2] every individual has a unique payoff scale to a linear standpoint [3] every individual is capable of comparing payoffs to others (A one-one ratio with other individual payoff scales)
However outside of these two person cases, extending this into society means more than two correspondents. We must look at Hobbes theory of eminence from a alternative standpoint that makes his argument more concrete.
To extend beyond the two-person game of eminence into the social sphere, we can according to Taylor see “eminence is defined as the average of his eminences over each other individual. […] that each individual seeks to maximize a convex combination (utility) of his own payoff and his eminence.” [24]
For notation, Proudhon is of the opinion that this natural state is not a result of aggressive eminence of desires, but the incompatibility of plans due to scarcity.
Although Proudhon accepts Hobbes’ description of the state of nature, he criticizes Hobbes’ explanation of it. This criticism enables him to reject Hobbes’ remedy. Hobbes ascribes natural war to aggressive desires so powerful that they can be neither eradicated nor weakened. Since these desires are uncontrollable, the only way to prevent their translation into hostile acts is by legal deterrence. Men must be frightened into behaving peacefully by threats of punishment from an absolute government. The trouble with this argument, according to Proudhon, is that it rests on “the most unfavorable hypothesis” about the cause of conflict. The truth is that even in the state of nature conflict springs not primarily from aggressive desires, but from competition for scarce goods and for attainment of incompatible ideals. [25]
The Proudhonian milieu has an entirely different state of nature than the Hobbesian, for Proudhon we proceed from the history of antinomy.
The primary law of conflict for Proudhon generates a ‘savage state’, but unlike Hobbes, Proudhon begets the proposition of unity and collection of conflicting persons due to their spontaneous attraction within nature, whereas Hobbes sees only atomism and individual aggression.
According to … [my] theory, man, although he was originally in a completely savage state, constantly creates society through the spontaneous development of his nature. It is only in the abstract that he may be regarded as in a state of isolation, governed by no law other than self-interest … Man is an integral part of collective existence and as such he is aware both of his own dignity and that of others. Thus, he carries within himself the principles of a moral code that goes beyond the individual … They are the characteristic mold of the human soul, daily refined and perfected through social relations. [26]
For Proudhon, we do not see the outgrowth of an individual eminence of desire like Hobbes, which is an outgrowth of his negativist and atomized ontology. This will instead lead to the natural outgrowth of our conscience as Justice. Which is to say, the outgrowth of forces in conflict were yearning for balance, a reciprocal counter, a mutual penetration between the Hobbesian brute and the Rousseauan noble, the term being Association.
Justice is not a commandment ordered by a superior authority to a lesser being, as the majority of authors who write on the rights of man teach; Justice is immanent to the human soul … [and] it constitutes its highest power and supreme dignity. [27]
Immanence is the composition of forces in conflict towards justice. Proudhon tells us, forces are not composed from a topological or transcendent law, rather it emerges from an immanent inclination of our practical social condition.
For Proudhon morality operates through three principal processes. The individual is the primary source of justice; the communities and groups individuals build or join become the second layer of justice, are irreducible to the individuals comprising them, and have a moral autonomy which Proudhon derives from the reality of their ‘collective conscience’; and finally, the norms of these collectives or associations feedback on to individual rationalisations of justice, and both help and hinder the subsequent development of the moral capacity in humans and in society. [28]
We can thus say in the state of nature, the law of antinomy in search balance is situated in three immanent processes. [1] Individuation (Conflict) is the base for justice [2] Group formation is produced to compose heterogeneous individualities into a Collective Force of Justice with a ‘Collective Conscience’ [3] Norm formation takes place to regulate and mediate the moral faculties of the individuals composing the Collective Force, to ensure justice is maintained {Memetic Feedback Loops}.
In Proudhon there is exists an antagonism between the individual and Collective, namely that of social conflict.
Real human virtue is not solely negative. It does not solely consist of abstaining from all things condemned by law and morality, it consists also — even more so — in acting with energy, talent and with will and character against the excesses of those personalities which by the sole fact of their existence tend to erase us. [29]
The case being made is that humans are at once passive and active, and both virtues entail within them conflict. As Proudhon says ‘[a]ction is therefore a struggle: to act is to combat’. This is best stated by Alex Prichard on how the reactive and active virtues of group formation shape us:
In primitive societies (or Proudhon’s state of nature) this conflict is acutely exacerbated by the conflict between humanity and nature. The result is the need to associate into ‘natural groups’ for mutual protection, for creative or productive purposes, and also for destructive, defensive and domineering purposes against other associations and nature itself. [30]
Proudhon reminds us that these emergent groups from the ‘state of nature’ which contain the conditions for solidarity also ‘affirms itself in its unity, its independence, its life or its own movement (autokinesis), and its autonomy’. [31]
These associations have their own autonomy, their own distinct forces, which emerge from the flows of conflict and cooperation, they also are spontaneous as ‘they are responses to pre-existing social conditions and vary in size and purpose depending on the tasks they are designed to fulfill.’
According to Proudhon he was ‘led to consider society as being as real a thing as the individuals who compose it, and then to see the collectivity or group as the condition for all [human] existence’ Aaron Noland explains it as such:
In Proudhon’s view, … from the clash of singular, egoistical interests and wills — for conflict was inherent in the group as in society, in man and in nature — there is produced an entity which is a collective expression, something utterly unlike the individual elements themselves. The confluence of individual forces produces an entity ‘different in quality from the forces that compose it and superior to their sum’ [32]
Thus, the individual is not subsumed under the pure rationalism of some abstract interests nor a totality of social determining forces. Rather in this case the individual is an end in itself, not because of a secret egoism, but because if the individual were not free (along with his expression and forces), then the conflict emerging from said expression would cease, we would see a coma-like state of society. No differentiation, no conflict, means the death of society itself.
Proudhon’s state of nature, is thus the state of finding justice in antinomy, we do not have a Hobbesian eminence we seek where we exist in constant isolation on an atomized basis of games, rather we form iterated groups to help satiate the insatiability of desire, the yearn for BALANCE is our condition.
NEO-LEVIATHAN OFF WITH HIS HEAD!; Towards a Mutualist Game theory
In Michael Taylor’s ‘Possibility of Cooperation’ [33] which we will use to outline out Mutualist game theory but also how the Hobbesian milieu gets to the scale of ‘Leviathan’, namely the problem of ‘how do we get people to get stuff done?’ This may formally be thought of as the classical Prisoner’s dilemma or the Coordination Problem. There are two kinds in Hobbes, the Static and Dynamic game.
In Hobbes state of nature men are locked in this exemplary game of utilities, the Prisoner Dilemma, and this classical framework is the only way Hobbes assumptions on the state of nature can play out.
Hobbes grants the subjects two optional strategies for two agents in the classic scenario, we can call these two strategies Cooperation ( C ) and Defection ( D ). There is thus a total of 4 possible outcomes in between the 2 agent prisoners.
[1] ‘War’ as in the selection for defection to maximize utility without restraint (lack of common authority to impose norms), this is what Hobbes agrees will take place.
[2] ‘Peace’ is the course when no agent prisoners select [D]efection, it is the selection for [C]ooperation, according to Hobbes this state of peace is achieved only if everyone is made to behave differently than their natural state (War).
Now it is said that War is the Pareto-inferior choice, everyone wants peace over war. According to Hobbes ‘men live without … security and there is ‘continual fear, and danger of violent death; And the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short’
In this state of war, which is synonymous with lack security or trust, man cannot maximize his eminent desires whereas in the state of peace, there is a guarantee of lie and security for all, and thus men can reasonably obtain their desires.
If we take Hobbes at his word, that War is the inferior choice and that to prevent this state of affairs is through the constitution of a common power.
The function of the ‘common power’ is to maintain the playing field such that none of the agents reasonably select for D over C, the only according to Hobbes to do this is through authorizing, a singular man or collection of men to set these conditions, this entity can be called the ‘Sovereign’.
For Hobbes the first law of our natural condition, is that it is rational to select for D if there is a belief that peace is not possible, that is one thinks other will select for D.
Hobbes second law of nature is basically that out condition requires us to forego our rights to all things either through renouncing it or transferring it. (To Hobbes men only do this in exchange for some good to himself, men only give up their rights for something in exchange.) This is called a ‘contract.’ A covenant would the future promise to uphold their end of the deal.
Hobbes third law of nature tells us ‘Men perform their covenants made’ contracts do not perform their function of peace security if they aren’t binding. But according to Hobbes in the ‘state of nature’ by performing our covenant, we are exposed to the laws of nature, which is to say contracts in nature have no binding and are voided under reasonable suspicion. We cannot be certain or assured another will uphold their end. Thus, for Hobbes there must be a ‘Sovereign’ common power above them mediate and compel them to both perform their ends, making the covenant of trust non-voided.
Thus, we can conclude Hobbe’s argument based on these three laws he gives, namely that to avoid the repugnant state of war and obtain peace, every man must form a covenant contract of mutual trust by foregoing their individual agency (rights) to a Common Sovereign Entity. The Sovereign is the binder of heterogeneous wills in a mutual contract through the threat of punishment on (D)efectors.
The game in the Hobbesian state of nature is definitely non-cooperative, as in the state of nature there is no binding or constraint which hold men to agreements.
It is assumed there are only two choices, D and C, and it is granted D is rational for every man to choose in this state of nature (given that is gives a more preferred outcome to than other strategies), since everyone prefers the security of peace over war.
It is also clear that no agent will change their strategy from D to C in the state of nature, if it is thought that others are choosing D. If other men will not forego their rights to Cooperate, then why should I? Hobbes says. This would be to expose oneself too the brutish laws of nature.
Michael Taylor brings up the point that in this sense Hobbes in making the argument, that it does pay to Cooperate, we do not engage in mutual trust if it is believed others will not, also, but Hobbes he says doesn’t layout any conditions of society, what the members do etc.
Yet, clearly, the payoffs to the two individuals, each of whom is choosing between keeping and not keeping the agreement, depend on what the rest of the society is doing (on how many others are choosing D, for example). We must infer that Hobbes is assuming that his argument holds no matter what others are doing. It follows that, just as long as one other individual (the one with whom I am covenanting) chooses D, it pays me to choose D also. [34]
All in All this brings up there can be a notion of contingency not acknowledged in Hobbes argument, this tells us just like earlier, his argument is presented as Static, for Hobbes the prisoner dilemma is treated like a snapshot, a one-off game.
The second is a more dynamic game which to a extend grants sequential choice and and contingent strategies based on social dynamics.
We actually see this sentiment in Bejamin Tucker’s views on Hobbes ethics of imagination as a contingency in his viewpoint. Whereby we must assess the conditions more dynamically considering ‘Social dynamics are important’ As Tucker states:
And according to Hobbes, all bodies have one aversion in common, the aversion to death. But, remembering someone’s name is also a sign that you care about yourself, because remembering a person’s proper name and therefore the history between the two of you provides insights concerning how to behave in order to maintain the friendship or relationship. Hobbes says, “…to have friends is power: for they are strengths united.“ (L, 72) Power, for Hobbes, is what all people strive for, as well as the value or worth of a person. (L, 73) If the above conception of Hobbes’ morality of memory is correct, then we can see that Hobbes’ morality of memory, like his scientific knowledge, is not objective, but conditional. We have a moral obligation to remember proper names, on the condition that we have a thick relationship with the individual in question. The reputation that one establishes through remembering her/his friend’s proper names and therefore caring about/maintaining the relationship is how one accumulates more power. Maintaining our powerful reputation is completely dependent on others. [35]
Now if we believe that in the Hobbesian state of nature that the first interpretation of the static one-shot game is correct, then yes, Hobbes is correct, there is no rationale to select for C even if everyone else does it too, there is no rational inclination to form a covenant, whether it’s a simultaneous agreement or one based on future knowledge of another players choice, it is not a rational response.
However, as Taylor argues, if we take our second interpretation of the Dynamic Prisoner Dilemma, it may be rational to cooperate under the pretense others will as well. Conditional Cooperation is rational in a condition of ‘future payoffs’.
In Hobbes, he does actually assert “that if one of the parties to a covenant has already performed his part, then it is rational (and obligatory) for the other to perform his, even in the state of nature: ‘… where one of the parties has performed already; or where there is a Power to make him performe; there is the question whether it be against reason, that is, against the benefit of the other to perform, or not. And I say it is not against reason” [36]
If this is true, than the Static initial Prisoner dilemma cannot hold true, and actively it less plausible.
Hobbes tells us why this cooperation would not be irrational under this ‘Conditional Cooperation’ of the dynamic Prisoners Dilemma
First, that when a man doth a thing, which notwithstanding any thing can be foreseen, and reckoned on, tendeth to his own destruction, howsoever some accident which he could not expect, arriving may tume it to his benefit; yet such events do not make it reasonably or wisely done. Secondly, that in a condition of Warre, wherein every man to every man, for want of a common Power to keep them all in awe, is an Enemy, there is no man can hope by his own strength, or wit, to defend himself from destruction, without the help of Confederates; … and therefore he which declares he thinks it reason to deceive those that help him, can in reason expect no other means of safety, than what can be had from his own single Power. He therefore that breaketh his Covenant, … cannot be received into any Society, that unite themselves for Peace and Defence, but by the errour of them that receive him; nor when he is received, be retayned in it, without seeing the danger of their errour; which errours a man cannot reasonably reckon on as the means of his security. [37]
In Hobbes, we see him suggesting that it is reasonable for man to uphold his end of the deal (covenant), given that the fear there will future consequences to not doing so.
Hobbes thus tells us himself that his own static atomism must not be granted in absolute, in other words, two parties in mutual trust are behaviorally contingent on eachother.
Hobbes also gives us two other strategies for not breaking covenant, namely the fear of power of those who offend and the fear of God.
{A interesting point is that Proudhon tells us the first is negligible, as the law of conflict tells us, that forces of BALANCE cannot supersede into control over another, ‘equality of conditions is a necessary consequence of natural right, of liberty, of the laws of production, of the capacity of physical nature, and of the principle of society itself’. ‘JUSTICE’ may just the Hobbesian state of nature in positive harmony.}
The only other is the fear of God, and both us and Hobbes are in agreement this lacks the efficacy necessary to bind people to their covenant agreements.
This conditional mutualism emerges directly from the 3 Hobbesian laws of natural conflict and from the Proudhon antinomy of reciprocal penetration of forces, mentioned above. Namely that the first ‘That every man, ought to endeavor Peace, as far as he has hope of obtaining it; and when he cannot obtain it, that he may seek, and use, all helps, and advantages of Warre’. And the second law that ‘a man be willing, when others are so too, as far, as for Peace, and defense of himself he shall think it necessary, to lay down this right to all things; and be contented with so much liberty against other men, as he would allow other men against himself’
In general, Hobbes is saying he that men ought to do what produces peace, meaning in the state of nature only opt for Cooperation if it is safe to do so, in other words if others do the same. This is not necessary a tit-for-tit strategy.
The Sovereign for Hobbes is institutes mutual trust through compelling men to equally enact their covenant agreements. But Hobbes is not saying the Sovereign is effective in ensuring peace because of the fear he imposes, he believes that men will no longer have reasonable suspicion for men to not uphold their covenants under the Sovereign rule.
The sovereign thus does not merely make you pay to maintain mutual trust, rather it is always a payoff to maintain mutual trust as long as you don’t expose yourself.
There are thus certain N-Person Prisoner Dilemma games in which cooperation becomes a rational condition. Only conditional Cooperation is rational, and it must be contingent on the cooperation of other cooperator. (Conditional or non-conditionally)
Cooperation does not necessarily need to be conditional for all players, there can be both condition and unconditional strategies, so long as discount rates for cooperation are not too high relative to the games payoff to Defect.
It however is not enough to get the Possibility of conditional Mutualism, Cooperation, nor Association from these Hobbesian conditions alone. Hobbes does not a give a particular kind of cooperation he says that is rational in the state of nature, Hobbes does not layout any conception of discounting future benefits, but even in this case of ignoring social discounting, voluntary cooperation in the Prisoner Dilemma is precarious (unstable), and it is why Hobbes sought after the sovereign to make these conditions more fixed, so that it would become universally rational for all men to maintain mutual trust covenants.
Thus under the real Hobbesian political theory, lies the ‘Dynamic Prisoner Dilemma’ and in the case of this game, there is a rationale for conditional cooperation.
The problem with Hobbes even in his dynamic interpretation however is that, even though conditional cooperation is present when the game is played more than once, Hobbes gives nothing to say on the dynamics in this game. There is no explicit role of Time, Hobbes vaguely mention ‘anticipating’ and ‘foresight’ but he never mentions the valuation of future gains or the future prospect of voluntary cooperation.
For Hobbes, the only mention of such Time driven elements is ‘’For all men are by nature provided of notable magnifying glasses, (that is their Passions and Self-love), through which, every little payment appeared a great grievance; but are destitute of those prospective glasses (namely Moral and Civil Science,) to see a far off the miseries that hang over them and cannot without such payment be avoided.’
The concept of a distant, future or remote good, is seemingly nonexistant, which make is enticing to view Hobbes game as a static interpretation with lack of dynamism. But Hobbes would lack coherence if we select this view.
Hobbes operated on individual utility maximization, and Hobbes does say it is rational to select for Cooperation if others do the same, in which the more dynamic interpretation where cooperation is contingent but always rational, due to its precarity mentioned above.
It it thus fair to say Hobbes has some dynamism in his view, but not a full account of the dynamics of a interdependent choice optimization.
The core of the Hobbesian argument was that the Prisoner Dilemma game is only played once. Michael Taylor notates why the One-Shot game has different incentives than the ones outlined by Hobbes:
It is worth noting here that if it were accepted that in the state of nature men find themselves in a Prisoners’ Dilemma one-shot game, then it would not make sense to argue that the Sovereign’s sanctions are required, not so much to compel everybody to obey, but rather to provide a guarantee that those who would obey voluntarily can do so without exposing themselves. Clearly, if the ‘game’ in the state of nature is a Prisoners’ Dilemma, then it follows that if a player is certain that the other players will choose C (because they fear the Sovereign’s punishments), then he would not consider it in his interest to choose C himself — unless he/ears the Sovereign’s punishments. In other words, although his expectation that the Sovereign would punish others for their disobedience may reassure him that he will not be ‘double-crossed’, this alone does not give him reason to obey. Rather, it gives him a greater incentive to disobey: unless the Sovereign’s presence changes his (subjective, perceived) utilities as well as his perception of the other players’ utilities [38]
If Hobbes game is played only once, then there are still only two alternatives.
We create the New Games of Mutualism, similar to the Prisoner Dilemma [1] each players prefer Peace to War [2] It pays each player to select for D if others do, which is something we agree with Hobbes on.
As Proudhon tells us the spontaneous consensus or precarious cooperation is not merely a strong enough force to ensure this cooperation emerges, we must create a viable alternative.
“But though spontaneous consensus at first makes society perfectly harmonious, it is too weak to prevent instability. So long as each member of society follows expectations, the structure will remain stable. But should anyone fail to conform, the whole system will be jeopardized.” [39]
In our first alternative game, cooperation is the preference not defection, in the two-person case, the Proudhonian law of force predicates association to emerge, leading to a two-person game which appears as this.
In this game the game is prioritized in this order, X is ranked first, Y is ranked second, W is ranked third, and Z is ranked last. (x > y > w > z)
The classical Hobbesian game is y > x > w > z.
This game lacks a dominating strategy, for either player, we succumb rather to a mutual penetrating equilibrium (C,C and D,D), but because players prefer C to D, then we can expect no player to expect D to be the outcome, thus it will not be the outcome, because nobody will reasonably select for it.
In this game, coercion is not necessary to mitigate the Pareto-deficient outcome, mutual Cooperation of this Proudhonian variety will in that direction. (There are other static models of coopration which try to build off of that, like Hart’s model but this is not of our interest since it’s not prevalent in Hobbes)
With our Mutualist game alternative to the Leviathan, the state of nature is redundantly equal in relation, no singular source controls the game, there is a strategic interdependence. The payoffs in the mutualist game do not violate any of the principles namely that: [1] Payoffs depend on the actions of all other men, as well his own [2] Payoff is necessarily symmetric (Payoffs can be unequal in the case of Mutual collaboration) [3] Not all men will equally be successful in the competition to obtaining what they want.
Thus, by us instituting more than the bare options Hobbes gives us, that Man must either forego his rights to be violated by nature, or not doing that.
In the mutualist game however, where the law of conflict and its phenomenological expression as war as between mutually differentiation of heterogeneous forces (agents), the result between them has degrees of both, foregoing our liberty, and maximizing it. This is the law of Equal Liberty. Degrees of cooperation and degrees foregoing liberty, is the basis for as Proudhon calls it “mutual penetration of antagonistic elements.” [40]
If we look at Taylor’s dilemma of the Mutualist game in the ‘Tragedy of the commons scenario’
We can consider the strategy of pollution to be D, but there are of course numerous alternatives to D where there are possible levels of pollution less than D. As Taylor states:
As before, in the state of nature, every player chooses D; the resulting outcome is (D, D, … , D) which is Pareto-inferior. The Hobbesian problem remains the same: to get the players from this ‘miserable condition’ to an outcome preferred by every player. If there is only one such outcome this is presumably the only outcome which the players would covenant to have enforced. Hobbes’s analysis of covenanting applies unchanged to this convenant. Usually, however, there will be a set (S, say) of outcomes preferred by every player to (D, D, … , D). The players would presumably only consider covenanting to enforce one of those which are Pareto-optimal with respect to the set S. A covenant to enforce anyone of these would be necessary and Hobbes’s argument applies to each of the possible covenants. The only new element introduced here is the problem of agreeing on one of the Pareto-optimal outcomes: of agreeing, for example, on a particular level of permissible individual pollution. [41]
The issue thus Hobbes does not have a permissible scope of S (S representing a set of pareto-optimal outcomes mutually beneficial to players.
To Hobbes, these S (set of optimal outcomes) do exist, but as opposed to seeing them being emergent out of a voluntary cooperation, Hobbes believes there is not degrees of such but only for full force Defection, thus men will not refrain through agreement to prevent D, but they require a Common Power to enforce these outcomes.
For us the mutualist game, Hobbes games due to its lack of conflicting forces that form a social interdependence; Mutuality, Hobbes’ individual preference can only form an ordinality in which preferences have a independence the relative degrees of preference to others and this is a cardinality of preferences.
As Taylor tells us in the Mutual game of differentiation:
the game defined in terms of the basic payoffs (the ‘basic game’) is a Prisoners’ Dilemma, then we know from chapter 5 that the game defined in terms of the derived utilities (the ‘transformed game’) is also a Prisoners’ Dilemma, if two conditions are met: (i) Aj is non-zero; that is, the game is not one of pure Difference; and (ii) the payoff g(v) to a player who chooses D is strictly increasing with the number of other individuals (v) who choose C. However, if the transformed game is a Prisoners’ Dilemma, it does not follow that the basic game is a Prisoners’ Dilemma. A simple two-person example shows this: if the payoff matrix is [42]
The Hobbesian problem is the result of his assumption of eminent desire.
In our game there are two kinds of equilibria, (1,1) and (2,2), the former being Pareto-inferior and the latter being Pareto-optimal, because the condition of rational cooperation mentioned above being a condition, players do not suspect D (1,1) to be selected for and thus it will not be a outcome, over C (2,2), all in all negating the Hobbesian problem.
The traditional game and the game of mutual difference is also a Prisoner Dilemma no matter the degrees of ‘eminent desire’ exigent in the model, but only to the extent immediate eminent desire is not the only goal. (As long as the game is not purely differentiated (isolated) and the payoff to defectors increases with the number of cooperators.
Proudhon and the outgrowth of Mutualism was both a testament to his sympathy for Hobbes’ propositions, but also the death to the conclusion entailed, Proudhon was the first to reject the Head, in favor of the Body.
RECIPROCITY, in all creation, is the principle of existence. In the social order, Reciprocity is the principle of social reality, the formula of justice. Its basis is the eternal antagonism of ideas, opinions, passions, capacities, temperaments, and interests. It is even the condition of love. [43]
SOURCES:
P.-J. Proudhon, “Principles of the Philosophy of Progress” (selections) section1, pp 7
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, The Philosophy of Progress ch. 2 pp 3
ibid ch.1 pp 9
P.-J. Proudhon, “Principles of the Philosophy of Progress” (selections) section1, pp 9
ibid section 1 pp 8
ibid section 2 pp 1
ibid section 2 pp 5
The Fundamental Laws of the Universe(!) and the Anarchism of Approximation, Shawn P. Wilbur
Proudhon, The philosophy of Poverty Ch. 8
Proudhon War and Peace (Ch. ?) ref. Alex Prichard
Aaron Noland, Proudhon’s sociology of war pg. 292
ibid. pg. 292
ibid pg. 293
ibid pg. 295
Justice, Order, and Anarchy by Alex Prichard pg. 10
Cormac McCarthy, Blood Merdian
Proudhon, War and Peace Volume 1, Summarty
Proudhon, What is Property, Paris Letter December 5. 1831
BUT IN THE END, WHY IS DELEUZE “ANTI-HEGELIAN”? AT THE ROOT OF THE HEGEL–DELEUZE AFFAIR, section 1.
Ansart, Proudhon’s dialectics, ‘Dialectics and it’s object’
BUT IN THE END, WHY IS DELEUZE “ANTI-HEGELIAN”? AT THE ROOT OF THE HEGEL–DELEUZE AFFAIR, section 1.
ibid, section 1
Hobbes Leviathan, 52
Michael Taylor, Possibility of Cooperation pg. 127
Allen Ritter, the political thought of Proudhon, ch. 5, section 1.
Alex Prichard, Justice, Order. and Anarchy, pg. 6
ibid, pg. 6
ibid, pg. 6
ibid, pg. 8
ibid, pg. 8
ibid, pg. 8
ibid, pg. 8
Michael Taylor, Possibility of Cooperation pg. 129
ibid, pg 33
Benjamin Tucker, The Ethics of Memory in Thomas Hobbes, pg 9
Hobbes Levithan, 112
ibid, pg. 112
Michael Taylor, Possibility of Cooperation pg. 139
Allen Ritter, the political thought of Proudhon, ch. 2, section 3.
The Fundamental Laws of the Universe(!) and the Anarchism of Approximation, Shawn P. Wilbur
Michael Taylor, Possibility of Cooperation pg. 142
ibid, pg 143.
The Fundamental Laws of the Universe(!) and the Anarchism of Approximation, Shawn P. Wilbur