It might seem far-fetched to introduce the discussion of the theory of politics through a survey of scientific disciplines in general. However, I hope this will appear justified in the sequence.
All scientific disciplines, whether they be akin to physics or to politics, owe their existence to the conjuncture of three entirely independent factors: a human interest in some “corner” of the universe; a method that is suitable to form definite elements into a pattern; finally, the presence of such elements in the “corner” toward which interest is turned. The discipline registers the regularities shown by the pattern to be existing in the element.
The emphasis is on the independence of the factors. None is a function of any other. Interests form part of man's original equipment; most people are interested in nature, glory, love, secrets, or fate; some in mathematical series; all in matters of everyday life. Methods are rules applicable to operations concerned with definite elements; innumerable rules of this sort may be devised, but only few will produce a pattern. Finally, there are the elements themselves and their actual distribution in the universe. Obviously it is a matter of chance whether a method produces a pattern or not and, if it does so, whether the elements thus patterned out occur in a region toward which human interest happen to be directed. Yet, unless the three factors coincide, no science can emerge.
Mendelism is an example, in natural science, of method meeting the conditions that lead to unpredictable success. The crossing of peas of various kinds according to definite rules of operation happened to produce a numerical pattern. Even so, the method could not have resulted in the establishment of a scientific discipline if we had no interest at all in the phenomenon of heredity.
Or take in the field of social sciences: the device of choosing from scarcea means according to a scale of priority. When applied to markets, this otherwise useless method produced a pattern that revealed highly complex regularities in the various kinds of prices. And yet this astonishing result would not have led to the creation of the discipline of theoretical economics were it not for the interest attached to the phenomenon of prices in a market economy. Without it, the regularities shown by the pattern would have been ‡hardly even of…‡b
Let us apply this to political theory. The interest that is designed to satisfy centers roughly on the body politic. The method that brought it into existence is the rule of reason. The elements that thus come into view form part of the individuals on the one hand, of the common good on the other.
We will have to show how a theory was constructed on these foundations. Throughout we will rely in our inquiry on the threefold determination of the structure of science.
Before we proceed to do so, some remarks on the nature of the three factors may be in place.
(1) Few sciences, unfortunately, respond to the direction of our interest. They simply do not answer the question. They merely get near enough to the object of interest or circumscribe it with sufficient clarity to satisfy some of our curiosity. Very few disciplines are as much to the point as that part of mathematics called arithmetic, which tells us how much 2 × 2 is. We should also like to know, naturally, what gravitation is. Yet physicists keep telling us that the question is meaningless. And so we put up with what they can tell us (which may satisfy some of our interests completely, some partially, but leaves our original interest unsatisfied).
The same may be true of political theory. Nothing is probably more natural to man than interest in his position in the community, in the good and evil that comes from government, in right and wrong in public affairs, in the prospects of communal welfare and of his own share in it. Nothing, accordingly, could be more welcome to him than reliable knowledge about what to do and what to avoid in order to make both the community and himself happier. He would like to know how to vote; how long the government will be in; what foreign policy it should support. It is better, anyway, to have to resign himself to the fact that there is no science that could tell him all that.
He must put up with a second or even third best and be content if he can gain some clarity on the nature of his position in society, learn, in brief, anything that is relevant. Even that may be useful to him. Again, what exactly is relevant depends on the precise nature of the interest – which natural science rashly assumes to be cognitive, in the sense that “we want to know something.”
But neither the word “want,” nor the word “know,” nor the word “something” should be taken in its precise sense. Actually our interest may reflect no more than a hitch in the process of living, which cannot be formulated as a question and therefore cannot, strictly speaking, be answered. At this sub-inquisitive stage we are not yet interested in “something,” nor do we “want” anything; even less would it be accurate to say that what we desire is to “know.” Everything depends on the situation. Even assuming our interest to have reached the intellectual level, it still may be no more than a wish to discover some indication of how to behave so as to get rid of the cause of the interest – a very different thing from a “thirst for knowledge.” The notion that a numerical statement about measurable quantities is the ideal answer to any question is simply the physicist's way of saying that any interest that is not directed toward such an answer should be discounted. Indeed, in the case of political theory, the questions themselves are ridiculed as meaningless. This, however, is only another instance of the proved incapacity of the scientific mind to understand human problems. Itc maintains that the method, used arbitrarily, defines the body politic and leaves in effect no room for investigation. But this means to leave out the “third dimension” of science, namely interest. If “knowledge” about “something” were everything, then nothing could be learnt about such things. But the same, accidentally, would be true of mathematics, without entailing either its uselessness or its unscientific character. Actually, neither political theory nor mathematics is useless, only their uses are not always obvious.
Political theory, however, caters not so much for interest in knowing what the body politic is as for interest in living in it.
(2) The rule of reason consists in relating individual behavior to the common good. This is implied in the postulate that the common good be the “purpose” of that behavior. When applied to an empirical society, such an assumption seems singularly vague. The common good may be taken to refer to matters as different as the glory of the nation, the survival of an existing society, the welfare of individuals, the freedom of public life, the maintenance of the covenant with God, or a favorable balance of trade. Behavior of the individuals, again, is a no less inclusive term. It comprises the whole sphere of their private and public life, viewed from any conceivable angle. Now the rule of reason demands that, in every case, the “common good” be the purpose of their “behavior.”
Such a postulate would be in effect meaningless, unless it was taken to imply that (1) behavior is determined by “motives” (for in no other way can “purpose” enter into behavior); and (2) the “common good” is a definite state of affairs (otherwise it cannot be the aim of the purpose). Even so, the application of the method remains uncomfortably hazy.
Without further explicit definition that would indicate which elements of the common good can be related to which individual motives, the rule of reason would appear to result in no recognizable pattern at all.
(3) The distribution of the elements supplies the answer. Let us take examples from the field of nature and society. A man has an interest in audition.d Most of it is, of course, practical: in conversation, or in listening to music, we indulge in this interest. But much of it is cognitive; it appeals to an intellectual curiosity that yearns for explanations and predictions. But even this cognitive strength of the interest turns toward a specious “corner” of the universe, where a variety of elements are hiding. “Hearing” may link sound with human anatomy and produce the discipline of physiology of the senses; it may deal with “sound” and the measurable space and time, which physics has so successfully explored; it may refer to “music” and the laws of harmony; it may turn toward the history of musical instruments, or toward the technique of operatic singing. Each time, a different set of elements appears on the scene.e Live sounds, together with parts of the human anatomy in the physiology of the senses; masse, space, and tone in acoustics; musical notes in the theory of harmony; artifact, manufacture in the history of musical instruments; orchestra and the organs of the body in vocal training. Sound hearing, song, music, and human speech are all huddled together in that corner of the universe to which our interest faces; and yet, as the searchlight of one method after another is turned on this region, different elements come into view. The strands of interest also intermingle in the most varied ways. While each separate discipline satisfies some of it, none satisfies it completely, nor perhaps do they do so together. Indeed our original interest does not only direct the beams of the searchlight, but also combines the results of this operation. As long as that interest has not been impaired, it can perform the vital function of putting to use the results of the various disciplines. Without this it would not be possible to apply theoretical knowledge to empirical reality.
The social sciences turn toward the human work, which occupies an altogether different place in our consciousness from that of nature. Much has been made of the fact that the elements of nature and society are largely identical; our physical body, our sensations and appetites, indeed even our mental faculties are such as may connect our world with that of the minerals, plants, and animals. It has been overlooked that, although this may be true and indeed explains why some parts of the human world could be satisfactorily explored with the help of methods rightly described as those of natural science, the character of the interest is utterly different. The job of living arises here with an immediacy unknown in the field of the natural sciences, and even if cases of similar urgency can be found there, the meaning of living is itself different. However, the formal analogy of nature and society holds insofar as in both cases there is a distribution of variegated elements, susceptible to a number of disciplines.
What are these disciplines and what is their relation to political theory?f
Human society is, of course, primarily of practical, not merely of theoretical interest to man.
The various scientific disciplines concerned with human society are mainly the different branches of sociology, anthropology, political science, economics, and statistics. Although they are all concerned with the human community, with interpersonal relations, with group history and group life, with regularities observable in man's behavior in society, yet the actual elements made visible in them are different, or at least they are related in a different fashion. Even the distribution of the same elements varies enormously, if sociometry is compared to law or ecology to the theory of sovereignty. But one of the most peculiar of all disciplines is political theory.
Interest is here narrowed down to that which the rule of reason can pattern out of the body politic. Only that, in the individual, shows up that is volition directed toward the common good – the latter being a state of affairs such as can be an object of human purpose. The individual is here a mere idealized shadow of himself – a citizen whose volition is determined by civic virtue. Conversely, service of the common good is legitimate, since it is rooted in the will of the citizens. Sovereignty appears as a function of individual freedom. Civic rights and public duties, as well as the hierarchy of legitimate power, form part of a pattern that has gained clarity and finiteness at the price of shading all other elements of social reality except those encompassed by the rule of reason. It is a gaunt structure, as empty as mathematics.
And yet no discipline is perhaps more vital – as we will see – to the survival of organized society than political theory, without which no progressive human community is indeed possible. For, the more general its proposition, the wider is applicability. However, it remains to be shown how such an application of theoretical propositions to empirical reality is possible at all.g
The answer, again, lies in the “third dimension” of science: the interests that give rise to it. Human interest is not simple but complex. Strands of interest intermingle in the most varied ways. Numberless interests of various character, tone, and intensity combine in the apparently simple “interest” with which we turn toward our “corner” of the universe. Now, the elements of reality existing in that region are dispersed in a manner that is utterly unpredictable. The pattern produced by the methods applied to those elements is also unpredictable.
Now this comprehensive interest has the quality of persistence. It does not disappear after having given birth to a scientific discipline. It continues to be active, its main function being to make use of the results obtained in the various disciplines. Although each method separates out a distinct pattern in “the region of interest,” the interest, by virtue of the strands contained in it, is capable of relating the patterns to one another and thus of putting together again that which was separated through the methods employed.