Mob Characters and Hayek: The Constitution of Liberty Preface (2)-1 Rousseau and the General Will

Introduction

In the first part of the preface, I started with a quote from Pericles and traced a positive lineage that leads from Locke, Montesquieu, and Smith to Hayek.
A consistent theme of "protecting liberty" flowed through it.

However, as I continue reading the preface of "The Constitution of Liberty," I notice something.
There is not only a warmth in Hayek's writing style that seems to reminisce about this lineage, but also a certain sense of urgency.

It is the urgency of a stance of "fighting".

I am a 'lost generation' guy, a mob character.
It would be extremely difficult to accurately grasp the true intentions of a great thinker.
Even so, I would like to trace the true nature of this urgency in my own way as a mob character.

What was Hayek fighting against?

In 1960, when Hayek wrote "The Constitution of Liberty," he was fighting against something.

It was not an abstract ideological debate. It was a concrete struggle of ideas unfolding right before his eyes.

First, I would like to hear how he describes it himself.

This is how I interpret it

Hayek writes here, "currently taking place."
It is not a problem of the past, nor a concern for the future.
It is a statement about a struggle that is happening right now before his eyes.

And he calls that struggle a "great struggle of ideologies."
It is not merely a policy debate.
It is a fight over the foundations of thought.

What is interesting is that Hayek assumes this struggle is unavoidable.
"If we are to win," he says.
The option of running away from the struggle is not in his field of vision.

And the conclusion is a demand on the reader.
" We must first and foremost know our own convictions."

I feel something at the root of Hayek's thought in this one sentence.

Liberty means not delegating one's thinking to others.
Do not delegate it to authority, do not delegate it to experts, and do not delegate it to the atmosphere of the group.
Know your own convictions yourself and speak in your own words.
That is the essence of liberty.

Abandoning thought and delegating it to others is, regardless of what kind of liberty is formally guaranteed, substantially equivalent to the abandonment of liberty.

Hayek places this recognition as a premise.
Based on that premise, he enters the main body of "The Constitution of Liberty."
Where is liberty threatened, and what kind of thought undermines liberty?
The position of the argument developed in the main body is already made clear at the beginning of this preface.

He asks the same of the reader as well.
Think for yourself and know your own convictions, he says.

If so, I will trace what he was fighting against with my own feet.

I want to start with Rousseau.

To trace what Hayek was fighting against, it is necessary to look at both the historical background and the intellectual lineage.

The era of 1960.
And the source of the intellectual lineage Hayek fought against.

Tracing this source leads to one thinker.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

The concept of the "general will" that he presented determined the subsequent intellectual trend.
And I would like to look at how that trend is structurally connected to the historical consequences of the 20th century.

Why start with Rousseau?
That is because it is the most fundamental starting point for understanding what Hayek was fighting against.

The era of 1960

I wrote that I wanted to start with Rousseau, but before that, I want to confirm what kind of era Hayek was in when he wrote The Constitution of Liberty.
By knowing the atmosphere of the times, the intellectual trends he faced become clearer.

1960, when Hayek wrote The Constitution of Liberty.
What kind of era was this decade?

The Soviet Union had launched Sputnik, the world's first artificial satellite, in 1957.
In 1961, Gagarin achieved the first human spaceflight.
They were ahead of the West in space development.
Khrushchev said, "We will bury you," and declared in 1961 that they would "reach communism within 20 years."
According to official statistics, the Soviet industrial growth rate was higher than that of the United States.

Standard economics textbooks of the time included graphs to the effect that "the Soviet economy might overtake the United States in the near future."
It was an era when many intellectuals seriously thought so.

In the Third World, where decolonization was progressing, the planned economy model held strong appeal as a "development model for late-developing countries."
Nehru of India, Nasser of Egypt, and many other leaders of emerging nations saw the future in state-led economic planning.

Even in advanced Western countries, moderate planning was the mainstream among intellectuals.
Keynesian macroeconomic policy, the Beveridge-type welfare state, French state-led industrial policy, and Nordic social democracy.
These were widely supported as "the best of both capitalism and socialism."

In this era, Hayek was in the minority.

He was in a position often ridiculed as an "outdated 19th-century liberal."
His ally Mises was treated similarly.

That is precisely why his words, "the great struggle of ideologies that is actually taking place," were not rhetoric but a recognition of reality.
He was a minority going against the tide of the times.
However, he still followed his own convictions and wrote this book.

The person Jean-Jacques Rousseau

The intellectual trend Hayek faced in 1960 did not emerge in a single day.

Tracing its source leads to 18th-century France.
There is one thinker there.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

Rousseau was born in Geneva in 1712.
His mother died when she gave birth to him,and he grew up separated from his father in his early childhood.
Without receiving a formal education, he deepened his thoughts through self-study.

He was active in France during the Enlightenment, and authored works such as "Discourse on the Origin and Basis of Inequality Among Men" (1755), "The Social Contract" (1762), and "Emile" (1762).
However, his works were banned in various places, and Rousseau ended up moving from place to place as if being chased.

In England, the philosopher Hume devotedly protected him.
However, Rousseau gradually began to feel that Hume was trying to frame him, and denounced him in an open letter, breaking off their relationship.
He spent his final years with the feeling that he was being conspired against by those around him.
In 1778, he died in solitude.

He was a thinker who pioneered the cutting edge of his era, and at the same time, he was a person who struggled throughout his life to maintain relationships with others.

Rousseau's Face ①: The Insightful Observer of the Individual

Rousseau has two faces.

First, Rousseau as a deep observer of the individual.

In "Discourse on the Origin and Basis of Inequality Among Men," he diagnosed that civilization distorts human natural sensibility.
He argued that vanity, born from comparison with others, erodes the original human self-love.

In "Emile," he developed an educational theory that respects the child's spontaneity.
Rather than imposing external norms, it is a stance of supporting the child's own natural growth.

What is here is an insight into the natural sensibility and intrinsic motivation within each individual human being.

In terms of modern psychology, one could position Rousseau as a distant ancestor of Maslow's theory of self-actualization and Deci and Ryan's self-determination theory.

I feel a deep respect for this face of Rousseau.

Rousseau's Face ②: The Theorist of "The Social Contract"

However, Rousseau has another face.

His face as the theorist of "The Social Contract".

In this book, he presented the concept of the "general will."
The general will is not the sum of the individual wills of each person.
It is the essential will of the entire community, he says.

"The general will is never wrong."
"Whoever refuses to obey the general will shall be compelled to be free."

Why did Rousseau, who was an insightful observer of the individual, arrive at such a claim?

Within him, these two faces may not be contradictory.
Perhaps it is precisely because he respects the natural spontaneity of the individual that he sought to remake the civilized society that distorts it through the general will.

However, it seems as if he is denying the accumulation from the past and trying to rebuild from scratch.

Is that not far too arrogant?
We are merely able to see a little further by standing on the shoulders of the great figures of the past.
Is it not a fatal conceit to deny that accumulation from its very foundation?

The logic of "compelled to be free"

"Whoever refuses to obey the general will shall be compelled to be free."

At first glance, it appears to be a contradictory expression.
What does it mean to be compelled while being free?

Following his logic, it can be understood as follows.

Humans have two types of will.
One is the particular will, which is swayed by immediate desires.
The other is the general will, which embodies the essential interests of humanity.

For Rousseau, true freedom is not following immediate desires.
That is, after all, being a slave to desire.
True freedom lies in following the essence of humanity.

Therefore, when a person desires something contrary to the general will, it is their immediate desire, not their true will.
Compelling them to follow the general will is to realize their true freedom.

This is Rousseau's logic.

However, one question arises here.

"Who determines the 'true freedom' of others?"

Entrusting oneself to others?
Is that not an abandonment of freedom?

What does it mean to know the general will

Another premise is hidden in Rousseau's concept of the general will.

The premise that "there can exist those who know the general will".

Someone can grasp the essential will of the entire community of society. That person who has grasped it can lead the community
.

This premise becomes the starting point for the intellectual lineage following Rousseau.

Hayek's answer

I interpret it this way

Hayek is speaking here of epistemological limits.

No one can know the whole of society.

This proposition shakes Rousseau's concept of the general will to its foundations.
This is because to know the general will, one must grasp the will of the entire society.
Since no human intelligence can do that, anyone who claims 'I know the general will' is, in principle, a fraud.

This is a warning against the fictional existence of a 'leader who knows everything'.
And at the same time, it is a warning to us, the general public, who might believe in such a fictional leader.

Every person must judge for themselves, on their own responsibility, everything concerning themselves. However, that is a heavy burden.
Therefore, one wants to entrust it to 'someone who knows everything.'
That temptation is understandable.

But Hayek says:
Such a human intelligence that knows everything does not exist in principle.

Entrusting it to others, regardless of whether the general will actually exists, is nothing other than the abandonment of freedom.

In the first place, is the one you are entrusting it to actually reflecting your own convictions?

But here, an even more fundamental question arises.

Does the 'will' of a community really exist?

If it is the will of individuals, it certainly exists.
When those wills gather, relationships are born.
However, apart from the totality of those relationships, does the 'will' of the community itself exist?

Those who claim to 'know' something called the general will are, in fact, perhaps speaking of their own particular will in the name of the general will.

Finally

However, this concept of Rousseau's would go on to greatly move subsequent history.

How the mechanism of the general will was inherited throughout the history of thought and what consequences it produced in the 20th century.

Next time, I would like to trace that path.

[References]

F. A. Hayek, "The Constitution of Liberty I: The Value of Freedom (Popular Edition)," supervised by Chiaki Nishiyama and Kinji Yajima, translated by Kenzo Kiga and Katsujiro Koga, Shunjusha
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, "Discourse on the Origin and Basis of Inequality Among Men" (1755)
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, "The Social Contract" (1762)
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, "Emile, or On Education" (1762)