Sitting amongst the scorched ashes of his former home, the desert sun relentlessly beating down on his already sore and tortured body, Job sat with his arms stretched out in mercy. Suddenly, in one mighty bellow, he let out all the angst which gnawed and agitated him: âWherefore hast thou brought me forth?â (Job, 10:18). He prayed that, from beyond the transcended blue sky and the unending burnt orange sands, God, that supreme Deity in whom he had such loving faith, would provide answers. Suffering and in pain, Job wanted to know what the point of his existence was? For what purpose had God created him? Why had he been âbrought forthâ into being?
Jobâs plight is overtly theological, he seeks explanation as to why he had recently suffered so greatly at Godâs hands: why God had reduced his world to ashes. Nonetheless, despite its obvious theological focus, âThe Book of Jobâ is arguably one of the most existential books of the Bible, speaking to fundamental questions as to why we exist and what purpose we have in the world. For our being in this world is not a situation of our own making, it is not one we chose, yet it is the situation we find ourselves in and the one in which we must live and make sense of life. Like Job, Thomas Hobbes also saw this situation as one characterised by angst. Choosing a Pagan myth over Hebrew, Hobbes acutely compared it to the plight of Prometheus who, as punishment for transgressions against the gods, was chained to a rock so that the eagles could devour his liver by day, only for the organ to grow back each night, thus maintaining the agonising torture into perpetuity. So we human beings trapped in this strange world not of our choosing are tortured by its unknown possibilities (Hobbes 2008: 72). In such gnawing pain and doubt over these questions of existence, have we not all found ourselves in the position of Job, calling out into the vastness in hope for an answer as to why we have been âbrought forthâ into being.
Yet, we are not alone. We are not, like Prometheus, strapped to an isolated rock, nor are we abandoned into a vast and unforgiving desert. Rather, we find ourselves, from the moment of our entry into the world, immediately surrounded by âothersâ. âOthersâ who will help us understand this world we have been cast into and aid us in our search for a meaningful place in it. Such people will include those we love: parents, friends, partners. People Charles Taylor described as the âsignificant othersâ who shall help colour and define our earthly existence (Taylor 2003: 33â34). Such noteworthy âothersâ may, however, not just be ones we love, but also those who treat us with hostility: competitors, rivals, enemies, who shape our lives through antagonistic struggle. As Carl Schmitt observed, âwho we areâ is shaped as much by the antagonists we face as it is the friends who support us (Schmitt 2007). In addition to these particular âhuman othersâ, there are also those institutions, political organisations, and legal bodies, who will attempt to regulate and restrict our existence. Most notable and powerful amongst such bodies is undoubtably the modern State. This institution is one we likely never chose or consented to obey, yet obedience it will expect. It will demand we obey its commands, it will demand a proportion of any money we ever earn, it may even expect us to sacrifice our lives for its continuing survival. It will indeed expect us to be willing and proud to make such sacrifices. It will often claim we âowe itâ: we owe an obligation to it for creating conditions in which our existence may be happy and prosperous; we âowe itâ for making this situation we find ourselves in as safe and stable as possible. How we understand and accept these claimsâif we accept these claimsâand how our relationship with this authority develops will subsequently have an enormous influence on our journey through this world.
This book seeks to articulate an approach by which we may interpret how the relationship between citizens and States unfolds, a relationship denoted by the term âPolitical Obligationâ. It will in particular seek to understand how the State communicates such claims to its citizens; what justification it builds such arguments upon, and through which frameworks of language it chooses to communicate. The book will seek means to interpret this relationship through focus on the âencountersâ between citizen and State, the moments in which the citizen may come face to face with manifestations of the State whose territory she inhabits. It is by interpreting the arguments, ideas, and narratives the State presents to citizens in such âpolitical encountersâ it will be argued one can uncover and interpret the ethos upon which the State rests its authority, and which subsequently hold political communities together in a sense of obligation.
1.1 Political Obligation
The term âPolitical Obligationâ is one that may not be immediately familiar, even to the most well-educated and politically astute reader. Indeed, even students well versed in Political Philosophy may not be immediately familiar with what the term exactly denotes, although they will likely be able to have a reasonable guess. The term, as its most prominent scholars duly recognise, simply does not have the same currency in popular discourse as does more familiar concepts such as âjusticeâ and ârightsâ (Horton 2010: 1). It thus seems appropriate to make clear what I denote by the term âPolitical Obligationâ before proceeding. Political Obligation can be acutely understood to denote the relationship between the citizen and the political authority which governs the community of which she is a member. As the Nineteenth-century Idealist Philosopher T. H. Green articulated: Political Obligation includes âthe obligation of subjects towards the sovereign, of the citizen towards the State, and the obligations of citizens towards each other as enforced by a political superiorâ (Green 1986: 13). We might thus understand Political Obligation to be the sense of obligation which binds a political community together with the authority which governs it. Ideas, arguments, and narratives of Political Obligation thus underpin and form the foundation of the sense of legitimacy and duty within a community.
Political Obligation is often framed as a âproblemâ. Indeed, Dudley Knowles, one of the leading theorists on the subject in recent years, describes it as one of the oldest political problems (Knowles 2010: xi). This âproblemâ of Political Obligation is the difficulty of finding satisfactory grounds to justify a sense of obligation to political authority: the question of why we should accept this authority as a legitimate power over our lives. Framing Political Obligation as a âproblemâ, much discourse on the subject has subsequently taken the form of providing âanswersâ to it: to providing normative arguments as to why the citizen should, or should not, have a sense of obligation to this power. Indeed, it is notable that one of the first treatises specifically addressing the term Political Obligation, Greenâs âLectures on The Principles of Political Obligationâ, is explicitly concerned with giving normative argument as to exactly why the citizen is morally obliged to obey the State (Green 1986). This is reflected further in more contemporary discourse on the subject, which typically follows the method of outlining the âproblemâ of Political Obligation, proceeds to analyse the different âanswersâ to it, before finally providing what it is assessed to be the best âsolutionâ. 1 In this book however, I do not want to necessarily characterise Political Obligation as a âproblemâ which must be âsolvedâ. I feel such an approach moves us too quickly to trying to justify the citizen and State relationship without actually trying to understand it first. This book will thus be aimed at considering Political Obligation, less a âproblemâ to be âsolvedâ, and more a âsituationâ that we need to better understand.
Before explaining this shift between the framing of âproblemâ to that of âsituationâ, and the significance of this, I want to further consider the lack of âcurrencyâ Political Obligation has in popular discourse; why it may not share the same position in the public consciousness as its conceptual relatives âjusticeâ and ârightsâ. One reason may be that it is a philosophical concept which denotes not one issue but rather is an umbrella term covering many particular issues that exist in the relationship between citizen and State. This is hinted at by leading experts on the concept: John Horton claims that the term Political Obligation denotes a cluster of problems which lie at the heart of political life (Horton 2010: 1); Knowles echoes this interpretation when referring to Political Obligation as a âterm of art amongst philosophersâ which is in reality a âlabelâ used to group a cluster of more familiar issues (Knowles 2010: 6). Thus, whilst the umbrella âterm of artâ Political Obligation may be âarcaneâ and âunknownâ, the issues it is concerned with will be familiar to almost everyone; most citizens have never dwelled upon the âproblem of Political Obligationâ, but nearly every citizen will have likely at some time considered questions such as: âwhy must I pay taxes?â; âwhy is my childâs teacher inquiring into our family life?â; âwho are the government to tell me I cannot smoke cigarettes indoors?â This may to a degree explain why the term Political Obligation is unfamiliar, and framing it as an âumbrella questionâ may increase its popular appeal. Nonetheless, I would argue that the term denotes a greater issue than these particular surface questions may suggest. In asking âwhat is the basis of my relationship with political authorityâ, one is not simply asking why I should obey a particular command the State has given that is currently irritating me; âwho is the State to tell me where I can smoke?â On the contrary, it is rather inquiring into the foundations of this relationship: it is not necessarily asking why I should obey this law or that one, but rather the deeper more foundational question of âdo I have any obligation to obey political authority at all?â It is in the form of such inquiry that Political Obligation thus penetrates deeply into the fundamental arguments, ideas, and narratives which hold our political communities together.
The answer as to why the term has not attained popular currency is thus perhaps more likely to be that such deep questions do not occur to most citizens: most citizens do not stop to think âwhy do I listen to the government and obey the law?â âShould I?â Whilst one may grumble about a âsmoking banâ or an inquisitive government employee, this is unlikely to lead to a questioning of oneâs fundamental relationship to the State; being unhappy...