Philosophical Anarchism and Political Obligation

Magda Egoumenides

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781441124456
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Anarchism
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Political obligation refers to the moral obligation of citizens to obey the law of their state and to the existence, nature, and justification of a special relationship between a government and its constituents. This volume in the Contemporary Anarchist Studies series challenges this relationship, seeking to define and defend the position of critical philosophical anarchism against alternative approaches to the issue of justification of political institutions. The book sets out to demonstrate the value of taking an anarchist approach to the problem of political authority, looking at theories of natural duty, state justification, natural duty of justice, fairness, political institutions, and more. It argues that the anarchist perspective is in fact indispensable to theorists of political obligation and can improve our views of political authority and social relations. This accessible book builds on the works of philosophical anarchists such as John Simmons and Leslie Green, and discusses key theorists, including Rousseau, Rawls, and Horton. This key resource will make an important contribution to anarchist political theory and to anarchist studies more generally.

1

What the problem is

In this chapter I set out the central problem and argument developed in this study. For this I focus on three theorists, each of whom relates in a significant way to the position of critical philosophical anarchism. I discuss Rousseau as a traditional theorist whose view is a basic inspiration for the anarchist approach to political institutions. Joseph Raz’s theory is analyzed as a view largely compatible with critical philosophical anarchism. I use it to illustrate how accounts of state authority motivated by the anarchist perspective can be understood and improved. Finally, I discuss Simmons as a representative critical philosophical anarchist, from whose approach, however, I depart, criticizing it on central points in my defense of critical philosophical anarchism.

The problem of political obligation

The correlativity thesis

The problem of the existence and justification of political obligation is usually taken to be identical to the problem of the justification of political authority, which involves the establishment of the state’s (claim to the) right to rule. This right is most often seen as the logical correlate of an obligation to obey: when we assert the state’s right to rule, we automatically recognize that citizens have a political obligation to the state.¹ Alternatively, this correlativity of right and obligation can be conceived as a normative doctrine: if we have one, we should have the other. On this view, political obligation is understood as either a normative condition for or a normative consequence of political authority, although not identical to it.² Theorists are divided concerning whether to accept correlativity in any of the above senses.³ To the extent that political authority is understood as a complex right to exclusively and coercively make regulations, impose duties, and demand compliance (i.e., command and be obeyed, or, more inclusively, issue directives⁴ and have them followed), then it is properly taken as correlative to a complex set of obligations constituting a general obligation to comply, i.e., political obligation.⁵ In this study I take this correlativity as one central sense of legitimacy, whether in its logical or in its normative form. Since normative correlativity already involves substantive considerations about the nature of political authority and our relation to it, however, it is sufficient to focus on the normative form of correlativity for us to keep in mind that it is in the nature of the state’s claim-right to rule to generate obligations to it.

The two main aspects of the problem of political obligation

Thus the problem of political obligation is primarily the problem of finding a special justification for the various obligations imposed on citizens by their political institutions, which are correlative to a complex right of those institutions to rule those citizens. Theorists like Horton seem to be correct that this problem in fact involves a range of questions and that, in addition to the question of justification, the issues of the author and of the scope of political obligations are also central. This study concentrates on the question of justification, which, as Horton rightly points out, is presupposed by the other two and in general “has been taken to be the kernel of the philosophical problem of political obligation.”⁶ It is with regard to the question “why should we obey political authority?” that I evaluate the anarchist position. The traditional philosophical discussion of political authority concerns attempts to account for de jure political authority, that is, authority that has the right to rule—or is exercised in accordance with a certain set of principles or rules—rather than for de facto political authority, namely one that claims to have this right and has this claim acknowledged by its subjects.⁷ Because no state has the right to rule, the anarchist demands the moral justification or, in other words, the legitimacy of de facto authority. This problem has also been identified as that of state legitimacy morally understood. I use “state legitimacy” interchangeably with “state authority” and “political obligation.”⁸

Political obligation has traditionally been regarded as that notion through which we must understand a special relationship between individuals and the political institutions of their country of residence. There are two main features of the nature of the problem of political obligation:

(a) The state, the law, and political institutions in general have a special character and status. This is described by four theses.⁹ The sources thesis: political institutions take their own validity from within the political/legal structure, from legally defined criteria and standards. The particularity thesis: citizens are taken to have a special relationship with their own government as it itself determines the conditions of membership within its territory. This means that political institutions have a particular constituency to which they apply and any justification of political obligation should provide a basis for obeying one’s own particular government with its own criteria for membership.¹⁰ The coercion thesis: institutional requirements may be backed by coercion. The state is sovereign and monopolistic in the sense that it determines the rights and duties of its citizens in an authoritarian, permanent, and exclusionary way. With respect to this function, legal sanction, or coercion, is its primary means. The independence premise: an account of political obligation should include criteria that show the independent nature of the “political” (as this nature is reflected in the elements of the three previous theses), and it is by appeal to this essentially political nature of institutions that political obligation should be justified. That is, the special commitment that such an obligation is supposed to express needs to be shown to be necessarily connected to its political nature. I will be referring to these four premises as “the theses on the political.”

(b) The commands of political authorities are directed at the behavior of individuals in the public domain. This means that such commands have a direct effect not only on the beliefs of individuals, but also on their actions (such directives guide their practical reasoning and behavior). In this way they are reasons for action—normative requirements, those with the power to direct action—in the same way as moral or prudential reasons. More importantly, for those who accept and discuss the problem of political obligation, political obligations are understood to be moral in character.¹¹ They are the defining terms of a special moral relationship between citizens and their polity, a concomitant of the latter’s status as a normative power, that is, of its claim to a moral right to impose directives on its citizens. Yet the most convincing reason for requiring a moral ground is that it provides the most appropriate way of filtering political requirements in order to decide which of them can properly be attributed the status of obligations. Thus it works as a criterion for distinguishing requirements that can be accepted as valid laws from requirements that are unacceptable. When, for example, individuals are presented with laws against bodily harm and laws discriminating against a specific group of people (such as immigrants), they need to be able to assert the acceptability of the former and exclude the latter by reference to a stable testing ground. Since institutions have a considerable effect on our lives, such filtering is necessary and valuable, because it demands that institutions need to be sufficiently motivated in doing so: there have to be convincing reasons in favor of their interference. A moral ground provides the strongest basis for normative requirements, creating a distance from our institutions that is beneficial to a critical assessment of their function and quality. These points express the second important aspect of the issue of political obligation as traditionally understood: a justification of political obligation must involve the provision of moral grounds for supporting political institutions, if political obligation is to be acceptable.

Together (a) and (b) say that an adequate justification of political obligation involves the recognition of the legitimacy of political authority qua political, on the basis of moral reasons. Following philosophical anarchists, I see as inevitable the need to defend the existence of special obligations in the political domain with moral principles and arguments. This is so mainly because of the direct and dominant role that political institutions, with their requirements and present practices, play in our social lives and because they claim the right to do so. The demands of political institutions affect primarily individual self-determination and social equality, which gives rise to a constant requirement to put limits on these institutions and conditions on how they do so, rooted in individual life and morality. As the anarchist reminds us, domination and coercion can never be desirable in themselves, without proper motivation. They are always a defect, needing to be counterbalanced by merits that are sufficiently strong to qualify the agencies that incorporate them. The very fact that obligations are requirements, which involve a “pressure to perform,” makes explicit the tie between obligation, domination, and coercion, thus pressing the demand for proper justification.¹² These points relate to the other central feature in the traditional understanding of the debate over political obligation: the appeal to a moral reason as a ground of the political qua political. To appeal occasionally (or even frequently) to moral reasons as justifications for compliance with particular laws does not constitute a moral recognition of the authority of the law.¹³

Quality-based and interaction-based evaluations of political institutions

Two central elements of the evaluation of states that are found in discussions of political obligation are quality and specific interaction. The former involves general positive qualities or accomplishments of institutions (such as justice and the supply of important goods), and it is a commonplace in moral arguments for their existence. The latter refers to “morally significant features of the specific histories of interaction between individual persons and their polities” (components such as actually giving one’s consent).¹⁴ Judgments about the nature of political institutions, the qualities that might make them morally acceptable, provide a basic condition that institutions must satisfy, and in this respect they affect judgments about political obligation.¹⁵ Some of the theories of political obligation employ them more centrally, as grounds of that question. But the general moral relationship based on the nature of a state overall differs from the particular moral relationship that is the focus of the problem of political obligation. It will be part of the argument of this study to see whether the one can ground the other and, in general, to assess the role of institutional qualities in justifying political obligation. This study follows a classical perspective in seeing the problem of political obligation as concerned with grounding a special bond between individual and government through understanding “the relationship or transaction which could create” such a bond.¹⁶ This study also stresses the fact that political obligation is a special bond between a particular government and each particular citizen. Having such a particularized character, political obligation seems more likely to derive from very specific relationships, characterized by the actual and particular features of direct transaction, and it is doubtful that these can be captured by more generally described connections between states and subjects.¹⁷ Thus, political obligation appears more relevant to the category of transactional evaluation, which Simmons considers to be the proper one for assessing the question of political obligation.

These are some preliminary points that will play an important role for the main argument of this study and will be further clarified in the course of its development. Whether or not justification and legitimacy are separate dimensions of the evaluation of institutions and whether or not justification in terms of institutional qualities (or of generic evaluation) is directed primarily at the existence of the state, anarchism challenges political institutions with regard to both existence and obligation. This study concentrates on its position with regard to the particular relationship of political obligation. Nevertheless, one of my main objectives is to show how the critical philosophical anarchist perspective makes the problem of political obligation central for a broader evaluation of political institutions, thus ultimately a challenge to their very existence.

The conditions of political obligation

The four theses that define the political nature of obligation and the demand for a moral ground are accompanied by certain formal conditions that have traditionally been used to determine theories of political obligation and that are pressed by anarchists. In the next few pages I will clarify which of these conditions remain operative and introduce their role within the debate on political obligation.

Theories of political obligation, which attempt to justify morally a specially political kind of requirement, are constrained by four formal conditions: particularity, generality, bindingness, and content-independence. I call them “the conditions of political obligation.” These conditions appear as merely formal requirements, which a theorist of political obligation might find reasons to dispense with, against the anarchist standpoint. But one task of this study is to make explicit how their role is indispensable in the debate on political obligation and how these conditions characterize the anarchist perspective, ultimately helping decide the anarchist contribution within this debate. This study is aimed at confirming that they are justifiably offered as determinants of the link required between the political nature of obligation and its second aspect,...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Halftitle Page
• Title Page
• Dedication Page
• Contents 
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1. What the problem is
• 2. The limits of voluntarism
• 3. An anarchist critique of the Rawlsian idea of a natural duty of justice
• 4. The failure of the principle of fairness as an account of political obligation
• 5. Horton revisited
• 6. Where friends of political institutions and anarchists are in the same boat
• 7. Anarchism: Philosophical and political
• Epilogue
• Bibliography
• Index
• Imprint