The Online Library of Liberty

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• Editorial Staff
• Associate Editors
• Editorial
• Bibliographical Essay: Isaac Kramnick, English Middle-class Radicalism In the Eighteenth Century
• I: I Social and Political Thought
• Community, Individuality, and Freedom
• Rousseau's Social Thought
• A Sociological History of Utilitarianism
• Spencer and Comte In American Labor Thought
• Bureaucracy In Weber & Kafka
• Bergson's Political Doctrines
• Oakeshott's Political Theory
• Oakeshott's Political Philosophy
• Undermocratic Liberal Republicans
• Wilkes and Radical Politics
• Late Liberal Imperialism
• Kant and Reason In Politics
• II: Education, Politics, and Values
• Schools and Political Socialization
• Schooling For Imperialism
• The Political Economy of Public Schooling
• Federal Education Policy
• The Problems of Federal Education
• William James As Individualist
• Existential and Phenomenological Education
• Early Federal Educational Policy
• Education, Labor Markets, & Controlled Youth
• Government Control of Universities
• III: Economic Thought and Values
• Business and Legal History
• Schumpeter's Economic Theories
• Menger and Entrepreneurship
• Saint-simonian Economic Ideas
• The Free Market & the Third World
• Democratic Capitalism, Justice, & Religion
• Property, Law, and Economics
• The Economic Analysis of Law Vs. Values
• IV: Foreign Policy and Ideology
• The Attractiveness of War
• Walzer On International Morality
• Eduard Bernstein and Imperialism
• Roosevelt Vs. His War Critics
• American Preconceptions of Japan
• The Marshall Plan and Russia
• V: Self-knowledge, Autonomy, and Liberty
• The Self In Political Thought
• Autonomy, Self, and Will Power
• Self-knowledge: Goethe, Kant, and Hegel
• The Egoist As a “psychopath”
• The History of Social Psychology
• Psychology, Self, and Society
• Free Will, Responsibility, and Motivation
• Free Will, Purpose, and Responsibility
• Political “groupthink” and Reality
• Personal Freedom and Autonomy
• Research Fields
• Economics
• Education
• History
• Philosophy
• Political Philosophy
• Psychology
• Sociology

IV

Foreign Policy and Ideology

What accounts for the appeal of war, militarism, and imperialism? The following summaries analyze facets of the personal motivations and abstract ideology that justify war and international violation of individual rights. Stromberg's study of the reasons behind many intellectuals' enthusiasm for World War I confirms Robert Nisbet's earlier dissection of “The Lure of Military Society” in The Twilight of Authority (1975). These summaries show that one's vision of the value of all human life affects one's judgment of just and unjust wars, the morality of imperialism, war critics, and national “enemies.” An earlier issue of Literature of Liberty (October/December 1979, p.56–67) stressed Sir Herbert Read's linking of irresponsibility or forgetfulness of the preciousness of every individual human life with political power and the spirit of militarism.

The Attractiveness of War

Roland N. Stromberg

With few exceptions, such as Bertrand Russell, the overwhelming number of European intellectuals in the various countries welcomed the coming of the First World War. Only a tiny handful were conscientious objectors. It is difficult for historians today to understand the outlook of those who glorified the coming of the war, and numerous recent biographies of such intellectuals are embarrassed by this attitude.

Why did war have such appeal to the intellectuals? It offered a sense of purpose for the intellectuals, a “spiritual awakening” which transcended the “narrowness and pettiness” of everyday life, offering “new perspectives on greatness.” War promised a growing opportunity for community and fraternity for intellectuals unhappy with the growing materialism and individualism. For the youth there was talk of “self-discovery” through violence and the solidarity of struggle.

There was a remarkable similarity between the youth of that generation and those today, which included such things as “communalism, getting back to nature, unconventional sexual morality, mistrust of the older generation, and protests against false education.” A worship of the irrational encompassed the occult, the mystical and the spiritual. Culture implied soul, while civilization meant intellect.

There was a certain paradox and illogic in rebelling against a sterile culture which impinged upon the individual, while asserting that individual affirmation could best be achieved through the re-creation of a primitive community where reason was subordinated to instinct. The overriding hope that a better world would arise from the ashes was closely linked to the “prevailing ‘historicism,’ at once optimistic and irrational.” Nowhere is this attitude better observed than in the work of Max Scheler, a pioneer in phenomenology, who argued in 1915 in The Genius of War and the German War that war would destroy the mechanical, bureaucratic organization of society and encourage freedom, love, and the creative spirit.

Walzer on International Morality

Gerald Doppelt

• University of California at San Diego

In Just and Unjust Wars, a major concern of Michael Walzer is to develop a theory of international aggression by means of a “legalist paradigm” within which states have rights and duties. Walzer is aware of certain problems, for the rights of states are difficult to determine, and in justifying the use of (or resistence to) force, what are the rights of individuals? In his view, for example, state sovereignty exists independently of the form of its political institutions. Foreign intervention can be justified, however, in three cases: humanitarian, to prevent a massacre or resettlement of the population; counterintervention, in which some other state has already intervened in the situation; and, secession, in which one political community coercively attempts to prevent the peaceful secession of another political community nearby.

The paradox inherent in Walzer's view leads to two questions. Why should unfree states be treated as possessing moral rights of political sovereignty; and “In what conceivable sense do such rights ‘derive ultimately from the rights of individuals?’” Walzer argues that a majority is not justified in asking for outside help in a despotism where that might improve the chance of success against the better armed forces of the regime. Doppelt suggests that this error stems from attempting to equate state sovereignty with individual rights.

For Walzer an established political community's right to self-determination is based upon consent, community, and collective rights. Thus, the citizens should defend this government to which they have given their consent and which protects their community and common life. But this notion of consent is very close to that argued by Thomas Hobbes. And what if the government is tyrannical though it does maintain a degree of order?

The term “community” raises question about just what constitutes this evasive entity. In the liberal tradition this has meant an essential equality under law, but Walzer does not devote much attention to such matters, nor does he clarify what he means by “free.” The major thrust of Walzer's whole argument reveals a conservative bias toward “de facto governments as the cornerstone of international morality.”

Consent is difficult to define because of the ambiguities of most social orders, and the attitude of many may be neither loyalty on the one hand, or outright opposition on the other. Unless there is respect for the rights of individuals, the term “consent” loses any real meaning.

Eduard Bernstein and Imperialism

Roger Fletcher

It is difficult to categorize Eduard Bernstein among the various writers who dealt with imperialism and foreign policy in the years prior to the First World War. He was neither indifferent to the importance of foreign policy, nor can he be described as one of those attracted to ideas of social imperialism. His views can best be understood within the context of party faction in the German Social Democratic Party.

The center of the Party was challenged not so much by radicals on the left as from those on the right. Prior to 1914, little writing among party leaders was given over to foreign policy matters. On the question of imperialism, the major influence was that of Karl Kautsky. While his views changed over time, by 1911 Kautsky, along with most centrists had come to believe “that imperialism itself was not a necessary feature of mature capitalism but rather an ephemeral aberration foisted upon capitalism by preindustrial social groups.” Imperialist rivalries would be superceded by a cartelization of world markets. For radicals of the left, such as Rosa Luxemburg and others, imperialism demanded a uniting of the masses for revolution, and many thought its collapse was imminent.

Although Bernstein did not systematize his views on imperialism, he did differentiate between ancient and modern imperialism, and rejected the idea that imperialism was the final stage of some sort of “moribund monopolistic capitalism.” He saw each particular type of imperialism as significant. That of the British, for example, was often defensive, progressive to the colonial peoples, and of a “strongly democratic, libertarian” type. On the other hand, he was very negative about German imperialism, based as it was on an intellectual climate of “super-patriotism,” often anti-British or anti-Russian. It was Germany which disturbed world peace and whose foreign policy was badly in need of some democratic counterforces.

At the same time Bernstein's view of imperialism was linked to notions of Social Darwinism. Colonialism, he believed, involved territorial expansion, permanent settlement, and the transference of a higher civilization, though he conceded it might well lead to certain excesses, such as mistreatment of the natives or retarding economic growth. Bernstein felt that colonies were not a necessity, but might even be an economic burden. He argued that Social Democracy should throw its weight behind German colonial policy in order to improve and upgrade it. While he had many insights into the nature of colonialism and imperialism, taken as a comprehensive whole, his views were not free of inconsistencies and even contradictions.

Roosevelt vs. His War Critics

Richard W. Steele

• San Diego State University

After the beginning of World War Two in 1939, the Roosevelt Administration faced widespread cynicism about the war's origins and considerable well-organized resistance to American involvement. Silencing or discrediting these critics became an important part of the overall effort to change the public's attitude. The persistence of the President's attempts gives some insight into his attitudes about free expression and the limits of presidential authority. Fed by spurious data from British intelligence, the Administration sought to demonstrate that the critics had links with the Nazis.

As early as 1934, Roosevelt had asked the FBI to investigate the Nazi movement in the U.S. This was almost at once expanded to include all dissidents, politically inspired, and “only remotely related to the commission of a crime or ‘subversion.’” By 1940 J. Edgar Hoover, the FBI Director, commented privately that the Administration and the Bureau would be seriously embarrassed if the nature and breadth of these investigations were made public.

Roosevelt tended to take a conspiratorialist view of the isolationists, seeing them as selfish opportunists or disloyal. After 1940 he attempted to portray them as members of a Nazi “fifth column,” to the American public, while Hoover confidentially discounted any such threat. The President moved against his critics as if allegations were facts.

To design a program to deal with his critics, the President chose Harold Ickes, a man like Roosevelt, whose civil libertarianism extended only to his friends. Both Solicitor General Francis Biddle and Attorney General Robert Jackson were concerned about the constitutional implications of such political harassment of critics. A secret investigative group later attempted to gain evidence against the anti-war America First Committee, and one advisor urged using the IRS against dissidents.

Roosevelt's campaign also extended to a manipulation of the press, and even after the war was underway, the Administration continued its harassment of critics, despite the lack of evidence of any “fifth column.” The President attempted to inculcate into Americans his own view that dissent was subversion.

American Preconceptions of Japan

Abraham Ben-Zui

• Hebrew University of Jerusalem

After Pearl Harbor two divergent interpretations emerged. Revisionists argued that Roosevelt pushed Japan toward war in order to involve the U.S. in the larger conflagration in Europe. On the other side, writers “praised the administration for being realistic, consistent, and prescient.” The end of the war, focusing around the use of the atomic bomb against Japan, also developed two schools of thought. The revisionists suggested that the U.S. used the bomb primarily as a political act to demonstrate American power to the Soviet Union. The traditionalists have argued that the bomb was used intelligently to hasten the end of the war.

If the revisionists have not fully proved their cases with respect to 1941 and 1945, it “should by no means imply that all facets of these issues have been fully dealt with or are fully explained.” “This study examines the extent to which U.S. policy makers were predisposed, in 1945, to evaluate events in the Pacific in the light of the recent past,” and to explore any “link between the outbreak and termination of the Pacific War.” Methodologically, it is apparent that decision makers act “in accordance with their perception of reality, not in response to reality itself,” and that the “image of the opponent” is fundamental for understanding behavior in crisis situations.

So-called “global-realists” such as Henry Stimson, Henry Morgenthau, Jr., and Stanley K. Hornbeck were dominant in policy decisions prior to 1941. Failing to see the “dangers of war inherent in their strategy of coercive diplomacy,” they believed the Japanese would yield to a firm, strong pressure. They persisted in this belief in spite of Japanese messages and the warnings of other policy makers such as Joseph Crew, General Lee Gerow, and John Emmerson. The former group consistently, for example, underestimated the Japanese and their military equipment.

When war did come, these men came to regard the Japanese as mad men and fanatics for having gone to war. Ironically, it was this new perception which dominated their thinking as the end of the war approached. Thus, they were often oblivious to a growing amount of evidence that Japan was exhausted, and would not continue a fanatical fight to the finish. But given this new perception of the Japanese as irrational, the use of the bomb to end the war became more logical in their thinking.

From the standpoint of making policy, it is not only important to have different points of view presented, but that an atmosphere be maintained so that those, in effect, playing “the devil's advocate,” feel their views are being taken seriously, rather than being simply ignored.

The Marshall Plan and Russia

William C. Cromwell

• The American University

This study examines U.S. policy planning with respect to the issue of Soviet and Eastern European participation in the Marshall Plan in order to ascertain whether the U.S. pursued a strategy excluding Russia, as suggested by several revisionist historians.

An early paper by George Kennan acknowledged that “we have no plan,” and Secretary of State George Marshall sought to disassociate any U.S. recovery policy from the anti-communist rhetoric which had characterized the Truman Doctrine. The Policy Planning Staff stressed that any formal plan for recovery should be initiated by the Europeans. On the other hand Undersecretary of State William L. Clayton argued that “the U.S. must run the show.” Marshall's Harvard speech, drafted by Charles Bohlen, drew upon both above sources, but it does appear that at this point the U.S. had no plan. In later talks with the British what is clear is that its leaders sought to secure maximum aid, though the question of Soviet participation drew little attention.

The major consideration by the Americans was to secure domestic acceptance of any plan by the Congress. Marshall wished to avoid any debate and before his own thoughts had developed and before any European response was forthcoming. Ironically, the European approach pressed by the Administration against the British was not anti-Soviet, whereas the British separate national position was similar to the idea later pushed by the Russians.

Kennan and others sought to keep the aid issue out of the conflict between the U.S. and Russia, but policy makers like Clayton thought in terms of Western Europe. In talking with the British about any program, the French especially were anxious to avoid the impression of taking organizational initiatives without the Russians, but both agreed to proceed without the Soviets if necessary. The Russians certainly were suspicious in the meetings held by the three nations, where the British, in effect, denied the talks with Clayton had been official. The Russians refused to go along with a plan that would have required revealing more data about their situation than they felt necessary.

It would appear that, despite the offer, policy makers were not enthusiastic about the idea of Soviet participation in any recovery plan. On the other hand the devolving strategy which placed initiative and conditions on the Europeans, and which caused the Soviets to back away, was not intended for that reason but rather to gain domestic support and passage by the Congress.