Norms
of Liberty is a work of political philosophy written by Douglas
B Rasmussen and Douglas J Den Uyl, and published in 2005.
The blurb on Amazon provides a good description of what
the book is about:
“How can we establish a political/legal order that in principle does not require the human flourishing of any person or group to be given structured preference over that of any other? Addressing this question as the central problem of political philosophy, Norms of Liberty offers a new conceptual foundation for political liberalism that takes protecting liberty, understood in terms of individual negative rights, as the primary aim of the political/legal order.”
Rasmussen
and Den Uyl argue for construing individual rights as metanormative principles.
These principles establish the political/ legal conditions under which full
moral conduct can take place.
The authors
distinguish metanormative principles from normative principles that provide
guidance for moral conduct within the ambit of normative ethics. This crucial
distinction allows them to develop liberalism as a metanormative theory rather
than as a guide for moral conduct.
The authors
show that the moral universe can support liberalism without either being minimized
or requiring morality to be grounded in sentiment or contracts. Rather,
liberalism can be supported, and many of its internal tensions avoided, with an
ethical framework of Aristotelian inspiration―one that understands human
flourishing to be an objective, inclusive, individualized, agent-relative,
social, and self-directed activity.
Readers who are
looking for a more expansive synopsis should read Ed Younkins’s essay, ‘Rasmussen and Den Uyl’s Trilogy of
Freedom and Flourishing’, published on The Savvy Street.
Some
explanation of the authors’ use of the term ‘liberalism’ might be helpful at
this point. As well as defending classical liberalism and libertarianism, the
authors seek to defend other types of political liberalism (as the term is used
in the United States) which still subscribe to some of the tenets of classical
liberalism e.g. that people should be free to pursue their own conceptions of
the good life.
My purpose
here is not to review the book but to explain why the book has made a lasting
impression on me. First, I will explain why I thought the book made an
important contribution when I first read it in 2007. Then, I will explain why I
still think the book provides the most appropriate framework in which to
consider the rights of individuals.
My
initial impression
Rasmussen
and Den Uyl advanced their argument for construing individual rights as
metanormative principles in large part as a response to communitarian and conservative
critics who claimed that liberalism had undermined its own principles.
I had read some
communitarian literature prior to reading Norms of Liberty but I was
more concerned about the threat to individual rights posed by people who wanted
to make happiness a goal of national economic policy. The people concerned
wanted to use survey data on average life satisfaction to monitor achievement
of that goal. I was concerned that responses to life satisfaction surveys don’t
give appropriate weight to everything that is important to people and that using
such surveys to pursue a national happiness goal would interfere with
individual choice. (I wrote an article about such matters in 2004. It can be
found here.)
I read Norms
of Liberty at a time when I was ready to move beyond utilitarianism. The
welfare economics that I had been imbued with decades earlier seemed to imply
that it would be good for governments to adopt aggregate welfare as an over-arching
policy goal if only it was possible to measure individual utility in a manner
suitable to be aggregated (or averaged) in some way. However, after some economists
began to claim that life satisfaction surveys provided a way to do that, the
potential conflict with individual liberty could not be ignored. It seemed
wrong for liberty to be viewed as just an element in an individual’s utility
function. But how could one avoid viewing liberty in that way if the sole goal of individuals
is to maximize utility functions?
The answer that
Norms of Liberty provided to me was that I needed to step aside from a framework
in which all goals of individuals could be summarised neatly in terms of
maximizing a nebulous concept referred to as “utility”. I needed to think more
broadly in terms of individual flourishing as a multidimensional process. Liberty
is integral to individual flourishing because individual flourishing is an inherently
self-directed process.
I began
blogging soon after reading Norms of Liberty. Some of my initial posts reflect
the favourable impression the book had on me soon after I had read it. For
example: What
does flourishing mean? , and Is
Freedom and necessary condition for human flourishing?
Later views
Over the
years, I have discussed many different things on this blog. Blogging has been a learning process. I cannot
claim that the views I have expressed have always been philosophically coherent.
Nevertheless,
I claim a degree of consistency in advocating for a political/legal order which
protects the possibility of individual self-direction, and ensures that the
flourishing of any person or group is not given structural preference over any
other. I also claim consistent optimism about the potential for the vast
majority of individuals to flourish – with help from family and friends – if governments
protect their natural rights and refrain from interfering with the manner of
their flourishing. (I don’t deny that government assistance has helped some
people to flourish but I observe that government assistance is often offered in
a manner that encourages people to languish.)
Those ideas
are also themes of my book, Freedom,
Progress, and Human Flourishing, as well as being reflected in many of
the essays on this blog.
While
re-reading Norms of Liberty a few days ago, I was struck by its relevance
to recent political developments in many of the countries often referred to as
western liberal democracies. When I first read the book, I had the impression
that groups who sought to have their modes of flourishing given structural preference
over others lacked the political power to implement their policies. At that
time, the main threat to individual self-direction seemed to come from well-meaning
paternalists who wanted to use the coercive powers of the state to make people
happy.
More
recently, it seems to me that some groups are increasingly seeking to use the
coercive powers of the state to have their modes of flourishing given
structural preference over others. I don’t see this tendency as being confined
to any one religious or political group, although some are more prone than
others to advocate restrictions on liberty.
One
development that seems to me to be of particular concern is the increasing
prevalence of the idea that freedom of speech should be restricted to protect people
from being offended by what others may say about their ethnicity, religious
views etc. If the legal system gives people greater incentives to take offence
at what others say, it is reasonable to predict an increase in the extent to
which people take offence, leading to demands for further restriction of
freedom of speech. Threats of violence should be prohibited because they are incompatible
with peaceful coexistence. Beyond that, however, restriction of freedom of
speech is a slippery slope that is likely to increase, rather than lessen,
conflict between different community groups.
Conclusion
My purpose in writing this essay has been to explain
why Norms of Liberty, by Douglas Rasmussen and Douglas Den Uyl, has made
a lasting impression on me.
At the time I first read Norms of Liberty, in
2007, I was particularly concerned about threats to liberty posed by the
proposals of some utilitarians who want to make happiness a goal of national economic
policy and to use survey measures of average life satisfaction to monitor
achievement of that goal. I was concerned that average life satisfaction doesn’t
adequately account for liberty. That provided the context in which I was ready
to step aside from the idea that all the goals of individuals could be summarized
in terms of utility maximization. It made more sense to think of individual
flourishing as a multidimensional process which is largely self-directed and to
think of liberty as the metanormative principle that protects the possibility of
individual self-direction.
I still think the best defence of liberty is to view it
as the means of protecting the possibility of individual self-direction, and
ensuring that the flourishing of any person or group is not given structural
preference over any other. While re-reading Norms of Liberty it struck me
that since the book was written, groups seeking to have their modes of
flourishing given structural preference over others have come to pose an
increasing threat to liberty in the western liberal democracies. Peaceful
coexistence among different groups is likely to break down if norms of liberty are
not adequately defended.
