One of the most outrageous and vulgar articles that I recently happened to read was Pankaj Mishra’s How Rousseau Predicted Trump, published on the New Yorker on August 1st 2016. The article basically consisted in the bashing of Enlightenment philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, imputed of being the political father of current right wing populism. Such cheap slander of one of the most influential philosophers of all time, and arguably one of the fathers of modern democracy, urged me to come up with an attempt to defend Rousseau’s political thought and its legacy.
My main point of disagreement with Mishra is his characterization of Rousseau as an anti-Enlightenment thinker and a counter-revolutionary. What Mishra indeed argues is that Rousseau’s skepticism on the extent to which Enlightenment innovations, such as political and economic freedom, improved the standard of living of the poor and enriched the morals of society, led him to the rejection of Enlightenment values. Rousseau’s skepticism on the latter issues however hardly makes him a counter-revolutionary or an anti-Enlightenment thinker. His own are the legitimate preoccupations that many thinkers of his time happened to be faced with in the light of the socio-economic changes that were occurring at the end of the 18th century. He was simply dubious that a system based exclusively on unrestricted freedom and economic self-interest would actually improve the conditions of the worst off and enrich the morals of society. Rather than a reactionary Rousseau was a skeptic. He believed that technological innovation and freedom were not sufficient to create a morally and materially fairer society. What was needed was a constitution that would prevent the egoism of one individual, or one group (including the majority), from jeopardizing the public interest, what Rousseau referred to as the “general will”.
Unluckily for Mishra, history was to prove Rousseau’s frustrations right. The application of Adam Smith’s principles (presented under a positive light by Mishra) in Britain during the Industrial Revolution increased output, but led to the commodification of land and labor and to the establishment of a culture of selfishness that had no regard for human exploitation and suffering, to the atomization of society and its near destruction. In the presence of a constitution that safeguarded the public good in the spirit of Rousseau’s philosophy, the bourgeoisie might not have attained the same level of wealth, but neither the ruthless exploitation of the laboring poor, nor would the atomization of society have happened. Ironically for Mishra, it was when postwar Europe adopted constitutions and new laws that reflected Rousseau’s attention for the common good that the hopes for prosperous society for all and not just the owners of the means of production first materialized.
Mishra’s designation of Rousseau as an Anti-Enlightenment reactionary is also fallacious for it is based on the notion that Enlightenment values essentially consisted in personal freedom, property rights and free market economics. This is however is not the case. The Enlightenment was also about the cult of equality, the emancipation of mankind from oppressive rulers and social structures and the revival of democracy. It is indeed no case that the French Revolution (1789-99), the founding event of modern democracy, is commonly viewed as a child of the Enlightenment. Rousseau, whose writings inspired the second and most radical phase of the Revolution, was a representative of this branch of Enlightenment.
Another depreciable aspect of the article is its insistence in comparing Rousseau with political figures and phenomena of our time such as Trump, Brexiters and even ISIS. This is no humor: Mishra actually argued that ISIS’s reign of oppression would fit quite well with the philosopher’s ideal society. I could not think of two more apart individuals than Trump and Rousseau. Rousseau would have hated the former as the embodiment of the system of greed and self-interest he denounced in his writings, whereas Trump would have deemed Rousseau’s egalitarian ideology as godless communism and would have sent him to Guantanamo. Sexism is probably the only thing they share. However, Rousseau’s sentiments about women were the ones of any man born in 18th century France, where sexism was simply an unquestioned norm, whereas Trump makes his statements in open opposition to the nearly 200-year old struggle for the equality of the sexes. The ISIS reference is probably the most ridiculous for, ISIS is a contemporary representative of the obscurantism and religious oppression that people like Rousseau intended to free mankind from.
I could also spend time talking about Mishra’s insinuations regarding Rousseau’s obsession with masturbation and his hobby of exposing himself to women, but to be completely honest I could not care less. I am interested in Rousseau’s ideas and not in his private life. This is what philosophers should be remembered for and judged upon. What matters about Rousseau are neither his conduct as a human, nor the thoughts he happened to share with most of the common men of his time, but the ideas that made him uncommon for his time: his egalitarianism, his attention for Positive Freedom rather than uncontrolled arbitrariness, and his determination to theorize a state where the common good and not the egoism of individuals is preserved. That is why he is remembered and that is why the adversaries of these very values still feel the urge to dismiss him through cheap and catchy criticism.
Original Article:
HOW ROUSSEAU PREDICTED TRUMP: The Enlightenment philosopher’s attack on cosmopolitan élites now seems prophetic. By Pankaj Mishra
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/08/01/how-rousseau-predicted-trump
By Cesare Vagge
The Bell 