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Mill's Evolutionary Theory of Justice: Reflections on Persky

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 October 2019

Piers Norris Turner Open the ORCID record for Piers Norris Turner [Opens in a new window]
Piers Norris Turner*
Affiliation:
Ohio State University
*
*Corresponding author. Email: turner.894@osu.edu
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Abstract

Joseph Persky's excellent book, The Political Economy of Progress: John Stuart Mill and Modern Radicalism, shows that J. S. Mill's support for socialism is a carefully considered element of his political and economic reform agenda. The key thought underlying Persky's argument is that Mill has an ‘evolutionary theory of justice’, according to which the set of institutions and practices that are appropriate to one state of society should give way to a new set of institutions as circumstances change and the people themselves improve. However, Persky does not spend a great deal of time discussing Mill's theory of reform, in particular the principles he believes should guide our reform efforts. Reflecting on these principles – notably his principle of impartiality or equal treatment – shows the consistency of Mill's thought over time.

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Article
Information
Utilitas , Volume 32 , Issue 2 , June 2020 , pp. 131 - 146
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2019

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References

1 Berlin, Isaiah, ‘John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life’, Liberty, ed. Hardy, Henry (Oxford, 2002), pp. 218–51CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 227.

2 Berlin, ‘John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life’, p. 228 n. 3 and associated text.

3 Berlin, ‘John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life’, p. 234.

4 Persky, Joseph, The Political Economy of Progress: John Stuart Mill and Modern Radicalism (Oxford, 2016)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 Perhaps the single most instructive article on Mill's socialism is McCabe, Helen, ‘Navigating by the North Star: The Role of the “Ideal” in John Stuart Mill's View of “Utopian” Schemes and the Possibilities of Social Transformation’, Utilitas 31 (2019), pp. 291–309CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also: Baum, Bruce, ‘J. S. Mill and Liberal Socialism’, J. S. Mill's Political Thought: A Bicentennial Reassessment, ed. Urbinati, Nadia and Zakaras, Alex (Cambridge, 2007), pp. 98–123CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Claeys, Gregory, Mill and Paternalism (Cambridge, 2013)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hollander, Samuel, John Stuart Mill: Political Economist (Toronto, 2015)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kurer, Oskar, John Stuart Mill: The Politics of Progress (New York, 2016)Google Scholar; Miller, Dale E., ‘Mill's “Socialism”’, Politics, Philosophy, & Economics 2 (2003), pp. 213–38CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Riley, Jonathan, ‘J. S. Mill's Liberal Utilitarian Assessment of Capitalism Versus Socialism’, Utilitas 8 (1996), pp. 39–71CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

6 Interestingly, some libertarians such as Hayek noticed (and deeply lamented) the fact that Mill was not in the end a fellow-traveler. Like Berlin, however, Hayek saw Mill's eventual support for socialism as the influence of Harriet Taylor, and this perhaps explains why Mill is still commonly lauded in public debates for his defence of individual liberty, without being similarly praised as a crusader for social equality and distributive justice. See Hollander, John Stuart Mill, ch. 11 for discussion of Hayek's view of Mill.

7 For an informed and careful assessment of Mill's tenure in the East India Company, see Varouxakis, Georgios, Liberty Abroad: J. S. Mill on International Relations (Cambridge, 2013), ch. 5CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For background, see Martin Moir, ‘Introduction’, in John Stuart Mill, Writings on India, CW XXX, pp. vii–liv. Citations of Mill marked by ‘CW volume number, page number’ refer to the Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, ed. J. M. Robson, 323 vols (Toronto, 1963–91).

8 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, p. xiii. Persky suggests that in recent decades radicals have not done well in articulating a clear path forward. Erik Olin Wright's influential Envisioning Real Utopias (London, 2010) might be a counterexample. Interestingly, despite echoing many aspects of Mill's reform programme, Wright does not mention Mill in that book.

9 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, p. 88.

10 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, p. xvi.

11 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, pp. 151, 76.

12 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, p. xvii.

13 Mill, System of Logic, CW VIII, p. 952.

14 It is impossible to summarize succinctly the debates associated with the term ‘neoliberalism’. But when ‘neoliberal’ is used as an epithet, it seems to me that there are two key complaints. First, there is the complaint that free markets in many cases serve to protect entrenched interests and the status quo. Free markets sometimes help to level the playing field, but in the real world they also sometimes serve to enshrine power, which is often the result of historical injustice. Second, there is the complaint that free market values should not dominate all other public or social values. The basic worry here is that the diffusion of market ideology into all walks of life has pernicious effects on people's character and well-being. Too many people come to see life as a competition, in which other individuals or groups are trying to ‘cut in line’ or take what is theirs; too many people see success or self-worth, and the value of education, in primarily monetary terms; too many people accept the myth of rugged individualism. In all of this, there is a corresponding decline in social trust, in our appreciation of the intrinsic value of education, and in our recognition of the ways social, political, and economic institutions create opportunities and support us in our endeavours.

15 Mill, Autobiography, CW I, p. 239.

16 Mill, Autobiography, CW I, p. 239.

17 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, p. 25.

18 Riley, ‘J. S. Mill's Liberal Utilitarian Assessment of Capitalism versus Socialism’, p. 64.

19 Mill, Principles of Political Economy, CW III, p. 794.

20 Miller, ‘Mill's “Socialism” ’, pp. 213–38.

21 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, pp. 81–3.

22 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, p. 25, emphasis added.

23 Mill, Considerations on Representative Government, CW XIX, p. 394; see also p. 390, and CW I, p. 177.

24 Mill, On Liberty, CW XVIII, p. 261.

25 Mill, CW V, pp. 441–57.

26 As already mentioned, there is an over-excited tendency among commentators to attribute Mill's pro-socialist writings to his being ‘henpecked’ by Harriet Taylor (for discussion, see Claeys, Mill and Paternalism, p. 40). Of course, Mill himself credits Taylor with co-authorship of the additions to Principles of Political Economy, and she deserves credit for her contributions. But the young Mill was already articulating principles that would lead towards socialism, and his Chapters on Socialism, written years after Taylor had passed away, repeats his support for some core socialist claims (while also emphasizing his concerns about some others). Mill also retained their additions to Principles of Political Economy through successive editions up to his own death.

27 Persky writes: ‘There can be no doubt that John Stuart Mill in the 1820s and early 1830s largely limited his advocacy of reform to little more than an expansion of the franchise coupled to free markets’ (Political Economy of Progress, p. 21). But, to take two just examples, his support for birth control measures (he was arrested in 1823 for distributing birth control literature) and his rejection of primogeniture are two examples of youthful advocacy going well beyond the franchise and free markets.

28 Mill, ‘Primogeniture’ (1828), CW XXVI, p. 337.

29 Mill, ‘Primogeniture’, CW XXVI, p. 338.

30 But he was remarkably consistent on many of his main concerns. In the final months of his life, for instance, Mill was still arguing for the ‘abrogation of the right of primogeniture’, which he regarded as ‘radically wrong’ (‘Advice to Land Reformers’ (1873), CW XXV, pp. 1228–31).

31 I say ‘most of’ because even as Mill worked to articulate a more cooperative ideal, and did not think the arguments against competition ‘altogether groundless’, nevertheless he thought competition was beneficial all things considered (Principles of Political Economy, CW III, pp. 794–6). He also retained his scepticism of central planning (Chapters on Socialism, CW V, p. 748).

32 Mill, Chapters on Socialism, CW V, p. 711.

33 Mill, Chapters on Socialism, CW V, pp. 714–16.

34 McCabe, ‘Navigating by the North Star’, p. 294.

35 For Mill's definition of a ‘state of society’, see System of Logic, CW VIII, pp. 911–12.

36 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, p. 21; see also p. 10.

37 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, p. 21.

38 Mill, Chapters on Socialism, CW V, pp. 749, 737. See Persky, Political Economy of Progress, pp. 149.

39 Riley, ‘J. S. Mill's Liberal Utilitarian Assessment of Capitalism versus Socialism’, p. 55.

40 I hasten to add that Mill always allows that our vision is limited. He does not pretend to know with any certainty what the concrete ultimate ideal would look like.

41 A full theory of reform would also help us understand why the author of On Liberty does not recommend liberal democracy for all states of society. But our focus here is on the principles that shape his reform efforts within a liberal democratic society.

42 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, p. 208.

43 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, pp. 208–9.

44 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, p. 209.

45 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, p. 215. Despite the talk of ‘transitional stages’, one could read Persky as holding only that Mill's later attention to luck is laid over a foundation of relational equality. But this (1) does not do justice to the tensions between luck and relational egalitarianism and (2) fails to recognize the way Mill's attention to luck is a manifestation of his more fundamental, and abiding, relational egalitarianism.

46 See Turner, Piers Norris, ‘John Stuart Mill on Luck and Distributive Justice’, The Routledge Handbook of the Philosophy and Psychology of Luck, ed. Church, Ian M. and Hartman, Robert J. (New York, 2019), pp. 80–93CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For an attempt to frame Mill's public reform project see my ‘Social Morality in Mill’, Public Reason in Political Philosophy: Classic Sources and Contemporary Commentaries, ed. Piers Norris Turner and Gerald Gaus (New York, 2017), pp. 375–400.

47 Mill, The Subjection of Women (1869), CW XXI, p. 262.

48 Mill, Principles of Political Economy, CW III, p. 892.

49 Mill, Utilitarianism, CW X, pp. 257–8; first emphasis added.

50 Mill, ‘The Income and Property Tax’, CW V, p. 491.

51 Mill, Principles of Political Economy, CW III, pp. 810–11.

52 Mill, ‘The Poor Laws’ (1834), CW XXIII, p. 686.

53 Mill, ‘The Poor Laws’, CW XXIII, p. 688. See also his ‘French News [85]’, CW XXIII, p. 673, Principles of Political Economy, CW II, p. 360, and Chapters on Socialism, CW V, pp. 713–15.

54 Baum, ‘J. S. Mill and Liberal Socialism’, p. 114.

55 Mill, Principles of Political Economy, CW III, p. 793; see also Chapters on Socialism CW V, p. 710.

56 Mill, Letter to Arthur Helps (1847), CW XVII, pp. 2001–2.

57 Mill, The Subjection of Women, CW XXI, p. 294.

58 Mill, Utilitarianism, CW X, p. 218, see also p. 233.

59 Mill, Utilitarianism, CW X, p. 259.

60 Persky, Political Economy of Progress, pp. 150–1.

61 Mill, ‘The Income and Property Tax’, CW V, p. 491.

62 As observed by his friend Bain, Alexander, John Stuart Mill: A Criticism with Personal Recollections (London, 1882), p. 89CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Quoted in Miller, ‘Mill's “Socialism” ’, p. 219.

63 Mill, ‘The Income and Property Tax’, CW V, p. 497.

64 Mill, ‘Errors and Truths on a Property Tax’, CW XXIII, p. 553.

65 Mill, ‘The Income and Property Tax’, CW V, p. 472; see also ‘Errors and Truths on a Property Tax’, CW XXIII, p. 550.

66 Mill, Principles of Political Economy, CW III, p. 811.

67 Mill, ‘The Income and Property Tax’, CW V. p. 493.

68 Mill, Principles of Political Economy, CW III, p. 755.

69 For discussion of these issues, I am grateful to Eric MacGilvray, Helen McCabe, Dale E. Miller, and Joseph Persky. I also benefited from feedback at a panel session on Persky's book at the PPE Society meeting in New Orleans in March 2019.