Autor: Manent, Pierre

Buch: An Intellectual History of Liberalism

Titel: An Intellectual History of Liberalism

Stichwort: Benjamin Constant 2; unbegrenzte Souveränität des Volkes: Kritik an Rousseau; C.: Ausschluss von Bereichen von Volkss. -> Sozialismus: Erweiterung des Volkswillens auf Wirtschaft

Kurzinhalt: If, then, a part of human existence escapes popular sovereignty by right, it escapes the political order itself... and returns to the rule of force.

Textausschnitt: 85c I have just said that the delicate question concerns the idea of sovereignty, in particular the sovereignty of the people such as the Revolution claimed to implement it, drawing inspiration from Rousseau. Constant completely accepts the principle of the sovereignty of the people, and also echoes Rousseau's language:

Our present constitution formally recognizes the principle of the sovereignty of the people, that is the supremacy of the general will over any particular will. Indeed this principle cannot be contested. In our days many have attempted to obscure it; the evils which were caused and the crimes which were committed on the pretext of enforcing the general will lend apparent strength to the reasonings of those who would like to assign a different source to the authority of governments. Nevertheless those reasonings cannot stand against the simple definition of the words which they use. The law must be either the expression of the will of all, or that of the will of some. What would be the origin of exclusive privilege if you should grant it to that small number? If it is power, then power belongs to whoever takes it. It does not constitute a right, and if you acknowledge it as legitimate, it will be equally legitimate whoever sets his hands on it, and everyone will want to conquer it in his turn. If you suppose that the power of a small number is sanctioned by the assent of all, then that power becomes the general will.4

86a Here Constant asserts the incontestable character of the sovereignty principle and recognizes the dangers of its application. He continues:

But while we recognize the rights of that will, that is the sovereignty of the people, it is necessary, indeed imperative, to understand its exact nature and to determine its precise extent. (Fs)

Without a precise and exact definition, the triumph of the theory could become a calamity in its application. The abstract recognition of the sovereignty of the people does not in the least increase the amount of liberty given to individuals. If we attribute to that sovereignty an amplitude which it must not have, liberty may be lost notwithstanding that principle, or even through it. (Fs)

When you establish that the sovereignty of the people is unlimited, you create and toss at random into human society a degree of power which is too large in itself, and which is bound to constitute an evil, in whatever hands it is placed. Entrust it to one man, to several, to all, you will still find that it is equally an evil.... There are weights too heavy for the hand of man.5

86b The principle of popular sovereignty is more negative than positive, more critical than founding. It signifies essentially that no individual or group has the right to subject the body of citizens to its particular will, or, put another way, that all legitimate power must be delegated by the body of citizens. But this does not at all mean that power thus delegated can do whatever it pleases:

There is, on the contrary, a part of human existence which by necessity remains individual and independent, and which is, by right, outside any social competence. Sovereignty has only a limited and relative existence. At the point where independence and individual existence begin, the jurisdiction of sovereignty ends. If society oversteps this line, it is as guilty as the despot who has, as his only title, his exterminating sword. Society cannot exceed its competence without usurpation, nor bypass the majority without being factious.... Were it the whole of the nation, save the citizen whom it oppresses, it would be none the more legitimate.6

86c The dangerously false idea of unlimited popular sovereignty relies on the authority of Rousseau, whose Social Contract, "so often invoked in favor of liberty [was] the most formidable support for all kinds of despotism." (Fs) (notabene)

87a However, Rousseau himself "was appalled by ... the immense social power which he had thus created, he did not know into whose hands to commit such monstrous force.... He declared that sovereignty could not be alienated, delegated or represented. This was equivalent to declaring, in other words, that it could not be exercised. It meant in practice destroying the principle he had just proclaimed."7 In Constant's eyes, Rousseau himself admitted that his principle was essentially inapplicable, hence false. (Fs)

87b As a critical description of the functioning of the idea of popular sovereignty, Constant's analysis is unassailable. However, it presents a difficulty in principle. Constant maintains that Rousseau "destroyed" the principle he had proclaimed. But how is he himself any different when he poses the "incontestable" character of popular sovereignty and simultaneously underlines that a part of human existence is by nature beyond the jurisdiction of this sovereignty? Is he not contradicting himself like Rousseau, and for the same reasons, when he says that popular sovereignty is both incontestable and essentially limited? (Fs)

87c Popular sovereignty, as Constant understands it, cannot be only negative. The negative or critical interpretation of this sovereignty, reduced to itself, would signify only anarchy, in the strict sense of the term: no individual or group has the right to subject others to its particular will. But the concept of popular sovereignty serves not only to criticize certain governments, to show their illegitimacy; it also founds new governments, it has a positive sense. If, then, a part of human existence escapes popular sovereignty by right, it escapes the political order itself. Since the latter is founded on consent, this part of existence therefore escapes the order of consent, and returns to the rule of force. Rousseau would doubtlessly have replied that, in order to preserve liberty, Constant let the state of nature (which is the rule of force) survive, and that because he failed to reflect on the state of nature, he is incapable of surmounting it. (Fs)

87d This objection to liberalism will develop throughout the nineteenth century. It presents a group of social and economic relationships as natural, escaping by right social jurisdiction or popular sovereignty, but since these relationships have not been instituted by the people's will or consent, they are consequently founded on force. One version of the socialist program will be expressed in this way: socialism is a matter of extending popular sovereignty to a domain—the social and economic, that of the firm—from which liberalism had excluded it. (Fs) (notabene)

87e Whatever the aptness of his critical description, Constant's position on the level of principles is rather thin. This is doubtless why, in the text I have just quoted, it is not principally to the idea of popular sovereignty that he attributes the misfortunes of the Revolution, but rather to an image, that of an ancient city-state (Sparta) which possessed the soul of the revolutionaries. If they became despots, in spite of their good intentions, it was not because they blindly followed the logic of the idea of popular sovereignty, but because they conceived of liberty in the ancient way, because they wanted to realize in modern France the liberty of the ancients. (Fs)

88a It could be argued that Constant's shifting criticism simply reflects the dual allegiance of the revolutionaries—for whom popular sovereignty and ancient liberty are identical—a dual allegiance that itself reflects Rousseau's ambiguity.1 But, depending on whether one concentrates on the idea of popular sovereignty or on the image of the ancient city-state, one will be pointed in one of two very different directions. In the former case, one will call into question an idea that liberalism must acknowledge, in one way or another; one therefore risks implicating liberalism itself, becoming a "reactionary" who believes that certain of the greatest evils of modern politics have their source in its principles. If, on the contrary, one incriminates the image of the ancient city-state, one is led to perceive these evils as alien to the foundation of this politics, to define them as anachronisms. Constant's extraordinary critical capacity regarding the Revolution and the Empire stems from the fact that he can pursue simultaneously these two lines of criticism. He did not manage to choose between them, but he definitely accentuated the latter—failing which he would have ceased to be a liberal.2