INDIVIDUALIM

I  Concept

1.  Autonomy and Paternalism:

   Individualism is an ethical or political attitude or doctrine which emphasizes the importance of human individuals in comparison with human groups.  The doctrine which teaches the preponderance of groups over individuals is called collectivism.  Individualism must be distinguished from egotism, which claims that only “I” (the ego) is important, whereas the former postulates that all individuals shall be equally respected.  Ordinarily, its emphasis is on the individual “will.” “Everything is by the will of the individual” is the individualist credo.  This version may be called “autonomist individualism.” 

There is, however, another version of individualism whose tenet is: “everything for (the sake of) individuals.”  If we presuppose that every individual is the best judge of what is good for oneself, both concepts coincide.  However, children or those who are suffering from serious mental illness must be cared by someone else for their sake.  Paternalism must be introduced to take care of individuals. 

   To call such paternalist ways “individualism” seems to be contrary to the ordinary usage, but this usage can be acceptable because it is contrary to the collectivist opinion according to which individuals are mere tools for the group.  Extreme form of collectivism justifies the killing of those who are regarded as useless, whereas individualism postulates to save suffering individuals at any costs.

Theologians have argued that human individuals are created as the “image of God,” who shall be treated as the most precious existence, or using the Kantian phrase, as “the end in itself.”  The so-called “secular humanists” somehow come to the similar conclusion.  Theologians and moral philosophers have elaborated doctrines on what is best for individuals: life, happiness or other values. 

2.  Independence of Mind:

   In the following, we shall focus on the “autonomist individualism,” which entails two characteristics: the independence of mind and the respect for other individuals.

Individualists are persons who have their own value system and project of life and determine their attitudes with a view to them.  If individualists are ordered by an authority to do something, they first consider whether it is acceptable.  Their obedience is “free persons’ obedience.”  If they find them unacceptable, they can refuse at their own risk.  However, to have an independent mind is one thing and to become a moral hero is another.  They may comply with it because they think that their life or welfare is too important to sacrifice, especially under autocratic regimes.

According to Sigmund Freud, human mind has three parts: “id,” “ego” and “super-ego.”  The “id” represents egotism.  The “super-ego” is the authoritative voice of the society implanted in mind in one’s early life.  The “ego” realistically recognizes one’s inner urge and one’s natural and social environment, and realizes that, in order to co-exist with other people, one must restrain one’s egotist urge, and recognize others’ claims as one’s equals.  The “ego,” as the buffer zone between the “id” and the “superego,” can work as the representative of individualism, which is distinguished from egotism.  

Freud’s personal ideal seems to be consisted in freeing human mind from the oppressive rule of “super-ego” and establishing the community of realists whose mind is directed by “ego.”  However, he was too pessimistic to believe in such a possibility.  In his work Group Psychology and the Analysis of Ego, which he wrote soon after experiencing the mass hysteria during World War I, he taught that crowd is composed of those who share the image of “ideal ego” which is the projection of the “superego.”  Referring to Gustave Le Bon’s analysis of the crowd, in which he saw the return to the primitive mind, Freud pointed out that crowd was the resurrection of the “original horde” under the oppressive “Urvater.”  Le Bon characterized the contemporary world as the rule of the crowd, which meant to Freud the rule of the oppressive dictator over the mass who returned to the infantile mind and adore him as the father substitute.  Soon after he published the treatise on group psychology, Mussolini took hold of the Italian government and Hitler published Mein Kampf.

3. Respect for Others:

Individualism is a universalistic doctrine in which every individual shall be equally respected.  Such an attitude or a doctrine presupposes a kind of relativism of value.  If there is an objectively ascertainable justice or goodness, there is scarcely a reason to leave others to erroneous belief or behavior.  Plato, who believed that he knew the absolute justice, planned an absolutist state ruled by a philosopher-king.

Co-existence of independent individuals requires the readiness to self-relativization and compromise, a conscious effort in contrast to mindless self-assertion, blind obedience to authority or thoughtless imitation of vogue.  However, there is a tension between the independence of mind and readiness to compromise.  A mature and realistic mind is necessary to bear this tension.

II Historical Perspective:

1.     Pre-modern Societies:

Henry Sumner Maine formulated the basic movement of human society: from status to contract.  In the pre-modern societies, the group imposes their status on individuals.  In the modern society, social relationship is established on the mutual agreement. 

One example of the society based on status is the traditional India where individuals are born into the hierarchical order called caste system.  Louis Dumont characterized the human beings in such a society “homo hierarchicus.”

Chie Nakane, on the other hand, characterized such hierarchical order as “horizontal society” and contrasted it with “vertical society,” in which people are organized into the “frame” of communities.  She found Japanese society as the typical example of the latter.  In the former, people can move rather freely, but wherever they go, they are treated according to their caste.  In the latter, people must live in a closed community, but their promotion to upper status is relatively free. 

Modernization is the liberation of individuals from both status and “frame.”

2.  Individualism in the Modern Legal System:

Individualist principles have been precisely formulated by the civil law codes of modern European nations, since the Code Napoleon in 1804.  According to the textbook version of their principles, every human being is the subject of rights.  Every adult person can decide his rights and duties.  By contract, as the agreement of wills, persons enter into mutual legal relationship.  Legal duties must be “self-invited,” either by one’s will or wrongs which are incurred by intention or carelessness.  Such legal principles are the institutionalization of the modern individualist morality, according to which every human individual shall decide one’s creed, occupation, mate and so forth.

   These principles have many exceptions and cannot be maintained even by using fictions.  First of all, in the realm of public law, public authorities can impose duties on individuals by one-sided will.  However, modern political theorists have espoused the doctrine of the “social contract,” according to which, in the beginning of human history, people gathered together and agreed to set up a common power called state.  According to this doctrine, even the state has its basis in individual wills.  Although this doctrine is a fiction, it can find its approximation to reality when people elect representatives of the people.  The secret voting system is an especially individualist device, because it protects the inner will of individuals from the intervention of others. Open voting system like show of hands is more collectivist than secret vote.

One of the problems for the autonomy of will is the paternalist character of education.  Infant baptism and religious education are subject matters of arguments among religious sects.  Fundamentalists argued that children, when they become adults, have the right to wipe out everything what their parents imprinted.

3. Individualism and Economy:

   The ancient Chinese thinker Laotse depicted his utopia without innovations, where people enjoy traditional food, clothes and abode.  They do not need any convenient tools, boats and wagons.  They like to live within their native towns throughout their lives and do not want to see the outside world. (Tao Te Ching 80)

  One day, a man invented a cheap and convenient tool.  If he found people who accepted the new device, it was the day when innovations started.  Other persons would invent cheaper and more convenient ones.  Innovative persons are individualists who challenged traditional way of life and authorities.

   Market economy is the system of competing innovations which entails victory and defeat.  In the modern society, victors are “capitalists” and the defeated will be “proletariats.”  According to Marxist hypothesis, capitalists will become fewer and fewer, leaving most of the population to be proletariats, who can do nothing but to sell their labor power.  History shows, however, that opportunities for innovations are omnipresent, and that people can sell not only labor power but expertise and technology.  In the market economy, there are a host of medium-sized and small innovators, who constitute the middle class.  They are main bearers of individualism in the market economy.

   Socialists try to organize workers for the promotion of their interests, and to introduce state control over the economic process.  Some of them claim that they are in reality genuine individualists who want to liberate working people from the “bondage of capital,” and give individuals equal opportunity to develop their possibilities. Their ultimate purpose may be the realization of individualism, and indeed autonomist individualism.  Their methods and their programs for immediate actions, however, tend to be collectivist or paternalist, if only for the time being, according to their intention.

   Karl Marx’s ultimate objective was to realize an association of individuals “in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all.” (The Communist Manifesto)  In order to attain this goal, he taught that proletariats must be organized under the leadership of “vanguards,” who claim to be working for the true interests of the people.  The principle “government for individuals” took the place of the principle “government by individuals.”  Because Marxists’ true happiness of the people is the realization of a future communist society which is in reality unrealizable utopia, the “transitional” time of the “dictatorship of proletariat” will continue to exist indefinitely, or until it disintegrates as the Soviet Union.

4. “Organization Men” and “Lonely Crowd”:

   Market economy gave rise to large organizations in which thousands of people work.  Big enterprises compete with each other as groups.  “There’s no ‘I’ in team.”  In contrast to the individualism of early market economy, collectivism became the characteristic feature of advanced capitalism.  Although some people with independent mind and bright ideas can establish themselves outside the preexisting big enterprises, most engineers, clerks and workers find their places in organizations.

   On the other hand, people outside organizations are not necessarily independent individuals.  Max Weber depicted the contemporary age as the world of “war of gods.”  Some people are devoted to one god and become sectarians or fanatics.  Others, however, fail to decide among the pluralities of value systems.  Emile Durkheim characterized those who failed to have inner value systems as “anomic” ones.  Jean Paul Sartre’s story is almost the same.  He taught that “existence precedes essence.”  By “essence” he means something like the orthodox theological system of Thomas Aquinas.  In the pluralistic contemporary world, there is nothing of the sort.  We must choose out of one’s own initiative.  People with strong personality may choose one alternative on one’s responsibility, but many common people cannot, and will become an “anomic” person.  Those who cannot decide, will follow.  This is what David Riesman called the “other-oriented personality.” 

III. Philosophical Background:

1.    Aristotle and Individualism:

Aristotle taught that human beings are a political or social animal who are born and live within communities.  Individualism within this framework is the doctrine which promotes the interests or wills of individuals as far as they are compatible with the existence of communities.  What matters here is the relative importance between individuals and community.  The difference between individualism and collectivism is a matter of degree.

        As for Greek city states, Benjamin Constant said:

“Among the ancients, an individual was a sovereign in public matters, but a slave in private relations.  As a citizen, he decided peace and war.  As an individual, he was circumscribed, observed and repressed in all his behavior.”

Even among such communities, Athens was more individualist than Sparta.  Socrates ironically told to Gorgias, that he abused the parrhesia (freedom to speak frankly) allowed in liberal Athens (Plato, Gorgias 461e, Republic 557b).  Socrates himself, however, fell victim to the collectivist Athenian state.   

2.   Descartes and Solipsism:

Modern philosophy developed a radical individualism which challenged the Aristotelian social philosophy. 

   When René Descartes found that “I think, therefore I am” was the only indubitable premise, the solipsist tradition of modern philosophy started.  Solipsism is the most radical form of individualism according to which only one individual (the ego) exists.  Other people and things are “complex ideas” within “my” experience.

   Empiricists have doubted the epistemological or ontological status of Descartes’ “ego,” pointing out that not “ego” but experience is the indubitable presupposition.  Bertrand Russell said that Descartes should have only said: “there are thoughts.”  John Locke, who compromised with common sense opinion, taught that we had the knowledge of our own existence by intuition, whereas we knew many other things by sensation, admitting that the ego is outside empirical world.  According to the empiricist solipsism, in contradistinction to the Cartesian one, only what exists is the world of “my” experience.  When I dreamt in which I won a lottery, the indubitable fact is the fact that I experienced the win. 

   The 19^th century solipsist Max Stirner argued that the whole world was his “property.”  One of his problems is that his power to control his “property” is very limited.  If he saw his love kissing with another man, he could shut his eyes, but he could not free himself from his toothache without the help of the complex ideas called dentist.  Most events in his world are moving in accordance with causal laws which are independent of his will.  He cannot make pigs fly.  He must obey the laws if he does not want to have uncomfortable experiences and failures.

   They assert that the solipsist is the only subject, whereas other persons are objects of knowledge.  However, if he acts against the “social norms” in his behavior towards the complex ideas called other persons, he will have uncomfortable experiences called revenges or punishments.  To avoid them, he must obey the norms of “his world.”

   Somehow, there is something in solipsist’s mind which is called “language,” which are not solipsistic.  If “I” talk with “you,” “I” and “you” cannot be interchangeable according to the solipsist philosophy, but interchangeable in ordinary languages (My “I” is your “you” and your “I” is my “you”).  If the solipsist fails to communicate with the complex ideas called “you” according to the rules of ordinary language, he will be rejected as eccentric or egocentric. 

   In order to avoid uncomfortable circumstances and failures, a solipsist must behave as if other persons are not the object but subject.  Mutual recognition as subjects between solipsists is the starting point of the social world, although both parties may not be really convinced of the existence of others as subjects.  By the co-existence of the solipsist individuals by mutual recognition, we shift from solipsism to individualism.

3.    Thomas Hobbes and Social Atomism:

Thomas Hobbes, a contemporary of Descartes, was influenced by his friend Pierre Gassendi, a modern follower of Epicurus, whose natural philosophy was atomism of Leucippus and Democritus (with some modifications).  According to their teaching, the universe is composed of atoms.  Phenomena in the macroscopic world can be reducible to the motion of atoms in the microscopic world.  Hobbes transferred this cosmic atomism to social world.  For him individual human beings are atoms in the social world. (The Latin word individuus is the counterpart of the Greek word atomos (indivisible)) 

He was, moreover, influenced by nominalist school of scholasticism which he studied at Oxford.  He said: “There being nothing in the world universal but names; for the things named are every one of them individual and singular.” (Leviathan, Chap.4)  Nominalism is the scholastic version of atomism.

   In contrast to Aristotle, who taught that human beings are by nature social or political, and that they are born into the pre-existing society, Hobbes taught that they are a-social, if not anti-social． In the “state of nature,” they are born alone, lead solitary lives, and often fight with each other.  Fear of death, however, with the help of reason, motivates them to persuade each other and to make a contract to establish a community equipped with the power to keep them in awe, the state.

   Hobbes’ state is a gigantic figure called “Leviathan,” but its basis of legitimacy is the combined will of individuals.  The individuals are free to refuse to take part in the contract and to secede from it even after they committed to it, at their own risk.  The one who was sentenced to death can innocently kill the jailers and flee, if possible, because he is no more bound by the contract.

4.   John Locke and Democracy:

John Locke succeeded Hobbesian individualist construction.  In the “state of nature”, individuals have property rights which they earned by their own labor.  As such, they can freely use, exploit and trade their property without any intervention.  Crawford B. MacPherson called his doctrine as “possessive individualism.” 

They persuade each other to defend this property by establishing a state.  Thus individual autonomy in the “state of nature” turned to collective autonomy in which individuals are ruled by the state which their combined wills have established.  If the state fails to fulfill its function, however, individuals can annul the contract and abolish the state.  For Locke, state collectivism is a necessary evil to keep personal security, which individuals can nullify if necessary.  Locke’s doctrine lead to the modern liberal democratic constitutionalism as a combination of individual and collective autonomy with the emphasis for the former.  The American Revolution institutionalized the doctrine.  The presidential election every four years is the renewal of the original contract.

5.    Jean-Jacques Rousseau and the “General Will”:

With Rousseau’s social contract theory, the theory of the state contract made a collectivist turn.  In his system espoused in Social Contract (1772), he taught that a political community somehow produced a “general will” which in turn ruled the society out of which it generated.  According to him, the rule of the “general will” as the collective autonomy is also a kind of, and even a higher form of, freedom.  Irrespective of whether one accepts this re-definition of freedom, it is certain that this new “freedom” does not represent an individualist concept.

Rousseau taught that the “general will” is not the simple aggregate of majority votes.  The general will shall be “represented” by some person or group of persons.  Many dictators claimed themselves to be the representatives of the “general will.”  Rousseau’s concept of “general will,” with his new definition of freedom, was accepted by the Jacobin dictatorship, Hegelian state cult, and by dictatorship in the name of proletariat.

6.    Utilitarianism and Classical Economics:

Jeremy Bentham began his book by the proposition: Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure.  Individuals pursue their own pleasure and avoid pain by natural necessity.  This individualist presupposition was modified by the collectivist principle: the greatest happiness of the greatest number, which justifies the sacrifice of minority for the happiness of majority.  There are individualist and collectivist utilitarianism.

    Classical economists proposed an individualist model for understanding economic phenomena, which presupposes homo economicus (individuals whose only motivations for action are economic profit).  These individuals constitute “market.”  Theories of “marginal value” espoused by Karl Menger, Stanley Jevons and Leon Walras are another form of economic individualism which lead to the rise of the so-called neo-classical school.

IV. Criticism of Individualism:

   Individualism has been criticized by various schools of thoughts. Apart from the ideologies of political collectism who have always vilified the individulaists,  there are philosophers and scientists who espoused the impossibility or mistakes of individualism.

   Plato's "theory of ideas" teaches that what really exist are universal concepts called "ideas," whereas individual things are nothing but their "shadows."  His disciple Aristotle also taught that the whole is something beyond the parts (Metaphysics 1045a10-11).  Aristotle's version of ontological holism seems to be the precursor of the organic theory of society and state, according to which individualism is a vain and harmful effort of limbs and stomachs rebelling against the whole body, as preached by Menelaus Agrippa.  According to the so-called “systems theory,” social world is a system of reciprocal interaction among component parts, eventually leading to homeostasis.  In a sense, cybernetics is a revived form of the organic theory of society

   Some statisticians point out the "mass" character of phenomena.  In 1835, Adolphe Quetelet pointed out the "astonishing regularity" of the budget for scaffold, which suggests the futility of individualist efforts.   Sociologists have tried to find out the "social laws" based on the "law of the large numbers."    Marxists taught that the infra-structure of society is determined by the economic laws and the supra-structure ("ideogogies")  is merely its dependent variables.

   Thinkers of the historical school argue that individualist conception of human beings is too abstract.  They emphasize that human beings are children of history, born in a specific community and that “unencumbered self” as the individualist John Rawls presupposes is just an illusion (Michael Sandel).

   Some argues that there are "key persons" who transcend "average persons," break social laws and create new historical era, such as Napoleon, Lenin or Mao.  There are, however, many key persons in the human world who founded companies, Tom and Mary who founded a family, and so forth.  In a sense, every human being is a key person for himself.

Cross References: Liberalism, Collectivism, Thomas Hobbes

Bibliography

Dewey, John, Individualim, Old and New, London, 1931.

Dumond, Louis, Essai sur l’individualisme: Une perspective anthropologique sur l’idéologie moderne, Paris, 1983 (English Translation: Essays on Individualism: Modern Ideology in Anthropological Perspective, Chicago, 1986)

Freud, Sigmund, Massenpsychologie und Ich-analyse, Leipzig, 1921 (English Translation: Group Psychology and the Analysis of Ego, London, 1922.

Hayek, Friedrich A., Individualism and Economic Order, Chicago, 1948.

Kelsen, Hans, “Foundations of Democracy,” Ethics, Vol.66, Chicago, 1955.

Riesman, David, Individualism Reconsidered, New York, 1950.

Sartre, Jean-Paul, L’existentialisme est l’humanisme, Paris, 1946 (English Translation: Existentialism and Humanism, London, 1948)

Strauss, Leo, Political Philosophy of Hobbes: Its Basis and Its Genesis, Oxford, 1936 (translated from German: Hobbes politische Wissenschaft, Neuwied am Rhein, 1965)

Ryuichi Nagao University of Tokyo, Professor Emeritus