The Elements of a Sustainable and Healthy Democratic Utilitarian Nation
We are fortunate to live in an era when global political systems and markets, for the most part, veer towards operating on the principle of modern Utilitarianism.
Imperfect as they might be in the year 2020, utilitarian societies are based in the “fundamental axiom” expressed by Jeremy Bantham: that, “it is the greatest happiness [or well being] of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong [actions or policies].”
Almost every nation and government today claims to be Utilitarian or to have utilitarian intent towards its citizens.
But what is this notion and how did it evolve?
Utilitarianism, as articulated by Bantham, ultimately emerged in humanity’s moral consciousness as a feasible pathway, because democracy dawned in human history. And it was further conceptualized and empowered with the contemporaneous sanctification of individual human rights, as an initially theological and then secular judeo-christian derived precept.
It goes without saying that Utilitarianism would not be a viable philosophical construct without realization of democracy, and without the enshrinement of individual human rights. It is ultimately an optimistic expression and hope for the human race, which is otherwise constrained by its mortality and its moral limitations — The Greatest Good for the The Greatest Numbers, is a transcendental state of human existence, indeed.
Though Bantham’s axiom might sound self-evident and almost simplistic to most modern persons, it was impossible as a viable social construct until relatively recently. Indeed, much of conscious human history until the 20th century, was plagued by the whims of minority subsets of humans wielding disproportionate power, for the most part unjustly, over the majority — dynasties, monarchies, feudalist societies, imperialist nations, caste systems, etc.
Thank goodness that contemporary utilitarian social constructs, or at least broad attempts to the effect, seem to dominate the institutions of most nations today — the result is self-evident, simply using the past century’s expansion of the earth’s human population as an abstract metric of success.
Utilitarian constructs are not only far more ethically justifiable than the alternative social constructs of past epochs, it is likely that they also hold the potential to create the most robust form of social stability yet to come — so doing, by keeping the majority of citizens actively and voluntarily invested in their nations as free persons, and by achieving an optimally balanced version of democratic utilitarianism.
It is the central thesis of this essay that only by keeping two critical questions about utilitarian society front and center, can those who consider themselves patriotic engineers and guardians of democratic nations (that is, good citizens), build a robust and sustainable society and world. These questions are:
- Who decides what cultural norms, products, services and social policies make for utilitarianism’s “greatest happiness or well-being”?
- How can a nation ensure that the minority subsets of people who either do not benefit, or are adversely affected by utilitarian social practices and policies, are not unjustly ignored or irreparably broken and left behind?
These two questions are, in fact, the Achilles heels of ANY Democratic Utilitarian society.
On the Question of “Who Decides”
It is arguably true that the 20th century tested this question of “who decides” what makes for the “greatest happiness and well-being” in society — at times in violent experiments involving both hot and cold wars. This test is, of course, still ongoing as of this writing.
The “Who decides” question is critical, because if utilitarian services, practices and policies (i.e., laws) are to create a sustainable society, the answer must comport with the actual REALITY of what makes for the “greatest happiness and well-being” as experienced by the citizens of a society, in any particular time and space.
It is likely that a threshold mismatch between the actual experience of social “well-being and happiness” by the majority, and what is intended by a nation or group’s practices and policies, will cause that society’s demise….that is, at a threshold level of discontent an intended utilitarian construct ceases being one and becomes, instead, tyrannical…Tyranny is the beginning of social demise.
One must ask, therefore, “who decides”:
Is it, as the “socialist” nation-states argue, an “expert and learned” state apparatus with a bird’s eye view that ought to decide the majority’s good?
Is it, as “theocratic” nation-states argue, divine law imparted by God or by our “better angels” and executed by men, that ought to decide the majority’s good?
Or, is it, as “market-based” nations argue, the free-markets that ought to decide the majority’s good?
The socialist and theocratic models quickly devolve into authoritarianism to keep the rule of law. Because neither can efficiently recognize or eliminate the discontent that results from the gap between the majority’s real feelings of “happiness and well being” and that which, either the slow process of an expert state or the rigid moralism of a theocratic state, achieves by legislative intent.
The free-market model does better, but unbridled without expert and empathic minimization of risk to consumers and without adequate respect for the sanctity of the human person, it too ultimately becomes cancerous to stable civil society.
But, it is important to consider that the marketplace is not only the economic driver of human society — it is also a real-time voting machine, which integrates our individual preferences, abstractly quantified in terms of our monies spent, to express our support or need for specific products and services in any given space. In as much as feelings of human happiness and well-being require that we, as citizen, are able to autonomously decide what we need (or want) to acquire/buy, when and where, a healthy marketplace is critical to the stability of a utilitarian democracy. Certainly, a marketplace primarily conducted by the state becomes the defining element of a tyrannical nation state.
It is likely that no society based strictly in any one of the above three options will achieve an optimally stable utilitarian state. Instead, it is most likely that government based in an optimally balanced collage of these deciding elements will have the highest likelihood of achieving the greatest good well. That is, an accountable, expert and empowered democratic state informed by a free-press, guided by a belief in the divinity of the human person (and, perhaps, of all living things), and economically powered by a free, safe and dynamic marketplace. Exclude or weaken any one leg of this “decision” tripod, and social stability will not be achieved or, worse, will be lost.
“Who decides”? The democratically chosen state, the sanctity of every human life and the free-markets collaborate to decide the optimal utilitarian position.
In the end, when a democratic society’s services, practices and policies fall short of being optimally utilitarian in enough sectors, citizens’ experience of tyranny (or harm) will ultimately reach a critical threshold, where the prevailing social order is disrupted — either through revolution against the state or through florid civil war.
A society whose government consists of democratically elected men and women of high expertise, well informed by the press and by science, and with kind affection for the people, whose legislative and judicial compass is based in preserving the sanctity of individual human life (nay, all life), and whose marketplace is governed by laws ensuring the fair, safe and un-coerced exchange of goods and money between supplier and customer — only in such a society does Utilitarianism stand a chance of being optimized to ensure the long-term happiness and well-being of its citizens and the sustenance of a powerful nation.
On the Question of the Un-Affected or Adversely Affected Minority
Optimization of utilitarian social services, practices and policies requires a cultural understanding that there will always remain citizens who do not experience the intended “goodness and wellness” of any given utilitarian service, practice or policy.
It is in the spaces where the un-affected or adversely affected minority emerge where the moral compass of a utilitarian democracy is tested — and where justice is to be reconciled with utilitarian “law”.
If there is a natural law of justice, it is that nations whose moral compass is not aligned with justice for ALL, ultimately fall!
So, in optimizing utilitarian constructs, it is not simply sufficient to minimize the numbers of the unaffected or adversely affected. It is certainly immoral for a utilitarian democracy to terminate or “physically” cleanse the un-affected or adversely affected from being. Nor is it sufficient to accept marketplace measurements of majority preference or majority benefit as justifications for the state imposed upon the un-affected or adversely affected minority — citizens for whom some, if not many, utilitarian practices and policies do not yield “happiness, wellness or equal protection”.
Indeed, it is safe to postulate that the moral compass of any utilitarian democracy is tested and set in its handling of the minority subsets whose rights, property and lives are juxtaposed against the majority’s by virtue of the society’s utilitarian constructs.
John Rawls and Emmanuel Kant addressed the “minority problem” in the utilitarian social construct, by invoking the idea of a “veil of ignorance” as it pertains to any utilitarian service, practice or policy. They articulated that, no utilitarian construct ought be justified (or retained) by society in which ANY and EVERY unbiased member of the society is unwilling to accept or justify becoming a member of that minority subset, unaffected or adversely affected by the service, practice or policy.
Moreover, a utilitarian democracy must equip and empower its civil judiciary to efficiently identify and expunge, or correct, practices and policies in which any minority subset of the citizenry are unreasonably or, perhaps, without their adequate informed and autonomous consent, subjected to loss, to harm and to damage.
Why is it essential to the long-term health of utilitarian democracies to be equipped to optimally address the “plight” of its minority subsets — and to correct unjust services, practices and policies? Because, when enough minority unaffected or adversely affected citizens begin to accumulate, whose disaffection or plight are undermined or ignored, in the face of the inevitable increase in the number of utilitarian services, practices and policies generated by a democratic market-economy….These minorities will eventually integrate to become a disaffected MAJORITY whose grievance is too broad to resolve! And a democratic society in which a majority of citizen are discontent is well on it way towards demise.
Elements of the Optimal Democratic Utilitarian Society
Below, therefore, are the constituents of a robust democratic utilitarian nation:
- A democratically elected governing body of expert and educated executives and legislatures informed by a free press, and by objective scientific precepts — and with high affection for all the people it serves.
- A society wherein the culture sanctifies the intrinsic value and dignity of every human life (and all life) — and where injustice to no person is justified or tolerated.
- A marketplace in which suppliers and consumers are engaged in a free, safe and un-coerced exchange of monies in exchange for the goods and services all citizens need to achieve their desired state of happiness and well-being.
- A judiciary empowered to efficiently evaluated and expunge or correct those products, services or policies that disaffect or harm individual or minority subsets of citizens.
These, are the four legs, likely the only ones, upon which the robust and prosperous table of democratic utilitarianism can nurture and feed a strong and healthy nation and people.
Let us all work to build and sustain a stable table of prosperity for our children and for the future.
