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'History, Method and Pluralism: a Re-Interpretation of Isaiah Berlin's HISTORY, METHOD, AND PLURALISM A Re-interpretation of Isaiah Berlin’s Political Thought Thesis submitted to the University of London for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy by HAOYEH London School of Economics and Political Science 2005 UMI Number: U205195 All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. Dissertation Publishing UMI U205195 Published by ProQuest LLC 2014. Copyright in the Dissertation held by the Author. Microform Edition © ProQuest LLC. All rights reserved. This work is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. ProQuest LLC 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 S 510 Abstract of the Thesis In the literature on Berlin to date, two broad approaches to study his political thought can be detected. The first is the piecemeal approach, which tends to single out an element of Berlin’s thought (for example, his distinction between negative liberty and positive liberty) for exposition or criticism, leaving other elements unaccounted. And the second is the holistic approach, which pays attention to the overall structure of Berlin’s thought as a whole, in particular the relation between his defence for negative liberty and pluralism. This thesis is to defend the holistic approach against the piecemeal approach, but its interpretation will differ from the two representative readings, offered by Claude J. Gallipeau and John Gray, of this approach. By focusing on the relation between Berlin’s historical methodology and his political arguments, this thesis argues that the doctrine of value-pluralism should be understood as Berlin’s vision of the world, his empathetic approach to understanding a methodological strategy to transcend cultural difference, and his engagement with the history of ideas an enterprise to enlarge his readers’ vision of human possibility so that they can come to see the fact that their own chosen forms of life are relatively valid. It begins with a reconstruction of Berlin’s methodology, and by way of exploring the presuppositions in his methodology it will be argued that his methodology in fact is ethics-laden and for this reason only those who share his moral concerns would be able to implement his prescribed methodology thoroughly - in other words, those who disagree with his morality and are determined not to act on his advice would not become Berlinian liberals who would realise the relative validity of their convictions. And it concludes that Berlin’s case for value-pluralism is unproven yet it may not be falsified either. 2 CONTENTS Chapter Page I. Introduction: Re-interpreting Isaiah Berlin 4 1.1 Berlin’s Conceptual Dichotomies and Ensuing Debates 5 1.2 Taking Berlin’s Historical Approach Seriously 18 1.3 Method, Argument, and Structure 25 II. A Reconstruction of Berlin’s Methodology 31 II. 1 Empathetic Understanding as a Critical Use of Imagination 31 11.2 A Transcendental Strategy without Transcendental Idealism 47 11.3 Reclaiming Human Agency and Abolishing the Purpose of History 58 III. The Meaning of Berlin’s Value-Pluralism 72 III. 1 Berlin’s Herzenian Conception of Value 72 111.2 Incommensurability and the Reach of Value Conflict 89 111.3 Value-Pluralism as Berlin’s Enlarged Mentality 105 IV. The Quarrel between One and Many 115 IV. 1 Berlin on Marxism as a Case of Monism 115 IV.2 Monism as a Style of Reasoning 129 IV.3 A Conflict between Two Visions of the World 143 V. Political Implications of Value-Pluralism 160 V. 1 Pluralism and its Alleged Affinities with Liberal Values 161 V.2 Value-Pluralism and Liberal Political Design 175 V.3 Liberalism, Value-Pluralism and the National Question 194 VI. Reconsidering Berlin’s Approach to Politics 214 VI. 1 Berlin’s Use of Historical Approach in ‘Two Concepts of Liberty’ 215 VI.2 Reconsidering Berlin’s Enlarged Mentality 230 VI.3 Conclusion 236 Bibliography 242 3 CHAPTER I Introduction: Re-interpreting Isaiah Berlin Isaiah Berlin occupies a curious position in the intellectual landscape of the twentieth century. Through numerous writings, broadcasts, and lectures, he established himself as a public intellectual who ardently defended individual liberty and the plurality of values. Also, he is well known as a rather old-styled man of letters who loves opera and literature, and his sophistication at dinner-table conversation even made him a legendary figure in the British establishment. By profession, nevertheless, Berlin was a political philosopher, and his reputation in the field rests chiefly upon the conceptual distinction he made between ‘negative’ and ‘positive’ liberty in his 1958 Inaugural Lecture as Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory at Oxford University - the script of which was published in essay form as ‘Two Concepts of Liberty’ a year later and is arguably the single best known essay of political philosophy in last century.1 To the general reading public, nevertheless, Berlin is known mainly as a historian of ideas with astonishing ability to enter into the minds of past thinkers and return with vivid accounts of their visions of the world. Indeed, his writings on the whole may be better classified as studies in the history of ideas rather than works of philosophy. And according to the anecdote Berlin himself was fond of circulating, he abandoned philosophy for history of ideas in 1944 after a conversation with the mathematical logician Harry Sheffer who convinced him that logic and psychology were to become the centre of philosophy - believing that he would not be able to make significant contributions to the discipline. At any rate, the vast majority of his writings have not evoked much comment from other professional philosophers who tend to take them to be Berlin’s peripheral activity of no significant implications on political philosophy. Perhaps more awkwardly, professional historians do not take them seriously either. Although Berlin is occasionally acknowledged by professional 1 1 Adam Swift, Political Philosophy (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2002), .51. 4 historians for coining the phrase ‘Counter-Enlightenment’, an established category in historiography now, his name appears, if ever, more likely in the footnotes than in the text of their works. As it seems, there is a discrepancy between Berlin the professional political philosopher and Berlin the historian of ideas. And in any case, his reputation in the field of political philosophy is still in the balance. At one extreme end, he is hailed as the most important liberal political thinker of the twentieth century. Yet at the other, he is dismissed as a historical surveyor of obscure thinkers in the past or even a mere conversationalist. No doubt this is enough to suggest that there may be an interesting biographical case to be made by reconciling the two very different representations of Berlin so as to reconstruct the true historical figure. However, on a more profound level, a case may also be worth investigating concerning his defence of individual liberty and his studies in the history of ideas. The aim of this thesis is to explore the so far under-researched relations between these two activities that occupied much of Berlin’s intellectual life, as well as their potential implications on political theorising and practice. What follows immediately is a section on Berlin’s dichotomies and their ensuing debates, and central to it is the suggestion that the logical and analytic approach practised by the mainstream political philosophers is inimical to his style of thinking. Thereafter, there is a section that tries to make a case for re-reading Berlin by way of discussing the interpretations offered by John Gray and Claude J. Gallipeau, and it argues that to take Berlin’s approach to politics seriously is to take his own historical consciousness seriously. The third and final section of this introductory chapter will therefore outline the method, argument, and structure of this thesis. 1.1. Berlin’s Conceptual Dichotomies and Ensuing Debates As a thinker, Berlin has a penchant for making conceptual distinction, and his central ideas are presented in the form of dichotomy, such as monism and pluralism, negative 2 Michael IgnatiefFs highly acclaimed biography Isaiah Berlin: A Life (London: Chatto & Windus, 1988) has contributed to this already. 5 liberty and positive liberty, Enlightenment and Counter-Enlightenment, hedgehogs and foxes - as well as, if Joan Cocks is right, bad nationalism and good nationalism.3 Of course, these dichotomies have not received equal attention. Judged from today’s literature in political philosophy, what Berlin’s critics have taken most seriously is the conceptual distinction between negative and positive liberty. Negative liberty is defined by Berlin as the area one ‘should be left to do or be what he is able to do or be, without interference by other persons’, while positive liberty as consisting in ‘being one’s own master’, that is to say, not as an instrument of another men’s acts of will.4 These two concepts are understood by Berlin to be logically distinct: for while the ‘negative’ sense of liberty is concerned with the question ‘How far does government interfere with me?’, the ‘positive’ one is with ‘Who governs me?’ or ‘Who is to say what I am, and what I am not, to be or to do?’.5 What is more, the negative account of liberty for Berlin is more ‘fundamental’ than the positive one, for ‘[n]o doubt every interpretation of the word liberty, however unusual, must include a minimum of [...] “negative” liberty,’ and his defence for negative liberty against the historically ‘more dangerous’ positive liberty is unequivocal.6 Since the essay’s publication, political philosophers have argued vigorously over the desirability and validity of Berlin’s distinction between negative and positive liberty, as well as their relative merits as a form of political freedom.
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