Theories of Political Obligation-Voluntarism

Voluntarism-
• Any metaphysical or psychological system that assigns to the will (Latin: voluntas) a
more predominant role than that attributed to the intellect. Christian philosophers have
sometimes described as voluntarist: the non-Aristotelian thought of St. Augustine
because of its emphasis on the will to love God; the post-Thomistic thought of John
Duns Scotus, a late medieval scholastic, who insisted on the absolute freedom of the
will and its supremacy over all other faculties; and the position of the French
writer Blaise Pascal, who in religion substituted “reasons of the heart” for rational
propositions.
• Immanuel Kant’s categorical imperative as an unconditional moral law for the
will’s choice of action represented an ethical voluntarism. A metaphysical
voluntarism was propounded in the 19th century by the German philosopher Arthur
Schopenhauer, who took will to be the single, irrational, unconscious force behind all
of reality and all ideas of reality. An existentialist voluntarism was present
in Friedrich Nietzsche’s doctrine of the overriding “will to power” whereby man
would eventually re-create himself as “superman.” And a Pragmatic voluntarism is
evident in William James’s reference of knowledge and truth to purpose and to
practical ends.
• 19th century voluntarism has its origin in Kant, particularly his doctrine of the
“primacy of the practical over the pure reason.” Intellectually, humans are incapable
of knowing ultimate reality, but this need not and must not interfere with the duty of
acting as though the spiritual character of this reality were certain. Freedom cannot be
demonstrated speculatively, but whenever a person acts under a motive supplied by
reason, he is thereby exhibiting the practical efficiency of reason, and thus showing its
reality in a practical sense. Following Kant, two distinct lines of voluntarism have
proceeded which may be called rational and irrational voluntarism respectively. For
Fichte, the originator of rational voluntarism, the ethical is primary both in the sphere
of conduct and in the sphere of knowledge.
• The whole nature of consciousness can be understood only from the point of view of
ends which are set up by the self. The actual world, with all the activity that it has, is
only to be understood as material for the activity of the practical reason, as the means
through which the will achieves complete freedom and complete moral realization.
Schopenhauer’s irrational voluntarism asserts a more radical opposition between the
will and intellect. For him, the will is by its very nature irrational. It manifests itself in
various stages in the world of nature as physical, chemical, magnetic, and vital force,
pre-eminently, however, in the animal kingdom in the form of “the will to live,”
which means the tendency to assert itself in the struggle for means of existence and
for reproduction of the species. This activity is all of it blind, so far as the individual
agent is concerned, although the power and existence of the will are thereby asserted
continually
Irrationalism-
• The idea that feeling, instinct and intuition are better guides for political action than
scientific reason. (it was popularized by Rousseau).
• Further promoted by metaphysical idealists like Friedrich Hegel- he laid emphasis on
unconscious reason, spirit and spiritual insight as the bases of understanding.
• Schopenhauer formulated the doctrine that the underlying cause of all that takes place
in the universe and on this earth is will; not conscious, rational will, but blind,
groping, struggling will.
• Consciousness is but a superficial aspect or phase of the all-pervasive and ever-
driving energy that constitutes will. Will has no definite purpose or goal and moves in
no comprehensible course; it merely acts, and that is all. Therefore, that the whole
universe, including man, must be utterly irrational, and that all attempts to subordinate
will to what man calls reason are foolish.
• Nietzsche, a disciple of Schopenhauer, added an idea which gave the doctrine of will
high political potentiality.
• He said that will, as manifested in living things, does have a purpose, namely, to
prevail and achieve dominance over other things. This is Will to Power. All living
things are actuated by the Will to Power, they struggle unceasingly to overcome
whatever opposes them or stands in their way and thus gain ever more and more
power. And they seek power for power’s sake, not for good, not for evil, not for any
reason save to satisfy their insatiate craving for power.
• Nietzsche was influenced by Darwin’s theory of evolution and he blended it with his
theory of will. According to him social evolution is nothing more than a never ending
struggle for power, with natural selection favouring the strongest and most ruthless. In
long run this process would divide mankind into two great classes-ordinary men and
supermen, the latter being so superior, because of the selective evolutionary process
that had produced them, that they would rule the world.
• Nietzsche, a disciple of Schopenhauer, added an idea which gave the doctrine of will
high political potentiality.
• He said that will, as manifested in living things, does have a purpose, namely, to
prevail and achieve dominance over other things. This is Will to Power. All living
things are actuated by the Will to Power, they struggle unceasingly to overcome
whatever opposes them or stands in their way and thus gain ever more and more
power. And they seek power for power’s sake, not for good, not for evil, not for any
reason save to satisfy their insatiate craving for power.
• Nietzsche was influenced by Darwin’s theory of evolution and he blended it with his
theory of will. According to him social evolution is nothing more than a never ending
struggle for power, with natural selection favouring the strongest and most ruthless. In
long run this process would divide mankind into two great classes-ordinary men and
supermen, the latter being so superior, because of the selective evolutionary process
that had produced them, that they would rule the world.