Political Man Research Articles

The Rationality of Political ManThe Politics of Rational Man.Robert E. Goodin

Previous articleNext article No AccessReview EssayThe Rationality of Political Man The Politics of Rational Man. Robert E. Goodin S. I. BennS. I. Benn Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by American Journal of Sociology Volume 83, Number 5Mar., 1978 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/226684 Views: 1Total views on this site Citations: 3Citations are reported from Crossref Copyright 1978 The University of ChicagoPDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:John Dryzek, Robert E. Goodin Risk-Sharing and Social Justice: The Motivational Foundations of the Post-War Welfare State, British Journal of Political Science 16, no.11 (Jan 2009): 1–34.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007123400003781Robert E. Goodin Freedom and the Welfare State: Theoretical Foundations, Journal of Social Policy 11, no.22 (Jan 2009): 149–176.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0047279400011648Robert E. Goodin Making moral incentives pay, Policy Sciences 12, no.22 (Aug 1980): 131–145.https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00135935

The Dramaturgy of Tyranny: More's "Richard III" and Sackville's "Complaint of Buckingham"

Tudor England was a unique culture in many respects, not least of which because it allowed, even encouraged, a man of politics to be as well a man of letters. Within certain limits, a man of letters could respond creatively to political issues of great concern to this culture. But the list of those who achieved a high degree of success in both politics and literature is brief because each of these endeavors demanded a special blend of imagination, command of language, dedication, courage, and sensitivity. Two men who epitomized this Tudor synthesis of politics and literature were Thomas More and Thomas Sackville, men whose careers offer some interesting parallels. In addition to biographical parallels, there is a context in which we can compare the two as literary artists. That context is the handling of the theme of tyranny in More's History of King Richard III and Sackville's Complaint of Henry, Duke of Buckingham. In these works, More and Sackville create a dramatic vision of tyranny and its corrosive effects, and we can draw certain parallels between their treatments of this theme. Before demonstrating this literary commonality, however, I wish to trace briefly the similarities of their careers, and suggest that the environments in which they matured seem to have nurtured within them a profound concern for tyranny and civil disorder, a concern that may well have led them to dramatize such political evils. The first parallel is that both attained political stature as young men and maintained it for several decades. Recall, for example, that More was a member of Parliament before he was twenty-five. Later, his public service included being undersheriff of London, member of a trade mission to Flanders, councilior and judge in the Court of Requests, and Under-treasurer. In 1523 he was elected speaker of the House of Commons, and, of course, in 1529 he was made Lord Chancellor of England. It was, in short, an enviable career, for More was as much devoted to his country and his king as his conscience would allow. I

The Georges' Wilson Reexamined: An Essay on Psychobiography

Psychobiography interprets a life-course in terms of a consciously thought-out interpretation of the subject's personality. There are criteria for judging the relative merit of differing lines of interpretation. The Georges' Woodrow Wilson and Colonel House, rightly recognized as a psychobiographical classic, proceeds from Harold Lasswell's formula for “political man” as one who seeks power to overcome a low self-estimate. The formula is in some respects questionable. The Georges' generally effective application of it falls short of full success. An alternative interpretation, based on the view that Wilson's life exemplified the neurotic search for glory as described by Karen Horney, is explored. The two different lines of interpretation are compared with respect to what Alexander George has called the “self-defeating pattern” in Wilson's career as a leader.

The Georges' Wilson Reexamined: An Essay on Psychobiography

Psychobiography interprets a life-course in terms of a consciously thought-out interpretation of the subject's personality. There are criteria for judging the relative merit of differing lines of interpretation. The Georges' Woodrow Wilson and Colonel House, rightly recognized as a psychobiographical classic, proceeds from Harold Lasswell's formula for “political man” as one who seeks power to overcome a low self-estimate. The formula is in some respects questionable. The Georges' generally effective application of it falls short of full success. An alternative interpretation, based on the view that Wilson's life exemplified the neurotic search for glory as described by Karen Horney, is explored. The two different lines of interpretation are compared with respect to what Alexander George has called the “self-defeating pattern” in Wilson's career as a leader.

Mao Tse-tung’s Leadership Style

By all standards, Mao Tse-tung belongs in company of few great political men of our century. Born and raised in obscurity and restrictions of nineteenth-century rural China, he rose to assume leadership of Chinese Revolution, rule largest population in world with most pervasive and intense government known in history, and finally has clung to life long enough to become last of political heroes of great generation of World War II. His life spans emergence of modern China and his character has shaped manner and style of Chinese Revolution. To say that Mao Tse-tung has been most revered and most ecstatically worshiped man of century may seem like paying him a slight compliment in light of awesome statistics of China. With some 8oo million Chinese presumably holding Mao Tse-tung in absolute reverence as a demigod, what other mortal of our times can claim to be his competitor in popular appeal? Yet, Mao Tse-tung's appeal has reached far beyond citizenry of his native land, however large. Few have not been touched by his existence, whether in admiration or hatred, in respect or scorn. His name has become label for revolutionary extremists throughout world, the Maoists, yet it is Mao Tse-tung with whom leaders throughout world seek audiences. The pope in one day admits to his presence more people than Mao Tse-tung grants audiences in a year. When Mao last appeared publicly, more than a million people expressed tumultuous joy, and since then occasions for allowing a select few into his

The Concept of Political Rationality

The authors seek to develop the concept of (instrumental) rationality into a useful analytic tool in political science. Analogous to the economists' hypothetical rational man, the political man seeks to maximize his power. They note the idiosyncratic limitations of assuming that all purposive behavior is rational by definition, and turn to the action with the larger payoff as the more rational strategy, but this situational definition of rationality offers its own problems. They conclude that in most political situations it may be impossible to discover with certainty the best strategy, so settle for a less demanding definition of rational political choices, which includes recognition of the cost of choosing. The starkness of game theory analysis is relieved en route by perceptive comments on political institutions and choices.

National Socialism and Antisemitism: The Case of Maurice Barrès

On 12 May 1898, in the midst of the violent agitation attending the Dreyfus Affair, Maurice Barres presented himself as a candidate for the seat of deputy from Nancy on a platform of 'National Socialism'.1 It was under this banner that he sought a mandate to bar the way to the coalition of the forces of evil-Jews, aliens, Marxists, rootless Kantian intellectuals, moneymen tied up with international high finance, grands bourgeois, and liberals of all kinds-who were eating away at the body of the nation and leading the land to ruin. For many scholars today Barres is only a minor figure in the history of ideas; Professor Stuart Hughes, for example, places him far behind someone like Sorel on the via regia of intellectual history.2 But Barres' contemporaries thought differently. Celebrated writer, important journalist, man of politics, and intellectual leader for a large segment of the younger generation (including for a time even such men as Gide, Aragon, and Leon Blum), Barres was for the men of his generation the model of the engage intellectual and the philosophe, in the eighteenth-century French meaning of the term, the theoretician of that new populist and socialist right that had been taking shape during the last years of the century-a right very different from any that French

Social Position and Interest Recognition: The Voter in Broadview, or Are Voters Fools?

In a brief footnote in Political Man, S.M. Lipset argued that political scientists had, in the past, approached the phenomenon of electoral change in terms of its being “a rational reaction to new situations or factors.” Sociologists and social psychologists who had channelled their endeavours in this directtion, on the other hand, had, Lipset argued, placed emphasis elsewhere: when it came to explanations of the vote, group pressures and the fulfilment of personal needs were first in their repertoire.

George Grosz: Art and Politics in the Weimar Republic

George Grosz's famous drawings of the plutocrats, militarists, industrialists, and war profiteers of the Weimar Republic speak as powerfully now as when they were first created, and Beth Lewis's penetrating account of the artist's career addresses the source of the passion behind the pictures: Grosz was a profoundly political man who raged against oppression and stupidity. He satirized the Germany of his time so bitterly and so perceptively that his pictures seem to confront today's evils as well. From Grosz's influential part in the anarchic Berlin dada movement through his years of association with the Communists and his later disillusionment with the party, Lewis provides a vivid picture of the life of a superb artist in political context. Illustrated with over eighty of Grosz's drawings, this work is also a stimulating analysis of the question of dissent in a democratic society. An extensive and completely updated bibliography is provided. Here is a complex character lovingly, intelligently, and elegantly presented by an author fully familiar with the world Grosz moved in.--Istvan Deak, Journal of Modern History

The "Myth" and "Value" Approaches to American Studies

Seymour Martin Lipset, Revolution and Counter Revolution: Change and Persistence in Social Structures. Revised edition. Anchor Books, 1970. $2.25.416 pp. Revolution and Counter-Revolution is a collection of essays written be- tween 1963 and 1968 which develop the themes of Lipset's earlier works, Political Man and The First New Nation. The title is from an essay on Canadian/American contrasts, and may suggest both the fascination of the book and an element of caricature which may be inherent in its ap- proach. Lipset is pursuing a grand program of comparative political analy- sis, with emphasis on the evolutionary process of "modernization" and the national traits which influence its exact outcome. It is a work of great value to anyone interested in area studies, not only for the variety of use- ful information but for an exemplified method which may at the same time both focus and broaden that vaguest and most problematic of area programs, "American Studies."

Ibn Khaldun and Thucydides

Comparative study of the Muqaddimah of Ibn Khaldun and Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War reveals striking similarities not only in the methods and assumptions of the two historical thinkers, but also in the conclusions to which each was driven by his experience of history. Both men are naturalists, both empircists, both exponents of a critical approach to historiography. Yet neither is a reductionist. Both seek a lesson in history, and and both believe that the message of history is to be discovered in the careful study of historical laws revealed in the play of forces which are the expression of man's political and social nature. But beyond similarities of approach, there is a deep congruity of thought between the two authors, for both believe themselves to have glimpsed the pattern, learned the lesson of history. Both Ibn Khaldun and Thucydides have been led by their study of history to a cyclical, rather than linear view of historical process; both have been led, in developing their concepts of human and political reality, to a qualified relativism, which affords them, as I endeavor to show, a cautious but by no means pessimistic historical theodicy.

Islam Facing Development

It is difficult to make valid statements on a subject over which the most distressing commonplaces are poured out daily and which escapes, in large measure, the competence of any one man.* Since the area for all fruitful reflection is encumbered by knotty and prejudicial diagrams, the first task must be to clear an empty space in which to inscribe some concepts and some measures appropriate to the historical and sociological situation of the Islamic countries. However, the situation itself is very little understood because of the very backward state of modern Islamological studies. Under these conditions, it will be understood that theoretical and practical thought cannot avoid encountering obstacles in the question of Islam's development. True scientific research consists in posing real problems well, not so much in defining more or less durable solutions. That does not mean that theory must develop in parallel with practice: the decisions of political man have such a greater import because they are inscribed in a problematic at once large and rigorous. We shall try to surmount the obstacles that hinder reflection and distort the results of the best-intentioned action, by (1) discarding the false problems and (2) posing the essential question.

Authoritarianism, economic liberalism, and political preference.

Investigation of the political behavior of 293 Wisconsin adults in a gubernatorial election suggests that, while authoritarianism has some effect on political behavior, this is small and attenuated by more important economic considerations. Political man is, in large part, economic man.

Political Man and the Heritage of Hair: Some African Perspectives

In 1953 the King of the Baganda entered into a political confrontation with the British Governor of Uganda, Sir Andrew Cohen. The issues at stake ranged from whether Uganda should be forcibly tied to Kenya and Tanganyika to form an East African federation dominated by white settlers to the more immediate issue concerning the limits of the Governor's authority over the King of the Baganda. The British finally decided to send the Kabaka away into exile in England. There thus started one of the most fascinating wrangles between an African tribal community and the Colonial Office in London. The Kabaka's people were plunged into grief, but not into a spirit of resignation. Debates, petitions, and demonstrations in favour of the Kabaka's return became part of the strategy of his people to get him back to his throne.

Extremism and Liberalism in Contemporary America

It would be difficult to imagine three recent publications * that could indicate more dramatically the nature of the intellectual climate in the United States today, or reflect as faithfully the state of the discipline from which they emerge. Seymour Martin Lipset is a familiar figure on the American academic landscape. A prolific writer, his better known works such as Political Man (1959) and First New Nation (1963), have influenced a generation of students and scholars. Essen tially Lipset is a sociologist and a major figure in that school of American sociology so heavily influenced by the work of Talcott Parsons. Indeed it would not be unfair to Lipset to describe him as perhaps Parsons's greatest popularizer. During the 1960s Professor Lipset became increasingly identified as a leader of the revisionist school of democratic theory, particularly those scholars identified as * pluralist democrats '.2 For the latter pluralism is both an analytical concept and a normative theory; basically they believe that classical theories of democracy have to be revised to reflect the real conditions of life in an industrial society, characterized by apathy and ignorance on the part of the electorate. Major influences on this school of thought include Talcott Parsons, Arthur Fisher Bentley and Joseph Schumpeter, the last being credited with the final reconciliation between democratic and ?lite theories.3 These pluralists see democracy as a competitive process in which group interests in society fight for favourable response from the government. These groups mediate between the ?lite and the non-?lite, structuring their relationship and filter ing demands either way. Political action which bypasses this process is regarded as undesirable and probably a danger to the stability of the political system. In the case of most of these theorists it is difficult to decide whether they consider their model to be a useful analytical theory, a state of affairs to be actively worked for, or a description of real democracies such as the United States and Britain.4

Political Man in Postwar West German Education

As GERMANY LAY in ruins after the collapse of Hitler's Third Reich in 1945, thinkers and planners on both sides of the Atlantic asked themselves what it was about the country that had produced and nurtured this Nazi beast, and how a postwar Germany could prevent its re-emergence. The diagnosis varied. One prominent theme-the one that would ultimately prevail when the Western powers encouraged the Germans in their occupation zones to build a West German federal republic--stressed the restoration of pre-Nazi institutions and processes. These had worked well enough, the proponents of this argument asserted. The fault lay in technical weaknesses that enabled Hitler and his gang of upstarts to usurp power and initiate a National Socialist social revolution that, had it been permitted to endure, would have resulted in an extensive restructuring of German society. A second prominent theme saw in the destruction of Nazism and the imposition of foreign occupation an opportunity to carry through another kind of social revolution. Some few wanted the establishment of a dictatorship of the proletariat, a people's republic such as those emerging in the Eastern European states under the control of the Red Army. More, however, were interested in creating the social basis for the realization of liberal democracy: effective equality of opportunity and guarantees of civil rights; the creation of governmental institutions and processes that recognized both the fact and the legitimacy of social conflict among competing social groups; the need for institutions and processes that would bring this social conflict out into the open and permit its mutually satisfactory resolution by pluralistic elites; and a culture stressing the public virtues of responsible participation in social affairs rather than the private virtues of the intellectually and morally righteous man.2 The battle between those wanting enlightened restoration and those wanting reform was carried out in many arenas. Perhaps in none was it so bitterly fought as in the field of education. For some it was sufficient to purge schools at all levels of Nazi influences, to restore them to the standards of excellence existing in Weimar Germany and the century before its creation. There were certainly few who could quibble with the excellence of the classical humanism taught in these schools. For others, however, it was precisely this classical hu-

Political Primitivism, Differential Socialization, and Lower-Class Leftist Radicalism

Campbell, A., P. E. Converse, W. E. Miller and D. E. Stokes 1960 American Voter. New York: Wiley. Gamson, William A. 1968 Power and Discontent. Homewood, Illinois: Dorsey. Kerner Commission 1968 See National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders. Kornhauser, William 1959 Politics of Mass Society. New York: Free Press. Hayden, Thomas 1967 Rebellion in Newark. New York: Vintage. Lipset, S. M. 1960 Political Man. New York: Anchor. Meyer, P. 1967 Detroit Free Press, August 20:11. Milbraith, L. W. 1965 Political Participation. Chicago: Rand McNally. National Advisory Commisison on Civil Disorders 1968 Final Report. New York: Bantam. Ransford, H. E. 1968 Isolation, powerlessness, and violence: A study of attitudes and participation in the Watts riot. American Journal of Sociology 73 (March):581-591. Sears, D. and J. McConahay 1967 The politics of discontent. Institute of Government and Public Affairs, University of California, Los Angeles (June).

Poetry as Fiction

p RADOXES make intriguing titles, but I am not otherwise fond of them and intend, by the end of this article, to dissolve the one that entitles it. I mean to do this by elaborating the proposition that fictiveness is the characteristic quality of what we call when we use the term in the broad sense bequeathed by Aristotle, i.e., to refer to the general class of verbal artworks. My primary concern will be to develop a conception of poetry that allows us to distinguish it from and relate it to both nonpoetic discourse and other artforms. The view presented here was initially, but rather incidentally, proposed elsewhere.' I have found the elaboration of it of continuing interest, however, especially since the grounds for those distinctions and the nature of those relationships remain, to my mind, extremely problematic in contemporary linguistic and aesthetic theory. Since my procedure in what follows may seem initially perplexing, some prefatory remarks may prevent confusion. First of all, I shall be saying a good deal about language in general before I say anything at all about poetry. Any theory of poetry inevitably, though not always explicitly, presupposes a theory of language. Thus, those who have at various times regarded poetry as inspired speech, or embellished prose, or the language of passion, or emotive statements, have obviously had somewhat different notions of what language is when it is not poetrye.g., uninspired speech, plain prose, the language of reason, or verifiable statements. Since, moreover, linguistic theory is now in a very volatile state, no general propositions concerning language can be offered casually or taken for granted. (One can often tell more about a man's politics and metaphysics now from his views of language than one once could from his class or religion.) In any case, although I am by no means offering here anything that could be called a theory of language, the first section of this article will develop some general observations on nonpoetic or what I call natural discourse, particularly in those respects that are most significant in distinguishing it from

On homo politicus and the instant referendum

It is the purpose of this note to suggest a crude categorization of the types of "political man" in our society and to suggest some of the implication of this categorization for the future of the instant referendum. In a recent issue of Public Choice, James C. Miller [1] wrote in somewhat optimistic terms about the possibilities of the new technology. I believe that some sort of computerized participation by large numbers of the public in opinion formation and direct policy making is in the cards in the next ten to twenty years. It may be that we will be able to turn this new technology to the improvement and defense of democratic institutions. I hope so. However, it is by no means evident that this will be the result.

Seven Days in May: The Teacher in Apocalypse

V Vhat does a man do when it dawns on him that life chosen, career laboriously prepared for, work he loves best on earth, has somehow mysteriously disappeared, no longer exists save in his memory and fantasy? Well, whatever he does, he feels strange-by turns unbelieving, defensive, resentful . . . excited, impatient, overeager . . . frightened. For some in my profession-teachers who've been political men almost exclusively for close to a decade -career and savored intellectual labor disappeared long ago. Others had the in moratoria and other class suspensions of 1969. Some, of course, are still untouched-they're facing upcoming school year with confidence and relish not greatly changed from that of past. In my case experience in question came after 20 of teaching, at a time when I was certain I'd found my way in my work. Twenty years has a portentous sound-I apologize. It's not that count, it's that toward end of stretch I'd come on my own teaching style, something that was personal; not irresponsible; capable-as though it were an independent source of energy, not a mere style-of generating questions fascinating (to me) in themselves. Simultaneously I was learning how to link up my teaching self and my citizen self in satisfying ways-small tutorial projects in Mississippi, work with ghetto schoolteachers in Washington, lobbying for controlled shifts of curricular and admissions policies at my college. One way of saying it is that I knew where I was, believed I earned my pay, felt confident I'd improved immensely at my work over years, felt pleased by my luck in capitalizing on expanded chances for using teaching skills in settings less privileged than my home base. I will lay it out in cliche: fulfillment seemed near at hand.