STEPHEN MILLER
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thought self-interest in the sense of a desire to make money was a positive
social and poli tical force. He was in favor of what the eighteenth century
called "luxury" - economic progress. So too were Hume and Adam
Smith. Hume welcomed the rise of what he called "parties from interest"
because he thought that the pursuit of one's self-interest was a moderate
passion. Parties from interest, he said, were willing to compromise, unlike
"parties from principle." The latter were dangerous to the health of the
polity, since people driven by principle - Hume was thinking especially
of those who belonged to dissenting religious sects - often provoked vio–
lent civil discord.
Some writers, most notably Bolingbroke in England and Rousseau in
France, decried private interest as a dangerous poli tical force. "Nothing is
more dangerous," Rousseau says in The
Social Contract,
"than the influence
of private interests on public affairs. . . ." According to Rousseau, "when
private interests make themselves felt and smaller associations begin to
influence the whole society, then the common interest becomes distort–
ed and encounters opposition, voting is no longer unanimous, [and] the
general will is no longer the will of all. .. ."
The American founders, especially James Madison and Alexander
Hamilton, the authors of The
Federalist Papers,
were swayed by the argu–
ments ofHume and Smith - not of Rousseau . Hamilton and Madison did
not disavow the notion of disinterestedness, but they were wary of those
who made much of their disinterestedness. Hamilton thought it was
unreasonable to expect most citizens to be disinterested. "We may preach
till we are tired of the theme, the necessity of disinterestedness in
republics, without making a single proselyte." Hamilton and Madison
argued for a modified notion of disinterestedness in which political lead–
ers realize that it is wise to refrain from speculating about the motives of
those with whom they disagree and also recognize that in a commercial
society there inevitably will be a variety of different interests. This modi–
fied notion of disinterestedness, which gained ground in England and the
United States, was attacked by some writers who lamented the fact that
men of commerce - men animated by self-interest rather than disinterest
- were now playing an important role in politics.
Marx took a totally different view of the question of disinterestedness.
He did not complain that self-interested men were too powerful; he ques–
tioned the ability of any bourgeois politician to be disinterested. All
legislators, reform or otherwise, serve the interests of the ruling class - the
bourgeoisie. In
The Civil War in France,
Marx describes elections as an event
in which "once in three or six years" the citizens decide "which member
of the ruling class was to misrepresent the people in Parliament...." No
matter how enlightened the governing class is, this class is driven by its
