2. What Are the Similarities and Dissimilarities Between How Hume and Ferguson Describe the Politics of Modern (“commercial”) Societies?

While David Hume and Adam Ferguson shared an interest in the social and political structures of their time, they had different views on the politics of modern (“commercial”) society, specifically in its relation to commerce, corruption, professional politics, and ethical differences between classes.

Both Hume and Ferguson recognized the rise of commercial society as an important development in human history that was “stumbled upon” as an unintended but beneficial consequence of human experiments. While Hume was more optimistic about the potential of commerce to create social order, Ferguson was more cautious about its side effects. Hume viewed commerce as a civilizing force that encouraged cooperation and discouraged violence. This force even extended to interstate interactions at the macro level—Hume argued that “nothing is more favourable to the rise of politeness and learning than… states connected together by commerce and policy.” Hume believed that this pursuit of wealth through commerce led to the creation of stable societies with strong institutions, prosperity, and social order. In contrast, Ferguson was far more skeptical of the impact of commercial society. Unlike some of his contemporaries, he was cautious of the hazards of unchecked commerce, which he argued led to moral decay, social fragmentation, and the erosion of civic virtue. According to Ferguson, commercial societies were characterized by individualism and self-interest, which undermined the community and shared purpose of a healthy society—“every successive art, by which the individual is taught to improve on his fortune, is… an addition to his private engagements and a new avocation of his mind from the public.” For this reason, Ferguson believed that the moral and social fabric of society was threatened by the unchecked growth of commerce, and he argued that the government should play an active role in regulating commerce to ensure they do not lead to social disintegration. 

Both Hume and Ferguson recognized the pervasiveness of corruption in politics, but they had different views on its solutions. Hume argued that corruption was an inevitable result of human nature and the desire for power and wealth. He believed that the best way to mitigate corruption was to create institutional checks and balances that would limit the power of any one group and ensure accountability. A successful mixed government, he argued, should be arranged such that one rank or branch may not “swallow up” the rest. In contrast, Ferguson saw corruption as a symptom of deeper social and cultural problems. He believed that corruption was rooted in the breakdown of traditional norms and values and that the only way to address it was to rebuild social cohesion and restore a sense of shared purpose and identity. He also argued that corruption was not limited to the elite, but was instead a universal problem that affected all levels of society. Specifically, he writes that society forgets “how many circumstances, especially in populous cities, tend to corrupt [even] the lowest orders of men,” and this “admiration on of wealth unpossessed,” pervades across all classes of citizens rather than just the elite (179). His writing emphasizes the ubiquity of corruption in society and the way in which envy pervades across all classes of citizens. He argues that the lower class is not ethically different from the upper class, but simply lacks wealth, which makes them envious. This focus on the role of envy in corruption is a central theme in Ferguson’s political philosophy.

This discourse regarding corruption extended to their views on professional politics.  Hume saw professional politicians as a solution to the functioning of government, but he also believed that they were prone to corruption and self-interest. He saw the role of the citizenry as that of vigilant watchdogs, monitoring the actions of politicians and holding them accountable. In contrast, Ferguson believed that the rise of professional politics, which he saw as a consequence of the growth of commercial society, was a threat to the integrity of political institutions. He argued that professional politicians were more interested in their own advancement than in the common good, and that this focus on personal gain led to corruption and the erosion of public trust. Ferguson believed that civil society emerged organically, through the voluntary interactions of individuals and groups. This separating of “the arts which form the citizen and the statesman,” he argued, “is an attempt to dismember the human character and to destroy those very arts we mean to improve” (242). Ferguson believed that this separation of professional politics created a self-serving political class that was disconnected from the needs and aspirations of ordinary citizens. According to him, the corruption of politics was a symptom of the larger problems facing commercial society, and could only be addressed by a broader recommitment to civic virtue and public service.

Through their political philosophies, David Hume and Adam Ferguson provided contrasting perspectives on modern societies in relation to corruption, professional politics, and ethical differences.

8. What is “happiness” for Aristotle and for Bentham? Are Their Accounts of “happiness” Antithetical or Similar or Partly Overlapping?

Aristotle and Bentham’s accounts of happiness are antithetical in their characterization and by extension their implications for pleasure, political theory, and the role of government. Both may view happiness as a “final good” and goal of human existence, but disagree on almost every aspect of how it is achieved.

For Aristotle, happiness (eudaimonia) is the ultimate end of human existence and is the highest good. He argues that happiness is not a feeling or a momentary pleasure, but a state of being that is achieved through living a life of virtuous actions, habits, and reason. In contrast, Jeremy Bentham conceives happiness as the experience of pleasure and the absence of pain. He believed that the goal of human action is to maximize pleasure and minimize pain, which is elaborated in his principle of utility (Bentham 1). Notably, this means that virtuous action is not necessary for achieving happiness. While there are some similarities between these two accounts of happiness, such as the idea that happiness is a desirable state, these definitions are fundamentally different, as are the methods to achieve them. For Aristotle, happiness is a state of being that results from living a life of virtue, whereas, for Bentham, happiness is hedonistic, a sensation that results from experiencing pleasure and avoiding pain.

By extension, Aristotle and Bentham had fundamentally different views on the role of pleasure in the pursuit of happiness. For Aristotle, pleasure is not the ultimate goal of human life, but is a means to achieving happiness. While pleasure is a component of a good life, Aristotle believed that pleasure should be pursued in moderation, which follows from his characterization of virtue as the “mean of excess and deficiency.”  He decries that “most men, and men of the most vulgar type, seem… to identify the good, or happiness, with pleasure,” and from this, concludes that “the mass of mankind are evidently quite slavish in their tastes, preferring a life suitable to beasts” (Nicomachean Ethics, “On Happiness”).

It is likely that Aristotle would characterize Bentham as such a beast. Unlike Aristotle, Bentham viewed pleasure and happiness as the same thing. Therefore, pleasure, like happiness, is a final good in itself rather than an instrumental means to achieving happiness. It is also not just one of many components of a good life, as Aristotle would say, but one of the “two sovereign masters” that “nature has placed mankind under,” the other being pain (Bentham 1).

This distinction extends into their political philosophy. Much of Aristotle’s writings were concerned with the ancient concept of harmony between the individual and community. Aristotle believed that the individual and the community were interdependent and that the well-being of each depended on the well-being of the other. He argued that individuals had a duty to contribute to the common good and that the community had a responsibility to provide the conditions for the individual to flourish. For Aristotle, the individual’s pursuit of goals could be antithetical to the goals of the state, leading to a lack of harmony between the individual and the community.

In contrast, for Bentham, this conflict between individual and community goals simply did not exist. This was due in part because he viewed the community as “a fictitious body, composed of the individual persons” (Bentham 3), and thus merely an aggregate of individuals whose utility should be maximized. Bentham describes “the interest of the community [as] one of the most general expressions that can occur in the phraseology of morals” (Bentham 3)—a characterization that Aristotle would likely find abhorrent for its failure to recognize the importance of community and the tension underlying it and its citizens. Bentham saw the state as an instrument for maximizing the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people in aggregate. In fact, if the happiness of the community is the sum of the happiness of its individual members, and the only thing that matters is happiness, Bentham implies that the interests of the individual and the community are perfectly aligned. This is in stark contrast to Aristotle’s writings that center around the existence of a tension between the individual and the community.

By extension, Aristotle and Bentham differed in their conception of the role of the government for its citizens. They both believed that the role of the government is to create conditions that enable individuals to pursue happiness, but because “happiness” means very fundamentally different things to them, their conceptions diverge. Aristotle believed that the government should provide opportunities for individuals to develop their virtues and cultivate virtuous lives. The state has a broader responsibility to promote the good and to create conditions that allow individuals to flourish as part of a harmonious community. For Aristotle, the community was not just an aggregate of individuals, but a living entity with a common good to that individuals had a duty to contribute.

In Bentham’s view, the state exists solely for the benefit of its citizens, and its function is to promote their happiness and well-being. He believed that the state’s goal should be to maximize the happiness of the greatest number of individuals, which would also benefit the community as a whole. There is no concept or concern for harmony, and Bentham believed that the role of the government is to promote the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people.

While Aristotle and Bentham would agree that happiness is an ultimate good, their conceptions regarding the role of pleasure as a intermediary or final good, the harmony between citizens and the state, and the role of government in achieving it differ.