Utopia: Social Theory and the Future

Keith Tester, Michael Hviid Jacobsen, Keith Tester, Michael Hviid Jacobsen

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN:
  9781138274556
• eBook ISBN:
  9781317002970
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

In the light of globalization's failure provide the universal panacea expected by some of its more enthusiastic proponents, and the current status of neo-liberalism in Europe, a search has begun for alternative visions of the future; alternatives to the free market and to rampant capitalism. Indeed, although these alternatives may not be conceived of in terms of being a 'perfect order', there does appear to be a trend towards 'utopian thinking', as people - including scholars and intellectuals - search for inspiration and visions of better futures. If, as this search continues, it transpires that politics has little to offer, then what might social theory have to contribute to the imagination of these futures? Does social theory matter at all? What resources can it offer this project of rethinking the future? Without being tied to any single political platform, Utopia: Social Theory and the Future explores some of these questions, offering a timely and sustained attempt to make social theory relevant through explorations of its resources and possibilities for utopian imaginations. It is often claimed that utopian thought has no legitimate place whatsoever in sociological thinking, yet utopianism has remained part and parcel of social theory for centuries. As such, in addition to considering the role of social theory in the imagination of alternative futures, this volume reflects on how social theory may assist us in understanding and appreciating utopia or utopianism as a special topic of interest, a special subject matter, a special analytical focus or a special normative dimension of sociological thinking. Bringing together the latest work from a leading team of social theorists, this volume will be of interest to sociologists, social and political theorists, anthropologists and philosophers.

PART I Theoretical Musings

1 Utopia and the End of History

Henk de Berg

DOI: 10.4324/9781315548555-2

Introduction

Never particularly popular to begin with, today Francis Fukuyama’s suggestion that we have reached ‘the end of history’ tends to meet with outright derision. His ideas, everyone seems to agree, represent a prototypical example of misguided utopian thinking.¹ I wish to argue that, in fact, the opposite is the case and that the theory of the end of history can only properly be understood as a warning against utopianism – not because Fukuyama exemplifies a naïvely optimistic belief that is mistaken, but because he provides a realistically sober view that is correct.

¹ The disparaging view of Fukuyama’s ideas is well conveyed by Wheen (2004, esp. 66–70).

In order to make this case, I shall first recapitulate in some detail the line of argument developed in The End of History and the Last Man. This is all the more relevant as a good deal of the criticism levelled at Fukuyama is based simply on a misunderstanding of what he is saying. I shall then examine the most important counterarguments to his theory – notably those that invoke the inherent tensions in ‘posthistorical’ societies, the continued existence of wars and other forms of political conflict and the rise of Islamic fundamentalism – and show why they do not hold water. Next, I shall look at the question that follows from this: if the liberal-democratic and capitalist order does indeed appear to have won the day, why do so many cultural critics wish to go beyond it? What is it that they believe is missing and which leads them to contend that we ought to battle, in word or deed, for a society in which this apparent lack no longer exists? I shall argue that the desire for a new world order is based on a fundamental misconception of what it means to be human and ignores the exigencies of life in modern society. On this basis, I shall make it clear why social and political utopianism is actually a danger, less a beacon of hope than a will-’o-the-wisp, and in what sense, therefore, the theory of the end of history needs to be embraced.

The End of History

Fukuyama’s thesis that the liberal-democratic and capitalist order constitutes the end point of humanity’s ideological evolution first reached a wider audience through his article “The End of History?”, published in the American international affairs magazine The National Interest in the summer of 1989.² The fall of the Berlin Wall almost immediately afterwards gave the author the aura of a prophet and catapulted him to international fame, even though, as Fukuyama himself remarked ironically (Fukuyama 1989/1990: 21), his real achievement appears to have been “to produce a uniquely universal consensus … on the fact that … history has not in fact ended”. The theory’s second outing, the 1992 book The End of History and the Last Man, again generated much media attention and intellectual discussion, but little approval.

² The article was virtually identical to an internal working paper – ‘Have we reached the end of history?’ – that Fukuyama had written a few months earlier for the RAND Corporation, the Washington-based think-tank to which he was affiliated at the time. Before that, Fukuyama was Deputy Director of the US State Department’s Policy Planning Staff. He is currently the Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at Stanford University’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.

What, exactly, is Fukuyama’s argument as developed in The End of History and the Last Man? His starting-point is the observation that over the last two centuries the number of liberal democracies in the world has risen steadily, while the illiberal regimes have significantly declined in number. The 20th century did produce several totalitarian – fascist or Communist – states, but what is striking about them, in addition to their barbarity, is their lack of staying power. Adolf Hitler’s tausendjähriges Reich lasted twelve years. Most Communist regimes have also already met their demise, and the few that remain are virtually all becoming more liberal (or less illiberal). In short, it is precisely the so-called strong states that have proved to be the weak ones. This worldwide process of liberalization began to gain momentum, Fukuyama points out, well before the collapse of the Soviet Union. In the 1970s, the dictatorships of Caetano in Portugal, Franco in Spain and the military junta in Greece came to an end. The 1980s witnessed the transformation of a host of South American countries – including Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay – into democracies. Finally, Nelson Mandela’s release from prison in 1990 marked the end of apartheid in South Africa. The question Fukuyama then asks is: is all this a coincidence, a piece of good luck that we cannot expect to continue? Or is there something driving this process so that we are in fact dealing with a long-term pattern? His answer his unequivocal: there is indeed a driving force behind history which explains both the “development of human societies from simple tribal ones based on slavery and subsistence agriculture, through various theocracies, monarchies, and feudal aristocracies, up through modern liberal democracy and … capitalism”, and the fact that “liberal democracy remains the only coherent political aspiration that spans different regions and cultures around the globe” (Fukuyama 1992: xii-xiii). This force consists of two converging trends, one which can be termed, in a broad philosophical sense, materialist and one which is, in the same sense, idealist.

The first of these trends is the development of the natural sciences, which is not just cumulative,³ but also directional, in that it invariably leads to industrialization and socio-economic modernization, which in their turn produce fundamental similarities between widely diverging countries and cultures: they engender urbanization and bureaucratization, destroy the ties of the extended family and the village, hugely accelerate the division of labour and give rise to an ever-expanding education sector.⁴ The reasons for this are partly military and partly economic in nature. The potential threat from other states forces all countries to create structures conducive to the development and production of military technology:

³ This is the case – Fukuyama (1992: 352–353, note 2) stresses – even when one accepts Thomas Kuhn’s thesis that scientific progress is discontinuous and takes place through paradigm shifts. After all, a new paradigm presupposes the old one (Einstein could not have come before Newton), which, moreover, it only dislodges when it constitutes an improvement on it. Additionally, no paradigm shift ever undoes the evolution of science: the machines constructed on the basis of Newtonian physics did not stop working with the advent of the theory of relativity. ⁴ The proximity of this part of Fukuyama’s argument to Marx’s ideas is obvious; see, for example, the famous first chapter of The Communist Manifesto (Marx and Engels 1976: 482–496).

they must be able to mobilize resources on a national level, which requires the creation of a strong centralized state authority with the power of taxation and regulation; they must break down various forms of regional, religious, and kinship ties which potentially obstruct national unity; [and] they must increase educational levels in order to produce an elite capable of disposing of technology (Fukuyama 1992: 73).

Fukuyama mentions as examples the defensive modernizations of early 19th century Prussia⁵ and the first phase of Mikhail Gorbachev’s perestroika. The economic implementation of scientific discoveries likewise leads to social modernization. The breakdown of apartheid, according to Fukuyama, is a case in point. Once South Africa moved into the industrial and then the post-industrial era, the black population could no longer simply be kept away in the countryside: they had to be allowed to become mobile, move into the cities, receive a proper education and master the new technologies. The “laws of modern economics” (Fukuyama 1992: 21) had made segregation and other official forms of discrimination unsustainable.⁶

⁵ “The reforms of vom Stein, Scharnhorst, and Gneisenau in Prussia were motivated by a recognition that Napoleon had been able to defeat their country … so easily because of the backwardness of Prussia and its total alienation from society. Military reforms such as the introduction of universal conscription were accompanied by introduction of the Napoleonic code into Prussia” (Fukuyama 1992: 75). Other measures included the educational reforms by W. von Humboldt and the abolition of serfdom. ⁶ Fukuyama does not claim that this is the only reason for the end of apartheid. Indeed, as we shall see shortly, one of the key characteristics of his theory is the stress it places on the role of ideas and ideology.

Fukuyama argues that the evolution of the natural sciences produces not only social modernization. Eventually, he contends, it also results in economic liberalization. This is because, once the economy is beyond the age of coal and steel and has entered the post-industrial era, capitalism is “far more efficient than centrally planned economic systems in developing and utilizing technology, and in adapting to the rapidly changing conditions of a global division of labor” (Fukuyama 1992: 91). There are at least three reasons for this. First, scientific enquiry prospers most when creativity and innovation are appreciated and rewarded. “While the Soviet state could pamper its nuclear physicists, it didn’t have much left over for the designers of television sets, which exploded with some regularity, or for those who might aspire to market new products to new consumers, a completely non-existent field in the USSR” (Fukuyama 1992: 93). Second, planned economies tend to destroy people’s work ethic. Finally and most importantly, from a certain stage onwards modern economies are simply too complex for centralized planning.

As Fukuyama himself notes, his approach up to this point has essentially been economic in nature; after all, the progressive unfolding of the natural sciences “has no force of its own, apart from the human beings who want to make use of science to conquer nature so as to satisfy their needs, or to secure themselves against dangers” (Fukuyama 1992: 131). That is to say, he has offered “a kind of Marxist interpretation of history that leads to a completely non-Marxist conclusion” (Fukuyama 1992: 131). This approach, however, as Fukuyama acknowledges, only gets us halfway. It explains the globalization of the free-market system and the increasing socio-economic uniformity of modern societies, but it does not account for the spread of liberal democracy. There is a strong empirical correlation between prosperity and democracy,⁷ but no causal link. Indeed, “if a country’s goal is economic growth above all other considerations, the truly winning combination would appear to be … what we might term a ‘market-oriented authoritarianism’” à la Taiwan (Fukuyama 1992: 123). What, then, is the explanation for the increasing global political liberalization?

⁷ “Of the formerly communist states in Eastern Europe, the most economically advanced among them – East Germany, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia, followed by Poland – also made the most rapid transitions to full democracy, while less developed Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, and Albania all elected reform communists in 1990–91 … Africa, the least developed region of the world, possesses only a handful of recent democracies, of uncertain stability” (Fukuyama 1992: 112).

In order to answer this question, Fukuyama turns to G. W. F. Hegel and one of Hegel’s more radical followers, the Russian-born French philosopher Alexandre Kojève (1902–1968).⁸ Central to his interpretation of their work are two Hegelian concepts: the desire for recognition and the dialectic of lordship and bondage. On Fukuyama’s reading of the first concept, what is most characteristic of human beings is not their striving for self-preservation, but their ability to transcend their animal existence and create and sustain their own selves. This potential to attain subjecthood can be fulfilled only in and through the relationship with other human beings: we cannot be said to be what we want to be if we are not recognized as such by others. (People are not actually free if they are kept in servitude, and there is no female equality unless women are actually recognized as being equal to men). Man is “a social being: his own sense of self-worth and identity is intimately connected with the value that other people place on him” (Fukuyama 1992: 146–147). The same holds for his work and his acquisition of property, which are not just means to satisfy material needs or desires, but ways in which he realizes himself through (that is, mediated by) other people who accept his choices, activities and possessions. That is why human beings are characterized first and foremost by the desire for recognition.

⁸ The key text is Kojève’s 1947 Introduction à la lecture de Hegel (a rather misleading title given that this is a fairly complicated 600-page tome). It should be stressed that Fukuyama is ‘interested not in Hegel per se but in Hegel-as-interpreted-by-Kojève, or perhaps a new, synthetic philosopher named Hegel-Kojève’ (Fukuyama 1992: 144). Criticism to the effect that The End of History and the Last Man does not tally with Hegel’s (or Kojève’s) philosophy is therefore beside the point. Fukuyama develops his interpretation of Hegel-Kojève to a large extent through a comparison with the views of Hobbes and Locke. F...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Contributors
• Introduction: Utopia as a Topic for Social Theory
• Part I Theoretical Musings
• Part II Theories In Motion
• Index