Such cooperative solutions as it was prepared to ask for would, therefore, be confined within narrow bounds. Even if its own ends were perfectly non-competing with those of its subjects-an obviously hard condition to fulfil-such a state would still have to consider the scope of any social contract as limited (if indeed it saw its services to society in contractual terms). However, the more it asked, the more it would use and strain its legitimacy. It could do so by simply asking its subjects to behave accordingly. The legitimate state, admitting that time and its own good conduct and good luck did earn it this rare status, could bring about cooperative solutions to a possibly wide range of otherwise unattainable ends over and above the preservation of life and property. to impose upon society the cooperative solution of respect for life and property, to keep out “non-minimal,” “non-capitalist” rivals and to pursue such meta-political ends as it may fancy while if it did heavily rely on consent, it is doubtful whether it could confine itself to as modest objectives as these. *2 Nor would the capitalist state necessarily require consent for carrying out its unambitious programme, i.e.
His ends were limited in scope and modest in extent, and those of the state did not directly compete with them (for instance, if the political hedonist wanted protection from muggers and the state wanted national greatness), both ends could be simultaneously furthered by stern government. Its ends while securing the compliance of civil society by repression alone. The expectations of the hedonist could conceivably be fulfilled even by a state pursuing It could perform this role in diverse ways, depending on how it combined the three ingredients which make up the obedience-inducing compound of statecraft, namely repression, consent and legitimacy. The most basic role of the state was to transform non-cooperation from an irresistible option (in game-theory language, a “dominant strategy” which the player must adopt if he is rational) into a prohibitive one. The functioning of the state facilitated self-preservation according to Hobbes, or the attainment of a broader range of ends, according to Rousseau the realization of these ends required cooperative solutions which (or so went the contractarian contention) could not come about without non-cooperation being deterred. When looking at the rationale of submission to the state, I argued that political hedonism involved the acceptance of coercion as the counterpart of a benefit conferred by the state. State of affairs (presumably the result of adopting the procedure). It may help in grasping some of the essential features of the liberal ideology and of the practice of the adversary state, to reflect briefly on democracy as a Democratic Valuesĭivisive policies which democratic competition forces the adversary state to adopt are promoted by the liberal ideology as contributing to universally agreed values.ĭemocracy is not the good life by another name.