<i>Possessive Individualism</i> at 50:

I went to the University of Toronto in the fall of 1983 to pursue a Master's Degree in what was then called Political Economy. I chose Toronto largely because C.B. Macpherson taught there. Or so I thought. In those pre-internet days, news traveled slowly, and while the brochure I had received in the mail clearly listed him as a member of the faculty, I discovered when I arrived that he had in fact retired.As it happens, his physical absence hardly seemed to matter, as his ideas—along with those of Allan Bloom, who was also no longer there—permeated the air. It was easy to think about and find discussions of not just Possessive Individualism, but also of his many essays on democratic theory. When, after a four year absence in the mid-80s, I returned for doctoral work, I found no small amount of faculty support for a dissertation on Macpherson's democratic vision.I mention this history because it is of a time that now seems quite remote. Good old-fashion Marxist inspired leftism has almost a quaint air about it, as the names of those whose works we debated endlessly—Miliband, Poulantzas, Althusser, Marcuse (a friend of Macpherson's), Fromm—now create more nostalgia than they do internecine graduate student fighting. So too does the name Macpherson, and, I would argue, we need, in marking the 50th anniversary of Possessive Individualism, to acknowledge that fact. The book is fifty years old, but it was really only alive for about half of that time. Part of the explanation for its decline is no doubt found in the critiques—by Dunn, Skinner and others—of Macpherson's interpretations of Hobbes, Locke et al.1 Of at least equal significance, however, are the forces that have undermined enthusiasm for much of the socialist left. Put simply: Macpherson was too forceful a critic of capitalism for his work to remain unscathed by that system's perceived triumph over communism.Or so I shall argue. When I say “too forceful” I do not mean to imply that Macpherson's critique of capitalism was where he went wrong. Actually, I intend to make precisely the opposite point. To be more specific, my argument here is that while the central ethical commitment of the theory of possessive individualism was anti-capitalist in nature—and for that reason a difficult sell in today's political climate—a close inspection of the manner in which Macpherson employed that commitment reveals a critical perspective that renders his work every bit as vital now as it was thirty, forty or fifty years ago.2Macpherson explained in the opening pages of Possessive Individualism that the book's central concept is a form of individualism arising in the seventeenth-century in which the individual is “seen as essentially the proprietor of his own person or capacities, owing nothing to society for them.”3 This image was, Macpherson argued, brought to life in the writings of liberal thinkers who took their cues about the nature of individuals from the nascent capitalist relations around them.4 In imbuing their theories with this image, they managed, as have their successors—and in Macpherson's hands, there is no shortage of possessive individualists—to in turn justify those relations, for capitalism as an ideal made sense only as long as humans were conceived in the possessive individualist mode (which, as he later commented, was “a fairly realistic conclusion at the time”5).The logic of these justifications made them unassailable to anyone unwilling to question the basic “postulates of human nature,” as Macpherson was fond of calling them. And for those who did question them—J.S. Mill and T.H. Green through to twentieth century liberals such as A. D. Lindsay and Ernest Barker—the results were various forms of contradiction “involving the thinkers' concealing from themselves the fundamental nature of the problem.”6 As the possessive individualism postulates could not be jettisoned “while market relations prevail,”7 critics of the possessive model simply tacked on to them an “egalitarian complement.”8 This “concept of man as at least potentially a doer, an exerter and developer and enjoyer of his human capacities”9 resulted in “an uneasy compromise between the two views of man's essence, and, correspondingly, an unsure mixture of … two maximizing claims made for the liberal-democratic society.”10 Thus while the theory of possessive individualism was initially an attempt to bring to light the pervasiveness in liberal theory of market assumptions about humans, it became, as Macpherson continued in subsequent works to explore its normative implications,11 an attempt to expose much broader and further reaching contradictions within what had become liberal-democratic theory. As he put it, “Because Western democratic theory contains these inconsistent postulates, its condition is internally precarious.”12So far there is little to indicate why this theory might have come to be neglected in the last twenty years. Even if Macpherson's critics were correct that early liberal thinkers were not drawing from nascent market relations in their postulates about human nature, none, to my knowledge, has suggested that these postulates are absent in their theories. (Rousseau, after all, had argued something very similar when he pointed out that all state of nature theorists, “speaking continually of need, avarice, oppression, desires, and pride, have transferred to the state of nature the ideas they acquired in society.”13) Nor has there been criticism of the claim that such postulates do indeed work to justify market relations (irrespective of whether that justification was the intention of any particular thinker). In fact, it is difficult to see how one could reject that claim. So what is the problem here? Why is the theory of possessive individualism not still in currency?The answer, I think, has far less to do with Macpherson's analysis of liberal-democratic theories than it does with the normative position that motivated it. He was, after all, targeting those theories not simply because he, like Rousseau, saw them as anthropologically or ontologically incorrect. Rather, he targeted them because of what they did, namely justify particular inequalities endemic to market relations.14 Hobbes, Locke, and others whose theories were imbued with possessive individualist assumptions did not interest him as subjects of intellectual history; they interested him for the part they played—wittingly or not—in the justification of unjust property relations. His general thinking was that the maintenance [of any particular system of property] requires at least the acquiescence of the bulk of the people, and the positive support of any leading classes. Such support requires a belief that the institution serves some purpose or fills some need. That belief requires, in turn, that there be a theory which both explains and justifies the institution in terms of the purpose served or the need filled.15 This, then, was the role of possessive individualist theories.So what unjust set of property relations—what institution—did possessive individualism explain and justify? In discussing possessive individualism's emphasis on humans as having unlimited desires, Macpherson followed a causal chain to the source of the problem: … the acceptance, by the most active part of society, of the belief that unlimited desire is natural and rational leads to the establishment of the right of unlimited appropriation, which leads to the concentration of ownership of the material means of labour, which leads to the continual transfer of powers.16 This continual transfer occurs because men, as “proprietors of their own person or capacities,” are able to “sell the use of their energy and skill on the market, in exchange for the product or the use of others' energy and skill.”17 The source of the injustice was, then, the wage relationship, a relationship made possible by “the individual right to unlimited, or virtually unlimited, accumulations of property.”18Possessive Individualism (the book) did not dwell long on these concrete conditions, as Macpherson's focus was on the possessive picture of humanity that emerges from Hobbes, et al. He did, however, in his discussion of Hobbes, outline the features of “possessive market society,” emphasizing that “if a single criterion of [this] society is wanted it is that man's labour is a commodity.”19 Indeed, this criterion makes this possessive “model of society” the only one (of three he described) that “meet(s) Hobbes's requirements:” Only in a society in which each man's capacity to labour is his own property, is alienable, and is a market commodity, could all individuals be in this continual competitive power relationship.20To sum up: the “possessive” in “possessive individualism” refers not to our relationship with commodities (as is commonly supposed),21 but rather to our relationship with our own labor. Specifically, it refers to the fact that we can have a relationship with it; that it is thought of not as “us” but rather as “ours.” (Try having a relationship with your leg.) This self-image—the product of possessive individualist theories—in turn allows us to accept the sale of labor to others, and it is this actual, concrete economic fact (the existence of the wage relationship) that lies at the core of Macpherson's critical analysis. It is also what makes that analysis problematic in the era that accepts the market in an increasingly uncritical fashion, for in attacking the commodification of labor, the theory of possessive individualism attacks the market at its core.In most of Macpherson's analysis of possessive is not In fact name only on two pages of Possessive as he makes on one of those two his is The of possessive market society is a an It is clearly similar to the of or capitalist society by and others, who have made the existence of a market in labour a criterion of Indeed, while Macpherson did in subsequent writings say a bit more about the concrete economic relations he as he or to he simply it as his he and was however, a if in his later of whether he was at some a I have found if not clearly as he that “the of as a means of the is over Macpherson's of analysis in to a between the Macpherson's analysis was the as the in which it was was and, as I shall it is precisely this that explains why the of as a means of the has not over and why the of possessive individualism need not the To see this we need to the each in discussing was the problem by the wage turn to analysis of the wage relationship is found in the and of where he the problem of that relationship as one of In the he four particular of from the from the of labor, from our and from each The to in this is how at least half of it on some fairly we are from our of on what that an that can hardly be in the absence of some claim. As far as from our human it is difficult to see how its on the be as a in some political if it is it is so only in a sense that would be difficult to be like a it seems that we can to any right however, of from the and the product of our is the of the problem the is to … labor is to the it does not to his that in his work, he does not but does not his physical and energy but his and his He is at when he is not and when he is he is not at His labor is not but it is labor. It is not the of a it is a means to to it … the of labor for the in the fact that it is not his but that it does not to that in it he not to but to results in a condition as has put it, “a person who life as and or who to a sense of as is what the The his life the but now his life no longer to him but to the the this the is the of the product of his labor he is the this the less is he The of the in his product means … that the life which he has on the him as something and the condition seems it is difficult to how to what is problematic about it. it that we to remain to our And what is to the the how precisely is he in not able to see in not that there no only that capacity to them as did seems of In some this us to the of To the problem with wage labor one of where of the are is to that of and is as it is to the very relations of we to Indeed, that our of and in his the product of those relations, might have our to the wage as an injustice or a of this claim seems similar to Macpherson's argument about the of possessive The however, is that Macpherson's claims about liberal theory were from a theory of He was largely on the of how theory was to its material do not the general question of the of ideas or material he and Locke could be explained by the in which they but so too could Mill and the theories were and of this the were that was not in much more Macpherson, on the his to from the of possessive then, is that Macpherson from the relations of to which he so His was one of as he put it, not a he makes in the opening pages of Possessive we are by some others might our he was in some we can indeed see and critique the relations of from some the point. only is that Macpherson's critique is one that still has in an era to the of liberal no Macpherson only that we relations of from in their he whether those relations might the very to justify Possessive Individualism, Macpherson's critique of the market was that by the twentieth century it had both the and of that were the of political The problem was that theory to use the assumptions of possessive individualism because they are for our possessive market the market no contradiction to the indeed it the only of of which possessive individuals were such as Mill who possessive assumptions as were to in Macpherson continued to work on in liberal-democratic theory over the he his of its contradictions the of The problem liberal-democratic to the of capitalist society a of market postulates and which were not when a century or more what made the was not simply that was but that one set of postulates (the possessive individualist to justify an economic system that the (the The market simply a society of and the of the postulates had liberal-democratic theory then, that while claim is that the capitalist market about a nature of humanity and human relations, Macpherson saw no need to the basic liberal-democratic that were liberal theory in the century to make it To claim that the system would the of its of concentration of argued that the contradiction was between a market system and the of human life on its own Put simply: Macpherson within be about why this last I no claims here about the of or In I have been to the of analysis of the very ideas that I suggested were and on I have found about Macpherson, however, was his to those As a of political Macpherson taught his that there was within the liberal a of human one that much of the of that was in fact the as the but one that also the political that with theory of In Macpherson's critique of the wage relationship that need not accept the with which had it. through a one that its possessive could a to the wage relationship, and it could do so the own of Macpherson's perspective is to in over the wage relationship to or a for is to at with all the more so in the twenty years. Even if is correct as a right of man is not on the of man with man but rather on the of man from it would still be to question whether the capitalist market is really the most means to its own of and to its own of to a critique of property in the claim that “the of any man which are … are only those which all others to have equal is to out that property at a be on basic liberal Macpherson's that from possessive postulates could not to this him to at a position both and than Macpherson its liberal position need not be to on an of capitalist it has been so The fact that liberal in capitalist market is not in a reason why the central ethical of of the individual to his or human be to such Macpherson's hands, then, the of capitalism could on liberal terms that the of both and human As long as was from the “an of the right to all to human could the of the market then, does the wage contradictions for In what is a human by a in which no part in what is when it is how it is or why it is The is not the of the means of as it for in the of and The is with to the that has on the in the Macpherson was about the on two to the liberal those of and those of I shall close by how the wage each can with in its most something to claim that it in having a to capacity in and the of the to which one and in to need in the which the this of the between the wage relationship and democratic it also to a of in which the two might have little or no on one is the that the as he or to the have a in and the of that The also to for of however, for could In what sense does the to the there is the of whether a is inconsistent with an to the fact that the of democratic on how we might about the nature of the for the of the democratic has normative only if we accept the claim that the be for that relations do not with democratic is more of an than a normative In we need to the to which the is similar to or from the society that others, had in Macpherson's such are for between democratic and are if not In an twenty years Possessive Individualism, Macpherson argued we think of as not a set of … but as a set of or to which these are but it is to that any economic which can be to be also means to the democratic are to the and support of the The that was not a political concept but a broader one (a of as at the of Macpherson's thought his So too did the claim that was not just about a to capacity in and the of the to which one but also that it a of an equal society in which can be as he later it, in which there was an to use and and each person Indeed, it is this broader of that explains Macpherson's on political the is to be then democratic as as an of that the over which one would the of the of particular be those that to the of and namely those our In discussing for the democratic in in the Macpherson what was at in are as not as or are in it not to a wage or a of the but to make their work more to them. were in the for more to … it would do nothing … to from their image of themselves as and is not about of it is about the of or the to Macpherson's central claim that how we is of vital to the in which we of who we from a the here only on the that labor in fact, a part of us that it is only in light of an turn in century liberal thought that we have come to think that perspective it is the wage relationship that and an at a an one whose requires a democratic ideal in calling for a human the of what the capitalist market has there can be no doubt that democratic is with the that are for has every for the of its own to democratic unlimited property right with the wage to a democratic Macpherson saw as the not to the market, but only to in its was the to to “the has a to capacity in and the of the to which he that is received not on the existence of the wage but on its any the democratic ideal would themselves a democratic one that as much on in as it did on any As Macpherson put “the of a in Western liberal-democratic with their … of the possessive individualist model of wage relationship was not simply a democratic for the of to the means of labor that it one of the basic justifications of the … institution of individual property, that human be that In his writings on property, Macpherson with the concept in its one that from any particular mode of this property in “a and not a because it that the not be by of the of his market society had the wage was to this between labor and its As its very was, as Green put it, be by society in the power of and the means of a had been Macpherson to to of property that the market and its theories had of the for property as a human right … on whether we property in the or in the more and more natural sense of an individual right both to some property and to some right of to the natural and the of a we to it in the the property right democratic human we it in the broader it does not a democratic concept of human indeed it bring us to something like the concept of individual property in and he was more As as a property in is from an right which is at the time an the right to or property in labour, the is property as a right by all to them to their human is to In forms of property are with the ideal of the institution and forms are In the market not only of fundamental they also the very which they were I have no to Macpherson at the of As I have most of these are with Macpherson, to property, not to it there can be no and no society where some form of property does not is a he did so by at its most form of is not the of property but the of and he did so on the as Macpherson no man of the power to the of all that it does is to him of the power to the labour of others by means of such problem of has less to do with the of his than it does with its to be And of the market are as vital now as they were in for that matter, more of and, for those who do have a of labor all for those who to that the is a The question is who to more to the to they of the market, if we are to them at all, that market property not us where we to … as why that and then they why an set of property is to be most they after such a set of be able to close the argument as a liberal-democratic theory which the concept of property still be in any sense a liberal That of on what put that it mean all the market … then clearly a political theory around the concept of property could not be called if to be essentially an of the right to all to human … then a political theory around the of property is as liberal theory less of property would not but would the liberal-democratic

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