|
[Notes
for the opening of a debate on Bentham v Kant. November 2001]
Jeremy Bentham
(1748-1832) came from a family of lawyers working in the City of London, but
became disgusted with the law, as then practised, since he felt that it was more
about making money for the lawyers than actually helping those in need. He was
practical man, concerned with the social conditions of his day, and particularly
with the conditions in prisons and hospitals. He wanted to find a moral basis
for law that could serve to benefit the whole of society.
Laws, he believed, should be framed according to reason, and in order to bring
about happiness, since
‘Nature has placed mankind under to governance of two sovereign masters, pain
and pleasure.’
(From the opening of An Introduction to the Principles
of Morals and Legislation)
Because he was practical, he believed that things should be judged to be right
or wrong according to whether or not they benefited the people involved. He
therefore argued for the ‘Principle of Utility’:
‘By utility is meant that property
of any object, whereby it tends to produce benefit, advantage, pleasure, good,
or happiness, (all this in the present case comes to the same thing) or (what
comes again to the same thing) to prevent the happening of mischief, pain, evil,
or unhappiness to the party whose interest is considered: if that party be the
community in general, the happiness of the community: if a particular
individual, then the happiness of that individual.
(An
Introduction…
Chapter 1 section 3)
Bentham wanted
to secure the happiness of individuals, and he wanted everyone to count equally,
since he believed that everyone had an equal right to happiness, irrespective of
their situation. He wanted morality to be fair and democratic.
He suggested that benefits should be measured in terms of:
-
their duration
-
their intensity
-
how
near, immediate and certain they are
-
whether or not they are likely to lead to further benefits in the future
Each action is
thus good or bad according to its predicted results.
Happiness or benefit should be shared equally between the maximum possible
number of people. As far as possible, we should quantify benefits, and act
accordingly.
Conforming to a rule or law is a matter of secondary consideration. Nor is it
necessary to choose between benefit to oneself and benefit to others, since
acting according to this Principle of Utility brings about an individual’s
greatest happiness, and can be followed for the pleasure of doing so, quite
apart from the benefits it offers to others.
In effect, he would argue that you cannot always tell what the result of your
actions will be, but you are right if you act in accordance with the intention
of sharing happiness and benefit in this way.
Bentham worked on the basis of the psychological observation that people
actually choose to do what is in their own best interest. A wise legislator
therefore organises the laws and moral principles in such a way that those who
seek their own interest will, at the same time, find that they are promoting the
interest of the rest of society as well.
So, punishment
can be justified only if it deters others from committing crime, or helps to
reform the criminal. Look at the long-term benefit. The criminal’s suffering is
outweighed by the overall advantage to society.
If government will not change the law to benefit people in this way, then the
government needs to be changed. Bentham became a democrat, and had a radical
proposal – he wanted there to be a system of one man, one vote, and a secret
ballot! The government of a country will only benefit the majority, when the
power to set up and dispose of that government is in the hands of the majority.
Democracy is the way to ensure fairness.
He argued that ‘from real law come real rights… from imaginary laws come
imaginary ones’ (in his criticism of the French Declaration of the Rights of
Man). The so-called ‘rights of man’ is ‘nonsense of stilts’!
So, in effect, Bentham was saying that to know what is right, one should not
start with high-flown, universal theories about right and wrong, but with
practical issues, with framing laws that benefit people. In the end, Bentham
would argue, that is in your own best interest, as well as in the interest of
society as a whole.
|
 |
