Bertrand Russell_ from Liberalism to Socialism?.pdf

7/27/2019 Bertrand Russell_ from Liberalism to Socialism?.pdf

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Bertrand Russell: fromliberalism to socialism?by Royden Hamson

INTRODUCTION

WRITING IN 1935 E. Halevy observed: "I f in fifty or a hundred yearssomeone writes the history of modern English thought, he will classBertrand Russell among the individualists and libertarians, not amongthe socialists."l This judgment has been supported by careful historiansand clever philosophers. Thus, Jo Vellacott asserts that he stayed withliberal values, but let the Liberal Party go. She adds: "Perhaps Russellhad too much liberal baggage to travel far on the socialist tram, but itcan also be argued that the destination of the socialist tram-the everstronger centralized state-was not the one that Russell had bought aticket for... . "2 The argument that empiricism is not merely often asso-ciated with liberalism, but entails it, is presented in a clearly arguedessay by B.R. Barber.3 Still more to the point, one can find manyinstances of Russell distancing himself from socialism and reaffirminghis faith in "liberal values". These declarations may be all the moreimpressive because they are separated by long spans of time. "I don'tI Elie Halevy, The Era oj Tyrannies (New York: New York University Press, 1966),-p:201.2 Jo Vellacott, Bertrand Russell and the Pacifists in the First World War (New York: 81.Martin's Press, 1980), pp. 247-9 (quotation on 249).l Benjamin R. Barber, "Solipsistic Politics: Russell's Empiricist Liberalism", in GeorgeW. Roberts, ed., Bertrand Russell Memorial Volume (London: Allen & Unwin; NewYork: Humanities Press, 1979), pp. 445-78. Yet Russell himself maintained that epistemological or metaphysical positions could have no logical bearing upon his historicalor political judgments. See Freedom and Organization 1814-1914 (London: Allen &Unwin, 1934), pp. 226-7. He allowed that there might be and often was an historicaland psychological association between empiricism and liberalism in Philosophy and Pol-itics (London: Cambridge University Press, 1947). In My Philosophical Development(London: Allen & Unwin,1959) RusseJi had nothing at all to say about social andpolitical matters. .

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38 Russell summer 1986ism! The fact of the matter is that Bertrand Russell was a Whig aristocrat to the very tips of his fingers. He concealed and protected hispatrician att itudes behind his democratic slogans. 124 However, oneimagines that he himself would have pointed out that "attitudes" and"slogans" are not true or false. He himself would have insisted that itwas unimportant whether he was usually prompted by a non-conforming conscience, or by a socialist sense of comradeship or by an aristocratic disdain. l25 In the end what mattered was neither liberalism norsocialism, bu t a remembrance of our common humanity. "I appeal, asa human being to human beings: remember your humanity and forgetthe rest. I f you can do so, the way lies open to a new Paradise; if youcannot, nothing lies before you bu t universal death."l26Yet, to remember our humanity is not to forget "all the rest". On

the contrary, it is to understand the rest adequately. It is not to bedeceived by the ideologies of either side. I t is to identify the actualchoice which is open to us. I t is to make our choice in as rational,peaceable and civilized a manner as possible. This is not going beyondliberalism or socialism. But it is what Bertrand Russell really meant. l27Centre for the Study of Social HistoryUniversity of Warwick

124 Clark, The Life ofBertrand Russell, p. 631.125 "I once wondered aloud to him whether his temperamental bias towards non-conformity and dissent was an expression not so much of intellectual courage as of thearistocrat's disdain of the commoner and his desire to epater le bourgeois. He repliedwith a disarming frankness: 'Hook, I think you have got something there ...'" (SidneyHook, I'Bertrand Russell: a Portrait from Memory", Encounter, 62, no. 3 [March1984]: 18). This testimony must be treated with caution since this is a "hatchet job".Hook depicts Russell as vain, greedy, cruel, lascivious and-worst of all-antiAmerican. Russell may simply have been taking the quickest way with a prying companion. He soon recognized that in his anti-Communist frenzy, Hook had come todiscard socialism.

126 "Man's Peril from the Hydrogen Bomb", The Listener, 52 (30 Dec. 1954): 1,135-6(at p. 1,136). Reprinted in Portraits from Memory (London: Allen & Unwin, 1956).127 I am indebted to Professor Chushichi Tsuzuki, under whose editorship this essay firstappeared in Japanese translation. For helpful comments on the English draft I wishto acknowledge Richard A. Rempel and Margaret Moran of the Bertrand Russell Editorial Project at McMaster, and Kenneth Blackwell and Sheila Turcon of the RussellArchives.

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Bertrand Russell_ from Liberalism to Socialism?.pdf