Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jkksz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T10:20:18.829Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Rousseau's Discriminating Defense of Compassion

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 November 2007

JONATHAN MARKS
JONATHAN MARKS
Affiliation:
Ursinus College
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Political theorists from Martha Nussbaum to Amitai Etzioni appeal to compassion as a basis that liberalism otherwise lacks for refraining from exploiting and even for helping others. However, critics like Clifford Orwin and Richard Boyd have raised this question: is compassion too weak and undiscriminating to rely on in politics? Jean-Jacques Rousseau's account of compassion helps answer it. Rousseau understands compassion as a useful manifestation of the otherwise dangerous desire to extend the self and show signs of power. Consequently, he considers compassion's relative weakness a strength and explains how it can be supplemented and complemented by other, independent motives for serving others, including gratitude, friendship, and obligation. Compassion's weakness also makes it less likely than self-love, narrowly conceived, to overwhelm reason. Rousseau excels compassion's contemporary defenders in his awareness of the complex relationship between compassion and other social passions and of the dangers that his understanding of compassion addresses.

Type
ARTICLES
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 101 , Issue 4 , November 2007 , pp. 727 - 739
Copyright
© 2007 by the American Political Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alford C. Fred. 1993. “Greek Tragedy and Civilization: The Cultivation of Pity.” Political Research Quarterly 46 (2) (June): 259– 80.Google Scholar
Arendt Hannah. 1990. On Revolution. London: Penguin Books.
Babbitt Irving. 1968. Rousseau and Romanticism. Cleveland, OH: Meridian Books.
Berlant Lauren. 1997. The Queen of America Goes to Washington City: Essays on Sex and Citizenship. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Boyd Richard. 2004. “Pity's Pathologies Portrayed: Rousseau and the Limits of Democratic Compassion.” Political Theory 32 (August): 519– 46.Google Scholar
Butler Melissa A. 2003. “Rousseau and the Politics of Care.” In Feminist Interpretations of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, ed. Lynda Lange. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 212– 28.
Camus Albert. 1991. The Rebel: An Essay on Man in Revolt. New York: Vintage International.
Charvet John. 1974. The Social Problem in the Philosophy of Rousseau. London: Cambridge University Press.
Cooper Laurence. 1999. Rousseau, Nature, and the Problem of the Good Life. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press.
Damrosch Leo. 2005. Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Restless Genius. New York: Houghton Mifflin.
Dent Nicholas. 1992. A Rousseau Dictionary. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
Dionne E. J. 2001. “Compassion is Good, but Justice Is Better.” Sojourners Magazine (May–June) 30(3): 31– 33.Google Scholar
Elshtain Jean Bethke. 1996. “Sense and Sensibility: Our Pity Culture.” The New Republic 215 (September 30): 29.Google Scholar
Etzioni Amitai. 2002. “Individualism Within History.” Hedgehog Review 4 (Spring): 49– 56.Google Scholar
Frazer Michael L. 2006. “The Compassion of Zarathustra: Nietzsche on Sympathy and Strength.” The Review of Politics 68 (February): 49– 78.Google Scholar
Hassner Pierre. 1997. “Rousseau and the Theory and Practice of International Relations.” In The Legacy of Rousseau, ed. Clifford Orwin and Nathan Tarcov. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 200– 209.
Held Virginia. 1993. Feminist Morality: Transforming Culture, Society, and Politics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Himmelfarb Gertrude. 2004. The Roads to Modernity: The British, French, and American Enlightenments. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
Kaus Mickey. 1999. “Compassion: The Political Liability.” New York Times, 25. JuneGoogle Scholar
King Martin Luther. 1992. I Have A Dream: Writings and Speeches that Changed the World. San Francisco: Harper Collins.
Kelly Christopher. 2003. Rousseau as Author: Consecrating One's Life to the Truth. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Kymlicka Will. 2001. “Altruism in Philosophical and Ethical Traditions: Two Views.” In Between State and Market: Essays on Charities Law and Policy in Canada, ed. Jim Phillips Bruce Chapman, and David Stevens. Kingston, Ontario: Mc Gill-Queen's University Press: pp. 87– 126.
Marshall David. 1988. The Surprising Effects of Sympathy: Marivaux, Diderot, Rousseau, and Mary Shelley. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Morgenstern Mira. 1996. Rousseau and the Politics of Ambiguity: Self, Culture, and Society. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press.
Nussbaum Martha. 2001. Upheavals of Thought: The Intelligence of Emotions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Nussbaum Martha. 1996. “Compassion: The Basic Social Emotion.” Social Philosophy & Policy 13 (Winter): 27– 58.Google Scholar
Orwin Clifford. 1997a. “Rousseau and the Discovery of Political Compassion.” In The Legacy of Rousseau, ed. Clifford Orwin and Nathan Tarcov. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 200– 219.
Orwin Clifford. 1997b. “Moist Eyes: From Rousseau to Clinton.” Public Interest 128 (Summer): 3– 20.Google Scholar
Reisert Joseph R. 2003. Jean-Jacques Rousseau: A Friend of Virtue. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Rieff David. 2005. “Dangerous Pity.” Prospect 112 (July).Google Scholar
Rorty Richard. 1993. “Human Rights, Rationality, and Sentimentality.” Yale Review 81 (October): 1– 20.Google Scholar
Rousseau Jean-Jacques. 1979. Emile or On Education. Trans. Allan Bloom. New York: Basic Books.
Rousseau Jean-Jacques. 1990. Rousseau Judge of Jean-Jacques: Dialogues. Trans. Judith R. Bush, Christopher Kelly, and Roger D. Masters. Ed. Roger D. Masters and Christopher Kelly. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England.
Rousseau Jean-Jacques. 1992. Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Inequality Among Men. In Discourse on the Origins of Inequality (Second Discourse), Polemics, and Political Economy. Trans. Judith R. Bush, Roger D. Masters, Christopher Kelly, and Terence Marshall. Ed. Roger D. Masters and Christopher Kelly. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England.
Rousseau Jean-Jacques. 1959–95. Oeuvres Complètes. Ed. Bernard Gagnebin and Marcel Raymond. Paris: Gallimard, Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 1959–95.
Rousseau Jean-Jacques. 1995. The Confessions. In The Confessions and Correspondence, Including the Letters to Malesherbes. Trans. Christopher Kelly. Ed. Christopher Kelly, Roger D. Masters, and Peter G. Stillman.
Rousseau Jean-Jacques. 2004a. Letter to D'Alembert. In Letter to D'Alembert and Writings for the Theater. Trans. and Ed. Allan Bloom, Charles Butterworth, and Christopher Kelly. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England.
Rousseau Jean-Jacques. 2004b. The Levite of Ephraim. In Letter to D'Alembert and Writings for the Theater. Trans. and Ed. Allan Bloom, Charles Butterworth, and Christopher Kelly. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England.
Rousseau Jean-Jacques. 1994. Social Contract. In Social Contract, Discourse on the Virtue Most Necessary for a Hero, Political Fragments, and Geneva Manuscript. Trans. Judith R. Bush, Roger D. Masters, and Christopher Kelly. Ed. Roger D. Masters and Christopher Kelly. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England.
Strong Tracy. 1994. Jean-Jacques Rousseau: The Politics of the Ordinary. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
Woodward Kathleen. 2002. “Calculating Compassion.” Indiana Law Journal 77 (2): 223– 45.Google Scholar
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.