An Examination of Althusius

The Debate That Changed the West: Grotius versus Althusius, by Ruben Alvarado

Alvarado begins by examining the work of Althusius, specifically Politica Methodice Digesta or “Politics Methodically Defined.”  In this work, Althusius does not focus on the ruler, instead focusing on the myriad other actors and structures in society:

And the primary focus was on restraint of power, not power itself.

As I have commented elsewhere, it seems to me that Althusius attempted to mimic the governance structures of medieval Europe and Christendom without the benefit of a universal Church that could stand against the king; a tall order, no doubt.  Alvarado puts it this way:

As such, the Politica is a Calvinistic meditation on the constitution of Christendom, a proposal for the way that constitution should be interpreted and implemented.

As in medieval Christendom, Althusius looks for a balance of the individual within a context of society as a whole – with God above it all; in other words, an individual, but not completely autonomous in the way that the individual has been defined since the Renaissance / Enlightenment. 

I have examined Althusius’s work in some detail before, so here I will summarize: Althusius builds from the family up, with all subsequent relations made on a voluntary basis, to include the freedom to secede from a previously agreed-upon union if one so desires.

These associations were meant to assure symbiosis: a shared life.  Althusius takes these associations as a given – no need to explore the nature and beginnings of institutions such as family, extended family, and collegium (or guild).  Men have in the past so associated and will in the future do the same.

In Aristotelian fashion, they are taken as given: “We discover no trace of a constructed state of nature in Althusius. He is cognizant only of real positive human communities, symbioses, with their own, characteristic laws.” (Alvarado citing H.J. van Eikema Hommes)

Up to this point, these associations are governed by private laws.  Beyond these and moving to an area to be represented by fixed laws are cities, with separate administration for secular and ecclesiastical purposes.  Above cities stand provinces, which also incorporate corporate representation: the ecclesiastic, the nobles, and the commons – with the latter further subdivided into city-dwellers and agrarians.  Finally, there is the commonwealth, representing the nation as a whole and holding sovereignty – with sovereignty held by the people and not the ruler.

Subsidiarity is the principle in play: “That which can be dealt with at the more local level should be addressed there, and not at the more general level.” 

The church has a role to play, in censure: acts that are not “referred to the courts because they lack an accuser or denouncer.”  Call these victimless crimes.  Alvarado offers:

That there is a public interest in acting against these activities is something that used to be understood by all, but today is utterly problematic.

This censure involves two aspects, inquisition and reproof.  Inquisition means investigation; reproof means punishment – ranging from “fines, confinement in penitentiaries, exclusion from the sacraments and excommunication.”  Proportionality must be observed; on the surface, it seems difficult to square the concept of proportionality with “confinement in penitentiaries” when considering actions that lack an accuser or denouncer. 

It is for this reason (and it is a critical distinction) that Althusius considers the idea of “rights” in the community – a city with fixed laws.  Of course, if one is free to choose his community, this does not seem problematic to a libertarian eye.  (I do not speak here of unlimited choices in community, just multiple and reasonably voluntary choices.) 

In all cases, Alvarado introduces much more detail about the nature of these institutions and their roles and functions; I will not go into this here as these specifics are regarding his time and place.  Instead, what of these “rights” in the community?

There is another topic of interest which needs to be addressed in more detail, and that is the question regarding Althusius’ use of the concepts of natural rights and the social contract.

Some see in Althusius a precursor of Rousseau and his social contract – presumably due to this concept of rights in the community.  Alvarado does not agree, offering a broad discussion as to why he disagrees and also citing several scholars who concur with his viewpoint.  Instead, there is the concept of citizenship, which is at play only at the level of the city.  Citizenship is as much a duty as it is a right:

Citizenship is the right owed to each member of the group, “the obligation and the power of communicating what is useful and necessary as well as the right and power to participate in it.”

One has rights in citizenship to the extent that one also as duties; these extend to those in his community or city.  This has little to do with natural rights or a social contract:

Indeed, we must realize that for Althusius, “though the particular community may seem a matter of free choice, living together is a natural process following its own eternal principles without regard to the willful attempts of human beings, conceiving of themselves as lawgivers, absolute and subject to no laws.”

“Living together” has its own “eternal principles.”  Dwell on that for a while and consider what defending these “eternal principles” might mean for a sustainable community.  Members of the group do obligate themselves to each other, but not in a manner that we would understand as a covenant or contract:

This pact is “the fundamental organizing decision of a living group whose common life transcends this organizing act.” It is the efficient cause, the constituting power of the association, but “belongs by nature to the living groups, just as much as life belongs to the living organism.

The “common life transcends” any “organizing act”; it belongs “to the living groups.”  Dwell on these also.  This is nothing like social contract theory as it is commonly understood, nor is it a matter of individual rights, at least not in the way we understand “individual” today.  This pact is described as “the efficient cause.”  Coming from Aristotle: the efficient cause is that which brings the thing into being – what actualizes the potentiality. 

As best as I can grasp this “efficient cause” is the group and it is its own entity, and it has rights.  The community is a thing with an end or purpose.

Conclusion

While at least some libertarians would agree that a community can voluntarily form under any set of rules and conditions as the members (or “citizens”) see fit, this isn’t what Althusius is getting at.  He is driving at the community itself as its own entity with rights in its survival, with “survival” being described as something along the lines of subsidiary governance and Calvinist tradition.

At the risk of being way off base, I see something of Hoppe here.  To be clear, I fully believe that Hoppe would agree that a community is free to live under any rules that its members choose.  But Hoppe also suggests that for a community to develop and maintain something approaching libertarian governance, there are some rules and conditions that are more valuable than others – even necessary.

I have not read Hoppe to ever write that the “community” has “rights”; I am not going that far in introducing him here.  Just that I see some similarities in that both Althusius and Hoppe see the necessity of certain conditions that must be maintained at the community level for a community to survive in a healthy and peaceful manner.

A Choice

The Debate That Changed the West: Grotius versus Althusius, by Ruben Alvarado

One can point to many inflection points in the history of the west and western tradition: the Resurrection of Christ, the fall of Rome, the establishment of Christianity and Christendom, the Battle of Tours, the Renaissance, the Reformation, the Battle of Vienna, the Enlightenment, and, finally, the Great War.  Several decades after the Reformation we find this debate. 

Alvarado examines this debate between Grotius and Althusius – or, more precisely, between their views on political order.  I have examined Althusius in great detail in the past, being introduced to him through Gerard Casey’s work, where he also examined Grotius. 

A simple view of this debate: Grotius thought in terms of international governance and individualism; Althusius thought in terms of decentralized and local governance; he attempted to mimic the decentralization of medieval Europe, however while lacking a very important factor: the Church that could stand in the face of the king.  In other words, I think the debate had no chance of being given a fair hearing or concluding with any other outcome.

From the Preface:

That the modern world is in a state of crisis is no secret. What has been building up for some time is now breaking out into the open: the utter untenability of a social order based on the primacy of the individual as the absolute standard and justification for authority, law, and order.

I read such words and the libertarian in me cringes – but not nearly as much as I would have cringed ten years ago.  I would have cringed reflexively, brought on by any challenge to the (political) primacy of the individual.  Yet today I can look around and see the damage this philosophy has brought to liberty.  It isn’t that I have done away with the individual; it is just that this idea is too shallow for liberty to survive in its wake.

As Alvarado notes, this has brought politics into every nook and cranny of life, as there is no room for institutions with the authority to intermediate between the individual and the state.  Few have pointed to or warned of this danger, but Alvarado notes Robert Nisbet who wrote of it more than 60 years ago.  Nisbet, like Althusius, saw the necessity of building from the bottom up such intermediating institutions as necessary to give man room and cover for his liberty.

Alvarado frames the debate that occurred four centuries ago:

For at the crossroads of Western civilization, at around the turn of the 17th century, an eventful and fateful choice was made, to go down the path of rationalist individualism instead of the path of communitarian associationalism. The two representatives of these opposing approaches to social order were Hugo Grotius and Johannes Althusius.

Alvarado offers an essay as introduction to the book: he describes Constantinople in 1453, finally succumbing to the Muslim Ottoman forces.

Western civilization today appears to be in the same position as Constantinople was in 1453: hunkered down behind once-impregnable walls, the breach of which is only a matter of time.

It is depressing to read, but this is the situation today.  Unfortunately, today the calamity is entirely self-inflicted – the west is consuming and willingly destroying itself.  In this, Alvarado finds it worthwhile to examine the crossroads and path taken at this similar time in the past – occurring in the Dutch Republic during its struggle to free itself from the Spanish Monarchy.  Two men, drawing on similar sources and with similar backgrounds, yet developing significantly differing political concepts.

Many new technologies were brought into play, technologies that would also shape the debate: the printing press (a driving factor in the Renaissance and Reformation), gunpowder (leveling the playing field between noble and peasant; changing the dynamic for walled cities), new techniques for silver mining and production (making the New World especially valuable).

In the middle of this were the Ottomans, threatening Europe and the Mediterranean in a manner unseen since the forces of Islam several hundred years earlier.  This was a driving factor in Portugal and Spain looking for alternative routes to the East – leading to circumnavigation of the globe.  Machiavelli is introduced – maligned by many, yet when taken in the context of the aftermath of the defeat of his beloved Florentine republic becomes, perhaps, a more sympathetic character.

The question at hand – in this tremendous confluence of religious, political, technological, and military upheaval: what of the jus gentium, “law of nations”?

What was involved was a common baseline understanding of sovereignty, extending in both directions – outward toward other nations, and inward, in terms of the structure of authority and constitutionalism.

It would be Spain where this question would first be dealt with, appropriate as Spain sat at the heart of many of these upheavals: the conflicts on the Italian peninsula, a major bulwark against the Ottomans, ruling over the North Countries – soon enough to be embroiled in a Catholic–Calvinist civil war, and a major power in conquering and settling the New World.  Each of these issues presented new challenges regarding this “law of nations” – some completely unknown even a few decades earlier.

The pioneer in this regard was Francisco de Vitoria, holder of the first chair of theology at the University of Salamanca, and founder of what has gone down in history as the School of Salamanca.

Details, Details

This treatise has been praised and attacked at different times in different places contrary to my thoughts and anticipations.

On Law and Power, Johannes Althusius

In this extract from Althusius’ work, the editors of this book have captured the detailed definitions of Althusius’ construct – helping to clarify his meaning in his writing.  On the one hand, I feel as if I should have read these definitions before I started exploring Althusius; on the other, I think it has been helpful that I have read of Althusius through the eyes of people who have already done this heavy lifting as at times his writing is confusing to me.

With that said, I think a handful of these definitions are worth understanding both in the context of his work and perhaps for the continuing purposes at this blog.

What Law Is – in my opinion, law is this: something that is established after coming into being because of an action in a human affair, or because of some individual, for the necessity, benefit, and direction of this life.

The Structure of Law – The structure of law is twofold – natural or common law and civil or individual law…

This statement from Althusius offers an example of why he is somewhat confusing to read directly – he uses as interchangeable natural and common, civil and individual.  For example, later in this listing he will offer seven different terms for natural law…and common law is not one of these in this subsequent list!

The Nature of Natural Law – A law is natural and common if common right reason produces it for common necessity and welfare of human social life in general.  Therefore, it is called natural law.

Common Law – Therefore, common law is that which has been inscribed on human hearts by nature or by God from birth…

The civil or individual law must be deduced from Natural Law, yet it must be unique to the issues of the situation and location.  For this reason, it is changeable.  Althusius offers two examples of this individual law, presumably from his own experience: the prohibition of gifts between spouses, and the prohibition of granting a loan to a son when the son is still under parental authority.  Neither violates the Natural Law, yet apparently there was some cause to enact these as civil / individual laws. 

Althusius then offers duties arising from Natural Law; these duties are twofold: first to ourselves, and second to others (including God).  With respect to ourselves, the duties are self-defense, self-preservation (to include property), and self-propagation (including the proper rearing of children).  Regarding our duties to others, these are three-fold: for our duties to God, look to the first table of the Decalogue; for our duties to others, look to the second; live the Golden Rule.

What Public Power Is – Public power is what has been granted to someone from the body of an association, with a territory, for the purpose of caring for and administering the business, affairs, and individuals of the associated body.

Keeping in mind the nature of the political relationships as we have examined previously – both subsidiarity and the ability to secede – this is a reasonable definition. This Civil Administration is responsible for administering the second table of the Decalogue; the Ecclesiastic Administration is responsible for administering the first.

Conclusion

I continue to find that Althusius did the best he could with the material available after the Reformation.  In many ways he has tried to capture the decentralization and subsidiarity of medieval Europe without the benefit of an independent Church, and without the authority such an independent Church held.