On Liberty and Other Essays (Oxford World's Classics)

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Summary: On "On Liberty..."
Review: Don't get me wrong. This book is quaint and it certainly has its merits. However, I was disappointed that the character on the cover isn't featured anywhere within. Who is the man with outsretched arms? Is he pleading for alms? Is he offering to pull someone out of a river? In fact, if you look closely he appears to be standing in a body of water which could support the latter theory. Who is he pulling from the river? Or is this a metaphor... do these essays figuratively pull one out of the river - the river of intellectual darkness? Perhaps not, which brings me back to my original point. Who is this man? Like all great philosophical questions... we may never know.

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Summary: Public vs. Private
Review: If confronted with the question: "To what extent, if any, and probably for what purpose can society as a body, interfere with the liberty of the individual?" The answer is probably, never. Oh well, one clear answer to this infinitely incomprehensible question was provided in the 19th century by John Stuart Mill in this classic writing On Liberty. JSM is the grand papa of what is modern Liberalism. We may not agree with Mill, but if we are to agree or disagree, it is best to first go back to the source. In a sense, Mill comes from the position that restraints always tend to stifle individuality. Freedom is the default, to stifle the abberation. If there is a call to interfere, there had better be a real good reason. Mill, however, does not have his head in the clouds but he does have a blanket statement that could use some complexity. Mill is of the reasoning that society is in the right to interfere with individual liberty only if harm is done or threatened to others. This is, of course, an over simplification. Mill further elaborates with a sense of paternalism and what seems like a progressive attitude about the rights of all people and the disutility of unfair treatment. It is not an easy read but it is a lucid one. In Mill's view, Harm, or the threat of harm, only brings conduct into public realm by (relating back to Plato) a prima facie condition to intervene. A foundational piece and a staple for the Humanities. To engage in the discourse of Mill is to step in the realm of Public contra Private.

Miguel Llora

Rating:
Summary: A lackluster text written by a troubled philosopher
Review: John Stuart Mill is the prodigious son of the philosopher James Mill, both disciples of Jeremy Bentham, the founder of the Utilitarian doctrine, one of the foundations of the philosophical and economic thinking of the 19th century.
What astounds in this book is that it does not convey what should be expected as the output of a man known to have had one of the most impressive education one can get at that time, from the vintage point Mill had, which is the Victorian England, where JOhn had frequent contact with the best minds of the time, Jeremy Bentham among others.
His prose and style are dull, akin to some philosophical writtings of the 17th century. Despite being a good soul, Mill does not have the power to convince anyone of his believes, due to his lack of enthusiasm, and maybe to the many times he felt depressive, not knowing if all the stuff his father pushed down into his brain were worth the effort.
Despite all this, John Stuart Mill seems to be a very sympathethic person, one type of person everyone fights for, but who does not carry to his texts the vigor he had in some times in his life in the defense of public liberties, but specially women's rights.
What is more impressive is that the poor guy abdicated many of his early liberal thoughts and became a socialist in his late life. One remarkable thing also is that his Principles of Political Economy was the Economomics textbook everyone read at the time.

Rating:
Summary: A keystone of liberal thought
Review: John Stuart Mill's chief concern is how individual liberty, which he held to be paramount, can be reconciled with public utility or, in other words, in delineating the tensions that arise between the public and private sphere in modern society. He expounds, with much clarity and insight, the feasability, as well as the desirability, of state intervention in the affairs of individuals. He defines freedom, above all, to be the freedom to think and act as one sees right (provided that this does not encroach on the rights of others). His essay "Utilitarianism", is an incisive explication of the philosophy of utilitarianism developed by Mill's father, James Mill and the jurist and philosopher, Jeremy Bentham, which holds "the greatest happiness for the greatest number" as the chief aim of social organisation. "On Representative Government", which should not be mistaken for direct democracy (rule of the people by the people) he covers the mechanisms of state action. "On the Subjection of Women" reveals Mill to have been one of the pioneering feminists, as his arguments for the emancipation of women continue to be adduced by leading feminist philosophers today. Admittedly, one cannot agree with Mill on everything. This is because the "liberalism" of the nineteenth century, with its stress on work, discipline and duty, is almost totally opposed to the "open-minded" liberalism of today. Furthermore, Mill's theories are filled with flaws. Nevertheless, these essays are documents of profound importance and relevance and repay close study.

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Summary: Liberal, Utilitarian and First Feminist. Essential reading.
Review: JS Mill is rightfully so one of the most studied political theorists and philosophers. His radical ideas on women started a womens revolution during the Victorian era. His ideas about good government and freedom are applicable today, and obviously not being listened to in this neofascist age. His 'harm principle' for freedom remains one of the most enlightened theories out there, and it is with an open heart that I recommend his readings to anyone with an open mind, who is not afraid of change.

Rating:
Summary: Worth owning
Review: The editor of this collection states that when read together, the four essays contained in this Oxford World's Classics edition reveal Mill to be an organized thinker on par with Marx. I'm not quite so sure of that, but I will say the collections feels thematically consistant and well thought out. Readers should not be scared off because Mill is considered a "classic" text. The tone of these essays, with the possible exception of "Utilitarianism" is pretty light, and Mill even occassionally makes an effort to crack a joke. In "On Liberty" and "Utilitarianism" we see an abstract breakdown of his belief structure where he tries to answer questions like, "When is it justified for government to interfere in individuals lives?" and "What is the overarching goal of society?" After he attempts to answer these questions he gets more specific by applying the principles to how government should operate in "Representative Government" and in "The Subjection of Women". Some concepts now outdated, but on the whole, still a relativly strong argument. It is particularly frustrating to see Mill talking about proportional representation in "Represenative Government" and knowing that the logic of that argument has still not made much headway here in the United States well over a hundred years later. Mill's systematic thinking makes this collection worth owning.

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Summary: Triumph of the individual
Review: This Oxford collection of four definitive essays by John Stuart Mill, arguably the most famous Victorian writer who could be called a philosopher, gives an excellent profile of a rigorous social reformer and political thinker. The subjects of these essays--liberty, utilitarianism, government, and women's rights--are interrelated to the extent that they reveal a man with a sharp sense of history and its impact on the methods and mores of contemporary society. Mill, after all, was of Charles Dickens's generation and therefore witnessed an era in which the British crown was inclined to manifest its power through tyranny in its efforts to maintain a costly worldwide empire.

Mill's basic concern is liberty, both social and civil. He identifies a difference between freedom and liberty--freedom is the state of being free, while liberty is the freedom that a government or governing body grants its people. Briefly a member of Parliament (the workings of which are described in great detail in "Representative Government") and heavily informed and influenced by Alexis de Tocqueville's "Democracy in America," Mill recognized that the most important (and perhaps the only proper) function of a government is to protect the liberties of its citizens. However, people generally get the form of government they deserve; if laws they allow to go unchecked become the tools of despotic powers, they have only their own ignorance or indolence to blame.

An enumeration of Mill's finer points may suffice as a summary of his ideas:

1. Freedom of the press and freedom of expression are essential rights of man. You don't have to accept as true what other people say, but let them say it because there's always the chance that they're right and you're wrong. Mill points out that even the Roman Catholic Church, most intolerant of religions (his words, not mine), allows a "devil's advocate" to offer repudiative evidence before it canonizes a new saint. He notes instances in which religious intolerance still rears its ugly head in the British Empire of his day.

2. Christianity does not have a monopoly on moral authority; literary history gives evidence of this.

3. Individuality should be fostered so that new ideas may flourish, but society, specifically the middle class, establishes the normative values that unfortunately tend to stifle individuality. You have an unlimited right to your opinion, but you are free to act only so far as you do not harm or molest others. Long before Orwell, Mill had the insight that institutional deprivation of liberty is effectively suppression of thought, for how can someone train himself to think independently when doing so could lead to persecution for heresy or treason?

4. State-sponsored education should restrict itself to teaching scientifically provable or reliably documented facts rather than push religious or political agenda. When or if polemical issues are raised, arguments for and against are to be presented as opinions so that students may draw their own conclusions.

5. The utilitarian principle states that actions that promote happiness (in its most obvious form, pleasure) are "right" and those that reduce happiness are "wrong"--in other words, utilitarianism is the opposite of puritanism. Consider how much better it is to be a dissatisfied human being than a satisfied pig, because the human has the potential for so much more happiness than the pig, whose breadth of experience is contained entirely between the trough and the slaughterhouse, could ever know.

6. Women deserve the same rights as men because the social and mental limitations attributed to women are for the most part a male-conceived artifice. Chivalry is a fallacy.

And so on. I'm not sure if it's correct to call Mill a libertarian in modern terms, but he was certainly concerned with the issues with which modern libertarians are concerned. Much of his discourse is relevant to today's world, even though he often draws upon the past for contrast in order to make his conclusions, the implication being that improvement comes with increased knowledge and experience. Anyone who is interested in nineteenth-century thought on democracy and individualism will find much to ponder in Mill's eloquence.