...Figure 2.1. Intersection of debates about language choice and aesthetic independence. This chapter shows how the aesthetic debates of the cold war, especially debates about autonomous versus utilitarian theories of literary production, were inextricable from anticolonial discussions about...

... represents a recurring problem for utilitarianism: if self-interest is the only reliable motivation, it becomes difficult to account for the legislator's—and hence, the ideal citizen's—supposed commitment to the common good. In Harriet Martineau's account, only the enlightened sufferer is able to regard all...

...This chapter examines William Godwin's role in the development of philosophical utilitarianism. It first provides a background on Godwin's early life before discussing his relationships, first with Mary Wollstonecraft whom he married and then with Mary Jane Clairmont, his second wife...

...This chapter examines John Stuart Mill's legacy as an advocate of utilitarianism. Mill championed an open society, critical thinking, human dignity, and women's equality and produced immortal works such as Utilitarianism, On Liberty, On the Subjection...

... and limited government. The chapter also explains utilitarianism. Utilitarianism states that “society” should be organized so as to yield the greatest possible level of welfare, where it is assumed that there is some way of comparing and adding welfare across individuals. Pareto Vilfredo Ricardo David Smith...

...This chapter examines John Stuart Mill's arguments in his essay On Liberty. It first considers Mill's early allegiance to utilitarianism as well as his reaction to the rise of democracy before expounding on the question Mill asks himself: on what general principle is the coercive...

...This chapter examines the characteristic concerns and claims of the so-called “Romantic” theorists of work and ownership, arguing that what they have in common is best highlighted by a contrast with instrumental and utilitarian accounts of these matters. The chapter's main assertion...

... thought, utilitarianism and bureaucracy, democracy, and Berlin's political theory. Part 4 focuses on liberalism in America, and Part 5 is concerned with work, ownership, freedom, and self-realization. Marx Karl Mill John Stuart Herodotus Locke John political theory Dewey John Ruskin John state...

..., individualism, human nature, John Locke on freedom, John Stuart Mill's political thought, utilitarianism and bureaucracy, pragmatism, social identity, patriotism, self-criticism, and more....

...This book tells the colorful story of the lives and legacies of the founders of utilitarianism—one of the most influential yet misunderstood philosophies of the past two centuries. Best known for arguing that “it is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right...

...This chapter examines Jeremy Bentham's doctrine of utilitarianism and the principle of “the greatest happiness of the greatest number.” Bentham is known for his radical critique of society, which aimed to test the usefulness of existing institutions, practices and beliefs against an objective...

...In A Theory of Justice in (1971), John Rawls laid out his objections to utilitarianism and advanced a powerful critique of the welfare metric, replacing it by attention to primary goods. Sen later advanced arguments against the welfare metric and called for attention to something...

... animals. For Rousseau, natural man is not the noble savage, nor is he Hobbes's rational egoist. Both these conditions are social conditions and, in an important sense, nonnatural. There is a good deal of straightforward Hobbes-like utilitarianism in the Social Contract. Hare R M Hobbes...

...This chapter examines John Stuart Mill's views on utilitarianism and bureaucracy, with particular emphasis on those dilemmas about administration that we can see in his writings. It first offers some remarks about the case of nineteenth-century administrative reform, and more specifically...

... utilitarianism. It concludes with the argument that Popper's account of scientific rationality is political and that what sustains his commitment to some awkward epistemological views is his liberalism. That is, it is not so much that Popper's philosophy of science supports his liberalism as that it expresses...

... which the laws representing the contracts made among men should seek to uphold, namely, 'the greatest happiness shared among the greater number'. Ultimately, the chapter assesses the influence of Helvétius on Pietro Verri and Beccaria in elevating an early version of utilitarianism to the status...

... dealt with inequality and oppressive power, focusing on the initial defense advanced for the low wages of the laborer in comparison with the revenues of the employer and landlord. It also discusses the defense from Utilitarianism, led by Jeremy Bentham, and the views of John Stuart Mill, Herbert Spencer...

...This chapter examines the utilitarian account of property rights and argues that property rights are not basic rights of the kind utilitarianism is commonly said to misrepresent. It suggests that the utilitarian rejection of rights as a fundamental component in morality does create problems...

...This chapter describes John Stuart Mill's attempt to redefine sensory experience as a way to reimagine the social order posited by the utilitarianism of both his father, James Mill, and Jeremy Bentham. While James Mill describes pain as profoundly personal, interiorized, and private, in his...

...This book presents biographical/philosophical sketches of the founders of classical utilitarianism such as William Godwin, Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, and Henry Sidgwick. The great irony of the legacy of utilitarianism is that its name has long been an obstacle to its message, an irony...