The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics (52 page)

See
economic man
.

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search

Law in force in Australia and Belgium, and in some other regimes in the past, which stipulates that it is compulsory to vote and lays down penalties for failing to vote. The main effects in Australia are thought to be:

(1) slightly greater support for parties of the left than there would otherwise be, because in a typical election their supporters are less strongly motivated to vote;
(2) the ‘donkey vote’, in which resentful or uninterested voters simply vote for the first few names on the list presented to them. Until elaborate procedures for randomizing names on the ballot paper and rotating their order were devised, this gave a significant advantage to parties which could find candidates with names early in the alphabet.

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search

(1798–1857)
French sociologist (he invented the word ‘sociology’ in 1838 although he always had doubts about the combination of Latin and Greek roots) and political philosopher. Auguste Comte based his system of ideas on
positivism
, originally a theory of knowledge which he had a large part in developing, but which also became the title usually applied to his substantive theories. He was greatly influenced by his time at the école Polytechnique (one of the
Grandes écoles
), and by
Saint-Simon
by whom he was employed as secretary from 1817 to 1824.
In the first part of his career, which saw the production of the
Cours de philosophie positive
(published in six volumes between 1830 and 1842), Comte was concerned with philosophy, which he saw as a necessary basis for the rest of science. In the second part, he was concerned with political restructuring, and produced his other main work, the
Système de politique positive
(four volumes, 1851–4). However, the basis of nearly all his later work in both parts had appeared in four essays written in the 1820s. Comte was not only a system builder, but he also remained committed to the same basic system from his first formulation of it at the age of 24.
In the first part, he advocated positivism as epistemology, rejecting the possibility of knowledge other than of correlative laws showing the connections between phenomena, generated by the application of reason to empirical observations. In the past, human knowledge had passed through two earlier stages, the theological (itself progressing from fetishism through polytheism to monotheism) and the metaphysical. This pattern of development constitutes Comte's philosophy of history (
historicism
). In the theological stage, humanity had invented imaginary beings to explain why things were as they were, and this stage had lasted from the origins to the thirteenth century, more than 3,000 years. The metaphysical stage had been much shorter, from the fourteenth century to the eighteenth, and consisted in effect of a critique of the theological stage. It still posed questions in the form of ‘Why?’, but substituted abstractions such as nature for supernatural beings. This did not constitute a viable alternative to the theological explanation, and the metaphysical stage was essentially transitional. The positive stage was in process of replacing the earlier ones in Comte's day, and had substituted the question ‘How?’ This law of the three stages was extremely influential, and was accepted in its general form, for example, by John Stuart
Mill
who rejected most of the rest of Comte's ideas.
Comte proposed a hierarchy of the sciences, from what he regarded as the simplest and most general, mathematics, to the most complex and particular, sociology, with astronomy, physics, chemistry, and biology in between. This logical order was also the historical order in which they would reach the positive stage. Each provided a necessary foundation for the next but did not determine it entirely, so that the more complex could only become positive after that foundation had been provided. When it was, the more complex could start to make its own contribution. In the second volume of the
Système de politique positive
(1852), Comte added ethics as the seventh basic science, characterizing it as the summit of the hierarchy. Sociology, however, remained unique in being the only genuinely social science. Both biology and ethics, on either side of it in the hierarchy, were concerned with the individual. Comte's argument for this depends upon his view that humanity—the Great Being—can only operate through individuals. So the ultimate science, in terms of complexity and importance, is the science of individual man. However, Comte also classified biology, sociology, and ethics together as anthropology, a complete philosophy of human life, and it is possible to see the other formulation as no more than an example of Comte's frequently visible tendency to make everything fit his abstract structure rather than modify it.
Comte divided sociology into two parts, social statics and social dynamics. The latter consists of the philosophy of history, the former of Comte's analysis of human nature. He classified these as the sciences of progress and order respectively, and saw both of them as necessary elements of society.
Every change in the social order brought about by human beings depended for Comte upon the intellectual system in operation. Because the
French Revolution
had been based on the metaphysical stage, it had not been able to produce a viable replacement for the
ancien régime
which it had destroyed.
The primacy of theory over action produced in Comte's social thought a division between spiritual and temporal powers, with the latter subordinated to the former. The temporal power was to be exercised by industrialists and bankers who would achieve the maximum economic development through their expertise. Comte dismissed any element of democracy because it would allow ignorance to dominate knowledge. Even in industrial society, however, some moral foundation beyond mere efficiency and well-being would be necessary, and this would be provided by the spiritual power. It was to be exercised by leading intellectuals who would provide it through the religion of humanity.
Despite the ridicule which his religion of humanity generally attracted (although it was to have considerable success in, for example, Brazil), Comte has been remarkably influential. He was important to
Spencer
, Renan , Taine ,
Durkheim
, and Lévy-Bruhl as well as John Stuart Mill . Echoes of his thought can be found in logical positivism, analytical philosophy, and particularly in one of the most widespread approaches in twentieth-century American political science,
behaviouralism
.
CS 

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search

Name given by evolutionary biologists to a form of suboptimal behaviour found among wasps and policymakers. Certain species of wasp are observed to defend their nests with an amount of energy proportionate to the amount they have spent on building the nest. It would be more efficient for them to defend them with an amount of energy proportionate to the cost of an alternative and the strength of the aggressor. Likewise, wasteful public expenditure on the supersonic aircraft Concorde was defended on the grounds that a great deal had already been spent. But this argument is fallacious. What has been spent has been spent, regardless of what happens now. Spilt milk cannot be unspilt. Spending on Concorde should have been judged by the expected value of the extra spending being contemplated, and on that alone.
The Concorde fallacy is extremely widespread in human reasoning, with the result that policymakers who commit it are rarely punished for doing so.

 
Back
  -  
 
New Search