Why did Rousseau argue for and Burke against popular sovereignty?
Popular sovereignty can be summarised as the belief that the legitimacy of a government is subject to the will of the people governed, but further details are essentially contested. This relates to the ‘social contract’ school of Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau, who postulated that society relies on a voluntary social contract, so power ultimately rests with the people.
Edmund Burke is generally thought to be conservatively against popular sovereignty, but he was more progressive than widely recognised. He believed that people should “choose their own governors, cashier them for misconduct and frame their own government” . Indeed, Burke thought that democracy could be the best option for some (small) states, and strongly criticised the disenfranchisement of Irish Catholics . As the London Agent of the New York Assembly, he fought for ending oppression in the new colonies, and was “broadly positive” about the 1789 Constitution. It is in India, a country he considered a lesser part of the Empire, that his contradictions become clear. Burke never resolved the conflict between political stability and individual rights, and didn’t explain why his concept of suffrage in India was so different to America or Ireland.
Despite being 'progressive’ on India compared to his peers, these interludes are overwhelmed by the conservative body of his work. Burke began his political education, and his political philosophy, with an analysis of European history since the Romans. He idolized the European system as it had developed, and so rejected Rousseau’s state of nature as a meaningless “fairy land” . Man without his history would be an “empty abstraction” , and for Burke, such rationalist theorizing (popular during the Enlightenment) led to the dangers of “scepticism” and atheism. He followed Montesquieu in basing government on experience, with “awe and reverence” given to the “sacred” present. He was not, as widely thought, merely a defender of the status-quo , but did argue that time justified events. Burke saw nations as “corporate entities” , with a common good existing over time. Therefore, 'society’ is a combination of the past, present and future; any single generation couldn’t, even with unanimous consent, claim to be justified in enacting radical change.
Burke rejects popular sovereignty for a number or reasons. For one, our birth renders us morally obliged to give our country (and its institutions) support. For another, he endorsed political prescription , which argues that any 'good’ government deserves obedience. In other words, even a dictator should be obeyed if he is a capable leader. Burke personally favoured constitutional monarchy with strong “primogeniture and restricted class suffrage” , but focused on results. As he argued against Thomas Paine, 'ends’ come before all else, including Lockean 'rights’ so prevalent in contemporary American discussion. While the consent of the people is desirable, their obligations must come first . For example, Price praised George III for being “more properly the servant than the sovereign of his people.” Burke attacked this with “Haec commenemoratio est quasi exprobatio” , believing it an unnecessary denigration of the sovereign’s historically justified position. Furthermore, Burke endorsed virtual representation , believing that commoners could be represented in Parliament without suffrage. This avoided the “inconvenience” of popular elections, and reflects an elitism which only increased over his lifetime.
Regarding human nature, Burke saw man as insufficient and “subject to sinful temptations” , which the institutions of church and state exist to regulate. In the end, man’s purpose is to “meekly submit to Divine Providence” ; subject to an omnipotent God. While also a Christian, Rousseau viewed human nature in a radically different way. Rejecting Machiavelli, he saw humans as “fundamentally good” , with our morality founded on an inherent sympathy. This avoided basing morality on God or Kantian rationality. Also, Rousseau attacked the Hobbesian 'state of nature’ for including a number of social faculties which could not exist in the pre-social state , and for being “unfairly coloured” by the Civil War. A Rousseauean state of nature, populated by self-sufficient and moral people, would not devolve into war.
With the Hobbesian need for a 'Leviathan’ rejected, why form civilizations at all? Firstly, we are born equal, so “no man has natural authority over his fellow man.” This inherently rejects Aristotelian 'natural slavery’ and Burke’s strict classes. But, far from Lockean ideals, the invention of private property was a great evil . It created inequalities of wealth and power antithetical to our natures, and led to magistracies and so arbitrary power in society . These conflicts pushed early groupings towards monarchies and dictatorships . By the 18th century, government’s function was to trick the poor into accepting unfavourable laws, and revolution is acceptable to 'fix’ society. In other words, “Rousseau holds out as an ideal something that Burke sincerely believes is already embodied in the old way of life.”
As a methodological individualist , Rousseau placed great importance on the concept of “volition” . An action can only be moral for him if freely performed; problematic when forming a society. Any civilization requires some adaptation of personal sovereignty, for which Rousseau introduces the idea of the 'general will’. This originated with Malebranche in the 17th century, which argues that the 'common’ good of the people should be formulated and followed. If I want 'A,B,C’ and you desire 'B,C,D’, the logical conclusion is for us both to work towards 'B,C’ . While a crucial concept in Rousseau’s work, its application is essentially contested. The idea could infer totalitarianism, as any leader can claim his actions are for the common good, but Rousseau rejected this reading. He argued that the general will must “come from all apply to all” , which requires universal suffrage in popular assemblies and the protection of individuals. However, he simultaneously recognised the ignorance of the masses, so 'general will’ does not enforce direct democracy. Some issues are best left with the “superior intellect” of legislators, styled on Lycurgus from Rousseau’s favoured Sparta . The concept was never fully fleshed out, but Rousseau himself preferred to live with “paradoxes than prejudices.”
On some issues, which recent papers have attempted to analyse , Burke and Rousseau were quite similar. From reform in 'old’ France, to the advantages of representative democracy and religious toleration (except for atheists), they had much in common. However, an event over which they academically sparred is the French Revolution of the late 18th century. This was fought in part for greater popular sovereignty, and Rousseau was praised (and blamed) for its intellectual foundation. Although none appeared in the decade after his death, the ten years of the Revolution (1789-1799) saw thirty-two editions of the 'Social Contract’ published in France , as Rousseau became the answer to every revolutionary question. His reaction to such status is obviously unclear, but, notwithstanding his radical thinking, he was careful to distinguish between the 'right’ and 'expedient’ courses of action. It is entirely possible that Rousseau would have been uneasy at such use of his work.
Burke’s views on the revolution, however, are abundantly clear. His 'Reflections on the Revolution in France’ are strongly critical of the events, and, somewhat ironically, understood their importance before many in France. He saw the revolution as acting against, not the government of a country, but the fabric of the universe. It was a “complete and irresponsible severance”, going against the “laws of God” and creating a “synagogue of the antichrist” . Much as the 1755 Lisbon Earthquake had for Voltaire , the French Revolution affected Burke, pushing him further into elitism. This can be explained by the importance he placed on history, which led him to see progress as a slow, cumulative process. The 'corporation’ of the state, containing the wisdom of countless generations, could hardly be improved by the whims of destructive radicals. Indeed, he saw their obsession with repressing the past as revealing their fascination with power , a viewpoint somewhat borne out. Also, the revolution would unleash the second 'Fall’ of man, hitherto held back by state institutions.
Unfortunately, there are a number of problems with Burke’s thinking. For one, his opposition seems to have been (strangely for a 'realist’ uninterested in high theory) partly based on an ignorance of reality . He shows little interest in Louis XVI’s tax increases, church abuses and other institutional failures. This is compounded by Burke’s explanation for the Glorious Revolution, that James II had “forfeited the trust” placed in him and so his removal didn’t break the 'historical continuity’ . Were the actions of Louis XVI not as destructive? The crucial difference between the two men is not made clear, leaving him open to claims of hypocrisy. Perhaps the great value Burke placed on history was merely in so far as it could confirm his a priori prejudices.
In conclusion, the primary differences between Burke and Rousseau, around human nature and the temporal nature of society, make their differing views on popular sovereignty inevitable. While Burke was arguably the more coherent theorist, the general trend of the past two centuries have proved Rousseau’s work the more prescient.