Don't leave Rousseau out of your political philosophy hall of shame:
You Reap What Rousseau
Blame French philosophers for
Europe's miseries.
BY PETE DU PONT
Wednesday, May 16, 2001 12:01 a.m. EDT
In the autumn of 1799 a market-oriented French economist
and legislator whose name I share fled from the romantic
promise of Robespierre's revolution, correctly fearing that his
head was about to be separated from his shoulders in the
name of liberté, égalité and fraternité. He was further
burdened by President John Adams's belief that "We have had
too many French philosophers already." President Jefferson
ultimately took a different view and let him into the country,
so the story had a happy ending for your columnist.
Two hundred years later the philosophy M. du Pont fled still
haunts Europe. French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau
believed, and Europe still insists, that the rights and
opportunities of the individual must be subordinated to the
overall public will as determined by bureaucrats. Thus the
nations of the socialist-leaning Continent are fundamentally
different from market-based, limited government nations such
as the U.S. and Britain, where the rights of the individual are
superior to and protected from invasion by the state.
The current edition of American Outlook magazine presents
an excellent series on the differences. Irwin Stelzer identifies
two crucial ones: the right and freedom of the individual to
pursue his own dreams and opportunities, and the
requirement the government to obtain the consent of the
governed before launching substantial economic or social
policy revolutions. The lack of these two principles has
brought about disastrous public policies on the Continent.
Holland now allows doctors not only to assist in a suicide, but
to kill patients they don't think deserve to live. Even before
the new euthanasia law was passed, national health service
physicians--yes, physicians--were taking 16 lives a day
without the consent of the victims, perhaps the ultimate
denial of individual rights for the convenience of the state.
A medical scandal in France involved transfusions of
HIV-tainted blood to some 4,000 hemophiliac hospital
patients. Hundreds of patients died because the government
banned the use of an American blood-screening test that
could've detected the incurable disease. The ministers who
made the decision weren't held accountable because--well,
because they were privileged ministers working for the public
good.
Just last week the French government reacted to the layoff
of 570 French workers at the Danone SA, a food company,
by proposing legislation to double severance pay and require
companies to consider "the social consequences" of any
restructuring. The Communist Party wants to force
companies to get government permission before laying off
any worker, and the Greens want the government to have
total control of companies. These are more than just the
predictable rants of the left, for in France it is the
Socialist-Communist-Green alliance that controls the National
Assembly.
High government spending and tax rates are a part of "social
justice," too. In Sweden the government spends 57% of
gross domestic product; the average of European Union
nations is 50%. The U.S., including state and local
governments, spends 31%. The top marginal tax rate is 50%
or more in seven of the 15 European Union member states,
which may explain why the underground economy is
estimated to be 20% of the economy in Sweden and Denmark
and more than 15% in France and Germany.
Even the Brits, the originators of the Magna Carta and the
rule of law, have the ruling Labour Party, with its odd
egalitarian policies. An April discussion paper on social
mobility from the Performance and Innovation Unit discusses
measures to assist "downward social mobility for dull middle
class children" and policies to level the playing field among
middle-class British citizens. Taxes could be raised, especially
on investment income, death taxes increased to 100% to end
inherited advantage, and education policies changed "to
counteract the scope for middle-class families to buy a good
education for their children by moving to the right area." One
would hope the unit is joking, but apparently it isn't.
But it is the EU's Brussels government that is continually
applying Rousseau's philosophy to public policies. Last June it
began a round of criticism of the 35 nations that have
"harmful tax practices," which means lower taxes than in the
EU. European socialists believe they have an inalienable right
to tax revenues, and thus they must restrain "mobile
investment from one location to another."
In February the EU launched an attack on Ireland's fiscal
policies, specifically its decision to cut taxes to increase
growth and enhance living standards. Ireland, likely because
of its lower taxes, has the highest growth rate and the
lowest unemployment rate in the Eurozone, and Irish citizens
have more purchasing power than do German citizens. The
success of such market policies enrages EU commissioners,
for as American economist Arthur Laffer wrote in The Wall
Street Journal Europe, "How could the repressive bureaucrats
of Europe keep a lid on its citizenry if Ireland keeps fanning
the fires of tax revolt?"
Then came the ultimate Rousseau policy, a March decision by
the European Court of Justice that the EU can lawfully
suppress political criticism of its bureaucracies and their
leaders. There is no First Amendment in Europe, but the
decision, making criticism of the EU government illegal, runs
counter to the fundamental notion of open discussion.
Nevertheless, the court held that the European Commission
could punish individuals' speech to "protect the rights of
others." This is important because the EU government sees
"a clear responsibility to regulate the dissemination of ideas,
because opinions can bubble up from individuals' selfish
personal interests and create social disturbances," as S.T.
Karnick explained in American Outlook magazine.
None of this pervasive EU activity has been blessed by the
consent of the governed; it has instead been undertaken by
governmental bureaucracies in pursuit of the greater good.
Rousseau's belief in "the social contract, which serves within
the state as the basis of all rights," is still the governing
philosophy of Europe.
On this side of the Atlantic we are blessed with a
Constitution and a Bill of Rights that elevate individual rights
above those of the government. In the words of the
Declaration of Independence, we are "endowed by [our]
Creator with certain inalienable rights . . . [and] to secure
these rights governments are instituted among Men, deriving
their just powers form the consent of the governed."
Two hundred years later, President Adams's suspicion of
French philosophers remains well founded. The peoples of
Europe would be better off with the individualism of the U.S.
Constitution than the statism of Jean-Jacques Rousseau.
Mr. du Pont, a former governor of Delaware, is policy
chairman of the Dallas-based National Center for Policy
Analysis. His column appears Wednesdays.
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