Abstract

This article is a reply to Ferenc Huoranszki’s article on the philosophical problem of political obligations in actual situations. His question is whether and how contractarian theory can be helpful in this justification. In my reply, I argue that all attempts, including the contractarian one, to justify moral obligations are problematic. The origin of the state, be it hypothetical or a historical fact, can never yield an argument for obedience, because one has always to decide to keep the promise in an actual situation. Moreover, if breaking a promise is factually possible, why is it not permitted to do so? Contractarian philosophy cannot give an answer to this question, firstly because it cannot deduce “ought” from “is” in general, and secondly because this kind of special philosophy cannot explain why we should give the benefit to ignorance instead of experience and knowledge.I make a plea for a Spinozistic alternative to justification. For Hobbes and other contract philosophers, it is the pact that constitutes power, while for Spinoza it is the power that constitutes the pact. The real motivating ground for this is always an individual judgement or opinion about an estimated good or bad, which for Spinoza is always the same as a personal advantage or disadvantage. It can be in one’s estimated selfinterest to act in conformity with one’s consciousness or conscience or against it, but one cannot act against one’s estimated self-interest. Therefore, the only way to “force” people is to combine self-interest and public interest. A good state succeeds in matching the subjective estimated self-interest with the objective common interest. Every institutional way of government is in fact always a democracy, the auto-government of the multitude.What the European Union therefore needs is a real union of the minds, a real willingness or an active, inner motivation of the subjects. This implies keeping promises not by abdication of self-will , but by realization of one’s own will.