Abstract
This essay locates the problem of dirty hands (DH) within virtue ethics – specifically Alasdair MacIntyre’s neo-Aristotelian thesis in After Virtue. It demonstrates that, contra contemporary expositions of this problem, MacIntyre’s thesis provides us with a more nuanced account of tragedy and DH in ordinary life, in its conventional understanding as a stark, rare and momentary conflict in which moral wrongdoing is inescapable. The essay then utilizes elements from MacIntyre’s thesis as a theoretical premise for Machiavelli’s thought so as to set the foundations for a nascent but richer framework of DH in politics and move beyond the standard, ‘static’ conceptualization of the problem within this context. In developing a dynamic account of DH, I conceive of politics as a distinct practice and way of life, with its own demands and standards of excellence, and draw on Machiavelli’s thought to sketch some of these. The dynamic account uncovers an inexhaustible tension between two ways of life, each with its own demands and standards of excellence: a virtuous politician should become partially vicious and no longer innocent. Understood in dynamic terms, DH in politics involves a paradox of character, not just a paradox of action as the standard, ‘static’ DH thesis suggests.
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Notes
See also de Wijze and Goodwin (2009) who cast DH as a conflict between incompatible ‘oughts’.
This need not deny the possibility or philosophical coherence of tragic dilemmas in ordinary life (Tillyris 2015: 62). MacIntyre’s account, I illustrate, offers a richer understanding of tragedy and DH – in its traditional conception as a stark conflict involving inescapable wrongdoing. Accepting the possibility of tragedy in ordinary life, however, does not entail that conceptualizing DH in politics as a momentary paradox of action suffices. It is this ‘static’ conception, I suggested, that most DH theorists borrow from Walzer (despite their disagreements over the scope and precise characterization of DH) and which is unsatisfactorily idealistic in certain on-going activities, most notably politics. These are controversial points but I state them boldly as I depart from them and seek to develop an alternative, dynamic account of DH in politics. Further, my critique and the dynamic account, by virtue of their Machiavellian affiliations, entail that ordinary and political morality cannot be harmonized in a perfect, coherent whole. This is a controversial point and is disputed by moralists (Kant 1903; Donagan 1977). Providing an all-encompassing defence of this point is beyond this essay’s scope but if we can accept its validity, my argument helps us to better grasp this conflict.
This does not apply to all DH analyses; there exists a rift within the DH tradition: between those espousing the standard, idealistic DH thesis (Walzer, de Wijze, Gowans and Stocker) and those sensitive to Machiavelli’s political realism (Hampshire, Williams, Hollis and Bellamy). See Tillyris (2015).
My critique and the dynamic account are not confined only in politics; they extend to other on-going practices (i.e., torture) (c.f. Tillyris 2015: 65–66). Doing so, however, is beyond this essay’s scope.
This point, I explain, extends to de Wijze’s and Goodwin’s account which subsumes and does not reject such theories.
See Machiavelli’s (1996) discussion of Soderini.
I take these expectations for granted but my critique of the DH thesis and the dynamic account entail that these are unrealistic and should be tethered. Whilst I do not intend to explicitly project the dynamic account’s insight to democratic politics here nor do I claim that, especially in the democratic context, we should conceive of a person as mere bearer of her role, my point also applies in democracies: one’s on-going political commitment might be jeopardized if one earnestly speaks about his vices and neglects the strategic aspect of one’s public proclamations (c.f. Tillyris 2015). Indeed, given that a virtuous politics, democratic or otherwise, is intertwined with the cultivation and practice of the vices, it is unsurprising that hypocrisy is ubiquitous especially in democracies, where politicians are exceedingly dependent on the demos’ support (Grant 1997; Kis 2008; Bellamy 2010). This point is not conditioned on our innocence per se. For, even if we accept that politics entails the cultivation and practice of the vices, we prefer not to be told (Hollis 1982). And, politics, democratic or otherwise, involves ongoing power-struggles; a politician’s public statements can be misused by her opponents.
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Tillyris, D. After the Standard Dirty Hands Thesis: Towards a Dynamic Account of Dirty Hands in Politics. Ethic Theory Moral Prac 19, 161–175 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10677-015-9604-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10677-015-9604-6