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Authority & Utopia: Utopianism in Political Thought Author(s): Lyman Tower Sargent Source: Polity, Vol. 14, No. 4 (Summer, 1982), pp. 565-584 Published by: Palgrave Macmillan Journals Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3234464 . Accessed: 18/10/2011 20:23
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& Authority Utopia: in Utopianism Political Thought Tower Lyman Sargent

The Institutefor AdvancedStudy

Some observers and equateutopiawithtotalitarianism violencewhile othersregardit as essentialto humanfreedomanddignity.Professor how thisissuehas been treatedin recentpolitical Sargentexamines or on theoryand arguesthatutopiais beneficial hazardous, depending the way we transform politicaldreamsinto reality. our LymanTowerSargent,Professorof PoliticalScienceat the University of Missouri-St. Louis,is currently memberof the Schoolof Historical a Studiesof the Institutefor AdvancedStudy,Princeton. is authorof He Britishand AmericanUtopianLiterature 1516-1975 (1979) and numerous articleson aspectsof utopianism. ThomasMore'sneo-Latincoinage,utopia,can be translated no-place; as it is also a play on the Greek word eutopia, the good place.1 In the twentieth century it has become dystopia, the bad place, under the The wars pressureof two worldwars and the rise of Soviet communism. forced us to recognizehow superficialour civilizationhad been. Soviet communismdemonstrated transformation eutopia into dystopia. the of This paper will examinethe crucial relationship between utopia and authority.Most utopias appearingin the twentiethcentury have been of dystopias,and most of them have focusedon excessivecentralization power as the primarycause of the troubles of society. Recently there has been a resurgence eutopianwriting,one that seems to be continuof ing into the 1980's. The examinationbelow is thus essential, for if utopia impliesor containsdystopia,the effortto create eutopiasis pernicious. If, on the other hand, utopias are among the highest creations
1. In addition to utopia and eutopia, More used nusquama (the Latin equivalent of utopia), and included a prefatory letter by William Bude in which Bude had suggested Udepotia (Never-land) or Hagnopolis (Holy City).

566 Authority Utopia & of the human intellect, as some have claimed, we must have more of them. I shall undertaketwo tasks. First, after a short statement of the problem, I shall present the argumentsboth against and in favor of utopianism.Second, I shall attemptto provide a balancedview of the possibilitiesand problemsof utopianismin the last quarterof the twentieth century,and submitthat any developedpolitical theory implies a utopia. I shall also argue that utopianismis somewhatdangerous,but visions into that the danger inheres in the processes of transforming not in utopia itself. political movements, I. The Problem During the past four decades a controversyhas developed aroundthe role of utopianismin literature,social and political thought, and theand perhapsfarther,but ology. Its roots go as far back as Aristophanes the moderndebateis of fairlyrecentorigin.Althoughmanyutopiashave provoked antiutopianargument,Karl Popper and Ralf Dahrendorf, among others, providethe basis for a more careful and thoroughqueseven the Theirthoughthas dominated controversy tioningof utopianism. when their more extremestatements,especiallythose of Popper, have been deplored. There are writerson the other side, most notably Ernst Bloch and FrederickL. Polak, but it is generallyconceded that the antiutopians have made a compellingcase. Even though the dystopia or bad place has dominated literaryproduction utopias,eutopiasor good places the of have continuedto be producedregularly,and have even increasedin number.We find also that people have continuedto go off, in larger numbersthan ever before, to found communesin which they hope to lead their version of the good life. And, of course, people have continued to dreamof a better world and to struggleto produceit. The highest expressionof man's aspirationor a deadeningartifact inevitablyleadingto violence,the Kingdomof God on earthor a heresy, these are utopia. The controversyis important.Utopia is at the root of all radicalismand even much of what we call liberalism. It is the archetypeand harbingerof social change-good, bad, and indifferent. Perhapsif we had betterutopias,we would be able to producea better answerthat if it were not for world, say the utopians.The antiutopians utopias, we would not have the present mess. Antiutopiansare not simplyconservatives,and utopiansare not all radicalsor even liberals. There have been conservativeutopias, and much of the attack on uto-

LymanTowerSargent 567 pianism comes from liberals, or even radicals,who fear that detailed withoutresortto force. plans for the futurecannot be implemented Some of the problemsstem from definitional controversies the lack or of attentionto definition.Also, commentators acquainted insufficiently with the vast scope of utopianwritingspeak ex cathedra,as if the few utopias they had read were typical of the genre. The fact that there is a very extensive secondaryliteratureon utopia at the same time that the most rudimentary agreementon terms has been lacking, and that until recentlythe most extensivebibliographies the genre listed only of some ten percentof the works,may explainsome of the errorsmade by both utopians and antiutopiansalike. But solutions to the problemsof definitionand bibliographywill not lead to answers to the questions raised regardingthe impact of utopianism.2Conceptualcontroversies and generatesome of the definitional difficulties, while greaterfamiliarity with the literaturecan dispel some of the more egregious nonsense writtenon the subject, it is not sufficientto settle the debate. Part of the problemarisesfrom a definitional about the disagreement relationshipbetween utopia and perfectionor, as Popper puts it, between utopia and blueprints.Are utopias intendedto be depictionsof perfect societies or is the aim somewhatlower and less well defined? NorthropFrye describesutopia as follows: The popularview of utopia, and the one which in practiceis acis cepted by many if not most utopia-writers, that a utopia is an ideal or flawlessstate, not only logicallyconsistentin its structure but permittingas much freedom and happinessfor its inhabitants as is possibleto humanlife. Considered a finalor definitive as social the utopia is a static society; and most utopianshave built-in ideal, safeguardsagainstradical alterationof the structure.This feature gives it a somewhat forbiddingquality to a reader not yet committed to it.3
2. Recent definitional studies include Lyman Tower Sargent, "Utopia: The Problem of Definition," Extrapolation 16 (May 1975): 127-148; and Darko Suvin, "Defining the Literary Genre of Utopia: Some Historical Semantics, Some Genology, A Proposal and a Plea," Studies in the Literary Imagination 6 (Fall 1973): 121-145. Bibliographiesare Glenn Negley, Utopian Literature (Lawrence: Regents Press of Kansas, 1978); and Lyman Tower Sargent, British and American Utopian Literature 1516-1975: An Annotated Bibliography (Boston: G. K. Hall, 1979). 3. "Varieties of Literary Utopias," in Frank E. Manuel, ed., Utopias and Utopian Thought (Boston: Beacon Press, 1965), p. 31.

568 Authority Utopia & On the other hand, Bertrandde Jouvenalsays, Eutopie, it shall be, if and when brought into being: till then Utopie. A dream: aye but that is a capital point, a dream, while less than reality,is much more than a blueprint.A blueprintdoes not give you the "feel"of things,as if they existedin fact; a dream does so. If you can endow your "philosophical city" with the semblance of reality,and cause your readerto see it, as if it were actufrom a mere ally in operation,this is quite a differentachievement explanationof the principleson which it shouldrest. This "causing to see" by means of a feigned descriptionis obviouslywhat More aimed at: It is also the essentialfeatureof the utopiangenre.4 This definitional conflictis over the very natureof the enterprise will and be discussed below. We should ask why the same works elicit such wildly divergentresponses. One person's tentative dream seems to be another'sblueprint. The basic issue then is whetheror not there is a connectionbetween or utopianismand totalitarianism utopianismand humanfreedom.Since the utopiantraditionis complex,generalization must be made carefully. WhereverI make a generalization try to base it on a dominanttenI dency withinthe utopiantraditionand whereverI criticizea generalization it is becauseit failsthis test. H. Utopiaand Totalitarianism The tendency in this century has been to equate utopia with force, The argumentis complex, with a number violence, and totalitarianism. of alternative subsidiary and on positions,depending perceivedresponses The basic propositionis definitional.A utopia is a blueby opponents. printof what the authorbelieves to be a perfect society, which is to be It constructed with no significant fromthe blueprint. is perfect, departure and any alterationwould lower its quality. But this is all impossible because there is no such thing as a perfect society, and even if there since it would requireperfectpeople, were, it could not be constructed and we know there are no perfectpeople. When a convincedutopiantries to build a eutopia, conflictwill arise because, failing to achieve eutopia, he or she will use force to achieve it. Force will be necessaryeitherbecausepeople questionthe desirability of the utopia or because there is disharmony between the perfectblue4."Utopia for Practical Purposes," in Manuel, ed., Utopias and Utopian Thought, pp. 219-220.

LymanTowerSargent 569 print and the imperfectpeople. Utopians will not, and cannot, give up the vision becauseit is perfect,and people are perfectible even if not yet Life in a perfect society is best even for imperfectpeople beperfect. cause they will accept it as better or law (force) will impose it. The antiutopiansconclude that only the last alternativeis possible. They believe that a deliberatelyconstructedsociety of this sort can only be maintainedby continualuse of force. Karl R. Popper,the best known exponentof this position, describes the utopian approachas follows: Any rationalaction must have a certain aim. It is rationalin the same degreeas it pursuesits aimsconsciouslyand consistently,and as it determines means accordingto this end. To choose the end its is thereforethe firstthingone has to do if we wish to act rationally; and we mustbe carefulto determine real or ultimateends, from our which we must distinguishclearly those intermediateor partial ends which are actually only means, or steps on the way, to the
ultimate end....

ical activity,demandthat we must determineour ultimatepolitical aim, or the Ideal State, before taking any practicalaction. Only when... we are in possessionof somethinglike a blueprintof the society at which we aim, only then can we begin to consider the best ways and means for its realization,and to draw up a plan for practicalaction.5 of Poppergoes on to say that the utopianenterprise creatingan ideal to a comprehensive cannotgo forward without state, according blueprint, a strong,centralizedgovernment the few, which will likely become a of This is an argument aboutbelief and the behaviorof indidictatorship.6 viduals. As Popper puts it, "the Utopian approachcan be saved only by the Platonic belief in one absolute and unchangingideal, together with two furtherassumptions, namely (a) that there are rationalmethods to determineonce and for all what this ideal is, and (b) what the best meansof its realizationare."7 It is basic to Popper'sunderstanding of the world that (a) and (b) are by their natureimpossible.8 This is due in part to our lack of knowledge,and in part to the inevitability of
5. The Open Society and Its Enemies, 4th ed. rev., 2 vols. (New York: Harper & Row, 1962) I: 157-158. 6. Ibid., I: 159. 7. Ibid., I: 161. 8. See his "Towards a Rational Theory of Tradition," The Rationalist Annual (1948): 50-51.

These principles, if applied to the realm of polit-

& 570 Authority Utopia effects, the certaintythat we cannot perfectlyreproduce unanticipated of our blueprint.Moreover,given the unavailability rational methods, betweenutopianplannersand engineerswill lead to "the disagreements use of power instead of reason, i.e. to violence."9 This analysisdenies that there is a rationalbasis for decisions in utopia.l0 whetherrightor wrong,has little to do with utoPopper'sargument, pianism in most of its guises. There are two reasons for this. First, Popper's utopia-blueprintidentificationis almost wholly inaccurate. Very few utopias were written with the intent of implementingthem in detail, and the history of political thoughtdoes not offer blueprints for buildingnew societies.Constitutions rarelygo beyondthe basic govand seldom has the authorof a proposedpolitical ernmentalstructure, system expected that his or her descriptionscould be put into practice withoutmodification. The strong point that Popper makes is not about utopias but about the fact that some people are willing to impose their beliefs on others. But these beliefs,while sometimesderivingfromliteraryutopiasor other sources that may reasonablybe called utopian, are not necessarilyrewho would like lated to utopianism.Popperdenouncessocial reformers to "clean the canvas, as Plato called it, of the social world... start afresh and build up again in a brand-newrationalworld. This idea is nonsense and impossibleto realize."'l But it is extravagantto suggest that this idea is at all common.When it exists, it is often appropriately labelled utopian, but it is rare and even if it were common, it would not necessarilyprovide a basis for proscribingall utopias. Moreover, the idea is extremelyvaluableas I shall soon argue. has WhilePopper'sargument againstutopianism been the best known, his has not been the only criticism.Ralf Dahrendorfmaintainsthat the influenceof utopianismon sociologicalanalysishas been pernicious.He Two points are involved: change characterizes utopias as changeless.l2 to the utopiafrom currentconditions,and changewithinthe utopiaonce "do not grow out of familiar it is established. Utopias, says Dahrendorf, 13 realisticpatternsof development." This observation realityfollowing reveals his lack of adequatefamiliaritywith the utopian tradition,for while some utopias will support his contention, most of them do explicitly root the developmentto the utopia in the presentreality.Some
9. Popper, The Open Society, I: 161. 10. Ibid., I: 161-162. 11. Popper, "Towardsa Rational Theory,"p. 50. 12. "Out of Utopia: Toward a Reorientation of Sociological Thinking," American Journal of Sociology 64 (September 1958): 115. 13. Ibid., p. 116.

LymanTowerSargent 571 utopian writershave been naive about the ease of social change. For best seller among example,in LookingBackward(1888), the worldwide the Bible until quite reutopias, and indeed among all books except cently,EdwardBellamyhad greatfaith in the abilityof men to recognize evil and correct it. But he also connectedthe fairly rapid evolution of his utopiato the developmentof the monopolysystemwithinAmerican capitalism. William Dean Howell's utopia, described in The Traveller from Altruria(1894) and Throughthe Eye of the Needle (1907), recapitulates the economic and politicalhistory of the United States as a basis for the change to the utopia. WilliamMorris,in News from Nowhere (1890), is considerablyless hopeful about mankind'sability to bring about the desiredchange rapidlyor peacefully,and posits violent revolution as the basis of the changeto his utopia, as do some other writers. It is hardly possible in the twentieth century to argue that a violent revolutionis not "familiarreality."Dahrendorfis simply wrong about the utopiantradition. The point about the changelesscharacterof utopias is more difficult. Dahrendorfnotes that "all processes going on in utopian countries follow recurrent patternsand occur within, and as a part of, the design of the whole."14 This ritualizedcharacterof utopia has been discussed by Frye. The procedure constructing utopiaproducestwo literaryqualiof a ties which are typical, almost invariable,in the genre. In the first place, the behaviorof a countryis describedritually.A ritual is a social act, and the utopia-writer concernedonly with is significant the typicalactionswhich are significant those social elementshe of is stressing.In utopian stories a frequentdevice is for someone, narratorto enter the utopia and be shown generallya first-person aroundit by a sort of Intouristguide. The story is made up largely of a Socratic dialogue between guide and narrator,in which the narratorasks questionsor thinks up objectionsand the guide answers them. One gets a little weary, in reading a series of such stories,of what seems a pervadingsmugnessof tone. As a rule the with his society and seldom admitsto guide is completelyidentified any discrepancybetween the reality and the appearanceof what he is describing.But we recognizethat this is inevitablegiven the conventionsemployed.In the second place, rituals are apparently irrationalacts which become rational when their significanceis
14. Ibid., p. 117.

572 Authority Utopia & explained.In such utopias the guide explains the structureof the of society and therebythe significance the behaviorbeing observed. Hence, the behaviorof society is presentedas rationallymotivated. It is a commonobjectionto utopiasthat they presenthumannature as governedmore by reason than it is or can be. But this rational emphasis,again, is the result of literaryconventions.The utopian romancedoes not presentsociety as governedby reason;it presents it as governedby ritualhabit, or prescribed social behavior,which is explainedrationally.15 There may be a conflictbetweenutopiasviewedas social and political If theory and utopiasviewed as literature. it is true that literaryconvention forces the utopian writer to present either a static society or one in whichchangecan only be recurrent, utopia as politicaltheorymay be limited. In fact, it is difficultto generalizeaccuratelyabout a seriously genre of literaturemarkedby considerablediversity.Many utopias do have the characterof ritualsthat Frye ascribesto them. They are best seen not as social theoryper se but as projectionsof the desirefor unity and simplicity.But this is not the complete picture. Dahrendorf writesthat "socialharmonyseemsto be one of the factors 16 adduced to account for utopian stability." Rarely does the utopian presenta societyin which there is basic conflictover social policy. More often, it is a society markedby agreementon basic principles,which tends to give it an authoritarian appearance.This leads GormanBeauto writethat "Utopiacan be definedas civilization-only-more so: champ that is, as a systemic intensificationof the restraintsupon which all societies rest. All of what we call civilizationis predicatedon order, limitationsthat counterman'smaterialor inregulation,regimentation: 17 stinctualdrivesand resultin the phenomenon Freudcalled repression." Many utopias fit Beauchamp'sdescription,but many others have for sought to reducerepressionand have, for example,compensated the intensification certainrestraintswith the eliminationor relaxationof of others. For instance, Ernest Callenbach'sEcotopia (1975) eliminates most restraints sexualityand those on the public displayof emotion, on anger. Restraintson sexual relations are reducedin many particularly utopias,althoughincreasedin others.Beauchampmakesthe point more clearlythanmost. Utopians tend to assume that there is one, and only one, right methodof doing everything consequently and that all other alterna15. "Varietiesof LiteraryUtopias," p. 26. 16. "Outof Utopia," p. 116. 17. "Utopia and Its Discontents," Midwest Quarterly 16 (Winter 1975): 161.

Lyman Tower Sargent 573

tives must be rigorously excluded, by whatever methods the society has at its disposal. The result of this logic is, as one historian [Marie Louise Berneri] of the subject puts it, that "Utopian men are uniform creatures with identical wants and reactions and deprived of emotions and passions, for these would be the expressions of individuality. This uniformity is reflected in every aspect of utopian life, from the clothes to the time-table, from moral behavior to intellectual interests." The intent of utopia is, of course, benevolent, but the techniques are totalitarian.18 For Beauchamp all utopias are dystopias. This is an interesting point, and elsewhere I have made a similar argument.19But the argument is too often carelessly made. Many utopias are, from the perspective of individual freedom, dystopias. Some have this appearance because the author wants to emphasize a value seen to be in conflict with freedom. This value is usually equality, order, or security. It is possible to trace a pattern of the dominant values found in utopias. For example, there is virtually no concern with freedom in early utopias, except, sometimes, to deplore its growth. They are concerned with order, established hierarchy, and obedience. Nineteenthcentury utopias were primarily concerned with equality, and while many of the authors clearly believed that an egalitarian social system would enhance personal freedom, this was a secondary concern. In the twentieth century most works have been written as dystopias, but the positive utopias written in recent years convey disillusionment with equality as a sufficient guide to the good society; freedom is appearing as a primary value. An interesting case in point is Ursula K. Le Guin's The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia (1974), which is the story of two societies, Urras, the equivalent of Earth today, and Annares, an anarchist society that has allowed freedom to be eroded, in part by equality. Much of the argument against utopianism can be dismissed as simply tautological or as based on ignorance of the utopian tradition, but an important part of the argument remains, the one relating to the conflict of values in society and the difficulties of achieving social change using models of alternative futures. Whether or not the questions raised should
18. Beauchamp, "Future Words: Language and the Dystopian Novel," Style 8, no. 3 (Fall 1974): 467. Marie Louise Berneri was an important figure in the British anarchistmovement. 19. "A Note on the Other Side of Human Nature in the Utopian Novel" Political Theory 3 (February 1975): 88-97.

574 Authority Utopia & lead us to reject utopianismaltogethermust await a discussionof the argumentsin favor of utopianism. II. Utopiaand Freedom The argumenton the other side is not as neat. Some grandioseclaims are made, which are not capableof proof or refutation,some questionare able definitions advanced,and some compellingarguments made. are The proponentsof utopia do tend to be more familiarwith the complexityof the utopiantradition,althoughthey are equallyadeptat ignoring contrary evidence. Since some of their positions have been left undeveloped,I shall attemptto clarify and extend them to show how they raise and answer some of the fundamentalquestions of political philosophy. The basic argumentin FrederickL. Polak's work is that the image of the futureaffectsthe actualfuture."We will view humansociety and of cultureas being magnetically pulled,towardsa futurefulfillment their own precedingand prevailing,idealisticimagesof the future,as well as being pushed from behind by their own realisticpast."20 This proposition, while hardlycapableof definitiveproof, has an a prioriplausibility thatcannotbe gainsaid. Polak goes on to arguethat "if Westernman now stops thinkingand the dreaming materialsof new imagesof the futureand attemptsto shut himselfup in the present,out of longingfor securityand for fear of the future, his civilizationwill come to an end. He has no choice but to dreamor to die, condemningthe whole of Westernsociety to die with him."21 Obviously,to argue that the survival of Western civilization dependson the continuanceof positiveimages of the future (eutopias) makes them one of the most important,if not the most important, artifactsdevised by the human race. Not much can be said about the claim. Polak presentsconsiderableevidence to enhance its plausibility, but the argument,by its very nature, remains beyond categoricalacceptance or refutation. Polak also says that utopia encouragesefforts towardsthe developThis is a neat contrastto the Popperianargument of humandignity.22 humandignityinasmuchas Polak contendsthat ment that utopia limits
20. The Image of the Future, Enlightening the Past, Orientating the Present, Forecasting the Future, 2 vols., trans. Elise Boulding (New York: Oceana, 1961), I: 15. 21. Ibid., I: 53. 22. Ibid., I: 445.

LymanTowerSargent 575 utopiais essentialto our abilityto achievedignity.Again, Polak is rather given to assertion,but obviouslyif one acceptshis first proposition,the secondfollows. For Polak, utopiameanschoice, freedom,and creativity. It is a constant mirrorheld up to the present, showing the faults of contemporary society, a distortingmirrorin reverseshowinghow good we look. Utopia rightlyupsets people becauseit constantlysuggeststhat the life we lead, the society we have, is inadequate,incomplete,sick. Utopia, to its proponents,is not a perfect society, not a blueprint. As George Kateb said, "any serious utopian thinkerwill be made uncomfortable the very idea of a blueprint, detailedrecommendations of by all facets of life."23 Utopia is a possibilityratherthan a cerconcerning tainty.As M. I. Finleysaid: The very word Utopia suggeststhat the ideal society is not actually or wholly attainable.Nevertheless,every significant Utopia is conceived as a goal towardswhich one may legitimately strive, a goal not in some shadowy state of perfectionbut with specific institutional criticismsand proposals.Utopia transcendsthe given social in sense.24 reality;it is not transcendental a metaphysical Even when a utopia is designed as a realistic alternative,it is not intendedto be achievedin all its detail. It is a vehicle for presentingan alternativeto the present. It is a glimpse of a functioningsociety at a momentin time containingwhat the authorperceivesto be better. It is designed to break through the barriersof the present and encourage people to want, and work for, change. Ernst Bloch, a Marxisttheoreticianwith the ratherunusual distinction of being consideredan importanttheologian,was one of the most important writers arguing for utopia. His works, Geist der Utopie Abriss der Sozial-Utopien(1946), Das (1918), Freiheitund Ordnung; PrinzipHoffnung (1955-59), and TubingerEinleitungin die Philosophie (1963), commendutopia as centralto both Marxismand Christianity.For him utopiais a standard whichto judgeexistingpractice.25 by Far from being the road to totalitarianism, is the road away from it totalitarianism. Bloch grounds his utopianism in both Marxism and Christianity.
23. "Utopia and the Good Life," in Manuel, ed., Utopias and Utopian Thought, p. 239. 24. "Utopianism Ancient and Modern," in Kurt H. Wolff and Barrington Moore, Jr., eds., The Critical Spirit; Essays in Honor of Herbert Marcuse (Boston: Beacon Press, 1967), p. 6. 25. A Philosophy of the Future, trans. John Cumming (New York: Herder and Herder, 1970), p. 91. Volume 1 of TubingerEinleitung in die Philosophie (1963).

576 Authority Utopia & comes fromthe Bible, and fromthe idea of the "Utopianunconditionally 26 that remainsthe apse of each New Moral World." He mainkingdom tains also that ideals as well as utopian goals necessarilybelong to Marxismboth now and in the future.27 traces some of the roots of He Marxismto Joachim of Flora and Thomas Miinzer. "No matter how social utopianismmay be secularizedand finally,at last, put on its feet,
since Joachim it always implies a societas amicoram, something Christ-

like that has become society. Happiness, freedom, order, the whole in regnumhominisreverberates it, in utopianuse."28 Freedommeans that we are able to perceive alternativesand act to realize preferences.Utopia presents alternativescolored to make them desirableor, in the case of dystopia,undesirable.Utopia caters to our abilityto dream,to recognizethat thingsare not quite what they should is be, and to assertthat improvement possible.Of course, the dystopian is stating that things could get worse, but most utopias suggest that whetherlife gets betteror worse dependson the choicesmadeby people exercisingtheir freedom. The strongestform of this argumentis that freedomis not possible without utopias. Natureof Utopia IV. The Contradictory In the previoussectionswe have discussedtwo incompatible arguments about utopia. In one, utopia is seen as leadinginevitablyto force, vioIn lence, and totalitarianism. the other, utopia is seen as an essential of freedom,civilization,and even of being human. While it ingredient may not be possibleto reconcilethese extremes,I shall arguethat there is a basic ambiguityin utopianismthat permitsthe possibilityof both positions containingsignificanttruth. Much of the original basis for the antiutopianposition came from first or It anticommunism antifascism.29 was transformed by the coalescence of these two positionsinto an antitotalitarian position, and transof formedsecondby the development dystopia.As GormanBeauchamp
26. Man on His Own; Essays in the Philosophy of Religion, trans. E. B. Ashton (New York: Herder and Herder, 1970), p. 141. 27. Bloch, On Karl Marx, trans. John Maxwell (New York: Herder and Herder, 1971), p. 171. Selections from Das Prinzip Hoffnung published as Uber Karl Marx (1968). 28. Bloch, Man on His Own, pp. 140-141. 29. Joseph Wood Krutch was a prime example of the anticommunist position. See, for example, his The Modern Temper (1929), and The Measure of Man (1954). The antifascist position derived from R. H. S. Crossman's Plato Today (1937).

LymanTowerSargent 577 put it: "This conflict-the individualversus the state, freedom versus the versusthe utopian-informs the twentieth regimentation, instinctual centurydystopiannovel, a roman a these whose purpose,clearly ideofreedomover logical, is to assertthe ultimatevalue of man's instinctual the putativelymelioristicrepressionof utopia."30 By contrast, Crane Brinton sees the developmentof dystopia as a failureof nerve.31 While it seems likely that there is considerabletruth in Brinton'sposition, it is importantto know why a loss of confidence developed.Eugen Weber explains it as follows: The antiutopians have seen the triumphof machinery,of automation, of national development,of the general over the particular. As they see it, Utopia stands for the unreal against the real, for the techniqueagainstthe man, for the rationalagainstthe manysided human.With all its superficial its materialism, essence... is the substitution abstractfor concrete,the sacrificeof the real for of the ideal.32 But the clashis betweeneutopias.In the nineteenth centurythe machinebased eutopiadeveloped.Whetherit be the railroad, pneumatic the tube, or the steam engine, machineswere either to take the burdenof labor from the worker'sback or to make meaningfullabor possible for the first time. These eutopias were inspiredboth by a horrorof the harsh conditionsbroughtabout by the introduction machineryand a faith of that machinecivilizationcould be humanized. Today, after a period in which it was believed that the machinehad come close to producing of eutopia,we see the development ecologically based eutopiasthat either reject the machinealtogetheror try to incorporate it into a civilizationthat rejects machine worship. This almost dialecticaldevelopmentof the eutopia is not new. In many past cases, the achievement near achievement the eutopiaof one age has been or of found wantingin the next. But, more often, the eutopiafound wanting is not completelyrejected.It is modifiedratherthan thrown out altogether. More than any past age the twentiethcenturyappeared rejecthope. to There was a complete loss of confidence,but it seemed, and to many still seems, justified.The catalogue of the twentiethcentury has been
30. "Utopia and Its Discontents,"p. 169. 31. "Utopia and Democracy," in Manuel, ed., Utopians and Utopian Thought, p. 58. 32. "The Anti-Utopia of the Twentieth Century," South Atlantic Quarterly 58 (Summer 1959): 441.

& 578 Authority Utopia read as nothingbut failure-World WarsI and II, Korea,Vietnam,the Middle East, NorthernIreland,the Gulag Archipelago,the rising rate of violent crime,the Cold War, the apparent failureof the welfarestate, Not surprisingly has led to pesthis ecologicaldisaster,and corruption. simismabout the ability of the human race to achieve a better society, and the dystopia,warningthat thingscould get even worse, becamethe dominantutopian form.33 Can we make correct choices? Are we condemned to failure?These are the questions raised by the dystopians. Some dystopiasare deeplypessimisticand can be seen as a continuation of the idea of originalsin. Ejectedfrom the Gardenof Eden, unable to returnand unableto achieve a securalized versionof it, the humanrace is incapableof utopia.But manydystopiasare self-consciously warnings. A warningimplies that choice, and thereforehope, are still possible. The shock of failing to achieve the eutopia envisionedat the turn of the century,the realityof fascism, and the revelationsof WorldWar II led to a deep pessimismabout our abilities.George Kateb summarizes as antiutopianism follows: 1. Give up the vision of utopianism,thoughit may be a worthy vision, becausethere is no way to go from the real worldto utopia; or if thereis a way, it could be none otherthan the way of violence; and that is either too costly or too unreliable. 2. Give up the vision of utopianism,though it may be a worthy vision, because there is no way to insure the maintenanceof its ends without an oppressivepolitical regime. 3. Give up the vision of utopianismbecause the vision consists of ideals (assumed as permanentand universal) that are unacceptable;or though acceptablein the abstract,are, in fact, destructive of other, perhapsmore worthyideals.34 The first two of Kateb'sthree "imperatives" include the positions of Popper and others who argue that utopias lead inevitably to force, The violence, and totalitarianism. thirdstatementadds a new dimension, the conflict of ideals. One of the most common charges againstutopia is that it will level us all down.35 Antiutopiansfear that excessive emphasis on equality will rob us of freedom, individuality,and other
33. For an analysis of the content of the dystopia in recent years, see Lyman Tower Sargent, "Eutopias and Dystopias in Science Fiction: 1950-1975," in Kenneth M. Roemer, ed., America as Utopia: Collected Essays (New York: Burt Franklin, 1981), pp. 347-366. 34. Utopia and Its Enemies (New York: Free Press of Glencoe, 1963), p. 18. 35. Ibid., pp. 220-221.

LymanTowerSargent 579 equallyimportantideals. This issue, centralto argumentsabout utopia for centuries,is today one of the most basic questionsof politicaltheory. Can one have a society both free and equal?Will an egalitarian society Is destroyindividuality? a free society necessarilyhighly stratified? The position taken by Polak, and to a lesser extent by Bloch, that civilizationdependson the continuedexistenceof a positiveutopian tradition,may appear extreme but it can be defended.Their essential is argument that our imagesof the futurehelp to shape our actualfuture. Put anotherway, social forms follow expectationsor, negatively,forms that are inconceivableare unlikely to arise. The corollary is that if people's expectationsare positive, if they believe that they can or will improvetheir lives, they are more likely to do so than if their expectations are negative.If they believe that life cannot get better, or that it is certainto get worse,they will not seek improvement theircondition, of and it is likely that even their dire predictionswill be fulfilled.Faith in, or hope for, the future breeds effort. Effort is more likely to produce positiveresultsthan no effort.Apathyproducesonly more apathy. Although many commentators, includingPolak, missed the positive messageof the dystopians,there were few positiveimages of the future in available,particularly the 1950's. The importantelement for Polak is the image that dominatesin a culture,positive or negative,and cerin tainlyfor muchof this centurydystopiahas dominated the West. On a less grand scale, utopia serves as a mirror to contemporary society, pointing to strengthsand weaknesses, more often the latter. This is one of its most important functions.The authorneed not intend that the detailsof her or his preferred society shouldbe adopted.As an alternative the present,utopia showsflaws in the presentby picturing to the moredesirable. People can be stronglymotivatedby a vision of a better future for themselvesand their children.Some vision of where we want to go is probablynecessaryfor any attemptto change social relations,but it is The clearlyessentialfor great social movements.36 most modest reform impliesthat somethingis wrong and needs to be made better. The idea of moving to a better state requires some conception of a different orderingof society, and while the "differentordering"does not entail a completeutopia, it does entail somethingsimilar.Every reformerhas some notion of how people should live. He or she may believe that with the social sysreform-or, let us say, a certainamountof tinkering
36. This argument is developed in E. J. Hobsbawm, Primitive Rebels: Studies in Archaic Forms of Social Movement in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, 2nd ed. (New York: FrederickA. Praeger, 1963), Chapters4-6.

& 580 Authority Utopia tem-is all that is needed or possibleat the moment.But even tinkering impliesthat the reformercan identifya fault, that it can be put rightor at leastmitigated. The conservativeopponentof reformis in the same sense a utopian. In arguingthat we cannot or should not attempt to improve on the present,he or she is sayingeitherthat we live in the best possibleworld, or that any change is likely to make our imperfectworld even more imperfect.The firstpositionis utopian.The secondis basic to the classic antiutopianargument.Accordingto this latter position reformis to be This approachis opposed since it is almost certain to produceerror.37 ratherlike that in Greek tragedy.In our pride we commit utopia and violate the boundariesof our allottedsphere. Therefore,we must confront nemesis,fail to achieveutopia, and pay for our effrontery through a worseningof our condition.As Finley notes, when reformmovements fail, "voices are raised... against the possibility of human progress, against man's potentiality for good."38 This cycle of hope, failure, despair, and the rejectionof hope altogether,followed by the renewal of hope seems to be the basic patternof attitudesto social change. Anothercriticismof the utopianpositionis that it ignoresthe practical difficultiesof moving from the unsatisfactory present situation to the One writer observes that much too often, the proposed means utopia. of achievingutopia "are describedvaguely, or the underlyingnaivety 39 and optimismamountalmostto frivolity." In one sense this criticism is well taken. Many utopiasdo not discussthe processof changein any detail. Some assume revolution,others evolution. Some prescribespecific political actions, but many depend on a "greatman," or in a few cases a "greatwoman,"to bring about the desiredresult. So what is a utopia to do? We have seen above that it can have one or more of at least six purposes,which are not necessarilyseparable. It may be simply a fantasy, a descriptionof a desirableor an undeto a sirablesociety, an extrapolation, warning,an alternative the present, or a model to be achieved.The utopian views mankindand its future with either hope or alarm. In the former case the result is usually a eutopia; in the latter, a dystopia. But basically, if we follow Bloch, utopianismis an optimisticdispositionthat translatesgeneralizedhope into a descriptionof a nonexistent society. Of course, hope may be as nothingmore than a naive wish-fulfillment in the Cockaigneor some
of "TheAnti-Utopia the Twentieth 37. Cf. Weber, Century," 447. p. AncientandModern," 19-20. 38. Finley,"Utopianism pp. Dissent (Australia) 39. GraemeDuncan,"In Defenceof PoliticalUtopianism," 20 (Winter1967): 24.

LymanTowerSargent 581 fairy tales, except that, on examination,most fairy tales turn out to be dystopias.Still, hope is essentialto any attemptto improvesociety. But this raisesthe possibilityof people attempting impose their dreamof to a desirablefutureon otherswho rejectthat dream.Utopiansare always faced with this dilemma when they attempt to move their dream to reality: Is the dreamcompatiblewith the repressioninvolvedin imposing it on dissidents?Can freedom be achieved throughunfreedomor equalitythroughinequality? If we go back to one of the roots of utopia in the golden age, the we earthlyparadise,the noble savage, and Cockaigne40 find themesthat all utopianspeculation,a desirefor simplicity,an escapefrom undergird drudgery,a desire for wholeness,unity with others, and, in some cases, unity with God. Most utopias in the West tend to be sophisticatedrejections of originalsin and its allegedconsequences. An importantelement of utopia, and part of all utopian satire, is Carnivalor Saturnalia,the turningover of the world as we know it. The mightyare put down and the lowly are raised.Roles are reversed. In the celebrationsof Carnival,Saturnaliaand the like, the reversalis in temporary; utopiait is to be permanent.41 In all this there is a rejectionof time, of history. Utopia admitsonly of patternedchange, recurrentchange, and that within set boundaries.
40. The literature connecting these myths to the utopian tradition is vast. For a variety of perspectives, see the following: The Golden Age-J. O. Hertzler, "On Golden Ages: Then and Now," South Atlantic Quarterly 39 (July 1940): 318329; Harry Levin, The Myth of the Golden Age in the Renaissance (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1969); and Frank E. Manuel, "The Golden Age: A Mythic Prehistory for Western Utopia," in his Freedom from History and Other Untimely Essays (New York: New York University Press, 1971), pp. 69-88. The Earthly Paradise-George Boas, "Earthly Paradises,"in his Essays on Primitivism and Related Ideas in the Middle Ages (New York: Octagon Books, 1966), pp. 154-174; and A. Bartlett Giamatti, The Earthly Paradise and the Renaissance Epic (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1966). The Noble Savage-Henry Baudet, Paradise on Earth: Some Thoughts on European Images of Non-European Man, trans. Elizabeth Wentholt (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1965); Rene Gonnard, La Legende du bon sauvage: Contribution a l'etude des origines du socialisme (Paris: Librairie de Medicis, 1946); and Edward Dudley and Maximilian E. Novak, eds., The Wild Man Within:An Image in WesternThought from the Renaissance to Romanticism (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1972). Cockaigne-Felix Sluys and Claude Sluys "Le Pays de Cocagne," Problemes: Revue de l'association generale des etudiants in medecine de Paris, 77 (October 1961): whole issue. 41. See Robert C. Elliott, "Saturnalia,Satire, and Utopia," in his The Shape of Utopia; Studies in a Literary Genre (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970), pp. 3-24.

& 582 Authority Utopia It is related to the millennium,the end of history or the escape from time. Religiousconsiderations aside, one of the majorthemesin utopias in is stability,the desire to avoid change.There is a basic conservatism utopianradicalism,a desire to live in a known pattern,without uncertaintyor fear of the unknown.Utopias often operatelike social systems based on the taboo or on an organized system of myths-everyone knowshis or her role andhow to fulfillit. Custom or traditionreplaces law. In one prime case, The Crystal Button (1891), there is no longer any law, but customhas the force of law. Utopias try to get rid of law, but some are even more law-ridden than we are today. Thomas More, the patron saint of lawyers,had no lawyers in his Utopia. There was law, but no arguingabout the law, no legal hairs to split, so that one could truly know the law. Again, this is an expressionof the need for certainty. Utopia expresses deep-seatedneeds, desires, and hopes. For some authorsthe proposedinstitutionsare important,for others it is the general set of values-unity, simplicity,wholeness,a comfortablefittingof person and life. Utopians do not believe frustration,poverty, and privation to be necessaryfor creativity.We do not know whetheror not they are right.

V. Conclusion There are two relationshipsof utopia to authority.In one utopia is a in central aspect of totalitarianism; the other utopia is a central aspect in the last section to point out that there is of freedom. I have tried truth and falsehoodin both positions,and that while utopia has importantfunctions,it is also liableto abuse. to Is susceptibility abuse inherentin utopias,utopianthinking,or the utopian mentality?Is there, as Popper contends, a mode of reasoning defeathis or her vision?The peculiarto the utopianthat must ultimately definedutopianas answermustbe to some extent"yes."KarlMannheim any process of thought which receives its impetus not from the direct force of social reality but from concepts, such as symbols, fantasies,dreams,ideas and the like, which in the most comprehensive sense of that term are nonexistent.Viewed from the standpoint of sociology, such mental constructsmay in general assume if two forms: they are "ideological" they servethe purposeof glossif over or stabilizingthe existingsocial reality;"utopian" they ing

LymanTowerSargent 583 inspirecollectiveactivitywhich aims to changesuch realityto conformwiththeirgoals,whichtranscend reality.42 It is preciselythis desire to bring realityinto accord with unrealistic goals that gives utopiansa bad name. Even when the goals are not unrealisticor transcendental, utopia can blind the believerto the problems of achievingit and to the possibilitiesof alternative utopias. The "true believer"in a given utopia is led to impose it if possible. He or she "knows"the resultwill be for the best. The true believeris alwaystroublesome.On the other hand, if there is ever to be change, some people withcompelling beliefsare needed. Another concern relates to the utopian rejectionof time. There are six closely related ways in which time, history or change, is rejected. First, there are three separateapproachesbased on the close relationship between utopia and religion-the millennium,heaven, and myth. The millennium the end of time and history,and it is often presented is as an eutopia.Heaven in all its forms is beyond time and is closely related to utopia. Myth, following Mircea Eliade, is concernedwith the overcomingof time,43and utopia is often a part of the myth. At times, utopianismurges rejectionof the present and a returnto what is believed to have been a purer,more simple,easierlife.44 As mentionedearlier,there is the tendencyto replacerandomchange with recurring patterns.Many utopias are based on custom or tradition which prescribecertain behaviors. Others are patterned over longer periods and might be called cyclic. Most utopias want to establishstability, which too encouragesthe rejectionof time, for time implies instability.This is the reason for the ambivalentattitudeto law referred to above. On the one hand, law is seen as an importantmeans of providingstability.On the otherhand, law and particularly lawyersare seen as agents of instability because of their quibbling over insignificant points. Finally, much utopianismis basicallyquite conservative.It expresses the desire to returnto earlierforms. The idealizationof the Noble Savage, the Golden Age, the EarthlyParadise,and the certaintiesof tribal life are all ways of rejectingthe change which is characteristic conof life. temporary
42. "Utopia," Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences (New York: Macmillan, 1958), XV: 201. 43. See his Myth and Reality (New York: Harper& Row, 1963). 44. See Eliade, Cosmos and History: The Myth of the Eternal Return, trans. Willard R. Trask (New York: Harper & Row, 1959).

584 Authority Utopia & All these forms of the rejectionof time are importantaspects of the utopian traditionand have been viewed negativelyby many commentators. Needless to say, utopians see the point differently.They equate the rejectionof time and the resultingrelease from the intolerableunin certaintiesof modernlife with freedom.Sometimes,particularly the more authoritarian hierarchical and utopias of the sixteenthand seventeenth centuries,law was to be imposedon a people for their own good. In other utopias,the good life was to grow out of evolutionto a higher standard.The utopianlamentsthat this life is intolerableand feels there mustbe a betterway. War,crime,rapecannotbe all that we are capable of achieving.We must improve-and some add even if it costs some people some freedom.There cannot be freedomto rape, rob, and kill. Today we tend to be skeptical of our ability to achieve significant Some doubtour abilityto do anything.Othershave hope; improvement. are still around. utopias