\u00bfQu\u00e9 es la Filosof\u00eda Pol\u00edtica? \/ III. Las soluciones Modernas<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Por Le\u014dnardus Str\u016bthi\u014d<\/span><\/p>\n\n Hobbes\u2019s<\/span> teaching was still much too bold to be acceptable. It, too, was in need of mitigation. <\/span>The<\/span> mitigation was the work of Locke. Locke took over the fundamental scheme of Hobbes and changed it only in one point. He realized that what man primarily <\/span>needs<\/span> for his self-preservation is less a gun than food, or more generally, property.<\/span> Thus<\/span> the desire for self-preservation turns into the desire for property, for acquisition, and the right to self-preservation becomes the right to unlimited acquisition. The practical consequences of this small change are enormous. Locke\u2019<\/span>s<\/span> political teaching is the prosaic version of what in Hobbes still had a certain p<\/span>oe<\/span>tic quality. It is, precisely on <\/span>Hobbes\u2019s<\/span> premises, more reasonable than Hobbes\u2019s own political teaching. With a view to the resounding success of Locke, as contrasted with the apparent failure of Hobbes, especially in the <\/span>Anglo-Saxon<\/span> world, we can say that Machiavell<\/span>i\u2019s<\/span> discovery or invention of the need for an immoral or amoral substitute for morality, became victorious through Locke\u2019s discovery or invention that that substitute is acquisitiveness.<\/span> Here we have an utterly selfish passion whose satisfaction does not require the spilling of any blood and whose effect is the improvement of the <\/span>lot<\/span> of all. In other words, the solution of the political problem by economic means is the most elegant solution, once one accepts Machiavell<\/span>i\u2019s <\/span>premise: economism is Machiavellianism come of age. No one understood this more profoundly than Montesquieu.<\/span> His <\/span>Esprit des Lois<\/i><\/span><\/a> reads as if it were nothing but the document of an incessant fight, an unresolved conflict, between two social or political ideals: the Roman republic, whose principle is virtue, and England, whose principle is political liberty.<\/span> But in fact Montesquieu <\/span>decides eventually in favor of England. The superiority of England <\/span>is based in his view on the fact that the <\/span>English <\/span>had found a substitute for stern, republican, Roman virtue; that substitute is trade and finance. The ancient republics based on virtue, needed pure manners; the modern system which replaces virtue by trade, is productive of gentle manners, of <\/span>h<\/i><\/span>umanit\u00e9<\/i><\/span>.<\/span> In <\/span>Montesquieu\u2019s work <\/span>we observe a last resurgence of the poetry underlying modern prose. There are only two books of the <\/span>Esprit des Lois<\/i><\/span> which are prefaced with poems: the book dealing with population is prefaced with Lucretius\u2019<\/a> verses in praise of Venus; the first book dealing with commerce is prefaced with a prose poem which is the work of Montesquieu himself.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Next paragraph<\/a><\/p>\n Previous paragraph<\/a><\/p>\n La teor\u00eda de Hobbes era demasiado <\/span>atrevida <\/span>para ser acept<\/span>able<\/span>. <\/span>Esta, tambi\u00e9n, <\/span>requer\u00eda una cierta atenuaci\u00f3n. Esta atenuaci\u00f3n fue obra de Locke. <\/span>Locke retom\u00f3 el esquema fundamental de Hobbes y lo modific\u00f3 <\/span>tan <\/span>s\u00f3lo en un punto.<\/span> S<\/span>e da cuenta de lo que el hombre fundamentalmente necesita para su <\/span>propia <\/span>conservaci\u00f3n no es tanto un arma como<\/span> comida, o, generalizando, la propiedad.<\/span> De esta manera, <\/span>el instinto de conservaci\u00f3n <\/span>se torna en un deseo de propiedades <\/span>\u2014<\/span>de adquisici\u00f3n<\/span>\u2014, <\/span>y el derecho de auto conservaci\u00f3n se convierte en derecho a la adquisici\u00f3n ilimitada. <\/span>Las consecuencias pr\u00e1cticas de este peque\u00f1o cambio son enormes. La doctrina pol\u00edtica de Locke es la versi\u00f3n prosaica de lo que en Hobbes <\/span>a\u00fan<\/span> ten\u00eda cierta calidad po\u00e9tica. <\/span>Pero, dentro de las propias premisas de la doctrina pol\u00edtica de Hobbes, la versi\u00f3n de Locke resulta m\u00e1s razonable. <\/span>A la vista del \u00e9xito arrollador de Locke, que contrasta con con el aparente fracaso de Hobbes<\/span> \u2014<\/span>especialmente en el mundo anglosaj\u00f3n<\/span> \u2014<\/span>, <\/span>estamos en posici\u00f3n de afirmar que<\/span> el descubrimiento <\/span>\u2014<\/span>o invenci\u00f3n<\/span>\u2014 <\/span>de Maquiavelo de la necesidad de un sustituto inmoral o amoral de la moralidad proclama su victoria a trav\u00e9s del descubrimiento <\/span>\u2014<\/span>o invenci\u00f3n<\/span>\u2014 <\/span>de Locke: la constataci\u00f3n de que dicho substituto es la codicia <\/span>\u2014<\/span>el deseo de adquisici\u00f3n.<\/span> Aqu\u00ed tenemos una pasi\u00f3n <\/span>absolutamente<\/span> ego\u00edsta cuya satisfacci\u00f3n no exige el derramamiento de una sola gota de sangre y cuya <\/span>efecto es <\/span>la mejora de la suerte de todos. En otras palabras, la soluci\u00f3n de<\/span>l <\/span>problema pol\u00edtico a trav\u00e9s de cauces econ\u00f3micos es la m\u00e1s elegante, una vez que se acepta la premisa de Maquiavelo. El economismo <\/span>es<\/span>, pues, el maquiavelismo <\/span>alcanzando su mayor\u00eda de edad. <\/span>Nadie comprendi\u00f3 esto <\/span>de manera tan profunda como <\/span>Montesquieu.<\/span> Su <\/span>De l\u2019<\/i><\/span>Esprit des Lois<\/i><\/span> (<\/span>De<\/i><\/span>l Esp\u00edritu de las Leyes<\/i><\/span><\/a>) puede ser le\u00eddo simplemente como el testimonio de una lucha incesante, un conflicto irresoluto, entre dos ideales sociales o pol\u00edticos: la Rep\u00fablica romana, cuyo principio es la virtud, e Inglaterra, cuyo principio es la libertad pol\u00edtica.<\/span> Sin embargo, en realidad, Montesquieu finalmente se inclina por Inglaterra. <\/span>Seg\u00fan su punto de vista, la superioridad de Inglaterra <\/span>esta basada en el hecho de la sociedad inglesa ha encontrado un sustituto <\/span>a la severa virtud romana republicana; <\/span>dicho su<\/span>ced\u00e1neo<\/span> es el comercio y las finanzas. <\/span>Las rep\u00fablicas antiguas basadas en la virtud, requer\u00edan modales estrictos y puros; el sistema moderno, que reemplaza la virtud por el comerci\u00f3, es generador de los delicados modales de la <\/span>humanit\u00e9<\/i><\/span>.<\/span> En la obra de Montesquieu observamos un \u00faltimo <\/span>destello<\/span> de la poes\u00eda que subyace a la prosa moderna. <\/span>S\u00f3lo hay dos libros del <\/span>De l\u2019<\/i><\/span>Esprit des Lois<\/i><\/span> que presentan poemas como ep\u00edgrafes: <\/span>el libro que trata de la poblaci\u00f3n est\u00e1 precedido por versos de Lucrecio<\/a> en alabanza de Venus; el primer libro que trata del comercio est\u00e1 precedido por un<\/span>a<\/span> prosa po\u00e9tica<\/span> que es obra del propio Montesquieu.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Siguiente p\u00e1rrafo<\/a><\/p>\n P\u00e1rrafo anterior<\/a><\/p>\n Ir al inicio de esta entrada<\/a><\/p>\nLe<\/span>\u014d<\/span>nard<\/span>\u012b<\/span> Str\u016bt<\/span>h<\/span>i<\/span>\u012b<\/span> verba<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n
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Hisp<\/span>\u0101<\/span>nice<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n