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Freedom, liberal, libertarian: Clouscard's book 1:30 Liberty, libertarian, liberal. But I'd also like you to tell us about Sartre. Clouscard wrote an essay, I don't quite remember the title, I think it's the critique of libertarian liberalism, where he contrasts the notion of freedom in Sartre and in Rousseau.
2:01 So again, can you shed some light for us on this triangle of freedom, liberal, libertarian? Because you said that the exact title of that book was "De la modernité: Rousseau or Sartre?" Since that was a rather enigmatic title, and it was already not selling much and unknown, the Delga editions were quite right, in their new edition, with Clouscard's agreement of course, to give it a new title, Critique of Libertarian Liberalism, because that's what gives the whole volume its unity.
2:33 We mustn't forget that Clouscard was the one who coined this phrase, which has become commonplace today, libertarian liberalism — you didn't hear it back then. On the contrary, what could be more opposed to the employers defended by Pompidou than the courageous Cohn-Bendit on the barricades — you couldn't get more opposed than liberal and libertarian. Well, I won't go back over that, we've talked enough about it, for 40 years everyone... We've seen the result quite clearly. Perhaps on the notion of freedom. And that our friend, as his name indicates, who is a European MP and a Green, of course, is at the forefront of this libertarian liberalism and that he has contributed to the collapse, in his small corner, he has contributed to the weakening of progressive values in that region.
Doing what one wants and doing what pleases one 3:18 France was in the crosshairs. It was the country most committed at the Liberation, along with Italy, and the least aligned with Atlanticist, Anglo-Saxon positions, etc. So, to answer this game of three words, liberalism, libertarian, liberty, I'll recall a very simple sentence from Rousseau: To be free is less to do what one wants than not to depend on the labor of another. A striking formula.
3:49 Especially since he takes "do what I want" in its ordinary sense, because we have to be honest when we talk about freedom. As Rousseau says, unforgettably after all, what I loved was free liberty. Well, we have to be serious: freedom is either free or it isn't. So I don't want to split hairs. Now, this freedom, I don't want to confuse it with that of, as they say, the fox in the henhouse or the wolf in the sheepfold. Because that's a relation of force. What an insult to freedom, to confuse it with the power to do not what I want — I'll come back to that.
4:19 That's the common answer, we have to be honest. You ask anyone, no matter who, what does it mean to be free — it means, I'm going to do what I want. They're right to answer that way. Now, when do I actually do what I want? Here I become a philosopher again, I have to analyze. Pierre and Paul, two young men, two high schoolers, are cramming for the baccalaureate, they're behind, they've been slacking off, they have the right, they're young, and they decide to catch up, they say, we need to work, there's only a month left, so tomorrow — no, it's the baccalaureate exam — 6 a.m. and we work. 6 o'clock, the alarm rings. I don't know, they're roommates I suppose.
4:51 One of them stays in bed and one gets up. Which one did what he wanted? I often ask the students this question. It's very interesting. Anyway, first they answer, both, sir — one wants to stay in bed, so he stays in bed; the other wants to get up, so after all he gets up. I say, oh really? Because to stay in bed, it takes willpower. They do understand, they start to see there's a problem. A lot of willpower needed to stay in bed when you're sleepy. Or maybe not to get up — no, it takes willpower. You see, the one who expressed his will is the one who got up.
Obedience to the law one has prescribed to oneself 5:25 So the one who stays in bed, what is he doing? He's doing what pleases him. I have nothing against that, I'm the first, when I can, to do what pleases me. But I'm not doing what I want. A crucial distinction. To talk about freedom, we have to start there. And when Rousseau says, impulsion of mere appetite is slavery, obedience to a law one has prescribed for oneself is freedom — the most important word, a single letter with an apostrophe, is the "self" — obedience to the law one has prescribed for oneself, not one that has been prescribed to me, whether by men in the relation of domination to servitude, or by nature — it's not a law I decided that I should be hungry every day, it's not decided that things age, that they die, that's not something decided.
6:15 So, obedience to the law one has prescribed for oneself, that already amounts to a striking prefiguration of what Kant will call autonomy, and the famous freedom in the modern sense, which consists in borrowing one's principles neither from God nor from nature. I come back to the anthropological point of view, where Marx said that it is man who makes man, and not nature or God who makes man. So then, does the liberal-libertarian do what pleases him? Quite the opposite. If liberalism is hedonistic, as is the case with Onfray and our other post-Nietzscheans, who are about as Nietzschean and Spinozist as they come measured against those great figures Spinoza and Nietzsche — not to go on forever, that would be pretentious, but to say it in passing, and to be done with Nietzsche for today: to me he's a poor fellow.
Liberal-libertarian hedonism and the pleasure principle 7:00 There it is, he's a poor fellow whom I admire greatly, but whom people absolutely want to make into... some kind of demystifier, some device, but no — he himself says in Zarathustra, you, friend of truth — people will call him a philosopher — you, friend of truth, come now, nothing but a fool, nothing but a poet. Nietzsche is honest when he speaks of himself. And that's already quite something. We'll talk about Nietzsche again. A great poet, agreed. So, in the perspective of these neo-Nietzscheans, these neo-Spinozists, it's about ecstasy, libido, affects, enjoy without limits — isn't that what they used to say?
7:31 Enjoy like pigs, enjoy without limits. Well, for these Epicureans — in fact all these fashionable thoughts, which I have nothing particular against, I have nothing against Epicurus. But that's the pleasure principle. Whereas any anthropology is precisely a permanent dialectic between the pleasure principle and the reality principle. Because you have to be remarkably privileged to be able to enjoy the pleasure principle while abstracting from the reality principle. Why? Because there are servants or boys to take care of reality, no doubt, and so I can abstract from it. So, once again, I want to make it absolutely clear that nothing is less puritanical than the point of view of Rousseau, Clouscard, Marx.
Happiness between virtue and the libertine 8:12 Nothing less puritanical. But that doesn't mean they're making an apology for the pleasure of masters. I note once again, and I'll finish with this triangle, since we're talking a lot about triangles today, that between these extremes that are virtue, à la Robespierre who guillotines in the name of virtue, and the libertine, à la Laclos, Marquis de Sade, Des Grieux, whatever, I mean, and the evanescent pleasure reserved for an elite, that's mainly what it is.
8:45 Between the two, there is happiness. The most revolutionary position, which throws back to back these two extremes that can last for centuries, the master's and the servant's, is happiness. It's no accident that the Fifth Walk is a study on happiness, and that reflection on happiness forms the deep unity of that century of the Enlightenment. Even Voltaire, in his own way, treats happiness as a value, since he is grateful to the merchants — he's quite the capitalist, Voltaire, of course — who give orders from their offices to Surat and Cairo, in the Letter on Commerce, and contribute, as the last sentence puts it, to the happiness of the world.
9:23 It's in this concern for happiness that the greatness of the Enlightenment lies. Happiness — now we're upside down. There's a puritanism that frightens me. There's a morality, from garbage sorting to... In short, I mean... Or in a certain feminism — people don't believe it each time I attack...
9:53 to her, it's a way of reviving the old puritanism of our grandmothers. But I am not the one you think. There's a bit of that in feminism too, which thinks itself avant-garde, quite simply. So faced with all these petty codes that prevent us from being happy, I defend happiness by throwing back to back the singular, elitist enjoyment of the master and the austerity of traditional societies where there isn't enough for everyone — so we need virtue, otherwise everyone seizes the neighbor's wife and that's not good.
10:50 Thank you.
