T. H. Green on Resistance

Freedom is social. Green's own argument in section 114 is that the desire for freedom in an individual is not a real desire unless he is a member of a society that recognises it. A person alone has no freedom in this sense, because there is nobody to recognise the claim.

And rights come from recognition. Without an authority embodied in civil institutions, Green says in section 115, a person would not even have the elementary idea of right that enables him to question authority. This is a striking claim and students should sit with it: the very capacity to say "this law is unjust" is something the political community gave you.

Why this matters for resistance. If freedom is a positive capacity that only a society can supply, then the state is not the enemy of freedom but its condition, and the case for obeying it is very strong. Green's account therefore makes resistance harder to justify than Locke's, and that is what makes his eventual justification of it more interesting.

The state's purpose, and the limit that follows

Green's formula for what the state does is that its function is to maintain the conditions without which a free exercise of the human faculties is impossible. It cannot make people moral, because an act done under compulsion has no moral worth at all; what it can do is remove obstacles. The standard summary is that the state hinders the hindrances to the good life.

Two consequences follow directly, and both are examinable.

A wide power to legislate for welfare. Because the state's job is to remove obstacles, Green's theory justifies factory legislation, compulsory education, public health measures and restrictions on the sale of liquor, all of which he defended. Interference with contract is justified where the contract is made under conditions that make it not really free.

A sharp limit. The state may not do anything that destroys the conditions of moral life, because that is the opposite of its function. A law which prevents people from exercising moral judgment, or which degrades them, is acting against the ground of its own authority.

The right of resistance

Green puts the question directly in section 102, asking whether, where a command can be resisted without serious detriment to the social order and fabric, there may be a right of resistance based on a higher law than the command of the ostensible sovereign. His answer has four parts.

1. The ground of obedience is the common good, so it can fail. Obedience is owed because the state maintains the conditions of a moral life. Where a particular law attacks those conditions, the reason for obeying it is not merely outweighed; it is absent.

2. But the effect on the whole fabric must be weighed. This is Green's characteristic caution, and it is what separates him from Locke. Even a bad law is part of a system that as a whole maintains the conditions of the good life, and disobedience weakens the system. So a citizen must ask not only whether the law is bad but whether resisting it damages more than it repairs.

3. Where the legal authority of the command is doubtful, the case is easier. Green notes in the same section that the definition of sovereignty, that is, the determination of who holds the supreme power to make and enforce law, has been arrived at slowly and remains uncertain in many states, several of which were formed by combination or by the gradual conversion of feudal superiority into sovereignty. Where it is genuinely doubtful that the person commanding has the authority to command, refusing is not disobedience to the sovereign at all.

4. Resistance is a duty of citizens, not a licence for individuals. Because rights exist through recognition by a society, an individual's claim to resist has to be a claim that appeals to the common good as the society understands it, not to private preference. This is why Green's resistance is closer to reform and public agitation than to rebellion.

A worked example

A State makes it an offence for any person to assist a manual scavenger to seek alternative employment, on the ground that it disrupts a settled occupational arrangement.

Apply Green's test. The state's function is to maintain the conditions in which people can exercise their faculties freely. A law that forbids helping somebody escape degrading work does the exact opposite: it manufactures an obstacle to the moral life of both parties, the scavenger and the helper.

So the ground of obedience is absent. This is not a case of weighing a bad law against the general benefit of obedience. On Green's account there is nothing on the obedience side of the scale, because the law is acting against the very purpose that gives the state its claim.

But Green's second condition still applies. How is it to be resisted? Green would ask whether public agitation, petitioning, and refusing to comply openly would repair more than they damage, and would be sceptical of anything that weakened the general habit of obedience beyond what this particular evil requires. A campaign to have the law repealed, and open refusal to comply with it meanwhile, satisfies him. An attempt to overthrow the State government does not.

Distinctions that carry marks

What Green is NOT

He is not saying the state can do no wrong. The whole point of grounding obedience in a purpose is that the purpose can be betrayed.

He is not a defender of unlimited state power, though his positive conception of freedom has been criticised as opening the door to it. Berlin's critique at topic 3.1.1 is aimed at this family of theories, and a good answer notes the criticism without pretending Green held the view attacked.

"Will, not force" does not mean states do not use force. It means force cannot explain why they hold together.

He does not deny rights against the state. He denies that rights exist outside a community, which is a different claim, and one that has consequences he accepted: a person in a society that recognises no such claim has, on his view, no right, only a case for one being recognised.

Quick revision

1. "Will, not force, is the basis of the state", section 113. Force cannot explain why a state holds together; common recognition of a common good can.
2. Contract theory's error: it treats sovereign and subject apart, when they are correlative. Its truth: political society exists only through common recognition of a common good.
3. Freedom is positive: the capacity to do or enjoy something worth doing, in common with others, and it is social, so it requires a society that recognises it.
4. Rights are powers recognised by society as necessary to the common good. Without civil institutions one would not even have the idea of right that enables one to question authority.
5. The state's function: maintain the conditions of a free exercise of human faculties; it cannot make people moral, only hinder the hindrances. This justifies wide welfare legislation.
6. Resistance: justified where a command destroys the conditions the state exists to secure, but the effect on the whole social fabric must be weighed, and the case is easier where the authority of the command is itself doubtful.

Test yourself

1. Explain Green's proposition that will, not force, is the basis of the state. That force can compel individuals but cannot explain why a political society holds together at all. What holds it together is the common recognition by its members of a common good, so that they will the arrangement rather than merely submit to it. Green adds that theories explaining obligation by contract err in the same direction as force theories, by treating sovereign and subject as separate pre-existing parties when the two are correlative, though contract theory expresses in a confused way the truth that society exists only through that common recognition.

2. What is Green's conception of freedom, and why is it social? Freedom is positive: not the absence of restraint but the actual power or capacity of doing or enjoying something worth doing or enjoying, and doing it in common with others. It is social because, on Green's argument, the desire for freedom in an individual is no real desire unless he belongs to a society that recognises it, and because without an authority embodied in civil institutions a person would not possess even the elementary idea of right that allows them to question authority.

3. What is the state's function on Green's account, and what follows? To maintain the conditions without which a free exercise of the human faculties is impossible. It cannot make anybody moral, because an act done under compulsion has no moral worth, so its work is to remove obstacles, which is usually summarised as hindering the hindrances to the good life. Two consequences follow: a wide power to legislate for welfare, including factory laws, compulsory education and public health; and a sharp limit, since a law that destroys the conditions of moral life acts against the ground of the state's own authority.

4. When does Green permit resistance? Where the sovereign's command destroys the conditions the state exists to secure, since the reason for obedience is then not outweighed but absent. He adds two qualifications. The effect on the whole social fabric must be weighed, because even a bad law forms part of a system that as a whole maintains the conditions of the good life, so resistance must repair more than it damages. And the case is easier where the legal authority of the command is itself doubtful, which he notes is common in states whose sovereignty was arrived at slowly by combination or by the conversion of feudal superiority.

5. How does Green's position differ from Locke's? Locke grounds the state in a trust created by consent, treats rights as natural and prior to the state, and permits resistance on breach of the trust after a long train of abuses. Green grounds it in the common recognition of a common good, treats rights as powers recognised by a society rather than as pre-existing possessions, conceives freedom positively as a capacity requiring society rather than negatively as the absence of interference, and permits resistance only where the command attacks the conditions of moral life and after weighing the damage to the whole social fabric. Green's theory therefore justifies far more welfare legislation and makes resistance harder.