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DEMONIZATION IN
INTERNATIONAL POLITICS
A Barrier to Peace in the
Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

LINN NORMAND

MET

Middle East
Today
 Middle East Today

Series Editors

Fawaz A. Gerges
Professor of International Relations
Emirates Chair of the Modern Middle East
Department of International Relations
London School of Economics
London, UK

Nader Hashemi
Director, Center for Middle East Studies
Associate Professor of Middle East and Islamic Politics
Josef Korbel School of International Studies
University of Denver
Los Angeles Review of Books
Highlands Ranch, Colorado, USA
Aims of the Series
The Iranian Revolution of 1979, the Iran-Iraq War, the Gulf War, and the US invasion and
occupation of Iraq have dramatically altered the geopolitical landscape of the contemporary
Middle East. The Arab Spring uprisings have complicated this picture. This series puts
forward a critical body of first-rate scholarship that reflects the current political and social
realities of the region, focusing on original research about contentious politics and social
movements; political institutions; the role played by nongovernmental organizations such
as Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Muslim Brotherhood; and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Other themes of interest include Iran and Turkey as emerging pre-eminent powers in the
region, the former an “Islamic Republic” and the latter an emerging democracy currently
governed by a party with Islamic roots; the Gulf monarchies, their petrol economies and
regional ambitions; potential problems of nuclear proliferation in the region; and the
challenges confronting the USA, Europe, and the United Nations in the greater Middle
East. The focus of the series is on general topics such as social turmoil, war and revolution,
international relations, occupation, radicalism, democracy, human rights, and Islam as a
political force in the context of the modern Middle East

More information about this series at

http://www.springer.com/series/14803
 Linn Normand

Demonization in
International Politics
A Barrier to Peace in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
Linn Normand
University of California, Davis
Davis, California, USA

Middle East Today

ISBN 978-1-137-56749-9 ISBN 978-1-137-54581-7 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54581-7

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016940834

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the
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translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on
microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval,
electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now
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exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information
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 To my father
Jean Henri Maurice Normand
 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

In the course of my research for this book, I have interacted with many
individuals to whom I am deeply indebted. First, I would like to thank my
PhD supervisor at the University of Oxford, Professor Avi Shlaim, for his
solid support and guidance. I am forever grateful for his expertise, criti-
cal insights and encouragement. Deep gratitude also goes to my college
supervisor at the University of Oxford, Professor Yuen Foong Khong,
for always being willing to provide advice, read drafts and suggest read-
ing recommendations. I would also like to thank Dr. Noa Schonmann,
Dr. Karma Nabulsi, and Dr. Marwa Daoudy for their valuable feedback
during my time at Oxford. I am deeply indebted to my mentor at the
Harvard Law School, Professor Robert Mnookin, whose work on the
challenges of ‘‘bargaining with the devil’’ has made us academic partners
in crime. I would also like to thank Professor Stanley Hoffman (Harvard
University), who inspired me to continue studying international rela-
tions back in 2005 and with whom I have had the opportunity to discuss
the ideas behind my research on several occasions since. Another special
thank-you goes to Professor Everett Mendelson (Harvard University) for
taking an active interest in my case study research and for providing me
with contacts before my research trip to the region in 2010. Discussions
with Professor Daniel Bar-Tal (Tel Aviv University) and Professor Herbert
C. Kelman (Harvard University) regarding my case study research have
also proved invaluable. Much appreciation goes to the interviewees—Yossi
Beilin, Shlomo Brom, Shlomo Gazit, Mark Heller, Ghassan Khatib, Nabil
Sha’ath and Sari Nusseibeh—for sharing their time and thoughts with
me. I would also like to thank Professor Fawaz Gerges for including my

vii
viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

manuscript in his Middle East series, my publisher at Palgrave Macmillan,

Farideh Koohi-Kamali, and the team of editors there, including Veronica
Goldstein, Alisa Pulver, Sara Doskow, and Sivakumar Krishnamoorthy.
This research would not have been possible had it not been for the financial
support of the Herchel Smith Scholarship at the University of Cambridge,
the Clarendon Fund Scholarship and the Nuffield College Studentship
at the University of Oxford, and the Program on Negotiation’s Graduate
Student Fellowship at the Harvard Law School. I would also like to thank
the Cyril Foster Foundation at Oxford for its travel grant, which allowed me
to conduct research in Israel and the Palestinian territories in 2010.
Much gratitude goes to my fellow peers at Emmanuel College
(Cambridge), Nuffield College (Oxford) and the Department of Politics
and International Relations (Oxford) for making my academic experience
both personally and intellectually enriching. I am greatly indebted to my
friends for their support throughout, and especially warm thanks goes to
Helga Eggebø, Andrea Baumann, Beth McLeod, Crystal Whitaker, Elvira
Rocha Queiro, Roberta Sotomaior, Gonzalo Giribet, Bernardo Lemos,
Andre Valente, Karen Falakfarsa, Leah Krubitzer, and Scott Simon, as well
as to Oluf Langhelle for his help in the final stages of editing.
Finally, I could not have completed this manuscript without the moral
support, love and encouragements from my entire family. In particular, I
am deeply grateful to my mother, Marit Normand, to my sister, Camilla
Normand, to my grandparents, Hansine and Karl Vannes, to my mother-
in-law, Maria da Graça Silva, to my late farther-in-law, Antonio Silva, to
avó Candida, to Doris and BjørnBjørnsen, to my brothers-and-sisters-in-
lawJørgenSperle, Sylvain Bordet,Teresa Silva, Pedro Silva, GualterPires,
and Cristiana Silva, to all my adorable nieces and nephews,andto my sister,
Silje Normand, who dedicated countless hours to readingand editing this
book. My husband, Eduardo Silva, has remained asolid rock throughout
and I cannot express enough gratitude for his supportand encourage-
ments. Our fun-loving and beautiful son Elias, now 15 months, has been
a constant source of positive energy and happiness. Thanks also to my
furry four-legged companion, Bolt, who has loyally been by my side as
I typed away on this manuscript. Finally, I would like to express my full
recognition and gratitude to my father, Jean Normand. His ability to
motivate and inspire me was crucial for the completion of this academic
journey. This book is dedicated to him.

Davis, California, June 2015

 CONTENTS

1 Introduction 1

2 Demonization in Historical Context 25

3 Demonization in War and Peace 57

4 The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: An Introduction 79

5 Documenting Demonization in the

Israeli-Palestinian Conflict 101

6 Demonization Deadlock in the

Israeli-Palestinian Conflict 137

7 Conclusion 183

Appendix A: The Statements 195

Appendix B: Overview of Tables Used in Data Analysis 219

ix
x CONTENTS

Appendix C: List of Interviewees and Their Biography 229

Bibliography 231

Index 263
 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

AIPAC The American Israel Public Affairs Committee

IDF Israel Defense Forces
MEMRI The Middle East Media Research Institute
MFA Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs
PASSIA Palestinian Academic Society for the Study
of International Affairs
PA Palestinian Authority
PLO Palestinian Liberation Organization
PMW Palestinian Media Watch
UN United Nations
USA United States of America

xi
 LIST OF FIGURES

Fig. 2.1 Grandes Chroniques de France (Royal manuscript, Paris,

fourteenth century). Charlemagne leads his army against
the Saracens. Courtesy of French National Library, BNF 33
Fig. 2.2 The Papist Devil (Woodcut, artist unknown, Germany,
late fifteenth century). Depicts the Borgia pope,
Alexander VI, as Devil. Legend states: “I am the Pope.”
©
INTERFOTO/Alamy Stock Photo 36
Fig. 2.3 The Devil’s Bagpipe (Woodcut, artist Erhard Schoen,
Germany, ca. 1520). Features Martin Luther as |
an instrument of demonic spirits. ©INTERFOTO/Alamy
Stock Photo 37
Fig. 2.4 The Witch of the Woodlands (Book print, Chapbooks
of the eighteenth century, 1882). Courtesy of
The Public Domain Review 39
Fig. 2.5 A warm place—Hell (Print, artist Paul Revere,
US, 1768). Courtesy of the American Antiquarian Society 41
Fig. 2.6 Indigestion of the Devil (Print, artist
unknown, France, 1793). Courtesy of French
National Library, BNF 42
Fig. 2.7 Hell broke loose (Colored engraving, artist W. Dent,
Britain, mid-eighteenth century). Courtesy of the
Library of Congress 43
Fig. 2.8 Gouvernement Anglais (Print, artist Jacques Louis David,
Paris, 1793). Courtesy of French National Library, BNF 45
Fig. 2.9 The first secessionist (Envelope for the Clerk’s Office2.
of the District Court of the U.S. for the Southern District

xiii
xiv LIST OF FIGURES

of Ohio, by Mumford & Co, 1861). Courtesy

of Tennessee State Library and Archives 46
Fig. 2.10 Untitled (Allied poster during the First World War,
1915). German Kaiser Wilhelm II depicted as the
Devil (Reprinted with permission from Jeffrey
Burton Russell. Used by permission of the publisher,
Cornell University Press) 48
Fig. 2.11 Untitled (Print, artist unknown, Germany, 1632).
Courtesy of Goettingen State and University Library,
2 H GERM VIII, 82 : 12 RARA 49
Fig. 2.12 The Great European War (War poster, artist unknown,
Russia, 1915). ©Heritage Image Partnership Ltd./
Alamy Stock Photo 50
Fig. 2.13 Kill Him with War Savings (War poster, printed by
Wiener Ltd., Britain, Second World War).
©
Pictorial Press Ltd./Alamy Stock Photo 52
Fig. 2.14 The Russian Monster About to Escape: The Crime
against Europe (War poster, Germany, Second World War)
(Reproduced from Keen, Faces of the enemy) 53
Fig. 2.15 This is our “Peace Partner” (Jerusalem Post, Israeli
Newspaper, 15 December 2000). Courtesy of the artist,
Oleg Schwartzburg 54
Fig. 5.1 Categories of Israeli targets 113
Fig. 5.2 Categories of Palestinian targets 117
Fig. 5.3 Categories of evil message content 117
 LIST OF TABLES

Table 3.1 Overview of the three dimensions of

“demonization deadlock” 77
Table 5.1 Categories of Israeli targets 112
Table 5.2 Categories of Palestinian targets 116
Table 5.3 Categories of demonizing messages 126
Table B.1 Breakdown of Israeli elite narrators 219
Table B.2 Breakdown of Palestinian elite narrators 220
Table B.3 Breakdown of Israeli targets 221
Table B.4 Breakdown of Palestinian targets 222
Table B.5 Palestinian demonization over time 223
Table B.6 Israeli demonization over time 224
Table B.7 Breakdown of coding of Palestinian demonizing messages 225
Table B.8 Breakdown of coding of Israeli demonizing messages 227

xv
 CHAPTER 1

Introduction

In April 1998 three artists—an Israeli Jew, an Israeli Arab, and a

Palestinian—came together to paint a mural. The project was entitled
The World Wall: A Vision of the Future without Fear. Inspired by a Mexican
American muralist, Judith Baca, and financially supported by the Canada
Fund for Dialogue and Development, the mural was supposed to stand
as a symbol of coexistence in a disputed land. It was a project with noble
intentions; however, it ended badly. Covering the story in an article for
the New York Times, Ethan Bronner dubbed the artistic discord “the
Devil incident.” The incident had occurred, he explained, when the
Jewish artist had painted an angelic figure to represent his people. The
Palestinian artist, furious at the depiction of the Israelis as the heroes of
the story, announced to the audience at the unveiling of the artwork that
his colleague’s creation “was a Devil, posing in angel’s dress…like the
Israelis themselves.” The Palestinian further explained:

For Palestinians, what Israel is doing is bad…Yet we Palestinians are seen

as the bad guys and they are the good guys, the angels. So this is what it
reflects. This thing that looks like an angel is not an angel but evil.1

“The Devil incident” between the Israeli and Palestinian artists exempli-
fies an instance of demonization. This book investigates the phenomenon of

1
Ethan Bronner, “Jews and Arabs, painting a mural together, find a mosaic of mistrust,”
The New York Times (Lexis Nexis), 28 April 1998. Accessed: 4 November 2010.

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016 1

L. Normand, Demonization in International Politics, Middle East
Today, DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-54581-7_1
2 L. NORMAND

demonization in international politics.2 Demonization is one particular nar-

rative-based and psychological dimension of conflict. It frames a polarizing
identity of “us” as good and “them” as evil. The book documents demoniza-
tion in order to lay the foundations for an inquiry into why the phenomenon
exists and what implications it has for the actors engaged in it. More specifi-
cally, it questions whether this very discursive framing can play a role in shap-
ing attitudes and influencing behaviors between actors. The book asks: why
does demonization appear in modern political discourse? Where does this
narrative come from? What, if any, are its implications—as one of the factors
among many—for conflict and cooperation? How significant is the demoni-
zation phenomenon in questions of war and peace? In light of these ques-
tions, the book has three main objectives: to introduce “demonization” as a
phenomenon in international politics; to understand its origins and purpose;
and to assess how it may come to inform political practice in two different
contexts—“waging war” (the discursive legitimation of violence) and “wag-
ing peace” (the discursive legitimation of negotiating with the enemy). These
questions will be explored in the context of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

1 DEMONIZATION DEFINED
Demonization is a speech act used to create an image of the enemy as
evil or in league with the Devil. “Demonization,” “demonized,” and
“demonizing” are recognizable catchwords in contemporary politics.
Politicians, journalists, and academics are familiar with the terms and
employ them in their analyses of conflicts. Examples of recent jour-
nal articles that have included demonization in their titles are geo-
graphically diverse, with topics ranging from Cambodia under Pol Pot,3
China under Mao Zedong,4 Germany during the Third Reich,5 African

2
The use of the term “phenomenon” is not incidental: a “phenomenon” denotes a con-
cept that is visible. Using the term, then, implies that demonization is an observable feature
in international politics.
3
David Chandler, “Cambodia deals with its past: collective memory, demonisation, and
induced amnesia,” Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions, vol. 9, no. 2, June 2008.
4
Daniel Leese, “The pitfalls of demonisation - Mao: the unknown story and its medial
repercussions,” Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions, vol. 8, no. 3, September
2007.
5
Peter Lambert, “Heroisation and demonisation in the Third Reich: the consensus-
building value of a Nazi pantheon of heroes,” Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions,
vol. 8, no. 3, September 2007.
 INTRODUCTION 3

Americans in the USA,6 Pan-Arabism in the Middle East,7 Chechens

in relation to Russia,8 and US-China relations.9 There are also other
examples of scholars who employ demonization in their analyses of
conflicts.10 Interestingly, however, very few actually define the term.
Like many other terms and phenomena, the definition and meaning of
demonization are often taken for granted.
6
Michael Dawson, “Black power in 1996 and the demonization of African Americans,”
PS?: Political Science and Politics, vol. 29, no. 3, 1996.
7
Ralph M. Coury, “The demonisation of pan-Arab nationalism,” Race and Class, vol. 46,
no. 4, Apr.-June 2005. See also Jonathan Scott, “The demonization of pan-American nation-
alism,” Socialism and Democracy, vol. 21, no. 2, July 2007.
8
John Russell, “Terrorists, bandits, spooks and thieves: Russian demonisation of the
Chechens before and since 9/11,” Third World Quarterly, vol. 26, no. 1, 2005.
9
Stanley Lubman, “The dragon as demon: images of China on Capitol Hill,” Journal of
Contemporary China, vol. 13, no. 40, August 2004.
10
Writing on the domestic identity conflict with Turkey, e.g., Gregory A. Burris noted that
“while pan-Turkists represented morality, freedom, and genuine Turkness, leftists and
Communists were demonized as immoral and degenerate slaves of a foreign enemy…” See
Gregory A. Burris, “The other from within: pan-Turkish mythmaking and the expulsion of
the Turkish left,” Middle Eastern Studies, vol. 43, no. 4, July 2007. In the context of the
India-Pakistan border dispute Ishtiaq Ahmed wrote: “The partition of India in 1947 was, on
the one hand, a gory consummation of a long process of mutual demonizing and dehuman-
izing by Hindu and Muslim extremists.” See Ishtiaq Ahmed, “The 1947 partition of India:
a paradigm for pathological politics in India and Pakistan,” Asian Ethnicity, vol. 3, no. 1,
March 2002. Writing on pan-Arabism, Adeed Dawisha explained how “Arabist ideas profited
from an imperialist foe throughout the 1950s demonizing of Westerners as alien and injust
[sic].” See Adeed Dawisha, “Requiem for Arab nationalism,” Middle East Quarterly, vol. 10,
no. 1, Winter 2003. Barry identified demonization also in US-Arab relations: in his opinion
“demonizing the US and arguing that it–and not domestic misrule–is the main problem
faced by the Arabs subverts efforts by moderate forces to encourage change and democracy.”
See Barry Rubin, “Arab liberals argue about America,” Middle East Quarterly, vol. 13, no.
1, Winter 2006. In an article on anti-Semitism, Nonna Mayer highlighted “…the demoniza-
tion of Israel and Zionism by both radical Islamism and the pro-Third World extreme left.”
See Nonna Mayer, “Nouvelle judéophobie ou vieil antisémitisme?” (A new judeophobia or
old anti-semitism?),” Raisons Politiques, vol. 16, Nov. 2004. See also Ofra Ayalon, “Dealing
with demonization of the “other” in the Middle East by metaphoric tools to transform foe
to friend,” in Judith Kuriansky, ed., Terror in the holy land: Inside the anguish of the Israeli-
Palestinian conflict, Westport: Praeger, 2006; Norman Cohn, Europe’s inner demons: the
demonization of Christians in medieval Christendom, London: Pimlico, 1993; Tom DeLuca
et al., Liars! Cheaters! Evildoers!: Demonization and the end of civil debate in American poli-
tics, New York: New York University Press, 2005; Rosalind Hackett, “Discourses of demoni-
zation in Africa and beyond,” Diogenes, vol. 50, no. 3, 2003; Elie Podeh, “Demonizing the
other: Israeli perceptions of Nasser and Nasserism,” in Elie Podeh, Onn Winckler, and
Mohamad Riad El Ghonemy, eds., Rethinking Nasserism: Revolution and Historical Memory
in Modern Egypt, Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2004.
4 L. NORMAND

In its literal sense “demonization” denotes the personification of the

Devil. Related to “dehumanization,” “demonization” occurs when an
actor portrays his enemy as being a Devil or in league with the Devil.11
Once rooted in the religious belief of literal diabolic possession, the
demonic charge today retains a figurative force: it is a metaphor, a figure of
speech, and an externally imposed and symbolic characterization of one’s
adversary. Demonization, then, can be understood as an “accusative” pro-
cess, involving the demonizers—those who accuse—and the demonized—
those being accused. “Demonizing” signifies the act of making someone
or something into a Devil or demon or their evil collaborators.
The meaning behind the demonic charge is hidden in the word itself.
The word-decryption G(o)od–(D)evil illustrates the theological ancestry
of the categorical imperatives of morality. “Good” is by definition what
God intends and “evil” is the work of the Devil. Thus in politics today the
cosmic battle between God and the Devil disguises itself in the rhetoric of
good and evil. The use of the term “evil” is therefore implicitly demon-
izing. Robert Ivie has written extensively on “the rhetoric of evil” and
argues that by using the term “evil,” or other words associated with it, the
“unconscious projection of this Devil figure is rhetorically triggered.”12
Demonizing involves imposing a moral judgment on one’s adversary and
does not necessarily have to include literal characterizations of Devils and
demons. This broader and less literal interpretation of demonization opens
up the scope of what is considered to be demonic and takes it beyond reli-
gious symbolism. For instance, equating one’s adversary with Adolf Hitler
also becomes a form of demonizing. The leader of the Third Reich has
become the ultimate symbol of evil in the twentieth century and attribut-
ing Nazi/Hitlerian features to enemies therefore becomes another demon-
izing strategy. Other nonhuman beings have also been used to depict the
adversary: apocalyptic multiheaded beasts, mythical fire-spewing dragons,
and venomous snakes with fangs effectively evoke evil and although some
might argue “animalizing” the enemy is distinct from demonizing him, evil
is still a common denominator. With frightful appearances and willful intent
to harm, these characterizations provoke similar emotional responses of fear
and repulsion. Indeed intent—and even desire—to harm is an important

11
Examples of dehumanization include characterizing the enemy as parasites, vermin, or
primates.
12
Robert Ivie and Oscar Giner, “Hunting the Devil: democracy’s rhetorical impulse to
war,” Presidential Studies Quarterly, vol. 37, no. 4, 2007, p. 580.
 INTRODUCTION 5

criterion of diabolical evil. In Bargaining with the Devil, Robert Mnookin

explained that the “Devil” signified “an enemy who has intentionally
harmed you in the past or appears willing to harm you in the future.”13
Literature on enemy representations focuses traditionally on
“dehumanization.”14 Conceptually dehumanization and demonization
are often used interchangeably. As Robert Nevitt Sanford and Craig
Comstock wrote: “Dehumanization of others…[involves] the process of
defining someone as subhuman (lacking will or feeling)….Whether people
are seen as Devils or monsters, germs or vermin, pigs or apes, as robots, or
as abstract menaces, they are thus removed from the company of men and
exposed to the defenses we employ against those threats.”15 Arguably the
two are associated (demonization is itself a form of dehumanization), but
there are distinct differences between the two: for instance, while demon-
izing (e)vilifies, dehumanizing representations are also used to humiliate
the adversary (e.g. the enemy as donkey).
“Demonization” is included in Daniel Bar-Tal’s broader conceptual frame-
work of “delegitimization” under the subcategory “dehumanization.”16

13
Robert H. Mnookin, Bargaining with the Devil: when to negotiate, when to fight,
New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010, p. 1.
14
For more on dehumanization, see Herbert C. Kelman, “Violence without moral
restraint: reflections on the dehumanization of victims and victimizers,” Journal of Social
Issues, vol. 24, no. 4, 1973; A. Bandura, B. Underwood, and M. E. Fromson, “Disinhibition
of aggression through diffusion of responsibility and dehumanization of victims,” Journal of
Research in Personality, vol. 9, no. 4, 1975; Viola Bernard, Perry Ottenberg, and Fritz Redl,
“Chapter 8: Dehumanization,” in Robert Nevitt Sanford and Craig Comstock, eds.,
Sanctions for evil: sources of social destructiveness, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1971; Nick
Haslam, “Dehumanization: an integrative review,” Personality and Social Psychology Review,
vol. 10, no. 3, 2006; S. Loughnan, N. Haslam, and Y. Kashima, “Understanding the rela-
tionship between attribute-based and metaphor-based dehumanization,” Group Processes &
Intergroup Relations, vol. 12, no. 6, 2009.
15
Robert Nevitt Sanford et al., Sanctions for evil: sources of social destructiveness, San
Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1971, p. 8. Emphasis added.
16
Bar-Tal identifies five subcategories to delegitimization: (1) Dehumanization (possessing
inhuman traits different from the human race—either by subhuman or suprahuman charac-
terizations, e.g. the enemy as “rat,” “bug,” “donkey,” “demon,” “monster,” “dragon”); (2)
Trait Characterization (possessing negative and socially unacceptable traits, e.g. the enemy
as “aggressor,” “idiot,” “parasite”); (3) Outcasting (violators of pivotal social norms, e.g. the
enemy as “murderers,” “thieves,” “psychopaths,” or “maniacs”); (4) Political Labels (pos-
sessing dangerous political views that threaten the basic value of society, e.g. the enemy as
“Nazi,” “fascist,” “imperialist,” “communist”); (5) Group Comparison (compared to another
negative group that symbolizes malice, evil, and wickedness, e.g. enemy as “huns,”
“vandals”).
6 L. NORMAND

“Dehumanization”, as he describes it, is a categorization of an enemy that

is portrayed as possessing inhuman traits. These features, he explains, can
be either subhuman or suprahuman. It is within this latter subcategory
that demonization falls. In this book’s definition of “demonization,” trait
characterization of the enemy as “evil” and dehumanization of the enemy
in the form of literal Devils or any other being that symbolizes “evil” are
grouped together. The book does not make a distinction between them.
Despite the range of enemy representations, demonization appears dis-
tinct from other types of adversarial images in terms of intensity: it evokes
an extreme evil akin to that of diabolic spirits and exists at the top of the pyr-
amid of possible negative representations of the adversary. Demonization
is the ripest testament of the good and evil dichotomy. Rodney Barker calls
demonization “the nuclear powered version of enmity.”17 In Barker’s scale
of “the narratives of contention,” this phenomenon expresses the highest
state of enmity.
Demonization is an extreme form of negative stereotyping and a radical
type of “othering.” According to Tom DeLuca and John Buell demoniza-
tion is “a sustained and illicit effort…to thoroughly stigmatize individuals,
types of peoples or groups.”18 To demonize, they say, “is to use language or
other symbols in ways that meet two requirements. First, to strongly imply
or directly suggest that others have very bad, immoral, or evil qualities, and
often that they are capable of quite immoral deeds; or to directly suggest
that they have done reprehensible deeds. Second, to do so without sufficient
evidence, inquiry, justification or consideration of the consequences.”19
Ralph White defined “demonizing” more broadly as the act of “exaggerat-
ing the evil of the enemy.” White identified “demonizing the enemy” as
the first of the three major components that lead to misperceptions in war.
“Demonizing is practically universal,” he argues in his study of instances of
war from the past century and concludes: “I discovered how many of the
wars fought over the last 100 years have been significantly influenced by
demonizing…one’s enemy.”20

17
Rodney S. Barker, Making enemies, New York: Palgrave, 2007, p. 127.
18
Tom DeLuca and John Buell, Liars! Cheaters! Evildoers!: Demonization and the end of
civil debate in American politics, New York: New York University Press, 2005, p. 5.
19
Ibid., p. 4.
20
Ralph White, “Misperception and war,” Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology,
vol. 10, no. 4, 2004, p. 408.
 INTRODUCTION 7

2 DEMONIZATION IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS:

A CONSTRUCTIVIST PERSPECTIVE
Notwithstanding Ralph White’s discovery, the role of demonization in
world politics is rarely considered and while enemy images have been ana-
lyzed in other academic disciplines, they have received less scholarly atten-
tion in International Relations (IR).21 A reason is that mainstream realist
IR theory considers ideational factors in international politics epiphenom-
enal—meaning that they are a by-product of deeper structural causes. It is
the relative balance of power between states in an anarchical international
system that gives rise to competition and conflict.22 Thus structural realities
such as military prowess and economic might determine threat perceptions
in the first place. Enemy discourses, images, and perceptions of the enemy,
as such, are merely symptomatic of these structural realities. As Alexander
Wendt, one of the fathers of constructivist IR theory, pointed out:

A feature of Neorealist structuralism is its materialism. The structure of the

international system is defined as the distribution of material capabilities

21
The majority of scholarship on enemy perceptions exists outside the field of IR or is
outdated. For more on enemy perceptions, see Arthur Gladstone, “The conception of the
enemy,” The Journal of Conflict Resolution, vol. 3, no. 2, 1959; Ole Rudolph Holsti,
“Cognitive dynamics and images of the enemy,” in John C. Farrell et al., eds., Image and
reality in world politics, New York: Columbia University Press, 1967; Heikki Luostarinen,
“Finnish russophobia: the story of an enemy image,” Journal of Peace Research, vol. 26, no.
2, May 1989; Robert Holt et al., “On the psychology of enemy images: introduction and
overview,” Journal of Social Issues, vol. 45, no. 2, 1989; Robert Holt et al., “The image of
the enemy: U.S. views of the Soviet Union,” Journal of Social Issues, vol. 45, no. 2, 1989;
Gustav Jahoda, Images of savages: ancient roots of modern prejudice in western culture,
London: Routledge, 1999; Louis Oppenheimer, “The development of enemy images: a
theoretical contribution,” Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, vol. 12, no. 3,
2006; Rune Ottosen, “Enemy images and the journalistic process,” Journal of Peace Research,
vol. 32, no. 1, 1995; Robert Rieber, The psychology of war and peace: the image of the enemy,
New York: Plenum, 1991; Brett Silverstein, “Enemy images: the psychology of U.S. atti-
tudes and cognitions regarding the Soviet Union,” American Psychologist, vol. 44, 1989;
Brett Silverstein et al., “Research on enemy images: present status and future prospects,”
Journal of Social Issues, vol. 45, no. 2, 1989; Kurt Spillmann and Kari Spillmann, “On enemy
images and conflict escalation,” International Social Science Journal, vol. 43, no. 1, 1991;
Ralph K. White, “Images in the context of international conflict: Soviet perceptions of the
U.S. and the U.S.S.R.,” in Herbert C Kelman, ed., International behavior: a social-
psychological analysis, New York: Rinehart, 1965.
22
For the most renowned structural theories in IR see Kenneth Waltz, Theory of interna-
tional politics, New York: Random House, 1979.
8 L. NORMAND

under anarchy. The kinds of ideational attributes or relationships that might

constitute a social structure, like patterns of friendship or enmity…are specifi-
cally excluded from the definition.23

This book’s focus on demonization falls in line with the constructiv-

ist theory of IR, which contends that identities and perceptions mat-
ter in international politics. Constructivism can help remedy some of
the shortcomings of realist IR theories with regard to their conceptual
understanding of enmity.24 It is insightful in that it introduces the idea of
enmity as a social construct. Enemies in international politics are real, but
perceptions of them are constructed. Moreover, these constructions are
necessarily social because there are always at least two actors involved as
far as enmity is concerned. Indeed, a prerequisite for demonization is to
have someone to demonize. This someone is the “enemy.”25 An “enemy
image” is a representation of the adversary. It is a psychological construct
as it signifies the actor’s perception of the enemy.26 While the enemy is

23
Wendt, Social theory of international politics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1999, p. 16. Emphasis added.
24
The constructivist school in IR emerged in the 1980s. It stressed the importance of
ideational forces, perceptions, identity politics, intersubjective meaning, and the constitu-
tive/normative approach to relations between states.
25
An “enemy” is defined as “one that cherishes hatred, that wishes or seeks to do ill to
another; also in the weaker sense, an adversary, antagonist or opponent.” Oxford English
Dictionary Online (http://dictionary.oed.com/).
26
An “image,” as defined in the Penguin Dictionary of International Relations, is “a psy-
chological construct that is an amalgam of cognitive and affective processes. For this reason
there will always be a sense in which the image can be distinguished from reality.” According
to Vilho Harle, “the ‘enemy image’ tells what our adversary, opponent or military enemy
looks like in a subject’s perception or war propaganda.” See Vilho Harle, “On the concepts of
the ‘other’ and the ‘enemy,’” History of European Ideas, vol. 19, no. 1–3, 1994, p. 12.
Robert Jervis pioneered the study of the use of images in IR theory. Noting how system-
based IR theory ignored the influence of images on basic policies, Jervis proceeded to dem-
onstrate how images could play a crucial role in shaping attitudes and determining behaviors
between states. See Robert Jervis, The logic of images in international relations, Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1970 and Perception and misperception in international politics,
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1976. For more on enemy images, see also Ragnhild
Fiebig-von Hase and Ursula Lehmkuhl, Enemy images in American history, Providence:
Berghahn Books, 1996; Holt and Silverstein, “On the psychology of enemy images”; Shoon
Kathleen Murray and Jonathan A Cowden, “The role of ‘enemy images’ and ideology in elite
belief systems,” International Studies Quarterly, vol. 43, no. 3, 1999; Oppenheimer, “The
development of enemy images”; Silverstein, “Enemy images”; Silverstein, “The psychology
of enemy images,” in Sylvia Staub and Paula Green, eds., Pscyhology and social responsibility:
 INTRODUCTION 9

real (i.e. material), his enemy image is constructed (i.e. ideational). State
actors acquire identities that are inherently relational and enmity is driven
by the identity politics of “us” versus “them.”27 Demonization of rivals
not only exists between states, but can also occur within the same politi-
cal system (intra-demonization). It is a discourse that further fuels this
bipolar “us” versus “them” environment where “good” is associated with
“us” and “evil” with “them.”
Constructivist perspectives, particularly in the field of international
security studies, can also help shed light on how discourse may come to
affect political practice. More specifically, the concept of securitization
developed by the constructivist-inspired Copenhagen school lends itself
particularly well to theorizing the impact of “demonization” in interna-
tional politics. According to the Copenhagen school, “securitization”
is a type of threat construction through speech acts.28 Elites articulate

facing global challenges, New York: New York University Press, 1992; Silverstein et al.,
“Research on enemy images”; Spillmann and Spillmann, “On enemy images and conflict
escalation.”
27
A number of postmodernist IR scholars have addressed the concept of socially con-
structed or exaggerated enemies in their theories of state behavior. For example David
Campbell highlighted the role of “difference, danger, and otherness” in his assessment of US
foreign policy toward the Soviet Union. He argued that the USA needed to articulate threats
and accentuate “otherness” in order to construct its own identity (see David Campbell,
Politics without principle: sovereignty, ethics, and the narratives of the Gulf War, Boulder,
Colorado: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1993. Similarly Michael Connelly in Identity/
Difference attempted to decipher the “enigma of Otherness.” Constructing “Otherness,”
Connelly argued, was a necessary step toward the shaping of one’s own state identity, a pro-
cess that he entitles “the self-reassurance of identity through the construction of Otherness”
(see William E. Connolly, Identity/Difference: democratic negotiations of political paradox,
Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991). States, according to Connelly, construct “a range of
differences as intrinsically evil, irrational, abnormal, mad, sick, primitive, monstrous, danger-
ous, or anarchical – as other.” Rob Walker also incorporated identity politics into his analyti-
cal framework, maintaining that IR evolves around a conceptual distinction between Inside
and Outside (see Rob Walker, Inside/outside: international relations as political theory,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993). Finally Der Derian builds upon the Marxist
notion of “alienation” to argue that states too, not just individuals, suffer from estrangement
and identity-driven antagonisms. Diplomacy, for Der Derian, is a means of mediating the
estrangement between the “self” and the “other” in international politics. He concludes by
noting that “until we learn how to recognize ourselves as the Other, we shall be in danger
and we shall be in need of diplomacy” (see James Der Derian, On diplomacy: a genealogy of
Western estrangement, Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1987).
28
See also Bezen Balamir Coskun, “History writing and securitization of the other: the
construction and reconstruction of Palestinian and Israeli security discourses,” Cambridge
10 L. NORMAND

a “security speech act,” which, if accepted by the general public, gener-

ates a perception of existential threat and a state of emergency subject to
extraordinary measures. Issues become securitized through speech acts
that come to affect political practice. As Ole Waever explained:

With the help of language theory, we can regard ‘security’ as a speech act.
In this usage, security is not of interest as a sign that refers to something
more real; the utterance itself is the act…By uttering ‘security’ a state-
representative moves a particular development into a specific area, and
thereby claims a special right to use whatever means are necessary to block
it.29

For constructivists, then, discursive labels matter in that they can legiti-
mize and facilitate particular political practices. As Wendt pointed out:
“there is a strong case for the proposition that social kinds often are con-
stituted in important part by external, discursive structures…‘war’ by a
discourse that legitimates state violence, ‘terrorism’ by a discourse that
delegitimizes non-state violence.”30 Demonization, like securitization, is a
speech act that helps legitimate a particular course of action, while delegit-
imizing others. By uttering the word “evil” or “Devil,” the parties bring a
moral dimension to the conflict.

3 WAGING WAR AND WAGING PEACE

The book identifies two different domains where demonization might
come to inform political practice—both when “waging war” and “waging
peace.” In exploring the “politics of demonization,” the book argues that
“demonizing the other” today can be instrumental.
In the context of conflict, demonization is a discourse that may help to
unite citizens, legitimize political authority, morally justify violence, and
mobilize the military and the population at large. It highlights how chasing
demons can serve politically expedient functions in that it helps promote:

Review of International Affairs, vol. 23, no. 2, June 2010. For more on “securitisation,” see
Ole Waever “Securitization and desecuritization” in On Security, edited by R. Lipschutz,
New York: Colombia University Press, 1993, and Barry Buzan et al., Security: A New
Framework for Analysis, Boulder, CO: Lynne Reiner, 1998.
29
Ole Waever (1995) cited in Michael C. Williams, “Words, Images, Enemies: Securitization
and International Politics,” International Studies Quarterly, vol. 47, no. 4, 2003, p. 513.
30
Wendt, Social theory of international politics, p. 84.
 INTRODUCTION 11

1) Unity through fear: Chasing demons can prompt unity as people tend to
unite behind a common enemy. As research in social psychology has shown,
a hostile image of the out-group will tend to increase in-group solidarity.31
Fear of the (d)evil enemy has cohesive properties because it establishes a
negative foundation upon which people can overcome differences: even
those who may otherwise be divided find that they share an ambition to
remove the source of threat and restore security. For the status-quo author-
ity, this unity helps safeguard political stability. For the revisionist force, it
helps unite the opposition.

2) Legitimacy through protection: Security is the very foundation upon

which the state’s legitimacy is built. Because threat inspires a need for pro-
tection, a state or church authority might use a hostile enemy image to
enhance its public legitimacy. As political scientist Ole Holsti explained:
“When people feel threatened they are more likely to turn to leaders or
authority for guidance, assurance and protection…The organisational struc-
ture may change, usually towards greater centralisation…tendencies
towards rigidity, inflexibility, or even despotism may develop...”32 The
advantages of such political outcomes—for the governing authority—are
self-evident.

3) Self-righteousness and moral heroism: Demonizing the enemy can jus-

tify reprehensible acts toward others. When a conflict is presented in
absolute terms of go(o)d-and-(d)evil, it indicates a clear division between
right and wrong. Any act of violence associated with the “evil” opponent is
branded as immoral, while one’s own acts are perceived as necessary and
legitimate. From this logic comes the crucial legitimizing principle of “self-
righteousness” and moral heroism, meaning that, in our own perception, we
consider ourselves and our actions to be just, upright, guiltless, and sinless.
Our acts of violence become dissociated from morality: we are not “good,”
“bad,” “right,” or “wrong” because of what we do, but because of who we
are and what we stand for. Thus in the fight against the (d)evil enemy, oth-
erwise immoral deeds become morally legitimate.

31
See e.g. Henry Tajfel and John C. Turner, ‘The social identity theory of inter-group
behavior’, in Stephen Worchel, ed., Psychology of intergroup relations, Chicago: Nelson-Hall,
1986.
32
Holsti, “Cognitive dynamics and images of the enemy,” p. 10.
12 L. NORMAND

4) Political and military mobilization: The more frightful the enemy, the
more important the cause and the more committed the soldier, and the pub-
lic supporting them. The demonized foe can therefore help secure both
popular and military mobilization and legitimacy. Intentions appear genu-
ine if the aim is to deter or eliminate a (d)evil enemy. Moreover, moral
considerations are removed. As social psychologist Herbert C. Kelman
pointed out: “To the extent that victims are dehumanized, principles of
morality do no longer apply to them and moral restraints against killing are
more readily overcome.”33 If dehumanizing the enemy is a strategy that
enables soldiers to remove their sense of guilt on the battlefield, demoniza-
tion is the strategy that fuels them with a sense of virtue in the act of killing.
For these reasons demonization and conflict share an intimate relationship.
In the context of peacemaking, demonization may create an environ-
ment that additionally contributes to diplomatic deadlock by preventing
the parties from coming together in the first place, by delegitimizing the
peace partners if they do decide to negotiate, and by polarizing the par-
ties even further apart. In coining the phrase “demonization deadlock,”
the book explores the relationship between demonization and diplomatic
deadlock. “Demonization deadlock” consists of three dimensions:
1) “Nip in the bud”: Demonizing the enemy might prevent any dialogue from
taking place as the prospects of negotiating with an “evil” enemy appear as
probable as striking a deal with the Devil himself. There is often a strong
moral principle not to negotiate with an evil foe: this is not just because the
prospect of a successful outcome is considered minimal but also because it
is perceived as wrong or compromising to do so. Evil must be vanquished,
not negotiated. Exaggerating the evil of the enemy, then, tends to nip the
diplomatic option in the bud.

2) “No partner for peace”: If negotiations do occur between demonized par-

ties, demonization may risk hampering a successful outcome in the process
as it fosters an image of the peace-partner as a dishonest broker. The major
problem with branding the enemy as “evil” is that it delegitimizes the adver-
sary sitting across the negotiation table. The demonic charge, then, may
render unrealistic any worthy and long-lasting negotiations with the oppo-
nent because it prevents the bargaining parties from generating mutual trust.

33
Herbert C. Kelman, “Violence without moral restraint: reflections on the dehumaniza-
tion of victims and victimizers,” Journal of Social Issues, vol. 24, no. 4, 1973, pp. 25–61.
 INTRODUCTION 13

3) “With us or against us”: Demonization may make the prospect of neutral

third-party involvement difficult because coating the conflict in terms of
“good” and “evil” tends to forge a “with us or against us” mentality.
The assumption is that one cannot be neutral in a conflict that involves an
“evil” party. Hence demonization also delegitimizes the role of the “honest
broker.” It either increases the prospects of third-party partisanship or pre-
vents the facilitating tool of third-party mediation altogether.

4 DEMONIZATION IN THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN

CONFLICT: AN ILLUSTRATIVE EXAMPLE
The book explores the phenomenon of demonization in the context of the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Three chapters are dedicated to this conflict:
the first provides a historical background and introduces conflicting narra-
tives. The second examines demonizing discourses among Palestinian and
Israeli elites, specifically asking “who demonizes whom, when and how.”
The third investigates some of the potential implications demonization
may have had on the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
There are both conceptual and empirical reasons for choosing this
conflict. Conceptually, focusing on one case allows for an in-depth analy-
sis of the conflict. A single-case study enables researchers to investigate
phenomena in greater detail and can therefore provide rich description
and understanding. An added dimension to a single-case study design is
the opportunity to study the case over a longer period of time, which
allows for the longitudinal study of multiple instances of a phenomenon.
Multiple observations from a single-case study can be useful in theory
development.34 Empirically, the Israeli-Palestinian case study was selected
on the basis that it remains one of the most intractable conflicts of the
twentieth and twenty-first centuries. An intractable conflict is one that is
perceived as irresolvable. It is protracted in that it has lasted over a long
period of time, at least one generation, meaning that during a person’s
lifespan he/she has known nothing else but the reality of the conflict.35
The conflict is of a violent nature that may vary in frequency and intensity

34
Alexander L. George and Andrew Bennett, Case study and theory development in the
social sciences, Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005, pp. 32–33.
35
Daniel Bar-Tal, “Sociopsychological foundations of intractable conflicts,” American
Behavioral Scientist, vol. 50, no. 11, 2007, p. 1432.
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
 363
this truly great man was under the influence, not only of his own
passions and of the general “problem” of his own life, but of such
specialized influences as, for example (1) the mediaeval dualism
between the City of God and the Empire of the World, (2) Aristotle’s
unfortunate separation of the “intellectual” and the “practical” virtues,
(3) the evil as well as the good of the dogmatic theology of the
fathers of the Church. Goethe is of infinitely more value to us men of
the twentieth century than Dante. And one of the very things Goethe
is most calculated to teach us is precisely this very matter of the
limitations of the cultural ideal of the Middle Ages and of the entire
364
Renaissance period that succeeded it. We should never,
therefore, think for a moment of taking Dr. Bosanquet’s intellectual
abstractionism about the “universal” literally without thinking at the
same time of its limitations, and of its sources in Plato and in Hegel
and in Neo-Hegelian rationalism, and of remembering with Hegel
himself, “after all, the movement of the notion is a sort of illusion.”
Then, secondly, to attempt to think in philosophy or any other
science merely in accordance with the Principle of “Non-
365
Contradiction” will never take us beyond the few initial positions of
fact or of principle (God, “substance,” pure being, matter, identity,
final cause, freedom, force, the will, the idea a perfect being, or what
not) with which we happen for one reason or another to start in our
reflections. Nor will this procedure account, of course, for these initial
assumptions or facts.
Thirdly, in virtue of its implication in the “solipsism” and the
“representationalism” of Subjective Idealism, Dr. Bosanquet’s
“Absolute” is inferior (both so far as fact and theory are concerned)
to the Pluralism and the possible Theism of Pragmatism and
366
Humanism to which we have already made partial references.
Fourthly, it is only natural that, on account of these, its many
polemical mannerisms, “Individuality and Value” has already made
upon some of its critics the impression of being a book that refuses
to see things as they are—in the interests of their forced adaptation
to the purposes of a preconceived philosophical theory.
 Fifthly, there is certainly a sufficient number of contradictions in
“Individuality and Value” to prevent it from being regarded as a
consistent and a workable (i.e. really explanatory) account of our
experience as we actually know it. Of these contradictions we think
the following may well be enumerated here: (1) That between Dr.
Bosanquet’s professed principle of accepting as real only that which
is “mediated” or established by proof, and the arbitrariness he
displays in announcing convictions like the following: “That what
really matters is not the preservation of separate minds as such, but
the qualities and achievement which, as trustees of the universe,
they elicit from the resources assigned them.” (2) The contradiction
between his belief in the conservation of “values” without the
conservation of the existence of the individuals who “elicit” these
“values,” or who are, as he puts it, the “trustees” for the “universe.”
(3) That between what he logically wants (his “concrete individual”)
and what he gives us (an impersonal “system”). (4) The contradiction
between the completed personal life in God (or in a perfected society
of individuals) that most of us (judging from the great religions of the
world) want as human beings, and the impersonal “conceptual”
experience of his book. (5) The contradiction that exists between his
intellectualism and his commendable belief in “great convictions” and
“really satisfying emotions and experiences.” (6) The standing
contradiction between his “solipsistic” view of reality (his reduction of
the universe to the conceptual experience of a single self-perfecting
individual), and the facts of history in support of the idea of the “new,”
or the “creative” character of the contributions of countless
individuals and groups of individuals, to the evolution of the life of the
world, or the life of the infinite number of worlds that make up what
we think of as the universe. (7) The remarkable contradiction
between Dr. Bosanquet’s calm rejection in his argumentation of all
“naïve ideas” and his own naïve or Greek-like faith in reason, in the
substantial existence of the concept or the idea over and above the
phenomena and the phenomenal experiences which it is used to
intepret.
Lastly, as for the matter of the non-moralism or the essentially
anti-ethical character of “Individuality and Value,” this is a
characteristic of the book that should, as such, be partly apparent
from what has already been said, in respect of its main argument
and its main contentions, and in respect of the apparent
contributions of Pragmatism and Humanism to philosophy generally.
The abstractionism of the book, and the absence in it of any real
provision for the realities of purpose and of accomplishment (and
even of “movement” and “process” in any real sense of these words),
are all obviously against the interests of ethics and of conduct, as
purposive, human action. So, too, are the findings of the critics that
Dr. Bosanquet’s “Absolute” is not a reality (for, with Professor Taylor
367
and others, man must have an Absolute, or a God, in whom he
can believe as real) that inspires to action and to motive on the part
of ordinary human beings. And it is also fatal to the ethical interests
of his book that he does not see with the pragmatists that our human
actions and reactions must be regarded as part of what we mean by
“reality.” And so on.
Apart, however, from these and other hostile pre-suppositions
the following would seem to be the chief reasons for pronouncing, as
unsatisfactory, the merely incidental treatment that is accorded in
“Individuality and Value” to ethics and to the ethical life.
368
(1) It is not “conduct” or the normative voluntary actions of
human beings (in a world or society of real human beings) requiring
“justice” and “guidance” and “help” that is discussed in these
Lectures, but abstractions like “desire,” or “ordinary desire,” or “the
selective conations of finite minds,” or “the active form of a totality of
striving” or [worst of all] the “self as it happens to be,” that are
discussed there.
(2) Even if conduct, as of course an “organic totality” in its way,
be faced for the nonce in “Individuality and Value,” it is invariably
369
branded and thought of by Dr. Bosanquet as “naïve morality,” and
it is forthwith promptly transformed and transmuted, in the most open
and unabashed manner in the interests and exigencies of (1) logical
theory, (2) aesthetics and aesthetic products [perhaps Dr.
Bosanquet’s deepest or most emotional interest], and (3)
metaphysical theory of a highly abstract character.
 (3) The conception of ethics as a “normative science” and of
370
conduct as free and autonomous, and as the voluntary affirmation
of a norm or standard or type or ideal, is conspicuous by its absence.
(4) There is really no place either in Dr. Bosanquet’s “concrete
universal” or in his fugitive pages upon ethics for the reality of the
distinction between good and evil (as “willed” in actions or as present
371
in dispositions and tendencies). Good and evil are for him,
“contents” either for himself as a spectator of man’s actions, or for
the “concrete universal,” or the “whole,” or the completed “individual”
of his too consummate book.
(5) Like nearly all forms of Absolutism (Hegelianism, Neo-
Hegelianism, Spinozism, Hobbism) Dr. Bosanquet’s ethics (or the
vestigial ethics with which he leaves us) comes perilously near to
372
what is known as Determinism or Fatalism or even Materialism.
As for the first of the preceding five points, it is perfectly evident
that any discussion of the various psychological phenomena that are
doubtless involved in conduct can be regarded as but a preliminary
step to the discussion of the real problems of ethics—that of the
actions and habits and standards of persons who are the subjects of
rights and duties and who affirm certain actions to be right, and
certain other actions to be wrong. The point, however, about Dr.
Bosanquet’s psychological abstractionism, especially when it rises to
the height of writing as if the “self” as the “active form of a totality of
striving,” or the “self as it happens to be,” were the same thing as the
“personal self” with which we alone are mainly concerned in ethics,
373
is that it is but another instance of the old “spectator” fallacy that
we have already found to underlie his whole treatment of the “self”
and of “purpose” and of “striving.” Such a philosophy, or point of
view, is quite foreign to ethics, because it is only in the ethical life
that we think of ourselves as “persons,” as beings playing a part, as
actors or players upon the great stage of life. By not facing the
ethical life directly, from within, instead of from without, Dr.
Bosanquet has entirely failed to understand it. And if he had
attempted this internal consideration of “personality,” his whole
metaphysic of “individuality” and of the great society of beings who
inhabit (or who may be thought of as inhabiting) this universe, would
have been very different from what it is.
Then as for the second and third points, it is surely evident from
the footnotes that have been appended in connexion with the matter
of his transformation of the facts of ethics in the interests of other
things like logic, and aesthetics, and metaphysics, that there is
indeed, in Bosanquet, no recognition of what must be called the
genuine, or independent reality of the moral life, or of the moral ideal
as a force in human nature. And as for the fourth point, students of
modern ethics are naturally by this time perfectly familiar with the
tendency of Rationalism to make evil action and the “evil self” simply
the affirmation of a “logically incoherent” point of view. It exists in an
374
English writer like Wollaston as well as in a German philosopher
like Hegel. This tendency is indeed a piece of sophistry and illusion
because the distinction between good and evil, and the distinction
between right and wrong (perhaps the better and the more crucial
formulation of the two—for us moderns at least) is unintelligible apart
from the fact or the idea of the existence of moral agents, who make
(in their volition, and in the judgments that accompany or precede
their volitions) a “norm,” or rule, or line between the ethically
permissible and the ethically unpermissible. The rationalism that
makes these distinctions merely a matter of “logic,” overlooks the
fact that in actual life men must be warded off from wrong-doing (and
they are in many cases actually so warded off by their consciences
and by other things, like the love of home, or the love of honour, or
the love of God) by something stronger than the mere idea of a
possible theoretical mistake.
As for the fifth point of the Determinism or the Necessitarianism
that hangs like a sword of Damocles over the entire ethic of Dr.
Bosanquet, the nature of this should be perfectly apparent from
many of the statements and considerations that have been brought
forward as typical of his entire line of thought. He teaches a
375
“passivism” and an “intellectualism” that are just as pronounced
and just as essential to his thought as they are to the great system of
his master, Hegel, in whose ambitious philosophy of spirit man’s
whole destiny is unfolded without the possibility of his playing himself
any appreciable part in the impersonal, dialectic movement in which
it is made to consist.
It is now necessary to speak definitely and outspokenly of the
element of supreme truth and value in Dr. Bosanquet’s unique book,
of the positive contribution it makes to philosophy and to natural
376
theology. This is, in a word, its tribute to the permanent element
of truth and reality in the idealistic philosophy. And he testifies to this
in his “belief” that in the main the work of philosophy has been done,
and “that what is now needed is to recall and concentrate the
modern mind from its distraction rather than to invent wholly new
theoretic conceptions.” This declaration is of itself a position of
considerable importance, however widely one is obliged to differ
from its author as to what exactly it is that has already been
demonstrated and accomplished “in philosophy.” If there has really
been “nothing done” in philosophy since the time of Socrates, if
philosophy is to-day no true antithesis of, and corrective to science,
then there is possible neither Pragmatism, nor Humanism, nor any
other, possibly more fundamental, philosophy. There can, as Dr.
Bosanquet puts it, “indeed be no progress if no definite ground is
ever to be recognized as gained.” This then is the first thing of
transcendent importance in “Individuality and Value,” its insistance
upon the fundamentally different estimate of reality given by
philosophy in distinction from science and its merely hypothetical
treatment of reality. This “difference” is, of course, but natural, seeing
that to philosophy there are no things or phenomena without minds,
or persons or beings to whom they appear as things and
phenomena.
The second great thing of “Individuality and Value” is its
insistence upon the need to all philosophy of a recognized grasp of
377
the principle of “Meaning.” What this instance implies to Dr.
Bosanquet is, that “at no point in our lives [either] as [agents or]
thinkers are we to accept any supposed element of fact or
circumstance as having any significance” apart from the great
“whole” or the great “reality,” with which we believe ourselves to be in
contact in our daily experience, when interpreted in the light of our
consciousness of ourselves as persons. In the letter of the book his
interpretation of the great “whole,” or the great reality, of life is by no
means as broad and as deep as the one at which we have just
hinted in attempting to describe his position. But overriding
altogether the mere intellectualism of Dr. Bosanquet’s interpretation,
378
is the fact of the dynamic idealism for which he virtually stands, in
379
virtue of the great and the simple effort of his lectures to find
“value” in “our daily experience with its huge obstinate plurality of
independent facts.” He would start, as we mentioned (at the
beginning of this chapter), with what he believes to be “the daily
transformation of our experience as verified within what we
uncritically take as our private consciousness, so far as its weakness
may permit,” and “as verified on a larger scale when we think of such
splendid creations as the State and fine art and religion,” and when
we think, too, of “the mode of our participation in them.” Now again
nothing could indeed be more nobly true (in idea) of the great work
of the philosopher than the proper theory and description of this
“daily transformation” of our lives, out of the life of “sense” and the
380
life of selfishness, into the spiritual communion that is the
essence of all right thinking and all right living.
But we may go further than all this and signalize one or two
things in Dr. Bosanquet that we venture to construe as a kind of
unconscious testimony, on his part, to the very humanism for which
we have been contending throughout.
The things to which we refer are, firstly, his use of the word
381
“belief” in speaking of his opinion that the work of philosophy has
in the main been accomplished, and, second, his fine and really
382
praiseworthy confession that his lectures, whatever they may
have done or may not have done, at least “contain the record of a
very strong conviction.” Dr. Bosanquet’s departure, in the letter of his
argumentation, from the spirit of these declarations only accentuates
what we regard as the regrettable failure and abstractionism of his
whole official (or professed) philosophy.
383
His use of the word belief shows that it is, after all his
professional homage to “mediation” and to the necessary
abstractions of logic and system, belief and not knowledge that is to
him the final and “working” estimate of truth and of reality. And the
same conclusion follows from the second matter of the confession of
which we have spoken, that his entire argumentation is but the
384
expression of a strong conviction. It is again, therefore, we would
insist a spiritual conviction, and not a conceptual system that is
actually and necessarily the moving force of his entire intellectual
activity. And, we would add to his own face, it is a conviction
moreover that “works,” and not a “logical whole” or a mere
conceptual ideal, that he must (as a philosopher) engender in the
mind of his average reader about reality. His “logical whole” and his
“individuality as logical completeness,” “work” with him [Professor
Bosanquet] for the reason that he is primarily an intellectual worker,
a worker in the realm of mind. But reality (as the whole world of
human work and human effort is there to tell us) is more than an
intellectual system. And what is a conviction to him is not necessarily
a conviction that works with the ordinary man, who knows reality
better than he does, or who knows it (like himself) in his desires and
in his beliefs rather than in the terms and conceptions that are the
mere tools of the intellect and the specialist. For, taking his book as a
whole, we may say about it that the dissolution of reality into a
conceptual system that is effected there is at best but another
convincing proof of the truth of the words of the great David
385
Hume, that the understanding, “when it acts alone, and according
to its most general principles, entirely subverts itself, and leaves not
the slightest degree of evidence in any proposition, either in
philosophy or common life.”

NOTE
 It is necessary for me to append a few words as to the possible
connexion between the foregoing criticism of the first volume of Dr.
Bosanquet’s Gifford Lectures and the subject-matter of the second
volume, which appeared while I was preparing the manuscript of this
book for the press. I have been able only to inspect its contents and
to inform myself about the ways in which it has impressed some of
its representative critics. What I have thus learned does not, in my
opinion, make it necessary for me to unsay or to rewrite what I have
said in this chapter. My desire was to indicate the kind of criticism
that the pragmatists and the humanists, as far as I understand them,
would be inclined to make of Absolutism as represented in the
Principle of Individuality and Value as the last significant Anglo-
Hegelian output. This, I think, I have done, and the reader may be
desirably left to himself to settle the question of the relation of the
first of Dr. Bosanquet’s books to its companion volume that appeared
in the following calendar year. I cannot, however, be so wilfully blind
to the existence of this second great “Gifford” book of his as to
appear to ignore the fact, that on its very face and surface it seems
to do many of the things that I have allowed myself to signalize as
things that Absolutism and Anglo-Hegelianism have not done, or
have done but imperfectly. Its very title, The Value and Destiny of the
Individual, and the titles of many of its chapters, and the reception
accorded to it in such instructive reviews as those of Professor Sir
Henry Jones and Professor Muirhead (in the July numbers of the
Hibbert Journal and Mind respectively), are to my mind convincing
proof that it is by far the most serious Anglo-Hegelian attempt of the
passing generation to deal with many of the objections that have
been brought against Rationalistic Idealism by the pragmatists and
the voluntarists, by the defenders of faith and feeling and
experience, and (before all these recent people) by many
independent idealist writers of our time in England and elsewhere. In
the interest of truth and of the thinking public generally, I append the
mere titles of some of the chapters and divisions of Dr. Bosanquet’s
second volume: “The Value of Personal Feeling, and the Grounds of
the Distinctness of Persons,” “The Moulding of Souls,” “The Miracle
of Will,” the “Hazards and Hardships of Finite Selfhood,” the “Stability
and Security of Finite Selfhood,” “The Religious Consciousness,”
“The Destiny of the Finite Self,” “The Gates of the Future.” There is
in all the rich content that is thus indicated, and in all the high and
deep discussion of “the ideas of a lifetime” that it includes, a veritable
mine of philosophical reflection for the reader who desires to think in
a connected, or Hegelian, manner about things—a mine, too, that is
at least indicative of the wide territory both of fact and of principle
upon which pragmatist philosophy must enter before it can become a
true philosophy. I cannot find, however—this was surely not to be
expected in a thinker of Dr. Bosanquet’s power—that the principles
of argumentation that determined the nature and contents of the
earlier volume have undergone any modification in its success or
successor; indeed, what is here offered, and discovered by the
reader and the critics, is but a continuation and application of the
same dialectic principles to “finite beings, that is, in effect to human
souls.” If any one will take upon himself the task of estimating the
success or the non-success of the enterprise he will travel through a
piece of philosophical writing that is as comprehensive and as
coherent, and as elevating in its tone, as anything that has appeared
from the Neo-Hegelian camp. The things that I chiefly feel and
believe about it are, firstly, that its account of the facts of life and
thought are, again, all determined by certain presuppositions about
conceivability and about the principles of contradiction and negation;
secondly, that it is still the same “whole” of logic that is to it the test of
all reality and individuality; and, thirdly, that it is, again, a great pity
that Dr. Bosanquet should not have acted upon some sort of
recognition of the relation of his own dialectical principles to those of
his master Hegel, or to those of some of his Neo-Hegelian
predecessors in England and America. Although it is almost an
impertinence on the part of one who has just made the acquaintance
of this outstanding volume to speak in any detail of its contents, I can
indicate part of my meaning by pointing out that it is throughout such
things as “finite mind,” the “finite mind” that is “best understood by
approaching it from the side of the continuum” [the “whole”], the
“finite mind” that is “shaped by the universe,” that is “torn between
existence and self-transcendence,” “appearance,” an “externality
which is the object of mind,” the “positive principle of totality or
individuality manifesting itself in a number of forms,” “good” and “evil
as attitudes concerning a creature’s whole being,” “volition” in terms
of the “principle that there is for every situation a larger and more
effective point of view than the given”—that are discussed, and not
the real persons who have what they call “minds” and “volitions” and
“attitudes,” and who invent all these principles and distinctions to
describe the world of their experience and the world of their
thoughts. As against him Pragmatism and Humanism would, I think,
both insist that the first reality for all thought and speculation is not
the “logical whole” that underlies, in the mind of the thinker, the
greater number of all his categories and distinctions, but the life and
the lives of the persons in a world of inter-subjective intercourse,
wherein these points of view are used for different purposes. And I
cannot see how Dr. Bosanquet is entitled to scorn all those who hold
to the idea of the reality of the lives of the persons who are agents
and thinkers in this personal realm, which is for us the highest reality
of the universe, as believers in the “exclusiveness of personality,”
although I would certainly agree with him that our experience, when
properly interpreted, carries us beyond the subjectivism and the
individualism of some forms of Pragmatism or Pluralism. The reader
who is anxious to know about the real value of the Hegelianism upon
which Dr. Bosanquet’s philosophy reposes should consult the work
of Croce upon the “living” and the “dead” elements in Hegel’s
System. It has recently been translated into English. Dr. Bosanquet,
like many Hegelians, seems to me to overlook almost entirely the
important elements in the philosophy of Kant—of some of which I
speak of in the next chapter as developed in the spiritualistic
philosophy of Bergson.
 CHAPTER IX
PRAGMATISM AND IDEALISM IN THE
PHILOSOPHY OF BERGSON386

The pragmatist elements in the philosophy of Bergson of which it is,

perhaps, legitimate for us to speak here are (1) his “Anti-
Intellectualism,” and (2) his “Activism” or “Actionism.” The latter
culminates in his freedom-philosophy and his spiritualism. I shall
comment shortly upon these two things, and then suggest one or two
general criticisms of his philosophy as a whole.
Bergson’s anti-intellectualism rests ultimately upon his contention
that the human intellect is related in the main to the needs of action,
that the brain is an organ of action rather than an organ of thought, that
our intelligence is at home only in the realm of the physical and the
387
mathematical sciences, that contrivance and invention and the
practical comprehension of the “material” are its proper activities, and
that for these latter purposes it splits up the world of the senses and
the understanding into a discontinuous aggregate of physical units,
which it then proceeds to reconstruct in a spatial and temporal order.
388
We perceive in Nature, he holds, what interests us in the way of our
vital needs; our intellect is adapted, not for the understanding or the
purely rational (“abstract”) comprehension of “causality” and the “life of
things,” but for the maintenance and furtherance of our own lives, and
for the creation of the instruments and agencies (signs, language,
tools, imagined sequences and laws, essences, causes, the
“descriptions” of science, the special senses, the convolutions of the
brain, etc.) that minister to this. Science is to-day still penetrated
through and through with primitive metaphysics, with the metaphysics
of animism, with a belief in separate things like forces, atoms,
elements, or what not—indicative all of them of its attempt to “divide
up” the real that it may command it for theoretical and practical
389
purposes. We can see this in the “structural psychology” of the day
and its analysis of our mental life into “elements,” in respect of the
number and character of which there are lasting differences of opinion
among the masters of the science—into “impressions,” and
“affections,” and sensations, images, memories, ideas, and so on. And
we can see it, too, in the erroneous attempts sometimes made by
psychologists to treat these entities as if they had clearly defined
temporal and spatial characteristics or qualities.
The supreme mistake of philosophy, according to Bergson, has
been to import into the domain of speculation a method of thinking that
was originally destined for action. It has forgotten that nearly all the
leading conceptions of common sense and of science and of “analysis”
have been invented, not for final and general, but for relative and
particular purposes. And it has fallen too readily under the influence of
a certain traditional view of the relations between metaphysics and
science—the view, namely, that philosophy should just take the
findings of science and of common-sense about the world as its initial
material, subjecting them, of course, to a certain preliminary
reinterpretation, but finally reconstructing them, almost as they were,
390
into a system. The one thing, in short, that philosophy has failed to
understand is the life and the movement and the process of the world,
as an infinitely more important fact than the endless terms and
conceptions and entities (“will,” “reason,” “Ideas,” etc.) into which it has
been analysed. We might sum up the whole by saying that Bergson’s
anti-intellectualism is simply a protest, not against the use, but only
391
against the “systematic misuse” of general conceptions that have
been current in science and philosophy “since the time of Socrates,” a
protest, however, that in his case is not merely general and negative,
392
but particularised and positive.
Like any and all anti-intellectualism, Bergson’s anti-intellectualism
is liable to serious misinterpretation, and it is currently misinterpreted
and misrepresented as “irrationalism.” His intention, however, is not to
destroy and to condemn philosophy and reasoning, and to exalt mere
393
intuition and faith, but rather to “liberate” our human consciousness
of ourselves and of the world from the dogmatism of what he regards
to be the utilitarian intellect, from the many hopeless contradictions
and antinomies and puzzles of the mere analytic understanding.
Philosophy, in particular, he would free from the last traces and
symptoms of scientific rationalism, although fully aware of the fact that
our modern philosophy had its very departure from the rationalism of
the great founders of modern science like Kepler and Galileo and the
rest.
He would strike at the roots of all this confident rationalism or
scientific philosophy by opening up a broader and a deeper view of
truth than that afforded to the merely piece-meal and utilitarian view.
As for the Actionism and the action philosophy of Bergson, this is
perhaps more in line than any other tendency of the day with the new
life and the new thought of the twentieth century, although (like
Pragmatism) it stands in need of correction or revision by the principles
of a sound ethical philosophy, by the Idealism that is not, and cannot
be, the mere creation of to-day or yesterday. In essence it is, to begin
with, but an extension to the mind as a whole and to all its so-called
special faculties (“sensation,” “perception,” “memory,” “ideation,”
394
“judgment,” “thinking,” “emotion,” and the rest) of the “dynamic,”
instead of the older, static point of view that the recent science of our
time has applied to matter and to life, and that Pragmatism and the
“hypothetical method” have sought to apply to all the ordinary
conceptions and constructions that exist in the different domains of the
395
different sciences. It is also, from our point of view, as we may see,
an attempt at the expression, in the terms of a comparatively simple
philosophy, of many of the considerations in respect of knowledge and
conduct that have been brought forward in the preceding pages of this
book. We have already dwelt in different ways, for example, upon the
fact that there is no perception or sensation without an organic reaction
on the part of the percipient or the sentient being, that an idea is in a
sense a motor attitude (a way of comprehending particulars or
particular facts in relation to our purposes and our ends), that a logical
judgment represents a “division” of the real, or of the processes of
Nature, for some purpose or other, that our whole mental life is
purposive, that there is no “pure” cognition without attendant emotion
 396
and volition, that it is in action that desire and thought come
together, that our whole knowledge of the world is necessarily a
knowledge of it in terms of our purposes and our highest attitudes, and
so on. All of this is, as it were, an indication of the psychological and
397
the logical considerations upon which Bergson bases his positive,
activistic, philosophy of mind.
It is to be remembered in Bergson’s interest that when we speak of
398 399
his Actionism we do not mean a narrowing down on his part of
the activities of the soul to physical labour and to mere utilitarian effort,
but its capacity, also, for that creative activity which he takes to be the
very keynote of personal life and the evolutionary process.
As for the freedom-philosophy with which Bergson’s Actionism is to
be associated, this is worked out by him, firstly, in the most perfect
correspondence with what he believes to be the facts of life and mind;
and, secondly, in terms of that anti-rationalism (or hostility to the
merely scientific intellect) which is his working theory of knowledge.
His views upon this subject have also been depreciated and
misunderstood by some of his opponents who attack what they call his
“intuitional” treatment of the freedom-question—his insistence upon the
direct intuition of our life that we have when we act consciously, and
when we are “most ourselves”—when we act out “freely” our own
nature. To him the primary fact for any human being is the life-impulse
that is both instinctive and reflective, that is certainly far more of a
fundamental reality than any of those entities or concepts (“cells,”
“atoms,” “forces,” “laws,” or what not) which, with Kant, he clearly sees
to be the creation of the intellect for its descriptive and practical
purposes. This life is “free” in the sense that we are not “determined”
by any or all of those forces and laws to which our intellect subjects
everything else, but which it cannot apply to the life that is more than
mere matter, that is a real becoming and a real process, a real creation
and development.
The “spiritualism,” again, of his interpretation of this life and activity
rests, to begin with, upon his opinion that the very inception of the
activity, and the adjustment, and the selection in which the simplest
life-effort, and the simplest perception of a living being consist, indicate
 400
the presence and the operation of a controlling agency, or mind, or
principle of spiritual “choice” that is not, and cannot be, explained on
the principles of a mechanical science or philosophy. This principle is,
in a word, the life-force, or the creative activity, the élan vital of which
we read so much in his books, that has “seized upon matter,” vitalizing
it into force and energy, into the “play” upon each other of all the varied
activities and grades and forms of the will to live, and into the various
forms of socialized and co-operative living on the part of animals and
men. We shall immediately remark upon the matter of the apparent
limitations of this spiritual philosophy of life, or reality, that is here but
indicated or stated.
One of its essential features, so far as we are at present
concerned, is his claim that his introduction of a spiritual principle into
the life-force, or the creative activity that has expressed itself in the
various grades and forms of life, both animal and human, is not a
401
phase of the old philosophy or theology of “final causes” or of a
402 403
predetermined “teleology.” To this old finalism or teleology the
life of organic nature (the “organs” and “cells,” the “instinctive” actions,
and the “adjustments” of animals, and so on) were all due to the work
of a pre-existing, calculating intelligence operating upon matter;
whereas to him they are but different expressions or creations of the
life-force that is as little predetermined in organic evolution, as it is in
the realm of the activities interpreted for us (in part) by the newer
physics and the newer chemistry—in the processes, for example, that
are exemplified in the generation of a star out of a nebula. This entire
treatment, however, of the notion of purpose in nature is a matter of
great difficulty in the philosophy of Bergson, and his own thought (as I
shall presently state) is apt to strike us as just as hypothetical as some
of the views he attempts to combat. It raises, too, the question of the
valuation of his philosophy as a whole, and of its relation to the great
thinker who still stands in the very centre of the entire modern
404
movement from Copernicus to Comte and Darwin—Immanuel Kant.
We shall best get at the matter of the fuller developments of the
philosophy of Bergson that are of interest to us at present, by
indicating some of the results that would accrue from it to the
constructive philosophy in which we are interested as the outcome of
Pragmatism and Idealism. Among these would be, firstly, a new and a
fresh, and yet a perfectly rational apprehension of the fact of the
405
necessarily abstract and hypothetical character of the analyses to
which our world is subjected by the science and by the technic and the
406
supposed “economy” of our present culture. Then an equally new
and equally rational (or “rationally grounded”) conviction of the
inadequacy of the physical and the scientific categories to the
comprehension and the explanation of life and of the life of the spirit.
Thirdly, a confirmation of many of the tendencies to which the
Pragmatism and the Voluntarism and the Humanism of the last century
have given a more or less one-sided and imperfect formulation. Among
such confirmed tendencies are (α) the attempt they have all made to
407
attain to a deeper view of human nature than the view hitherto
taken by rationalism and intellectualism, (β) their emphasis upon the
408
freedom and the initiative of the individual and upon the necessity,
409
on the part of philosophy, of a “dynamic” or “motive-awakening”
410
theory of reality, (γ) their insistence similarly upon the necessity to
our thought of a direct contact with reality, and upon the impossibility of
our beginning in philosophy without assumptions of one kind or
411
another, (δ) their refusal to make any ultimate separation between
the intellect and the will, between the highest thought and the highest
412
emotion, (ε) their tendency to regard belief rather than knowledge
as our fundamental estimate of truth and reality.
A fourth constructive result, however, of the philosophy of Bergson
would be not the mere confirmation of any number of pragmatist and
humanist tendencies, but their integration, and their transformation into
the evidences and the manifestation of a new spiritual philosophy of
life and of the universe generally. It is this possible quasi integration
and transformation of so many of the tendencies of Pragmatism and
Voluntarism and of the Philosophy of Science of the day, that makes
Bergson the greatest of all the pragmatists—although the term hardly
occurs in his main writings, and although he breathes from first to last
413
the air of an idealism and a spiritualism that is above and beyond all
the mere instrumentalism, and the mere empiricism and the ethical
opportunism of Pragmatism.

* * * * *
The following are some of the difficulties and counter-
considerations that stand in the way of the intelligibility and the
supposed novelty of the philosophy of Bergson. (1) It is in some
respects but a biological philosophy after all, a would-be philosophical
interpretation of the “evolutionary process” which takes many things for
granted and ignores many difficulties. Some of these things are the
life-force itself, the élan de vie, the vital aspects that he sees in the
forces of nature, the “eternal movement” of which he is always
speaking as the only reality and as the very life of the universe, the
whole “adaptation” philosophy that characterises his own teleology
despite his attacks on “mechanism” and on “finalism,” and so on. One
is tempted, indeed, to think that in much of all this he forgets his own
doctrine of the hypothetical character of science and philosophy, and
that, in his very anxiety to escape from mechanism and from
rationalism, and Paleyism, he credits Nature with a contingency and a
414
“freedom” that corresponds in their way to the chaos, of which the
Greeks thought as a necessary background to the cosmos. He seems,
in other words, to deify into a kind of eternal “becoming” and a quasi
free and creative “duration,” his own (necessary) inability to grasp the
system of things.
Then, secondly, there is a veritable crop of difficulties that arise out
of his contention that our intellect is adapted “only to matter.” What, for
415
example, of the various non-utilitarian intuitions of art and morality
and religion, that are as undoubtedly facts of our conscious experience
as is our comprehension and utilisation of “matter” for the various
416
purposes of civilisation? If it be literally true that our understanding
is “incapacitated” for the comprehension of life and of the creative
activities of the soul, a new set of categories and a higher form of
intelligence (than the merely material) must be elaborated for this
special purpose. And if this higher form of intelligence be the “intuition”
of which Bergson undoubtedly makes so much, then he must be more
careful than he often is in suggesting that intuition and a philosophy of
 417
our intuitions “must go counter to the intellect.” His theory of art
reduces itself, for example, in the main to the negative contention that
418
spiritual perception is always simply “anti-mechanical,” simply the
power of seeing things in another way than that of the engineer or the
craftsman, the homo faber.
Thirdly, there are many dualisms or oppositions in his doctrine or
expressed teaching, reducible all of them to the one great Cartesian
dualism between the mind and the matter that are said by him to
intersect in memory, and in perception, and in the life of the spirit
generally—the opposition, for example, between instinct and
419
intelligence, that between intelligence and intuition, between the
“mechanical” and the “organic,” between the “upward” and the
“downward” movements that he attributes to the life-force. And there is
a striking inconsistency between his apparent acceptance of the
teaching of Kant in respect of the limitations of the physical and the
temporal way of looking at things (ourselves included and our actions)
420
and his belief in an eternal “duration,” or movement, or process of
which he is always speaking as the very life and texture of everything.
This “real” or “pure” “duration” is a thing that troubles all students of his
philosophy; it seems to make Bergson believe in what James talked of
as a “strung-along” universe. And there is an inconsistency between
the supremacy that he seems willing to accord to mind and spirit in the
case of the new individuals who are always being born into the world,
and the absence of a similar supremacy (or determining rôle) in the
case of the mind or spirit without whose existence and operation the
421
universe is unthinkable.
As for the latter contradiction, we may note in his favour that he
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talks, at least once or twice, of “God” as “unceasing life” and “active
freedom,” and I am inclined to take this master thought as possibly a
kind of foundation for his rich and suggestive philosophy of life and
reality. But there is in his writings nothing like the thorough-going
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attempt that we find in the philosophy of Aristotle to ground the
motion and the life of the world in God as its final cause and its
ultimate explanation. Equally little is there in Bergson a thorough-going
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attempt to work out the Idealism upon which his whole system
reposes—his initial conception of objects as “images,” or “ideas” for a
consciousness, or for the life-force, or for the different “centres of
activity” with which he peoples the worlds.
Fourthly, there is the drawback from the point of view of social
philosophy about the thought of Bergson to which we have already
made reference—that it lacks somehow the ethical and the social
idealism that would warrant us in thinking of it as a worthy rival or
substitute for the philosophy of history of the great idealists of the past
and the present. It is necessary to speak here with the utmost caution
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if we would avoid doing injustice to Bergson. We cannot mean, for
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example, that he does not do justice to the social factor in human
development of which we have heard so much, perhaps too much,
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from the sociologists. We might mean, however, and we do in a
sense mean that he has not made as much as he might have done of
this factor, by developing for the thought of to-day the reality of that
world of “spiritual communion” and “inter-subjective intercourse” of
which we have spoken more than once.
Then we might also contend that Bergson has not as yet, in his
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philosophy of human life, taken much cognizance of the deeper
experiences of life, of the specifically ethical and religious feelings and
thoughts of men. With the pragmatists he is unduly optimistic about the
free expansive development of the individual. Against this objection it
may be replied, that he has so thoroughly assimilated into the very
texture of his thought and feeling some of the finest things in the
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spiritualism and the idealism of the reflective thought of France that
we would not, if we could, wish the germinal or fructifying elements in
his system to be different from what they are. His “social” message is
perhaps after all the best thing that it can be—the need of the inward
spiritualization of the life and thought of the individual.
Lastly, in addition to the fine traditional spiritualism and
libertarianism of French philosophy, we may think of the voluntarism of
Kant and Schopenhauer as also militating somewhat against the idea
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of Bergson’s originality in philosophy. Despite this it is still possible