Most people and many critical commentators seem to think that the concept of “national interest” or “interest of the United States” has a clearly understood meaning. (“United States” can be substituted for the name of any country.) This concept is the basis of “realist” foreign policy arguments—for example political scientist William Ruger in his article “Ideologies or Interests?” in the middle Law and Freedom (July 26, 2024). Dr. Ruger argues for the importance of national interests as a practical guide, as opposed to philosophical ideals, in foreign policy and matters of war and peace.
The meaning of the term “national interest” may seem obvious. It is in the public interest that the community is made up of the citizens of the nation. It is the interest of all citizens. If these interests do not exactly coincide, the national interest is considered to be, in a way, its sum. A concept is like the interests of two individual partners in a business or organization: it is the sum of their respective interests—in making a profit or (say) advancing some charitable purpose. If the national interest is not an exact sum, the addition and subtraction, of all individual interests, constitutes another form of aggregation.
On second thought, the problems quickly become apparent. How is it possible to add and subtract, or combine, even just mentally, the interests of two different people? In a private company business, partners pursue certain common interests together. Indeed, that is why they cooperate. If we exclude nations and “organizations” (in the Hakekian sense), society is the framework in which private individuals and organizations act. Since each individual (or voluntary partnership) has its own interests, talking about public, social, or national interests is problematic and confusing.
Let’s say the Appalachian redneck has “three interests” in national security, and the cosmopolitan New Yorker has “two interests,” or vice versa. If these are only two people, is the national interest 2+3=5? It exacerbates the problem in a nation of 300 million. And of course, it’s not national benefit if the interests of each member of the nation are considered equally.
There is a lot of theory that it is impossible to unite the interests of a few people. Let’s define a person’s interests as his utility, which means how high he judges his situation by the scale of his interests. Economists have known for over a century that an outside observer cannot simply add and subtract preferences, which are only known, or which are only available to the individual owner. There is no way to say that “public utility” increases if individual consumption decreases while the utility of others increases. Any observer or master of philosophy of Plato who says he can make this comparison expresses his ideas or his power. Traditional welfare economists have proven as much (see, for example, Francis M. Bator, “Simple Analytics of Welfare Maximization,” American Economic Review [1957]).
A democratic majority does not solve the problem. It cannot determine what the national interest is, even under the complex form of what social economists call “social welfare work.” In addition, minorities are also part of the nation. Who many anyway, given that different voting systems can produce different election results (see Gordon Tullock, Government Failure: The Origins of Public Choice])?
Discovered by Nicolas de Condorcet in the 18th century and mathematician Charles Dodgson (also known as Lewis Carroll) in the 19th, the difficulty of aggregating preferences through voting was recognized and formalized by economists in the mid-20th century. Kenneth Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem mathematically showed that, under practical conditions, no voting process can reproduce the rationality of voters (especially the change or convergence of preferences) and not be authoritarian (see Arrow’s 1951 book). Social Choice and Individual Values). Arrow was awarded the Nobel Prize in economics in 1972 for his work in this field, introducing the entire school of “social choice.”
In his 1982 book Liberalism Against PopulismPolitical scientist William Riker brought these findings and their implications to the attention of political scientists. For our inquiry here, a majority vote cannot express a national interest that is both logically coherent and non-dictatorian (“non-dictatorian” refers to a situation in which neither a dictator nor a group of tyrants can override the preferences of other people).
This ending seems to leave us stranded. If there is no public interest, what is the standard of public policy? If national interests do not exist, what is the criterion for determining how a state will deal with other states—or compel its citizens to behave, for example by regulating trade or other voluntary relations with individuals of other countries?
There aren’t many escapes from this cul-de-sac. The two are represented by two of the greatest economists and political philosophers of our time. One is to deny that the state has any economic and moral reasons, to see it as a mere tool of political rulers and their clients to impose their choice on the entire society or nation. Anthony de Jasay, who described himself as a classical liberal and anarchist, took this way out and defended the ideal of a stateless society with no public policy at all. However, he expressed doubt that it is possible that such a society can withstand attacks by tribes or other armed groups of the world.
Another escape route was formalized by Nobel laureate economist James Buchanan and his colleagues. If there is no such thing as a social organization with its own resources and interests, the only reason and function of the state is to protect the set of laws that represent the organization. normal interest of all members of society. This general figure is really small as it represents preferences or values everything members of a community (such as a nation) agree with one voice. At this level of abstraction, values can easily be added to the preferences of an individual’s activity. Universal laws can only serve to preserve a free society in which everyone has equal freedom to pursue their own interests—their own happiness, as it were.
This novel method is more flexible than it seems. It is an intangible—as the rule of law is—but a coherent abstraction is better than an incoherent and false recipe such as “national interest.” In my opinion, “realistic” foreign policy is not realistic. The concept of a normal interests provide a very different direction in matters of foreign policy and defense—for example, regarding conscription, neglecting the freedom to defend it, or torturing individuals in the name of the “national interest.”
One might argue that the phrase “national interest” is simply a shorthand for a common interest that all people may share. But it is a dangerous shortcut that makes a “nation,” that is, collection. History and theory strongly suggest that the “national interest” creates a fictional “we” that is bound to suppress real interests. individuals. “Common interest” means what it says: the normal preferences—including ideas in the sense of small common values à la James Buchanan—of individual members of a free society. This assumes that, individuals live in a free society or at least one that is becoming so.
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The philosopher king unites his people and their interests
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