The Two Kinds of Utopian

The words utopian and utopia are understood in a reasonably vague manner by most people, we understand a certain meaning but have widely different images flash in our minds eye. Sir Thomas Moore gave us the term by combining two Greek words which translate roughly to 'no place', a homophone for which is 'good place'. Moore's ironic play on words may not be as widely known as the word 'utopia' is today, but the sentiment remains true.

Moore's Utopia is a specific design for a system of society but the word utopia is now a general term to describe a society which aims at being the best or maximising the good. As 'good' and 'best' are subjective terms we are able to see why our images and ideas about a utopia will differ greatly.

Logistical and practical reasons aside, the fact people are not in agreement as to what is important or good is a fundamental road block to realising any utopia. This is why utopians are often regarded as dreamers and idealists.

I am reasonably happy with our general understanding that a utopia is a place that aims at perfection from a certain perspective in that I don't feel a need to define the word any more thoroughly, however it is very important to note the difference between talking about utopias in general or a specific one. As soon as a discussion begins regarding a specific utopia any previous preconception you may have regarding what a utopia should be are no longer connected to the word utopia in its new context. To speak about a specific utopia one must try to understand the perspective of the utopian, their objectives, their ideas of goodness and so forth.

We come now to define the word 'utopian' as a person who designs and creates utopias. I think that is the widely accepted view of a utopian however I would assert that the definition should be extended to those who look to improve things within a society or a system of living. Very few persons have attempted the gargantuan task that is documenting a complete system for society and so by our first definition alone there would be very few persons who would count as utopians and less still who postulate practicable goals. I deem any person who identifies a problem within a human system (political, social, economic, legal etc) and then suggests ways to resolve these issues to be utopian, which leads me to finally discuss why I feel you can categorize these persons into two opposing groups.

I have chosen words that are not free from bias to represent these categories as I feel they are the most accurate summations of the underlying difference between these two kinds of people. I dub all utopians either optimistic utopians or pessimistic utopians. John Stuart Mill, H.G. Wells and Karl Marx are examples of optimistic utopians where as Plato and Adolf Hitler would fall into the pessimistic category. Neither category is right or wrong and each category has both weak and strong utopian suggestions. Some pessimists are simply being pragmatic while optimists can often be guilty of wishful thinking.

The fundamental difference between the categories is the view the utopian has of humanity. A pessimistic utopian wishes for the best for humanity as they see it, but does not accept that individuals can be capable of acting in accordance with their aims. A pessimistic utopian does not trust others to be able to comprehend the world as they do or be able to clearly see the benefits of their actions and recommendations. Often the pessimistic utopian will use force or deny freedoms to others in their utopia in order to maintain it as they wish.

The optimistic utopian sees the good and worth in humanity and is more capable of entrusting their utopia to the masses. Optimistic utopians feel that under the right conditions and with the right treatment humans are capable of great things. The optimistic utopian believes that each person will be able to act in such a way that conserves a utopia and further proliferate goodness regardless of intellect or social standing.

Since the failing of the earliest communisms mankind has a dim view of the optimistic approach, we have become more distrustful of each other and that individual greed and self interest will undo any "optimistic" attempt at anything good. This view has also been strengthened by the recent financiall circumstances.

While I concede that one must be pragmatic in designing any utopia and account for human self interest, this does not require a pessimistic approach. A large part of managing to practically avoid a pessimistic utopia is to align the best option for an individual with what is also best for society, this does not force or coerce choice and therefore remove freedoms.

It may be greatly easier to tell people exactly how to behave, eensuring they do so by wielding power over them. This approach may then allow many kinds of (pessimistic) utopia to exist, far more so than optimistic ideas may be able to exist. It is not morally relevant to the pessimistic utopian that their values need to be forced onto people as that is the only way to achieve their goal. This may be a logically reasonable standpoint and act as a good counter argument to the morality of removing freedoms from a populous but in trying to account for certain aspect of human nature it ignores others. I would suggest that people resist force in a manner not unlike Newton's third law of motion - every force exerted by one body on another will be equally and oppositely returned by that body to the first. In other words, when you try to force people to act in a way they would otherwise choose not to then they will resist that force to an extent. On this basis alone I reject the pessimistic approach to utopianism and have attempted to adopt a pragmatic optimistic approach.

I believe, like John Stuart Mill, that if you treat people with respect, trust, compassion, honesty and with a fair hand that those values will be reciprocated. Perhaps not immediately, as mistrust takes a while to break down, but eventually others will follow the good example, not only that but those people will begin to see the merits of such behavior and go on to treat others in that way also. Individuals are able to make small ripples in society by their actions but only by introducing a complete social system that is sympathetic to treating people in these ways can large waves be made.

The society we live in presently does not set up conditions ripe for growing trust, compassion, honesty, respect and fairness. We may still value these ideas but the system we operate under has other driving mechanisms and as a result proliferates the values that go with those mechanisms. Capitalism is great for many things and has provided for society very well but the values it promotes are those of self interest and competition. Capitalism rewards ruthless and impersonal choices in the world of business and fails to reward altruism and other worthy aspects of humanity.

Even very negligible areas of our society such as health and safety lead us away from optimistic utopianism. Companies and people alike begin to lose faith in other peoples ability to look after themselves and be trusted to make choices. As this faith is lost we spiral closer to needing our choices made for us. As technology in medicine advances we veer away from evolving to ever fitter, well suited versions of humans and this is much like health and safety. The more society makes provisions for us and controls our decisions to aviod any type of mishap, the more incapable of living in a free utopia we shall become.