Jean-Paul Sartre: The Individual and Society

JEAN-PAUL SARTRE: THE INDIVIDUAL AND SOCIETY

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THE INDIVIDUALSartre’s philosophy is, before and after recognition of the other, and individualist one. We face an indifferent world with nothing but our own decisions for comfort. To avoid bad faith, we must choose things and be responsible for the choices we make with our freedom. This leads us to a threefold position: anguish because the weight of the world appears to be on our shoulders; despair because we know we cannot achieve what the weight of the world would require of us; and finally, abandonment, because in consideration of Sartre’s atheism we have no external force to appeal to.

So, we begin with an isolated individual in the sense that ones decisions alone bear the full responsibility for what we are and what we stand for. However, it is still a self-centred world. This all changes with recognition of the other.

THE OTHERJust as the first version of Descartes’ Cogito was supplanted in Sartre with pure existence, the step from myself to that of others is from being to being, not from being to knowing as Descartes suggested1. There is no abstract argument that can get us from solipsism to experience of the other; a second Sartrean-style Cogito is needed2.

The other is revealed to us initially via the ‘look’. Sartre spends a great deal of time on the phenomenology of the look. It is suffice for us to say that, when one is looked at by another and one realises for the first time that there is another intelligent subjective entity like myself, the look is in effect. After the initial look, of course, one does not need the presence of an actual look any more3. It is enough, after the initial earth shattering experience of the Other, that one apprehends that another is watching him, whether they are looking or even present or not.

The look makes us aware that there is another subjective world centre out there. In this way, encounter with the other opens up possibilities, we know, for a start, that the world is coherent for and acted upon by other subjective systems. Furthermore, we gain a fuller comprehension that the world is not just my world, when we conceive the existence of his

1 Grene, p. 146

2 ibid. p. 143

3 Caws, p. 99

Jean-Paul Sartre: The Individual and Society – Ben Dempster

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world4. So, the ‘bond of being’ that we have with others is a negative dependence of consciousnesses. We know more of what we are by knowing that they are not that thing5.

Bear in mind that the bond between us is just a synthetic connection. Sartre argues repeatedly against the idea of some kind of ‘hyper-organism’. The ‘we’ experienced is psychological, not ontological. Indeed, any group mind must inevitably break down into the individual consciousnesses that it is comprised of6.

Our emotions reveal the other also, especially the regard of another as it objectifies us. Sartre looks at shame, jealousy and fear in this respect7. We are degraded as low as well as being objectified by the other when we feel shame. It is only by imagining another disliking our behaviour that we feel shame. Because Sartre is an atheist, this ‘other’ cannot be a deity, it must therefore be other people who we feel shame in front of.

Jealousy is a ‘magical’ emotional release. Its purpose is to cover the pain of losing some possession (most often a loved one such as a wife or girlfriend) to another. Once again, we can see that these emotions are impossible without revelation of the other.

Finally, the other is revealed to us through fear; we are afraid of being objectified by others as we objectify them. It is in this sense that Sartre considers most human interaction to be on a hostile level: there is a kind of war of all against all to objectify others and avoid being objectified ourselves. This notion is confirmed in a passage from Being and Nothingness: “Conflict is the original meaning of being-for-others,” (p. 364).

Thus, all relations are attempted domination, and Sartre tries to show this with reference to three typical relations, love, desire and hatred8. Hatred is the outright attempt to destroy another. Through desire, we attempt to possess the body of another; this, in turn, allows us to attain their freedom in a sense also. Love, too, is an endeavour to possess the freedom of another. It is done by trying to become one with another rather than merely possessing their body.

Two objections come to mind when considering Sartre’s philosophy of the Other. Firstly, it seems overly simplistic and vague to suggest that the fount of conflict between people comes from objectification9. Who in living memory, can ever recall feeling any of the degradation that supposedly comes from merely acknowledging the existence of another?

4 Danto, p. 99

5 Anderson, p. 28

6 Danto, p. 111

7 Grene, p. 149

8 Anderson, p. 27

9 ibid. p. 30


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Surely it would seem more straightforward, if Sartre is offering an account with any psychological complexity at all, to see this source of conflict arising from some actual action of people towards each other?

One rejoinder would lie in showing that the pain of objectification from others is something that we are hit with early in life, and thus we become accustomed to its sting. This would account for why we are not constantly aware of such degradation. Yet surely if we did not feel the degradation it would not be there? To avoid this conclusion, a Sartrean thinker would have to strengthen the idea that we have this ‘background’ anguish that we have had since our original ignorance-breaking encounter with the other.

Implying that every human relation is hostile goes to far. If this is really what Sartre means, he must be mistaken. After all, how could our complex social system work for even one day if there were not a vast majority of co-operation?

I envisage two methods to evade the force of this point. Later, in The Critique of Dialectical Reason, Sartre puts forward a notion of conversion: one can deny the degrading effects of objectification by converting to intersubjectivity. This is where one is aware of others not as usurping objectifiers but as independent, subjective, free beings. So, it is not true that Sartre sees every human relation as inevitably hostile. We can break free from the cycle. It is more a point about present society that in fact very few of us have converted to intersubjectivity, hence hostile relations are common.

By seeing the culture we are embedded in as a shaping as well as shaped force, a Sartrean analysis can explain the mass co-operation of individuals as a result of blind, even oppressive conditioning. Thus, our co-operation in society does not show we are not hostile to each other, it merely shows our social system is largely successful in forcing us not to be.

PROBLEMSThe transition from an individual recognising the existence of the other to the presence of groups is mediated to a large degree by two important problems: scarcity and the ‘practico-inert’.

The fact that resources available for human use are scarce is, for Sartre, a fundamental human relation10. Scarcity creates material tensions between individuals so that every praxis (akin to custom or activity) becomes an act of aggression against another11. This is because scarcity sets up the conditions for viewing everyone as, deep down, an enemy whom we must fight against to survive in the face of scarcity. Sartre admits that if we could

10 Aronson, p. 246

11 ibid. p. 253


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end scarcity, there is indeed a possibility that we could have a utopia12. This shows how basic the idea of scarcity is in Sartrean thought.

There are those who have objected to this analysis of scarcity on the grounds that it stops short of the philosophical task. The account should also offer solutions for working effectively within scarcity. Such solutions are at hand, but they were not offered by Sartre. Grene asserts there is still great deal of co-operation within the frame of scarcity13. Indeed, we often characterise scarcity as the communal enemy against which we all strive. This would suggest the opposite of what Sartre is trying to show; scarcity may even unite us in an attempt to thwart it.

Furthermore, scarcity of matter is a very perspectival notion. If our appetites are large enough, any feast served to us will seem insufficient. We could attempt, in vain, to end scarcity by ending the shortage of resources. The difficulty of this task is easily understood when we consider the rising energy usage of the world; its rise in the twentieth century was exponential.

On the other hand, we could limit our material needs and achieve the same thing14. If our needs were not so incessant, scarcity would be manageable. Does the existence of this solution show Sartre was wrong? Scarcity is still a factor in human struggle, this is not being denied. However, Sartre needs to explain why scarcity was such a fundamental human relation if it can be avoided by mere desire reduction.

Another problem that has a formative influence on social groupings is the practico-inert. Something in the practico-inert field confounds praxis15. In its purest form, the practico-inert is the result of carrying from the past into the present certain arbitrary relations. It is most clearly seen where man is dominated by worked matter. Over time, man’s productions such as factories have come to shape the mode of existence men have in the present. The factory is a pertinent example because the advent of factory labour drastically changed the working environment at the time. Working on an assembly line, because one was merely part of a larger machine, was mechanistic, dull and psychologically destructive work. Here we see the implications of man becoming a product of his own productions.

Culture is an important part of the practico-inert field16. Thousands of years of prior praxis, the flow of the combined activities of man, has created a social economic and political

12 Grene, p. 246

13 ibid. p. 247

14 Aronson, p. 255

15 ibid. p. 258

16 ibid. p. 259


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system that alienates all under its power in many different ways. Thus, the fact that our actions come back to haunt us in this way limits the kinds of social groups we can have.

The difficulty with the notion of the practico-inert is that it takes certain unfortunate features of a complex capitalist labour force and heralds them as universal structures17. The idea of a group of workers working side by side to create a world that overwhelms them sounds like it is limited just to the advanced labour methods employed in capitalist societies. When the specific nature of this system is not present, it is far from clear that man’s actions would restrict him through the practico-inert.

For example, hunter-gatherer societies would not have the same kind of practico-inert creating organisation of labour. Hunting and gathering are largely dependent on uncontrollable natural forces, thus the ability for man to leave his mark on this work method, which would manipulate future hunter-gatherers, is drastically reduced. Admittedly, tool-making inventions are a way hunter-gatherer societies could make create such a practico-inert field, but surely such a field was far from influential until well after simple tools were around.

In response, Sartre could restrict his claims about the practico-inert to modern societies. After all, historical anthropology is not Sartre’s explicit concern. It ought to be sufficient to accept that much of the source of the practico-inert in the workplace comes from the modern labour system while still claiming both that analysis of modern society should be our primary concern and that our modern system will continue for some time. This allows Sartre’s notion of the practico-inert to remain relevant to the present and to the future.

SOCIAL GROUPINGSIt is important to note at the outset that Sartre did not claim to be analysing society as a whole. In his view, this cannot be done because there is nothing even remotely close to a unified society for us to analyse in the first place. Remember the vehement contention Sartre had against the existence of any kind of human hive-mind. Instead, society is a jumbled collection of numerous different groups.

The most evident of social groupings is the serial group. In a serial group, the people are united only in a secondary sense. Sartre gives as paradigmatic examples such groups as a bus queue and a radio audience. Some passages imply that even class distinctions only divided society into serial groups18. These groups are united only incidentally; those in the queue are just waiting for the bus, the radio listeners are listening to the same thing but nothing more. They are a group only because we can, by accidental means, form a series out of their number.

17 Aronson, p. 263

18 LaFarge, p. 156


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It is interesting that Sartre considers a radio audience a mere series as opposed to, in certain circumstances, a group-in-fusion. Consider the situation in New Zealand, where Massey University research has shown that the Holmes show plays a significant role in forming the national identity of New Zealanders. Are we to take from this that the people of New Zealand merely form a disunited serial group?

A Sartrean defence could certainly suggest this, but if we instead assume, for argument’s sake, that national identity should be analysed as something more than incidental presence, we have an interesting consequence. Because the television watching experience is in this case, although incidental, transformative, we cannot unproblematically infer anything about the intentions of the people. This is not true for those waiting for the bus; waiting for the bus does not transform us. Yet, watching an influential and unrelenting program like the Holmes show can change what intentions we have, and thus, can change the fact of whether or not those in the audience had a united purpose or not.

The lowly serial group comes from the pressure exerted by scarcity. It means there is no mutual praxis. We relegate others in our experience to the practico-inert, and many groups in society are therefore non-united with regard to purpose19. In the serial group, man alienates himself from his own purposes as well. This is because members of the serial group behave they are assumed to behave by all the other members20. This has the result of the Nietzschean ‘mass man’; a dulling down of the whole population via an extreme version of the tall poppy syndrome.

Another group in society is what is translated as either the ‘fused group’ or the ‘group-in-fusion’. I prefer group-in-fusion because fused group implies that some fusion process has already taken place, yet this description would be more apt for the sworn group, discussed below.

The group-in-fusion has a more than accidental existence. Members in the group have a fleeting common purpose. Sartre’s prime example of such a group was the one that stormed la Bastille. Before and after the storming, the group who did the storming where a somewhat disconnected group. There were many different reasons for storming the Bastille beforehand and many different reactions by the revolutionaries to the events that came afterwards. Yet during the moments when the Bastille was stormed, the group had a common purpose. Those in the group-in-fusion are brothers not because they share an identical or similar nature, but because they are accomplices in the same act21.

To overcome the hurdle of impermanence, a group-in-fusion can become a ‘sworn’ or ‘pledge’ group. Those in the group-in-fusion make some kind of allegiance to stay true to the purposes of the group, and in doing so, attempt to guarantee permanence to the groups

19 Grene, p. 251

20 Aronson, p. 251

21 LaFarge, p. 162


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original purpose. The sworn group, before conversion to intersubjectivity, is as close as society can get, in the Sartrean universe, to the idea of ‘we’.

But the sworn group quickly deteriorates. The formation of the group, embodied in the pledge or oath, becomes part of the pratico-inert field that takes power over and above its members. Part and parcel of an oath is enforcement of the oath, thus, sworn groups need to instigate punishment procedures. Terror becomes a cohesive force in the group; the terror of those punished instils enough fear into other members to force them to keep their pledge22. In the end, the only thing that is strong enough to retain the group’s initial purpose is a sovereign individual23.

Is there any way to avoid this calamity? Either social groups are totally non-united or they quickly regress into some dictatorial power game. Sartre suggested there was; intersubjectivity.

CONVERSIONThe essence of intersubjectivity is seeing other individuals as units of free praxis. This recognition allows one to avoid being degraded and objectified by the look of the other. If it is mutually recognised that there are numerous free individuals around whom a subjective world is centred, we need not feel objectified by others. We all simply acknowledge we are in the same boat.

The convert is given more features than just a positive view of other people, however. Sartre pictures the converted as humanistic democratic socialists with a penchant for a classless society. The link is obvious. If we realise others have freedom as we do, we realise the value of their freedom as we realise the value of our own. In turn, because no consciousness has any intrinsic value higher than any other, all people must be treated with equal respect.

So, from an isolated individual to the revelations and degradation of the presence of the other, we have seen how scarcity and the practico-inert lead to so many purposeless groups in society. If we are willing to accept other beings as legitimate alternate subjectivities, however, we can avoid the hostility of degrading objectification at its first instance.

22 Aronson, p. 99

23 ibid. p. 285


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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Anderson, Thomas C. 1993. Two Ethics – From Authenticity to Integral Humanity, USA: Open Court Publishing Company

Aronson, Ronald. 1980. Jean Paul Sartre – Philosophy in the World, USA: NLB

Caws, Peter. 1979. Sartre, Great Britain: Routledge & Kegan Paul

Danto, Arthur C. 1985. Sartre, Glasgow: Fontana Press

Grene, Marjorie. 1973. Sartre, New York: New Viewpoints

Lafarge, Rene. (translated by Marina Smyth-Kok) 1970. La Philosophie de Jean-Paul Sartre, USA: Gill and Macmillan


Jean-Paul Sartre: The Individual and Society

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