SOCIAL VALUE: THE THEORIES OF URBAN AND TARDE
Our point of view will be more adequately defined if we consider briefly
the theories of social value, set forth from the angle of a general (as
opposed to a specifically economic) conception of value, by Professor W. M.
Urban and Gabriel Tarde. These theories contain some elements which we
shall need, and our criticism of them will bring into clearer light the
need for the distinctive point of view of this book.
Professor Urban's conception as to the nature of value, in its individual
manifestation, has been already indicated, in part, in chapter X. Stressing
the organic nature of the relations of a value to other phases of the
mental life, insisting on a recognition of the "presuppositions" of value,
and recognizing that both feeling and desire (or desire-disposition) are
involved in value--our cursory account cannot begin to do justice to the
subtlety and exhaustiveness of his masterly analysis--he still insists on
finding the fundamental nature of value in a phase of its _structure_
(rather than in its function), namely, in the _feeling_. From this part of
his doctrine we have found it necessary to differ. When he comes to the
problem of social value, he carries over the same conception of value, and
he finds that social values appear when many individuals, through
"sympathetic participation," _feel_ the same value. With our conclusion
(chapter VIII) that we can share each other's emotional life he is in
thorough accord. His argument in this connection is admirable.[154] His
interest is primarily in moral social values, and he attempts no detailed
treatment of economic social values, seeming to hold that the Austrian
treatment of objective value is adequate.[155] Both moral and economic
values are "objective and social."[156]
Collective desire and feeling, when it has acquired
this "common meaning," when the object of desire and
feeling is consciously held in common, we may describe
as Social Synergy; and the objective, over-individual
values may be described as the resultants of social
synergies. The introduction of this term has for its
purpose the clearest possible distinction between
social forces as conscious and as subconscious. It is
with the former that we are here concerned.[157]
Conscious collective feeling is thus insisted upon as an essential in
social values, and Professor Urban insists[158] that the value ceases to be
a value as this conscious feeling wanes--even though conceding[159] that it
retains the power of influencing the _felt_ values, after it has passed
into the realm of "things taken for granted."
But this stressing of the conscious element of feeling--which as I have
previously shown is a variable element even within the individual
psychology, and has no necessary quantitative relation to the functional
significance, the amount of _motivating power_, of the value--makes it
really impossible for him to resolve the question of how the _strength_ of
a social value is to be determined. He does, indeed, undertake something of
the sort[160] (he is speaking of ethical values), making the quantity of
value depend on "supply and demand," the supply depending on the number of
people willing to supply a given moral act, and the intensity of their
willingness to do it--extension and intention both being recognized. And
demand is similarly determined. The thing seems to be nothing more than an
arithmetical sum of intensities of individual feelings, or, most justly,
individual values. But this leaves us no wiser than before as to the social
_weight_, the social _validity_, of these social values. An infinite deal
would depend, both in the case of supply and demand, on _who_ the
individuals are. A demand for a given act from a poor group of fanatics,
however intense, might count for little, while such a demand coming from a
group with great prestige, with great social _power_, might have a very
great significance. If we are trying to get an objective quantity of social
value, which shall have a definite weight in determining social action--the
function of social values--we are as poorly off as we were with the
Austrian analysis which, in order to get an objective quantity of economic
value out of individual "marginal utilities," has to assume value in the
background as the validating force behind these individual elements. The
error here, as there, comes from an abstraction, from centring attention
upon the conspicuous conscious elements. And it comes in stressing the
structure, the content, of social values, to the exclusion of their
functional _power_. Here is our real problem, if we would determine the
social validity of values. This lurking element of social power remains an
unexplained residuum.
This residuum of _power_, backing up the conscious psychological factors,
gets explicit recognition, even though no real explanation, at the hands of
Gabriel Tarde,[161] to whose theory of social value we now turn. I quote
chiefly from his _Psychologie Economique_, and the numerals which follow
refer to pages in volume I. (63-64) Value understood in its largest sense,
takes in the whole of social science. It is a quality which we attribute to
things, like color,[162] but which, like color, exists only in
ourselves.... It consists in the accord of the collective judgments ... as
to the capacity of objects to be more or less, and by a greater or less
number of persons, believed, desired, or admired. This quality is thus of
that peculiar species of qualities which present numerical degrees, and
mount or descend a scale without essentially changing their nature, and
hence merit the name of quantities.
There are three great categories of value: "_valeur-verite_,"
"_valeur-utilite_," and "_valeur-beaute_." To ideas, to goods (in a generic
sense of the term), and to things considered as sources "_de voluptes
collectives_," we attribute a truth, a utility, a beauty, greater or less.
Quite as much as utility, beauty and truth are children of the opinion of
the mass, in accord, or at war, with the reason of an _elite_ which
influences it.
(It may be noted in passing that Tarde's "trinitarian" conception of value
is not as artificial as it seems. It is simply a method of classification,
and there are many subdivisions under each head. Economic value, e.g., is a
subspecies within the group of utility values--"goods" include
"_pouvoirs_," "_droits_," "_merites_," and "_richesses_" (66). Our own
conception is, of course, that values are thoroughly "pluralistic" as to
their structure, and are "monistic" in their function.)
(64) The greater or less truth of a thing signifies three things diversely
combined: the greater or smaller number, the greater or less social
importance ("_poids_," "_consideration_," "_competence_," "_reconnue_") of
the people who believe it, and the greater or less intensity of their
belief in it. The greater or less utility of an object expresses the
greater or less number of people who desire it in a given society at a
given time, the greater or less social "_poids_" ("_ici poids veut dire
pouvoir et droit_") of the persons who desire it, and the greater or less
intensity of their desire for it. And so with beauty.
Here is, then, an explicit recognition of the element of the social
_weight_ of those who create a social value, as a factor coordinate with
their number and the intensity of their desires, etc. Toward resolving it,
however, Tarde makes no real contribution. If enough be read into the
parenthetical expressions given above, following the word "_poids_" in each
case, they would be found to harmonize with the theory of the writer,
shortly to be set forth. As it happens, however, Tarde attempts to resolve
this factor of the social weight of a participant in a social value, in an
analogous case, and gives us a different sort of explanation. He is seeking
a "_glorio metre_," or measure of glory--for glory is a social value too.
He finds that to determine a man's glory we must take account of two
things: one his notoriety, and the other, the admiration in which he is
held (71-72). The first is simple: we will count the number who watch him
and talk about what he does. The second is harder, for we must not merely
count the number who admire him, but also determine the importance of each
as an admirer. But how get at this? Tarde suggests that the study of the
cephalic index will throw light upon the problem--no satisfactory solution,
I think!--but says that anyhow the problem is practically solved every day
in university and administrative examinations.
Apart from the fact that conscious desire (or conscious belief, etc.),
rather than functional power, is made the basis of Tarde's social value,
and apart from the failure to give any real account of the origin of this
"social weight," of the individuals in the group which creates the social
value, there is a further defect in Tarde's analysis which cannot be
strongly objected to. It is his effort to treat organic processes as if
they were an arithmetical sum of elements. A sum of abstractions will not
give you a concrete reality. A man's social weight is not a thing
independent of relations, a thing which can be thrown now here and now
there with the same results in each case. And two men, each with a definite
social weight, do not have precisely twice that social weight when they
combine with each other. Two great leaders of opposing, evenly balanced
political parties, combining their influence, may secure wonderful results,
leading both parties to agree on a programme, and carrying it through. Two
equally great leaders, but both within the same party, may be unable to
accomplish anything by combining their efforts. And it may happen that two
men, each with great weight in his own sphere, would be so incongruous if
they tried to cooperate, that their joint weight would be less than the
weight of either alone. It is not a matter of arithmetical addition. Social
power can be used in certain ways, and in certain organic connections. If
we care to use a mechanical phrase, the effort to use it out of organic
connections is apt to result in so much "friction" that much of the power
is lost.
The objection to the insistence on the amount of conscious desire or
feeling as a criterion of the amount of value holds for social values
quite as much as for individual values. The social value of the gold
standard, judging by the amount of desire and feeling involved, by the
degree to which it was a factor in consciousness, was vastly greater during
the campaign of 1896, while its validity was still in question, than it was
after it had been validated, and made a really effective fact. Social value
depends, not on conscious intensity, but on motivating power. The social
consciousness, as the individual consciousness, is economical. And the need
for conscious feeling, for conscious desire, in connection with social, as
with individual, values, arises when values must be compared, when they are
in question, when they must show themselves for what they are, that they
may be brought into equilibrium with antagonistic values. And the amount of
consciousness will not be greater than the need for it--and, alas, is
rarely as great as the need! When a value becomes accepted, when its place
is secure, when the equilibrium is established, conscious feeling and
desire with reference to it tend to pass away, and peace comes.
Tarde seems to recognize this, indeed, when he says (72, n.):--
Of nobility, as of glory, it is proper to remark that
it is a force, a means of action, for him who possesses
it, but that it is a faith, a peace, for the people who
accept it, and who, in believing in it, create it.
FOOTNOTES:
[154] _Op. cit._, chap. VIII, esp. p. 243.
[155] _Ibid._, p. 319.
[156] _Ibid._, p. 312.
[157] _Ibid._, p. 318.
[158] _Ibid._, pp. 333-36.
[159] _Ibid._, p. 335.
[160] _Op. cit._, pp. 329-30.
[161] "La croyance et le desir: possibilite de leur mesure," _Rev.
philosophique_, vol. X (1880), pp. 150, 264. "La psychologie en economie
politique," _Ibid._, vol. XII (1881), pp. 232, 401. "Les deux sens de la
valeur," _Rev. d'economie politique_, 1888, pp. 526, 561. "L'idee de
valeur," _Rev. politique et litteraire (Rev. Bleue)_, vol. XVI, 1901.
_Psychologie Economique_, Paris, 1902.
[162] _Cf._ Conrad, _Grundriss zum Studium der politischen Oekonomie_,
Jena, 1902, Erster Teil, p. 10.