Abstract
Montesquieu famously claims that modernity ushered in gentle mores and peaceful relations among countries. Consulting Montesquieu’s teaching on Greek foreign policy, both republican and imperial, elucidates the character of these peaceful mores. Montesquieu weaves a modernization tale from primitive ancient Greece to modern commercial states, all to teach the reader to overcome any lingering attachment to glory and to adopt the rational standards of national interest and self-preservation. This account provides important insights on the relationship between realism and idealism in Montesquieu’s international relations teaching and helps scholars to rethink how these categories are construed.
Montesquieu famously claims that modernity is more peaceful than antiquity. According to him, modern states are more willing to abide by universal, humanitarian norms when engaging in international conflicts: “Here homage must be paid to our modern times, to contemporary reasoning, to the religion of the present day, to our philosophy and to our mores (moeurs)” (SL, X.3). 1 Montesquieu’s progressive view of international relations is well known and influenced David Hume, Adam Smith, Immanuel Kant, and others, but his teaching on international relations is largely unexamined.
It is worth bringing to light Montesquieu’s thoughts on the sources of peace in international relations. This is so not only because his reflections are of historical significance but also because they illuminate our continuing efforts to understand the disposition of liberal democracies with respect to war and peace. Most international relations theorists today, both realists and liberals, attempt to explain the seemingly incontrovertible fact that liberal democracies do not go to war with one another in terms of the incentives and disincentives for cooperation in the international sphere. 2 Mainstream international relations theory has marginalized discussion about the historical conditions for the transformation of mores that preceded the modern commercial and liberal landscape. 3 Those who do pay attention to the historical formation of mores tend to dismiss the importance of military and commercial power in the international sphere, hoping that the transformation and evolution of mores might make Kant’s perpetual peace a reality. 4 I show that Montesquieu’s foundational arguments regarding the basis of peace in modern international relations speak to and correct both perspectives, thus pointing to better ways to conceive of the possibilities for and limits to international peace.
Understanding the nature of Montesquieu’s hopes for peace in modernity is difficult. It is not immediately clear how peaceful he thinks international relations can become, and he does not spell out the basis of such peace as is possible. Montesquieu—like the eighteenth-century thinkers he influenced—argues that war is an outmoded way for modern states to compete in the international arena and that modern sensibilities are more pacific. At his most idealistic, Montesquieu writes that modern states abide by the various natural laws that attend the right of nations, particularly as compared to predatory republics turned empires like Rome (SL, X.3). Usbek, a prominent character in Montesquieu’s early epistolary novel the Persian Letters, enthusiastically proclaims that justice—cosmopolitan by its very nature, according to him—recognizes no borders. He muses that if new and more destructive weapons were to come about as a result of scientific advancements, rulers would outlaw them by unanimous consent (PL, #105). 5 Yet Montesquieu’s hopes that progress in the arts and sciences would be accompanied by moral and intellectual advances for humankind may be more modest than Usbek’s.
At a minimum, Montesquieu’s statements on enlightened modern morality must be considered alongside his comments regarding the imprudence of war in modernity. On this second point, he argues on a number of occasions that war had become too costly and too inconclusive because of the homogeneity of weaponry, fortifications, strategy, and martial discipline in modern Europe (Reflections 2000, 339-40; Considerations 2000, 105; also see SL, XXVI.20). 6 The ambiguity regarding the fundamental basis of modern peace is also present in Montesquieu’s discussion of commerce and commercial mores, which he ultimately credits with making relations among nations gentler. Commerce emerges both as a new mode of competition among states and as the harbinger of a new cosmopolitan ethic and intercultural exchange (SL, XX.1-2). 7 Some interpreters have focused on Montesquieu’s realism and some on his idealism, but no one has given an adequate account of the relationship between the two. 8 It is this relationship that is most interesting, and sheds light on the compatibility between power and gentle mores.
We stand to gain clarity on the relationship between realism and idealism with respect to Montesquieu’s hopes for international peace by examining his account of the road from ancient to modern gentle mores. In considering Montesquieu’s presentation of the improvements in relations among countries from the ancient polis to the modern commercial republic, we begin to grasp what aspects of ancient reasoning, philosophy, religion, and mores stood in the way of progress toward peace. We also gain an appreciation for how and under what circumstances progress is possible and a greater understanding of the relationship between power and morality in the development of peaceful mores.
Montesquieu tells two tales of modernization in international relations from ancient to modern times, one Roman and one Greek. I focus on the Greek modernization tale, which has not previously been recognized as a companion to the famous Roman one. Montesquieu’s account of Rome is well known as a cautionary tale demonstrating the pitfalls of overweening ambition and pretensions to universal monarchy. In his Reflections on Universal Monarchy, as mentioned, Montesquieu argues that war had become unprofitable in a modern context because no country had a significant enough military advantage to profit from war, and the new commercial playing field provided a much more beneficial way to compete and succeed in the international arena. 9 While Montesquieu’s Rome challenges the traditional view that Rome brought civilization to Europe, the Greeks receive a more favorable appraisal. According to Montesquieu’s presentation, Greek imperial ambitions (particularly those of Alexander) were somewhat progressive and prefigured modern commerce and, so, laid the groundwork for peace among nations.
Serious study of the Greek tale discloses that its rhetorical purpose is to prompt readers to overcome whatever lingering appreciation they have for the heroic ideal and to shift the narrative of international relations toward considerations of power and prosperity for the sake of peace. Glory and honor in war were part of the classical republican inheritance of the West, which European gentlemen learned about and admired as a matter of course. Although in France classical republicanism was not viewed as a viable political alternative to monarchy, the great feats of classical republics and empires and the civic virtue that was seen to make glorious successes possible were greatly admired. 10 To varying degrees, both Rome and Sparta presented themselves as models of the relationship between war and republicanism. Spartan esprit de corps lent itself to security, and Roman grandeur or grandezza produced brilliant if ultimately vulnerable empires. In both cases, civic virtue was thought to be responsible for the cities’ successes and a crucial component of republican government. For an inkling of the importance of classical republicanism for modern political actors, we can note that the failure of England’s seventeenth-century experiment with republicanism was widely attributed to the absence of virtue and public spiritedness (Armitage 2002, 37). 11 Montesquieu sought to make Greek and Roman republican models irrelevant for modern times and, thus, to decrease the appeal of war.
Despite the fact that war had become terribly costly and the benefits of going to war had diminished, modern European states engaged in war more than ever (Reflections 2000, 362-63). Louis XIV’s destructive expansionism—all in the name of princely glory (SL, X.2)—showed that the ambition for universal monarchy was alive and well (Rahe 2005). Montesquieu suggests in several different contexts in his writings that the best way to persuade people to abandon their cherished opinions is not to challenge these opinions directly but to make it attractive to abandon them (e.g., SL, XXV.12, Pensée 92). This may explain why Montesquieu does not take a tone of moral condemnation with respect to Greek imperial projects, both Athenian and Alexandrian. Instead, he carefully and deliberately encourages the reader to consider the efficacy of various Greek institutional arrangements and to judge them, in the final analysis, not in accordance with their purported brilliance but in terms of their ability to provide the solid goods of liberty, security, and overall profitability (Hirschman 1997, 79-80). He ultimately diminishes the worth of such projects in the eyes of the reader by suggesting that they were not in fact magnificent enterprises worthy of emulation.
I recount Montesquieu’s Greek tale in three parts. I look at Montesquieu’s account of Athens and its empire; next, I take on the confederate republic; and, last, I consider Montesquieu’s praise of Alexander the Great’s exploits. The role of Athens in Montesquieu’s account of ancient republicanism turns out to be very significant. While his assessment of Athens as the most “modern” of ancient republics is at times favorable, he shows that even Athens, the gentlest of the ancient republics, is prone to war and barbarism. But, more importantly, Montesquieu uses Athens to reinterpret the ancient republican preoccupation with patriotic attachment to the common good as no more than a societal or cultural response to the need for security. Small republics require militaristic virtue for the sake of fending off much larger powers. But if virtue functions well, then republics grow powerful in their own right and lose their virtue. More often, however, virtue is insufficient as a means to fend off external threats. 12 Either way, Montesquieu presents the interplay between virtue and security as a no-win scenario.
Once we note that Montesquieu presents ancient republicanism as an institutional problem in need of an institutional solution, we see that he is presenting the confederate republic and Alexander’s empire as two competing solutions to this problem. Initially Montesquieu makes a very strong statement in favor of the confederate republic; it is, he claims, an institutional model that solves the republican security dilemma by maintaining separate and small constitutions for each city while pooling military resources when under threat of invasion. I argue, however, that Montesquieu’s overall presentation of the confederate republic is a further demonstration of the intractability of the practical problems of ancient republicanism. While the confederate republic is a respectable republican option, it is Alexander the empire builder whom Montesquieu congratulates for being an agent of progress in the historical formation of peaceful commercial mores.
In my concluding remarks, I reflect on how the Greek tale illuminates the relationship between realism and idealism in Montesquieu’s account of peace in modern international relations. Montesquieu’s unexpectedly positive appraisal of Greek empire as opposed to Greek republicanism should make us question interpretations that associate Montesquieu’s hopes for peace with his purported attachment to republicanism. And his suggestion that the gentle and peace loving mores of modernity owe something to the harsh—if relatively enlightened—mores of Alexandrian war, empire, and expansion leads us to wonder if gentle mores rely on, that is, must always be the product of, harsh ones. This implies that the new commercial states, with their gentler mores, are not divorced from power politics and national self-interest. In fact, what gentleness is possible rests on a correct understanding of national self-interest. Montesquieu’s contribution to contemporary discourse, then, is to help us reconsider the theoretical categories now widely employed. On Montesquieu’s understanding, modern realism, liberalism, idealism are closely connected, and ultimately rest on a particular understanding of human nature as driven by the twin desires of security and profit.
Athens: Between Virtue and Commerce, War and Peace
Montesquieu famously helped to establish the distinction between ancient and modern republicanism in eighteenth-century Europe and beyond (Shklar 1998). While most interpreters agree with Shklar that Montesquieu did not wish to revive ancient republicanism for modern times, there is still much debate about whether ancient republicanism offers some positive guidance for modernity according to Montesquieu. 13 Athens is the most “modern” of the ancient republics and so seems particularly relevant in considering this question. After all, Montesquieu presents Athens as an example of a commercial republic, as distinguished from Sparta, the quintessential military republic (SL, V.6). Athens is also presented as a “communicative” and pleasant city, with an unparalleled appreciation for beauty and unsurpassed accomplishments in taste and art (SL, XXI.7). Commercial like England and pleasant like France, Athens almost seems to outdo the modern alternatives ultimately preferred by Montesquieu (SL, XIX.7 and 11).
Many, however, have taken it for granted that Sparta rather than Athens is the proper model of republicanism in Montesquieu’s view (Roberts 1994, 166-67; for the opposing view, see Mossé 1989, 60). This is an understandable conclusion since Montesquieu takes virtue to be the spring of republicanism. Virtue, which he defines as love of one’s city or of the common good, is an attribute of Sparta much more than of Athens (SL, V.2). Furthermore, as mentioned, the respectable view in the first part of the eighteenth century was that virtue is indeed always necessary for republican government to succeed. Even more significantly, Montesquieu is understood to be second only to Rousseau in instigating the laconic revival that proved so important for the French revolutionary movement (Rawson [1969] 1991, 227).
Yet if Montesquieu reinvigorated the republican tradition, this result appears to have been largely accidental. As Carrithers (2001, 110) points out, Montesquieu was not thought to be a partisan of republicanism by his contemporaries, nor was he in favor during the radical period of the French Revolution. Without Rousseau’s radicalization of Montesquieu’s thought, that is, Rousseau’s attack on the modern, enlightened, commercial state, Montesquieu would not be associated with a revitalization of republicanism at all (Guerci 1979, 43-44). A close analysis of Montesquieu’s account of Athens helps to uncover his true rhetorical aims, which have been clouded by events of the latter half of the eighteenth century. Montesquieu seeks to awaken in the reader a certain admiration for Athenian accomplishments, not least of which is its great empire, only to undermine this admiration in favor of gentler modern mores. To displace ancient models as such, Montesquieu first revives the less popular and more democratic alternative and implicitly dismisses Sparta, the more reputable Greek republican model, in the process.
While Athens emerges as the “modern” ancient republic in some important respects, it may be surprising to consider that Athens is also Montesquieu’s chief example of a virtuous republic, occupying a more prominent place than both Sparta and Rome in the early books of The Spirit of Laws. 14 Montesquieu reserves his greatest praise for the famed Athenian lawgiver Solon and the formidable virtue that his laws sustained. As Montesquieu tells it, these virtues kept the city remarkably resilient until its defeat by Philip at Chaeronea (SL, III.3 and VIII.16). This is an exceedingly positive view of Athens’s longevity. According to most eighteenth-century students of the ancient world, Athenian decrepitude was the cause not the result of Athens’s defeat at Chaeronea. So, based on Montesquieu’s most favorable rendering of Athens, the city was a bastion of both virtue and commerce, and its splendor and accomplishments in art had not been surpassed (SL, XXI.7). To appreciate the full effect of Montesquieu’s presentation of Athens, let us look more closely at Athens’s various purported achievements.
The greatest of these is the resilience and longevity of Athens’s virtue. Montesquieu evinces it but also presents contrary evidence. Having indicated that virtue lasts until the bitter end, he notes—when writing specifically of the corruption of the principles of government—that the decline began much earlier. He makes the following point about one of the chief causes of republican decline:
Great successes, especially those to which the people contribute much, make them so arrogant that it is no longer possible to guide them. . . . In this way the victory at Salamis over the Persians corrupted the republic of Athens; in this way the defeat of the Athenians ruined the republic of Syracuse. (SL, VIII.4)
15
The optimistic view that Athenian virtue is compatible with Athenian empire is here replaced by Montesquieu’s expression of the republican security dilemma. Montesquieu claims that fear of the Persians “maintained the laws among the Greeks” (SL, VIII.5). Republics are vulnerable to attack, and Greek republics were no exception. They were vulnerable to Persian aggression, but once Athens built a navy and successfully defended itself against Persia, it began to found an empire (SL, VIII.16) and suffer from the corruption of civic virtue–virtue that was crucial for forming and maintaining the martial spirit to fend off the Persians in the first place. 16
Montesquieu similarly qualifies an initially enthusiastic portrayal of Athens’s successful combination of virtue, commerce, and empire. At the outset, he gives an almost Periclean eulogy of Athens, writing that the Athenians “gained a true empire on the sea” through which “this commercial and victorious nation gave laws to the most powerful monarch at that time and crushed the maritime forces of Syria, of the island of Cyprus, and of Phoenicia” (SL, XXI.7). Only a few lines later in the same chapter, however, Montesquieu negates this rosy praise and concludes that Athens was amateurish in its pursuit of wealth and power:
Athens, filled with projects for glory, Athens, which increased jealousy instead of increasing in influence, more attentive to extending its maritime empire than to using it, with a political government such that the common people distributed the public revenues to themselves while the rich were oppressed, did not engage in the great commerce promised it by the work of its mines, the multitude of its slaves, the number of its sailors, its authority over the Greek towns, and, more than all that, the fine institutions of Solon. Its trading was limited almost entirely to Greece and the Black Sea, from which it drew its sustenance. (SL, XXI.7)
Athens’s commerce was limited by the Athenians’ preference for glory over profit and real power, and by the city’s geographic position. In this same chapter Montesquieu endorses Xenophon’s opinion that Attica’s land position constrained commerce and that Athens would have been more successful as an island. Montesquieu follows the lengthy excerpt from Xenophon to this effect with the following reflection: “You might say that Xenophon intended to speak of England” (SL, XXI.7). England is the new and improved Athens, and its many advantages begin with geographic position (also see Rahe 2009, 229-238.).
The modern commercial republic is not the first to outshine Athens. While Athens is an improvement over Homeric times, during which development and rule were very limited, Montesquieu depicts Corinth as more commercially successful than Athens during the republican age. Corinth’s admirable position straddling two seas, along with its perfectly corrupt mores, allowed it to outpace Athens. While Athens’s reputation had fallen on hard times, that of Corinth had never soared. Known for its wealth and libertine attitudes, Corinth is depicted by Thucydides as a self-serving, hypocritical instigator of the Peloponnesian War, an ancient city that stood for little besides profit and sufficient power to secure it (Thucydides 1919, book 1, 37-43, 68-71, 120-24). Montesquieu admits that Athenian accomplishments in taste and the arts have never been surpassed but credits Corinth with greater commercial prowess. For Montesquieu, Corinth’s corruption or lack of virtue goes together with its great commercial successes:
In no other town were works of art carried so far. Religion completed the corruption of what its opulence had left of its mores. It erected a temple to Venus, to whom more than a thousand courtesans were dedicated. From this seminary graduated most of the celebrated beauties whose history Athenaeus dared to write. (SL, XXI.7)
Montesquieu’s considered reflections on Athens lead us to conclude that he finds neither its virtue nor its commerce impressive. Athens’s military endeavors required virtue, which was then compromised by successful campaigns and the expansion of empire. If Corinth is a guidepost, then we might conclude that commerce requires freedom of the passions and the absence of virtue since virtue would subject the individual desires and interests to the will of the city as a whole. Is it the case that Athens has too much virtue for commerce and too little virtue for perpetuating the city and maintaining its empire?
These musings encourage us to consider the compatibility of republican virtue and commerce more broadly. Having initially suggested that virtue demands single-minded dedication to the exclusion of the pursuit of commerce and all individual ambitions (SL, III.3, IV.4), he goes on to deny that commerce necessarily means the corruption of virtue:
Certainly, when democracy is founded on commerce, it may very well happen that individuals have great wealth, yet that the mores are not corrupted. This is because the spirit of commerce brings with it the spirit of frugality, economy, moderation, work, wisdom, tranquility, order, and rule. Thus, as long as this spirit continues to exist, the wealth it produces has no bad effect. (SL, V.6)
For commerce not to ruin a republic, Montesquieu continues, the fortunes acquired should be of a middling amount, and inheritances should work against the concentration of wealth into the hands of a few. Luxury, which is often the result of successful military exploits, leads a republic to ruin. Virtue is both the condition for and the result of laws that distribute property equally and prevent the accumulation of wealth (SL, V.5, V.7, VII.2). Republican virtue amounts to the renunciation of one’s particular passions and the concentration of these into love of the homeland (SL, V.2). Successful military exploits, particularly when undertaken in the name of glory, a common outgrowth of the love of the homeland, lead to hubris and disorder among the citizens. Such exploits also often awaken—as they did in the Athenian case—new passions and new needs that serve to emphasize individual ambition at the expense of a desire to serve the city and see to its grandeur.
All of these observations on the nature of republican virtue indicate that virtue rather than commerce is the regulating force of a functioning republic. Yet when we compare Athens to England, the modern commercial republic, we begin to see that this is not simply so: moderation and virtue, necessary for the former, are unnecessary for the latter. While England requires the rule of law and the maintenance of contracts, Montesquieu never suggests that the pursuit of profit or the desire for personal advancement in commercial enterprises ought to be moderated or that property restrictions might apply. Frugality itself is at odds with a true commercial spirit, and at home only in republics that are animated by virtue. England, which shares attributes with both monarchies and republics, is not a republic in the same sense as ancient republics. Athens, as Montesquieu describes it, is an ancient republic that cannot maintain its commerce without also corrupting the love of country on which its military success is based. Athens is neither frugal nor egalitarian enough to maintain its virtue, nor reliant enough on its commercial enterprises to become suitably powerful such that the decline of virtue might become less of an obstacle to effective defense. 17
Montesquieu’s final judgment on the effect of virtue in ancient republics is that it was suitable for forming athletes and fighters and that the only occupation for the ancient citizen as citizen is arts and activities related to war (SL, IV.8). Virtue is an austere passion that manifests itself as a love of country and is the result of a “renunciation of oneself, which is always a painful thing” (SL, IV.5). It is therefore no surprise that all of the famous ancient republics are known for their military exploits. Montesquieu declares expansion the aim of Rome, war that of Sparta, and glory that of Athens (SL, XI.5; also see VIII.6). Athens is not fundamentally different from Sparta and Rome, and it is ultimately not gentler than its ancient republican cousins (see Rahe 1992, esp. chaps. 4 and 7).
Athens’s harshness is, to be sure, less obvious than that of Rome or Sparta. Athens did not pursue universal domination, or make its citizens into fighting machines, or engage in rampant slaveholding and trading. Montesquieu, as we have come to expect, initially brings out the so-called softer side of Athens. He claims that although Athens engaged in empire building and slavery, these were somehow unobjectionable in Athenian hands. Athens, though more inclined than Sparta to empire, preferred to rule over free people rather than slaves (SL, VIII.16). And when it came to slavery, Athens “treated its slaves with great gentleness,” which meant “the slaves did not disturb the state of Athens, whereas they shook it in Lacedaemonia” (SL, XV.16). Yet Montesquieu also reminds the reader that Athens’s slavery was not inconsequential (“the multitude of its slaves”; SL, XXI.7). He gives an Athenian example to illustrate the “abominable right of nations” that the Greeks practiced. “An Athenian law wanted all the useless people to be put to death when the town was besieged” (SL, XXIX.14; also see VI.12). Athens no less than any other ancient city tended to be indifferent to humanitarian concerns.
Perhaps it is predictable that Athens, despite its great love of beauty and its mastery of taste and the arts, is not a bastion of gentleness and humanitarianism in ancient Greece. As discussed earlier, Athens rather than the more expected Sparta is Montesquieu’s chief representative of ancient republicanism. When considering why this is so, we need to look at Montesquieu’s account of the role of ancient philosophy in classical republicanism. According to him, speculative sciences make men savage (sauvage), no less than rigorous physical exercises (SL, IV.8). Montesquieu treats Plato, Aristotle, and Xenophon as lawgivers in the same sense as Lycurgus and Solon (SL, IV.6). All three Athenian philosophers argue that the health of republics depends on virtue or dedication to the common good, a quality to be found in Sparta rather than Athens. Montesquieu ignores the many qualifications these thinkers make when praising Spartan civic virtue and completely neglects their concern with moral and intellectual virtue or virtue that speaks to human excellence rather than the more limited horizon of excellent citizenship. As Lowenthal (1964, 278-79) argues, Montesquieu distorts the views of the ancient philosophers on virtue (particularly those of Plato) and denies virtue’s trans-political significance. Montesquieu suggests that ancient philosophy failed to appreciate the passionate, grasping nature of political life and, in seeking to broaden the horizon of the citizen to theoretical and transcendental concerns about reason and true virtue, implicitly endorsed the savagery of ancient republican citizenship (SL, IV.8). 18
The strong attractiveness of virtue seems to be tied to and bolstered by the disquisitions provided by the most esteemed thinkers on this subject. Montesquieu does not dispute that the ancient type of republic required virtue, but he is at odds with ancient philosophers about the further merits of virtue and whether ancient republicanism as such is worthy of emulation. Montesquieu steps in to undo Plato’s work: he dislodges the esteem in which virtue is held. He does so with a light touch, by attempting to form a new taste for gentleness and humaneness. For Montesquieu, “humanity” or humanité is a new and explicitly modern virtue, one that applies to human beings qua human beings (first introduced in Considerations 2000, 200). “Humanity” transcends the partisanship encouraged by the love of country and embraces the somewhat peaceful cosmopolitanism of the spirit of commerce. “Humanity,” then, is consistent with human acquisitiveness and requires no overcoming of the self. Whatever gentleness and humaneness is possible for human beings will find its full development in a society in which human ends rather than superhuman ones set the tone (see SL, XXIV.11). 19
Unlike his contemporaries, Montesquieu does not point to Athenian corruption only as a foil for Spartan steadfastness and sobriety. Even as he points to Athens’s shortcomings, he does so in a way that makes clear he is aware of its charms. Rather than moralize against Athenian warmongering and other vices, he chooses to portray Athens’s accomplishments as paltry and primitive. He speaks to the brilliance of Athens and of Greece, but also casts them into a historical moment that has since been eclipsed by progress. Montesquieu encourages the readers to judge Athens as we should judge all political entities, which is to say by their power and ability to maintain themselves, not according to misguided notions of glory and heroism so often attributed to the past. This education in reorienting the reader from heroic mores to modern and gentle ones continues through his accounts of the confederate republic and Alexander the Great.
The Confederate Republic: An Exercise in Institutional Thinking
Montesquieu introduces the confederate republic seemingly as a cure for all that ails the ancient republican model. Having discussed the principles of the corruption of all regimes in book 8, Montesquieu surprisingly introduces the institutional arrangement that would cure “every drawback” of republics—implying that the corruption of classical republics can be avoided (SL, IX.1). The confederate republic comes on stage very abruptly in book 9 and soon drops from sight again. This strange interlude on confederate republics is presented with such fanfare, purportedly to reconcile republican virtue with safety, as to demand a serious account of its meaning.
Montesquieu’s aphoristic treatment of this subject has encouraged competing interpretations. While some have taken Montesquieu at his word that confederation solves the republican security dilemma, most have suggested that there is something inadequate or even contradictory about the evidence he provides. Interpreters who take the confederate republic to be a true solution either maintain that classical republicanism is a relevant model for Montesquieu (Keohane 1972, 395; Onuf 1998, 233; Rosow 1984, 358-59) or argue that despite the inadequacies of the confederate model, it points to Montesquieu’s desire to find a new international model of shared sovereignty (Howse 2006, 5-6; Long 2008, 99; Long 2010, 774). Many commentators note the lack of clarity of the confederate republican proposal, indicating that Montesquieu’s account of the internal coherence and external security is unconvincing (Carrithers 2001, 128; Levy 2006, 53-54; Nelson 1975, 61; Pangle 1973, 83-84; Shklar 1998, 247; Ward 2007, 555). Some of these go so far as to suggest that Montesquieu did not understand confederacy, as this concept had yet to make its way into France in the middle of the eighteenth century (Larrère 2005–6, 120-23; Nelson 1975, 8). I propose that the confederate republic is meant, above all, as an exercise in institutional thinking for the reader.
Virtue is at the center of Montesquieu’s analysis of republicanism in books 2 through 8 of The Spirit of Laws, and the confederate republic is initially touted as an ingenious way to allow small republics to maintain their virtue without compromising security. Yet when writing about the ideal form of confederacy, Montesquieu concludes that the most perfect of these arrangements historically was the highly centralized Lycian confederation, in which local governments were little more than administrative branches of the federal government (Wolfe 1977, 434; also see Nelson 1975, 10-11). In light of the choice of Lycia, Alexander Hamilton notes—against the Anti-Federalists—that there is no discernible difference between “confederacy” and “consolidation” of states in Montesquieu’s account (Hamilton 2009, fed. #9). Such consolidation would presumably harm the virtue and internal cohesion of the individual units of the confederacy. Montesquieu is oddly silent about this issue and does not bring up virtue at all when analyzing confederacy.
Montesquieu’s silence suggests that he chooses security over virtue. Yet when one looks to the efficacy of confederate republics in securing the safety of constituent parts, the picture is mixed. The Lycian confederation, for instance, is unsuccessful in heading off the offensive challenge posed by the Romans. If this indicates that confederate republics are sometimes too weak to contend with outside threats, Montesquieu’s broader portrayal of ancient confederacy suggests that at times they work all too well to protect themselves. After all, Lycia lost to Rome, a lethal fellow confederacy. Montesquieu’s description of successful confederacies makes it very clear that confederacies could be as offensive as they were defensive:
Such associations made Greece flourish for so long. By using them, the Romans attacked the universe, and with their use alone, the universe defended itself from the Romans; and when Rome had reached its greatest height, the barbarians were able to resist it by associations made beyond the Danube and the Rhine, associations made from fright. (SP, IX.1)
Although Montesquieu ultimately suggests consolidation rather than confederacy, here he emphasizes the fluidity of these republican associations fueled by the interconnected desire for security, freedom, power, and empire. This in part bears out Larrère’s (2005–6, 120-23) observation that the term république fédérative is best translated into English as alliance. At the very least, alliance accurately describes the motivation of individual republics in joining forces with others.
While the ancient examples of confederacy remind the reader that these institutional arrangements were often the means by which republics like Athens and Rome became empires, the modern examples Montesquieu provides point to another possible outcome, which is instability and administrative confusion. Holland, Switzerland, and Germany, ironically titled “eternal republics,” all suffer from internal difficulties typical of these arrangements. Germany is characterized as terribly problematic, a hodgepodge of petty monarchies and republics. Holland is already in decline when Montesquieu offers his analysis. And Switzerland, whose constituent parts had some semblance of civic virtue (as Rousseau would soon famously argue), was consumed by internal squabbling (SP, X.6; Wolfe 1977, 434-35; for counterpoint see Howse 2006, 5). In short, confederate republics are either destroyed by more successful confederate republics, or become successful empires and the catalysts for new, additional confederate republics formed for defense.
As the confederate republic drops from sight after its brief appearance in book 9, the more important solution to the problems associated with republicanism is introduced in the form of the new commercial republic (Levy 2006, 53-54). England is his primary example of this sort of polity, which incorporates republican and monarchic characteristics, all of which are altered by the transformative power of commerce. These sorts of states value peace for the sake of commerce and allow no “prejudice” to get in the way of their commercial interests. They have no need for confederation because they are large, powerful, and wealthy (SP, XIX.27). In Montesquieu’s view, these new republics (to the extent that they are republics) do not resemble ancient republics and have little or nothing to learn from them. The account of the confederate republic, which only reaffirms the problems of ancient republicanism, is the beginning of Montesquieu’s case for modern commercial government. In book 11, immediately following the books on foreign policy, Montesquieu states explicitly that the ancients misunderstood liberty. Liberty, he teaches, is not obeying those whom we elected, nor is it being governed by a compatriot, or even living according to our own laws (SP, XI.2). Rather, liberty is consistent with the rule of laws that protect individuals and their rights (SP, XI.3). Montesquieu is concerned with removing the powerful prejudice that characterizes the association of liberty with republicanism (SP, XI.4; contra Wolfe 1977, 437).
The confederate republic is not a symbol of Montesquieu’s devotion to republicanism, particularly the ancient model, nor is it a signal that republican models are necessary to overcome the prevalence of war. While monarchies are warmongering, republics have come to light as equally if not more problematic in this respect. This is so despite the fact that he writes that “the spirit of republics is peace and moderation” (SP, IX.2). For he makes this statement in the context of advising against mixed confederacies in which both republics and monarchies are included. Republican virtue, as we have learned, leads to warriors in search of glory and national self-assertion. Since in book 9 Montesquieu is focusing on the weakness of republics, their so-called peacefulness and moderation are best understood as military weakness vis-à-vis monarchies (SL, X.6 and 7).
The purpose of Montesquieu’s presentation of the confederate republic, then, is to point out that the institution is flawed and that republicanism as conceived by the ancients cannot be salvaged through confederation. Having emphasized nothing else so much as the need for virtue in republics, through the exercise of presenting the reader with the confederate republic, Montesquieu now replaces virtue with security concerns entirely. He has paved the way for this and now suggests that virtue is a tool for security and nothing more—a rather flawed one at that. Personal security, it turns out, is best assured in a modern commercial state such as England, which, as mentioned above, has little truck with virtue, at least virtue as dedication to the common at the expense of the individual. Montesquieu’s presentation of the confederate republic encourages the reader to analyze regimes and institutions according to their efficacy in protecting their citizens and maintaining themselves. Virtue or any self-abnegating morality is otherwise not relevant, and the marginalization of virtue’s charms, such as they are, in Montesquieu’s presentation here is meant to promote in the reader a sensible and sober disposition toward such matters. Considerations of organization, administration, security, and other mundane aspects of modern statehood begin to replace those of character and education that were associated with republicanism.
Alexander the Great: Agent of Progress and Modernity
According to Montesquieu, Alexander the Great succeeds where the confederate republic fails. Confederacy served some republics well, some too well (acting as the incubator of great empires), and some very inadequately; overall, this institutional arrangement is in no way the precursor of modern, gentle international mores. Alexander, on the other hand, emerges as a surprisingly important forerunner of modern commercialism in Montesquieu’s account of the grand narrative of history. The interpreters who have noted Montesquieu’s favorable view of Alexander are understandably perplexed about how to reconcile Montesquieu’s denunciation of conquests for the sake of glory and expansion with his praise of one of the most ambitious imperialists that the West has produced.
All agree that Montesquieu’s praise of Alexander in no way suggests that Montesquieu approved of imperialism, but they differ on interpreting the reasons behind Montesquieu’s assessment of Alexander. Ehrard (2004, 48-50) cautions the reader against misunderstanding or exaggerating Montesquieu’s praise of Alexander, which is extremely qualified and benefits tremendously from the comparison with the Roman Empire. Volpilhac-Auger (2002, 53-54) thinks Montesquieu’s praise of Alexander is more meaningful. She argues that Montesquieu’s Alexander is a facilitator of open communication among nations and a symbol of opposition to solipsism, narrowness, prejudice, and other irrational divisions among peoples. Michael Mosher (2005–6, 106) goes still further and argues that Alexander is the paradigmatic multiculturalist, who “acknowledged the existence and position of the Asians, not as an object of knowledge, but as a form of subjectivity in confrontation with his own subjectivity” (also see Kojève 2000, 170; Howse 2006, 9). While Montesquieu’s praise of Alexander is limited by his fundamental animus against empire, we must explain his laudatory attitude nonetheless. As we will see, Montesquieu’s Alexander is not a liberal pluralist avant la lettre but represents instead an intermediary figure between ancient republicanism and modern commercialism that, among other things, helps the reader overcome any persistent attachments to glory and empire.
Two aspects of Alexander’s imperial accomplishments are praiseworthy according to Montesquieu. First, Alexander behaved in such a way as to preserve his conquests, as distinguished from the Romans—who conquered only to destroy theirs. He understood his power and well-being to consist in improving the lives and filling the coffers of those he conquered. Second, Alexander improved the “presiding genius” of the places he conquered. Although Montesquieu counsels that homegrown reforms and improvements are preferable, he admits that it is possible for a conquest to improve the mores and way of life of the conquered. “A conquest can destroy harmful prejudices, and, if I dare speak in this way, can put a nation under a better presiding genius” (SP, X.4). As one of two examples that Montesquieu uses to illustrate this point, he commends Alexander’s “triumph” over “superstition” when he forbade the Bactrians from feeding their elders to large dogs (SP, X.5). A second and broader improvement in the presiding genius of a conquered people is Alexander’s removal of the religious prejudices that had prevented the Persians from undertaking great commercial enterprises (SP, XXI.8).
Alexander embodies Montesquieu’s maxim for conquerors: “The spirit of acquisition carries with it the spirit of preservation and use, and not that of destruction” (SP, X.3). Montesquieu especially applauds the fact that Alexander knew how to maximize his power while also improving the lot of those he overcame in battle. Whether Alexander’s desire to preserve his conquests is the result of prudent calculation or of applying humanitarian principles depends in part on what Montesquieu means by preserving conquests. Montesquieu affirms his preference for defensive rather than offensive war, and he lists several so-called laws of nature meant to limit the scope of conquests (SP, X.3). Yet Montesquieu allows considerable latitude with respect to defense and self-preservation, including, for example, preemptive war (SP, I.3). Montesquieu readily admits that conquest is for the sake of victory, and, although it is clearly preferable to do the least damage possible in one’s campaign to win, even enslavement of the conquered population is permitted if circumstances require such an act (SP, X.3).
The facet of Alexander’s prudence that Montesquieu most emphasizes is his lack of prejudice with respect to the mores of the peoples he conquered. He praises Alexander for abandoning his Greek ways once he conquered Asia, for as helpful as these had been in gaining victory in the first place, maintaining control of the newly conquered territory and people required a certain kind of openness to their mores:
He resisted those who wanted him to treat the Greeks as masters and the Persians as slaves; he thought only of uniting the two nations and wiping out the distinctions between the conquerors and the vanquished: after the conquest, he abandoned all the prejudices that had served him in making it; he assumed the mores of the Persians in order not to distress the Persians by making them assume the mores of the Greeks; this is why he showed so much respect for the wife and the mother of Darius and why he was so continent. (SP, X.14)
Montesquieu states that allowing a nation to be governed by its own laws is the most modern and enlightened mode of conquest (SP, X.3). This is a great compliment, which implies that Alexander somehow respected the conquered and cared about their rights before such a standard had been established in international relations.
To conclude that Alexander was a gentle multiculturalist avant la lettre, however, would be too great a leap of interpretation. Montesquieu congratulates Alexander for not letting chauvinism and ethnocentrism become impediments to his interests. It is worth noting that although Montesquieu praises the progressiveness of the practice of leaving the conquered their laws and ways of life in The Spirit of Laws, in his Considerations he admits that the Romans employed this practice too. The Romans were clever enough to understand that allowing the conquered to keep their laws when possible helped them maintain control of the empire. “It is folly for conquerors to want to give all peoples their laws and their customs. This is worth nothing, for they are capable of obeying under all sorts of government” (Considerations 2000, 141). Alexander’s de facto multiculturalism was typical of ancient empire builders and was the result of his very great prudence in attaining his acquisitive goals.
Montesquieu follows a long line of historians in noting Alexander’s deft ability to make the conquered love his rule. But Montesquieu, unlike most historians, suggests that Alexander simply abandoned his Greekness. In doing so, Montesquieu willfully ignores evidence of Alexander’s continuing attachment to his Hellenic roots. For instance, it is well known that although Alexander married two Iranian princesses and forced several of his chief men to do the same, these mixed families learned Greek and were brought up according to Macedonian ways (Brunt 1965, 214). For Montesquieu, Alexander was a rational actor who aimed to increase his power and who succeeded because of his sensible plans and superior force (SP, X.13). Neither Greek pride nor Greek enmity against Persia played a part in his designs. Montesquieu’s account ought to be compared with Plutarch’s, for example, in which Alexander’s great exploits are considered in light of his overweening love of glory, in combination with a certain religiosity, and his magnanimity (Plutarch 1992, 139-99). 20 Plutarch presents Alexander as a very calculating leader and brilliant general, but these qualities are folded into a more complicated psychological portrait that features love of glory as a crucial component. Montesquieu’s Alexander, it seems, was driven by neither love of glory nor idealism of any kind. 21
Montesquieu’s enlightened Alexander desired above all else to increase his power by increasing commerce among those whom he conquered. He did not Hellenize the East, as many had suggested approvingly, but brought true civilization to the world in the form of commerce. He removed the “cataracts” of the Persians, which is to say the superstitions that prevented them from undertaking great commercial projects. Most impressively, he discovered the Indian Ocean and attempted to unite the Indies with the West by maritime commerce (SP, XXI.8). Montesquieu underplays and undermines Alexander’s heroism and encourages the reader to admire this great conqueror for having to the extent possible at the time modernized the known world, by focusing on the economic well-being of those he ruled (Briant 2005). Alexander, the enlightened and calculating self-interested conqueror, is the best that antiquity has to offer, but it is crucial to understand the very great limits of Alexander’s purported accomplishments.
While Alexander fares well when compared to Greek republicanism and Roman empire, his prowess looks measly and quaint in comparison to the modern technological advances that revolutionized the world well after his death. His ships, like those of the Greeks before him, were superior to Indian and other ships in the ancient world, but vastly inferior to the results of modern shipbuilding (SP, XXI.5). More significantly, all navigation prior to the supremely important invention of the compass confined sailors to the coasts, except when, seeking favorable winds, they “took advantage of monsoons or the trade winds, which were a kind of compass for them” (SP, XXI.9). In the ancient world commerce was established by the discovery of land through conquest. The possibility of commerce therefore depended on the character and disposition of conquerors of territories. In modernity, Montesquieu argues, sea voyages have made conquest of territories unnecessary and therefore obsolete (SP, XXI.9). Alexander may have been one of the few conquerors to do commerce a good turn, but Montesquieu intimates that Macedonian merchants have since done more than any monarch before them (SP, XXI.16). Finally, it is important not to overemphasize the success of Alexander’s commercial exploits. Alexander’s project largely failed to outlast him, and it is certainly not the case that commerce needs an Alexander. Commerce, in fact, displaces Alexander as the heroic figure in world history, as the underdog who overcomes political despotism:
Commerce, sometimes destroyed by conquerors, sometimes hampered by monarchs, wanders across the earth, flees from where it is oppressed, and remains where it is left to breathe: it reigns today where one used to see only deserted places, seas, and rocks; there where it used to reign are now only deserted places. (SP, XXI.5)
As he had previously presented Athens, so he presents Alexander’s adventures, namely, as primitive in comparison to the modern world that he in some ways prefigured. Alexander is not a modern figure, let alone a postmodern one, but his enlightened or reasonable attitude toward tradition and religion gains Montesquieu’s approval. Alexander adopts Persian ways to secure Persian allegiance, seemingly going against his teacher Aristotle who was widely understood to hold the view that Easterners ought to be treated like slaves. But, more importantly for Montesquieu’s narrative, Alexander overcomes his own attachments to Greek politics and philosophy. Alexander removed the cataracts of the East, having already put an end to republicanism in the West. Montesquieu’s portrayal of Alexander, which abstracts from this conqueror’s love of glory and his masterful capacity to achieve it, suggests that we ought to assess his accomplishments in light of the progress that would follow him. To the extent that we continue to admire him, it is not as a result of his Hellenization of the world or his immense yet controlled appetite for rule, but because he knew that his real interests lay in enriching his empire through great commerce among peoples.
Montesquieuian Reflections on International Peace
Athens emerges as a flawed ancient republic that is neither militaristic nor commercial enough. Its gaiety and its commerce foreshadow the progress that is to come in the form of modern states in a modern world. In Montesquieu’s presentation, Athens is the poor man’s England, while Alexander brings humanity closer to commerce and commercial mores. Alexander, however, is also a kind of brilliant relic and is supplanted by the new world that he helps (modestly, all things considered) bring into being. The Greek narrative that Montesquieu carefully weaves deflates the purportedly glorious past. Montesquieu, well aware of the great attractions of glory, seeks to diminish them for the reader and to reinterpret whatever love of glory cannot be displaced from the human soul as compatible with our preservation, material prosperity, and individual liberty. Commerce is presented as a hero of sorts, one that overcomes the aggression of conquerors and helps enormously to provide for our basic human needs.
The Greek tale offers some evidence that Montesquieu’s hopes for peace are based on a hard-boiled understanding of human nature. He abandons the model of confederate republicanism in favor of Alexander’s spread of the spirit of commerce at the point of the sword. Montesquieu’s realism shows that although human beings are fundamentally self-interested, they are also often led astray regarding what self-interest ought to entail. Our interests are distorted by all manner of prejudices, superstitions, and even ideals. Most important among the prejudices of the West is our fondness and admiration for republican ideals, which goes hand in hand with the love of glory in the name of the common good. Montesquieu does not view it as sufficient to point out that war has become unprofitable (as he does through the Roman story). We must also receive an education, aimed at both our reason and our sentiments, instructing us on our fundamental needs, which are consistent with peace and prosperity. Montesquieu’s historically nuanced realism stands as a correction of contemporary realism, which tends to treat individual states as interest-optimizing units that knowingly or unknowingly perform rational choice analyses. Montesquieu’s extensive historical lessons show that he thinks that our conception of interests is historically constructed—or, at least, historically distorted—and requires an education to correct or reinforce the appropriate disposition.
While Montesquieu notes the progress of mores from ancient belligerence to modern gentleness, it is a mistake to attribute to him idealistic hopes for future peace. As mentioned, some interpreters point to Montesquieu as an avant-garde constructivist who conceives of the international arena as an actual or potential society of states that can overcome the agonistic relations of sovereign states. Such interpreters see in Montesquieu’s confederate republic a symbol of his hopes for shared sovereignty arrangements such as the European Union (Long 2008, 99), and his support for international commerce appears to them a road map for an international legal order beyond a world of sovereign states (Howse 2006, 6, 7, 14-16; Larrère and Weil 2000, 332-33; for a measured account of the interplay between government and commerce, see Larrère 2001, 356-57). But Montesquieu does not mean to suggest that individual or group self-interest can be overcome. Whatever peace is available in the international sphere depends on a proper understanding of self-interest. England, for instance, puts nothing before profit, but jealously guards its economic profits and engages in war on account of this.
In fact, peace and commerce internationally seem to depend on the existence of powerful states that enforce security and liberty domestically and protect citizens from external threats. According to Montesquieu, citizens would contribute to the defense of states that genuinely protected their liberty because they would judge this to be the only way to maintain their liberty (SL, XIX.27, para. 30). If there is reason to question Montesquieu’s optimism regarding the willingness of self-interested “confederates,” as he calls the English (SL, XIX.27, para. 62), to sacrifice their lives, there is even greater reason to doubt that human beings—so fond of “destructive prejudices” through the course of history—would become reliably enlightened with respect to their fundamental interests. Benjamin Constant, famous early-nineteenth-century French liberal and follower of Montesquieu, wonders what his teacher would have concluded about the future of war had he been alive to witness the French Revolution and the subsequent Napoleonic Wars. Constant notes that despite the fact that glory had become outmoded and modern commercial men and women displayed utilitarian sensibilities, a new and virulent rationale for war and conquest had emerged (Constant 1988, chaps. 2, 12, 13). Napoleon fought in the name of abstract ideas and had the desire to impose these on the vanquished. Ancient republicanism received a modern makeover and became a potent ideology that served as a powerful pretext for total war. Montesquieu may have underestimated the appeal of republican fervor and overestimated the human propensity to be reasonable and peaceful. Still, the longer view of history vindicates Montesquieu’s sense that politics that centers on personal liberty and security would form gentle mores and minimize the appeal of war.
Even if Montesquieu overestimates the extent to which power politics can be made gentle and rational, his impressive historical sensibility is a useful counterweight to ahistorical rational choice realism (and liberalism) and to idealism that is tone deaf to the limits of international peace. Montesquieu’s hopes for peace are firmly rooted in his realism, but his realism is informed by his study of human nature and the changes and distortions that affect this nature. The Greek tale, which has been the subject of this essay, shows the way in which Montesquieu was able to envision and encourage a great deal of change and progress in relations among nations, while grounding these hopes for progress firmly in his hardheaded analysis of human acquisitiveness.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Lewis Slawsky and the remarkably knowledgeable and magnanimous anonymous referees for this journal. All remaining errors are my own. I also thank the Earhart Foundation for its generous support.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: I received a summer fellowship in 2010 from the Earhart Foundation in support of writing this paper.