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Political Integrity and Dirty Hands: Compromise and the Ambiguities of Betrayal

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Abstract

The claim that democratic politics is the art of compromise is a platitude but we seem allergic to compromise in politics when it happens. This essay explores this paradox. Taking my cue from Machiavelli’s claim that there exists a rift between a morally admirable and a virtuous political life, I argue that: (1) a ‘compromising disposition’ is an ambiguous virtue—something which is politically expedient but not necessarily morally admirable; (2) whilst uncongenial to moral integrity, a ‘compromising disposition’ constitutes an essential aspect of political integrity. In so doing, I question certain moralistic assumptions which fuel contemporary vilifications of compromise—that, in theory, democratic politics should be inhospitable to compromise and that political integrity should be akin to moral integrity—and which are shared by Walzer’s Dirty Hands thesis which professes to be sensitive to the realities of politics. These assumptions displace the complex realities of politics and misconstrue the standards of political excellence; they unsatisfactorily idealize political integrity and the messy context in which democratic politicians operate—a context characterized by a plurality of incompatible traditions, each with its own values and principles. Whilst commitment to a set of principles stemming from one’s tradition or pre-election promises implies commitment to realize these, leading a virtuous political life amidst such a grubby domain often requires abandoning some of these. An innocent, all-or-nothing pursuit of one’s principles in politics might prompt political disaster or defeat: an uncompromising disposition entails the entire abandonment of any hope of realizing all of those principles.

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Notes

  1. This point is raised by philosophers who criticize the moralism of contemporary political thought—its focus on societal consensus and harmony as opposed to compromise and conflict (cf. Honig 1993; Galston 2010; Mills 2000; Gray 2005).

  2. I borrow this term from Gutmann and Thompson (2012).

  3. This paradox is captured by Gutmann and Thompson: whilst there is great ‘public support for compromise in general’, they observe, the public is unsupportive of concrete compromises on particular issues such as ‘immigration, taxation, government spending, the environment’ or ‘abortion’ (2012, p. 26).

  4. I defend this controversial point in more detail and set the general foundations of this practice-based approach to political ethics in Tillyris (2015b, c).

  5. I say partly because, as I explain, the negative view is also expressed by politicians for political reasons. I do not claim that this view can be eliminated from politics. I rather wish to explore certain moralistic assumptions which underpin it and which misconstrue democratic politics, political virtue and integrity.

  6. My argument uncovers a divide in the DH literature: between moralists (Walzer and de Wijze) and philosophers labelled as DH theorists (Hampshire, Williams and Hollis) who account for the messy realities politics. See Tillyris (2015a).

  7. A consensus is explicitly supported, not merely forged for pragmatic reasons. Hence, my account differs from the Rawlsian conviction that pluralism precludes only agreement on the good, not on justice. Pluralism, I contend, entails that conflict cuts deeper: agreement on the good and justice is implausible—that Rawls’s principles of justice are expressive of the liberal tradition which is just one tradition and comprehensive moral doctrine amongst the many (cf. Hampshire 1993; Bellamy 2010). This sort of moral demandingness and misconception of pluralism and conflict also permeates contemporary accounts of reconciliation, emphasizing ‘solidarity, and social unity’, ‘respect’ and ‘reciprocity’ (May 2011, pp. 589–590; see also Horton 2011). Contra these accounts my conception of compromise resembles Shklar’s (1989) and Williams’s (2002) ‘liberalism of fear’, or Horton’s (2010) and Gray’s (2001) modus vivendi: it is predominantly about damage control. Given this, it does not follow that the parties should unconditionally honour the compromises they strike (cf. Hollis 1982). Addressing this issue is beyond this essay’s scope but note that because politics is intertwined with conflict, the parties might compromise but defect if politically necessary (and, if doing so does not jeopardize some of the political goods I identify).

  8. Negotiation and persuasion reinforce the perception of compromise as a messy agreement and are unnecessary in a consensus where a solution congruent with each party’s substantive values exists (Laden 2007).

  9. Note that compromises involve the modification of one’s principles in action as opposed to modification tout court and in light of an overarching conception of morality/justice inherent in consensus-based agreements.

  10. As Fumurescu (2013) suggests, the ‘one-dimensional’ man often propounded by philosophers displaces the ambiguity and complexity of compromise; it obscures the relationship between one’s forum externum—the social or public realm—and forum internum—the realm of conscience.

  11. This might seem an exaggeration but most philosophers since Plato advance a vision of rational harmony in individual morality—between morality and politics—and in the polis—a consensus on substantive moral principles, values and aspirations—which curtails the room for compromise (cf. Hampshire 1989, 2000). And, as I illustrate, even those who defend the necessity of compromise premise their argument on abstract, moral premises and are bound to reject some compromises or fail to capture the ubiquity of compromise in politics.

  12. Similar cries were heard when Bush Senior reneged on his ‘Read my lips. No new taxes’ pledge (cf. Smith 1990; Mullins and Wildavsky 1992; Gutmann and Thompson 2012).

  13. An uncompromising stance might also serve politicians well in negotiations—in striking compromises that maximize their gains vis-à-vis those of their opponents (cf. Luban 1985).

  14. For what is worth, even Clinton, Boehner and Reagan (amongst others), who publicly adopted this stance successfully, did compromise. See Gutmann and Thompson (2012), Boudreaux and Lee (1997), Himelfarb and Perotti (2004).

  15. This need not entail that order and security are absolute, unconditional goods. However, these ‘negative’ goods are of fundamental importance—securing these is a condition for pursuing other, more positive goods and substantive values (cf. Berlin 1990; Williams 2002; Hall 2013).

  16. For a defence of dissimulation and hypocrisy in democratic politics see Hollis (1982), Bellamy (2010) and Tillyris (2015b).

  17. Whilst de Wijze (2005, 2009, 2012) characterizes DH as a conflict between incompossible ‘oughts’, his account subsumes and does not reject Walzer’s characterization. Further, his account can only capture one-person conflicts; it ignores that politicians are members of different traditions, each with its own incompatible ‘oughts’ and that achieving some of these requires compromising with their rivals.

  18. For an account of Robespierre’s ‘terror of virtue’ see Arendt (1990).

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Acknowledgments

I am extremely grateful to Derek Edyvane, Kerri Woods and Jonathan Dean for reading earlier versions of this essay as well as for their fruitful feedback, encouragement and support. Earlier versions of this essay were presented at the 2014 Association for Legal and Social Philosophy Conference. I would like to thank the participants of the conference—and, in particular Matteo Bonotti and Jesse Tomalty—for their constructive feedback and suggestions. I have also benefited from discussions with Jonathan Allen on the topic of Dirty Hands. Finally, I would like to thank the University of Leeds and the ESRC for funding my research as well as the editors of Res Publica and two anonymous reviewers for their encouragement and helpful comments and suggestions.

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    Demetris Tillyris

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Tillyris, D. Political Integrity and Dirty Hands: Compromise and the Ambiguities of Betrayal. Res Publica 23, 475–494 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11158-016-9323-4

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