Ayn Rand: The Russian Radical

by Sciabarra, Chris

  PRODUCTIVE WORK

  Rand did not merely deduce the practical power of reason from ontological and epistemological axioms. Her observations of history helped to provide the foundation for her philosophical approach. Rand recognized that her own identification of ethical principles would not have been possible without the Industrial Revolution. Though the ancient Greeks had celebrated the human being as a rational animal, even thinkers such as Aristotle saw contemplative knowledge as superior to practical knowledge.38 Industrialization brought the practical power of reason to fruition. It offered an uncontestable historical display of the connection between thought and reality, thinking and activity, theory and practice, science and technology, reason and production.39

  Rand’s validation of the virtue of productive work is as much an outgrowth of historical specificity as it is of objective necessity. For Rand, labor is a concrete expression of rationality. It is the “process by which man’s mind sustains his life.” Productive work, in Rand’s view,

  is the road of man’s unlimited achievement and calls upon the highest attributes of his character: his creative ability, his ambitiousness, his self-assertiveness.… It means the consciously chosen pursuit of a productive career, in any line of rational endeavor, great or modest, on any level of ability. It is not the degree of man’s ability nor the scale of his work that is ethically relevant here, but the fullest and most purposeful use of his mind.40

  Productive labor is a constellation of both mental and physical activity. Every productive human endeavor involves the translation of thought into a specific material form. Although the proportion of mental and physical activity will vary depending on the relative level of skills required, Rand argued that every human productive process is an outgrowth of mental effort.41 For Rand, “Production is the application of reason to the problem of survival.”42

  Productive work is the distinctive means by which human beings attain purpose in their lives. It is also the means by which they concretize their species identity as goal-directed beings. The purposive character of human action is manifested in production. By mastering production techniques and skills, they gain a sense of particularized efficacy. By integrating their goals and achieving their purposes over a period of time, they enhance their generalized sense of control over both the material world and their own lives.43 In optimizing a person’s sense of efficacy, productive work also brings forth all of the rational and creative impulses in the human spirit. This is essential to Rand’s expansive conception of labor. Labor is a synthesizing activity, involving both spiritual and material aspects. It is not the application of a purely instrumental rationality. It is constituted by a creative process, one that involves the full integration of reason and emotion, the conscious and the subconscious, articulated and tacit dimensions of mind.

  It is possible that Rand’s tribute to the role of productive labor in human life was influenced by her exposure to the works of Marx while she was a student at Petrograd University. Though there is no journal evidence that can corroborate this contention, it is clear that the entire Russian intellectual and cultural atmosphere was suffused with Marxist theory. And though Rand was deeply critical of Marx, both thinkers exhibit a quasi-Aristotelian respect for human praxis. For Marx, as for Rand, persons are rational, productive beings with inherent potentialities.44 Both thinkers viewed labor as causally efficacious, as enabling the actualization of specifically human powers and needs.45

  In Marx’s thought, as in Rand’s, labor is not purely instrumental or mechanical. Marx argued that labor is a process “in which man of his own accord starts, regulates, and controls the material re-actions between himself and Nature” (Capital, 1:177). The labor process concretizes the human “species-character,” which is exemplified by “free, conscious activity” (Marx, Manuscripts, 113). Productive work transforms both the external world and the laborer’s internal world. Human beings affirm themselves objectively as they appropriate nature’s substances to human requirements (140). By acting on material reality, human beings change it and actualize their own nature as conscious and social animals. In Capital, Marx expressed a profound respect for the integrated nature of human labor, its synthesizing effect on mind and body, its distinctively human character:

  A spider conducts operations that resemble those of a weaver, and a bee puts to shame many an architect in the construction of her cells. But what distinguishes the worst architect from the best of bees is this, that the architect raises his structure in imagination before he erects it in reality. At the end of every labour-process, we get a result that already existed in the imagination of the labourer at its commencement. He not only effects a change of form in the material on which he works, but he also realises a purpose of his own that gives the law to his modus operandi, and to which he must subordinate his will. And this subordination is no mere momentary act. Besides the exertion of the bodily organs, the process demands that, during the whole operation, the workman’s will be steadily in consonance with his purpose. This means close attention. (1:177)

  It is fitting that Marx used the example of the architect as the paradigmatic case for specifically human, productive work. Howard Roark, Rand’s protagonist in The Fountainhead, reflects everything in Marx’s passage and more. He epitomizes the creative architect and laborer, integrating the material and spiritual in each of his productive efforts. In Roark’s architectural blueprints, form follows function. In his design of the Stoddard Temple for instance, Roark spiritualizes the secular, giving material form and objective visibility to his exaltation of humanity’s noble soul; he “thought that a place built as a setting for man is a sacred place” (356).

  While Rand shared with Marx a view of productive work as the distinctive, conscious, practical activity of the human species, she celebrated the creative spirit embodied by the labor process. It is this integrated creativity which enables people to take pride in their achievements.

  THE VIRTUE OF SELFISHNESS

  For Rand, pride is one of the spiritual consequences of productive work. But it is also a by-product of consistent reality-oriented practices. It is based on the premise “that as man must produce the physical values he needs to sustain his life, so he must acquire the values of character that make his life worth sustaining—that as man is a being of self-made wealth, so he is a being of self-made soul” (Atlas Shrugged, 1020).

  Rand distinguished between pride and conceit. A proud man holds himself as his own highest value.46 A conceited man is a “pretentious mediocrity.” The conceited judge themselves by a comparative standard that frequently places them in positions of superiority or inferiority relative to other people. In Rand’s view, a person engaging in offensive boasting is as self-abasing as a person who practices humility.47 For Rand, humility and presumptuousness are two sides of the same dualistic coin.48 Nathaniel Branden has argued further that those who arrogantly boast of their worth to others are implicitly acknowledging their own shortcomings (N. Branden and E. D. Branden 1983, 28). Narcissists are not proud. Their excessive self-absorption is unhealthy because it “arises from a deep-rooted sense of inner deficiency and deprivation” (N. Branden 1987, 146).

  In attempting to draw this distinction between genuine pride and the false alternatives of humility and conceit, both Rand and Branden inadvertently affirmed elements of the Aristotelian ethos. Aristotle argued that virtuous behavior was the golden “mean between two vices, the one involving excess, the other deficiency.”49 Pride is the “crown of the virtues,” enhancing the other virtues of a person’s character and forming an inseparable unity with them. A proud person’s claims to greatness are strictly in accordance with his or her actual merits.50 The proud are neither boastful nor humble. As lovers of self, the proud have “nobility and goodness of character.” A proud person refuses “to make his life revolve round another, unless it be a friend; for this is slavish.”51

  In recognizing Aristotle’s perceptiveness, Peikoff argues, however, that it is incorrect to
conceptualize pride as a mean on the same continuum as the vices it opposes. In most cases, the vices that Aristotle typically identifies are different not in degree, but in kind from the virtuous “mean.” The proud are essentially different from the boastful and the obsequious.52 In keeping with the nondualistic thrust of Objectivism, Peikoff suggests that Aristotle has actually identified a pair of false alternatives, each of which is a variation on the other. Both the humble person and the braggart share the premise of self-doubt, while the genuinely proud individual is self-reliant, self-respecting, and self-accepting.53

  Rand recognized pride as a virtue, an ambitious dedication to the achievement of one’s highest potential. But Objectivism also distinguishes between the virtue of pride and the value of self-esteem. Branden ([1969] 1979) explains:

  The two are related, but there are significant differences in their meaning. Self-esteem pertains to a man’s conviction of his fundamental efficacy and worth. Pride pertains to the pleasure a man takes in himself on the basis of and in response to specific achievements or actions. Self-esteem is confidence in one’s capacity to achieve values. Pride is the consequence of having achieved some particular value(s). Self-esteem is “I can.” Pride is “I have.” (125)

  This is an important distinction. Pride is an aspect of one’s particularized efficacy grounded in the genuine mastery of certain skills and practices. Self-esteem pertains more to a person’s generalized or metaphysical efficacy. Both Rand and Branden see self-esteem as a fundamental human need. Branden defends the concept of “need” in the same manner that Rand defends the concept of “value.” A need arises from the “conditional nature of life.… Without the concept of life, the concept of need would not be possible.… ‘Need’ implies the existence of a goal, result or end: the survival of the organism. Therefore, in order to maintain that something is a physical or psychological need, one must demonstrate that it is a causal condition of the organism’s survival and well-being” (19).

  But self-esteem is not like other human needs. It seems less “real” than say, the need for food, clothing, or shelter. And yet, self-esteem is mind-esteem.54 In Rand’s original formulation, it is a man’s “inviolate certainty that his mind is competent to think and his person is worthy of happiness, which means: is worthy of living” (Atlas Shrugged, 1018). To achieve self-esteem is not a purely cerebral accomplishment. It is more than the mere conviction that we are worthy. It is earned by consistently applying thought to action. It is experienced through praxis, and is both the source and product of human efficacy.55 It is a human need not because people would die without it, but because it has survival value that impinges on their very capacity to think, act, and live as human beings (N. Branden and E. D. Branden 1983, 11).

  Drawing from Rand’s initial formulations, Nathaniel Branden has made a lifetime profession of exploring the meaning and applications of self-esteem.56 He argues that self-esteem has two internally related aspects: a sense of personal efficacy and a sense of personal worth.57 Just as we cannot escape the need to evaluate the facts of external reality, so we cannot escape the need for self-evaluation. By achieving our goals, we gain a sense of self-confidence and control over our existence that fuels our further achievements, as well as our practical competence. To be the beneficiary of our achievements, we must also feel that we deserve these benefits. By living (1) consciously and (2) purposively, and by practicing the arts of (3) self-acceptance, (4) self-responsibility, (5) self-assertiveness, and (6) personal integrity, we achieve a generalized feeling of self-worth, which is as necessary to our practical competence as the mastery of any technical skill.58 Neither Rand nor Branden deny the effects of internal and external factors on the development of self-esteem. Indeed, as Branden emphasizes, our sense of identity does not evolve solipsistically. It emerges in the context of our relationships, which contribute to the sense of self we acquire. In human interaction, each person expresses that which is internalized in his or her consciousness, the many complex consequences of past encounters and experiences (N. Branden 1983b, 40). Our relationships to parents, teachers, significant others, organizations, and the culture greatly impact upon our evolution toward independence and autonomy. The ideas, beliefs, and practices that we accept, either consciously or tacitly, can prove fatal to our self-image, and to our very existence (N. Branden 1992, 94–95).

  What must be emphasized at this stage is that this exalted view of self-esteem is the essence of Rand’s ethical egoism. When Rand advocated rational selfishness, she was not projecting the ideal of a savage, club-wielding caveman. She argued that the virtue of selfishness is inseparable from the virtue of rationality. When we exercise our minds to the fullest extent of our ability, we are being rational. By applying our thought to the achievement of material values, we are being productive. By benefiting from our own rational efforts, we are being selfish in the most benevolent sense of that word. None of these virtues is separable from the others.

  By realizing our purposes and reaping the benefits of our efforts, we acquire the values necessary to survival. For Rand, such an achievement does not require the sacrifice of others to the self or the sacrifice of the self to others. Objectivism sees no inherent conflict of interest among people who earn the values of their existence and who deal with one another by trading value for value. Rand argued that such free, voluntary, uncoerced trade is the only rational and moral principle for all human relationships, whether personal or social, private or public, spiritual or material. This trader principle recognizes neither masters nor slaves in human relations.59 It acknowledges no polarization between the individual and the society in which that individual lives, if that society is genuinely human. Indeed, the greater a person’s self-esteem, the more likely it is that he or she will engage in social relationships marked by mutual respect, kindness, and generosity. The deeper a person’s self-doubt, the more likely it is that he or she will view others with fear and distrust (N. Branden 1987, 147).

  At this juncture, it is important to grasp why Rand used the word “selfishness” to connote something beneficent. She argued in The Virtue of Selfishness, that she used it for the very reasons that make people afraid of it (vii). She claimed that conventional morality creates a conceptual “package-deal” in which only two alternatives are possible: the sacrifice of the self to others (traditional altruism) or the sacrifice of others to the self (traditional egoism).60 Convention equates altruism with benevolence and egoism with brutality. In both cases, however, the spirit of benevolence is sabotaged and the practice of brutality is made inevitable.

  In Rand’s view, the conventional alternatives obscure the true meaning of the word “selfishness,” which is: “concern with one’s own interests.” Such a definition is morally neutral, according to Rand.

  It is debatable whether Rand pinpointed the actual definition of “selfishness.” Most dictionaries define “selfishness” as “concern only with one’s own interests,” which is not neutral. In any event, the major obstacle for Rand is not philological, but philosophical. By transposing the concept of “selfishness” into a nondualistic context, Rand aimed to alter its conventional meaning (Virtue of Selfishness, vii). To effect this metamorphosis of meaning, Rand had to transcend the limitations of the very categories she was using. This is a difficulty faced by most dialectical thinkers: utilizing terms whose meaning has been tainted by a vastly different, one-dimensional philosophical context. To avoid such terms entirely, Rand would have been compelled to invent wholly new terms at the risk of becoming incomprehensible. By using known terms, she might appear to have actually endorsed one pole of a duality. Thus, in the conflict between egoism and altruism, for example, she was an egoist. In the conflict between capitalism and socialism, she was a capitalist. But such a one-sided characterization profoundly distorts Rand’s philosophical project. She was not a conventional egoist. Her ethics constitutes a rejection of traditional egoism and traditional altruism alike. Likewise, she was not a conventional capitalist. As I
will discuss further in Chapter 10, Rand defended capitalism as an unknown ideal. If we fail to grasp these important distinctions, we risk viewing Rand as a monist. In actuality, Rand’s approach to ethics is but another illustration of her revolt against formal dualism.

  LOVE AND SEX

  Rand’s ethics are internally related to every other aspect of her developed worldview. It is impossible to comprehend the extent and depth of her vision in a single chapter or study. But there are immediate ramifications that further illustrate the essentially nondualistic tenor of her philosophy. In no area of ethics or psychology is this more apparent than in the Objectivist perspective on love and sex. These issues highlight Rand’s understanding of the connections between the conscious and the subconscious, the mind and body.61

  Rand’s integration of the material and the spiritual is central to her concept of productive work. But it is equally essential to her examination of love and sex. Rand traced a philosophical link between those who deny the spiritual roots of production and those who believe that sex is a purely mechanical function. In production, the materialist engages in promiscuous acquisition devoid of principles, and the idealist excoriates material values. In sex, the materialist engages in literal promiscuity, and the idealist extols the virtues of Platonic love. Rand ([1976] 1992T) warned that the cultural treatment of sex as a bathroom function would lead to a Victorian backlash. She maintained that this swinging from one pole to another was an inevitable by-product of the materialist and idealist bifurcation of mind and body.

  Rand argued that just as material production emerges from cognitive and creative activity, so too, sexual choices will reflect consciously or subconsciously held convictions. As a distinctively human activity, sex involves the exploration of all of our sense modalities and spiritual values (N. Branden 1980, 90–92). Ideally, it is the expression of romantic love. Such an integration of love and sex is neither exploitative nor submissive. It “is the most profoundly selfish of all acts,” because it celebrates the self as an object worthy of desire and appreciation (Atlas Shrugged, 489–90). It requires self-assertion, self-responsibility, self-respect, and above all, self-esteem. Indeed, as Rand explained through Roark, “To say ‘I love you’ one must know first how to say the ‘I’” (Fountainhead, 377).