The Converging and Diverging Views of Wilhelm von Humboldt and John Stuart Mill on the Subjects of Self-development and the Role of the State

Titolo Rivista HISTORY OF ECONOMIC THOUGHT AND POLICY
Autori/Curatori Filip Birsen
Anno di pubblicazione 2016 Fascicolo 2016/1
Lingua Inglese Numero pagine 19 P. 65-83 Dimensione file 268 KB
DOI 10.3280/SPE2016-001004
Il DOI è il codice a barre della proprietà intellettuale: per saperne di più clicca qui

Qui sotto puoi vedere in anteprima la prima pagina di questo articolo.

Se questo articolo ti interessa, lo puoi acquistare (e scaricare in formato pdf) seguendo le facili indicazioni per acquistare il download credit. Acquista Download Credits per scaricare questo Articolo in formato PDF

Anteprima articolo

FrancoAngeli è membro della Publishers International Linking Association, Inc (PILA)associazione indipendente e non profit per facilitare (attraverso i servizi tecnologici implementati da CrossRef.org) l’accesso degli studiosi ai contenuti digitali nelle pubblicazioni professionali e scientifiche

This article shows that a number of the key points expressed by Mill in On Liberty (1859) were very similar to many ideas that Humboldt presented in The Limits of State Action (1792). In fact, it was by Humboldt that Mill gained an appreciation for the concept of self-development. The primary goal of his paper, however, is to find significant differences in their respective ideas on the role of the state as a way to facilitate the development of individuality. It also claims that these differences can be mainly attributed to Mill having had the opportunity to directly observe the negative impacts of industrial capitalism, which led him to defend a positive state role in counteracting them.

Keywords:Welfare state, liberalism, utilitarianism, freedom, diversity

Jel codes:B12; B15.

  1. Roberts J. ( 2008). Wilhelm von Humboldt and German Liberalism. Oakville: Mosaic Press Sweet, Paul R. (1973). Young Wilhelm Von Humboldt’s Writings (1789-93), Journal of the History of Ideas. No. 3-34: 469-482. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2708967
  2. Tribe K. ( 1988). Governing Economy: Reformation of German Economic Discourse 1750-1840. Cambridge: Cambridge University.
  3. Valls A. (1999). Self-Development and the Liberal State: The Cases of John Stuart Mill and Wilhelm von Humboldt, The Review of Politics. No. 2-61: 251-74 http://www.jstor.org/stable/1408357.
  4. Von Humboldt W. [1854] 1969. The Limits of State Action. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.
  5. Beiser F.C. ( 2011). The German Historicist Tradition. New York: Oxford University Press.
  6. Burrow J.W. (1969). Editor’s Introduction. In W. von Humboldt, The Limits of State Action. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: VII-XLIII.
  7. Farrant A. (2011). Hayek, Mill and the Liberal Tradition. New York: Routledge.
  8. Gray J. (1984). On Negative and Positive Liberty In Conception of Liberty in Political Philosophy, ed. Z. Pelczynski and J. Gray. London: The Athlone Press: 321-348.
  9. Gray J. (1986). Hayek on Liberty. Oxford: Basil Blackwell Ltd.
  10. Gray J. (1991). Introduction, in Mill [1859]1991 In On Liberty and Other Essays, ed. John Gray. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  11. Hayek F.A. ( 1969). John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor: Their Friendship and Subsequent Marriage. New York: Augustus M. Kelley Publishers.
  12. Kant I. (2005). Groundwork for the Metaphysic of Morals. http://www.earlymoderntexts.com/pdfbits/kgw2.pdf
  13. Leroux R. ( 1932). Guillaume de Humboldt : La Formation de Sa Pensée Jusqu’en 1794. Paris: Éditions Ophrys.
  14. Leibniz G.W. (1991). Discourse on Metaphysics and Other Essays. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company.
  15. Leibniz G.W. (2006). The Shorter Leibniz Texts. London: Continuum.
  16. Lichtman R. ( 2010). The Social Context of Mill’s Theory of Freedom, Critique, No. 2-38: 189-205.
  17. Mill J.S. (1836). Civilisation. http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=
  18. 233&chapter=16538&layout=html&Itemid=27
  19. Mill J.S. [1873]1960. Autobiography of John Stuart Mill. New York: Columbia University Press.
  20. Mill J.S. [1848]1969. Principles of Political Economy. New York: Augustus Kelley.
  21. Mill J.S. [1859]1991. On Liberty and Other Essays. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  22. Mill J.S. [1848]1994. Principles of Political Economy and Chapters on Socialism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  23. Miller D.E. ( 2003). Mill’s Socialism, Politics, Philosophy & Economics. No. 2-2: 213-38.
  24. Popper K.R. (1960). The Poverty of Historicism. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
  25. Popper K.R. ( 1966). The Open Society and Its Enemies: 2 Hegel and Marx. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
  26. Riley J. (1994). Introduction. In Principles of Political Economy and Chapters on Socialism, Mill [1848]1994, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

  • Mill-Handbuch Thomas Schramme, pp.35 (ISBN:978-3-476-05929-1)

Filip Birsen, The Converging and Diverging Views of Wilhelm von Humboldt and John Stuart Mill on the Subjects of Self-development and the Role of the State in "HISTORY OF ECONOMIC THOUGHT AND POLICY" 1/2016, pp 65-83, DOI: 10.3280/SPE2016-001004