36 lines
1.8 KiB
Plaintext
36 lines
1.8 KiB
Plaintext
The idea of good government
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by Errico Malatesta
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(from Umanita Nova 1920; included in 'Malatesta: Life and Ideas', Freedom Press)
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None can judge with certainty who is right and who is wrong, who is nearest
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the truth, or which is the best way to achieve the greatest good for each and
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everyone. Freedom coupled with experience, is the only way of discovering the
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truth and what is best; and there can be no freedom if there is a denial of the
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freedom to err.
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But when one talks of freedom politically, and not philosophically, nobody
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thinks of the metaphysical bogy of abstract man who exists outside the
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cosmic and social environment and who, like some god, _could do what he wishes_
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in the absolute sense of the word.
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When one talks of freedom one is speaking of a society in which no one could
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constrain his fellow beings without meeting with vigorous resistance, in which,
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above all, nobody could seize and use the collective force to impose his wishes
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on others and on the very groups which are the source of power.
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Man is not perfect, agreed. But this is one reason more, perhaps the strongest
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reason, for not giving anyone the means to "put the brakes on individual
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freedom".
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Man is not perfect. But then where will one also find men who are not only good
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enough to live at peace with others, but also capable of controlling the lives
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of others in an authoritarian way? And assuming that there were, who would
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appoint them? Would they impose themselves? But who would protect them from the
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resistance and the violence of the "criminals"? Or would they be chosen by the
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"sovereign people", which is considered too ignorant and too wicked to live in
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peace, but which suddenly acquires all the necessary good qualities when it is a
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question of asking it to choose its rulers?
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