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1 What is Utopia? What is Utopian Political Thought?

      Defining utopia and utopian political thought presents a fundamental problem. When Thomas More invented the word “utopia” in 1516, he created a frustrating and fruitful sort of ambiguity. “Utopia” has a contested nature, because it means both “good place” (eutopia) and “no place” (outupia). Since More’s original Utopia, all thinkers who follow in his footsteps face a set of serious questions. Is utopia a real place that can be attained by the efforts of human beings? Or is it someplace that will always be out of reach? Compounding this ambiguity, More’s Utopia was not just a savage critique of the injustices of his times. Nor was it simply speculation about a state that, if made real, would create a just community. More’s work was also a lighthearted entertainment for his friends. The book is full of puns, some good, some lame. The name of the castaway sailor who returns to report on the wonderful country of Utopia means “speaker of nonsense.” There is a playfulness that lies at the heart of More’s Utopia. If utopia is a desire or a dream, More reminds us to approach it with a light heart.

Homo utopicus: The Mindset of the Utopian Animal

Utopia begins with politics. Utopia might not end with politics, but the nature of political life, the distribution of power among individuals and in society, and the legitimacy of authority over the community lie at the heart of utopian thought.

      We can begin with two propositions from the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle. First, in his classic work The Politics, he declared that humans are “by nature a political animal” (1996: 13). If he is correct and we are political animals, then politics must be the central pivot of our lives. Politics is really the only thing that sets us apart from the animals. The organized struggle for power and authority conditions our lives and our societies. Second, if Aristotle is also correct that the good state is based on friendship (1996: 75), then politics becomes the art of working together and moving toward some realization of the common good. No state can be fully legitimate unless it is based on the actions of those who are equal, since true friendship is based in equality.

      The political animal, then, is an autonomous individual who is able to think and act freely as a person. The political animal is not an individualist, valuing personal goals above all else. But the political animal is able to think and act and, most critically, decide whether or not to accept the values and goals of an existing society. Obviously, the extent of an individual’s autonomy cannot be fixed. It will vary depending on many circumstances. But, to address honestly the central problem in utopian thought, the place of the individual in the perfected community, utopian thinkers must come to grips with the political animal.

Taming the dangerous and self-destructive tendencies of the political animal becomes the critical task of all forms of politics. Taming becomes even more important in utopia, since utopia strives for a kind of justice, order and societal well-being far beyond the somewhat ramshackle arrangements that have characterized most of human political history. Utopian thought demonstrates a revulsion against political forms arising from what the American constitutional framer Alexander Hamilton called “accident or force” (2003: 1). The utopian mindset questions everything, not simply to tear things down but to make us look at the world in new and exciting ways. The utopian asks how we can create a community in which authority, whether exercised by something we can recognize as a government or through social norms, is accepted as legitimate and good. So, utopian thought questions all social and political organization. As Plato said in his Seventh Letter, all existing states are “bad – nothing can cure their constitution but a miraculous reform assisted by good luck” (1973: 114). His contempt for the imperfect political systems of his own times led him to create a model for many future utopias, the community of total commitment, subsuming individual desire to the good of the whole.

      Utopia is a humanistic enterprise. It is based in the belief that society can be understood by human beings and changed for the better. Any utopian theory worth discussing must recognize the value of our fellow beings and our moral relation to them. Recognizing a common good extending beyond the self, the family, or a particular religious or ethnic community remains the greatest and most utopian aspiration of all.

Defining Utopia/Utopianism

“Utopia” is a contested term for which “no fixed definition as such is attainable” (Claeys and Sargent 2017: 2). But in order make the systematic study of utopia and utopian thought possible, the term must be defined in a manageable way, keeping in mind there are exceptions to any rule. The idea of utopia is highly plastic and can be made to fit almost any political, economic or social system. It extends in all directions and can encompass any human endeavor. As Ernst Bloch said in his classic work on utopian theory The Principle of Hope, “so far does utopia extend, so vigorously does the raw material spread to all human activities, so essentially must every anthropology and science of the world contain it” (1986: 624). The danger here should be obvious: we can make utopia mean almost anything and attach utopian ideas to almost any human action. We must beware of a utopianism that is “watered down to the point that it can be found everywhere and nowhere” (Ingram 2016: xx). In that light, it is absolutely necessary to provide a rigorous definition of the concept to avoid confusion. However, creating an overly narrow definition risks removing much of the richness inherent in the study of utopia.

      Utopianism might be described as a continuum. On one side, we see efforts at reform, exemplified by the “realistic utopia” advocated by the great philosopher of liberalism John Rawls (2001). At the other extreme, we find bold visions of the complete overhaul

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