Political Philosophy Of Utilitarianism In The Perspective Of Political Civilization

Although utilitarianism is first proposed as an ethics, it is not a mere ethics. For it haspenetration influence and specific guidance on real political life, political philosophy is one of themost dignified and the most profound theories which constitute utilitarianism, also it is a powerfultheoretical weapon for utilitarianism to change the reality of the political system. In the view ofpolitical civilization, both supporters and its opponents are unable to bypass the politicalphilosophy of utilitarianism. To adapt to the call of the times spirit, utilitarian political philosophygenerated in a specific historical conditions, its mission is to provide a proof of legitimacy for thenewly established bourgeois regime can reasonably run, making it thoroughly clear the fetters offeudal remnants, safeguard the interests of the industrial and commercial bourgeoisie, and ease theincreasing intensification of the contradiction between the bourgeoisie and the proletarian. As animportant political philosophy school, utilitarian combed and inherited the previous wealth ofideas, and Jeremy Bentham, John Mill and others created and developed the political philosophyof utilitarianism. In the entire political philosophy of utilitarianism system,"Utilitarian" as thecore concept is the standard to judge all the political phenomena. Bentham and others spent theirwhole life to apply the utilitarian principle to all aspects of life, used utilitarian scale to measurethe pros and cons of each system, tried to use the utilitarian standard to transform the reality andclean up the maladministration, eventually to ensure the realization of humanity’s greatesthappiness. Utilitarianism belongs to liberalism in nature, utilitarian give liberalism aninterpretation of “Anglo-Saxon” model. They opened the door to modern liberalism, realizing thetransition between the new and the old liberalism. As a weapon, modern liberalism criticizesdespotic, tyrannical and other phenomenon, also they make theoretical preparation and attempts inreality, clearing the conceptual and institutional barriers for the rapid developing of Britishcapitalism. In terms of system design, Bentham and others opposed to the natural law theory andthe social contract theory, on the contrary, they put forward the utilitarian theory of the origin ofthe government. They oppose the monarchy, advocate of representative government, and makeexplanations to the functions of government in line with the utilitarian.Since utilitarianism was created, its critique prevalent, especially in the20th century, the utilitarian suffered violently criticism from everywhere. These critiques stroke the heart ofutilitarianism, however, utilitarian political philosophy is not all bad. The theoretical value of theutilitarian political philosophy lies in historical rationality of the utilitarian standard, the politicalpurpose of the "greatest happiness" administrative guidance of the public interest, the politicalsystem of representative democracy and libertarian civil rights. Its drawbacks are theincompleteness of the utilitarian standard, evaluation mechanism of “consequentialism”, theabstraction of the concept of “the greatest happiness of the greatest majority of people”, the socialunfairness and dehumanization of "calculative reason". In the view of the political civilization,utilitarianism is not only belongs to bourgeoisie, but for all mankind. When Marxists explore andcreate a better social system, they do not completely deny utilitarianism, but critically inherit anddevelop the utilitarian political philosophy in a scientific attitude. In the course of constructing thesocialist market economy in china, the connotations of socialist utilitarian including"People-oriented” is the value claim of Socialist utilitarian, collectivism is the moral principle ofsocialist utilitarian, fairness and justice is the core concept of the socialist utilitarian, for thepeople’s well-being is the ultimate goal of socialist utilitarian. Socialist utilitarian is the principleof value of political civilization. In the construction of Chinese contemporary political civilization,socialist utilitarian is beyond the abstraction of utilitarianism, it seeks for complement of justiceunder the framework of the scientific concept of development, interprets the true meaning of thecivic happiness in the value orientation of people’s livelihood, with special emphasis on building aservice-oriented government based on common interests, focusing on the development of socialistdemocracy whose essence is that the people are the masters, thus socialist utilitarian is beyond theabstraction of utilitarianism whose meaning is “the greatest happiness of the greatest majority ofpeople”, developing of the "good government" standard and important duty of utilitarianism, andsublates utilitarianism which establishes the ideal model of "representative government" ondemocratic regime which is based on domination of a small number of outstanding figures,ultimately achieved the universality and authenticity of democracy.