Suppression of politics by morality - philosophical anarchism of Robert Paul Wolff

Abstract

Acceptance of the fact that man is responsible for his activities is a basic assumption of the moral philosophy of R.P. Wolff. If man is responsible for them, there is no duty to submit to the government. As the consequence, there is no politics that, in the author’s opinion, is using the authority by the State. Autonomy suppresses authority and analogically morality suppresses politics. (In that sense exactly the author used a phrase „suppression of polines by morality”.) Philosophical anarchism can be interpreted - the author tends to such an interpretation - as a radical protest against politics made from moral point of view. It would be an extreme form of moral objection to politics concerning not the actual actions, such as unjust war or unfair taxes, but politics itself and the fact that there is somebody who makes decisions for me, while I do not accept them. The article ends up with the most general and most risky thesis that philosophical anarchism is an expression of post modernistic consciousness.