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Review of "'Individualism' in the Mid-Nineteenth Century", by Koenrad W. Swart
from _The Journal of the History of Ideas_, v.23 no.1 (1962), pp.77-90.
Koenrad Swart states his thesis early on when he states: "The term
'individualism' with its perplexing varieties of meanings is responsible
for many inconclusive debates in the history of ideas." He goes on
to identify three "highly dissimilar clusters of ideas": individualism
as 1) the idealistic doctrines with egaitarian implications, such as the
"rights of man" made popular by/in the French Revolution; 2) the anti-statist
utilitarian doctrine of _laissez faire_, economic liberalism; and 3) the
aristorcratic cult if individuality, Romantic individualism, such as put
forth by Wilhelm von Humboldt and Fredrich Schlegel. This contingent
was at odds especially with the egalitarian aspect of what had been termed
individualism up to that time (c.1830), and stressed the diversity and
inequality of talents and abilities. On the other hand, many thinkers
at this time considered individualism, including _laissez faire_
capitalism, to be the logical outgrowth of the ideas which spawned the
French Revolution, pointing out that the founding fathers of this
revolution were inspired more by self-interest than love of humanity.
Individualism as a positive term made its first strides toward acceptance
in England in the work of William McCall, whose _Principles of Individualism_
gained a fairly wide readership; one of his early enthusiasts was George
Eliot. McCall was apparently infulenced by J.S. Mill and Carlyle, but
above all, by the German Romantic ideas by authors discussed above, and,
although Swart does not explicitly say so, it would seem that Max Stirner
may have figured into it as well; McCall's book was published in 1847,
two years after Stirner's book _Der Einzige und sein Eigenthum_.
Many of the writers, especially in Germany, stressed the long
history of German independence as a widespread cultural trait; their
love of freedom could be traced to the old Germanic tribes which had
successfully resisted Roman domination and which later insinuated itself
into medieval institutions such as the feudal system after the Germanic
invasion of Roman territories. This love of liberty was considered
a strong cultural trait until German unification in the 1870's, with
the rise of Prussianism.
The individualist tendency is seen by Swart as culminating with the
thought of the Young Hegelians, in particular Max Stirner, in rejecting
the claims of society upon the individual, in the 1840's.
An interesting contrast between the individualism of _laissez faire_
capitalism and what was termed "infinite individualism" was developed
by Karl Bruggemann in 1842 in which he asserted that this infinite
individualism was based in a German infinite self-confidence to be
personally free in morals and truth.
Individualism gained a lasting impetus in the publication of Jacob
Burckhardt's _Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy_ in 1860.
>From this moment on the term was a force to be reckoned with in
the ongoing battle of ideas still being waged today.
David Westling