The liberal self: John Stuart Mill's moral and political philosophy

Abstract

Wendy Donner offers an interpretation and defense of John Stuart Mill’s moral and political philosophy, arguing that his conception of the good—qualitative hedonism centered on human self-development—provides a unified foundation for his ethics and liberalism. Donner counters longstanding criticisms that Mill’s distinction between qualities of pleasure abandons hedonism, consistency, or objectivity. Situating Mill against Bentham’s quantitative hedonism and associationist psychology, she demonstrates that Mill evaluates complex mental states rather than simple sensations, incorporating both quality and quantity as empirical, good-making properties. To measure utility, Mill relies on the preferential judgments of competent agents who have undergone intellectual, affective, and moral development. Analogizing this evaluative process to expert wine appraisal, Donner shows how standards of value are cultivated through experience and critical training. This developmental process culminates in self-development, which integrates individuality and autonomy with sociality and fellow-feeling. In political theory, Donner argues that Mill’s principles establish a moral right to liberty of self-development that requires positive institutional guarantees and social resources, not merely negative noninterference. Consequently, she contends that Mill’s philosophy fundamentally leans toward radical egalitarianism rather than elitism. Finally, the work examines tensions in Mill’s applied thought, analyzing how his overarching commitment to human growth informs his balancing of competence with popular participation in representative government, as well as his support for worker cooperatives in economic democracy. – AI-generated abstract.