Hope Abjuring Hope: On the Place of Utopia in Realist Political Theory

• DOI: 10.1177/0090591717740324
• Author: Mathias Thaler
• Date: 01 October 2018
• Published date: 01 October 2018
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/0090591717740324

Political Theory

2018, Vol. 46(5) 671 –697

© The Author(s) 2017

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DOI: 10.1177/0090591717740324

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Article

Hope Abjuring Hope: On

the Place of Utopia in

Realist Political Theory

Mathias Thaler1

Abstract

This essay reconstructs the place of utopia in realist political theory, by

examining the ways in which the literary genre of critical utopias can

productively unsettle ongoing discussions about “how to do political theory.” I

start by analyzing two prominent accounts of the relationship between realism

and utopia: “real utopia” (Erik Olin Wright etal.) and “dystopic liberalism”

(Judith Shklar etal.). Elaborating on Raymond Geuss’s recent reflections, the

essay then claims that an engagement with literature can shift the focus of these

accounts. Utopian fiction, I maintain, is useful for comprehending what is (thus

enhancing our understanding of the world) and for contemplating what might

be (thus nurturing the hope for a better future). Ursula K. Le Guin’s novel The

Dispossessed deploys this double function in an exemplary fashion: through

her dynamic and open-ended portrayal of an Anarchist community, Le Guin

succeeds in imagining a utopia that negates the status quo, without striving to

construct a perfect society. The book’s radical, yet ambiguous, narrative hence

reveals a strategy for locating utopia within realist political theory that moves

beyond the positions dominating the current debate. Reading The Dispossessed

ultimately demonstrates that realism without utopia is status quo–affirming,

while utopia without realism is wishful thinking.

Keywords

realism, utopia, anarchism, Ursula Le Guin, Raymond Geuss, science fiction

1University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Midlothian, United Kingdom

Corresponding Author:

Mathias Thaler, University of Edinburgh, 15a George Square, Room 4.09, Edinburgh,

Midlothian EH8 9LD, United Kingdom.

Email: mathias.thaler@ed.ac.uk

740324PTXXXX10.1177/0090591717740324Political TheoryThaler

research-article2017

672 Political Theory 46(5)

I don’t think we’re ever going to get to utopia again by going forward, but only

roundabout or sideways. . . . Increasingly often in these increasingly hard times

I am asked by people I respect and admire, “Are you going to write books about

the terrible injustice and misery of our world, or are you going to write escapist

and consolatory fantasies?” . . . I am offered the Grand Inquisitor’s choice. Will

you choose freedom without happiness, or happiness without freedom? The

only answer one can make, I think is: No.

Ursula K. Le Guin1

[Utopias] don’t speak to us trapped in this world as we are. . . . Must redefine

utopia. It isn’t the perfect end-product of our wishes, define it so and it deserves

the scorn of those who sneer when they hear the word. No. Utopia is the process

of making a better world, the name for one path history can take, a dynamic,

tumultuous, agonizing process, with no end. Struggle forever.

Kim Stanley Robinson2

A start for any habitable utopia must be to overturn the ideological bullshit of

empire and, unsentimentally but respectfully, to revisit the traduced and

defamed cultures on the bones of which some conqueror’s utopian dreams

were piled up.

China Miéville3

An Old Problem in Need of a New Articulation

Is a realist orientation in political theory compatible with an interest in, or

even an endorsement of, utopianism? This essay tries to answer affirmatively,

by complicating the conventional picture of the relationship between realism

and utopia. The main argument I shall put forth is that, once we re-consider

what realism is and what utopia is, we are in a position to conceive of their

relationship in a mutually supportive, rather than reciprocally exclusive fash-

ion. Distilled into an aphorism, we might express the underlying intuition like

this: realism without utopia is status quo–affirming; utopia without realism is

wishful thinking.

The essay thus interrogates the widely promoted identification of realism

with anti-utopianism, and thereby discloses one possible way to deflect the

charge of conservatism, which has frequently been levelled against realists of

all stripes. To establish this argument, the essay steers attention to utopian

fiction and introduces a reading of Ursula K. Le Guin’s novel The

Dispossessed. Rather than focussing on the narrative content alone, the gist