John Stuart Mill.

• Author: CAPALDI, NICHOLAS
• Position: Review

* John Stuart Mill By William Stafford New York: St. Martin's Press, 1999. Pp. 176. $45.00 cloth.

William Stafford's recent book is the best short introduction to the thought of John Stuart Mill I have come across. The first chapter is devoted to a brief discussion of Mill's life and his reputation, the latter part constituting a good overview of the history of Mill scholarship. The second chapter discusses Mill's own narrative of his life, a task required by the fact that one of Mill's most important publications, and perhaps one of the most important books of the nineteenth century, is his Autobiography. The third chapter reviews Mill's Logic and Principles of Political Economy, works that earned him fame during his lifetime and that achieved canonical status as textbooks during the latter part of the nineteenth century. The fourth chapter focuses on Mill's other major and influential publications, Utilitarianism and On Liberty. The fifth chapter deals with Mill's life as a political journalist, politician, and political activist with regard to such issues as imperialism, Ireland, Jamaica (Governor Eyre), democracy, socialism, and feminism.

For readers of The Independent Review, the most interesting part of the book will be the discussion of socialism (pp. 122-30). Most readers of Mill's Autobiography will remember that Mill declared himself to be a socialist, a declaration that has both mystified them and largely colored later reactions to or interpretations of Mill. What most readers do not take the time to do, as Stafford highlights, is to ask what socialism meant at the time and for Mill himself. Mill was a utopian socialist, critical in particular of the morally debilitating class structure of the economic world in Britain in the nineteenth century. What he opposed was the idea of a permanent divide between employers and employees. As a utilitarian, Mill did not believe in the natural right to property. He favored a mild degree of state intervention, in the form of free and compulsory public education, among other things. Finally, he found unearned and unmerited advantage repugnant. Stafford recognizes that Mill opposed central planning, opposed violence, advocated compensation for "takings," opposed many aspects of trade unionism, was not "a state socialist of the Fabian or any other kind" (p. 123), saw competition as an absolutely necessary and good thing, and took the advancement of liberty as the criterion against which he...