Étienne de la Boétie
When “Discourse on Voluntary Servitude” was first published in 1577, its author had been dead for more than a decade. The author was Étienne de la Boétie, who had never made it to his 33rd birthday. His friend Michel de Montaigne said that Boétie had written it when Boétie was just 18 years old. Boétie had made quite a mark for someone so young, but most people have never even heard of his name. Even in the political philosophy world, his name is fairly unknown. Nonetheless, he is one of the most important political philosophers of the Renaissance era, and arguably of all time. His ideas are still studied today in universities.
Michel de Montaigne
What was this book, and why was it so important? Its French title was simply “Discours de la servitude volontaire.” In English, again, this translates as “Discourse on Voluntary Servitude.” The book is fairly short, but it has many ideas in it. For example, it argues against the idea that a people can ever consent to become slaves. Boétie argued that such consent, even if given, would not be valid. It would be void. And even if people could consent to sell themselves into slavery, they would not be able to sell their unborn descendants. Such descendants would be unable to give such consent themselves, and would thus not be bound by the promises of their ancestors. Even those who did consent to become slaves would be free to break this promise whenever they could, since this promise was never valid in the first place.
John Locke
Some of these arguments would later be used by the English philosopher John Locke, in his “Second Treatise on Government.” He, too, argued that no one can ever consent to become a slave. These ideas might seem obvious, and easy to take for granted. But they were quite revolutionary in the sixteenth century. In the world of that time, few were willing to question servitude, since most defended the “duty” of obedience to a monarch. But despite the fact that these arguments were published posthumously – and, to some degree, secretly – they would have a great influence on later generations. In 1940, the French government would issue copies of “Discourse on Voluntary Servitude,” since it spoke to the concerns of France shortly before it was occupied by Nazi Germany.
Niccolò Machiavelli
This audiobook is coupled with another audiobook on Niccolò Machiavelli’s “The Prince.” I suppose that these audiobooks are coupled together because the books themselves are from the same general era. Even though Machiavelli died some three years before Étienne de la Boétie was born, both men wrote during the Renaissance era. Both audiobooks are good at placing the works under discussion into the context of their times. For example, the installment on “Discourse on Voluntary Servitude” gives some biographical information about Étienne de la Boétie’s life. It also describes what was going on during this part of the Renaissance. To some extent, this includes a discussion of the Reformation, since Boétie was a French Protestant – specifically, a Huguenot, or French Calvinist. But it also focuses on some more secular aspects of the Renaissance as well.
This audiobook is much recommended to anyone who wants to learn about unalienable rights. Again, this influenced the later idea that rights to life and liberty were “unalienable rights,” and thus could not justly be taken from anyone, except as punishment for crime. These ideas would later be made famous by John Locke’s “Second Treatise on Government” – and later, by the United States Declaration of Independence, another document in this tradition.
If you liked this post, you might also like:
Part of the audiobook series
The Giants of Political Thought
Étienne de la Boétie’s Discourse on Voluntary Servitude
Others to be covered later
See also the audiobook series
The United States Constitution
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