Harari's Humanist Horror Story:
Why History Matters
7. Humanism, Tyranny and Exploitation
If humanism were really the fountainhead of totalitarianism and capitalist exploitation, we should expect to find those commitments—or at least an indifference to them—in the documents by which organized humanism has defined itself. We find the reverse. For nearly a century, the humanist manifestos and declarations have condemned tyranny and economic injustice in the plainest terms, and each of them long predates Harari's characterization of humanism.
The American Humanist Association's 1933 Humanist Manifesto I held that 'existing acquisitive and profit-motivated society has shown itself to be inadequate' and called for an economic order directed to 'the equitable distribution of the means of life' and 'a satisfactory life for all, not merely for the few'. Its successor fifty years later, Humanist Manifesto II, opened by naming the enemy directly: 'Nazism has shown the depths of brutality of which humanity is capable. Other totalitarian regimes have suppressed human rights without ending poverty.' It decried 'dehumanizing institutions' and 'totalitarian repression'. The measure of economic systems, it insisted, should be by how well they 'increase economic well-being for all individuals and groups, minimize poverty and hardship'. 'World poverty must cease', it urged, advocating that 'extreme disproportions in wealth, income, and economic growth should be reduced on a worldwide basis'.
In 2003, Humanist Manifesto III reaffirmed a commitment to the 'inherent worth and dignity' of each person and to 'a just distribution of nature's resources and the fruits of human effort'. It upheld 'the equal enjoyment of human rights and civil liberties' for all citizens engaged in the 'democratic process' in which differences are resolved 'cooperatively without resorting to violence'. Even this latest Manifesto was published some 10 years prior to Harari's Sapiens and is easily found in the public sphere with a basic search.
The same note sounds across other key humanist pronouncements. In 1980, the Council for Democratic and Secular Humanism's A Secular Humanist Declaration declared itself 'opposed to all varieties of belief that seek supernatural sanction for their values or espouse rule by dictatorship', expressly naming 'intolerant messianic and totalitarian quasi religious movements, such as fascism and communism' as the developments it stood against. On the 'improvement of the human condition', it extolled efforts at 'reducing poverty, suffering, and disease' and in 'making the good life possible for more and more people'.
Humanists International's inaugural Amsterdam Declaration of 1952 aimed for 'the fullest possible development of every human being'. It rejected forthright 'totalitarian attempts to perfect the machine in order to obtain immediate gains at the cost of human values'. Its 2002 successor reiterated aiming for 'the fullest possible development of every human being', who is imbued with 'worth, dignity and autonomy'. It advocated using resources for the 'furtherance of peace and in the service of compassion', emphasizing our 'duty of care to all of humanity'.
Inspired by the 'tribulations of history', Humanists International's 2007 Brussels Declaration resolved that 'never again shall Europeans suffer at the hands of tyranny'. 'Democracy is incompatible with dictatorship', it declared, advocating 'mutual tolerance, and agreement neither to resort to threats or violence nor to seek to impose our own particular worldview on others'. On economic justice, it aimed 'to create a fair society based on reason and compassion, in which every citizen is enabled to play their full part'. One could hardly ask for a more consistent eighty-year record of opposition to precisely the crimes Harari lays at humanism's door.
Nor is this only the voice of committees. Many prominent humanist philosophers, politicians and social activists actively resisted totalitarianism. There are too many to mention here. However, of note in the period following the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 are the philosophers Bertrand Russell and Karl Popper, the novelists George Orwell and Victor Serge and the existentialist humanists Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus. We can add here also Julian Huxley, the originator of evolutionary humanism, and the socialist humanists, Erich Fromm, Leszek Kołakowski, Edward P. Thompson and Raya Dunayevskaya. The people Harari casts as the architects of tyranny were in fact its most articulate and active opponents.
