Professional Documents
Culture Documents
and
"The Public Interest"
CLARKE E. COCHRAN
Special thanks for their comments and criticisms of the original draft of
this paper are due to John H. Hallowell and Thomas A. Spragens. Thanks are
also due to Steve Panyan, James Wiser, Paul Henry and the Journal of
Politics' anonymous reviewers for comments and suggestions for improvement.
Richard Jackson provided invaluable assistance in the final preparation of the
manuscript.
1
For a few recent examples of the use of the term "public interest" in these
areas, see Louis M. Kohlmeier, Jr., The Regulators: Watchdog Agencies and
the Public Interest (New York: Harper and Row, 1969); W. Willard Wirtz,
Labor and the Public Interest (New York: Harper and Row, 1964); Daniel
H. Henning, "Natural Resources Administration and the Public Interest,"
Public Administration Review, 30 (March 1970), 134-140; and "Administra-
tive Agencies, the Public Interest, and National Policy: Is a Marriage Pos-
sible?" Georgetown Law Journal, 59 (November 1970), 420-447; Theodore
L. Garrett, "Federal Tax Limitations on Political Activities of Public Interest
and Educational Organizations," Georgetown Law Journal, 59 (February
1971), 561-585; Franklin H. Cook, "Aspects of Tublic Interest' in Utility
Mergers," Public Utilities Fortnightly, Jan. 16, 1969, 28-34.
328 THE JOURNAL OF POLITICS, VOL. 36, 1974
In the second place, the meanings which this term is given and
the uses to which it is put by contemporary political scientists are
revealing indications of their views on politics as such. That is, its
function or lack of function in the writings of various members of
the discipline is an accurate weathercock for determining which
way the wind is blowing in contemporary American political science.
This paper focuses on this second aspect of the concept of the pub-
lic interest. It will not, therefore, attempt to describe the reality of
a "public interest" or "common good," or to give these concepts a
new meaning, but rather it will attempt to show that contemporary
public-interest theory is a symptom of the dominance in contem-
porary political science of what may be called "the politics of
interest."
What is here called "the politics of interest" is the understanding
of politics in terms of autonomous and isolated individuals and
their interests. It is the vision of politics as an arena into which
individuals and groups of individuals enter in order to advance
their own interests or preferences. These interests are transformed
by the political processin a manner whose conceptualization varies
from theory to theoryinto outputs, policies, or outcomes which,
temporarily at least, satisfy the interests of the political actors.2
The dominance of the politics of interest makes impossible within
contemporary political science any credible notion of a public in-
terest or a common good. There can be no public interest because
there is no public or community other than the aggregation of indi-
viduals and special interest groups which they form. There is no
common good because there is nothing which is good for the com-
munity as a whole; there are only goods or interests pursued by
individuals and groups. It will be the contention of this paper that
the various theories of the public interest presented by contempo-
rary political science depend upon the assumptions of the politics
of interest and thus cannot constitute credible theories of the public
interest. This is not to say that these theories are inaccurate in
taking account of the clash of interests in the realm of political
decisions. The error lies rather in the claim that it is only the clash
2
For a fuller explanation and critique of the idea of the politics of interest
as the dominant assumption about politics in contemporary political science,
see Clarke E. Cochran, "The Politics of Interest: Philosophy and the Limita-
tions of the Science of Politics," American Journal of Political Science (No-
vember 1973), in press.
"THE PUBLIC INTEREST" 329
of interests which takes place in this realm and in the claim that
the concept of the public interest refers solely to interest conflict.
This idea of politics and public interest obscures the experience and
the nature of the political realm as the realm of community. It
denies that a common good or public interest can exist which is
more than the result of the conflict of individual and group interests
in the political arena. Ultimately, it is a denial of the common na-
ture of man which requires and makes possible a political com-
munity that is more than simply a convenient instrument for the
satisfaction of individual desires.
The current scholarly literature on the public interest reveals a
wide divergence among students of the concept. C. W. Cassinelli,
for example, considers the public interest to be "the highest ethical
standard applicable to political affairs," while David Braybrooke
denies that it is the supreme or comprehensive goal of public policy,
although he concedes that it is occasionally a helpful consideration.3
Others argue that it is a meaningless concept in a theory of politics.4
In the face of this divergence it becomes necessary, if any progress
at all is to be made toward discovering a central theme within the
diversity of uses of the term in the recent literature, to examine the
various definitions which have been offered and categorize them.
The range of the definitions and their relationships may then be ex-
plored, and it can be determined whether in fact the "politics of
interest" is the foundation of contemporary public-interest theory.
To accomplish this task within the limits of this paper, the post-
World War II literature on the public interest is examined, but at
the same time a few of the most important earlier works have been
studied in order to illustrate the full range of opinion and to clarify
the meaning of some of the more recent efforts.
Since past attempts to classify theories of the public interest have
not aimed at elucidating the unity of definitions of the concept in
political science, a new classification will be employed in this
paper.5 Four categories are used. The first is what might be desig-
3
Cassinelli, "The Public Interest in Political Ethics," and Braybrooke, "The
Public Interest: The Present and Future of the Concept," both in Nomos V:
The Public Interest, ed. Carl J. Friedrich (New York: Atherton Press, 1962),
46, 129.
*Glendon A. Schubert, Jr., The Public Interest (Glencoe, 111.: The Free
Press, 1960), 199-224; and Frank J. Sorauf, "The Conceptual Muddle," in
Nomos V, ed. Friedrich, 183-190.
5
Other classifications of theories have been made by Virginia Held, The
330 THE JOUBNAL OF POLITICS, VOL. 36, 1974
nated the "normative" theory of the public interest. Here the public
interest becomes an ethical standard for evaluating specific public
policies and a goal which the political order should pursue. Ad-
vanced primarily by men like Cassinelli, Herbert W. Schneider, and
Walter Lippmann, this position finds very few adherents among
political scientists concerned with the public interest.6 It closely
resembles the older conception of the common good and advances
two basic contentions: the public interest (or common good) is a
normative concept and the relevant norm is the general good of a
whole community. Thus, it views men as social beings who form
associations, including political associations, for a better common
life and not simply for private benefits. They form communities as
well as partnerships or interest groups. It follows, then, that the
good of such a community will be a common goodthat is, a good
which enhances their common life and is shared by all. Therefore,
under this conception, the normative standard by which a proposed
public policy must be evaluated is whether it will contribute more
to the common good than will alternative policies. This category
finds few adherents in contemporary political science. What needs
to be emphasized here is that the theories of the other three cate-
gories reject both its idea of community and the possibility of a
normative standard outside of the political process itself by which
to judge public policy.
The second category"abolitionist" theoriescontains theorists
who, for various reasons, deny that the concept of the public inter-
Public Interest and Individual Interests (New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1970);
Wayne A. R. Leys and Charner M. Perry, Philosophy and the Public Interest
(Chicago: Committee to Advance Original Work in Philosophy, 1959); Schu-
bert, Public Interest; and Sorauf, "The Public Interest Reconsidered," Journal
of Politics, 19 (November 1957), 616-639.
6
For examples of this type of public-interest theory, see Lippmann, Essays
in the Public Philosophy (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1955); Cassinelli,
"The Public Interest," "Comments on Frank J. Sorauf's 'The Public Interest
Reconsidered'," Journal of Politics, 20 (August 1958), 553-556, and "Some
Reflections on the Concept of the Public Interest," Ethics, 69 (October 1958),
48-61; Schneider, Three Dimensions of Public Morality (Bloomington: Indi-
ana University Press, 1956), esp. chaps. 3-4. For similar theories, but with-
out an emphasis on community, see S. I. Benn, " 'Interests' in Politics," Pro-
ceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 60 (n.s. 1958-59), 123-140; Edgar
Bodenheimer, "Prolegomena to a Theory of Public Interest," and Ernest S.
Griffith, "The Ethical Foundations of the Public Interest," both in Nomos V,
ed. Friedrich, 205-217, 14-25.
"THE PUBLIC INTEREST" 331
I
It may seem odd to begin a consideration of the concept of the
public interest with the abolitioniststhose who reject the con-
ceptbut it is important to understand why they do so, for their
assumptions and premises underlie many subsequent attempts to
find some validity in the idea of the public interest. Those who
reject the concept make explicit the denial of community as a basis
of political life and of the common good as defining the purpose
of political society. These denials are presupposed in later public-
interest theory which, however, endeavors to avoid their conse-
quences. The concept of the public interest has been rejected
principally by the advocates of the "scientific" study of politics.
According to Schubert, if the public interest is to be a valid con-
cept in political science, it must be capable of yielding measurable
data about the "decision-making process."8 He does not find any
such data yielded by the concept. For him it makes no sense in
7
Schubert, Public Interest; Sorauf, "Public Interest Reconsidered." This
category also resembles Held's "preponderance of interests" category, though
it takes elements from her "common interest" category as well. Public In-
terest and Individual Interests, chaps. 5-6.
s "The Theory of the Public Interest," PROD, 1 (May 1958), 34-35.
332 THE JOURNAL OF POLITICS, VOL. 36, 1974
8
Public Interest, 223.
10
The Process of Government, ed. Peter H. Odegard (1908; reprinted,
1967; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press), 167, 165, 172.
11
De Jouvenel, Sovereignty: An Inquiry into the Political Good, trans.
J.F. Huntington (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1957); Maritain,
Man and the State (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1951); Simon,
Philosophy of Democratic Government (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1951). Henry S. Kariel rightly cautions against easily associating
Bentley with those who claim him as their leader. Open Systems: Arenas
for Political Action (Itasca, 111.: F. E. Peacock Publishers, Inc., 1969), 96-99.
But at least in their treatment of group interests and the public interest Bent-
ley and his "followers" are very similar. Cf. Held, Public Interest and In-
dividual Interests, 79-82.
12
Bentley, Process, 218-220; and David B. Truman, The Governmental
Process (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1951), 512. Truman and Bentley see
in these "rules of the game" (that is, unorganized, mass beliefs) "potential"
interests or "potential" groups; they do not imply the existence of a society.
Truman, Governmental Process, 512-514.
" T H E PUBLIC INTEREST" 333
"Process, 213-214.
20
"What Is an Interest?" 835.
^Ibid., 833-834.
22
Governmental Process, 48.
"THE PUBLIC INTEREST" 335
25
Cf. the remarks of Walter P. Metzger in a discussion of "The Govern-
ance of the Universities, II," Daedalus, 98 (Fall 1969), 1,138-1,148, esp.
1,139-1,140.
20
"Interests," Political Studies, 2 (February 1954), 7; also John H. Hallo-
well, The Moral Foundation of Democracy (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1954), 34-36. For the idea of interests as justified claims, see Held,
Public Interest and Individual Interests, esp. 18-36; and Benn, "Interests."
Further criticism of the concept of interest in modern political science may
be found in Isaac D. Balbus, "The Concept of Interest in Pluralist and Marx-
ian Analysis," Politics and Society, 1 (February 1971), 151-177; and William
E. Connolly, "On 'Interests' in Politics," Politics and Society, 2 (Summer
1972), 459-477.
"THE PUBLIC INTEREST" 337
II
An abolitionist rejection of the concept of public interest which
is related to but different from that outlined above is urged by
Schubert and also by Sorauf. Both have specifically concerned
themselves with the diverse modem ideas of the public interest.
They, therefore, write with a purpose unlike that of Bentley and
Truman. Yet both implicitly follow the fundamental assumption of
the interest-group theorists that the conflict between various inter-
ests is the foundation of the democratic political process. There is
no need to unravel all the details of Schubert's and Sorauf's treat-
ment of the various types of public-interest* theory. It will suffice
to mention their classifications and to review their conclusions.
Schubert starts with a perspective somewhat different from most
of those who write about the public interest. He sets out to ex-
amine how ideas of the public interest vary with the role percep-
tions of public officials.28 Schubert feels that a substantive defini-
tion is impossible, for policies change with circumstances. There-
fore, attempts at such definition "build upon shifting sands."29 In-
stead, he divides theorists of the public interest into three groups:
rationalists, idealists, and realists. He himself feels closest to the
realists, those who view public officials as engaged in the political
mediation of disputes. For them the policy alternatives are specific,
but in conflict, because various groups advance different interests.
The realists are divided into three factions: the mechanist faction,
the psychological realists, and the due-process realists. All, how-
ever, emphasize the amorality of the group struggle, hence the
Ill
Attention must now be turned to the third category of public-
interest theoriesprocess theorytheories which acknowledge the
usefulness of the concept and define it in terms of the conflict of
interests. The process theorists accept many of the assumptions of
Bentley, Schubert, and their followers. They find many "publics"
rather than one community or public and many interests rather than
one interest held by the community. It is also difficult for many of
them, but certainly not for all, to accept the public interest as a
normative concept. They are unwilling, however, to abandon the
idea of the public interest as a standard of public policy. They con-
sider it an important element in the decision-making process, not
merely the cynical rhetoric of the politician or administrator, and
not simply a "datum" of politics. The theories in this category may
be divided into three groups.
The first alternative theory to the denial of the reality of the pub-
lic interest is an old one which today has few adherents. Never-
theless, it should be mentioned in any survey of theories of the pub-
lic interest. This theory conceives of the public interest as the sum
or aggregation of individual interests. Its lineage traces back at
least to Bentham and the Utilitarians, for whom the goal of society
was the greatest good for the greatest number. The old and well-
known objections raised against Utilitarianism probably account for
the relative lack of popularity of the aggregation theory today. Yet,
there are those who maintain the position in spite of its difficulties;
it has, however, few systematic statements.36 The aggregation
36
For a discussion of various types of Utilitarian public-interest theory, see
Martin Meyerson and Edward C. Banfield, Politics, Planning and the Public
Interest (Glencoe, 111.: The Free Press, 1955), 324ff. For brief statements
by some political scientists, see Leys and Perry, Philosophy, 17-18; and Robert
A. Dahl and Charles E. Lindblom, Politics, Economics and Welfare (New
York: Harper & Brothers, 1953), 25-54, esp. 41-47, 51-54. For a more fully
developed theory, see Roscoe Pound, An Introduction to the Philosophy of
340 THE JOUBNAL OF POLITICS, VOL. 36, 1974
Law (rev. ed.: New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1954) and Social
Control Through Law (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1942);
Julius Stone, Social Dimensions of Law and Justice (Stanford, Calif.: Stan-
ford University Press, 1966), 165-182. Stone was a student of Pound's and
his ideas closely parallel those of his teacher. Pound and Stone, of course,
are not political scientists but legal theorists. An interesting discussion of
Bentham may be found in J. A. W. Gunn, "Jeremy Bentham and the Public
Interest," Canadian Journal of Political Science, 1 (December 1968), 398-413.
37
Public Interest, 202.
38
Democracy and the Public Interest (Athens: University of Georgia Press,
1960).
3
Ibid., 27-31, 153-155.
*o Ibid., 27, 31, 94, 111.
"THE PUBLIC INTEREST" 341
than with the process itself. In summary, Smith holds that the
public interest is identical with the result of the democratic interest-
conflict process as long as that result is responsive to the substantive
community consensus.41 A difficulty, however, arises since, accord-
ing to his theory, there can be no guarantee that the consensus is
respected other than the guarantee given by the process itself; Smith
has ruled out normative considerations as authoritarian. If no one
has the authority to say that a particular policy ought to be followed
(because only the process itself can determine such questions), then
no one has the authority to determine when a policy is responsive
to the substantive community consensus. The interest-group pro-
cess itself must guarantee this, as Bentley argued when he postu-
lated that the result of the process must be equilibrium.42 The
political process not only produces the public interest; it also guar-
antees its authenticity.
Smith's identification of the result of the interest-group process
with the public interest is merely the explicit statement of some-
thing implicit even in the works of those, like Bentley and Truman,
who deny the validity of the public interest. There is an implicit
belief that the result of the decision-making process will be bene-
ficial to society. As Grant McConnell puts it, "Curiously, a notion
of the public interest, or something much like it, tended to slip
back into this scheme of things [group competition], in the guise of
a belief that the result of the various group forces at work was
beneficent."43 Indeed such a notion must be present in this scheme,
for to define politics without reference to a purpose of social benefit
is to relegate it to the sphere of anomic and pathological behavior.
Yet, once purpose finds its way back into politics, so do normative
standards, despite the gate-guarding of positivism. The attempt to
define the public interest without reference to such standards
founders on the necessity of smuggling them back into the theory.
The public interest defined as the result of interest-group conflict
also flies in the face of ordinary linguistic usage, for such a result
is neither public nor an interest, as Sorauf points out. "The public
interest as a compromise is no longer an interest that men strive for,
IV
Other interest-group theorists have tried to avoid the difficulties
involved in identifying the public interest with the outcome of the
political process by declaring that the process itself is the public
interest provided that certain standards of "due process" are ob-
served.45 In this third subcategory of theories, the public interest
is defined by the interest process. This group may be called "pro-
ceduralists." Sorauf summarizes the position as follows: "To put it
briefly, the process of compromise and accommodation, so charac-
44
"Public Interest Reconsidered," 630. See Lowi, End, 71-72 et passim.
45
Often it is not clear whether a particular writer belongs to one category
or the other. It is not clear whether the public interest is seen as the outcome
of the process or as the process itself. See Sorauf, "Public Interest Recon-
sidered," 623, where he argues t h a t the idea of t h e public interest as com-
promise often does not distinguish between "compromise-as-result" and "com-
promise-as-method." For a discussion which bears upon this question, cf.
Leys and Perry, Philosophy, 25-38. Others beside H o w a r d R. Smith who
might fall into the compromise-as-result or mechanist school include V. O.
Key, Jr., Politics, Parties and Pressure Groups ( 3 r d ed.; N e w York: Thomas
Y. Crowell Co., 1956), 173-178, esp. 174; E. Pendleton Herring, Public Ad-
ministration and the Public Interest ( N e w York: McGraw-Hill Book Co.,
1936), 134, 209 ( b u t see the discussion below of Herring's ambiguities);
Arthur Holcombe, Our More Perfect Union ( C a m b r i d g e , Mass.: Harvard
University Press, 1950), 426.
"THE PUBLIC INTEREST" 343
46
"Public Interest Reconsidered," 623. See, also, Schubert, Public Interest,
137, a n d " 'Public Interest' in Administrative Decision-Making," 3 6 6 ; and
Leys a n d Perry, Philosophy, 26.
47
"Public Interest Reconsidered," 623.
48
Lowi, End, a n d " T h e Public Philosophy: Interest-Group Liberalism,"
American Political Science Review, 6 1 ( M a r c h 1 9 6 7 ) , 5-24.
49
Philosophy, 2 6 .
50
Ideal and Practice in Public Administration (University: University of
Alabama Press, 1 9 5 8 ) , 113-114; see also Herring, "Public Interest," Interna-
tional Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, ed. David L . Sills, 1 3 ( N e w York:
Macmillan Company and Free Press, 1968), 170. In his Democracy in the
Administrative State (New York: Oxford University Press, 1969), Redford
attempts to spell out administrative due-process in detail.
344 THE JOURNAL OF POLITICS, VOL. 36, 1974
so Ibid., 34.
57
Ibid., 23-25, 4 3 . Similar statements are found in Phillip Moneypenny,
"A Code of Ethics for Public Administration," George Washington Law Re-
view, 21 (March 1953), 4 4 1 ; John M. Pfiffner and R. Vance Presthus, Public
Administration ( 3 r d ed.; New York: Ronald Press Company, 1953), 55, 529-
530, 532; Norton E. Long, "Public Policy a n d Administration: the Goals of
Rationality and Responsibility," Public Administration Review, 14 (Winter
1954), 22-31; Redford, Ideal and Practice, 114, and "The Protection of the
Public Interest with Special Attention to Administrative Regulation," Ameri-
can Political Science Review, 4 8 (December 1954), 1,106-1,109.
58
Ideal and Practice, 114.
ss " T h e Public Philosophy," 12.
Ibid.
346 THE JOURNAL OF POLITICS, VOL. 36, 1974
The approach just considered really gives only a partial answer to the third
question. But because its upholders also thought that it was answering the
other questions as well they could see no point in any substantive definition
of the common good.84
64
"Political Justice," 162.
63
Pfiffner and Presthus, Public Administration, 525. Sorauf, "Public In-
terest Reconsidered," 639. Cf. the almost identical concept in Moneypenny,
"Code of Ethics," 441, and Herring, Public Administration, 335ff., 375-376.
68 Herring, "Public Interest," 170-171; Pennock, 'The One and the Many:
A Note on the Concept," in Nomos V, ed. Friedrich, 180-182.
67
"The Public Interest: Its Meaning in a Democracy," Social Research, 29
(Spring 1962), 1-2, 4, 10.
348 THE JOUBNAL OF POLITICS, VOL. 36, 1974
68
The Public Interest (New York: lohn Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1966).
89
For another attempt, with different results, to deal with the concept of
the public interest from the perspective of linguistic analysis, see the work of
the British political scientist, Brian Barry, "The Public Interest," in Bias of
Pluralism, ed. Connolly, 159-177, and "The Use and Abuse of T h e Public
Interest'," in Nomos V, ed. Friedrich, 191-204. The most recent attempt to
deal philosophically with the concept of the public interest is Held's, Public
Interest and Individual Interests.
70
Public Interest, 32-52, et passim.
"THE PUBLIC INTEREST" 349
This last assertion, however, does not carry us very far in determin-
ing a descriptive meaning of the public interest. It is essentially a
functional definition. Realizing this, Flathman amplifies the idea
of standards and principles:
We conclude that "public interest" is a general commendatory concept used
in selecting and justifying public policy. It has no general, unchanging, de-
scriptive meaning applicable to all policy decisions, but a nonarbitrary de-
scriptive meaning can be determined for it in particular cases. This descrip-
tive meaning is properly found through reasoned discourse which attempts to
relate the anticipated effects of a policy to community values and to test that
relation by formal principles.74
Ibid., 52.
72
/fcid, 45.
Ibid., 73.
>* Ibid., 8 2 .
350 THE JOURNAL OF POLITICS, VOL. 36, 1974
VI
It should be apparent from this attempt to discover a central
theme in the recent literature on the concept of the public interest
that, with a few exceptionsnotably Lippmann, Cassinelli, the
common-good theorists, and, to some extent, the consensualists
the debate over the public interest is almost a textbook case of the
dominance of the politics of interest. Two fundamental principles
of the politics of interest give form to an underlying unity among
78
F o r a discussion of some of t h e problems involved in t h e role of the
public authorities in Flathman's theory, see t h e review of his book by C. E .
Lindblom, American Political Science Review, 6 0 ( D e c e m b e r 1966), 1,008-
1,009.
79
Despite her criticism of Flathman's public-interest theory (Public Interest
and Individual Interests, 152-154), Held's own explication of the concept is
in many ways similar. Her own discussion, however, goes beyond Flath-
man's and is more suggestive and stimulating for an adequate account of the
public interest. It should be noted that the account above of Flathman's
theory contains an interpretation of him which differs from Held's.
352 THE JOURNAL OF POLITICS, VOL. 36, 1974
When we think about men and the way in which they are bound
together into groups, two images are immediately presented. In
sociological thought they are described by the familiar distinction
between Gesellschaft and Gemeinschaft. The first image is one of
free and sovereign individuals freely consenting to join together the
better to pursue their individual interests and to protect their lives
and fortunes. This concept can be called the "image of contract
or partnership"; it lies at the heart of the politics of interest and of
the dominant conceptions of the public interest. The second image
is one of a group of men so firmly united to one another that the
moment of their joining together cannot be specified. Their bonds
are spiritual, ethical, symbolic, and psychological, as well as physi-
cal. They are united to share common experiences and endeavors
a common life. This concept can be called the "image of com-
munity." Political theory must begin to deal with wholes as well
as parts and with community as well as partnership. It must dis-
cover again the important place of organic wholes in social and
political experience and take account of them theoretically.84
The concept of community, then, should stand at the center of a
theoretical discussion of political order. This concept, however,
does not deny, but rather affirms man's individuality and his in-
dividual dignity. It does so because it also realizes that man's in-
dividuality is completed only in relations of community with others.
As George Morgan has put it:
The fullness of individuality and the fullness of relation go together. In re-
sponding to another, in opening the self to a personal encounter, in assuming
responsibility for another being, man is genuinely an individual self. His own
being and his being in relation with another are one reality. 86
Beacon Press Inc., 1968), chaps. 4-5; Carl J. Friedrich, ed., Nomos II: Com-
munity (New York: Liberal Arts Press, 1959); Simon, Philosophy of Demo-
cratic Government; Robert A. Nisbet, The Quest for Community (New York:
Oxford University Press, 1953, 1969); Cochran, "The Politics of Interest: The
Eclipse of Community in Contemporary American Political Theory" (un-
published Ph.D. dissertation, Duke University, 1971), chaps. 6-7.
84
Sheldon S. Wolin, Politics and Vision (Boston: Little, Brown & Co.,
1960), 3-10, 429-434, a n d "Political Theory as a Vocation," American Po-
litical Science Review, 63 (December 1969), 1,076-1,082; Morgan, Human
Predicament, esp. pt. 3 ; Alfred North Whitehead, Science and the Modem
World ( N e w York: Free Press, 1967), chaps. 4-5, and esp. 64ff., 7 3 , 90, 193-
199.
85
Human Predicament, 314.
"THE PUBLIC INTEREST" 355
86
" T h e Common Good," Proceedings and Addresses of The American
Philosophical Association, 24 (September 1951), 16.
87
Wolff has also identified t h e common good with community. Poverty of
Liberalism, chap. 5.