Clarifying Envy
Citing a
careful definition provided by William L. Davidson in the Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Schoeck writes:
Envy is an emotion that is
essentially both selfish and malevolent. It is aimed at persons, and implies
dislike of one who possesses what the envious man himself covets or desires,
and a wish to harm him [the envied]... There is in it also a consciousness of
inferiority to the person envied… He who has got what I envy is felt by me to
have the advantage of me, and I resent it. Consequently, I rejoice if he finds
that his envied possession does not give him entire satisfaction – much more,
if it actually entails on him dissatisfaction and pain… (Schoeck, pg. 20-21)
With this definition, we see that envy is complicated. It is
generally a painful emotional state, but can give rise to pleasure if the
envier subjectively perceives that the envied person is in some way set-back or
dissatisfied. Typically the object of envy is something material, but it need
not be, as in the case of fixating on the envied persons “good looks” or
“superior intelligence”. Schoeck elaborates that “envy very often denies the
asset itself” (pg. 19). By this, he means that the envier fixates more on the
perceived level of satisfaction of the envied person than the actual object of
envy, in some cases preferring the loss or destruction of the object to the
perceived detriment of the envied person. Even dissatisfaction suffered by the
envied person unrelated to object can please the envier.
Shoeck goes to great lengths to
distinguish what he perceives to be some misconceptions about the concept of
envy. One of these misconceptions is the idea of envy as emulation. When
advertisers use a phrase like “Be the envy of all your friends with Product X!”,
they’re probably not trying to invoke the destructiveness which typically
characterizes envy proper. They’re attempting to awaken the “animal spirits”
(to basterdize a Keynesian phrase) by ingeniously tapping into our deepest
desires for admiration and respect.
Another common misconception is the
conflation of envy with jealousy. Where with envy, one would ignore/destroy the
object of envy, the coveted asset in the case of jealousy is the prize to be
won. Additionally, Schoeck writes: “…the jealous man is often in doubt as to
the nature of his antagonist: whether he is a genuine, honourable rival on his
own level or an envious man… intent merely on destruction” (pg. 19). The sense
of inferiority is implied with the experience of envy, not necessarily so with
jealousy. Jealousy differs from envy also in that it typically requires
competition between two individuals over a prize: “Jealousy arises out of an
opinion of what is one’s due…” (Schoeck pg. 21). It’s not clear that envy
requires this competition, as we can imagine the envious person dreaming up all
sorts of violent fantasies directed towards the envied person who remains
totally unaware of their existence.
The Inevitability of
Envy
Can there
be such a thing as an envy-free society? If by envy-free we mean “a social
reality in which nothing is left that is enviable” (Schoeck pg. 341), then as
we have seen from our definition of envy, this is seemingly impossible – the
object of envy can very easily transfer from distributions of wealth to
intangible personal attributes. The presumption that envy emerges because of
unjustifiable economic inequalities has led some utopian dreamers to the
conclusion that a strictly egalitarian society, where all are thought to be
treated exactly the same, can solve the problem of envy. The “socialist”
experiments in the Soviet Union are a tempting example of the failure of
egalitarianism, but the USSR’s hierarchical decision-making and bureaucratic
nature make it a poor sample of strict egalitarian societies. Instead, Schoeck
cites examples of life on the kibbutz (an Israeli communal settlement and
deliberate experiment in strict egalitarianism first pioneered in the early
20th century), discussing some of the serious challenges that kibbutzniks face.
In the case of electing leaders for
important tasks, the artificial expectation of intense mistrust of anyone with
an elevated social status, even if democratically imposed, leads to a ‘refusal
pattern’, where “all seek to evade nomination or acceptance wherever anyone has
to be chosen for necessary office” (Schoeck pg. 347). As natural divisions of
labor emerged due to the unique talents of individuals, Schoeck recounts an
experience that kibbutznik Melford Spiro encountered when he lived on a kibbutz:
“One man told Spiro that he found it impossible to develop his poetic gift
because he could not help thinking of his comrades, capable only of manual
labour, who, as children, had sat next to him in the latrine…” (Schoeck pg.
351). The kibbutznik come as close as any modern society to establishing strict
egalitarianism, but the problems of envy continue to persist. It would seem
then that envy is an inevitable part of social life.
REFERENCE
Schoeck, H. (1969). Envy: A theory of social behaviour. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World.
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