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John Mill’s so-called harm principle is right accurately accounting for individual freedoms, and
the rights of a society to intervene in certain situations. In this paper I will first define John Mill’s harm
principle. After defining his principle I will discuss objections to this libertarian view which examine the
loop holes within his principle. Once I have outlined the objections to John Stuart Mill’s harm principle I
will argue that he accurately accounts for these discrepancies, and that in fact his principle is the best
argument for the freedoms of individuals and rights of societies. To conclude I will state that Mill’s harm
principle is right due to the arguments that I make in my previous paragraphs for and against his
principle.
One of John Mill’s most influential philosophical works is On Liberty. The goal of this essay is to
define the boundaries between societal control and the individual. He accomplishes this by creating a
simple principle the Harm Principle which he introduces at the beginning of this essay. He states, “That
principle is, that the sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering
with the liberty of action of any of their number, is self-protection.”(Mill) The basic idea is that the only
time in which society may control an individual freedoms is when the individual may cause harm to
others. Mill argues that the liberty of the individual to think and do as they wish is crucial to the
wellbeing of society. He states later on that basically the purpose of freedom is the ability of an
individual to pursue their, “own good in their own way.” (Mill) The only time that a society should
intervene with an individual’s pursuit of their own good is when their “good” or “way” is harmful to
others in the society. Their actions can not affect other members of the society in a negative way, or the
society has the right to intervene with the individual and take action in order to hinder the negative
effects. Mill goes into more detail later explaining his two maxims which account for the rights of the
individual and the rights of the society. The first of two maxims emphasis the idea that society does have
the right to intervene with an individual’s actions if the actions of the individual are only concerning that
individual. The second maxim accounts for the idea that society does in fact have the right to protect the
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society as a whole when the actions of an individual affect the society in a negative way. If an
individual’s actions have consequences for society then society has the right to change the freedom of
the individual for the benefit of the society.
There are several aspects of John Mill’s Harm Principle that can be debated. There are many
loop holes in his theory that lead some people to believe that the harm principle is not right. One of the
first controversies is that the idea that the line between an individuals actions effecting only the
individual, and their actions effecting the society as a whole is very thin. Society and government can in
any situation use this principle to take away the freedoms of the individual, or the individual can argue
that their actions are not harming the society therefore they should not be persecuted. This challenging
aspect of Mill’s harm principle is clear in arguments regarding Marijuana use today in the United States.
Those arguing for legalization of marijuana believe that smoking pot does not affect the society only the
individual therefore the society has no right to place laws on the drug. Those arguing against marijuana
would state that the effects of marijuana use spread across the society not just the individual. For
example marijuana leads to increase in schizophrenia among individual which puts a strain on the
mental health institutions of the society, marijuana leads to more drug use with increases the amount of
drugs floating around in a society, or the marijuana causes people to stop perusing education which
lowers income levels in a society. Those who believe that Mill’s harm principle is not right would say that
it is an ineffective way to counter these arguments. In order for a action to have no effect on outside
people then it would have to occur in a vacuum is what many would argue. Therefore the harm principle
does not effectively answer the challenging question of when does the society have the right to restrict
the individuals freedoms. Another argument against Mill’s principle is that it allots a lot of room for
authorities to control human liberties. It can be argued that due to the fact that actions and inactions
often cause harm, and the authorities government or society can turn any individual action in a way that
shows it is causing harm to others. They believe that this is a loop hole in Mill’s harm principle. The
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argument is that there is no way to make a distinction between self-regarding actions and actions that
effect the group as a whole. There are also those who would take a different approach to argue against
Mill’s harm principle. They would argue that the government or authority figures have a moral
obligation to protect its citizens. If an individual is going to harm to themselves then the government
should limit the amount of harmful opportunities. If only these arguments are considered then one
would believe that the harm principle is wrong, however, Mill makes statements that counter these
arguments and lead one to agree that the harm principle is right.
Mill’s takes into account the idea that individual’s actions inevitable effect the society, and that
there is a connection of all people making it nearly impossible for individual actions to not have at the
very least a slight effect on society. He states, “I fully admit that the harm a person does to himself may
seriously affect (both through their sympathies and their interests) those closely connected with him,
and may in a lesser degree affect society in general.”(Mill) He counters this idea by clearing defining the
harm as a damage to others. The action can not merely affect others it must in fact harm them in their
goal of achieving happiness. Which is the ultimate goal of human society. Therefore if a action of an
individual damages the society or has the potential to damage the society. The society must take action.
He also goes on to discuss how the majority can come to the conclusion on whether something is
damaging or not. If the majority believe that an action for example marijuana has the ability to damage
the society then it is the right of the government or authority to inhibit the negative outcome. This
principle explains why it is right for a government to have rules and regulations for its society to follow.
If one were to consider the harm principle in its most basic manner than loop holes could be argued and
they could say that it isn’t right. After discussing Mill’s counter argument and examining his principle in
more detail this argument is not valid. For the second argument against Mill’s harm principle he would
say that the morality of the government is not as important as the liberty of the individual. If we analyze
and treat individuals as if they are unable to make their own decisions then we are infringing upon their
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liberties. A society has the right to influence individuals to live healthy lives for example commercials
against smoking, or telling people the facts about unhealthy diets, but the government does not have
the ability to stop individuals from taking the action of smoking. If you infringe upon one principle you
are likely to fall into the slipper slop trap and eventually eliminate all liberties. This shows that Mill’s
harm principle is still correct.
After presenting the harm principle, analyzing arguments against the principle, and countering
those arguments by including more depth regarding Mill’s priniciple it can be concluded that the harm
principle is right. There is no reason that an individual’s liberties should be infringed upon as long as
they are not damaging others.
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Work Cited
"Problems with Mill's Harm Principle." <i>Ramble Focus Ramble</i>. N.p., 12 Dec. 2012. Web. 05 Nov.
2015.
Mill, John Stewart. "Liberty." (1982): n. pag. <i>Early Modern Text</i>. Mar. 2005. Web. 5 Nov. 2015.