Co-operation as it is understood here includes people in social systems. It lets them participate in decisions and establishes a more just distribution of and access to resources. Hence co-operation is a way of achieving and realising basic human needs. Competition in contrast is a way of achieving and realising basic human needs only for certain groups and by excluding others. Co-operation forms thus the essence of human society, whereas competition alienates humans from their essence. For Hegel, essence means
things really are not what they immediately show themselves. There is something more to be done than merely rove from one quality to another, and merely to advance from qualitative to quantitative, and vice versa: there is a permanence in things, and that permanence is in the first instance their Essence (Hegel 1830, §112).
Essence is ‘the sum total of all realities’ (Hegel 1812, §810). ‘The truth of being is essence’, essence is the ‘background [that] constitutes the truth of being (Hegel 1830, §807).
One can imagine a society that functions without competition. A society without competition is still a society. One can, however, not imagine a society that functions without a certain degree of co-operation and social activity. A society without co-operation is not a society. It is rather a state of permanent warfare, egoism, and mutual destruction that sooner or later destroys all human existence. If co-operation is the essence of society, then a truly human society is a co-operative society. Full co-operation is just another formulation for participatory democracy. Co-operation as the highest principle of morality is grounded in society and social activity itself. It can be rationally explained within society. For doing so, there is no need for referring to a highest transcendental absolute principle such as God that cannot be justified within society. Co-operative ethics is a critique of lines of thought and arguments that want to advance exclusion and heteronomy in society. It is inherently critical and subjects commonly accepted ideas, conventions, traditions, prejudices, and myths to critical questioning. It questions mainstream opinions and voices alternatives to them in order to avoid one-dimensional thinking and strengthen complex, dialectical, multi-dimensional thinking. Co-operation is the immanent essence of all societies. It is grounding human existence. Competitive class-based societies estrange society from its very essence. To transcend estrangement and the false state of society means to constitute transcendental political projects that struggle for the abolition of domination so that the immanent essence of society can be realised. This transcendence is grounded in society itself, in the co-operation process of humans. It is an immanent transcendence.
Herbert Marcuse and Social Media
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