MacIntyre's ethics is communitarian; the way he sees things, values flow from society to individuals rather than vice versa. Thus I have come to see his critique of enlightenment philosophy (such as utilitarianism) as part of a deeper attack: on Hobbes' egoism, as well as on the Cartesian notion of the 'self' being the point of certainty that all philosophy begins with. Aristotle was in no doubt of man's ties to society, famously describing mankind not just as 'the rational animal' but also as: 'zoon politikon' (the social animal).
I was impressed by aspects of his argument in his more recent work: 'Dependent Rational Animals'. I like the fact that his attitude to humanity is biologically rooted in modern common sense, and recognizes the fact that we are animals - correcting Aristotle's dated, arrogant, anthropocentric assumption that 'animals were made for the sake of man'. I also like the argument for communitarianism there which emphasizes the importance of the virtue of care/compassion (notoriously missing from Aristotle's 12 moral virtues). He makes a straightforward convincing case for our interdependence right from birth and into old age. This recognition of our own dependence imposes a (prudential) duty on us towards all those who are also dependent (such as the disabled). I was expecting the more traditional economic Marxist argument about the need for mutual economy, but it was much more personal and humane than that.
The critique of Bentham's approach to politics (treating people as units, and society as a sum) and Kant's idea of using "pure reason" to find "universalisable" categorical imperatives is found in MacIntyre's book "A Short History of Ethics". In his view meta-ethics follows a path from these formulaic doctrines via subjectivism to a 'Nietzschean morality', or even emotivism, such as that proposed by AJ Ayer. He thinks that this has been destructive and has left everyone generally confused about right and wrong. He argues that with a better conception of the self - as being essentially part of a society - one can avoid such naive errors and reconnect with the genuine values traditionally espoused in Western narratives.
I value individuality highly, and the personal liberties that Western cultures have fought for must be treasured -(and some are only recently or partially won). We would be foolish to take them for granted. Although Aristotle favoured a 'timocracy', that in his culture may not have respected the rights of 'lower' individuals (women, for example!!!), I don't see any essential conflict between MacIntyre's ethics and the freedom of expression that I care about. After all, believing in society is not the same thing as denying the individual (though Margaret Thatcher in denying the former seemed to imply these two were mutually exclusive!) It is with the idea of a 'pure individual' that I am taking issue.
I recently read a great article by Jonathan Lethem about influence. It struck home something I've always suspected: our creative free will is not so much about the expression of one's independent self as the expression of the self within the community we identify with. Though we are indeed unique, our genes are merely a jumbling of the DNA of our ancestors with a few random mutated 'letters' thrown into the code. I always struggled when trying to write songs, partly because I am no musical genius, but partly because everything I wrote felt too much like a tribute to songs that were already out there. The point I'm trying to emphasize is that the 'pure individual' is a myth - though we 'add our own unique voice to the choir', so to speak, we would be nothing without the choir that trained us to sing for ourselves.
