Week 3: guiding philosophies

Part 3 of Crime and Punishment introduces the reader to Raskolnikov’s mother and sister, who have travelled to St. Petersburg on the invitation of Luzhin (the man who proposed to the sister). Raskolnikov’s cold and curt behaviour to those who try and help him isn’t any different to his family than it was to his friends. He asks his mother, sister, and friend (Razumikhin) to ‘stop harassing him’ when they stop by his flat to check in on his health. Part 3 convinces the reader of a central theme to Raskolnikov’s character — his ego. Its quite likely that his resistance to accepting any help offered to him is a result of him simply thinking that those who have tried to help him are far too inferior to him. His anger and rudeness most likely stem from some overinflated belief in his own intellect and abilities.

Previously in the book, Raskolnikov thinks that his sister agreeing to marry Luzhin (a wealthy man who can offer Raskolnikov a job and give his sister and mother a comfortable life) was motivated by a desire to help him. He believes that his sister is sacrificing her dignity in her marriage to Luzhin (who is portrayed as elitist and arrogant), and says that he won’t accept that she may have her own motivations for the marriage. He even alludes to believing his sister will get some sadistic joy out of being in a position to help him. He doesn’t seem happy in accepting the world as anything other than how he sees it.

Dostoyevsky has spent a lot of time through the chapters of Part 3 exploring Raskolnikov’s ego. He is described as ‘standoffish and proud’ and as not listening to or being interested in what other people have to say. He has a fearfully high opinion of himself, says his friend Razumikhin. His mother worries about whether he actually loves his family and his sister is surprised by how he talks to her and their mother, as if speaking with them is a chore to him. In some instances, his mother and sister seem afraid to talk to him because of his tone and stated disinterest in matters from their lives which don’t relate directly to him. There is a clear distance between Raskolnikov and his family, but they love and trust him (even though he is insulting, rude, and arrogant). To an extent that his sister even agrees to end her engagement to Luzhin, on Raskolnikov’s insistence.

But the strongest indictment of Raskolnikov’s ego comes right before the halfway mark of the book. In a meeting he has with a police officer about retrieving some of the items he had pawned to the women he killed. The officer brings up an article that Raskolnikov published about the nature of crime. Raskolnikov argues in this article that the world is divided into ‘ordinary’ and ‘extraordinary’ persons, the latter of whom have the right and duty to commit crimes and atrocities if doing so is the a way for them to performing great and important tasks. He argues that if ten people came in the way of Newton publishing his work, Newton absolutely has the right and duty to ‘get rid of’ these people. All of these extraordinary people, for Raskolnikov, had to be criminals in some way to achieve greatness. He believes the ordinary people to be of 2 categories: those who like to obey, and those who like to destroy; and believes it reasonable for the extraordinary to ‘cross a legal line’ if the latter of the ordinary people get in their way. This is an obvious allusion to what Raskolnikov thought of the pawnbroker (as we saw earlier in the book, Raskolnikov believed her murder to be justified as a ‘net positive’ to society). This version of caste that Raskolnikov imagines in the world is of course not original, but what stands out is his belief that certain crimes are ethical if they are committed by those Raskolnikov sees as extraordinary. “That’s the way things are, and that’s how they’ll always be”, he says. He later confirms his belief that he himself is extraordinary, in the same ranks as Napoleon. The greatness that Napoleon achieved gives him permission to do anything, according to Raskolnikov. It is clear, after reading this, that Raskolnikov’s ego and rationalisation of his crimes are founded in his classist worldview.

Raskolnikov’s evidence to support his worldview is virtually non-existent. I find it quite amusing that a supposedly intelligent law student produced an argument this bad. Most of his claims about great people having to commit some crimes to achieve their greatness is based on conjecture and is completely hypothetical. Further, he ignores the institutional and societal processes that put people in powerful and influential positions. But I suspect his own ego masks from him another flaw in his design — that anyone with above average vanity and arrogance can use the excuse of being extraordinary to rationalise their crimes.

It’s obviously easy to claim that the world would be better if there were no obstacles to the accomplishment of things that improve the wellbeing of all. An obvious example is the race to vaccinate the world against Covid-19. It would be great if there were no logistic and distributional challenges to distributing the vaccine, but there are. Another related example is the need to impose lockdowns and restrictions to prevent the spread of the disease. It would make everyone happy if so many people didn’t lose their jobs or fall back in their learning or have to cancel their social plans, but as the Sisyphean lockdown cycle in the UK should teach us, hard sacrifices need to be made for long term benefit. It’s easier still to construct a hypothetical ethical quandary and wax lyrical about its philosophical implications, like the trolley problem (also made for one of the best scenes in television history). But in realty there I can’t think of any reasonable and believable situations in which a person would actually have to commit a crime to supposedly ‘progress the wellbeing of all mankind’.

But of course, all is not well in the world. People believe and spread nefarious information often (online conspiracy theories, disinformation campaigns), and the interests of the few can and have come in the way of the interests of the many. There are some difficult but necessary policy solutions that may help in this. But I don’t see how Raskolnikov’s worldview helps do this in any meaningful way.

I can’t claim to be a legal scholar or an expert in moral philosophy but it seems obvious that Raskolnikov’s claim of extraordinariness are rooted in a poorly constructed worldview (supported by dubious evidence and unnecessary conflating) and a belief that his own intelligence is extraordinary.

Part 3 ends with Raskolnikov having a nightmare about his victims. The police now suspect him and a stranger he runs into claims to know that he is guilty.