Ayn Rand’s “The ‘Conflicts’ of Men’s Interests”

We’re often told that self-interest is a zero-sum game: if you win, someone else must lose. Whether it’s landing a job, getting a promotion, or falling in love, your gain is assumed to come at another’s expense. It’s a grim view of life — and one that rarely gets questioned.

Ayn Rand questioned it.

In “The ‘Conflicts’ of Men’s Interests,” Ayn Rand dismantles the popular belief that such clashes are inevitable. For decades, this essay was available only in print in The Virtue of Selfishness. Now, for the first time, it’s been made available to read online, thanks to rights secured by the Ayn Rand Institute.

In the essay, Rand argues that the real source of conflict isn’t competing goals — it’s a mistaken view of what our interests actually are. Too many people assume that wanting something makes it good for them. But desire alone doesn’t determine what truly serves our well-being.

Rand also targets the habit of treating our goals as if they exist in a vacuum, detached from the means of achieving them and the incalculable value we gain from competition. If fulfilling a desire required wiping out the competition, what kind of world would that imply? A world without freedom, without progress, and without the mutual gains that come from exchanging knowledge and effort in a free society.

If you’re tired of the worn-out narrative that self-interest is inherently zero-sum — or if you’ve never questioned it — this essay is worth your attention.

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Some students of Objectivism find it difficult to grasp the Objectivist principle that “there are no conflicts of interests among rational men.”

A typical question runs as follows: “Suppose two men apply for the same job. Only one of them can be hired. Isn’t this an instance of a conflict of interests, and isn’t the benefit of one man achieved at the price of the sacrifice of the other?”

There are four interrelated considerations which are involved in a rational man’s view of his interests, but which are ignored or evaded in the above question and in all similar approaches to the issue. I shall designate these four as: (a) “Reality,” (b) “Context,” (c) “Responsibility,” (d) “Effort.”

Read the full essay here.

Also available in the book The Virtue of Selfishness.