Utilitarianism

John Stuart Mill’s short defence of the greatest-happiness principle, published as three articles in Fraser’s Magazine in 1861 and as a book in 1863. Mill takes Bentham’s claim — that actions are right in proportion as they promote happiness — and tries to answer the objections that had made it easy to dismiss: that it is a doctrine fit for pigs (hence the distinction between higher and lower pleasures), that it leaves no room for justice or rights, that no one has time to calculate consequences before acting, and that you cannot prove a first principle. It is the text through which utilitarianism became a respectable moral theory rather than a reformer’s slogan.

Why it’s on the list: Assigned in the University of Austin’s Intellectual Foundations of Economics course. Utilitarianism is the philosophical bridge the course needs: welfare economics, cost-benefit analysis and the entire modern habit of adding up preferences to decide policy all inherit Mill’s move, and reading him first makes visible how much the discipline assumes without arguing.

Where I saw it: On the University of Austin’s Fall 2025 reading list, “65 Texts Our Students Are Reading”, November 13 2025, saved to Kyle’s “Books To Read” Apple Note. The full 65-text curriculum is transcribed on UATX Fall Reading List.

Connections

• UATX Fall Reading List — the curriculum this is assigned in.
• Utilitarianism — the concept page; this card is the book that named it.
• Moral Philosophy · Ethics — the field it argues in.
• Economics — the course context, and where the principle went on to operate.