Altruism in five disciplines

Altruism in five disciplines means asking the same question – why people help others even when it costs them something – from five directions. Philosophy asks whether altruism is rational; anthropology, whether it lies in our nature; social psychology, when and why people help; economics, whether human beings calculate only for themselves; sociology, what holds a society together. This page sums up what ten thinkers from these disciplines contribute – as Tobias O. R. Alke selected them in 2017 in Selected Perspectives on Altruism and checked them anew against the original texts in 2026.

The result in one sentence: Human beings are built for consideration; altruism and self-interest do not exclude each other; reciprocity sustains where it is free, and coercion destroys what it means to protect.

The word itself was coined by Auguste Comte in 1851 – “vivre pour autrui”, to live for others (see Altruism in Comte). What the term means today is set out in the entry Altruism; this page puts the disciplines in order.

Philosophy: Is altruism rational?

For Thomas Nagel, altruism is not a stirring of feeling but a requirement of reason: whoever sees themselves as one among many must take the reasons of others as seriously as their own – just as prudence takes the future self as seriously as the present one. He does not refute the egoist; he shows the price. Friedrich Nietzsche provides the counter-test: his slave morality is a way of valuing that arises from the resentment of the powerless – not a form of helping. At the same time he knows a giving out of abundance, which he himself calls selfishness and which we read as altruism out of freedom.

→ The Possibility of Altruism (Nagel) · Slave morality (Nietzsche) · Standpoint The Good in the Human Being in Friedrich Nietzsche

Anthropology: Does readiness to help lie in our nature?

Frans de Waal gave the view that morality is a thin layer over a self-serving nature the name veneer theory – and contradicted it: empathy and reciprocity are building blocks of morality, grown in the evolution of social animals. Michael Tomasello shows that children help of their own accord from around their first birthday, without reward; whom they help, they learn. For him, altruism grows out of collaboration for mutual benefit. Both leave open whether human beings are “good” – capable of morality they certainly are.

→ Veneer theory (de Waal) · Shared intentionality (Tomasello) · The prosocial nature of human beings

Social psychology: When and why do people help?

Hans-Werner Bierhoff sorts the reasons: empathy, norms of responsibility and reciprocity, personality – and the situation that inhibits help when responsibility is spread across many. He also shows the recipients’ side: help that cannot be returned hurts; help that creates dependence misses its aim. Whether a purely altruistic motive exists he calls an open question; as a rule, both motives operate at once. Marco F. H. Schmidt and Jessica A. Sommerville found that children as young as 15 months expect a fair distribution – and those who do are more likely to share; confirmed several times in its direction, probably overestimated in its strength.

→ Helping Behaviour (Bierhoff) · Fairness expectations (Schmidt/Sommerville) · Empathy

Economics: Do human beings calculate only for themselves?

Ernst Fehr and Simon Gächter showed that people punish free riders at their own cost and that cooperation then rises; they call this altruistic punishment. The research since then teaches the measure: moderate punishment, experienced as fair, supports cooperation; too much destroys it. Axel Ockenfels explains fairness and reciprocity by the fact that people also pay attention to their standing relative to others. Economics thereby gives up, of its own accord, the assumption of pure self-interest – not rationality.

→ Altruistic punishment (Fehr/Gächter) · Fairness in economic decisions (Ockenfels) · Standpoints Do people only calculate for themselves? · Who really exploits – state or market?

Sociology: What holds a society together?

Émile Durkheim finds the cohesion of modern societies in the division of labour: whoever can do different things depends on others, and the foundation of this solidarity is altruism; a forced division of labour he calls an abnormal form. Marcel Mauss shows through the gift that giving is free and obligatory at the same time: whoever gives creates a bond; whoever accepts owes a return – and whoever cannot return is hurt. Both look for the middle ground between too much and too little attachment.

→ Solidarity through the division of labour (Durkheim) · The Gift (Mauss) · Reciprocity · Standpoints What sociology can learn from altruism · Dying rich – a disgrace?

What do the five disciplines show together?

1. Readiness to help is built in; its direction is learned. Children help early and of their own accord; whom and how, they learn in their community (Warneken & Tomasello 2006; Dahl & Brownell 2019).
2. Mixed motives are the normal case – and no counter-proof. Whoever helps and feels good doing so is helping nonetheless.
3. Reciprocity sustains when it is free. Freely returned, it connects; forced, it erodes.
4. Punishment needs measure. It can support cooperation; raised to a principle, it destroys it (Balliet et al. 2011; Gächter et al. 2008).
5. The image of pure self-interest does not hold – economics says so itself.
6. No discipline on its own explains altruism. Experiments show causes, philosophy reasons, sociology the order in which they operate.
7. Our reading: Individual and community condition each other. Altruism grows where people may judge freely, give freely and return freely – free exchange is individualistic and the foundation of altruism. The opposing positions stand openly alongside: Hayek saw altruism above all in the small group, holding that the large order rests on learned rules; Carnegie and Mauss wanted laws and taxes where we rely on voluntariness.

Outlook

Since 2017 much has been confirmed, and some things have become smaller: that children judge fairly at an early age holds in its direction, but the effects are probably overestimated; whether even infants prefer helpers is disputed in the research (Margoni & Surian 2018). Whether markets strengthen fairness towards strangers or lower moral inhibitions is supported in both directions (Henrich et al. 2010; Falk & Szech 2013). Sociology has opened itself to biological questions again. What remains open is how upbringing and culture steer the built-in readiness to help, how laboratory findings hold up in everyday life, and how altruism can be measured at all.

What we read differently in 2017

• We took Durkheim for a thinker who swung from individualism to collectivism – that is one interpreter’s reading (see Durkheim).
• We made Bierhoff an opponent; he shares our view that mixed motives do not cancel altruism (see Bierhoff).
• We rejected punishment as a principle and meant every punishment by it; what matters is the measure (see Fehr/Gächter).
• We held “the market” responsible for the erosion of the social; what is meant is a steered, distorted order – not free exchange (see Who really exploits?).
• We equated Nietzsche’s slave morality with altruism; for him it is a valuation born of resentment, not a form of helping (see Slave morality).
• We put terms such as collectivism into Comte’s mouth; they are our analytical terms – in the entry, Comte speaks in his own words (see Altruism in Comte).

The 27 contributions to sociology

The 2017 study closed with 27 contributions that the five disciplines offer to sociology. Here they stand in the form that holds after checking against the original texts.

How sociology can take up these contributions is described in the standpoint What sociology can learn from altruism; how research on altruism is spread across the decades is shown in The Development of the Altruism Discourse.

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By Tobias O. R. Alke