As the dust settles from the election, we can see that some people got more than they expected—and quite a few much more than they deserved. The Lib-Con coalition wasn’t based on justice but a mix of pragmatics and mathematics. This has left those on the outside turning various shades of green. They want the power and position they feel is rightfully theirs. Envy is unpleasant. Aristotle defined it as “the pain caused by the good fortune of others”—it’s the flipside of schadenfreude, the pleasure in others’ suffering that some of the lucky ones are quietly feeling now. But envy isn’t just uncomfortable: it can fuel aggression and retaliation. Immanuel Kant recognised that its true aim is to destroy others’ lucky breaks. Despite the coalition’s optimistic start, the next five years could see a series of skirmishes as the envious return to eke their revenge on the smug. Friedrich Nietzsche claimed envy was the source of Christian morality. Compassion was simply the weak turning their resentment against the strong into a virtue by inverting aristocratic values—not that Nietzsche valued compassion so highly. More plausibly, Bertrand Russell thought it one of the most potent sources of unhappiness. Children feel it from an early age. As soon as another child gets a better toy or better treatment envy rears its head. “That’s not fair!” rings round the nursery. This carries over to adulthood—except that most of us are better than children at hiding what we’re feeling. That’s certainly what some politicians will be trying to do. There’s no easy way around this vice either: achieving success just makes you envious of those who are even more successful. And if you do succeed, and are much happier, others will start to envy you. Yet envy has some benefits. Russell claimed it was the driving force behind democracy. Without a sense of resentment and injustice, egalitarianism would never get off the ground. None of this bodes well for Nick Clegg and David Cameron. Paradoxically, the amount of envy that is swirling around already puts them in a completely unenviable position.
