Thelesser of two evils principle, also referred to as thelesser evil principle andlesser-evilism, is the principle that when faced with selecting from two immoral options, the less immoral one should be chosen. The principle is most often invoked in reference to binary political choices under systems that make it impossible to express asincere preference for one's favorite.
The maxim existed already in Platonic philosophy.[1] InNicomachean Ethics,Aristotle writes: "For the lesser evil can be seen in comparison with the greater evil as a good, since this lesser evil is preferable to the greater one, and whatever preferable is good". The modern formulation was popularized byThomas à Kempis'devotional bookThe Imitation of Christ written in early 15th century.
In part IV of hisEthics,Spinoza states the following maxim:[2]
Proposition 65: "According to the guidance of reason, of two things which are good, we shall follow the greater good, and of two evils, follow the less."
The concept of "lesser evil" voting (LEV) can be seen as a form of theminimax strategy ("minimize maximum loss") where voters, when faced with two or more candidates, choose the one they perceive as the most likely to do harm and vote for the one most likely to defeat him, or the "lesser evil." To do so, "voting should not be viewed as a form of personal self-expression or moral judgement directed in retaliation towards major party candidates who fail to reflect our values, or of a corrupt system designed to limit choices to those acceptable to corporate elites" rather as an opportunity to reduce harm or loss.[3]
Hannah Arendt argued that "Those who choose the lesser evil forget very quickly that they chose evil". In contrastSeyla Benhabib argues that politics would not exist without the necessity to choose between a greater and a lesser evil.[4] When limited to the two most likely candidates,[5] "lesser evil" is the most likely "greater good",[6] for the "common good", asPope Francis has said.[7]
In 2012,Huffington Post columnist Sanford Jay Rosen stated that refusal to vote for the lesser of two evils became common practice for left-leaning voters in theUnited States due to their overwhelming disapproval of the United States government's support for theVietnam War.[8] Rosen stated: "Beginning with the1968 presidential election, I often have heard from liberals that they could not vote for the lesser of two evils. Some said they would not vote; some said they would vote for a third-party candidate. That mantra delivered us to Richard Nixon in1972 until Watergate did him in. And it delivered us toGeorge W. Bush andDick Cheney in2000 until they were termed out in 2009".[8]
In the2016 United States presidential election, both major candidates of the major parties —Hillary Clinton (D) andDonald Trump (R) — had disapproval ratings close to 60% by August 2016.[9] Green Party candidateJill Stein invoked this idea in her campaign stating, "Don't vote for the lesser evil, fight for the greater good".[10] Green Party votes hurt Democratic chances in 2000 and 2016.[11][12][13] This sentiment was repeated for the next two election cycles, both of which were between Trump and Democratic candidatesJoe Biden in 2020 andKamala Harris in 2024.[14][15] Accordingly, the lesser evil principle should be applied to two front-runners among many choices, after eliminating from consideration "minor party candidates (who) can be spoilers in elections by taking away enough votes from a major party candidate to influence the outcome without winning."[16]
In hisDarkHorse podcast,Bret Weinstein describes hisUnity 2020 proposal for the2020 presidential election as an option that, in case of failure, would not asymmetrically weaken voters' second-best choice on a single political side, thereby avoiding thelesser evil paradox.[17]
In elections between only two candidates where one is mildly unpopular and the other immensely unpopular, opponents of both candidates frequently advocate a vote for the mildly unpopular candidate. For example, in the second round of the2002 French presidential election graffiti in Paris told people to "vote for the crook, not the fascist". The "crook" in those scribbled public messages wasJacques Chirac ofRally for the Republic and the "fascist" wasJean-Marie Le Pen of theNational Front. Chirac eventually won the second round having garnered 82% of the vote.[18]
"Between Scylla and Charybdis" is an idiom derived fromHomer'sOdyssey. In the story,Odysseus chose to go nearScylla as the lesser of two evils. He lost six of his companions, but if he had gone nearCharybdis all would be doomed. Because of such stories, having to navigate between the two hazards eventually entered idiomatic use.
An equivalent English seafaring phrase is "Between a rock and a hard place".[19] The Latin lineincidit in scyllam cupiens vitare charybdim ("he runs into Scylla, wishing to avoid Charybdis") had earlier become proverbial, with a meaning much the same asjumping from the frying pan into the fire.Erasmus recorded it as an ancient proverb in hisAdagia, although the earliest known instance is in theAlexandreis, a 12th-century Latinepic poem byWalter of Châtillon.[20]
[You] can't honorably interfere in a normal election cycle because you're told that if you do, if you try to represent the people and get elected on that basis, that you will elect the party that is less in line with your values rather than more. So, you're gonna do more harm than good because of the lesser evil paradox. So Unity 2020 addresses that so that we don't have to face the lesser evil paradox and we can reach the public and say: look, we've got a plan for actually having your interest represented at the highest level of government