Tolerating Decent Societies

John Rawls ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 371-382
Author(s):  
Jon Mandle
Keyword(s):  
Public Reason ◽  
Democratic Society ◽  
Careful Examination ◽  
Liberal Democracies ◽  
The Public ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Liberal Democratic Society ◽  
Political Decisions

Rawls argues that the public reason of a liberal democratic society should aim to include—and therefore tolerate—all reasonable persons. But the public reason that he defends for the Society of Peoples (globally) is considerably more inclusive. Rawls argues for the toleration of “decent” societies that are not liberal democracies. Critics have charged that such toleration, while perhaps pragmatic, is unprincipled. But a careful examination of Rawls’s criteria for “decency” reveals a defense of Rawls’s position that is grounded in the institutional requirements for a society to be able to make its own legitimate political decisions.

Unmasking the Weakness of Liberalism: Why the Future of the Liberal Order Is in Danger and What We Can Do to Safeguard It

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Beverly Crawford Ames
Keyword(s):  
21St Century ◽  
Economic Inequality ◽  
The United States ◽  
Democratic Society ◽  
Public Realm ◽  
The Public ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Underlying Causes ◽  
Liberal Democratic Society

Liberal democracy is in decline across the globe. Why? The literature provides many answers, i.e., a decline in the power and gatekeeping role of political parties (Lavinsky and Ziblatt), the role of intellectuals (Applebaum), changes in political campaign financing (Balkin), the anti-liberal influence of Donald Trump (Kendzior), the flaws of “democracy” itself (Mounk), to name just a few. Most scholars, however, neglect the underlying causes of these proximate phenomena. In this essay I take a sociological and social-psychological approach to explore the underlying causes. I focus on liberal democracy’s decline in the Industrial West, particularly the United States. I argue that this decline can be partly attributed to the inherent weaknesses/limitations of liberalism, exacerbated in the 21st century by neo-liberal economic forces and digital technology. I contend that liberal values of equality, tolerance, the rule of law, and rational debate chafe against the sacrosanct entrenchment of the neo-liberal free market and its laissez-faire ideology, as well as the inherent liberal neglect of the human need for status, community, heroes, and the impulse to unleash passionate grievances. This chafing has now opened lesions in liberal institutions, exacerbated by widespread disinformation and obscene inequality, I offer three suggestions to strengthen 21st century liberalism: government regulation of social media to censure hate speech and disinformation, new taxes on wealth to reduce economic inequality, and an expansion of the public realm—parks, libraries, beaches, public schools, etc., where “money doesn’t matter.” This last suggestion is crucial. Because economic inequality and precarity will persist in a liberal democratic society even when taxation is more equitable, expansion of the public realm is needed to reduce the impact of inequality in liberal democratic society.

THE SUPREME COURT AS THE FOUNTAIN OF PUBLIC REASON

Legal Theory ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 345-369 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Kogelmann
Keyword(s):  
Supreme Court ◽  
Public Reason ◽  
Public Debate ◽  
Democratic Society ◽  
Public Deliberation ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Liberal Democratic Society ◽  
Judicial Authority

ABSTRACTThe idea of public reason requires that citizens in their public deliberation employ considerations stemming from a shared conception of justice. One worry is that public reason's content will be incomplete, in that it does not contain sufficient material for adequate public debate. Rawls has a way of expanding the content of public reason to address such concerns—by including in public reason all those things you and I say in our justification of the conception of justice. After arguing that this strategy fails, a new way of expanding public reason's content is proposed. Instead of understanding the Supreme Court—which Rawls famously calls the “exemplar” of public reason—as an institution that appeals to exogenously determined public reasons, we should understand the judicial authority in a liberal democratic society as an endogenous fountain of public reason.

Friendly Rejoinders

2017 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 207-224
Author(s):  
Gilbert Meilaender
Keyword(s):  
End Of Life ◽  
Common Good ◽  
Religious Beliefs ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Kingdom Of God ◽  
Democratic Society ◽  
Divine Grace ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Liberal Democratic Society ◽  
Moral Limits

In this article Gilbert Meilaender responds to nine scholars whose papers (collected in this issue) analyze and interact with a variety of theological and ethical themes that emerge in his writing. Among those themes are the moral limits grounded in our embodied nature, the freedom to transcend those limits, the perfection of that nature by divine grace, the relation between political progress toward a common good and the kingdom of God, the place of religious beliefs in public discourse within a liberal democratic society, the meaning and scope of our responsibility to care for human persons at the beginning and end of life, and the meaning of our creaturely longing to rest in God.

Philosophical Review of Faith and Religion in the Conditions of the Post-Secular World: from J.W. Goethete’s Wandering to Religious Consumerism

2021 ◽  
pp. 101-112
Author(s):  
Olga N. Shadrina ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Global Scale ◽  
Democratic Society ◽  
Philosophical Review ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Secular World ◽  
The Face ◽  
Liberal Democratic Society ◽  
Migration Crisis ◽  
Philosophical Understanding

The article is devoted to the philosophical understanding of faith in the post-secu­lar world in the context of the phenomenon of interfaith pilgrimage: from the hu­manism of the Renaissance and Enlightenment (Goethe) to the religion of the laity and religious consumerism in the philosophy of postmodernism. Goethe’s model of individual religiosity in the face of challenges to traditional faiths (migration crisis) and the spread of post-secular, poor theology on a global scale as the world­view of a liberal democratic society (exotic churches, evangelics, charismatics, etc.), and also the process of psychologization, even the mythologization of tradi­tional religions, the movement towards a “religion without grace” can be the sought-after alternative, which is a balance between tradition and innovation; and the reli­gious and philosophical worldview of Goethe, conceptually meaningful, is the new horizon of philosophizing after the post-philosophy.

Religion in the Public Sphere—with Dietrich Bonhoeffer towards a Renewed Understanding of ‘the Two Kingdoms’

2015 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 269-288
Author(s):  
Torbjörn Johansson
Keyword(s):  
Public Sphere ◽  
Public Reason ◽  
Religion And Politics ◽  
Dietrich Bonhoeffer ◽  
Liberal Democracies ◽  
The Public ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
The Public Sphere ◽  
Two Kingdoms ◽  
The Church

In this article Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s critical reception of the Lutheran doctrine of the two kingdoms is related to the discussion about religion and politics in liberal democracies. Bonhoeffer experienced not only how the church isolated itself from the political sphere—by a ‘pseudo-Lutheran’ doctrine of the two kingdoms—but also how the church was politicized and abused by Deutsche Christen. His theological thinking is therefore a helpful starting point to formulate a theology which is politically relevant without being transformed into politics. Against the background of Bonhoeffer’s theology an argument is advanced that a renewed understanding of the two kingdoms assists the church in being focused on the Gospel, at the same time as it can also give the church instruments to be present in the public sphere with well-defined pretensions, which clarifies whether the assertions of the church are based on revelation or on public reason.

On the value of economic growth

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 128-153 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julie L Rose
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Democratic Society ◽  
Environmentally Sustainable ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Liberal Democratic Society ◽  
Normative Foundations

Must a society aim indefinitely for continued economic growth? Proponents of economic growth advance three central challenges to the idea that a society, having attained high levels of income and wealth, may justly cease to pursue further economic growth: if environmentally sustainable and the gains fairly distributed, first, continued economic growth could make everyone within a society and globally, and especially the worst off, progressively better off; second, the pursuit of economic growth spurs ongoing innovation, which enhances people’s opportunities and protects a society against future risks; and third, continued economic growth fosters attitudes of openness, tolerance, and generosity, which are essential to the functioning of a liberal democratic society. This article grants these challenges’ normative foundations, to show that, even if one accepts their underlying premises as requirements of justice, a society may still justly cease to aim for economic growth, so long as it continues to aim for and realize gains on other dimensions. I argue that, while continued economic growth might instrumentally serve valuable ends, it is not necessary for their realization, as a society can achieve these ends through other means.

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