Michael Walzer, Spheres of Justice

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Margaret Moore
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Michael Walzer ◽  
Spheres Of Justice ◽  
Micro Level ◽  
Different Levels

This essay examines the ideas and influence of Michael Walzer’s Spheres of Justice. It argues that Walzer’s influence on the discipline has taken a different form than many other writers on justice, such as Rawls, where the central ideas have been taken up and argued about in essentially Rawlsian terms. Walzer’s influence has operated on different levels, of which we can distinguish at least three. There is a micro level, with numerous authors picking up fruitful ideas, lines of inquiries or suggestions, found in Walzer’s work, and appropriating them or using them to pursue further arguments. There is a more general social justice level, where ideas that are central to his understanding of social justice have been appropriated by diverse thinkers, often in quite different ways. He has been also influential on a very general, methodological level, where theorists have adopted his method and style of doing political theory.

scholarly journals Intercultural Public Intellectual Engagement

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tariq Modood
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Contact Interaction ◽  
Public Intellectual ◽  
Macro Level ◽  
Abstract Reasoning ◽  
Intellectual Engagement ◽  
Micro Level

AbstractThe article firstly examines the different conceptions of dialogue and reason within political theory, especially in the work of Rawls. Secondly we explore multicultural political theorists who have been motivated less by abstract reasoning by a sole reasoner or identical identity-less individuals and more by dialogue. For such multiculturalists, the principles of social justice are not known in advance or simply by reason, but are arrived at by conflict and learning, by dialogue and negotiation in circumstances of inequality and minority-claims making. In response to the multiculturalists, interculturalists allege that multiculturalism is too focused on the macro and the conflictual, and dialogue should be redirected to the micro and the cooperative. Although I welcome the interculturalists’ focus on micro-relations, this does not require abandoning the idea of dialogue at the level of political controversies and public discourses. It is not an either–or choice because groups and intergroup problems exist in society and cannot be simply handled at a micro level of contact, interaction and sociability. The kind of macro-level dialogue that I am speaking of can also be understood as a form of public intellectual engagement that can contribute to societal dialogues.

Contrasting sentiments of social justice in France and Quebec

2016 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 13-34
Author(s):  
Michel Forsé ◽  
Simon Langlois ◽  
Maxime Parodi
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Michael Walzer ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Spheres Of Justice ◽  
Democratic Societies

Sociologists from many countries have recently paid attention to measures of social justice sentiments. In doing so, they are following the lead of philosophers like John Rawls (1971) or Michael Walzer (1983), among many others, and are now studying the question of justice empirically. Do individuals evaluate justice from the perspective of equity (or fairness) like Rawls proposed? Do they conceptualize different spheres of justice like Walzer argued? Only empirical studies can provide answers to these questions and offer “grounded knowledge” (Boudon 2012) that is knowledge that connect philosophical concepts with the actions and thought of social actors, at least in contemporary democratic societies.

scholarly journals Intercultural Public Intellectual Engagement

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-47
Author(s):  
Tariq Modood
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Contact Interaction ◽  
Public Intellectual ◽  
Abstract Reasoning ◽  
United Nations Educational ◽  
Intellectual Engagement ◽  
Cultural Organization ◽  
Micro Level

The article firstly examines the different conceptions of dialogue and reason within political theory, especially in the work of Rawls. Secondly we explore multicultural political theorists who have been motivated less by abstract reasoning by a sole reasoner or identical identity-less individuals and more by dialogue. For such multiculturalists, the principles of social justice are not known in advance or simply by reason, but are arrived at by conflict and learning, by dialogue and negotiation in circumstances of inequality and minority-claims making. In response to the multiculturalists, interculturalists allege that multiculturalism is too focused on the macro and the conflictual, and dialogue should be redirected to the micro and the cooperative. Although I welcome the interculturalists’ focus on micro-relations, this does not require abandoning the idea of dialogue at the level of political controversies and public discourses. It is not an either–or choice because groups and intergroup problems exist in society and cannot be simply handled at a micro level of contact, interaction and sociability. The kind of macro-level dialogue that I am speaking of can also be understood as a form of public intellectual engagement that can contribute to societal dialogues.1 1This article is a reprint of Tariq Modood (2017) ‘Intercultural public intellectual engagement’ in Fethi Mansouri (ed) Interculturalism at the Crossroads: Comparative perspectives on concepts, policies and practice, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, France, 83-102.

scholarly journals Beyond a Dichotomous Understanding of Online Anonymity: Bridging the Macro and Micro Level

2021 ◽  
pp. 136078042110197
Author(s):  
Lina Eklund ◽  
Emma von Essen ◽  
Fatima Jonsson ◽  
Magnus Johansson
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Online Auctions ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Plural Form ◽  
Contentious Issue ◽  
Online Anonymity ◽  
Complex Process ◽  
Theoretical Synthesis ◽  
Micro Level ◽  
Different Levels

Anonymity on the Internet is a contentious issue; by some seen as an important freedom to be protected, while others argue for increased identification to protect groups at risk of exploitation. The debate reflects a dichotomous view of online anonymity; you are, or you are not anonymous. However, anonymity is a complex process played out on different levels and defined by various actors. While empirical studies show this, theoretical synthesis is lacking. This essay provides perspective on anonymity online by comparing two critical cases, online auctions and online gaming, we corroborate results from a 4-year interdisciplinary project with researchers from sociology, economics, and computer and system sciences. We argue that one should talk about anonymities in plural form, as online anonymity is not a state but a relational process. We put forth a conceptual model, which unpacks online anonymity as interdependent macro structures – legal, commercial, and technological – and micro/meso facets – factual, social group, and physical – to be used in future research.

Aliens and Citizens: The Case for Open Borders

1987 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 251-273 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph H. Carens
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Third World ◽  
Final Part ◽  
Michael Walzer ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
The Third ◽  
Oppressed People ◽  
Open Borders ◽  
To Come ◽  
The Third World

Many poor and oppressed people wish to leave their countries of origin in the third world to come to affluent Western societies. This essay argues that there is little justification for keeping them out. The essay draws on three contemporary approaches to political theory — the Rawlsian, the Nozickean, and the utilitarian — to construct arguments for open borders. The fact that all three theories converge upon the same results on this issue, despite their significant disagreements on others, strengthens the case for open borders and reveals its roots in our deep commitment to respect all human beings as free and equal moral persons. The final part of the essay considers communitarian objections to this conclusion, especially those of Michael Walzer.

scholarly journals The Pitfalls of “Love and Kindness”: On the Challenges to Compassion/Pity as a Political Emotion

2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 53-61 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne-Kathrin Weber
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Presidential Election ◽  
Democratic Theory ◽  
The Political ◽  
Election Campaign ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Political Realm ◽  
Presidential Election Campaign

Martha Nussbaum’s political theory of compassion offers an extensive and compelling study of the potential of employing compassionate emotions in the political realm to further social justice and societal “love”. In this article, two pitfalls of Nussbaum’s affirming theory of a politics of compassion are highlighted: the problem of a dual-level hierarchisation and the “magic” of feeling compassion that potentially removes the subject of compassion from reality. I will argue that Hannah Arendt’s thoughts on pity provide substantial challenges to a democratic theory of compassion in this respect. Following these theoretical reflections, I will turn to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 US-American presidential election campaign, to her video ads “Love and Kindness” in particular, in order to provide fitting illustrations from current realpolitik for these specific pitfalls of the political employment of compassionate emotions.

InProfile

2008 ◽  
Vol 41 (04) ◽  
pp. 908
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Social Justice ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Film Studies ◽  
Racial Politics ◽  
Special Interests ◽  
History And Literature

Professor Isis Leslie is an interdisciplinary scholar who draws on film studies, history, and literature to examine questions of social justice. Some of her special interests include globalization, the intersections of racial politics and political theory, comparative political thought, human rights—their definition and abuses, and the relationships between psychoanalysis and politics.

Spheres of Justice: A Defense of Pluralism and Equality. Michael Walzer

Ethics ◽  
1984 ◽  
Vol 94 (2) ◽  
pp. 329-333
Author(s):  
William A. Galston
Keyword(s):  
Michael Walzer ◽  
Spheres Of Justice
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