scholarly journals At the Margins of Ideal Cities: The Dystopian Drift of Modern Utopias

SAGE Open ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 215824401880313
Author(s):  
Felipe Schwember ◽  
Julia Urabayen
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Critical Reflection ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The Ideal ◽  
Perfect World

Contemporary political philosophy has critically reflected on—if not denounced—the theoretical constructions and political enterprises that have been encouraged by modern Utopian tradition. This process of critical reflection has constantly signaled the tension between the emancipatory aspirations of that thought and its dystopian drift. Many authors have highlighted the problems that affect the constitution of those ideal cities. However, this article will be focused on the exclusive and excluding character of those ideal narratives, of those unblemished ideal spaces, of those happy spaces that are, in the end, nonspaces. This article will explain the meanings of the modern utopias taking into account the postmodern point of view that shows the exclusion the modern utopias provoke. At the margins of the ideal cities live all those beings that the utopias have vomited out and expelled from their perfect world: monsters, abnormals, infamous, pariahs, and countryless refugees. Those beings—so well described by Arendt and Foucault, among others—are those who are not part of any ideal city; they are the stones that the builders of the perfect cities have used to build them or have discarded them.

The Tyranny of the Ideal

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerald Gaus
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Moral Life ◽  
Moral Inquiry ◽  
Open Society ◽  
The Past ◽  
Theories Of Justice ◽  
The World ◽  
Diverse Society ◽  
Just Society ◽  
The Ideal

This book lays out a vision for how we should theorize about justice in a diverse society. It shows how free and equal people, faced with intractable struggles and irreconcilable conflicts, might share a common moral life shaped by a just framework. The book argues that if we are to take diversity seriously and if moral inquiry is sincere about shaping the world, then the pursuit of idealized and perfect theories of justice—essentially, the entire production of theories of justice that has dominated political philosophy for the past forty years—needs to change. Drawing on recent work in social science and philosophy, the book points to an important paradox: only those in a heterogeneous society—with its various religious, moral, and political perspectives—have a reasonable hope of understanding what an ideally just society would be like. However, due to its very nature, this world could never be collectively devoted to any single ideal. The book defends the moral constitution of this pluralistic, open society, where the very clash and disagreement of ideals spurs all to better understand what their personal ideals of justice happen to be. Presenting an original framework for how we should think about morality, this book rigorously analyzes a theory of ideal justice more suitable for contemporary times.

Neuplatonische politische Philosophie in der Rede Περὶ βασιλείας des Synesios von Kyrene

Elenchos ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 38 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 151-177
Author(s):  
Michael Schramm
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Reality ◽  
Political Realm ◽  
The Ideal

Abstract This paper argues that Synesios’ De regno is a mirror for princes and a splendid example of Neoplatonic political philosophy. It is based on Plato’s Politeia and its model of philosopher-kingship. Synesios makes his audience compare the current political reality with the ideal of the philosopher-kings, who are the image of the transcendent god in the political realm. In doing so he recommends political virtue in general, especially phronesis and sophrosyne. Particularly he argues for reforming the recruitment of military and civil officials with reference to Plato’s concept of friendship in the Politeia.

Habermas on Rawls and the normative foundations of democracy

2021 ◽  
pp. 136843102098541
Author(s):  
Krzysztof Kędziora
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Political Liberalism ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Veil Of Ignorance ◽  
Normative Foundation ◽  
Internal Relations ◽  
The Veil ◽  
Politics And Law ◽  
Normative Foundations

The debate between Jürgen Habermas and John Rawls concerns the question of how to do political philosophy under conditions of cultural pluralism, if the aim of political philosophy is to uncover the normative foundation of a modern liberal democracy. Rawls’s political liberalism tries to bypass the problem of pluralism, using the intellectual device of the veil of ignorance, and yet paradoxically at the same time it treats it as something given and as an arbiter of justification within the political conception of justice. Habermas argues that Rawls not only incorrectly operationalizes the moral point of view from which we discern what is just but also fails to capture the specificity of democracy which is given by internal relations between politics and law. This deprives Rawls’s political philosophy of the conceptual tools needed to articulate the normative foundation of democracy.

Justice as a Personal Virtue and Justice as an Institutional Virtue: Mencius’s Confucian Virtue Politics

2020 ◽  
Vol 2019 (4) ◽  
pp. 277-294
Author(s):  
Yong Huang
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
Affirmative Answer ◽  
The State ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Character Traits ◽  
Social Policies ◽  
Moral Principles ◽  
The Government

AbstractIt has been widely observed that virtue ethics, regarded as an ethics of the ancient, in contrast to deontology and consequentialism, seen as an ethics of the modern (Larmore 1996: 19–23), is experiencing an impressive revival and is becoming a strong rival to utilitarianism and deontology in the English-speaking world in the last a few decades. Despite this, it has been perceived as having an obvious weakness in comparison with its two major rivals. While both utilitarianism and deontology can at the same time serve as an ethical theory, providing guidance for individual persons and a political philosophy, offering ways to structure social institutions, virtue ethics, as it is concerned with character traits of individual persons, seems to be ill-equipped to be politically useful. In recent years, some attempts have been made to develop the so-called virtue politics, but most of them, including my own (see Huang 2014: Chapter 5), are limited to arguing for the perfectionist view that the state has the obligation to do things to help its members develop their virtues, and so the focus is still on the character traits of individual persons. However important those attempts are, such a notion of virtue politics is clearly too narrow, unless one thinks that the only job the state is supposed to do is to cultivate its people’s virtues. Yet obviously the government has many other jobs to do such as making laws and social policies, many if not most of which are not for the purpose of making people virtuous. The question is then in what sense such laws and social policies are moral in general and just in particular. Utilitarianism and deontology have their ready answers in the light of utility or moral principles respectively. Can virtue ethics provide its own answer? This paper attempts to argue for an affirmative answer to this question from the Confucian point of view, as represented by Mencius. It does so with a focus on the virtue of justice, as it is a central concept in both virtue ethics and political philosophy.

The Ambivalent Relationship of Japan's Soft Power Diplomacy andPrincess Mononoke: Tosaka Jun's philosophy of culture as moral reflection

2014 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 683-698 ◽  
Author(s):  
KOSUKE SHIMIZU
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Soft Power ◽  
Critical Reflection ◽  
Academic Discipline ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Moral Reflection ◽  
The West ◽  
Soft Power Diplomacy

AbstractCulture is a demanding word, particularly when it is used in the context of the contemporary academic discipline of international relations (IR). It is often employed in order to distinguish one identity from another, allegedly illuminating idiosyncrasies embedded in a particular society or group of people. The essentialized understanding of culture is also detectable in the case of the current debate on the non-Western international relations theories (IRT). Non-Western politicians and scholars often employ the term culture in order to distinguish their values from alleged Western values. However, culture has another important function mainly advanced by a left-wing Kyoto School philosopher Tosaka Jun, that is, culture as a mirror for critical reflection for morality (Tosaka, 1966). This article is based on Tosaka's argument that culture has an important function for moral reflection beyond that of a mere means to identify one's distinctiveness from the West, and it criticizes Japan's soft power diplomacy or the total absence of it from that point of view. It also argues that this absence is the result of the soft power discourse's over-simplified interpretation of culture that results in confrontation between the West and the rest, particularly when it is employed in non-Western IRT discourses. Towards the end, I examine Miyazaki Hayao's films,Princes Mononokein particular, as examples of cultural works facilitating a moment of critical reflection, and I extract embedded messages of relevance to critical reflection on contemporary IR literature, particularly non-Western literature.

Multilingualism and the Ideal of Unity in Diversity in the European Union. Key Concepts and Context

2020 ◽  
Vol 65 (2) ◽  
pp. 265-282
Author(s):  
Roxana-Maria Nistor-Gâz ◽  
Delia Pop-Flanja
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Cultural Diversity ◽  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Cultural And Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Tower Of Babel ◽  
Key Concepts ◽  
Unity In Diversity ◽  
The Ideal

"In a world challenged by cultural diversity, this article aims to look at the great diversity of languages and cultures that coexist within the European Union. Building on the story of the Tower of Babel that explains, from a religious point of view, the cultural and linguistic diversity existing in the European Union, the authors tried to contextualize EU’s motto of “unity in diversity”, interpreted as an ideal involving a lot of effort and sometimes even many conflicts, but one that we should all fight for and strive to maintain. Keywords: linguistic diversity, ethnicity, nation, minority, majority, communication, unity in diversity"

«Razao e Liberdade. A Filosofia Politica de James Madison» Arguicao e Resposta

2011 ◽  
Vol 19 (37) ◽  
pp. 217-240
Author(s):  
Alessandra Silveira ◽  
José Gomes André ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Judicial Review ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The Political ◽  
Alexander Hamilton ◽  
James Madison ◽  
The Relationship

This paper includes the exam of a Ph.D thesis about James Madison’s political philosophy, as well as the answers presented by the candidate to several criticai observations. Various themes are considered, though always surrounding Madison’s work: the peculiar characteristics of his federalism, the relationship between the idea of human nature and the elaboration of political models, the political and constitutional controversies that Madison entangled with several figures from its time (namely Alexander Hamilton), the problem of “judicial review” and the place of “constitutionality control” taken from a reflexive and institutional point of view, and other similar themes.

Some Possible Lines of Development in Aircraft Engines

1921 ◽  
Vol 25 (123) ◽  
pp. 130-165
Keyword(s):  
Present State ◽  
State Of The Art ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Aircraft Engines ◽  
Aero Engine ◽  
The Ideal

In the following paper the writer's aim is to indicate certain possible lines of development and research which his own investigations and preliminary experiments have shown to be at least worthy of serious consideration.If we review the present state of the art we find the position to be substantially as follows :—From a thermodynamic point of view the performance of the modern aero engine has approached so nearly to the ideal obtainable from the cycle on which it operates that there is little scope for improvement.

scholarly journals Garrett Barden and Tim Murphy. Law and Justice in Community (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010)

2011 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Guðmundur Heiðar Frímannsson
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Adam Smith ◽  
Thomas Aquinas ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Deep Roots ◽  
Oxford University ◽  
History Of ◽  
Law And Justice ◽  
Field Of Inquiry ◽  
Oxford University Press

Jurisprudence is a lively field of inquiry and law and justice are among its most important subjects. They are not exclusive to jurisprudence but are also inquired into in ethics and political philosophy. The book under review is an extensive inquiry into law and justice from the point of view of jurisprudence but it is jurisprudence that has deep roots in the history of the discipline. The authors use ideas from Aristotle, Gaius, Justinian, Thomas Aquinas, Adam Smith, Hobbes and from various law books from the Code of Hammurabi onwards. One way of understanding the book is to see the authors as reworking an old tradition that has not been prominent in modern jurisprudence. This approach leads to surprising conclusions from a modern point of view that are both radical and conventional.

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