Tolerating the Conditionally Tolerant

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 86-98
Author(s):  
William A. Edmundson
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Early Education ◽  
Bernard Williams ◽  
Liberal Society ◽  
Half Century ◽  
Decent Peoples

How can a tolerant, liberal political culture tolerate the presence of only conditionally tolerant illiberal sub-cultures while remaining true to its principles of tolerance? The problem falls within the intersection of two developments in the thinking of two of the leading anglophone philosophers of the last half-century, Bernard Williams and John Rawls. Rawls, particularly, struggled with the problem of how a liberal society might stably survive the clash of plural sub-cultures that a liberal society – unless it is oppressively coercive – must itself foster and allow to flourish. And he separately struggled with the problem of how liberal peoples might peacefully share the planet with illiberal, but “decent” peoples elsewhere. This article shows that Rawls’s two solutions do not easily mix, and argues that state-approved early education must do more than merely to inform children that losing their faith will not land them in jail.

Testing pragmatic genealogy in political theory: The curious case of John Rawls

2020 ◽  
pp. 147488512090977
Author(s):  
Francesco Testini
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Alternative Strategy ◽  
The Political ◽  
Bernard Williams ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Democratic Societies ◽  
Basic Ideas ◽  
Miranda Fricker

Starting from the ‘Dewey Lectures’, Rawls presents his conception of justice within a contextualist framework, as an elaboration of the basic ideas embedded in the political culture of liberal-democratic societies. But how are these basic ideas to be justified? In this article, I reconstruct and criticize Rawls’s strategy to answer this question. I explore an alternative strategy, consisting of a genealogical argument of a pragmatic kind – the kind of argument provided by authors like Bernard Williams, Edward Craig and Miranda Fricker. I outline this genealogical argument drawing on Rawls’s reconstruction of the origins of liberalism. Then, I clarify the conditions under which this kind of argument maintains vindicatory power. I claim that the argument satisfies these conditions and that pragmatic genealogy can thus partially vindicate the basic ideas of liberal-democratic societies.

Therapeutic Politics: Rawls's Respect for Rousseau

2016 ◽  
Vol 78 (1) ◽  
pp. 117-140
Author(s):  
John M. Warner ◽  
James R. Zink
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Social Problem ◽  
Political Life ◽  
The Political ◽  
Classical Liberalism ◽  
Fundamental Level ◽  
The Social ◽  
Search For Self

AbstractFor nearly half a century democratic citizens have been preoccupied with the search for self-respect. Though classical liberalism places this question outside its purview and many commentators see in such a concern evidence of a “thin-skinned” political culture, John Rawls has recently provided serious arguments for the political relevance of self-respect. These arguments, we claim, are deeply indebted to the social and political theory of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, whose deep albeit underexamined influence on Rawls shows itself both in Rawls's conception of the social problem as well as in his solution to it. Rawls's belief that the provision of self-respect can solve the social problem is uniquely Rousseauan not only because of its emphasis on equality but also because it suggests political life can and must reconcile the conflicts between self and society at a fundamental level.

Thick-Skinned Liberalism: Redefining Civility

1995 ◽  
Vol 89 (3) ◽  
pp. 612-620 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard C. Sinopoli
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
The Other ◽  
Liberal Theory ◽  
Ronald Dworkin

Anorm of civility defines a standard of conduct that citizens can rightfully expect from strangers. What are appropriate norms of civility for citizens of liberal states? I argue that two approaches to civility are prominent in our political culture, one requiring “mere” tolerance, the other, that we affirm the worth of others' pursuits (and thereby the worth of those others). This split parallels a division in liberal theory between an interest-based account of liberalism (represented primarily by J. S. Mill) and a status-based account (represented principally by John Rawls and Ronald Dworkin), respectively. The exploration of this theoretical divide and how it relates to contending notions of civility helps to clarify disputes in the broader culture. I conclude that interest-based liberalism offers a more satisfactory approach to the issue at hand.

Liberalism and Distributive Justice

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Samuel Freeman
Keyword(s):  
Distributive Justice ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Western World ◽  
Liberal Society ◽  
Difference Principle ◽  
The Social ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Principles Of Justice ◽  
Political Philosopher

This volume of essays addresses a wide range of issues in contemporary political philosophy, from the different branches of liberalism and their relation to capitalism, to the basic institutions of a liberal society that underwrite political and economic justice. Samuel Freeman is a leading political philosopher and one of the foremost authorities on the works of John Rawls. This volume contains nine of his essays on liberalism, Rawls, and distributive justice. Freeman organizes his chapters into a narrative arc: from liberalism as the dominant political and economic system in the Western world, to the laws governing interpersonal transactions in a liberal society, to the broad social and political structures that determine distributive justice. Freeman analyzes the primary differences between the classical and high liberal traditions; shows why libertarianism is not a liberal view; argues for the social rather than global bases of distributive justice; demonstrates why Rawls’s difference principle supports a property-owning democracy rather than welfare-state capitalism; and shows how Rawls’s liberal principles of justice and the difference principle are to be applied in both ideal and non-ideal circumstances, effectively responding to criticisms by Amartya Sen, G. A. Cohen, and others.

scholarly journals The construction of a ‘realistic utopia’: John Rawls and international political theory

2002 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
CHRIS BROWN
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Ideal Theory ◽  
Law Of Peoples ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
International Political Theory ◽  
Utopian Thinking ◽  
The Law ◽  
Decent Peoples

‘The limits of the possible in moral matters are less narrow than we think. It is our weaknesses, our vices, our prejudices that shrink them.’Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract Book II, Chapter 12.2 [cited from John Rawls The Law of Peoples, p. 7]After presenting a brief sketch of John Rawls's theory of justice, his international political theory is outlined and evaluated. Rawls develops a classification of ‘peoples’ based on whether or not they are ‘well-ordered’. The Law of Peoples covers ‘liberal’ and ‘decent’ peoples who adhere to minimum standards of human rights and are not aggressive in their international relations. This is in the realm of ‘ideal’ theory; ‘non-ideal’ theory must cope also with societies that are not well-ordered, such as outlaw states and burdened societies. The long-term aim is that all should be part of a confederation of decent peoples. Rawls's theory has been criticized by cosmopolitan liberals for its communitarian tendencies, but has much to offer scholars of international relations, including a systematic basis for classifying states, a helpful discussion of the distinction between reasonableness and rationality, and a powerful restatement of the importance of utopian thinking in international relations.

scholarly journals Filozoficzne ujęcie kultury politycznej

2016 ◽  
Vol 18 ◽  
pp. 91-109
Author(s):  
Agnieszka Nogal
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Political Culture ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Liberal Democracy ◽  
Civic Culture ◽  
Attitudes And Practices ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Normative Dimension ◽  
Political Philosopher

The theory of political culture was presented by two well-known scientists, Gabriel Almond and Sidney Verba. They outlined three pure types of political culture that can be combined to create civic culture. They argued that we are in transition toward a more universalistic political culture, which may be characterized by unification and participation. The thesis of this paper is that we observe a return of the category of political culture in philosophical and normative, rather than in sociological and descriptive, terms. A well-known political philosopher, John Rawls, created a model of liberal political culture. Other modern scholars also suggested that education and political culture are the keys to establishing the institutional forms of liberal democracy. The difference between the recent understanding of political culture and that presented by Almond and Verba in the 1970s is vivid and important. In the 1970s, political culture was perceived in sociological terms – as a historically shaped set of attitudes and practices which can be described by using quantitative and qualitative tools. Today, political culture has become a subject of research in the field of political philosophy. It is recognized in its normative dimension, and it shapes a debate around the positive model of citizenship.

scholarly journals Rawls on Markets and Corporate Governance

2015 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-64 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wayne Norman
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Political Culture ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Market Failure ◽  
Regulatory State ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
Theories Of Justice ◽  
Just Society ◽  
Egalitarian Theory

ABSTRACT:Like most egalitarian political philosophers, John Rawls believes that a just society will rely on markets and business firms for much of its economic activity—despite acknowledging that market systems will tend to create very unequal distributions of goods, opportunities, power, and status. Rawls himself remains one of the few contemporary political philosophers to explore at any length the way an egalitarian theory of justice might deal with fundamental options in political economy. This article examines his arguments and conclusions on these topics. It argues that contemporary Rawlsians will reach different conclusions if they take more seriously than Rawls himself did: (1) the implications, for the political culture and the democratic regulatory state, of large firms competing in adversarial markets characterized by the inevitable “fact of market failure,” and (2) the relevance of ownership and governance relationships involving different kinds of business firms. And with respect to the second point, Rawlsians and other egalitarians have much to learn from contemporary economic, legal, and sociological theories of the firm, and the role of these theories in the structure of and rationale for corporate law. This is the kind of social theory that Rawls believes is relevant to the justification and application of theories of justice, but he himself did not appeal to it in his writings on political economy. Contemporary egalitarians can and should appeal to it now, and in doing so correct errors and omissions in Rawls’s analysis. But taking seriously the two points mentioned above will also force egalitarians who support efficient markets to face difficult dilemmas or compromises of their own.

Bernard Williams

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark P. Jenkins
Keyword(s):  
Bernard Williams
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