ХАБЕРМАС: ЭТИЧЕСКИЙ ДИСКУРС КАК СПОСОБ РЕАБИЛИТАЦИИ ПУБЛИЧНОЙ СФЕРЫ

According to Jurgen Habermas, since the end of the 19th century the government had been increasingly interfering in the public sphere, depriving it of the opportunity to form an independent opinion and eroding its borders. With the erosion of public sphere contours, the involvement of people in solving social problems was weakened, and moral principles were replaced by the principles of economic feasibility or scientific provability. Withal, the break with tradition, the diminishing role of religion, the crisis of values, individualism and multiculturalism, which all are typical of modern society, have led us to the need to create the shared vision of the new society development. Thus, there are more reasons for the re-opening of the public sphere. The article considers the concept of Jurgen Habermas, in which discourse ethic is offered as a way to rehabilitate the public sphere. In discourse ethic, people are not burdened with government or other influence, and discuss socially important issues from equal positions and impartial perspectives, following the principles of moral reasoning. A number of critical remarks on Habermas’ concept is formulated. Critics are interested in questions about motivating people to take part in discourse ethic and behave morally, in question about the discourse ethic location, about the making decisions procedure and the strength of these decisions. A critical analysis of Habermas’ concept leads to the conclusion that the one is idealistic. The article presents two other concepts as alternatives to the discourse ethic concept. Apostolis Papakostas, the author of the first one, allows the government to participate in the public sphere formation. Ronald Inglehart and Christian Welzel, the authors of the other one, consider social and economic development to be the driving force in the public sphere modernization. However, on closer examination, both concepts are also not able to give an exhaustive answer to the question of how to ensure the public sphere rehabilitation.

Dialogue among Friends: Toward a Discourse Ethic of Interpersonal Relationships

Despite clear parallels between Jürgen Habermas's discourse ethics and recent scholarship in feminist ethics, feminists are often suspicious of discourse ethics and have kept themselves mostly separate from the field. By developing a sustained application of Habermas's discourse ethics to friendship, Keller demonstrates that feminist misgivings of discourse ethics are largely misplaced and that Habermas's theory can be used to develop a compelling moral phenomenology of interpersonal relations.

Negotiating Ethics as a Two Level Debate

As a form of moral debate, discourse ethic, according to Habermas, is based on regulated discussion. Participating moral agents share a common understanding in the ideal speech situation. Following procedures they try to reach consensus on questions of justice and rights. Critics of discourse ethic point to the bias of Western assumptions regarding agents and methods, the danger of elitism, and the optimism and the pacifism that run through the theory. After modification, Habermas distinguishes two types of discourse: the discourse of justification and the discourse of application. The second is inferior to the first. In the second, there is room for negotiating. There is another way of looking at negotiation, one that takes negotiating seriously as an important category of human behavior. This category shows an interesting overlap with moral behavior. Distinguishing four concepts of negotiating and using reciprocity and trust as the moral minimum, Negotiating Ethics is presented as a two level moral debate, close to Habermas but morally different in essential aspects.