Political theorists, increasingly, are realizing the virtues of contextuality to conceptual analysis. Just as theory may provide useful standards for the assessment of political practices, so may application of theoretical constructs within particular contexts provide a critical corrective to theory. This essay relates work undertaken within sociolegal studies applying a constitutive methodology to such efforts to contextualize political theorizing. The essay describes how the emphasis placed by constitutive theory on locality and meaning entails a contextual analysis. The essay then demonstrates (...) how a constitutive and contextual approach can enhance our understanding of the moral issues surrounding differentiated citizenship policy. While the most obvious cost associated with differentiated citizenship policy is a loss in formal equality, a contextual assessment demonstrates the prospect of an even deeper, though ultimately contingent, moral loss in self-invention. (shrink)

Educational neutrality states that decisions about school curricula and instruction should be made independently of particular comprehensive doctrines. Many political philosophers of education reject this view in favor of some non-neutral alternative. Contrary to what one might expect, some prominent liberal neutralists have also rejected this view in parts of their work. This paper has two purposes. The first part of the paper concerns the relationship between liberal neutrality and educational neutrality. I examine arguments by Rawls and Nagel and argue (...) that some of the same arguments they use to justify liberal neutrality also justify educational neutrality; thus, if we accept these arguments for liberal neutrality, we should also accept educational neutrality. The second part of the paper defends educational neutrality against objections that it is impossible and objections that it is undesirable. (shrink)

Since at least as long ago as Plato’s time, philosophers have considered the possibility that justice is at bottom a system of rules that members of society follow for mutual advantage. Some maintain that justice as mutual advantage is a fatally flawed theory of justice because it is too exclusive. Proponents of a Vulnerability Objection argue that justice as mutual advantage would deny the most vulnerable members of society any of the protections and other benefits of justice. I argue that (...) the Vulnerability Objection presupposes that in a justice-as-mutual-advantage society only those who can and do contribute to the cooperative surplus of benefits that compliance with justice creates are owed any share of these benefits. I argue that justice as mutual advantage need not include such a Contribution Requirement. I show by example that a justice-as-mutual-advantage society can extend the benefits of justice to all its members, including the vulnerable who cannot contribute. I close by arguing that if one does not presuppose a Contribution Requirement, then a justice-as-mutual-advantage society might require its members to extend the benefits of justice to humans that some maintain are not persons (for example, embryos) and to certain nonhuman creatures. I conclude that the real problem for defenders of justice as mutual advantage is that this theory of justice threatens to be too inclusive. (shrink)

Illustrating the tensions and possibilities that the notion of the ethic of care as a democratic and citizenship issue may have in discourses of citizenship education in western states is the focus of this article. I first consider some theoretical debates on the definition of an ethic of care, especially in relation to issues of justice and (im)partiality. Then, I discuss the reconceptualization of care on the basis of two related but distinct themes: the reconciliation of justice and care, and (...) the rethinking of citizenship. Following this, I lay out some implications for citizenship education and answer the question of what learning and teaching for/about a reconceptualized ethic of care can contribute to changing current perceptions of and actions towards immigrants, refugees and asylum seekers. (shrink)

RÉSUMÉ: Plusieurs libéraux modernes soutiennent que le pluralisme des valeurs a d’importantes conséquences pour l’élaboration des procédures et des institutions politiques. Mais les arguments fondés sur l’incommensurabilité et sur l’indétermination de la rationalité ou de la délibération se révèlent tous compatibles avec le monisme; et certaines formes de pluralisme sont compatibles soit avec une hiérarchisation des valeurs soit avec une hiérarchisation méta-éthique de certains types de concepts normatifs. En outre le «pluralisme» en tant que thèse métaphysique concernant les valeurs est (...) souvent confondu avec la thèse descriptive qu’il existe une pluralité de conceptions du bien dans les sociétés modernes, qui, elle, fournit la véritable justification du libéralisme dans l’organisation politique. Or cette forme de pluralisme est également compatible avec le monisme des valeurs. Le libéral pluraliste se trouve ainsi confronté à un dilemme: soit certaines valeurs sont d’importance prioritaire pour la justification de l’organisation politique, soit les conséquences du pluralisme des valeurs en pareil domaine sont indéterminées. (shrink)

The debate over the nature of egalitarianism has come to dominate political philosophy. As ever more sophisticated attempts are made to describe the principles of an egalitarian distribution or to specify the good or goods that should be distributed equally, little is said about the fundamental basis of equality. In virtue of what should people be regarded as equal? Egalitarians have tended to dismiss this question of fundamental equality. In the first part of the paper I will examine some of (...) these strategies of marginalisation and assess whether the issue of fundamental equality matters. Jeremy Waldron has criticised this strategy of avoidance in his recent book God, Locke and equality. He argues that Locke’s turn to a theistic grounding for fundamental equality provides a better approach to the problem than the approach taken by contemporary liberals such as John Rawls. I will examine Waldron’s critique of Rawls and show that it is wanting. I will conclude by suggesting that Rawls’s approach to the issue has a bearing on the way in which equality should be understood as a political value. This argument for the primacy of a political conception of egalitarianism has a bearing on the interconnection between core liberal values and the idea of the state that has been emphasised by Rawls, Dworkin and Nagel. (shrink)

The article deals with Hurka?s critique of Kymlicka and Arneson?s critique of Dworkin on endorsement constraint thesis, according to which a person cannot have a valuable life if values are imposed on her - primarily by state action - overriding her preferences and convictions on the good life. This thesis has often been identified with neutral liberalism and counterposed to perfectionism. The text argues against Hurka?s and Arneson?s argument that mild coercion and paternalistic reduction of trivial, bad or worthless options (...) can indeed bring about a more valuable life. Their argument does not acknowledge adequately the difference between coercion from a person?s immediate social environment and state coercion, which are not equally legitimate. My critique, however, does not exclude the legitimacy of perfectionistic measures, as a person could accept as justified state intervention concerning the support of particular values or goods, while at the same time not endorsing those values and goods. Not all endorsed goods or activities should be treated equally, as more relevant and valuable ones can be legitimately supported by particular policy. (shrink)

John Rawls’s case for a duty of assistance is partially premised on the assumption that liberal societies have an interest in assisting burdened societies to become well-ordered: Not only are well-...

Although ethical and justice arguments operate in two distinct levels—justice being a more specific concept—they can easily be conflated. A robust justification of ecological justice requires starting at the roots of justice, rather than merely giving, for example, an argument for why certain non-human beings have moral standing of some kind. Thus, I propose that a theory of ecological justice can benefit from a four-step justification for the inclusion of non-human beings into the community of justice, starting with Hume’s circumstances (...) of justice. I will further argue that the resulting theory of ecological justice should be biocentric—meaning that all living beings should be included into the community of justice, as they constitute a ‘community of fate’. (shrink)

This book offers an original account of a distinctly republican theory of social and global justice. The book starts by exploring the nature and value of Hegelian recognition theory. It shows the importance of that theory for grounding a normative account of free and autonomous agency. It is this normative account of free agency which provides the groundwork for a republican conception of social and global justice, based on the core-ideas of freedom as non-domination and autonomy as non-alienation. As the (...) author argues, republicans should endorse a sufficientarian account of social justice, which focuses on the nature of social relationships and their effects on people's ability to act freely and realize their fundamental interests. On the global level, the book argues for the cosmopolitan extension of the republican principles of non-domination and non-alienation within a multi-level democratic system. In so doing, the book addresses a major gap in the existing literature, presenting an original theory of justice, which combines Hegelian recognition theory and republican ideas of freedom, and applying this hybrid theory to the global domain. Fabian Schuppert creates a grand synthesis uniting neo-republican insights on freedom with Hegelian recognition theory. The result is an account of agency that arises from the idea of non-domination whose aim it is to safeguard individual freedom. When combined with Hegelian recognition theory a social focus also emerges. This amalgam comments on many of the major disputes concerning global justice from a cosmopolitan perspective. Because of the broad scope and the many contemporary discussions engaged this book will be of keen interest to scholars as well as a welcome addition to the classroom. (shrink)

The paper is meant to be a contribution to the study of Indian and comparative ethics. It treats the Vajj laggam, an anthology of Pr krit stanzas (subh sita literature) dealing with a variety of topics. Focusing on the 'ethical' sections of the VL, it tries to describe and analyse its underlying ethical system. In Part I the different ethical themes of the VL (Valour and Destiny, Virtues and Vices, Masters and Servants, Friendship and Affection, Poverty and Charity) are described (...) in detail. In Part II it is shown that the VL. offers a clear example of a virtue ethic with a strong emphasis on self-regarding virtues (gunas), based on a pluralistic and instrumental theory of the good. The paper also treats the crucial ethical problem of the relationship between personal well-being and virtuousness as described in the VL. (shrink)

John Horton has argued for an associative theory of political obligation in which such obligation is seen as a concomitant of membership of a particular polity, where a polity provides the generic goods of order and security. Accompanying these substantive claims is a methodological thesis about the centrality of the phenomenology of ordinary moral consciousness to our understanding of the problem of political obligation. The phenomenological strategy seems modest but in some way it is far-reaching promising to dissolve some long-standing (...) problems of political theory. However, it fails at just the point at which a theory of political obligation is needed, namely when individuals question the grounds of their political obligation. A principle of obligation is needed to provide individuals with a reason for compliance with authoritative social rules when the exercise of that obligation is irksome. It is at this point that we need to invoke the idea of society as an implicit social contract, in which obligations are seen as stemming from those terms that it would be in the interests of individuals to agree in a social contract. This is consistent with the method of reflective equilibrium. (shrink)

In his essay, ‘The Question of Machiavelli’, Isaiah Berlin notes the depth of Machiavelli's pluralism. Taking my cue from Berlin, I argue that much modern liberal political philosophy neglects this deep pluralism and, as a result, misunderstands modern political problems such as the phenomenon of religiously-motivated terrorism.

A central focus of care ethics is on the compelling moral salience of attending to the needs of our particular others. However, there is no consensus within the care literature for how and when such partiality is morally justified. This article outlines and defends a novel justificatory argument that grounds partiality in the facts and values of the relation itself. Specifically, this article argues that partiality is justified when grounded in caring values exemplified in good caring relations. Hence, this justification (...) is termed the argument from good caring relations. This justification is promising for two reasons. First, the argument from good caring relations has the potential to spur engagement between care ethics and the broader partiality literature. In particular, the argument from good caring relations could enhance what Simon Keller has termed ‘the relationships view’. Second, the argument from good caring relations is more persuasive than the other major justificatory argument for partiality presently in the care literature: a distributive argument, which takes the form of a modified version of Robert Goodin’s assigned responsibility model of moral obligation. Indeed, where this distributive argument fails, the argument from good caring relation succeeds. This article thus concludes that the argument from good caring relations is preferable for justifying partiality in care ethics. (shrink)

It is a commonplace that liberalism and religious belief conflict. Liberalism, its proponents and critics maintain, requires the privatization of religious belief, since liberals often argue that citizens of faith must repress their fundamental commitments when participating in public life. Critics of liberalism complain that privatization is objectionable because it requires citizens of faith to violate their integrity. The liberal political tradition has always sought to carve out social space for individuals to live by their own lights. If liberalism requires (...) citizens to violate their integrity, liberals have cause for concern. I seek to rebut this integrity objection to liberalism. I focus on the dominant form of philosophical liberalism: public reason liberalism. I argue that the integrity objection undermines the mainstream conception of public reason liberalism, but not public reason liberalism itself. The paper opens by outlining the structure of public reason liberalism and the integrity objection (§§2 and 3). It then analyses two versions of the objection and argues that the second version is successful against the mainstream conception of public reason (§4). I argue in response that public reason liberalism need not endorse principles of restraint—the civic restrictions on religious expression typically associated with it. I then sketch a conception of public reason liberalism that eschews principles of restraint (§5). This alternative promises to reconcile public reason liberals and their faith-friendly critics by putting the integrity objection to rest. (shrink)

There is an awakening of interest in links between geography and moral philosophy, or ethics. This paper reviews a range of issues where common ground might be found on this new disciplinary interface. These issues include the historical geography of moralities, the notion of moral geographies, inclusion and exclusion in the context of the bounding of spaces, and the moral significance of distance and proximity, as well as the more familiar concern with social justice. Environmental ethics provides a link with (...) the physical side of the subject. Some suggestions are made as to the possible contribution of geography to the understanding of moral issues. (shrink)

This paper asks whether political justice can be encapsulated by procedures. It examines John Rawls’s tripartite distinction between perfect, pure and imperfect procedural justice, concluding that none gives a satisfactory account of procedural justice. Imperfect procedural justice assumes that there could be an authoritative source of justice other than procedures, while perfect procedural justice takes a double-minded view of procedure-independent standards of justice. That leaves pure procedural justice as an apparently decisionistic mode of deciding which outcomes are just. This at (...) least avoids the confusion between having authoritative procedures and procedure-independent standards that are also purportedly authoritative. However, it is argued that even a political procedure that defines the extension of a term such a ‘justice’ will lack authority over it once its reference is fixed. Since Rawls’s categories of procedural justice are jointly exhaustive, the problem of determining justice via political procedures appears insoluble. (shrink)

(2006). The Social Theory of Anti‐Liberalism. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy: Vol. 9, The Political Theory of John Gray, pp. 137-154.

There is an awakening of interest in links between geography and moral philosophy, or ethics. This paper reviews a range of issues where common ground might be found on this new disciplinary interface. These issues include the historical geography of moralities, the notion of moral geographies, inclusion and exclusion in the context of the bounding of spaces, and the moral significance of distance and proximity, as well as the more familiar concern with social justice. Environmental ethics provides a link with (...) the physical side of the subject. Some suggestions are made as to the possible contribution of geography to the understanding of moral issues. (shrink)

In A Theory of Justice, John Rawls argues that self-respect is ‘perhaps the most important’ primary good and that its status as such gives crucial support to controversial ideas like the lexical priority of liberty. Given the importance of these ideas for Rawls, it should be no surprise that they have attracted much critical attention. In response to these critics, I give a defense of self-respect that grounds its importance in Rawls’s moral conception of the person. I show that this (...) understanding of self-respect goes well beyond giving support to the lexical priority of liberty, also supporting Rawls’s still more controversial view of public reason. On my account, taking self-respect seriously requires the coercive enforcement of public reason. This is a novel argument for public reason, in that it grounds the idea in justice as fairness and mandates its coercive enforcement. (shrink)

Proponents of environmentalist views often urge the teaching of such views and the inculcation of ‘green’ values within the educational curriculum of schools as a key component of achieving their ends. It might seem that modern versions of political morality that refuse to take a stance on controversial questions—religious, ethical, philosophical—or eschew appeal to perfectionist doctrines, such as Rawlsian political liberalism, are beset by a particularly acute difficulty in this regard. To the extent that environmentalist views embody claims about ethical (...) matters such as how individuals should live their lives, they fall foul of this version of political morality. This article evaluates the resources available to political liberalism to respond to the challenge of bringing the teaching of green values and virtues within the national curriculum. It argues that environmental concerns differ in morally important ways from other ethical, philosophical, and religious views that are typically off-limits to political liberalism. Much that passes as green ideals are not simply a conception of the good life in the manner that religious views, for example, are. Rather, many environmental goods are crucial to the realisation of socioeconomic justice and therefore escape the requirement of state neutrality on endorsing the truth or importance of their role. A minimal political liberal education includes teaching about justice-based concerns as part of a compulsory national curriculum. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that any adequate evolutionary ethical theory needs to account for moral belief as well as for dispositions to behave altruistically. It also needs to be clear whether it is offering us an account of the motivating reasons behind human behaviour or whether it is giving justifying reasons for a particular set of behaviours or, if both, to distinguish them clearly. I also argue that, unless there are some objective moral truths, the evolutionary ethicist cannot offer (...) justifying reasons for a set of behaviours. I use these points to refute Waller's claims that the illusion of objectivity plays a dispensable role in Ruse's theory, that my critique of Ruse's Darwinian metaethics is built on a false dilemma, that there is nothing to be distressed about if morality is not objective, and that ethical beliefs are subject to a kind of causal explanation that undermines their objectivity in a way that scientific beliefs are not. (shrink)

Much modern liberal political theory takes the concept of autonomy as central and argues that political arrangements are to be assessed, in some part, by their ability to foster the development of individual autonomy understood as being the author of one's own life. This paper argues that so understood, autonomy is less important than is usually thought The liberal requirement that we 'author' our own lives disguises the importance of also being accurate readers of our own lives. I explore the (...) metaphor of reading through a discussion of the character of Nora in Ibsen's Doll's Houseand argue that Nora's case demonstrates the limitations of the liberal understanding of autonomy as involving authorship of one's own life. (shrink)

This article provides an ethical evaluation of the CIA's use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles to target so-called terror suspects and insurgents. It utilises Christian informed deontological and virtue-ethical criteria to assess this practise. These criteria include just intent, charity, proportionality, moral consistency, truthfulness, mercy, courage and prudence. The article concludes that the UAV target programme is morally problematic. The United States’ ‘kill not capture’ policy as exemplified in the use of ‘signature’ strikes defies the virtues at stake. By using UAV's (...) as tools for preventive warfare, utilising armed UAV's that are weapons of war outside areas of armed conflict and disregarding the principles of transparency, last resort and proportionality, the United States is employing UAV's in a morally illegitimate and imprudent way, and is setting precedents that might have dire consequences for global peace and the security of future generations. (shrink)

En el presente trabajo sostengo que los argumentos específicos desarrollados por John Rawls para justificar la adopción de un estándar de bienes sociales primarios no logran su cometido. En primer lugar, presento y critico los argumentos rawlsianos relacionados con intuiciones antidiscriminatorias y con el hecho del pluralismo razonable. Asimismo, caracterizo y critico las ideas rawlsianas concernientes al alcance del concepto de equidad, así como el argumento de los gustos caros y de la responsabilidad por los fines. Estimo que ellos no (...) logran justificar el distribuendum recursivista de bienes sociales primarios. En cambio, entiendo que tales consideraciones brindan apoyo a un estándar bienestarista. Ello se debe a que un estándar welfarista enfrenta exitosamente las dificultades que Rawls menciona para favorecer el estándar recursivista de bienes sociales primarios. In the present paper I argue that the specific arguments developed by John Rawls to justify the standard of social primary goods do not succeed. In the first place I develop and criticize the Rawlsian arguments grounded in antidiscriminatory intuitions and the fact of reasonable pluralism. I also characterize and criticize Rawls's ideas concerning the scope of the concept of fairness as well as his argument concerning extensive tastes and responsibility for ends. I believe that they do not justify a resourcist distribuendum. On the contrary, I argue that such considerations support a welfarist standard. The reason is that a welfarist standard successfully deals with the difficulties Rawls mentions in favoring the resourcist standard of social primary goods. (shrink)

Quotas, including youth quotas for representative institutions, are usually evaluated from within the social justice discourse. That discourse relies on several questionable assumptions, seven of which I critically address and radically revise in this contribution from a libertarian perspective. Temporal justice then takes on an entirely different form. It becomes a theory in which responsibilities are clear and cannot be shifted onto the shoulders of the weak and innocent. I shall only briefly sketch some outlines and general implications of such (...) a theory, arguing that it offers too little guidance for our imperfect world. While that implies more tolerance for quotas, I nevertheless propose an alternative more suited to a representative, deliberative democracy: veto rights. (shrink)