This essay presents a new way of conceptualizing the problem of political obligation. On the traditional ‘normativist’ framing of the issue, the primary task for theory is to secure the content and justification of political obligations, providing practically applicable moral knowledge. This paper develops an alternative, ‘pragmatist’ framing of the issue, by rehabilitating a frequently misunderstood essay by Hanna Pitkin and by recasting her argument in terms of the ‘pragmatic turn’ in recent philosophy, as articulated by Robert Brandom. From this (...) perspective, the content and justification of political obligations cannot be determined in a way that is in principle separable from their application. This casts ‘political obligation’ not as a problem to be philosophically resolved, but as a political predicament that calls for a kind of practical engagement. The merit of this perspective is to draw our attention toward the conditions under which the problem appears as a lived predicament. (shrink)

Agonism is a political theory that places contestation at the heart of politics. Agonistic theorists charge liberal theory with a depoliticization of pluralism through an excessive focus on consensus. This paper examines the agonistic critiques of liberalism from a normative perspective. I argue that by itself the argument from pluralism is not sufficient to support an agonistic account of politics, but points to further normative commitments. Analyzing the work of Mouffe, Honig, Connolly, and Owen, I identify two normative currents of (...) agonistic theory: emancipatory agonism, aimed at challenging violence and exclusion, and perfectionist agonism, aimed at the cultivation of nobility. From a normative perspective the former presents an internal challenge to liberalism, while the latter constitutes an external challenge to liberalism by providing a competing account of the ends of politics. Recognition of the distinction between emancipatory and perfectionist agonism is crucial in assessing the purchase of agonistic critiques of liberalism. Furthermore, this analysis draws us beyond the simple opposition between contestation and consensus. It is not simply a question of valuing genuine pluralism and therefore criticizing consensus; rather the question comes to be: what are the ends of politics? (shrink)

Straddling the divide between universalism and relativism, agonistic reason as construed by Foucault and Castoriadis dismisses universal foundations without becoming context-bound or inescapably subjectivist. It is propelled by a strong commitment to freedom and it draws flexibly on available resources and its creative potentials in order to vindicate its conditional claims. This provides a hyper-critical and liberating mode of critical reason which delves into the underlying norms of agency in order to open them up to question and to enhance free (...) self-direction. The argument that is put forward, then, is threefold. Firstly, Castoriadis’ accent on ontological reflection, the imaginative disclosure of new figures and the global intent of critique contrasts with Foucault’s account of agonistic reason and yields a more robust version of critical rationality. Secondly, this form of reflective agonism can effectively address fundamental challenges and reason across contexts, tackling moral and other issues that arise from cultural innovation and exchange. Lastly, agonistic reason need not, and should not, call upon absolute principles on any level in order to uphold its own values and do justice to its radical others. (shrink)

In this article, I chart some recent developments in the linguistic contextualist philosophy of history defended by Quentin Skinner. I attempt to identify several shifts in the way in which Skinner's position has been presented and justified, focusing particularly on his embrace of anti-foundationalism, his focus on rhetoric rather than speech-acts and his concern to recast contextualism as compatible with other interpretive approaches. In the final section, I reject the notion - suggested by Skinner and others - that a contextualist (...) philosophy of history might constitute a distinct form of political theorizing in itself. (shrink)

When assessing North American students' oral participation in classes, should all students be subject to the same evaluation criteria or should teachers make reasonable allowances for Asian students practicing humility? How do we weigh the promotion of 'courage' through character education initiatives with traditional Asian dispositions? Viewing Asian humility in Western classrooms and as it rubs up against liberal principles of equality or justice, and a virtue ethic raises a number of philosophical questions around authenticity, polyvalence, and relativity. I approach (...) first through the lens of liberal philosophy as the 'dilemma of diversity' meets a boundary with communitarianism, and then through the contextualist lenses of Wittgenstein, Heidegger, and Foucault. Drawing on Tully's political philosophy, I inspect humility as embedded in language-games and then open it to revision through comparative history, inviting participants in the teacher's game of assessment to renegotiate the rules: a process complicated by their reticence to speak up. I also use Medina and Scheman's political reading of Wittgenstein to discuss how teachers can discern humility as performative silence within the classroom, distinguishing between genealogical accounts that show how comportments could be otherwise from perspicuous inspection of interconnected language-games in current educational settings. (shrink)

In a number of recent articles, Nancy Fraser attempts to understand the World Social Forum within the framework of critical democratic theory. In this article, we examine the descriptive and normative aspects of Fraser’s theoretical framework, and explore the effects of projecting it upon the World Social Forum. We argue that while this theory may elucidate some features of the Forum, many of the Forum’s most challenging and innovative aspects are obscured and limited by Fraser’s framework. Not only, then, does (...) the World Social Forum elude Fraser’s conceptualization of it, but we suggest that the praxis of the Forum poses a number of serious challenges to Fraser’s critical theory of democracy and social justice. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to clarify the relation between genealogy and history and to suggest a methodological reading of Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals. I try to determine genealogy's specific range of objects, specific mode of explication, and specific textual form. Genealogies in general can be thought of as drastic narratives of the emergence and transformations of forms of subjectivity related to power, told with the intention to induce doubt and self-reflection in exactly those readers whose (collective) history is (...) narrated. The main interest in understanding the concept of genealogy and revisiting Nietzsche's introduction of it into philosophy lies in understanding how a certain way of writing and a certain textual practice function that successfully call into question current judgments, institutions and practices. Nietzsche's example, I argue, can provide a paradigm for a critical practice that accounts for historical processes of subject formation in terms of power and turns them against given forms of subjectivity. (shrink)

Using the example of cross-cultural philosophy’s relation to disciplinary philosophy, this article seeks to think through some of the issues relevant to diversifying philosophy as an academic discipline. Guided by James Tully’s ruminations on non-domination, it attempts to make a case for a practice of philosophy which is more attuned to its social situatedness in a postindustrial, liberal society. Within this context, it argues that disciplinary philosophy must seek to contribute to making meaning of our place in the world.

What is the appropriate role for the political philosopher in a democratic society? One possible answer to this question is that she should use her expertise to provide normative guidance for her community. My aim in this article is to cast significant doubt on this view. I begin by endorsing a ‘qualitative continuity’ thesis about the nature of political philosophy, which posits an essential crossover between the activities of professional philosophers and ordinary citizens. I then offer a contextual account of (...) scholarly expertise, which views it as a status that is dependent on institutional recognition – rather than knowledge – and involves relational role obligations. I move on to argue that the authority implied by scholarly expertise cannot properly be extended to the normative political domain of a community. I then reject some potential grounds upon which such an extension might be defended, before briefly considering what a rejection of normative expertise might mean for the professional political theorist in a democratic community. (shrink)

Deliberative democracy’s roots in critical theory are often invoked in relation to deliberative norms; yet critical theory also stands for an ambition to provoke tangible change in the real world of political practice. From this perspective, this paper reconsiders what deliberative democracy ought to look like as a critical theory, which has not just theoretical and practical, but also methodological implications. Against conceptions of activism as pushing through one’s pregiven convictions, recent debates in critical theory highlight the necessity for critical (...) activism to be emancipatory in way that is enabling rather than imposing, and inclusive rather than ‘enlightened’. As such deliberative democracy must be at once a critical theory of democracy and a democratic critical theory: committing itself to being an innately inclusive, itself reflexive and self-reflexive project rather than a substantive theory to be implemented. (shrink)

Issues relating to diversity and pluralism continue to permeate both social and political discourse. Of particular contemporary importance and relevance are those issues raised when the demands associated with forms of pluralism clash with those of the liberal state. These forms of pluralism can be divided into two subcategories: thin and thick pluralism. Thin pluralism refers to forms of pluralism that can be accommodated by the existing liberal framework, whereas thick pluralism challenges this liberal framework. -/- This thesis is an (...) examination of four forms of political association that may be able to accommodate and support the demands of pluralism. These four models are Rawls’ political liberalism, Crowder’s value pluralism, Rorty’s post-foundational liberalism, and Mouffe’s radical democratic project. What unites these four forms of political association is their capacity to avoid the exclusionary effects of a form of liberalism that I, following Gaus, refer to as Enlightenment liberalism. As the name suggests, this conception of liberalism is anchored in the Enlightenment, and in particular with what may be considered as the Enlightenment view of reason. As such, therefore, Enlightenment liberalism is both universal and perfectionist. In this context, I argue that Enlightenment liberalism is a species of what Berlin refers to as ‘moral monism’. -/- These four forms of political association are ordered in such a way as to chart an intellectual trajectory. Rawls and Crowder are both situated firmly within the liberal tradition, whereas Rorty and Mouffe move beyond this, and embrace a form of post-foundational politics. It is in this trajectory that the second theme of this thesis emerges. This is centred on a paradox: in order to avoid the exclusionary effect of Enlightenment liberalism and embrace a form of political association that meets the demands of pluralism and diversity, the models examined still promote autonomy as the dominant virtue. (shrink)

Statelessness and displacement represent nothing short of a loss of place, the violation of rights and international norms, threat to safety and belonging, and severely limits access to law and citizenship. Social work must leverage and sustain an ethical standpoint as a critical counterpoint to the increasing moral and political urgency of statelessness. However, traditional and normative social work ethics operate at a level of abstraction that do not engage sufficiently with the realpolitik of statelessness. This paper critically engages with (...) moral questions concerning displacement and statelessness by engaging the philosophy of James Tully and Christine Korsgaard. This engagement enables connections between agency and notions of democratic constitutionalism where people have the right to call into and contest relations of governance that oppress them, through various means such as advocacy and activism. We present a reconsideration of established ethical understandings by arguing for the place of public philosophy and the constitution of the self as key to social work theory and practice in response to statelessness and displacement. Korsgaard’s work on normativity and agency, and Tully’s notion of democratic constitutionalism provide a rich and original contribution to social work ethics that will be articulated for social work theory and practice. (shrink)

Over a decade after publication of Thinking Again: Education After Postmodernism (1998) contention still emerges among Foucaultians over whether discursively made‐up things really exist, and whether removal of the constituent subject leaves room for agency within techniques of caring for the self. That these questions are kept alive shows that some readers have not rethought Foucault, finding what possibly comes after postmodernism. Using Wittgenstein to ‘reciprocally illuminate’ Foucault (after Tully and Marshall), I open teacher inspection and reforms to problematization, as (...) relations to bedrock rules governing games of truth. ‘How, upon entering classrooms, do inspectors know “teaching” is taking place and not crazy and fuzzy things in its name?’ Taking up Hirst's vexing question, I move beyond liberal‐analytic concept‐mapping and neo‐liberal individualism to more fully assay the political ground for judging teaching practices through genealogy. Epistemological, political and ethical concerns intersect as we approach the problem through Foucault's three axes of an historical‐ontology of the present: knowledge(s), power relations, and arts of the self. Drawing on recent Governmentality Studies in Education (Peters., 2009), we aver the impasses of postmodern relativism while finding limited ranges of agency along each axis, as teachers practice freedoms by critiquing and renegotiating rules. (shrink)