Download social and political philosophy

SOCIAL AND POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
BA Philosophy optional course, final year
Spring and Summer Terms 2008
Gordon Finlayson
Course web page: http://www.sussex.ac.uk/Users/jgf21/SPPindex.html
Course outline and Seminar Programme
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essential reading for the seminar
recommended
introductory
date of publication of first edition
paperback edition currently in print
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A13
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copy in reserve collection
3 (etc.) copies in short loan collection
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photocopy in box in A13
available in Uni bookshop/at Amazon
Course summary
The course explores central questions in social and political philosophy as raised by major historical figures
and as treated by contemporary political philosophy. It is both historical and thematic. Issues are explored
through readings of core texts in the Western tradition of social and political thought, and their treatment in
the current literature. We will attempt to identify the specific difference between political and social
questions, and the relation between these. We will ask central questions such as: What is the state? What
makes a state legitimate? What is the point of the state? What is the best form of government? What is
democracy? What are the advantages and disadvantages of democratic government? What is society? What is
the basis of social order? What kind of society is best? What is the relation between the political community
and other forms of human association, such as markets, contracts, families, friendship and extra-political civil
society?
The second part of the course focuses more closely on a contemporary debate: Rawls’s liberalism and
conception of justice on the one hand, and its critics on the other.
Readings
The essential readings for each seminar usually add up to the equivalent of two journal articles. In addition to
them you should read one or two other items from the reading list for the seminar, following your own
interests. Reading the secondary literature will give you a much clearer and more nuanced grasp of the
primary texts. You should expect reading for the seminar to take a day and a half. Under each topic,
introductory readings are usually listed first (marked +) and then others, roughly in order of
recommendation. Please use the bibliographies in more recent readings to find further material on the topic.
Questions
I have listed seminar questions – things to think about for the lectures as well as the seminars – separately
from the essay questions which are given in order of topic at the end. You should choose an essay topic
from the list of essay questions. Alternatively you can make up your own question, but only with my prior
approval. If you make up your own question, and it is a poor one, you may end up losing a lot of
marks!
Assessment: all relevant information about assessement is on the Departmental web page:
http://www.sussex.ac.uk/philosophy/1-3-13.html. . The 2000 word essay must be on one of the
first four topics and is to be submitted by 4pm on Wednesday of week 7 to the SCHOOL
OFFICE.
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Books for purchase
I have found one volume that contains nearly all the primary literature we will be looking at
Pb UB/A Political Philosophy: The Essential Texts ed. Steven M. Cahn, Oxford OUP, 2005.
You will also need to buy John Rawls’s Political Liberalism Columbia U.P. 2005, for the second part of the
course. Pb UB/A
You may also want to buy the following historical texts. They should be available second hand.
Pb/A Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, edited by Richard Tuck, Cambridge, CUP.
Pb/A Jean Jacques Rousseau, Rousseau: The Basic Political Writings, tr. Cress, Hackett.
Pb/A G. W. F. Hegel, Elements of the Philosophy of Right, translated by Alan Wood, CUP, 1992.
Pb/A D.McLellan ed. Karl Marx: Selected Writings Oxford, OUP.
Online sources for texts and articles
Most of the primary texts used in this course are available online, and some of the articles in the reading list are
available in electronic format. See the Sussex Electronic Library philosophy site:
http://www.sussex.ac.uk/library/subjects/philosophy.shtml and the course webpage for the course (above).
See also the University of Michigan Documents centre – Political Theory @
http://www.lib.umich.edu/govdocs/pstheory.html and also the very useful resource http://www.marxists.org.
You will find Andrew Chitty’s online Bibliography on Marx @
http://www.sussex.ac.uk/Users/sefd0/bib/marx.htm.
The order of topics is:
Introduction: The state, society and the political community.
Essay Topics
1.
2.
3.
4.
Plato’s Republic
Aristotle’s Critique of Plato
Aristotle’s perfectionism and the nature and function of the polis
Hobbes on the nature of the state and on political obligation
Examinable Topics
5.
6.
7.
8.
Kant – the Rechtsstaat and the compossibility of external freedom
Hegel – ethical life, the state as the actualized idea of freedom
Liberalism and Justice – Rawls
The Communitarian Critique of Rawls.
9.
10.
11.
12.
Rawls’s Political Liberalism.
Habermas on Democracy and Civil Society
Habermas’ Criticisms of Rawls and the Habermas-Rawls Dispute
The Feminist Critique of Rawls and Habermas.
NB these are topics not Weeks.
Introduction: State, Society, Political Community
Questions of politics or ‘the political’ nowadays, if they are not empty gestures, are usually questions of some
kind or another concerning the state. So let us begin by trying to find out what the modern state is. We also
need to know, if there are any, what the political questions are that do not concern the state. This may help
us come to a provisional distinction between political questions strictly speaking and non-political social
questions, and between the political and the social more generally.
J. Raz ‘The Authority of States’ Morality of Freedom Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1986. ch. 4 pp.70-105
R. Geuss, History and Illusion in Politics, hereafter 28-68.
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Q. Skinner ‘The State’ in Goodin, and Pettit, eds. (1997) Contemporary Political Philosophy: An Anthology
hereafter 3-27.
C. Offe & K Ronge ‘Theses on the Theory of the State’ p. 60-66
Questions:
1. What is the state? What does it consist in?
2. What do we mean by the term ‘the state’? How does its meaning differ from say the meaning of
‘government’, ‘nation’, ‘country’?
3. What do we mean by the ‘legitimacy’ of the state?
4. What are the criteria of legitimation? What shows a state to be legitimate – how do we recognize a
legitimate state when we see one, and what makes a state legitimate?
5. What do we mean by the ‘authority’ of the state?
6. What nowadays makes a community or association a political association? Does this have anything to do
with the state?
1. Plato. The Just Society
Essential Reading: Plato, Republic in Cahn pp.31-126
+ Gosling, J.C.B. (1973) Plato, ch. 1
+ Hall, R.W. (1981) Plato, chs. 2-5
+ Berki, The History of Political Thought, pp. 42-57
+ Sabine and Thorson, A History of Political Theory, ch. 3 ‘Plato: The Republic’
+ Foster, M.B. (1935) The Political Philosophies of Plato and Hegel, chs. 1-2
+ Pappas, N. (1995) Plato and the Republic, Routledge Philosophy Guidebook, chs. 4, 5, 10
Annas, J. (1981) An Introduction to Plato’s Republic, chs. 4-5
Gail Fine, Plato 1 and Plato 2 (Oxford OUP 1992).
R. Kraut ed. The Cambridge Companion to Plato, (Cambridge, C.U.P, 1992)
Plato’s Republic: Critical Essays, (Lanham Md.: Rowan and Littlefield, 1997)
Strauss, L. (1950) Natural Right and History, chs. 3-4
Barker, E. (1906) The Political Thought of Plato and Aristotle, ch. 3, later rewritten as chs. 8-11 of Barker’s
Greek Political Theory
Gouldner, A.W. (1967) Enter Plato: Classical Greece and the Origins of Social Theory, ch. 6
Crombie, I.M. (1963) An Examination of Plato’s Doctrines, vol. 1 Plato on Man and Society, ch. 3
Kraut R. (1993) ‘The defence of justice in Plato’s Republic’, in R. Kraut ed. The Cambridge Companion to Plato
N. P. White, Philosopher-Kings: (Princeton N.J.: Princeton UP, 1988)
On women in Plato:
Lloyd, G. (1984) The Man of Reason, 2nd ed. 1993, chs 1-2 (see parts on Plato)
Saxonhouse, A. (1976) ‘Philosopher and female in the political thought of Plato’, Political Theory 4
Annas, J. (1981) An Introduction to Plato’s Republic, ch. 7 or ‘Plato’s Republic and feminism’, Philosophy 51, 1976
Seminar questions:
1. The Republic is subtitled On Justice. In what sense? What does Plato mean by justice - a just person and a
just society?
2. Are the connections Plato draws between (a) rulers and reason, (b) soldiers and spiritedness, and (c)
economic producers and physical appetites plausible?
3. Is Plato’s conception of the soul an inherently masculine one?
4. Does Plato’s three-part theory of the soul inevitably lead to support for a class society
5. In what sense, if any, is Plato a communist?
2.
Aristotle
Aristotle’s Critique of Plato.
3. The thesis that the State Exists by Nature and that Man is by nature a political Animal
Aristotle’s Politics provides a good point of departure for anyone who is interested in the tradition of political
philosophy. First, he did not make a distinction between society (of human beings) and the political
community. Human association is, in its fully developed form, political association, i.e. a plurality of human
beings living together in a polis. Second, however he addresses the question of what makes one political
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constitution or régime i.e. one type of society better than another? In his Ethics Aristotle says that all human
beings seek eudaimonia (happiness human flourishing) or ‘the good life’. This consists in realising your nature
as a human being, which in turn consists in living on the basis of reason i.e. acting virtuously. The rest of the
Ethics enumerates the ‘virtues’ or specific excellences which we need to cultivate in order to be live in a
rational way. But at the end of the Ethics Aristotle says that the virtues can only be cultivated within a ‘polis’.
Correspondingly in the Politics he characterises the polis, by contrast with the household or the village, as that
form of association which enables human beings to realise their nature as human beings. This is the basis for
his recommendations in the rest of the Politics about how the state should be organised. Thus ‘A state is an
association of similar persons whose aim is the best life possible. What is best is happiness, and to be happy
is an active exercise of virtue and a complete enjoyment of it.’ (Politics 7.8).
Seminar Two: Does the polis exist by nature?
Essential Reading: #Cahn pp.129-169
Or alternatively you can look at #Aristotle: The Politics ed. Stephen Everson, CUP 1988.
Book I, 1-6, 13. The origins of the polis, the polis nature or convention; the elements of the polis, the role of
slaves, natural and conventional slaves.
Book III What is a citizen; the relation between citizen and state vi criterion of good regime; discussion of
the different regimes.
Book IV 4 (1291b31) problems with various kinds of demokratia 11&12 role of the middle classes.
Book V, 9 only loyalty and education.
Book VI 2-5 of demokratia
Book VII 1-5, 7-10, 13-15 The best state. Happiness and the good life for individuals and the polis;
Book VIII, 1 only.
It is useful also to look at Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book 1, 1.1-1.4, or, if you prefer the Stephanus
pagination 1094a1-1094b12 on political science, Book 8, 9.6-9.64, or 1159b25-1161a10.
Seminar Two: Questions:
1. What is the meaning of Aristotle’s claim that “man is by nature a political animal”?
2. Why does he say that man is more political than any bee or other social animal?
3. What according to Aristotle is the basis of the political community?
4. What kind of things does Aristotle mean when he says that the state exists by nature?
5. What does Aristotle say is characteristic of a good regime or polis?
6. What are the different kinds of constitution and how does Aristotle rank them?
7. How does Aristotle define demokratia? What are the conditions in which it ought to thrive?
8. What, for Aristotle, is the best kind of polis and why?
9. What are the various kinds of contribution made by slaves, women, metics and citizens to the political
community?
10. Does Aristotle say that political participation is necessary to achieve eudaimonia? Does he mean
participation in the community or participation in government?
11. What are the major differences between the poleis discussed by Aristotle and modern states?
12. What are the major differences between the kinds of ancient demokratia discussed by Aristotle and
modern representative democracy?
Background Reading
+ Barnes, J. (1982) Aristotle, chs. 17-18 (reprinted (2000) as Aristotle: a Very Short Introduction)
+ Mulgan, R. (1977) Aristotle’s Political Theory: An Introduction for Students of Political Theory, ch. 1-2
Everson, S. (1988) ‘Aristotle on the foundations of the state’, Political Studies
* Finley, M. Politics in the Ancient World, CUP 1983, ch 3 & 4 (ignore all the stuff about Rome) or
Democracy Ancient and Modern (London, 1985)
Further reading:
On the state exists ‘by nature’.
Bradley, A.C. (1880) ‘Aristotle’s conception of the state’, in E. Abbott ed. Hellenica (reprinted in The
Cambridge Companion to Aristotle.)
David Keyt ‘Three Basic theorems’ in Keyt and Miller, A Companion to Aristotle’s Politics, chapter 3.
Wolfgang Kullmann, ‘Man as a Political Animal’ in Keyt and Miller, A Companion to Aristotle’s Politics,
chapter 4.
W. L. Newman, The Politics of Aristotle, 4 vols. (Oxford, 1887-1902) vol 1 pp.24ff.
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von Fritz, K. and Kapp, E. [1950] ‘The development of Aristotle’s political philosophy and the concept
of nature’, in J. Barnes et. al. eds. Articles on Aristotle Vol. 2, 1977.
On Justice
Julia Annas, ‘Aristotle on Human Nature and Political virtue’, Review of Metaphysics 49. 996 pp. 731-53
Fred D. Miller, Jr., Nature, Justice, and Rights in Aristotle's Politics (Oxford, 1995).
Fred D. Miller, ‘Aristotle: ethics and politics’ in C. Shields ed. The Blackwell Guide to Ancient Philosophy (2003)
B. Yack, ‘Natural Right and Aristotle’s Understanding of Justice’, Political Theory, 18(2) (1990)
Nussbaum, M. (1990) ‘Aristotelian social democracy’ in R.B. Douglass et al eds. Liberalism and the Good
Josiah Ober ‘The Polis as a Society: Aristotle, John Rawls and the Athenian Social Contract’, The Athenian
Revolution: Essays on Greek Democracy and Political Theory, Princeton University Press (1996) ch. 10.
Bernard Yack, The Problems of a Political Animal: Community, Justice, and Conflict in Aristotelian Political Thought
(Berkeley, 1993).
On participation
M. I. Finley, Democracy Ancient and Modern (London, 1985) and The Ancient Greeks
Mulgan, R. (1990) ‘Aristotle and the value of political participation’, Political Theory 18:2
Josiah Ober The Athenian Revolution: Essays on Greek Democracy and Political Theory, Princeton University Press
(1996) chs 8 & 9.
Malcolm Schofield ‘Sharing in the Constitution’ Review of Metaphysics 49. 1996 pp. 831-58
Delba Winthrop: ‘Aristotle on Participatory Democracy’ Polity 11, 1978, pp. 151-71
4.
Thomas Hobbes
Hobbes begins from a standpoint diametrically and consciously opposed to Aristotle’s. There is no such
thing as an objectively ‘good life’ for humans that consists in living rationally; rather ‘good’ is just a word we
project onto whatever we happen to desire, and rationality is just a matter of doing what is effective in
satisfying one’s desires (it is ‘instrumental rationality’). Humans do not have an inherent developmental drive
to realise their telos of becoming rational beings, rather they are simply animals dominated by their desires,
and first and foremost by the desire to stay alive. The justification for the state is not that in and through it
humans can realise their telos, but that without it human interaction would degenerate into a violent chaos.
In this session we will look at Hobbes’s account of human nature and his claim that a ‘state of nature’ – a
situation in which there was no state – would become a state of permanent warfare between human beings.
For Hobbes it follows that it is in the rational self-interest of each citizen to obey the laws of the state, for as
long as the state is one that succeeds in forcing everyone else to obey the same laws, and every such is in that
sense a ‘legitimate’ one. We will use two ‘games’ described by modern game theory – the ‘prisoner’s
dilemmas’ and the ‘assurance’ game – to elucidate the exact nature of Hobbes’s argument. We will investigate
the ‘laws of nature’, the idea that they bind ‘in foro interno’, and the idea of a contract in Hobbes’s argument
for the state. Finally we will consider what responses an anarchist might make to Hobbes’s argument.
Seminar Three: Human nature and the basis of political legitimacy
Essential Reading: #Cahn pp.217-242
Or alternatively #Hobbes, T. [1651] Leviathan, Introduction, chs. 6, 11, 13-16, review and conclusion
#Read at least one article from list A and one from list B.
A: On the state of nature and Hobbes’s contract argument for the state:
* Hampton, J. (1995) ‘Contract and consent’ (omitting the section on Kantian contractarian theory) in
Goodin and Pettit eds. A Companion to Contemporary Political Philosophy or Hampton, J. (1986) Hobbes and the
Social Contract Tradition, chs. 2-3
Kavka, G. (1986) Hobbesian Moral and Political Theory chs. 3-4 or Kavka, G. (1983) ‘Hobbes’s war of all against
all’, Ethics 93
Gauthier, D.P. (1969) The Logic of Leviathan, ch. 1 or Gauthier, D. (1988) ‘Hobbes’ social contract’ in Rogers and
Ryan eds. Perspectives on Thomas Hobbes, secs. 1-3
M. Taylor, Anarchy and Cooperation, ch. 6: ‘Hobbes and the Prisoner's Dilemma'.
B: Responses to Hobbes’s argument:
Taylor, M. (1976) Anarchy and Cooperation (or 2nd ed. 1987 as The Possibility of Cooperation) ch. 7 or Taylor’s
Community, Anarchy and Liberty, 1982, ch. 2
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Macpherson, C.B. (1962) The Political Theory of Possessive Individualism, ch. 2 or ‘Introduction’ to Penguin
edition of Leviathan (1969) or ‘Hobbes today’ (1945) Canadian Journal of Philosophy, reprinted as ‘Hobbes’
bourgeois man’ in K.C. Brown ed. Hobbes Studies
Miller, D. (1984) Anarchism, chs. 1-2
Axelrod, R. (1984) The Evolution of Cooperation, chs. 1-2
Seminar questions:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
What is Hobbes's view of human nature?
What is the role of his state of nature?
What role does it play in his political theory?
Is it like the Prisoner's Dilemma?
Kant
Some people maintain that Kant is chiefly responsible for shaping the founding ideas of liberal democracy
although he certainly was neither a liberal (in the modern sense of the term) nor a democrat in any sense of
the word that means government by the people. However, he does present a very sophisticated account of
the legitimacy of law or Recht, based on a combination of the idea of republican government and the idea of
the social contract, ideas that are more usually kept separate.
Seminar Six. On Freedom and the Foundations of Right
Essential Reading: #Cahn pp. 379-388 and
Kant [1793] “On the Common Saying: ‘This May be True in Theory, but it does not Apply in Practice>’ in
Immanuel Kant: Political Writings, ed. Hans Reiss, CUP, Cambridge 1970 pp. 73-92.
Further Reading
Introductions to Kant’s political philosophy :
Reiss, H. (1970) ‘Introduction’ to Reiss ed. Kant’s Political Writings, secs. 4-6
Hassner, P. (1973) ‘Immanuel Kant’, in Strauss and Cropsey eds. The History of Political Philosophy
Riley, P. (1986) ‘The “elements” of Kant’s political philosophy’, Political Theory 14:4
Sullivan, R.J. (1989) Immanuel Kant’s Moral Theory, chs. 16-17
Kersting, W. (1992) ‘Politics, freedom and order: Kant’s political philosophy’ in P. Guyer ed. The Cambridge
Companion to Kant
Wood, A. (1999) Kant’s Ethical Thought, chapter on Kant’s political philosophy
On Kant’s political philosophy and philosophy of right:
Arendt, H. (1982) Lectures on Kant’s Political Philosophy
K.Baynes, "Kant on Property Rights and the Social Contract", The Monist, 72 (1989), pp. 433-53
L.W.Beck, "Kant and the Right of Revolution", Journal of the History of Ideas, 32 (1971), pp. 411-22; also
reprinted in his Essays on Kant and Hume, pp. 171-87
C.L.Carr, "Kant's Theory of Political Authority", History of Political Thought, 10 (1989), pp. 719-31
O.Hoffe, Immanuel Kant, ch. 9 [much commended by previous students]
(R) J.G.Murphy, Kant: the Philosophy of Right, ch. 4
Riley, P. (1983) Kant’s Political Philosophy
P.Riley, "On Kant as the Most Adequate of the Contract Theorists", Political Theory, 12 (1973), pp. 450-70;
also forms ch. 5 of his book Will and Political Legitimacy
Pippin, R.B. (1985) ‘On the moral foundations of Kant’s Rechtslehre’ in R. Kennington ed. The Philosophy of
Immanuel Kant, reprinted in Pippin’s Idealism as Modernism
Taylor, C. (1984) ‘Kant’s theory of freedom’ in Z.A. Pelczynski and J. Gray eds. Conceptions of Liberty in
Political Philosophy, reprinted in Taylor’s Philosophy and the Human Sciences: Philosophical Papers Volume 2, 1985
Seminar Questions:
1. What is ultimate justification for law in Kant?
2. How does Kant propose to unite individual morally autonomous individuals in a political community?
3.
How according to Kant do individual, society, state relate to each other?
4. What according to Kant is the aim of political society?
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6.
Hegel
Hegel is famously critical of the idea of the state as a social contract. He has several arguments. One is that
contracts imply that a whole raft of norms, obligations and social attitudes are already in place, otherwise
contracts themselves would never be honoured. But such things, are only possible within the ethical life of a
whole community, and ultimately within a state. So the social contract does not explain and justify the
existence of the state, rather the other way round. The existence of the state explains the existence of
contracts, even social contracts. Another is that he takes it to be a false implication of the social contract
theory tha the purpose of the state is to protect the pre-given antecedently established interests and rights of
pre-social individuals. It presupposes what is generally called social atomism, or an atomistic social ontology.
Hegel thinks that atomism is wrong – both an incorrect picture of what society is like - and pernicious
insofar as it encourages self-interested individualism. Societies are not like that. Instead Hegel paints an
organicist picture of society in which each individual citizen forms part of a whole – he calls this whole
‘ethical life’. In being knowlingly and self-consciously part of an ethical whole, each individual actively
pursues the common good alongside and indeed over and above its own good.
Hegel and the Actualisation of Freedom
#Essential Reading: Cahn pp. 392-406
And #G.W.F.Hegel, Elements of the Philosophy of Right, translated by Alan Wood, (Cambridge, 1992) §257-8
§260, §268, §270
# Patten A, Hegel’s Idea of Freedom Oxford, O.U.P. 1999, ch 1.
http://www.oxfordscholarship.com.ezproxy.sussex.ac.uk/oso/private/content/philosophy/978019
9251568/p015.html?q=Patten,|alan#acprof-0199251568-chapter-1
Further Reading
F. Neuhouser, Foundations of Hegel’s Social Theory, Harvard U. P., 2000. ch 4.
* Ilting K-H ‘Hegel’s Concept of the State’ in Pelczynski (1994): 211-26
* Jackson M. ‘Hegel, the Real and the Rational’ in International Studies in Philosophy 19 (1987), 1-19 Reprinted
in J. Stewart ed. (1996) pp. 19-26.
* Hardimon M O Hegel’s Social Philosophy: The Project of Reconciliation, Cambridge. C.U.P. 1994. esp. pp. 205227.
+ D Knowles Routledge Guidebook to Hegel and the Philosophy o f Right, London: Routledge 2002, p. 303ff.
Patten A, Hegel’s Idea of Freedom Oxford, O.U.P. 1999
+ R Plant, Hegel: An Introduction (2nd edn [1983] has two extra chapters) Very good thematic and cultural
historical account of Hegel with an emphasis on the politics. Chapters on writings prior to our text makes
it a good companion to it.
R Schacht, "Hegel on Freedom", in A C MacIntye, ed., Hegel: A Collection of Essays, pp. 288-328; also
reprinted in Schacht's Hegel and After, pp. 69-94.
*S. B. Smith, Hegel's Critique of Liberalism: Rights in Context. Chs. 3-5.
Jon Stewart (ed.), The Hegel Myths and Legends (1996).
*P G Stillman “Hegel's Critique of Liberal Theories of Right”, American Political Science Review, 68
(1974). Reprinted in R Stern, ed., G.W.F Hegel: Critical Assessments, vol. IV
*Charles Taylor, Atomism, in Philosophical Papers 2, (2 vols) Cambridge, CUP 1985, also in A Kontos ed.
Powers, Posessions and Freedoms, University of Toronto Press 1979, reprinted in Communitarianism and
Individualism, S. Avinieri and A de- Shalit eds. OUP 1992 ch. 2 pp.29-51.
Seminar questions:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
What does Hegel mean by the statement ‘the state is the actuality of ethical life’? Is his view
defensible?
Hegel argues that the state is the actualisation of concrete freedom? What is concrete freedom? How
can it be actualized?
How does this view differe from say Rousseau’s or Kant’s?
What according to Hegel is the salient characteristic of the modern state?
Critically evaluate Hegel’s understanding of the thesis that a citizen’s highest duty is to the state?
Critically evaluate the significance of the following remark for Hegel’s theory of the State in EPR. ‘A
bad state is one which merely exists; a sick body also exists, but it has no true reality. A hand which is
cut off, still looks like a hand and exists, but it has no true actuality.’ §270Addition.
Is Hegel simply an apologist for the Prussian State?
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7.
John Rawls A Theory of Justice
Rawls’s A Theory of Justice is widely regarded as the founding text of contemporary egalitarian political
philosophy. In it he argues that we can derive the principles of social justice – of the proper distribution of
burdens and benefits in society – which ought to govern our evaluation of any particular social structure by
working out what principles people would choose to govern their society if they were choosing in an ‘original
position’ behind a ‘veil of ignorance’, in which no-one knew anything about themselves or about what
position in society they occupied.. He concludes that in such a position people would choose a principle of
liberty and a ‘difference principle’ calling for equality of opportunity and for the elimination of all economic
differences except those that improve the economic position of the worst off. We will examine Rawls’s
justification of his two principles and in particular the role that his conception of the self plays in it, and ask
whether the justification succeeds.
Seminar Nine: Justice as Fairness
Essential Reading: #Cahn pp. 477-492
#Nozick R. ‘Distributive Justice’ in Contemporary Political Philosophy: an Anthology pp. 218-47.
Sandel M. J. ‘The procedural Republic and the Unencumbered Self’ in Contemporary Political Philosophy: an
Anthology pp. 247-56.
#Mulhall, S. and Swift, A. (1992) Liberals and Communitarians (or 2nd ed. 1996), pp. 1-9
Further Reading
Introductions to Rawls (read any two):
+ Wolff, J. (1996) An Introduction to Political Philosophy, pp. 168-189
+ Rogers, B. (1999) ‘Portrait: John Rawls’, Prospect, June 1999 (an illuminating account of Rawls the man; A13)
+ Kymlicka, W. (1990/2002) Contemporary Political Philosophy, ch 3 ‘Liberal equality’
* Mulhall, S. and Swift, A. (1992) Liberals and Communitarians (or 2nd ed. 1996), ‘Introduction’ pp. 1-9
* Rawls, J. (1958) ‘Justice as Fairness’ Philosophical Review 67, reprinted in Quinton ed. Political Philosophy, also
in Goodin and Pettit eds. Contemporary Political Philosophy: An Anthology (Rawls’s first sketch of his theory)
* Kukathas, C. and Pettit, P. (1990) Rawls: A Theory of Justice and its Critics, chs. 1-4
Daniels, N. (1975) Reading Rawls, introduction
Brown, A. (1986) Modern Political Philosophy, ch. 3
Campbell, T. (1988) Justice, ch. 3
Kolm, S.-C. (1995) ‘Distributive justice’ in Goodin & Pettit eds. A Companion to Contemporary Political Philosophy
Seminar questions:
1. How convincingly does Rawls derive his principles of justice from his original position?
2. Why should reflection on choices made in Rawls’s original position affect our views on the justice of
actual social arrangements?
3. In what way is the original position as Rawls defines it based on our shared moral intuitions?
4. Is the maximin principle a license to justified inequality?
8.
The Communitarian Critique of Rawls.
Michael Sandel argues that the concept of the self as a purely rational chooser on which Rawls relies is
unrealistic since every individual is in fact already steeped in the values of their particular society. This
critique applies implicitly to the whole constructivist tradition. John Gray asserts that the very idea of
human beings as free agents fundamentally distinct from other animals is simply a long-standing illusion of
Western religion and philosophy.
Seminar Reading:
A: #Sandel, M.J. (1982) Liberalism and the Limits of Justice, 2nd ed. 1988, introduction, chs. 1-3, conclusion
#Sandel, M.J. (The Procedural Republic and the Unencumbered Self, Political Theory, Vol. 12, No. 1
(Feb., 1984), pp. 81-96 Available online @ Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=00905917%28198402%2912%3A1%3C81%3ATPRATU%3E2.0.CO%3B2-X
Walzer, M. (1983) Spheres of Justice, preface, ch. 1
B: Pogge, T. (1989) Realizing Rawls, ch. 2 ‘Sandel and the conception of the person’ [m]
+ Kukathas, C. and Pettit, P. (1990) Rawls, ch. 7
8
+ Mulhall, S. and Swift, A. (1992) Liberals and Communitarians: An Introduction, 2nd ed. 1996, Introduction,
chs. 5,6
#Gray, J. (2002) Straw Dogs: Thoughts on Humans and Other Animals, Granta, pp. 37-52
Seminar Questions:
What are Sandel’s chief Objections to Rawls’s Theory of Justice?
What does Sandel mean by the unencumbered Self?
Where, if anywhere, do his criticisms bite?
Can political constructivism provide a basis for justifying a legal order if it is based on a conception of the
self that is (a) produced or (b) reinforced by that same order?
How should a political constructivist respond to Sandel’s critique of Rawls?
5.
Rawls’s Political Liberalism
Seminar Reading:
A: # Rawls, J. (1985) ‘Justice as fairness: political not metaphysical’, Philosophy and Public Affairs 14.
Available on-line @ Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=00483915%28198522%2914%3A3%3C223%3AJAFPNM%3E2.0.CO%3B2-0
Revised as lecture 1, secs. 1-5 of Rawls’s Political Liberalism 1993.
# Rawls, J. Political Liberalism Lecture 3 “Political Constructivism” §1-4
# Rawls, J. Political Liberalism Lecture 4 “The Idea of an Overlapping Consensus” §1-5
# Rawls, J. Political Liberalism Lecture 6 “The Idea of Public Reason” §1-4
B: +Kymlicka, W. (2002) Contemporary Political Philosophy¸ 2nd ed., ch. 6 sec. 7 ‘Political liberalism’
Seminar Questions:
What does Rawls mean by calling this conception of justice a ‘political’ one?
What is a comprehensive doctrine?
Why is justice for Rawls not a comprehensive doctrine?
What is an overlapping consensus?
What are public and non-public reasons?
What are ‘pro-tanto’, ‘full’, and ‘public justification’?
What is the duty of civility? Who owes it to whom?
C: Further Reading:
Raz, J. Facing Diversity: The Case of Epistemic Abstinence, Philosophy and Public Affairs, Vol. 19, No. 1
(Winter, 1990), pp. 3-46. Available on-line @ Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=00483915%28199024%2919%3A1%3C3%3AFDTCOE%3E2.0.CO%3B2-J.
Reprinted in Raz, J. Ethics in the Public Domain, Oxford, 1194 ch. 4.
10. Jürgen Habermas
Seminar Ten: Habermas on Democracy and Civil Society
Essential Reading:
A: Three Normative Models of Democracy. In #Cahn pp. 524-541[Reprinted in Habermas The Inclusion
of the Other: Studies in Political Theory, ed. C. Cronin and De Greiff, CambridgeMass.: , MIT Press, 1998.]
B: And at least one of the following articles
#Baynes, K. (1995) ‘Democracy and the “Rechtsstaat”: Habermas’s “Faktizität und Geltung”‘, in S.K. White
ed. The Cambridge Companion to Habermas
#Scheuerman, W.E. (1998) ‘Between radicalism and resignation: democratic theory in Habermas’s Between
Facts and Norms’ in P. Dews ed. Habermas: A Critical Reader
Further Reading
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+*If you don’t know anything about Habermas read my Habermas: A Very Short Introduction, OUP 2005,
esp ch. 6,7, and 8.
On Habermas’s theory of law and democracy:
O’Neill , O. (1994) ‘Practical reason and possible community: a reply to Jean-Marc Ferry’, Ratio Juris 7:3
Peters, B. (1994) ‘On reconstructive legal and political theory, Philosophy and Social Criticism 20:4
Baynes, K. (1995) ‘Democracy and the “Rechtsstaat”: Habermas’s “Faktizität und Geltung”‘, in S.K. White
ed. The Cambridge Companion to Habermas
Scheuerman, W.E. (1998) ‘Between radicalism and resignation: democratic theory in Habermas’s Between
Facts and Norms’ in P. Dews ed. Habermas: A Critical Reader
Olson, K. (2003) ‘Do rights have a formal basis? Habermas’ legal theory and the normative foundations of
the law’, Journal of Political Philosophy 11:3
Habermas’s discourse ethics:
Habermas, J. [1982] ‘Discourse ethics: notes on philosophical justification’, in S. Benhabib and F. Dallmayr
eds. The Communicative Ethics Controversy 1990, also in Habermas’ Moral Consciousness and Communicative
Action 1990
Habermas, J. [1991] ‘Remarks on discourse ethics’, in Justification and Application: Remarks on Discourse Ethics,
tr. 1993
Seminar Questions:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
11.
What according to Habermas is the idea of popular sovereignty?
What is the idea of human rights?
How do these ideas relate to one another?
According to Habermas does liberal democracy succeed in uniting them in 5. practice? If so how?
What according to Habermas does a good functioning democracy look like?
In what sense, if any, is Habermas a liberal?
How according to Habermas does democracy deal with the problems of modern society, especially
problems of diversity, disagreement and pluralism?
The Habermas Rawls Debate:
A: Essential Reading:
#Jürgen Habermas: "Reconciliation through the Public Use of Reason: Remarks on John Rawls's Political
Liberalism," Journal of Philosophy XCII: no. 3 (March 1995) [Reprinted in Habermas The Inclusion of the Other:
Studies in Political Theory, ed. C. Cronin and De Greiff, CambridgeMass.: , MIT Press, 1998. part II chapter 2.]
#John Rawls, "Reply to Habermas" (also in Journal of Philosophy, vol. XCII, no. 3, March 1995); reprinted in
Rawls Political Liberalism (N.B. not in the 1993 first edition but the subsequent editions in 1996 and 2005)
Lecture IX, p. 372-435.
B: Secondary Reading
# Christopher McMahon Journal of Philosophy Vol. XCIX, NUMBER 3
March 2002, pp. 111-129 ‘Why There Is No Issue between Habermas and Rawls.’
# J.G. Finlayson, Habermas versus Rawls Redivivus. I’ll post this on the course web page.
Seminar Questions:
1.
2.
3.
4.
What are Habermas’s chief objections to Rawls? Are they good?
What are Rawls’s objections to Habermas?
Who, if anyone, gets the better of the exchange?
On what grounds does McMahon argue that there is no real issue between them? Is he correct?
5.
Is there an Issue between Rawls and Habermas?
6.
On what grounds does McMahon claim there is no issue between Rawls and Habermas?
Is he right? If not, what is the issue?
Further Reading
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*Thomas McCarthy ‘Kantian Constructivism and Reconstructivism: Rawls and Habermas in Dialogue’ Ethics
105, 1994, pp. 44-63
*Reasonable Democracy: Jürgen Habermas and the Politics of Discourse, Simone Chambers (Ithaca, Cornell University
Press, 1996).
Finlayson, G. (2005) Habermas: A Very Short Introduction, chs. 6-7
Additional texts:
Habermas, J. [1992] Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy, ch. 3 (esp.
from 3.1.2 onwards)
Habermas, J. (1988) ‘Law and morality’, Tanner Lectures on Human Values 8
Introductions to Habermas:
Outhwaite, W. (1994) Habermas: A Critical Introduction, ch. 3 ‘Communication and discourse ethics’ and ch. 9
‘Law and the state’.
Finlayson, G. (2005) Habermas: A Very Short Introduction, chs. 6-7.
Heath, J. Communicative Action and Rational Choice, MIT Press 1999
Chambers S. Reasonable Democracy.
12.
The Feminist Critique of Liberalism
Essential Reading:
#‘The Generalized and the Concrete Other: The Kohlberg-Gilligan Controversy and Feminist Theory’ in S.
Benhabib, Situating the Self: Gender, Community and Postmodernism in contemporary Ethics. London,
Routledge (1992).
#Maihofer, A (1998). ‘Care’ in A. Jaggar and I. M. Young (eds.), (1998). A Companion to Feminist Philosophy.
Oxford, Blackwell.
(Different versions of the Benhabib’s article can be found elsewhere: ‘The Generalized and the Concrete
Other: The Kohlberg-Gilligan Controversy and Feminist Theory’ in S. Benhabib and D. Cornell (eds.)
(1987): &
Benhabib (1986). ‘The Generalized and the Concrete Other: The Kohlberg-Gilligan Controversy and
Feminist Theory’. Praxis-International 5/4: 402-424.)
It would be good if you took a look at Rawls’s remarks on Benhabib in Political Liberalism. See index to the
new material,
Seminar Questions:
1. What Objections does Benhabib make?
2. At whom or what are they directed?
3. What political implications do they have, if any?
4. What is the distinction between generalized and concrete others?
5. Is the distinction temable?
6. Does it give rise to any criticisms that can be directed at liberalism?
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Further Reading:
Benhabib S. and Cornell D. (eds.) (1987). Feminism as Critique. Essays on the Politics of Gender in Late-Capitalist
Societies. London, Polity Press. Blum, L. (1998). ‘Gilligan and Kohlberg: Implications for Moral Theory’,
Ethics 98: 472-491.
Benhabib S. ‘The Debate over Women and Moral Theory Revisited’ in S. Benhabib, Situating the Self: Gender,
Community and Postmodernism in contemporary Ethics. London, Routledge (1992).
Dean, J. (1995). ‘Discourses in Different Voices’ in J. Meehan (ed.) (1995).
Flanagan O. and Jackson K. (1987). ‘Justice Care and Gender: The Kohlberg-Gilligan Debate Revisited’
Ethics 97: 622-37.
Fraser, N. (1995). ‘What is Critical about Critical Theory’ in J. Meehan (ed.) 1995.
Gilligan (1982). In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women’s Development. Cambridge Massachusetts,
Harvard University Press
- (1986). ‘Remapping the Moral Domain’, in T. Heller, M. Sosna, and D. Wellbury (eds.), Reconstructing
Individualism: Autonomy, Individuality, and the Self in Western Thought. Stanford California, Stanford University
Press.
Joanna Meehan (ed.) Feminists Read Habermas. London, Routledge (1995).
Kymlicka, W. (1989). Liberalism, Community and Culture. Oxford, Clarendon Press.
Okin, S. (1989). Justice, Gender and the Family. New York, Basic Books.
- (1989a). ‘Reason and Feeling in Thinking about Justice.’ Ethics 99/2: 229-49.
13.
Week 4.
Lecture Only. Tips on Examination Technique . Revision & Q and A session. No seminars.
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