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Summary of Contemporary Political Philosophy CPP
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Summary of Contemporary Political Philosophy CPP
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1. Comment12 March 2021 at 16:05:49
Determine values via rational
argumentation
2. Comment
12 March 2021 at 16:06:26
E.g. marriage
3. Comment
12 March 2021 at 16:07:26
E.g. behavior, moral principles,
social orders
4. Comment
12 March 2021 at 16:07:36
Part 1: Introduction
E.g. what citizens should do
when violated by state
Political philosophy:
• Questions of right/wrong (not just legal/illegal)
5. Comment
1 • Philosophy: seeks truth
12 March 2021 at 16:08:08
• Political: pertains to states/citizens
What people are permitted to
make each other do 2 • Feminist critique: should include private sphere
Key terms:
6. Comment
12 March 2021 at 16:11:29 • Concept: basic structure of value (e.g. liberty)
E.g. liberty (Locke) and equality • Conception: particular specification of concept (e.g. libertarian liberty)
(Rousseau) are not actually
conflicting, only different Definitions/purpose:
conceptions of liberty 3 4 • Swift: normative claims about states/citizens + scope of political control
5 • Subset of moral philosophy
7. Comment • State:
12 March 2021 at 16:12:55 • Coercive instrument
Why do we participate? • Collective agent of subjects (not separate)
• State treatment of citizens = citizen treatment of each other
8. Comment • Fabre: theory of social justice
12 March 2021 at 16:16:11 • Which principles should regulate institutions
- What can state legitimately • What is owed to whom + content of justice + scope
coerce us to do? • Rawls:
- How should state constrain 6 • Uncover shared moral foundations (solves conflicts)
individual action? 7 • Reconsider (our role in) institutions
- How can the law be justified? • Understand rational fabric (core) of institutions (identify flaw)
- How should society be • Create terms for reasonable utopia
organized? • Take men as they are + make laws as they should be
9. Comment Approaches:
12 March 2021 at 16:19:59 • Social justice:
Geuss: start with existing politics • Rawls: “justice is the first virtue of social institutions”
(complex/historical), then limit 8 • Key questions
intolerable parts (e.g. excessive • Ideal theory: principles that should guide society
disorder) • Objections:
• Realism: insensitive to power politics
10. Comment 9 • Should start with real politics and aim for moral outcome (vs reverse)
12 March 2021 at 16:21:51
• Non-ideal theory: not pragmatic (dangerous)
E.g. MeToo challenged by lack of • No real application (e.g. non-compliance)
witnesses 10 • Structural problems impede ideal solutions
• Defense:
E.g. police brutality stems from 11 • Lighthouse function: generates guiding principles
structural racism 12 • Figure out why society should be ideal
13 • Adjudicate between (rank) values
11. Comment
• Outline moral stakes in political decisions
12 March 2021 at 16:24:05
Not perfect, but better than
Does not include readings
nothing
E.g. don’t need to know specifics
about police brutality to know it is
wrong (?)
12. Comment
12 March 2021 at 16:25:48
E.g. must understand WHY
police brutality is wrong (?)
13. Comment
12 March 2021 at 16:28:19
E.g. whose liberty is most
important (e.g. curfew)
,Readings:
• Swift, pp. 1-10
, 14. Comment
12 March 2021 at 16:34:27
Philosophers: Benthem, Mill
15. Comment
12 March 2021 at 16:35:19
Philosophers: Kant
16. Comment
12 March 2021 at 16:38:52
Compliance, establishment
17. Comment
12 March 2021 at 17:16:46
“Theory of Social Justice” (1971)
- Completely reshaped the Part 2: Justice
political philosophy discipline
Definitions:
• Concept (Swift): giving people what is due to them
Position: left liberal
• Duty: what we are morally compelled to do
• Conception:
18. Comment
12 March 2021 at 17:38:10 • Rawls: fairness
Natural endowments + social • Nozick: entitlement
position
Good vs right:
E.g. gender, race, talents, 14 • Good: ends/substance (utilitarianism)
income, etc • Rawls: satisfaction of rational desire
15 • Right: means/procedure (deontology)
19. Comment • Rawls: set of principles as for ordering conflicting claims
12 March 2021 at 16:50:23 • Generally universal application
What makes life worth living (e.g
religious beliefs) Justice (duty): subset of morality
• Not vice versa (e.g. charity is moral, but not a duty)
20. Comment • Swift: state is justified to coerce duty
12 March 2021 at 16:53:05 16 • Rawls: highest duty is to promote just institutions
Don’t know what you will do with
them, but know that you will need Hayek: social justice does not exist (category mistake)
them • Justice is an attribute of agency
• Collective cannot have agency (be just/unjust)
21. Comment • Critique:
12 March 2021 at 16:57:42 • Agency not necessarily a source of justice
Critique of utilitarianism • Not intentional ≠ not responsible
• States = aggregate agency
17 Liberal Conception: Fairness (Rawls)
• Flaw in social contract theory:
• Only just if people act without self-interest, but this is impossible
• Paradox: consent out of self-interest, but self-interest makes contract unfair (may come at
expense of others)
• Rawls’s hypothetical contract:
• Original position: principles agreed to in order to further self-interest
• Veil of ignorance: principles agreed to without knowledge of own position:
18 • Ascriptive characteristics → unbiased by advantage → maximize equality
• Morally arbitrary
19 • Conception of good → maximize capacity to frame/revise/pursue conception of good
(freedom)
20 • Requires primary goods (essential tools; e.g. rights, liberty)
• Strengths:
21 • Protects individual
• Consent under fair terms of deliberation
• Practical application:
• Imperfect procedural justice
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