The Bloomsbury Companion to

Political Philosophy
Other volumes in the series of Bloomsbury Companions
Aesthetics, edited by Anna Christina
Ribeiro
Analytic Philosophy, edited by Barry Dainton
and Howard Robinson
Continental Philosophy, edited by John Ó
Maoilearca and Beth Lord
Epistemology, edited by Andrew Cullison
Ethics, edited by Christian Miller
Existentialism, edited by Felicity Joseph, Jack
Reynolds and Ashley Woodward
Hegel, edited by Allegra de Laurentiis and
Jeffrey Edwards
Hume, edited by Alan Bailey and Dan
O’Brien
Hobbes, edited by S. A. Lloyd
Kant, edited by Gary Banham, Dennis
Schulting and Nigel Hems
Leibniz, edited by Brendan Look
Locke, edited by S.-J. Savonious-Wroth, Paul
Schuurman and Jonathan Walmsley
Metaphysics, edited by Robert W. Barnard
and Neil A. Manson
Philosophical Logic, edited by Leon Horston
and Richard Pettigrew
Philosophy of Language, edited by Manuel
Garcia-Carpintero and Max Kolbel
Philosophy of Mind, edited by James Garvey
Philosophy of Science, edited by Steven
French and Juha Saatsi
Plato, edited by Gerald A. Press
Pragmatism, edited by Sami Pihlström
Socrates, edited by John Bussanich and
Nicholas D. Smith
Spinoza, edited by Wiep van Bunge, Henri
Krop, Piet Steenbakkers and Jeroen van de
Ven
 THE BLOOMSBURY
COMPANION TO POLITICAL
PHILOSOPHY

Edited by

Andrew Fiala

Bloomsbury Academic
An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

L ON DON • N E W DE L H I • N E W Y OR K • SY DN EY
 Bloomsbury Academic
An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

50 Bedford Square 1385 Broadway

London New York
WC1B 3DP NY 10018
UK USA

www.bloomsbury.com

BLOOMSBURY and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

First published 2015

© Andrew Fiala and Contributors, 2015

Andrew Fiala has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988,
to be identified as the Editor of this work.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or

transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including
photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system,
without prior permission in writing from the publishers.

No responsibility for loss caused to any individual or organization acting on or

refraining from action as a result of the material in this publication can be accepted by
Bloomsbury or the authors.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN: HB: 978-1-84706-554-4

╇╇╇╛╛╛ePDF: 978-1-44114-217-7
╇╇╇╇╛ePub: 978-1-44111-434-1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress

Typeset by Newgen Knowledge Works (P) Ltd., Chennai, India

 CONTENTS

List of Contributors vii

INTRODUCTION 1
Andrew Fiala
  1. THE HISTORY OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY 19
James Alexander
  2. SOVEREIGNTY 33
Andrew Fiala
  3. COSMOPOLITANISM 47
Gillian Brock
  4. HUMAN RIGHTS 61
Siegfried Van Duffel
  5. DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE 75
Ovadia Ezra
  6. REASSESSING PUNISHMENT: RETRIBUTIVE VERSUS
RESTORATIVE JUSTICE 95
Trudy D. Conway
  7. WAR 109
George R. Lucas, Jr
  8. PEACE 127
Andrew Fitz-Gibbon
  9. LIBERAL TOLERATION 139
Robert Paul Churchill
10. DEMOCRATIC THEORY 153
Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley
11. FEMINISM AND GENDER 167
Anca Gheaus
12. IMMIGRATION AND BORDERS 183
Shelley Wilcox

v
contents

13. THE FUTURE(S) OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY 199

Matthew Voorhees and J. Jeremy Wisnewski
14. GLOBALIZATION, COSMOPOLITICS, DECOLONIALITY:
POLITICS FOR/OF THE ANTHROPOCENE 213
Eduardo Mendieta

Chronology 223
Glossary 227
Research Resources 255
Annotated Bibliography 259
Index 265

vi
 LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
James Alexander, PhD is an assistant pro-
fessor in the Department of Political
Science, Bilkent University, Ankara, Turkey.
Originally a Cambridge historian, educated
in the era of Cowling, Skinner, and Dunn,
he shifted, as many did, to political phil-
osophy, and is still trying to make philo-
sophical sense of the distinctively historical
approach to politics. He is the author of
“The Contradictions of Conservatism,”
Government and Opposition (2013); “Notes
Towards a Definition of Politics,” Philosophy
(2014); and “The Major Ideologies of
Liberalism, Socialism and Conservatism,”
Political Studies (2014).
Andrew Fiala, PhD is Professor of Philosophy,
Chair of the Philosophy Department, and
Director of the Ethics Center at California
State University, Fresno. He is the author of
a number of books and articles on ethics,
religion, and political philosophy including:
The Just War Myth (Rowman & Littlefield,
2008), Public War, Private Conscience
(Continuum, 2010), Against Religions,
Wars, and States (Rowman & Littlefield,
2013), Civility and Education in a World of
Religious Pluralism, co-edited with Vincent
Biondo (Routledge, 2013), and Ethics:
Theory and Contemporary Issues, eighth
edition, with co-author Barbara MacKinnon
(Cengage Publishing, 2014).
vii
Gillian Brock, PhD is Professor of
Philosophy at the University of Auckland
in New Zealand. Her most recent work
has been on global justice and related
fields. Her books include: Debating
Brain Drain (Oxford University Press,
2015), Cosmopolitanism versus Non-
Cosmopolitanism (Oxford University Press,
2013), Global Heath and Global Health
Ethics (Cambridge University Press, 2011),
Global Justice: A Cosmopolitan Account
(Oxford University Press, 2009), Necessary
Goods: Our Responsibilities to Meet
Others’ Needs (Rowman & Littlefield,
1998), and Current Debates in Global
Justice (Springer, 2005).
Siegfried Van Duffel, PhD has taught Ethics
and Political Theory at the University of
Groningen, the University of Hong Kong,
and Nazarbayev University. He also
held post-doc positions at the National
University of Singapore and the University
of Helsinki and was visiting Associate
Professor at Huafan University and
National Taiwan University. He is cur-
rently writing a book on human rights and
cultural differences. He has published in
journals such as The Pacific Philosophical
Quarterly, The Journal of Political
Philosophy, The Monist, and The European
Journal of Philosophy.
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Ovadia Ezra, PhD is a senior lecturer in
the Department of Philosophy at Tel Aviv
University and a human rights activist. He
was incarcerated several times in a military
jail for refusing to serve reserve military serv-
ice in the occupied territories. He writes on
ethics, political, and social philosophy. He is
the author of the books: The Withdrawal Of
Rights: Rights from A different Perspective
(Kluwer, 2002), Moral Dilemmas in Real
Life: Current Issues in Applied Ethics (Spring,
2006), Justice and Equality: Affirmative
Action Needed (Hakibutz Hameuhad-Sifriat
Poalim, 2006).
Trudy D. Conway, PhD is Professor of
Philosophy at Mount Saint Mary’s University
in Maryland; prior to that she taught at
Shiraz (formerly Pahlavi University) in Iran.
Her areas of specialization are contemporary
philosophy, virtue ethics, especially virtues
associated with cross-cultural understanding
and dialogue, and cross-disciplinary stud-
ies of the death penalty. She is the author of
Wittgenstein on Foundations (Humanities
Press International, 1989), Where Justice
and Mercy Meet (Liturgical Press, 2013),
and Cross-Cultural Dialogue on the Virtues
(Spring, 2014) and a range of articles on spe-
cific virtues and select issues in contempor-
ary philosophy.
George R. Lucas, Jr, PhD is Class of 1984
Distinguished Chair in Ethics in the Vice
Admiral James B. Stockdale Center for
Ethical Leadership at the United States
Naval Academy (Annapolis), and Professor
of Ethics and Public Policy at the Graduate
School of Public Policy at the Naval
Postgraduate School (Monterey, CA). He is
the author of Anthropologists in Arms: The
Ethics of Military Anthropology (AltaMira
Press, 2009), Perspectives on Humanitarian
viii
Military Intervention (University of
California Press, 2001), Lifeboat Ethics: the
Moral Dilemmas of World Hunger (Harper
& Row, 1976), Poverty, Justice, and the Law:
Essays on Needs, Rights, and Obligations
(UPA, 1986), and a number of other books
and articles.
Andrew Fitz-Gibbon, PhD is a fellow
of the Royal Society of Arts, Professor
of Philosophy, Chair of the Philosophy
Department, and Director of the Center
for Ethics, Peace and Social Justice, at the
State University of New York College at
Cortland. He is the author, co-author, or edi-
tor of ten books, numerous book chapters,
and articles in peer-reviewed journals such
as Social Philosophy Today, The Journal for
Peace and Justice Studies, The Acorn, Peace
Review, and Philosophical Practice. He is
an associate editor, VIBS, Editions Rodopi,
B.V., where he edits the Social Philosophy
Series.
Robert Paul Churchill, PhD is Elton Professor
of Philosophy at George Washington
University where he has also served as
Chair of the Department of Philosophy and
Director of the Peace Studies Program. He
is the author or editor of five books and has
published dozens of book chapters and jour-
nals and encyclopedia articles on a variety
of subjects including altruism, civil disobe-
dience, crimes against humanity, genocide,
humanitarian intervention, human rights,
just war theory, nonviolence, pacifism, tol-
erance, and violence. His most recent book
is Human Rights and Global Diversity
(Pearson, 2005).
Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley, PhD is Professor
of Philosophy at California State University,
Bakersfield. She is author of Josiah

Royce in Focus (Indiana University Press,
2008) and Genuine Individuals and Genuine
Communities: A Roycean Public Philosophy
(Vanderbilt University Press, 1997). She is
an author and editor of Genetic Knowledge,
Human Values and Responsibility (Paragon,
1999)  and Persuasion and Compulsion in
Democracy (Lexington, 2013). She was
President of the Society for the Advancement
of American Philosophy from 2010 to 2012
and a recipient of the Herbert Schneider
Award for outstanding contributions of
American Philosophy.
Anca Gheaus, PhD works at the universi-
ties of Umea in Sweden and Sheffield in the
United Kingdom. Her main research is in
caring relationships and what they mean for
distributive justice, in the nature and value
of childhood and in gender justice. A recent
publication on the latter topic is “Gender
Justice” in the Journal for Ethics & Social
Philosophy 6(1) (2012). She is currently
working toward a monograph on justice in
childrearing.
Shelley Wilcox, PhD is Professor of
Philosophy at San Francisco State University.
She works in the areas of social and politi-
cal philosophy, feminist philosophy, and
applied ethics, with a special interest in
immigration, global justice, and urban envi-
ronmental issues. She has published articles
on the ethics of immigration and globaliza-
tion in Philosophical Studies, Social Theory
and Practice, Journal of Social Philosophy,
Philosophy Compass, and The Stanford
Encyclopedia of Philosophy, as well as in
numerous anthologies. She is currently serv-
ing as Book Review Editor for Hypatia: A
Journal of Feminist Philosophy.
ix
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Matthew Voorhees, PhD is currently an
associate professor of Political Science at
Hartwick College, where he teaches courses
on the history of political thought, democratic
theory, American political thought, the phi-
losophy of law and American Constitutional
law. He has published work on the relation-
ship between Rousseau’s musical and politi-
cal theory and his current research focuses on
African-American autobiographical writing
as a form of political discourse in American
political thought.
J. Jeremy Wisnewski, PhD is Associate
Professor of Philosophy at Hartwick College.
He is the author of numerous publication
in phenomenology and moral and political
philosophy. His books include Wittgenstein
and Ethical Inquiry (Continuum, 2007),
The Politics of Agency: Toward a Pragmatic
Philosophical Anthropology (Ashgate, 2008),
and Understanding Torture (Edinburgh
University Press, 2010).
Eduardo Mendieta, PhD is Professor of
Philosophy, and Chair of the Department of
Philosophy, at the State University of New
York, Stony Brook. He is the author of The
Adventures of Transcendental Philosophy
(Rowman & Littlefield, 2002)  and Global
Fragments: Globalizations,Latinamericanisms,
and Critical Theory (SUNY Press, 2007). He is
also co-editor with Jonathan VanAntwerpen
of The Power of Religion in the Public Sphere
(Columbia University Press, 2011), and with
Craig Calhoun and Jonathan VanAntwerpen
of Habermas and Religion (Polity, 2013),
and with Stuart Elden of Reading Kant’s
Geography (SUNY Press, 2011). His book
The Philosophical Animal will be published by
SUNY Press in 2015.
 INTRODUCTION
Andrew Fiala
Political philosophy is a broad field of inquiry
with a deep history, a vexing set of prob-
lems, and a contested methodology. Political
philosophy can also have important practi-
cal impacts. The field includes a variety of
questions about the legitimacy and optimal
structure of states, the role of citizens within
these states, the proper behavior of governing
authorities, relations between states, and the
status of norms—such as justice and rights—
in both domestic and international contexts.
Beneath this set of issues are profound
questions about human nature. Are human
beings individuals first, whose membership
in social groups is only legitimately derived
from individual consent by a social contract?
Or are states and other associations histori-
cally, ontologically, and normatively more
significant than the individuals who con-
stitute them? Are we warlike and competi-
tive or are we cooperative and reasonable?
Can we live well without social interaction
and legal regulation or do we benefit from
the benevolent control of ruling authorities?
How ought we regulate our lives, structure
our social organizations, and relate to one
another across the globe? How do we define
and ground key concepts such as human
rights, justice, equality, and liberty?
It is no surprise that the big names in the
history of political philosophy are, indeed, the
1
important names in the history of philosophy
in general: Plato, Aristotle, Hobbes, Locke,
Rousseau, Kant, Hegel, Marx, and Mill.
The problems of political philosophy have
inspired and troubled the best minds in the
philosophical canon; and issues in political
philosophy are connected to issues in the rest
of philosophy. Contemporary political phil-
osophy builds upon this history, while also
criticizing it. Contemporary authors includ-
ing feminists, cosmopolitans, anarchists, and
others are pushing boundaries and challen-
ging the assumptions of the discipline—in-
cluding the Eurocentric assumptions of the
canon of political philosophy.
Political philosophy develops along with
the rest of culture. Political philosophy
impacts political reality, as political philoso-
phers such as Locke or Marx have inspired
revolutions. But political philosophy must
also respond to the political world. Issues in
the contemporary world drive philosophical
inquiry. Locke or Marx, for example, were
responding to the concerns of their contem-
porary political actuality—including issues
arising out of the Reformation, colonialism,
or the development of capitalism. Today’s
emerging issues include secularization, mod-
ernization, globalization, democratization,
liberalization, and the lingering problems of
Eurocentrism and postcolonial development.
Andrew Fiala
Our thinking about borders, immigration,
and sovereignty is being revised. Our under-
standing of the power of nonviolence, the
norms of warfare, and the role of interna-
tional law is changing. Also we continue
to question the status (and application) of
principles of retributive and distributive jus-
tice, human rights concepts, and ideas about
basic norms of political decision making.
Contemporary issues inform contemporary
political philosophy, and contemporary
political philosophers—from Foucault and
Rawls to feminism—inspire political action.
This volume attempts to offer an overview
of the field and the depth of the issues. No
single text can offer full coverage of a subject
as broad as political philosophy. The chap-
ters collected here range across the topic,
while attempting to provide sufficient depth
to inspire further reflection.
POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY,
UTOPIA, AND REALISM
There is no single method of political philos-
ophy. Pluralism is implicit in the topic, since
there is an ambiguity exposed in the two
terms that make up the name of the subject,
“political philosophy.” On the one hand, phi-
losophy is often conceived as reflection on
transcendent categories of being and thought
that are contemplated from a disembodied
vantage point outside of Plato’s cave. On the
other hand, political life includes the tumult
and change of history, including the rise and
fall of cities, civilizations, states, and forms of
life. One of the deepest challenges for politi-
cal philosophy is the question of whether
there are transcendental categories, eternal
truths, and transcultural norms. A related
question is the extent to which philosophical
2
inquiry is itself part of the political landscape
engaged in struggles for power and recog-
nition, subject to the changing turmoil of
social, cultural, and historical circumstance.
While Marx and others would view philoso-
phy as ideology and thus would locate phi-
losophizing in the struggles of political life,
others—perhaps following Plato or Hegel—
view philosophy as speculative reflection
hovering outside of political life. A middle
path is found in the work of pragmatists such
as Dewey or in the democratic theorizing of
someone like Joshua Cohen who maintains
that “the point of political philosophy is to
contribute reflectively to the public reason-
ing about what we ought to do that always
already forms one part of political life”
(Cohen, 2009, 4). Political life involves both
power struggles and reason-giving. Cohen,
Dewey, and others maintain that political
philosophers can help to contribute to this
process of reasoning, even if we give up on
the quest to escape from Plato’s cave.
A related issue is the political danger of
doing political philosophy in a political envi-
ronment that is not conducive to philosophi-
cal reflection. Socrates was killed for political
reasons. Locke had to flee the country. Marx
inspired a global revolution. Those who ques-
tion the norms and structures of political life
continue to find themselves in a precarious
situation with regard to life in the polis. This
is especially true in parts of the world where
authoritarian regimes continue to rule. The
freedom to philosophize that we take for
granted in the liberal-democratic world is not
shared in other political milieus. The problem
is found at the heart of Plato’s foundational
cave allegory. Plato implies that there will
be no rest from troubles until philosophers
become kings or kings become philosophers.
But he also implies that when the philoso-
pher returns to the cave to impart wisdom to

the enslaved masses, the masses will laugh,
mock, and kill him. Plato asks us to consider
whether political philosophers can be under-
stood and whether it is possible for political
philosophers to change the world.
A central question of political philosophy
is whether Plato’s paternalistic view of philo-
sophical wisdom is really appropriate in an age
of democracy. It might be that there is no a pri-
ori vantage point—no access to the world out-
side of the cave—as Dewey, Rorty, and other
pragmatists and postmoderns imply. Platonic
political philosophy is utopian: it imagines an
ideal of political life and imparts its wisdom
from the outside. Some may reject this entirely
and locate philosophy itself within political
struggle. Thrasymachus, Marx, and Nietzsche
point in this direction, understanding philoso-
phy as simply another form of ideology. Most
contemporary political philosophy is found
somewhere between these extremes. Consider
Rawls’s understanding of political philosophy
as “realistically utopian”: political philosophy
extends the limits of practical political possi-
bility while also reconciling us to our political
and social condition (Rawls, 2001). Utopian
thought extends by imagining ideals and aspi-
rations, while realism reconciles us to political
reality. Political philosophy involves a process
of balancing between extension and reconcili-
ation, idealism and realism.
The idealists and utopians will argue that
philosophizing about political life should
aim to provide us with true answers and a
correct or optimal theory of political reality.
But realists will argue that, given the fact of
diversity, no such agreement is possible and
the best we can do is to establish a pragmatic
and partial accommodation and agreement.
Again Rawls is helpful: his idea of over-
lapping consensus is an account of how
we might agree to disagree. But this points
toward an intractable problem at the heart of
3
INTRODUCTION
political philosophy. The liberal idea of over-
lapping consensus acknowledges that diver-
sity is a fundamental fact of political life,
while other more idealistic political theories
aim to eliminate diversity by establishing a
normative theory grounded in fundamental
truth. The tough question of political phil-
osophy is whether political philosophy is
grounded in fundamental truth or whether
it is grounded in the fundamental fact that
we disagree about fundamental truth. This
leaves us either with intractable conflict, with
a mere modus vivendi that simply avoids vio-
lence while giving up hope for agreement, or
with a more substantial but similarly fra-
gile overlapping consensus that establishes
coexistence and cooperation without deeper
agreement.
We see this problem in the very etymol-
ogy of the term political philosophy—which
is a term loaded with European baggage. It is
common to begin a discussion of political phi-
losophy by acknowledging that both terms,
political and philosophy, come to us from
Greek origins. The root of the word political
is the word polis, the name of the city-states
of ancient Greece. The word philosophia can
be literally translated from the Greek as “love
of wisdom.” Combining these terms gives us
love of wisdom about the city-state. One
wonders whether the endeavor to philoso-
phize about the political is merely a product
of Western culture. Can there be a political
philosophy articulated in Chinese, Navajo,
or Swahili? Would those who do not live
in cities need a political philosophy? Would
those who do not philosophize in the Greek
sense—say, religious fundamentalists—be
receptive to political philosophy? A signifi-
cant worry in our postcolonial era is whether
the enterprise of political philosophy is ines-
capably Eurocentric. Does political philoso-
phy describes states, justice, human rights,
Andrew Fiala
and human nature from a privileged vantage
point? Or can political philosophers tran-
scend the blinders of the citadels of power
and see political reality without ideological
and historical limitation?
Rousseau and other radical critics (such
as the neoprimitivist “green anarchists”)
have suggested that the norms of political
philosophy only make sense within the con-
text of “civilization” (another value-laden
Eurocentric concept)—and that uncivilized
people in the state of nature may have no
use for these concepts. Of course, it is nearly
impossible for us to imagine what life would
be like for “noble savages” in a Rousseau-ian
state of nature. But the primitivists remind
us that we ought not take civilization and
political life for granted: it is possible at
least to imagine Homo sapiens in a prepo-
litical state—and indeed Homo sapiens lived
quite well for long millennia without devel-
oping cities. The city, the state, and political
philosophy are quite late developments in
the life of our species. Thus political phi-
losophers ought to pay attention to the find-
ings of sociobiologists, archaeologists, and
anthropologists who offer suggestions about
the evolutionary roots of social cooperation
and the stability of hunter–gatherer social
structure.
While the musings of contemporary
anarcho-primitivists may seem like a minor
current in the ocean of political philoso-
phy, the question of whether human beings
are naturally political beings is a serious
philosophical concern. We often take it for
granted that Aristotle was right that to be
human is to live in cities and to be politi-
cal. But Christian authors from Augustine
to Aquinas and Ockham wondered whether
political life was merely a necessity of our
post-lapsarian condition. Augustinian politi-
cal philosophy tends to hold that after the
4
fall of man, political authority is necessary
to prevent human beings from falling fur-
ther, with political dominion understood as
protective care for those who are ruled by a
benevolent statesman who cares for his sub-
jects as a father cares for his family. Thomistic
political thought tends to hold that political
authority is less focused on negative restric-
tion as a remedy for sin and more oriented
toward promoting human flourishing and
the common good. This dispute has impli-
cations for how we think about the relation
between divine (or natural) law and civil law
and for ideas about the separation of church
and state. Religious speculation about the
origins of political life directs our attention
to questions about paternalism and the com-
mon good. Also the ideal of genuine commu-
nity as imagined in some Edenic paradise has
often inspired utopian political aspiration.
Leaving religion aside, we might still won-
der whether political hierarchy, division of
labor, and the social and political structures
of civilization are merely contingent ways
of organizing human life. Could there be a
political philosophy of hunter–gatherers that
ignores or rejects the idea of the nation-state?
If we continue to evolve beyond the era of
nation-states in a cosmopolitan direction,
what would a political philosophy of the
future look like? The modern Western tradi-
tion assumes that humanity made a necessary,
logical, and progressive step when it left the
state of nature and created the original social
contract, which left us with a world carved
up into nation-states. But critics have pointed
out that the leap into political life cannot be
assumed to be unequivocally good and that the
move toward the social contract often served
the interests of the powerful. Cosmopolitan
critics add that the modern emphasis on
nation-states may impede us from delivering
on the promise of global justice.

Critics also contend that the contempo-
rary global system of nation-states rests
upon an often sordid history of colonial and
imperial domination of the rest by the West.
One might argue that the categories of polit-
ical philosophy are universal and are thus
not liable to the sort of genealogical criti-
cism that wants to throw Western political
philosophy baby out with the Eurocentric
bathwater. In this volume, James Alexander
suggests, for example, that “Europe is to
the World what Greece was to Rome.” He
means that we cannot deny the historical
source of political philosophy, even though
we have developed a global political philoso-
phy that has developed beyond its European
roots. Critics will wonder whether the cat-
egories of political thought are tainted by
this historical origin. Eduardo Mendieta
argues in this volume that contemporary
political philosophy ought to reimagine and
reconstruct the colonialist narratives of our
philosophical inheritance. He worries that
“the future remains mortgaged to the vision
of progress projected by both Occidentalism
and Orientalism.”
There is a deep methodological question
here. On the one hand, we do not suspect
that mathematical truths are tainted by their
Greek origin in Euclid or Pythagoras. So
why should the truths of political philoso-
phy be tainted by their origin in Plato or
Aristotle—or Augustine, Hobbes, Locke, and
Kant for that matter? On the one hand, those
who suspect a taint here will point out that
the ideas of European political philosophy
have been used to support crusades, colo-
nialism, imperialism, and other pernicious
endeavors. But, on the other hand, it may not
be fair to lay blame for the misbehavior of
political agents on the philosophers whose
ideas were appropriated (and often distorted)
by unphilosophical political agents.
5
INTRODUCTION
The deeper methodological question is
whether the supposed truths of political
philosophy are members of the same spe-
cies as the truths of other sciences. We don’t
think that geometry is a uniquely Greek or
Pythagorean science. But what about politi-
cal philosophy: is it merely “political” or
do the truths of political philosophy have
a nonpolitical status similar to the truths of
geometry? This points toward a fundamen-
tal disagreement about the very nature of
the topic under discussion and the method
of inquiry. Can political philosophy arrive
at knowledge, truth, and wisdom? Or do
the concepts of political philosophy merely
reflect the contingent ideologies of a par-
ticular and limited form of life? How do
we ground values and normative concepts
such as liberty, human rights, democracy,
equality, etc.? Do these concepts point to
real things: are “rights” real—grounded per-
haps in the endowment of some Creator?
Or are “rights” merely conventions of the
Hobbesian sort—or even worse, “nonsense
on stilts” as Bentham argued? The significant
problem here is methodological: how do we
know what we are talking about in political
philosophy—and what access do we have to
the objects of political ontology? This meth-
odological problem comes to a head in the
question of normativity: what provides the
normative impetus of political thinking? Is
there a natural law of some sort that helps
us understand and ground a normative hier-
archy of political structures and values? Or
are the norms of political philosophy merely
the product of a historically contingent per-
spective subject to the deflationary critique
of conventionalists and nominalists?
What method should we employ to work
our way through these sorts of questions:
empirical political science or speculative
political metaphysics? Other branches of
Andrew Fiala
philosophical inquiry have begun to turn
toward empirical and naturalistic explana-
tions and accounts of value. Perhaps political
philosophy ought to be reduced to social sci-
ence and give up on its normative aspirations.
Others may argue, following Wittgenstein (or
Rorty), that since we cannot make progress
toward fundamental truth about politics, we
should give up on the effort (perhaps, after
going through appropriate Wittgensteinian
therapy). Yet, nothing seems more important
than finding ways to ground the norms of
political life. Without such a grounding—in
natural law, social contract, dialectical mate-
rialism, or some other approach—we are left
unable to criticize political life, unable to jus-
tify revolutionary activity, unable to justify
and legitimate states and constitutions.
CLASSIFICATION SCHEMES
AND ASSUMPTIONS
A primary concern of political philosophy
has traditionally been the classification,
organization, and justification of structures
of power. A very basic method found in
Plato, Aristotle, and Hegel is to apply math-
ematical notions to political structures, leav-
ing us with an account of ruling power that
says either that one rules (monarchy), some
rule (oligarchy), all rule (democracy), or that
there is no rule whatsoever (anarchy). Such
a metapolitical analytic is compelling in its
purity. But analysis without norms leaves
us merely with a cold and abstract calcu-
lus that is unable to rank the mathematical
alternatives. Is rule of one better than rule by
all—and how would we know? So disputes
continue about which basic constitution is
better. While the European sphere of interest
has embraced the idea of democracy, other
6
parts of the world continue to refuse the lib-
eral-democratic impetus of the modern age,
maintaining that monarchic (or even theo-
cratic) rule is best.
Another approach in political philosophy
resists analytical schematism, focusing instead
on the nature of “the political” as a sphere
of conflict, domination, and social struggle.
This more radical approach is associated
with a tradition running from Heraclitus
and the Cynics to Marx, Nietzsche, Schmitt,
Arendt, Marcuse, and Foucault. From this
perspective, the analytical effort to classify
constitutional schemes is insufficient since
it ignores the motive force of political life,
which is power or the struggle for recogni-
tion. The analytical effort of the radical theo-
rists is to understand and describe ways that
power is organized and channeled. Again the
normative problem arises and some of the
efforts to describe social conflict slide over
toward social theory and sociology (in so far
as they resist the effort to impose norms on
“the political”).
Another tradition turns away from the
political entirely either to focus on the next
world (as Christian anarchists have occa-
sionally done) or to focus on a simple life
of a-political domesticity (as Epicureans of
all ages have done). While apolitical and
anarchist trends in political philosophizing
are often ignored as merely rejectionist, the
challenge from outside of the city is to show
why participation in political life is either
necessary or optimal for human flourishing.
Indeed, some of the most radical anarchist
critics reject the basic claim, which goes back
to Aristotle, that man is a political animal
(zoon politikon). This idea may itself be an
ideological imposition used to condemn the
outsiders. Aristotle suggested that only gods
or beasts live outside of cities—and since
human beings are not gods, this includes an

implicit condemnation of the “barbarians”
who live outside city walls. The claim that
“man” is a “political animal” (as Aristotle’s
anthropos is often translated) is also loaded
with gendered assumptions, as feminists will
point out. The idea that “man” is political
is also loaded with theological assumptions
about the fallen or imperfect nature of politi-
cal life (as Augustine argued).
While Aristotle suggests that human
beings flourish in political communities,
there is no doubt that political formations
are only a part of a larger whole of human
life that includes the domestic sphere that
was traditionally associated with the female.
Aristotle locates political philosophy within
the broader inquiry of ethics and what he
calls the “philosophy of human affairs”
(anthropeia philosophia) at the end of his
Nicomachean Ethics (1181b). This reminds
us that political philosophy is only a por-
tion of a larger inquiry into human nature or
anthropology. As Aristotle explains in Book I
of Nicomachean Ethics, a student of poli-
tics must study the nature of happiness, the
nature of human activity, the nature of vir-
tue, and the nature of the soul. Thus politi-
cal philosophy includes an open and difficult
question about what is natural for human
beings. It may be that only gods and beasts
do not live in cities—but we are still work-
ing out the details of whether we ought to
strive to become more divine or more beastly,
and whether we should be content with our
middle position as zoon politikon. That deep
normative question is central to the spirit
that animates inquiry in political philosophy.
Who are we? How ought we to live? And
how should we organize our communal life?
The term “political” contains a variety of
connotations and denotations. The political
may be viewed as merely focused on issues
of “public” concern (as opposed to the
7
INTRODUCTION
private sphere of domestic life, which was
often viewed as the domain of women and
slaves). However, the term political has fur-
ther connotations that include both power
struggles within private affairs (marriages,
families, friendships, and careers contain an
element of the political in this sense) and the
question of international, global organiza-
tion (as in the somewhat oxymoronic term
cosmopolitan—the city of the whole cos-
mos). While the ancient Greeks wrangled
about the relation between law, morality, and
religion—and about the proper structure of
society, the family, and the polis—profound
puzzles remain, as indicated by recent work
by Žižek and others who call the ontology
of “the political” into question. Žižek indi-
cates that our use of the term “political”
presumes a fundamental ontology contain-
ing a normative hierarchy. As Žižek puts it,
drawing upon insights found in the work of
Arendt, “in human society, the political is the
englobing structuring principle, so that every
neutralization of some partial content as
‘nonpolitical’ is a political gesture par excel-
lence” (Žižek, 2000, 191). From this vantage
point, everything is political (love, ethics,
religion, Darwinian evolution, and so on).
Even when we attempt to identify a nonpo-
litical sphere of concern (say in domestic life
or in the private sphere or in “the state of
nature”), the effort to isolate the nonpolitical
is connected to “the political.” It is certainly
“political” in this sense to say that feminin-
ity is private, domestic, and nonpolitical.
The political is a primary term and start-
ing place so that attempts to find something
a-political or nonpolitical can only proceed
by negation. Our concepts and categories are
laden with political significance (it is curious
that “the state of nature” includes the word
“state,” for example). A related point is made
by Raymond Geuss who cautions against
Andrew Fiala
any simplistic distinction between concepts
and their application in political philoso-
phy (Geuss, 2008). He reminds us that ideal
theories often fail to account for the reality
of political life (and its motivating forces).
We also underestimate the power of ideals in
political life.
Political philosophy in its broadest sense
includes just this sort of speculation about
human nature, the nature of the political, and
the status of our ideals. Political philosophy
thus connects with questions of psychology,
sociology, and anthropology—and even biol-
ogy and theology. But within the modern aca-
demic discipline of political philosophy, the
topic is often more narrowly circumscribed,
as a discussion of justification and legitima-
tion of governmental organization and social
power. A philosophical inquiry into justifi-
cation and legitimation would seem to rise
above the merely empirical question of who
is in power or what constitution is in place.
Such a “philosophical” inquiry would not
itself be political—that is engaged in politi-
cal struggle. Rather, it would be focused on
logical analysis, claims about truth, and con-
cern for justice. When we assert a truth about
political life—for example, that democracy
is the best form of governance—we appear
to rise above political squabbling and reach
the level of justification. However, radical
critics of the truths that are articulated and
defended in political philosophy may argue
that the truth-claims and justifications of
political philosophy are themselves merely
political—based upon partial perspectives
and engaged in a struggle for power and
legitimation that falls short of the discourse
of philosophical justification and truth.
Thus Thrasymachus defined justice as what
is in the interest of the stronger party and
denied that there was any discourse of jus-
tification beyond the political. Socrates and
8
the philosophical tradition he inspired were
intent on proving Thrasymachus wrong: the
philosophers looked (and continue to look)
for knowledge and wisdom about the politi-
cal that transcends political struggle. But the
Thrasymachus–Socrates dialectic continues
to unfold. Millennia later, when Hegel main-
tained that the modern European state repre-
sented the end of history, Marx viewed this
as an ideological claim that failed to account
for its own economic, social, and political
basis. One philosopher’s truth-claims will be
viewed by another as a political ploy. Thus
one might worry that the whole endeavor of
political philosophy is fraught with hypoc-
risy, double standards, and Machiavellian/
Orwellian manipulations. Political philoso-
phy may be merely the voice of patriarchy, of
capitalism, or Christianity, of Eurocentrism,
and so on. Radical critics worry that the
more strenuously a political philosophy
denies its political motivations, the more rea-
son we have to be suspicious. One wonders
whether the philosopher’s voice can be ade-
quately distinguished from the voice of the
politician and whether political philosophy
can be distinguished from mere politics (see
Fiala, 2002).
After Marx, Nietzsche, Freud, Foucault,
and others suspicious hermeneuts, it is no
longer possible to simply accept that we even
know what we are talking about (or what
we are inheriting and perhaps obfuscating)
when we employ the language of political
philosophy. This postmodern conclusion may
be understood either as the nadir or as the
zenith of political philosophy. For those who
are interested in simply making “progress”
in political philosophy, the deep question
of the meaning and extent of “the politi-
cal” creates an impediment (indeed, asking
us to pause and reconsider what we mean
by “progress” as well as by “the political”

and whose interests are being served by
our definitions). Yet, it is commonplace—
especially in Anglo-American thought—to
hold that we have made progress and that
we are making progress in both political phi-
losophy and in the world of political reality.
The work of Rawls, for example, is viewed
as ground-breaking and progressive, since
he reconstructed the social contract in a way
that worked better than previous iterations.
With the advent of the United Nations and
the end of the Cold War, it is thought that we
are making progress in disseminating ideas
about human rights, in developing secular
governments, and in developing institutions
of international law (cf. Fukuyama’s [1992]
once triumphant claim about the end of his-
tory). There is no denying that Rawls’s work
is influential and creative, and there is no
denying that the world looks quite different
today than it did in prior centuries. However,
political philosophy that is not merely an
apology for the status quo continues to
encourage deep questioning with regard to
liberal political theory and the world that is
developing. Are we better? Is political philos-
ophy better? While it certainly seems that we
are doing better, philosophers recognize the
difficulty of drawing final conclusions.
METAPOLITICS, POLITICAL
THEORY, AND APPLIED POLITICAL
PHILOSOPHY
Ethicists generally recognize a distinction
between metaethics, normative theory, and
applied ethics. Metaethics focuses on con-
ceptual problems (such as relativism and
absolutism). Normative theory focuses on
concrete theories of ethics that provide a defi-
nition of what is good (such as utilitarianism,
9
INTRODUCTION
natural law, or Kantian deontology). Applied
ethics applies these normative theories to
various problems. This tripartite scheme is
useful for organizing political philosophy
as well. Political philosophy in its broadest
sense (similar to metaethics—and thus per-
haps properly called metapolitics) asks about
the nature of the political and about methods
of justification. At this level, we might find
questions about human nature and prob-
lems familiar from metaethics, such as the
issue of relativism. At the level of normative
political theory, we find concrete theories
of justice and political organization: social-
ism, capitalism, democracy, communism,
and so on. These normative theories often
simply assume that the metapolitical issues
have been resolved and proceed with a defi-
nition of what is best or just. While norma-
tive political theory makes up the majority of
what students of political philosophy study,
we ought not forget that metapolitical issues
arise as we attempt to compare and judge the
different normative theories. When we evalu-
ate the difference between negative liberty
and positive liberty, for example, we discover
a metapolitical question (the meaning of the
concept of liberty) that is resolved in diverse
ways by proponents of different normative
political theories.
Applied political philosophy occurs when
we employ normative political theories to
resolve concrete problems such as immigra-
tion, crime, or economic issues. As in applied
ethics, there is often quite a bit of interplay
between our intuitions about specific prob-
lems and the way we understand and justify
our normative theories. Thus if we think that
distributive justice and moderating inequal-
ity are fundamental, we may adjust our the-
ory of political life accordingly (and adopt
some version of socialism). But if our intui-
tion is that liberty is more important than
Andrew Fiala
inequality, we may end up adopting some
version of libertarianism.
This process of adjusting our theories to
our intuitions and vice versa is similar to what
Rawls described as “reflective equilibrium.”
One important lesson to be learned from the
field of applied ethics is that contexts and cir-
cumstances matter. Euthanasia and abortion
are issues that depend in part on the sorts
of technologies that are available. Likewise,
political topics such as the status of interna-
tional law or the problem of cross-border
immigration and refugees depend upon his-
torical contingent circumstances, technologi-
cal development, access to information, basic
economics, climate, geography, and so forth.
Most will agree that our theoretical and
normative commitments ought to be respon-
sive to changing circumstances. However,
some may worry that this responsiveness is
a sign of relativism and inconsistency. This
directs us back to the metapolitical ques-
tion of whether there are absolute and true
answers to the questions of political philoso-
phy or whether the very nature of political
theory is such that it ought to be responsive to
historical, economic, or cultural variations.
This book contains both metatheoretical
considerations (e.g. in the chapters on sover-
eignty and human rights), chapters focused
on concrete or normative political theory
(e.g. in the chapters on democracy and cos-
mopolitanism), and chapters focused on
applied issues (distributive justice, retributive
justice, war, peace, immigration, and so on).
UTOPIAN CONTEMPLATION AND
PRACTICAL REASON
What is the goal or telos of political phi-
losophy? The Greek tradition of philosophy
10
points toward two ways of understanding
the purpose or end of political philosophy: as
a practical inquiry with useful applications
in the real world (as a means to an end) and
as a critical, utopian, and even paradoxical
inquiry that creates wonder (as an end in
itself). Many view political philosophy (and
ethics and anthropology more broadly con-
strued) as merely practical wisdom. Aristotle
suggests in Nicomachean Ethics that ethi-
cal and political inquiry ought to provide a
way to live a good, productive, and happy
life. However, Aristotle also notes (in Book
X of Nicomachean Ethics) that there is a
higher good for human beings, which is con-
templation. While one expects contempla-
tion to have some practical significance, the
contemplative act of philosophizing may
be an end in itself. This contemplative side
of philosophy grows out of the experience
of wonder, which was described by Plato in
Theatetus (155d) as the origin of philoso-
phy, an idea that was reiterated by Aristotle
in Metaphysics (1933a, 982b). In his dis-
cussion of wonder in Metaphysics, Aristotle
notes that wonder and speculation grow out
of a feeling of ignorance and the experience
of being perplexed or bewildered. Moreover,
he notes that speculative contemplation
develops out of leisure time, as a “recreation
and pastime,” such as “when practically all
the necessities of life were already supplied”
(982b). The contemplative and wondering
side of political philosophy is connected to
metapolitical questions. This may be under-
stood in contrast with the more practical set
of concerns that we encounter as political
agents within applied political philosophy.
The first more practical approach finds
its roots in Aristotle’s book Politics (1933b).
Aristotle suggests that the philosophical
study of politics should aim to be scientific
in the sense of analytical comprehension of

the origins and organization of political real-
ity. For Aristotle, the knowledge provided by
political science has practical import insofar
as statesmen and politicians can employ this
knowledge both in the construction of con-
stitutions and in the technical task of ruling.
This leads Aristotle to suggest in Book IV of
Politics that the technical art and science of
governing ought to be supplemented by an
analysis of what the best form of constitu-
tion is and how different constitutions are
adapted to different people in different ways.
But Aristotle notes that the science of politics
ought not to stray too far into an inquiry into
the ideal that neglects the question of what is
practical and useful. As Aristotle puts it, we
must examine both what is best and what is
possible.
But a different conception of political
philosophy sees it as an exploration of ideas
that is primarily speculative and engaged
in the philosophical art of wondering. This
approach may be more closely associated
with Plato, who explores utopian schemes
and plays with myths in his discussion of
political subjects. In Apology, Plato’s Socrates
speculates about the afterlife, refers to the
Delphic oracle, and invokes his daimon. In
Crito, Socrates imagines an encounter with
the personification of the Laws. In Republic,
Socrates imagines a perfect state based upon
the fantastical idea of the philosopher-king
and a eugenic project intended to create a
just and harmonious social order. While Plato
may have become more practical in his later
work—as in Laws—the speculative impulse
of political philosophy continues to inspire.
Political philosophers attempt to apply
reason and order to the world of human
reality, which may indeed be resistant to this
process. When modern political philosophers
imagined the creation of states from out
of the state of nature by way of the social
11
INTRODUCTION
compact, they simplified the actual history
of state formation. The idea of the social
contract is as ideal and utopian as Plato’s
philosopher-king: there never was a social
contract of the sort imagined by Hobbes,
Locke, or Rousseau. However, this process
of simplification helps to clarify ideals and
normative principles. This sort of speculative
idealization continues in the work of more
contemporary political philosophers such
as John Rawls, who imagines an even more
explicitly ideal sort of social contract situa-
tion—known as the original position under
the veil of ignorance. Rawls admits that this
is merely a heuristic—a device for imagining
how impartiality, rationality, and fairness
work in theorizing about justice. It is import-
ant to clarify ideals in this way. The effort to
imagine political ideals in this way may be
an end in itself—an act of wondering. One
wonders whether political philosophy must
always have a practical impact or whether
philosophizing about the political should be
free to wander in the fields of imagination.
While we may expect political philosophy
to result in prescriptions that ought to change
the world, as Marx put it in his critique of
Hegel, we should also acknowledge that spec-
ulating and reflecting on political reality is
intrinsically fascinating. We might acknowl-
edge, as Hegel attempted to show, that there
is a kind of enlightenment and freedom that
can arise from contemplation of political
reality that does not dare to articulate a plan
for how the world ought to be. Political phi-
losophers are often pulled back down into
Plato’s cave and passionately motivated to
change the world. But it might be that one
way to change the world is to stimulate the
sort of wonder that is associated with con-
templation. Indeed, Aristotle suggests in Book
X of Nicomachean Ethics that contemplation
is based in leisure and peace and is closely
Andrew Fiala
connected to happiness. Of course, the more
active political philosophy of someone like
Marx would say that there is a fundamental
injustice when the majority of people lack the
leisure to contemplate, while others are free
to wonder about how those who lack free-
dom provide a material basis for the leisurely
contemplation of the philosophical class.
HUMANITIES OR SOCIAL SCIENCE?
In addition to considering whether political
philosophy is a means to an end or an end
in itself, we ought also consider the proper
method for engaging in political philosophy.
Should political philosophy be an enter-
prise of idealization abstracted from politi-
cal reality or should it arise from within
political reality and primarily be empirical
reflection on practical, lived experience?
The issue of method leads to a loose dis-
tinction between political science, political
theory, and political philosophy. “Political
science” (as it is called in the United States)
is an established discipline in the social sci-
ences that is based upon empirical methods.
While political scientists may want to remain
neutral and refrain from making prescriptive
claims, political scientists do offer advice and
evaluation of policies and institutions. But
these normative claims are usually limited
by advice that works within a given politi-
cal framework. Political theory is the more
theoretical or philosophical side of political
science—often grounded in a more historical
orientation and more interested in normative
claims and connection with larger moral and
historical issues. Political theorists are thus
more willing to question the frameworks
that political scientists take for granted. The
larger metapolitical questions are exclusively
12
the focus of political philosophy per se,
which addresses metapolitical issues in ways
that are informed by work in epistemology,
metaphysics and ontology, ethics, and philo-
sophical logic.
In the academy in the United States, the
divide between the humanities and the social
sciences helps to explain the divide between
political theory and political philosophy
(although this generalization admits a vari-
ety of exceptions). While the social sciences
employ empirical reasoning including quan-
titative techniques of analysis, the humani-
ties tend to be more focused on conceptual
analysis, textual hermeneutics, and norma-
tive theory. As one facet of the social scien-
tific discipline of political science, political
theory in the social sciences is more closely
allied with empirical methodologies and less
inclined toward normative claims of humani-
ties scholars (although political theorists are
more normative and “philosophical” than
other scholars in the social sciences). On
the other hand, political philosophy—as a
subfield within the discipline of philosophy,
which is usually located in the humanities—is
more deeply grounded in the history of ideas,
more concerned with the status of normative
claims, and not as reluctant to imagine uto-
pian alternatives to the status quo.
As a discipline within philosophy and the
humanities, political philosophy is connected
with other philosophical concerns: epistemol-
ogy, metaphysics, ethics, and even psychol-
ogy and aesthetics. Thus political philosophy
wonders how (and whether) we know what
we think we know about political reality. It
asks about the foundations of political phe-
nomena, including the ontological status of
political entities, the origin of these things,
and their purpose or teleology. It is concerned
with questions about justice and the good,
as well as questions about human happiness

and flourishing. It may also be interested in
questions about taste, inclination, and mean-
ing. While these topics are also the concern of
political science (and other social sciences—
such as economics and sociology), political
philosophers are interested in deep and broad
reflection on these concerns and issues. They
are also interested in the hermeneutical and
phenomenological questions that arise when
we realize that inquiry in political philosophy
implicates the inquirer. When we contemplate
political reality, we must also contemplate the
fact that such contemplation arises within a
political context that limits and determines
norms and knowledge.
Consider one example: the question of
how political constitutions are organized.
As Plato and Aristotle did, political scientists
may categorize and analyze various sorts of
constitutions. There is quite a bit of social
scientific work to be done that involves
reflection on the various ways that human
beings have organized our lives politically.
Such work can often be grounded in high-
powered empirical methods and can provide
useful information about voting methods,
voter participation, cycles of political power,
the relation between the economy and politi-
cal movements, how leaders succeed, and
so on. However, political philosophers ask
deep questions about the meaning and pur-
pose of all of this: why do we need consti-
tutions, is voting really important, why can
we not agree about power, should economic
concerns be included, what virtues should a
good leader possess, and so on. While politi-
cal philosophy should not ignore the find-
ings of empirically oriented political science,
political philosophers should not loose sight
of the importance of a deeper set of ques-
tions about the sorts of beings we are, what
our purpose and function is, how we know
what we claim to know about these things,
13
INTRODUCTION
and what a perfect or ideal world might look
like.
Political philosophy tends to be con-
cerned with analysis of meta-level norms.
Thus Rawls defines justice as fairness and
provides an analysis of this definition. Thus
democratic theory is often focused on the
status of the norms of democracy such as
legitimation or participation. This exercise
in conceptual analysis aims to clarify what
we mean when we are discussing topics in
political philosophy. Conceptual analysis of
this sort is usually understood as a central
feature of philosophy as a discipline in the
humanities. This method is similar to related
efforts at conceptual analysis in discussing
philosophy of mind or philosophy of science
and so on. Philosophy of science, for exam-
ple, studies how knowledge claims are made
in scientific disciplines—including the ques-
tion of what distinguishes science from other
forms of thought. In a similar fashion, philos-
ophy of politics studies the way that norms
function in political life and the question
of what distinguishes “the political” from
other aspects of human life. It is important
to note that philosophers of science are not
scientists engaged in the act of discovery and
hypothesis testing that scientists are engaged
in. In the same way, political philosophers
are not engaged in the effort of political sci-
ence, conceived as a discipline in the social
sciences. Political scientists focus on discov-
ery and hypothesis testing in the realm of the
political. But political philosophers wonder
whether the empirical approach of political
science is valuable, while also reflecting on
the very subject matter and asking what is
(or is not) political.
Consider another example: the question of
justice. In the social sciences, one studies jus-
tice in an empirical fashion. Criminologists,
for example, study the nature of criminal
Andrew Fiala
justice, asking what works or does not work
in terms of crime reduction and punishment.
Philosophers wonder, however, how we
define crime and why it deserves punishment.
Or, in political science, one might study the
structure of a particular constitutional sys-
tem or the emerging norms of international
law. The inquiry of political science will be
informed by history and interested in empir-
ical questions about popular opinion, about
conflicts arising within structures of politi-
cal life, and about the lived implications of
certain structures and institutions. However,
political philosophers will be interested in
questions about whether history matters
with regard to politics (or whether the politi-
cal realm ought to be considered under the
rubric of a-historical and universal norms).
Political philosophers will ask fundamen-
tal normative questions about the status
of institutional frameworks—including the
question of which framework is better or
best.
JUSTICE, THE GOOD LIFE, AND
POLITICAL EXHORTATION
Let’s return to the idea that political philoso-
phy is part of the larger inquiry into human
life. This fact reminds us that political philos-
ophy ought to have some existential impact:
it ought to transform our lives. While there
have been significant discussions of philoso-
phy as therapy or philosophy as a way of
life (e.g. in works by Pierre Hadot), we often
forget that philosophizing about the political
is central to such projects of philosophical
transformation. One underappreciated form
of discourse connected to political philoso-
phy is what we might call political exhorta-
tion. While philosophers analyze and argue,
14
they can also offer admonishments, inspira-
tion, and incite us to act.
In Republic (Book II), Glaucon suggest
that justice is a middle path between unbri-
dled power and abject suffering. As Glaucon
asserts, echoing Thrasymachus, the best thing
would be to get away with unjust actions but
not be punished, while the worst thing would
be to suffer injustice without hope of retali-
ation. He further suggested that justice is a
lesser evil. As he puts it, no one would will-
ingly submit to the rule of law if he had the
power to get away with injustice with impu-
nity. This points toward one of the deepest
questions of political philosophy—why we
accept social and political norms. Socrates
attempt to provide an explanation through-
out the rest of Republic, ultimately pointing
toward a myth at the end of Book X, where
he suggests that justice is somehow linked to
happiness both in this life and in the next.
This is an answer to the question of why we
should care about the norms and concepts
of political life. Plato’s Republic ultimately
exhorts us to be just.
Political philosophy points beyond the
mere analysis and dispassionate inquiry of
empirical political science. Several of the
books of Republic offer analytical discus-
sion of the virtues and vices of various forms
of government: the famous story about the
dissolution of the perfect state through aris-
tocracy, oligarchy, democracy, and on to tyr-
anny. Such analysis is important. But political
philosophers will also wonder why this mat-
ters—what is at stake for us in analyzing
political reality in this way? Plato’s answer
in Book X of Republic provides a key. He
implies that an inquiry into the nature of jus-
tice and political life will have an existential
impact. It will make us better persons.
This points us toward a final problem
in terms of defining the field of political

philosophy. Do explicitly activist speech-acts
qualify as political philosophy? A standard
anthology of political philosophy will include
examples of activist exhortation, for example:
Machiavelli’s Prince, Jefferson’s “Declaration of
Independence,” Marx’s Communist Manifesto,
or King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail.” Each
of these documents was written in reaction to
a specific political context, directed toward a
specific audience, and aimed at stimulating
political action. Do such texts count as political
philosophy? They are not purely disembodied
considerations of abstract truth—even though
they contain claims about truth, justice, and
other norms. But they are central texts for con-
sidering key questions about governance and
power, about revolutionary action, and about
equality, ideology, and justice.
One key feature of exhortative texts is that
they raise our consciousness—directing our
attention to unspoken features of our lives
(including our own double standards and
hypocrisy). The idea of consciousness-raising
is a central one for feminists, who think that
women must be given the opportunity and free-
dom to properly experience and understand
their oppression. A similar effort is found in
Marxism, which wanted to bring class strug-
gle out of the ideological shadows and make
it an explicit theme of thinking. On the cut-
ting edge of this effort of political philosophy
as consciousness-raising today are those who
are exploring globalization and Eurocentrism.
We take certain linguistic and social catego-
ries for granted: patriarchal, racist, classist
(or bourgeois), and Eurocentric language and
concepts permeate our thinking and our insti-
tutions. One seemingly universal exhortation
of political philosophy is that we ought to be
aware of how our language and culture limits
our political thinking and activity.
A remaining problem is that political
exhortation is seemingly one-sided—it is
15
INTRODUCTION
polemical and tendentious. Philosophical
reflection would seem to be more ecumenical,
universal, and abstract. Liberatory political
exhortations on the Left call for revolutionary
action, reminding us that we’ve got nothing
to lose but our chains. But those on the Right
will remind us to hold fast to traditions and
ideas that are threatened with disruption by
the forces of revolution. One reason we might
want to claim that exhortative texts are not
properly political philosophy is that they are
one-sided in this way. Political philosophy per
se would seem to look beyond a particular
political agenda and take in the whole of the
field. But one may argue—following Marx’s
critique of Hegel or following feminist cri-
tiques of contemporary philosophy—that the
disembodied vantage point privileges a certain
class–gender–culture matrix. It thus might be
that abstract Platonic (or Hegelian) political
philosophy is itself a sort of exhortation—that
inspires us toward a certain form of life (even
while it denies its own tendentiousness).
A very narrow version of political philoso-
phy would deny that exhortative texts count
as political philosophy. But a broader under-
standing of the existential import of politi-
cal philosophizing would find such texts to
be primary examples of what political phi-
losophy ought to do, which is to help us live
better lives. As we’ve discussed in this intro-
duction, political philosophy also recognizes
that there are no easy and obvious answers
to the question of how best to organize our
lives and how best to live.
PRECIS/SYNOPOSIS
The chapters collected in this volume exam-
ine the sorts of questions discussed here,
while also extending reflection more deeply
Andrew Fiala
into specific topics. This volume begins with
James Alexander’s reflection on the history
of political philosophy. Alexander considers
the very question of whether it is important
to consider political philosophy from the
vantage point of history or whether political
philosophy can be understood in a-histori-
cal terms. He concludes that both historical
depth and a-historical reflection are of use:
“If philosophy without history is a desert,
and history without philosophy is a jungle,
then we certainly need something of both.”
Andrew Fiala considers the question of
sovereignty, while pointing toward problems
of civil disobedience, the challenge of anar-
chism, and development of international
law and what some are calling a “post-sov-
ereignty” era. Gillian Brock explores related
issues under the topic of cosmopolitanism.
Brock is concerned with the question of defin-
ing the concept of cosmopolitanism and with
the question of what a cosmopolitan world
would look like. She wonders whether cos-
mopolitanism is inevitable as a matter of nor-
mative theory. The issues considered by Brock
are connected with questions about human
rights and the ground of political life and jus-
tice. These concerns are taken up by Siegfried
Van Duffel, who explores the status of human
rights in both domestic and international con-
texts. Van Duffel suggests that there is a major
dispute between moral theories of rights and
more politically oriented theories. He further
suggests that a middle path can be found by
way of limited descriptive theories of rights.
A central concern for political philoso-
phy—especially liberal-democratic politi-
cal philosophy—is the question of justice.
Several chapters take a look at specific
notions of justice and their application.
Ovadia Ezra considers the topic of distribu-
tive justice. Dealing with important recent
work by Rawls, Dworkin, Hayek, Nozick,
16
and others, Ezra examines arguments about
inequality and the role of the state in redis-
tributing wealth, ensuring equality of oppor-
tunity, and managing social and economic
difference. Ezra links his consideration to the
emerging problem of global environmental
justice, showing how the question of dis-
tributive justice is applied in a vexing global
context to deal with the problem of resource
distribution and risk mitigation in the face of
climate change. The question of justice and
distributions of harms and benefits becomes
concrete in discussion of immigration.
Taking up a different thread with regard
to justice, Trudy Conway examines a differ-
ent aspect of concern for justice by consider-
ing retributive justice and alternative models
of viewing punishment. She situates this in
the history of political philosophy, with a
particular focus on Plato and Kant, while
also examining contemporary issues such
as the problem of mass incarceration. She
reminds us that the question of the justice of
punishment is a central concern for political
life and for political philosophy. The ques-
tion of domestic crime is related to the ques-
tion of international aggression, warfare, and
international law. George Lucas develops the
discussion of justice by considering the topic
of war. Lucas focuses our attention on the
way that the evolution of warfare in the con-
temporary era requires that we reassess our
understanding of just war theory, the status
of international law, and the military profes-
sion. In each of these chapters, it is important
to notice how philosophical accounts develop
together with and in light of developments in
the real world of political actuality.
While punishment and justice in war are
traditional concerns of applied political
philosophy, an alternative point of view is
that of pacifism. Andrew Fitz-Gibbon pro-
vides an overview of the topic of peace and

nonviolence, exploring the power of nonvio-
lence as a method of political activism, includ-
ing a brief history of pacifism and an account
of recent and successful examples of nonvi-
olence. In a related chapter, Paul Churchill
examines the notion of toleration, which is a
key value for liberal political regimes and a
vexing topic for liberal political philosophy.
Churchill provides a historical overview of
the development of the concept as well as a
contemporary account of remaining prob-
lems. He works through so-called paradoxes
of toleration and the concept of state neutral-
ity, while touching upon a variety of concrete
and applied issues: freedom of speech, hate
speech, pornography, and the challenge of
religion. Churchill and Fitz-Gibbon remind
us of a certain brand of contemporary politi-
cal life associated with liberal regimes that
value toleration, nonviolence, and the like.
Developing the idea of liberal political
philosophy further, Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley
examines emerging issues in democratic the-
ory. She considers the problem of social con-
tract theory, consequentialist justifications of
democracy (what she calls democratic instru-
mentalism), and the ideas of deliberative
democracy and public reason. She reminds us
of the breadth and complexity of the concept
of democracy and its linkage to other moral/
political concepts such as equality, autonomy,
and authenticity. She shows how democratic
theory develops as a critique of paternalism.
She considers feminist critiques and so-called
agonistic pluralism—a radical view of politi-
cal life as an unavoidable field of contested
values and struggles for power and recogni-
tion. The consideration of feminism is taken
up in more detail by Anca Gheaus in her chap-
ter. Gheaus offers an examination of feminist
critiques of political philosophy with a spe-
cial focus on care ethics and practical effort
to respond to the demand for gender equality.
17
INTRODUCTION
Gheaus’s concern represents an approach to
issues in political philosophy that develops
feminist concern in a way that is different
than that considered by Kegley. Following
this thread and returning to issues found in
the discussion of cosmopolitanism, Shelley
Wilcox examines the issue of immigration,
asking whether liberal-democratic states have
a right to exclude immigrants, while also con-
sidering the rights of foreigners who are in
need of aid. She points toward a vexing cir-
cularity haunting this discussion, in the issue
of who is able to express consent and benefit
from the right of self-determination. It might
be, she suggests, that central liberal-demo-
cratic principles such as liberty and equality
point toward open borders or cross-border
redistribution. But proposed solutions are
problematic, and these issues become more
complicated when we take into account class
and gender disparities—such as “global care
chains” involving domestic labor—in immi-
gration and cross-border relations.
Near the end of this book, coauthors
Jeremy Wisnewski and Matthew Voorhees
discuss the future of political philosophy.
They examine current trends in the discipline
by providing an empirical analysis of recent
publications. They identify ongoing con-
cern for liberal theory and the work of John
Rawls, as well as emerging issues of diversity/
difference and cosmopolitanism. They remind
us that political philosophy ought to be
grounded in hope and concern for the future:
“If political philosophy has no bearing on our
political future, then political philosophy will
itself have no future—save being a boutique
hobby for intellectuals who are predisposed
to considering its themes.” They note that
philosophical inquiry develops in response
to political reality (ex. torture emerges as a
topic after Bush permits it—and other emerg-
ing applied topics: surveillance and high tech,
Andrew Fiala
intellectual property, income inequality, ter-
rorism, etc.). Thus they conclude by reminding
us that the discipline will undoubtedly change
as new issues emerge and philosophers turn
their attention to them. Finally, Edouardo
Mendieta provides an afterword to this vol-
ume that reminds us that philosophy is his-
torically and culturally located. Eurocentrism
remains a problem—and indeed a central
challenge of political philosophy. Could there
be a truly global political philosophy? As
our globe shrinks and cosmopolitan concern
grows, can we reimagine political philosophy
from a perspective that is not haunted by the
shadow of Eurocentrism?
This book concludes with several appen-
dices that provide resources for research-
ers: a chronology, a glossary of key terms, a
list of research resources, and an annotated
bibliography.
WORKS CITED
Aristotle (1894), Nicomachean Ethics
from Aristotle’s Ethica Nicomachea,
N. J. Bywater (ed.). Oxford: Clarendon
Press; from Perseus digital library: www.
perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/.
18
— (1933a), Metaphysics in Aristotle in
23 Volumes, Vols. 17, 18, trans. H.
Tredennick. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press; London: William
Heinemann Ltd., 1933, 1989; from
Perseus digital library: www.perseus.tufts.
edu/hopper/.
— (1933b), Politics in Aristotle in 23
Volumes, Vol. 21, trans. H. Rackham.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press; London: William Heinemann Ltd.,
1944; from Perseus digital library: www.
perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/.
Cohen, J. (2009), Philosophy, Politics,
Democracy: Selected Essays. Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press.
Fiala, A. (2002), The Philosopher’s Voice:
Philosophy, Politics, and Language in the
19th Century. Albany, NY: SUNY Press.
Fukuyama, F. (1992), The End of History
and the Last Man. New York: The Free
Press.
Geuss, R. (2008), Philosophy and Real
Politics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
Rawls, J. (2001), The Law of Peoples.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Žižek, S. (2000), The Ticklish Subject: The
Absent Center of Political Ontology.
London: Verso.
 1
THE HISTORY OF
POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
James Alexander
Oakeshott once wrote that political philoso-
phy concerns the relation “between politics
and eternity.” “At all other levels of reflection
on political life we have before us the single
world of political activity, and what we are
interested in is the internal coherence of that
world; but in political philosophy we have in
our minds that world and another world, and
our endeavour is to explore the coherence of
the two worlds together.” This is a vivid con-
ception of political philosophy. But it is one
which is challenged by history. Oakeshott
rather blithely claimed that the history of
political philosophy is simply the recogni-
tion that political philosophy so defined has
a “continuous history in our civilisation”
(Oakeshott, 1991, 225). But if history is the
antithesis of eternity, then the history of pol-
itical philosophy may be nothing other than
the death of political philosophy so defined.
History has an essentially contradictory
nature. We may write history after we have
lost something, as Acton suggested, or in
order to lose it, as Goethe suggested (Goethe,
1904, 158). The historian may bury the past
by writing about it, but he may also bring it
back to view. This is why the philosopher is
never sure whether the historian is his friend
or his enemy. The historian may be Brutus
19
to his Caesar, but he may also be Jesus to
his Lazarus. The consequence of this extreme
indeterminacy is that there is no way to leg-
islate for the history of political philosophy
which cannot be immediately contradicted.
In this chapter, therefore, I seek not to legis-
late for it, but instead to clarify some of its
constitutions, conditions, and contradictions.
The first thing to observe is that each of its
three substantive terms—“history,” “poli-
tics,” “philosophy”—is contested.
Politics, before the twentieth century, was
always subjugated to something else—to the
polis, or to empire, church, or state. But in
the twentieth century, there were attempts to
define politics (or the category of “the polit-
ical”) as something in itself. This was evident
in classic works like Schmitt’s Concept of
the Political, Collingwood’s New Leviathan,
Arendt’s The Human Condition, Oakeshott’s
On Human Conduct, and even in more quix-
otic works like Badiou’s Metapolitics and
Rancière’s Dis-Agreement. The consensus
now, however, seems to be that politics has
no simple meaning: it can mean more or less
anything (Alexander, 2014). In the last half
century or so, almost everything has become
subject to what we could call the last laugh of
Protagoras—the possibility that everything is
James Alexander
relative, that there is nothing true about pol-
itics. It is in this situation that we attempt to
make sense of politics in historical or philo-
sophical terms, or both.
Philosophy is, I have argued elsewhere,
any attempt to respond to the world, or any
part of it, in terms of wonder, faith, doubt, or
skepticism (Alexander, 2012). It is, of course,
a rather high specification for thought: it
appears to exclude ordinary thought, while
being related to it. I think we have to admit
that political philosophy cannot always be
very securely distinguished from political
theory or political thought. When they are
distinguished it is usually on the grounds that
political thought includes any judgment, no
matter how fragmentary or incoherent (e.g.
“Legislate!”), that political theory is some-
thing more ordered so it includes justifica-
tions of certain ideas used in politics (e.g.
“Liberalism”), and that political philosophy
is something further narrowed and intensified
so it includes all attempts to understand and
explain what politics is and where it stands
in relation to other human concerns (e.g.
Leviathan). It would be a mistake to distin-
guish them too severely: to only suppose, say,
that ideas do not matter in politics, or that
ideas matter in politics only in terms of what
purposes they serve, or that ideas are only of
significance when they enable us to under-
stand politics without regard to purpose. But
if the three were blurred together without
argument, then we would be unable to distin-
guish prescription, justification, and explana-
tion. There would be no distinction between
“We should do this,” “We should do this for
this set of reasons,” and “We say ‘We should
do this for this set of reasons’ for this set of
reasons” (Oakeshott, 2008, 193). Where all
this leaves political philosophy is, of course,
unclear: which is why we sometimes turn to
history.
20
History complicates everything. It places
everything in the framework not of truth but of
time: and so raises questions about whether we
are telling a story or set of stories about what
was thought true rather than trying to establish
whether it is true or not. Consciousness of time
makes us aware of broken traditions, of litera-
tures canonical and uncanonical, of disconti-
nuities and silences in our stories, and of the
difficulty of assessing the motives behind and
meanings of the relics which survive of older
thoughts, theories, and philosophies. Perhaps
it also increases our consciousness of the fra-
gility of our own understanding, generating
a caution about saying anything at all. And
then there is also, as Condren has observed,
the fact that we read historic works of political
philosophy for a variety of reasons: sometimes
because they are original, sometimes because
they are coherent, and sometimes because they
are influential. It should be obvious to every-
one that what is original may not be coherent
or influential; that what is coherent may not
be influential or original; and that what may
be influential may not be original or coherent
(Condren, 1985).
The problem of history was evident to
Aristotle when he distinguished poetry and
history. On the one hand, philosophy, like
poetry, has always been with the gods, while
history has always been human, all too human.
Hegel wrote in the Phenomenology that “phi-
losophy moves essentially in the element of
universality” (Hegel, 1977, 1). History, on the
other hand, moves essentially in the element
of particularity. Within the “fundamental cat-
egory of historical thought,” as Collingwood
put it, we no longer look “for a change-
less and knowable something.” We sup-
pose that there is “no unchanging substrate
behind the changes, and no unchanging laws
according to which the changes took place”
(Collingwood, 1945, 10–13). This is clear.
 THE HISTORY OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
But such an emphasis on change may seem to
undermine philosophical certainty altogether.
Oakeshott noticed that “almost impercep-
tibly, Collingwood’s philosophy of history
turned into a philosophy in which all knowl-
edge is assimilated to historical knowledge,
and consequently into a radically sceptical
enquiry” (Oakeshott, 2007, 199). Skepticism
is a form of philosophy, and perhaps the most
influential one now (though we resist it),
because of our tendency to think historically.
But the history of political philosophy draws
our attention to the fact that most political
philosophers were concerned with essences,
ideas, and truth, and rarely concerned them-
selves with history. History itself, therefore,
seems to ask whether the historian always has
to think historically. Certainly, no one until
the last few centuries could have imagined
the possibility that history might be the fun-
damental category of thought.
It is important to recognize that the emer-
gence of our historical consciousness has a
history. In The Idea of Nature, Collingwood
argued that at certain critical points in the
past there has been a ruling analogy which
has enabled men to explain nature—and
also, we may add, politics. The first was an
analogy between nature and man, so that
nature was macrocosm and man microcosm.
When this analogy was brought into poli-
tics, it suggested that politics was natural, in
harmony with the universe. The second was
an analogy between God as the creator of
the world and man as creator of machines.
When this analogy was brought into politics,
it suggested that politics was artificial. The
third was an analogy between the history of
nature and the history of man, so that nature
was seen to be historical, subject to change
(Collingwood, 1945, 3 ff). This third analogy
“detached early modernity from its past and
at the same time inaugurated our modernity
21
with a new future” (Koselleck, 1985, 16).
In this modernity, politics is neither natu-
ral nor artificial but emergent. As Marx put
it, “Men make their own history, but they
do not make it just as they please; they do
not make it under circumstances chosen by
themselves but under circumstances existing
already, given and transmitted from the past”
(Marx, 1963, 15). In this continually chang-
ing situation, and one recognized as such, it
becomes much harder to postulate a founda-
tion of politics. Aristotle simply assumed that
politics must be in harmony with the laws
of nature: it was our nature to be political.
Hobbes thought this too complacent. He sug-
gested that politics had another foundation,
namely, the brutal necessity imposed on us by
nature to find some artifice by which we can
achieve order. Many contemporary philoso-
phers still begin with Aristotle or Hobbes. But
this is to ignore the fact that political philoso-
phy since at least the time of Hegel has begun
with the lack of any certain foundation. Hegel
did not think that this was a problem, since
his philosophy was meant to explain every-
thing without depending on any foundational
assumptions. But Schopenhauer, Kierkegaard,
and Marx all criticized Hegel’s philosophy
in very different ways, and those who have
followed—apart from the scientists who can
continue on Cartesian or Baconian assump-
tions—have made these criticisms their start-
ing point. This is still not understood as well
as it should be. It explains why political phi-
losophy is generally now so fragmentary, and
why it blurs into political theory and thought,
and their histories. Most modern writings are
indirect testimony to our failure to sketch a
total understanding of politics in relation to
what we have done in history and in relation
to what we can think in philosophy.
It is unlikely we could understand this with-
out the history of political philosophy. Some
James Alexander
modern writers have understood it: Andrew
Vincent in The Nature of Political Theory,
a book which deals with everyone but the
marxisant French; and Olivier Marchart in
Post-Foundational Political Thought, a book
which deals only with the marxisant French.
Marchart distinguishes modern political phi-
losophers into three categories. First, there are
foundational philosophers, who posit some
foundation for politics. Most philosophers
before the nineteenth century fit into this cat-
egory. It survives into the present, although
heavily modified: since instead of simply pos-
tulating that there are foundations, philoso-
phers like Rawls and Habermas have instead
sought to construct them. Yet this classical tra-
dition has come under severe assault. For there
are also anti-foundational philosophers who
claim that such foundations do not exist, and
so instead propose theories that tend to be rel-
ativistic, skeptical, or nihilistic. Thirdly, there
are post-foundational philosophers, who posit
that the “lack” or “absence” of foundations
is itself constitutive of political philosophy,
which then becomes “a constant interrogation
of metaphysical figures of foundation—such
as totality, universality, essence and ground”
(Marchart, 2007, 2). This involves paradoxes
which have to be accepted as a matter of faith.
If one accepts them, then one can adopt the
obscure terminology of Baudrillard, Badiou,
and the rest; if one does not, then one can, as
many do, ignore it. Most moderate commen-
tators, such as Vincent, think that the best we
can do is to adopt the sort of position sketched
by Gadamer, who simply says we cannot
escape our traditions and prejudices. But it is
far from clear what the consequence of this
would be, or that Gadamer, despite his sophis-
tication, has done as much as Collingwood,
Koselleck, Arendt, Oakeshott, and MacIntyre
have done to dramatize its difficulties in rela-
tion to politics.
22
Vincent divides the different attitudes to
foundations somewhat differently. In his book
he distinguishes, first, those who believe in
transcendental foundations: foundations of
politics derived from some external sources,
such as divine revelation, natural law, and
even perhaps, although more ambiguously,
historical inevitability and scientific gen-
eralization; secondly, those who believe in
immanent foundations, which are founda-
tions found within politics itself: what these
are is highly contested, since writers are torn
between universal claims, usually constructed
abstractly or in terms of discourse, and “con-
ventional” claims which depend on particu-
lar historical traditions; and, thirdly, those
who do not believe in foundations, since they
consider that everything is conventional and
therefore particular (Vincent, 2004, 3–14). If
we combine these two schemes together, then
I think we have something like a complete
scheme. There are five possible claims:
1. The claim that there are foundations,
which are transcendental and universal,
and that these can be known.
2. The claim that foundations can be some-
how constructed through or for the sake
of universal agreement, so we can avoid
contingency.
3. The claim that the foundations are con-
tingent and conventional, so not universal
but particular (and traditional).
4. The claim that since everything is contin-
gent there are no foundations.
5. The claim that there are no foundations,
but that our need for foundations is so
fundamental that it may still be consid-
ered constitutive of whatever we think
about the world.
Each suggests a different purpose for the
history of political philosophy. The first sug-
gests that history is unified in terms of the
 THE HISTORY OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
understanding and misunderstanding of the
truth, and otherwise in terms of the contin-
ual failure to enact this truth in the past in
any particular politics. The second suggests
that history is a repository of earlier con-
structions, which are only to be studied for
the sake of better construction. The third
suggests that history is a constitutive form of
study, since the supposition here is that we
can only understand politics in terms of our
own historical finitude: although here there is
no secure way of distinguishing history from
tradition. The fourth goes further and sug-
gests that history is anything and everything.
The fifth suggests that history is evidence
for the intractable nature of our condition
of being permanently committed to certain-
ties we can neither wholly believe nor wholly
abandon belief in.
All of these except the first would have
struck everyone before Burke as possibilities
to be avoided. This is one reason why we still
read the classics: for the reason that, even
if we cannot agree with them, we recognize
that our own writings are in certain respects
inferior to them. This is, perhaps, a mini-
mal justification for the continued study of
the history of political philosophy. But here
we return to the original contradiction. We
may study the history of political philoso-
phy because our commitment to a historical
form of understanding makes it impossible
to believe in the certainties held about poli-
tics in the past by the political philosophers
we study. The history of political philosophy
both enables us to emancipate ourselves from
the past and encourages us to recover it. We
are in the interesting situation of remember-
ing something we have chosen to forget.
The history of political philosophy is only
a few centuries old. Momigliano notes that
the English were rather good at it in the nine-
teenth century. But the tradition of Grote,
23
Lecky, Freeman, Maine, Bryce, and Bury was
threatened in the mid-twentieth century by
the positivistic view that ideas were of no sig-
nificance in explaining politics (Momigliano,
1977, 1). It was in answering this sort of claim
that certain figures tried to justify the status
of history of political philosophy within the
modern academic study of politics. In the early
part of the twentieth century, the history of
political philosophy and political science were
rarely distinguished: they were part of a single
study of politics. But the establishment of pol-
itics as a science forced what were now rival
branches of political study to justify them-
selves. Justification for the history of politi-
cal philosophy came, Vincent suggests, in two
waves. Those of the first wave of the 1940s
and 1950s—Strauss, Arendt, Oakeshott, and
even to some extent others like MacIntyre
later—suggested that if the history of political
philosophy was correctly carried out it would
enable us to establish what was of permanent
philosophical significance. The books of these
writers were still meant to be contributions
to political philosophy. But the writers of the
second wave of the 1960s and after—Pocock,
Skinner, and Dunn—suggested that, since his-
torians could only show what was of histori-
cal significance, nothing was of permanent
philosophical significance (Vincent, 2004,
37–51). This position was associated with
the intensification of historical study found in
The Political Thought of John Locke (1969),
The Machiavellian Moment (1975), and The
Foundations of Modern Political Thought
(1978), which are still taken to be models
for the subject. A subject was legislated for:
methods established, enemies identified, and
books written. Skinner and Pocock between
them drew our attention to two different
ways of writing the history of political phi-
losophy. Either we can write the history of
the uses of argument found in the works of
James Alexander
political philosophers, so emphasizing the
particularity of each argument, the question
it was meant to answer, and the supposed use
to which the argument was meant to be put;
or we can write the history of the changes
in the languages or discourses of political
philosophy in terms of the longue durée. In
practice, the difference between these may
not be very great, although they may register
slight differences in temperament and even in
political inclination. If Foucault’s historical
writings were tainted with a radical hue, and
Koselleck’s with a reactionary hue, Skinner’s
and Pocock’s have been tainted with the hues
of moderate reformism and restraint. Even
though their works are meant to be good his-
tory, they are also meant to offer something to
contemporary political philosophers. Skinner
has suggested that the value of history is in
recovering past ideas in order to challenge
present ones (Skinner, 1997). Pocock has
suggested that its value is in performing “the
liberal-conservative function of warning the
ruler on the one hand, and the revolution-
ary on the other, that there is always more
going on that either can understand or con-
trol” (Pocock, 2009, xiii). These, though not
unreasonable, hardly require an elaborate
apparatus of historical learning. What we
may observe is that, unlike Koselleck, the
leading figure of the German philological tra-
dition of Begriffsgeschichte, who was mainly
concerned to characterize what is distinctive
about our modernity—the modernity con-
stituted by a distinctive historical conscious-
ness—Pocock and Skinner have concerned
themselves with earlier eras. So they have had
to face difficult questions about how their
study relates to the present which Koselleck
did not have to face. They are not characteriz-
ing our world, so they are perhaps explaining
its origins, merely characterizing an earlier
era for its own sake, or even only reminding
24
us of older ideas. In the end, it may be that
most histories of this type are nothing more
than archival compilations complicated by
the subjectivity of the historian, in which case
the history of political philosophy is nothing
more than a high form of literature for failed
politicians and frustrated philosophers.
This may seem like a dead end. So it is
interesting to note that Dunn recanted. He
saw that the revolution associated with the
“Cambridge” contextualizing methods of
Skinner and Pocock was no revolution at all,
and that reaction was necessary if the history
of political philosophy was to have any sig-
nificance (Dunn, 1996). He argued that the
study of politics should be
committed by its central tasks to a rejec-
tion of the intellectually, educationally,
and politically disastrous divorce between
a purely historicist history of politi-
cal ideas, a style of political philosophy
committed to political inconsequence by
the self-conscious purity of its methods,
and a political science ludicrously aping
the sciences of nature and uninformed
by any coherent conception of political
value (and thus at the mercy of the most
superficial of local ideological perspec-
tives and sentiments). (Dunn, 1985, 2)
This is the broad justification for the con-
tinued study of the history of political phi-
losophy over against the almost deliberately
unhistorical political philosophy of Rawls
and Habermas. The major significance of
Rawls’s Theory of Justice (1971) was that
it established a form of political philosophy
that confined itself to a sphere in which it
was untroubled or uncomplicated by his-
tory and that, within the modern univer-
sity, could exist alongside political science.
Oakeshott once said that philosophy is
“radically subversive” (Oakeshott, 1993,
 THE HISTORY OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
141), but academic political philosophy is
at best moderately subversive and at worst
radically supportive of whatever is going on
politically. Bevir and Adcock say that politi-
cal philosophy has always been “the locus of
hostility—whether conservative, radical or
some curious blend of them—to the scien-
tific aspirations of the discipline’s new main-
stream” (Adcock and Bevir, 2010, 90). But
this is only true of political philosophy when
it is reinforced by the history of political phi-
losophy. History to Rawls was no more than
the conflict of Protestants and Catholics in
the sixteenth century, and to Habermas lit-
tle more than the newspapers and clubs of
the eighteenth century. Both, of course, paid
some attention to their own heritage: Rawls
lectured on Hobbes, Kant, Sidgwick, and
others, while Habermas has written about
almost everyone from Hegel to Derrida. But
this has all been a lot less reflective, and a
lot less subversive, than the work of oth-
ers—such as Oakeshott, Arendt, MacIntyre,
Cowling, Dunn, and Geuss—who have seen
history as less anticipatory of, or exemplary
for, modern trends. My own view is that the
theories of Rawls and Habermas are nothing
but moments, or arrests, in what is possible—
footnotes to Kant, say, or worth a page or two
of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right. Geuss (2008)
has recently made this sort of claim respect-
able. The claim, in short, is that the political
philosopher should not ignore the history of
political philosophy. But it is never easy to
see where the history of political philosophy
points with any clarity (which is a particular
matter of despair for any impatient academ-
ics who seek “outputs” and “impacts” from
political philosophy): I think this is because
an openness to history involves an openness
to fundamental difficulties. It opens us to
both the transcendent and the immanent, to
both the universal and the particular, to both
25
enthusiasm and skepticism. It is necessary to
say something about this.
In a short chapter, it is only possible to
sketch some of the antinomies involved.
These antinomies are not symmetrical, and
do not form a logical set. They are the alter-
natives which arise as soon we attempt to
reflect in the present on thought which is
supposed to have come from the past. These
antinomies cannot be resolved unless we set-
tle for arbitrary compromises which only
conceal the contradictions. It is more impor-
tant to recognize contradictions than try to
resolve them. So we have:
1. Either history is the objective past, or his-
tory is whatever the historian subjectively
believes about the remains of the past.
2. Either history can be written of the entire
past, or history can only be written of
partial pasts.
3. Either history is concerned with the past
for the sake of the present, or history is
concerned with the past for its own sake.
4. Either history is conditioned by some-
thing which does not itself have a history
because it exists outside of time and is
eternal, or history is not conditioned by
anything outside time, so history has to
be understood only in terms of its own
conditions.
5. Either not everything can be studied his-
torically (not all objects are historical), or
everything can be studied historically (all
objects are historical).
6. Either the history of political philosophy
is a form of study which is secondary to
political philosophy: a mere retrospective
study of the earlier attempts to generate
a philosophical view of politics, or the
history of political philosophy is a form
of study which is inseparable from and
therefore not secondary to political phi-
losophy because it is the study of what
constitutes political philosophy, perhaps
James Alexander
at any time, and certainly, now at a time
when we suppose that everything is con-
stituted by its history.
Some of these antinomies are very close—
the fourth and fifth, for instance—and all
are related. They raise great difficulties. To
take only the second antinomy, we may ask
whether it is possible to write a history of
political philosophy for the entire world or
only for part of it. If we suppose that the
history of political philosophy is contin-
gent and largely discontinuous, then it can
include whichever elements we happen to
find exemplary. These have always tended to
be the “European” or “Western” traditions of
Classical, Christian, and Enlightened thought,
but there is no reason to exclude others if we
are skeptical about the importance of our tra-
dition. If the history of political philosophy is
continuous and therefore constitutive of our
current political philosophy, then the ques-
tion is a much harder one. Yet it is possible
to answer it, and again in terms of history. I
mentioned earlier that a historical conscious-
ness emerged in the eighteenth century. The
impact of this on how philosophers saw the
history of philosophy was total, whether or
not they thought history was contingent
or constitutive. By the time of Hegel and
Schopenhauer, it was common to see phi-
losophy historically. Both were interested in
the discovery of other traditions besides their
own. But Schopenhauer still saw history as
contingent: indeed, of no significance at all.
His philosophy was in large part a Western or
Kantian reinterpretation of Buddhistic recog-
nitions, as he himself saw: he took elements
of Indian religion to be exemplary of a cor-
rect philosophical understanding. Much later,
with less verve and more obscurity, Heidegger
saw pre-Socratic philosophy as equally exem-
plary—a view which influenced not only
26
Arendt but also Derrida. On the other side,
Hegel was equally fascinated with Indian and
Chinese philosophy, and incorporated both
of the great Eastern civilizations of China
and India into his philosophy of history and
even, although more as preliminaries than
anything else, into his history of philosophy.
Schopenhauer, on the one hand, suggested
that there is a dilemma: we have to choose
either a Pelagian, ethical, or world-affirming
form of philosophy, or an Augustinian, anti-
nomian, or world-denying form. Hegel, on
the other hand, suggested that there was a dia-
lectic whereby the simple unities of Chinese
thought were logically opposed by the simple
multiplicities of Indian thought and whereby
both were reconciled through the compli-
cated unity-in-multiplicity of Greek thought
into the distinctive and familiar tradition of
the Christian West. These are two magnifi-
cent and influential myths, and we have not
entirely abandoned them. It is of course sig-
nificant that Hegel and Schopenhauer wrote
in a century when it was thought that the his-
tory of humanity could be told as one story.
If we scale down our ambition, as we have
tended to do since what Thomas Mann called
the “bad nineteenth century,” then a story
less tendentious is necessary. Perhaps the
best available one is the one sketched in The
Nomos of the Earth, where Schmitt argued
that there was no unity in history until there
was unity in geography. It was the contingent
achievement of the Europeans to unite the
world geographically. (Hegel would have said
it was a constitutive achievement.) But we
could say, with Schmitt, that this achievement,
though contingent, was imaginatively deci-
sive. There was a consciousness which arose
in Europe, which was taken across the world
so that the unity of the world was forged in
relation to it, and which then was separated
from its origin to become a complete world
 THE HISTORY OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
consciousness, and which has been reflected
back into Europe (Schmitt, 2003). There is
reflexivity here: this consciousness is now no
longer that of Europe, but that of the world;
yet, for contingent reasons, the European
story is the only one into which all other
traditions can be placed to form a unity. It is
common for writers of the history of political
philosophy to emphasize that they are writ-
ing about the Western tradition only: but this
is, for the most part, just good manners. For
the moment, the Western tradition is the only
unitary tradition. Everything else, so far, is
partial (Dunn, 1996, 15). This does not mean
that there could not be alternative traditions,
say, Confucian or Vedic or Islamic. But these
would involve revolutions in thought of which
there is as yet no sign. Europe is to the World
what Greece was to Rome. Indeed, there is
good historical justification for the claim that
the Greeks invented politics, that the Romans
invented law—that is, they invented the habit
of treating them separately from religion,
ethics, and each other—and that Europeans
conveyed these two paradigms of politics
and law to the world, along with, eventually,
a third paradigm of a separately treated eco-
nomics (McCloskey, 2010, Schiavone, 2012,
11). But we have to admit that there is noth-
ing in this dual or triple legacy which prevents
an evangelical interruption of the sort which
came with Christianity—although it could
come in the future from Islam, Buddhism, or
elsewhere.
The point is that the antinomies are ines-
capable: we exist between simple and coher-
ent positions which we cannot possibly
entirely adopt. The most immediately rel-
evant antinomy here is of course the sixth.
This is the question of whether we suppose
the history of political philosophy is simply
an additional way of reflecting upon texts
we already reflect upon philosophically, or is
27
something deeper, more intractable. I think
it is fair to say that the first ends in triviality
and the second absurdity, taken separately.
According to the former, the history of politi-
cal philosophy would simply be a category
into which we collect anything and every-
thing which remains of earlier thought: a
category of the relics of political philosophy
perhaps modified by the insistence that we
understand them historically. This certainly
would not require any of the historical sub-
tlety we have acquired since the eighteenth
century. According to the latter, the history of
political philosophy would depend on some-
thing like a philosophy of history. Here his-
tory would be unified not through facts, but
in terms of a theory or event which relates
everything—a theory such as, say, natural
selection or historical materialism, or an event
such as crucifixion-resurrection. If any the-
ory or event of this sort were to be believed,
then clearly it would change our idea of his-
tory, which would no longer be “one damned
thing after another” but many damned or
saved things, one after another, or, at least,
many things ordered according to one struc-
turing principle. The point is that such a the-
ory or event would not itself be historical but
abstract or timeless or eternal. “Modern his-
torians have always reacted, understandably,
against philosophies of history,” comments
Perry Anderson. But philosophies of history
“have not gone away, and are unlikely to, as
long as the demand for social meaning over
time persists” (Anderson, 1992, 284–285). It
seems that historians of political philosophy
are always in danger of turning into philoso-
phers of history—or turning back into mere
historians.
In this situation, I think we have to admit
that there is no way to legislate for the his-
tory of political philosophy which is not
arbitrary. Yet if philosophy without history
James Alexander
is a desert, and history without philosophy is
a jungle, then we certainly need something of
both. There is certainly nothing to be gained
by being too concerned with historical or
philosophical correctness. To some extent,
the “methodological” writings of the last
half century came out of anxiety caused by
the requirement to be exact. Skinner was too
subtle to simply encourage a mindless con-
cern with “historical context” but there is no
question that at least part of his legacy is the
view that we should not look at philosophi-
cal works without some historical awareness
of context (Tully, 1988). What he left to one
side was, as Leavis put it, that “context, as
something determinate is, and can be, noth-
ing but [the historian’s] postulate; the wider
he goes in his ambition to construct it from
his reading in this period, the more it is his
construction (in so far as he produces any-
thing more than a mass of heterogeneous
information alleged to be relevant)” (Leavis,
1968, 293). Oakeshott famously suggested in
his introduction to Hobbes’s Leviathan that
if Hobbes had written a masterpiece, as he
had, then its context should be nothing other
than the entire history of political philoso-
phy (Oakeshott, 1991, 223). If we agree with
this, then we end up in circularities, for the
history of political philosophy is whatever
we suppose it to be.
Awareness of what we are doing is not
the same as doing it. But it is important to
be aware of different ways of carrying out
the history of political philosophy. Rorty dis-
tinguished, first, “rational reconstruction”:
which is the study of older ideas in terms of
their truth, with the intention of saying them
better; secondly, “historical reconstruction”:
which is the study of older ideas, whether
or not we consider them true, in terms what
they meant at the time of writing; thirdly,
“geistgeschichte”: by which he meant a form
28
of study concerned to establish speculatively
why the ideas came in the form that they
did; and, fourthly, “doxology”: by which he
meant simply textbook history. Rorty did
not think much of the fourth, although it
is still by far the most common. (Consider
any “History of Political Thought” you have
ever read.) He thought the third is the most
interesting, since it “meets needs which nei-
ther unphilosophical history not unhistorical
philosophy is likely to fulfil,” since it estab-
lishes the nature of the canons of our ideas.
It is “parasitic on, and synthesises, the first
two genres.” He even added a fifth, which
is the general intellectual history or history
of ideas which offers the “raw material” for
the other four (Rorty, 1984, 59, 61). In a dif-
ferent register, MacIntyre has distinguished,
first, “encyclopaedia,” an unhistorical form
of understanding in which systematic order
is sought, on the belief that all knowledge
is related to all other knowledge; secondly,
“genealogy,” a historical form of understand-
ing in which everything is to be explained
in terms of contingent continuities and dis-
continuities, especially in terms of uses and
powers; and, thirdly, “tradition,” which is a
form of understanding neither straightfor-
wardly historical nor unhistorical, in which
everything is to be explained in relation
to a tradition which has a truth at its core
(MacIntyre, 1990). The first is enlightened:
it requires history to be treated as no more
than a set of cases. The second is critical: it
requires history to be treated as a set of past
particulars. The third is neither enlightened
nor critical: it requires history to be taken
seriously enough to see whether we can find
any certainties there that can survive enlight-
enment and criticism. To take the second,
the most influential now, Nietzsche claimed
that history as genealogy was a weapon to
be used against other forms of history for the
 THE HISTORY OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
sake of our present unhistorical ends. In his
later writings, he did not quite answer the
question he had posed in his earlier writings,
which is whether to think historically is to
think ironically and therefore to damage our
capacity to act. But in his earlier writings he
also suggested that we might write history
for any of three reasons: and, following him,
we could say that we might write the history
of political philosophy for these three same
reasons: because it inspires us to strive to
write great works of political philosophy, it
enables us to preserve the older traditions of
political philosophy we revere, or it enables
us to overcome our suffering in politics by
studying historically the means of delivering
ourselves philosophically from it (Nietzsche,
1997, 67).
Much is still written in all of these cat-
egories in our time by those who seek some
authority in the history of philosophy for
their explanations, justifications, and pre-
scriptions. We might ignore this if we were
only to follow a narrow contextualist method
or limit ourselves to a study of Skinner’s or
Pocock’s methodological writings. The ten-
sion between historical and unhistorical
approaches to political philosophy is still
a great matter of concern to political phi-
losophers. This is not only because history
puts the certainties of philosophy into ques-
tion, but also because for some time it has
seemed as if the unhistorical political phil-
osophy of Rawls and Habermas has failed
to adequately theorize politics as it really is
(Floyd and Stears, 2011). Arguments about
these matters are likely to be repeated, espe-
cially by those who do not know how old
they are. The truth is, of course, that “the
unhistorical and the historical are necessary
in equal measure” (Nietzsche, 1997, 63).
But the history of political philosophy will
always face questions about the adequacy of
29
the relations between its different elements.
Even the great philosophers in our tradition
did not always know how to relate them.
Just to take one instance, Hume and Hobbes
were rather untroubled by hypocrisy in pol-
itics when writing philosophically, but were
far more censorious about it when writing
historically (Runciman, 2008, 17).
The distinctions I have drawn in this chap-
ter should indicate that history discloses no
simple attitude to political philosophy. We
are torn, finally, between two main theoreti-
cal possibilities:
Either the history of political philoso-
phy is simply an assemblage of useful or
amusing materials about politics: written
to amuse and edify readers, and used,
when we are neither amused nor edified,
by sociologists, protestors, journalists,
politicians and dictators as evidence for
the particular points they want to make:
it is a fragmentary set of materials, valu-
able because exemplary.
Or the history of political philosophy is
the only correct way to understand the
continuing fragility of our attempts to
impose political order on the world by
ordering it philosophically: it is not frag-
mentary but complete, even if impossible,
since it is a bringing into consciousness
of the highest elements of the history by
which our own thought about politics is
constituted.
In short, it may be exemplary or constitu-
tive: we may study it to find examples of
great political philosophy, or we may study
it because the history of philosophy is a con-
scious emanation of some philosophy of his-
tory. In the first our relation to the past is
discontinuous, in the latter it is continuous.
These seem the only wholly coherent possi-
bilities, even if one risks triviality, the other
James Alexander
absurdity. There is no way to completely
harmonize them. Compromises will con-
tinue to be sought, and contradictions will
continue to be found. The history of politi-
cal philosophy is both the recollection of our
former attempts to understand politics philo-
sophically and the explanation of why we no
longer fully understand it philosophically. It
is not political philosophy, but political phi-
losophy is nothing without it.
WORKS CITED
Adcock, R. and Bevir, M. (2010), “Political
Science,” in R. Backhouse and P. Fontaine
(eds), The History of the Social Sciences
since 1945. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, pp. 71–101.
Alexander, J. (2012), “The Four Points of
the Compass,” Philosophy, 87: 79–107.
— (2014), “Notes Towards the Definition of
Politics” Philosophy, 89: 273–300.
Anderson, P. (1992), “The Ends of History,”
in A Zone of Engagement. London:
Verso, pp. 279–376.
Collingwood, R. G. (1945), The Idea of
Nature. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Condren, C. (1985), The Status and Appraisal
of Classic Texts: An Essay on Politics,
Its Inheritance and the History of Ideas.
Princeton, NJ : Princeton University Press.
Dunn, J. (1969), The Political Thought of
John Locke. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
— (1985), Rethinking Modern Political
Theory: Essays 1979–83. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
— (1996), “The History of Political
Theory,” in The History of Political
Thought and Other Essays. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, pp. 11–38.
30
Floyd, J. and Stears, M. (eds) (2011),
Political Philosophy Versus History?
Contextualism and Real Politics in
Contemporary Political Thought.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Geuss, R. (2008), Philosophy and Real
Politics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
Goethe, J. W. von (1904), Criticisms,
Reflections and Maxims of Goethe, trans.
W. B. Rönnfeldt. London: Walter Scott.
Hegel, G. W. F. (1977), The Phenomenology
of Spirit, trans. A. V. Miller. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Koselleck, R. (1985), Futures Past: On the
Semantics of Historical Time, trans. Keith
Tribe. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Leavis, F. R. (ed.) (1968), A Selection from
Scrutiny, Vol. II. London: Cambridge
University Press.
McCloskey, D. (2010), Bourgeois Dignity:
Why Economics Can’t Explain the
Modern World. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press.
MacIntyre, A. (1990), Three Rival Versions
of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopaedia,
Genealogy, and Tradition. London:
Duckworth.
Marchart, O. (2007), Post-Foundational
Political Thought: Political Difference
in Nancy, Lefort, Badiou and Laclau.
Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Marx, K. (1963), The Eighteenth Brumaire
of Louis Napoleon. New York:
International Publishers.
Momigliano, A. (1977), “A Piedmontese
View of the History of Ideas,” in Essays
in Ancient and Modern Historiography.
Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 1–7.
Nietzsche, F. (1997), “On the Uses and
Disadvantages of History for Life,”
in Untimely Meditations. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, pp. 59–123.
 THE HISTORY OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
Oakeshott, M. (1991), Rationalism in
Politics and Other Essays, T. Fuller (ed.).
Indianapolis, IN: Liberty Press.
— (1993), Religion, Politics and the Moral
Life, T. Fuller (ed.). New Haven, CT: Yale
University Press.
— (2007), The Concept of a Philosophical
Jurisprudence: Essays and Reviews
1926–51, L. O’Sullivan (ed.). Exeter:
Imprint Academic.
— (2008), The Vocabulary of a Modern
European State, L. O’Sullivan (ed.).
Exeter: Imprint Academic.
Pocock, J. G. A. (1975), The Machiavellian
Moment: Florentine Political Thought
and the Atlantic Republican Tradition.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
— (2009), Political Thought and History:
Essays on Theory and Method.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Rawls, J. (1971), A Theory of Justice.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
Rorty, R. (1984), “The Historiography
of Philosophy: Four Genres,” in J. B.
31
Schneewind, R. Rorty, and Q. Skinner
(eds), Philosophy in History: Essays
on the Historiography of Philosophy.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Runciman, D. (2008), Political Hypocrisy:
The Mask of Power, from Hobbes to
Orwell and Beyond. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press.
Schiavone, A. (2012), The Invention of
Law in the West, trans. J. Carden and A.
Shugaar. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press.
Schmitt, C. (2003), The Nomos of the
Earth in the International Law of the
Jus Publicum Europaeum, trans. G. L.
Ulmen. New York: Telos Press.
Skinner, Q. (1978), The Foundations of
Modern Political Thought. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
— (1997), Liberty before Liberalism.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Tully, J. (ed.) (1988), Meaning and Context:
Quentin Skinner and His Critics.
Cambridge: Polity Press.
Vincent, A. (2004), The Nature of Political
Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
 2
SOVEREIGNTY
Andrew Fiala
One of the most important and vexing
issues in political philosophy is the ques-
tion of who or what should have supreme
ruling authority within a territory. While
some have dreamed of identifying a single
ultimate source of authority, in reality there
are multiple relationships and directions of
power as well as plural sources of normative
authority. Often there are layers and levels
of sovereignty: superior power is concen-
trated and centralized in larger structures,
but inferior powers still retain some auton-
omy, resulting in jurisdictional conflict and
instability. Sovereignty may describe the de
facto supremacy of a particular institution
or person—the entity to which others defer.
In international law, sovereignty is primarily
understood as a descriptive feature of states
that mutually recognize one another, with-
out appeal to any metaphysical or norma-
tive ground. But de facto sovereignty ignores
normative evaluation. As Francis Fukuyama
notes in some cases—as in Afghanistan or
Somalia—sovereignty is a “fiction or a bad
joke” (Fukuyama, 2004, 97). Indeed, the
international community appears to agree
that violations of “sovereignty” in the case
of failed states is morally permissible. Thus
sovereignty often also includes a normative
ideal of legitimacy: sovereign power is justi-
fied power that ought to be obeyed and has
33
a right to command. The normative account
holds that the sovereign power has the de
jure authority to use coercive power within
a territory, including the right to kill, and
freedom from intervention when it exercises
that right. The sovereign is often conceived
as the person or institution that constitutes
the law. On some interpretations the sover-
eign is understood as residing outside the
law, retaining the de jure right (or de facto
power) to make exceptions to the law. Other
interpretations establish a basic limit to the
exceptional power of the sovereign located
in the normative primacy of something like
natural law. While the natural law tradition
provides a guide for the proper exercise of
sovereign power, natural law may also be
used to support the idea of civil disobedience
in which violators of the law assert allegiance
to the sovereign natural law; related claims
are made about the sovereign authority of
the individual conscience. A less metaphysi-
cal notion of positive law (associated with
legal positivists such as Hart) identifies a de
facto sovereign in a legal regime or (in ideas
found in Hayek) in common law as a sponta-
neous but evolving source of authority.
Sovereignty is a threshold or liminal con-
cept, which can inspire contemplation, awe,
wonder, and fear. The sovereign—whether
the political executive or the conscientious
Andrew Fiala
individual—may retain the right to break
the law. Sovereignty is thus a trump that pre-
vents criticism or intervention. The focus on
supremacy at the outside edge of the legal
system has religious overtones. God (or the
Church) was once viewed as the sovereign,
symbolized in the coronation of the mon-
arch by Pope or bishop. But in the modern
period, the state emerged as sovereign, with
secular governments asserting sovereignty
over religious institutions. Sovereignty is a
practical concept used to describe structures
of power and deference in international law
and domestic political science. But the hier-
archies of authority, power, and obedience
continue to provoke philosophical reflection.
This chapter examines the concept of sover-
eignty by explaining (1) how the concept of
sovereignty evolved in Western political phi-
losophy and (2) how the concept functions in
contemporary legal theory, political science,
and Anglo-American political philosophy.
GENEALOGY OF THE CONCEPT
OF SOVEREIGNTY
The sovereign is the supreme or superior
authority: superanus in Vulgar Latin; souve-
rain in French; in German rendered either as
Souveränität or with two words, Staatshoheit
und Staatsgewalt indicating the majesty/dig-
nity and power of the state (see Bluntschi,
1892, Beaulac, 2004). Behind this is the Greek
terms kyrios, which is most frequently trans-
lated as “Lord” or “sovereign” in the Bible
(along with the Hebrew Adonai). The term
kyrios was employed to identify the Roman
emperor—as in the title Kyrios Kaisar (Lord
Caesar), which was countered by Christians
who denied that Caesar was Lord and
affirmed Kyrios Christos (see Jongeneel, 2009,
34
92). In the Bible, the account of God’s lord-
ship or sovereignty shows up, for example, in
Psalm (71:16), where the Sovereign Lord God
is praised for his mighty deeds and as the sole
source of justice. We see this in the phrase
“the Almighty” which is also used to describe
God, even occasionally piling on epithets to
emphasize power, as in the phrase, “Lord
God Almighty” (kyrios theos pantokratōr)
found in Revelation. Revelation makes clear
the hope, foreshadowed in the Psalms, that at
some point God will rule over the kingdoms
of the world (Revelation 11). Thus sover-
eignty can have a metaphysical and religious
significance. Even though we take sovereignty
as “the sine qua non of political life,” as Jean
Elshtain puts it, the concept reflects a com-
plex interplay between theology and political
philosophy (Elshtain, 2008, xiii–xvi).
The debate about sovereignty reflects a
conflict between Platonic (and later Christian)
views of political authority as grounded in a
moral and metaphysical hierarchy, on the one
hand, and the modern liberal, democratic idea
of citizen or individual sovereignty, on the
other hand, as the revolutionary antithesis
to religious paternalism and political despot-
ism. Sovereignty has been a primary focus for
political philosophy since Plato. The catalogue
of regime types in Republic can be under-
stood as a catalogue of the varieties of sover-
eign power. Bloom points out that the debate
between Thrasymachus and Socrates at the
beginning of Republic is about sovereignty—
about whether there is some principle supe-
rior to strength that could limit its exercise
(Bloom, 1991, 326–327). In his translation of
Republic, Bloom points toward an interpreta-
tion of Plato’s cave allegory (Republic 517c) as
a discussion of sovereignty: the good (or sun)
in the cave allegory is kyrios or sovereign—the
source of light and of truth. Arendt explains
that Plato thus suggests that politics ought to

be subordinated to philosophy (Arendt, 2005,
130). Not only is the philosopher-king the
paradigm of the wise, virtuous, and just sov-
ereign authority, but also his knowledge of the
truth connects him with the sovereign power
of the universe.
This metaphysical conception of sover-
eignty is linked to Christian ideas about the
divine right of kings and idea of absolute
sovereignty. Bodin explained in the sixteenth
century that the prince’s power is derived
from the absolute sovereignty of God (Bodin,
1992, 34–35). At the turn of the twentieth
century, Figgis argued that during the medi-
eval period, God and church were held to be
superior to the state. It was only in the tran-
sition to modernity that the notion of divine
right of kings developed—as an attempt to
stipulate that the state was independent of
the church. Nonetheless, Figgis followed
Bodin and others in arguing that the best
place for sovereignty to rest was in the will
of the monarch and that the idea of a lim-
ited monarchy was a contradiction in terms
(Figgis, 1914, 6).
Hobbes and the social contract tradi-
tion developed in a different direction, not
grounded in a metaphysical or religious
account of divine right. Rather, for Hobbes,
the absolute power of the sovereign was
grounded in the original contract. From
Hobbes, it is a short leap to modern demo-
cratic revolutionary politics that calls hierar-
chical and absolutist accounts of sovereignty
into question. Absolutist ideas can be found
in the work of Schmitt, whose theory of sov-
ereignty—as the exception beyond the law—
was related to Hobbesian notions (Schmitt,
1985, 2008). But Schmittian absolutism has
been opposed by a more radical development
of the social contract idea. In its most radical
iteration, liberal, democratic ideas are revo-
lutionary and may even aim at the abolition
35
SOVEREIGNTY
of sovereignty (as traditionally understood).
Arendt suggested that revolutionary political
activity—as in the American (and French)
revolutions—aimed to abolish sovereignty
entirely (Arendt, 2006, 144). Arendt sug-
gests that the early American experiment in
self-government showed that political socie-
ties and bodies could enjoy power and claim
rights “without possessing or claiming sover-
eignty” (Arendt, 2006, 159).
One wonders whether there could be a
political organization that does not possess
or claim sovereignty. Arendt’s suggestion
that sovereignty and tyranny are the same
is a hint in the anarchist direction, which
holds that sovereignty is primarily about
domination, dominion, and paternal or des-
potic rule. However, for the mainstream of
the Western tradition in political philosophy,
which develops after Plato, political philoso-
phy has often primarily been concerned with
the justification of sovereignty.
Discussions of sovereignty emphasize that
there is (or ought to be) a supreme authority
in a territory, whose rulings trump those of
other lesser authorities. There are two rival
directions of the evolution of the idea: (1)
toward centralization in modern bureau-
cratic states and (2) away from central power
in liberal democratic theory. In feudal organi-
zation, the king was said to be sovereign over
the princes and other feudal lords within his
territory. In federations and federal systems—
as in the United States—the federal authority
and its bureaucracy is said to have sover-
eign power, which trumps the authority and
power of the confederated states and local
authorities. At the same time, democratic
states are based upon some notion of popu-
lar sovereignty, which is the decentralized
notion of governmental legitimacy as based
upon the consent of the governed. Liberal
political philosophy also tends to hold that
Andrew Fiala
sovereignty should include a foundation in
human rights, which can be understood as
asserting the sovereignty of the individual as
a person with inherent dignity and the right
to obey the authority of conscience. While the
notion of individual sovereignty is the most
radical, since it asserts that each individual
possesses supreme authority, a related (and
more limited) notion of “citizen sovereignty”
also appears in the literature (see Dworkin,
2002, Vanberg, 2007). Citizen sovereignty
is the liberal, democratic idea that politi-
cal power is derived from and legitimated
by the choices and consent of citizens; indi-
vidual sovereignty points beyond citizenship
toward the purity of conscience and individ-
ual autonomy.
The idea of human rights and related
ideas about of the sovereignty of citizens or
individuals can call the political notion of
sovereignty into question along with related
notions of authority, obedience, loyalty,
patriotism, and national identity. In a cosmo-
politan world of diverse allegiances entered
into voluntarily by sovereign individuals, it
is unclear that the political notion of sover-
eignty can remain useful. Indeed, one might
argue that the most important question of
political philosophy is whether there should
be any sovereign political authority at all.
Nozick writes, “The fundamental question of
political philosophy, one that precedes ques-
tions about how the state should be organ-
ized, is whether there should be any state at
all. Why not have anarchy?” (Nozick, 1974,
4). Anarchism represents one extreme on the
continuum of answers about who should
rule and how ruling should be organized:
for the anarchist, the answer is that no one
should rule—there should be no sovereign
authority in the political sense. As Goldman
explained, anarchism is “the philosophy of
the sovereignty of the individual” (Goldman,
36
1960, 67). Indeed, anarchists often hold that
individual autonomy (or “self-sovereignty”
or “personal sovereignty” as it is variously
called) is absolute and inviolable. Thus for
the anarchist, political sovereignty is, at best,
an oxymoron, since political organizations
ultimately undermine the sovereignty of the
self. The anarchist challenge forces us to
confront the question of where sovereignty
resides: in the self or in the state.
The mainstream tradition assumes—
contra the anarchists—that some form of
supreme ruling authority is justified. The
question was not usually whether sovereign
authority ought to exist but, rather, how best
to conceive and organize it—whether sover-
eignty was absolute or not, whether sover-
eignty was focused internally or externally,
and who—monarch or demos—should prop-
erly hold supreme authority (see Philpot,
2011). The deepest question in this tradi-
tion has to do with the moral limit of sov-
ereignty—whether sovereignty ought to be
grounded in virtue, wisdom, and the natural
law, whether sovereignty is best conceived as
limited by fiduciary relations (as in modern
liberal-democratic ideas about the state), or
whether sovereignty is an amoral concept
merely identifying who has de facto power.
Political sovereignty is a concept closely
associated with the idea of the supremacy
of “the state.” A state is an entity that exists
in a delimited geographic area, consisting of
a more or less permanent group of people,
organized under the authority of a central-
ized and hierarchical government who has
the power ultimately to decide on questions
of life and death. While anarchists may argue
against the sovereignty of states, states have
de facto and often de jure power and author-
ity that routinely trumps the power and
authority of individuals and their voluntary
local associations. Jackson explains, “when

the government of a state is said to be sover-
eign, it holds supreme authority domestically
and independent authority internationally, at
one and the same time” (Jackson, 2007, 6).
We should note that the ideal of supreme
and independent authority is merely an ideal.
In reality, state sovereignty is limited in a vari-
ety of ways: domestic culture and tradition,
international treaty, and moral law. The idea
that there is an absolute and independent sov-
ereign power that can trump all other histori-
cal, social, and moral norms in an arbitrary
act of political will is quite unrealistic and
ideal. One might argue, following Elshtain,
that the notion of absolute sovereignty can
be derived from a sort of nominalism and
voluntarism about power and law that can
be traced back to medieval nominalists such
as Ockham (Elshtain, 2008, 36–39). Elshtain
argues that the more coherent notion of sov-
ereignty—even of God’s sovereignty—is less
focused on arbitrary (voluntaristic) power
and better understood as law governed and
reasonable activity. This idea of sovereign
power as reasonable and law-governed is
connected with Aquinas and the natural law
tradition, which developed into the modern
notion of human rights (see Philpot, 1996).
When, for example, Locke offers a revolu-
tionary challenge to government, he appeals
to the importance of natural rights. Locke is
also arguing—in his less studied First Treatise
of Government—against Filmer’s notion
of absolute monarchic sovereignty. Filmer
held that Adam’s sovereign power was a gift
from God, that men are not naturally born
free, and that political power is based upon
patriarchal sovereignty. Locke describes this
notion of sovereign power as “absolute, arbi-
trary, unlimited, and unlimitable” (Locke,
1764, section 9).
The idea of unlimited and arbitrary sov-
ereign power is rejected by Locke and other
37
SOVEREIGNTY
liberal, democratic theorists who hold to one
extent or another that individuals are born
free and retain sovereign power over them-
selves. The modern idea that natural right
and individual conscience is sovereign has
been developed in a libertarian (and nearly
anarchist) direction by authors such as
Machan, who explains, “the libertarian view
is that each individual is a sovereign person,
in possession of basic negative rights to life,
liberty, and property (and whatever other
rights are implied by these). None may vio-
late these. If one needs to protect these rights,
the option exists of doing so oneself or hiring
others” (Machan, 2008, 63). One significant
implication of this idea is that individuals
may be permitted (or even obliged) to diso-
bey the law. The notions of civil disobedience
and conscientious refusal—as developed in
the work of Thoreau, Gandhi, and King—
imply that political authority is not ultimate.
The usual defense of civil disobedience is
grounded in the idea that the authority of
natural law trumps the authority of the posi-
tive law. Civil disobedience does not usually,
however, eliminate the notion of political
sovereignty, nor does it necessarily lead to
anarchism. Rather, civil disobedience usually
depends upon what Rawls (Rawls, 1971, sec-
tions 55–59) calls “fidelity to law” or what
Walzer explains as the need for public jus-
tification and dialogue about the status of
rights, laws, responsibility, and sovereignty
(Walzer, 1970, Chapter 1). Civil disobedience
is not usually an argument against sovereign
power, rather it is an argument for just gov-
ernment grounded in respect for natural law.
The idea that natural law provides a trump
that may override sovereignty is a central
idea in modern liberal-democratic regimes
and in evolving notions about humanitar-
ian intervention across borders. This idea is
grounded in the claim that individuals have a
Andrew Fiala
kind of sovereignty that states ought not vio-
late. Donnelly quotes former UN chief Kofi
Annan to make the point that “individual
sovereignty, rooted in human rights, is taking
its place in international relations along side
state sovereignty” (Donnelly, 2003, 251).
Annan’s idea is that traditional notions of
state sovereignty should not prevent inter-
ventions intended to protect individuals
from being harmed by their states. This idea
culminated in the newly evolving interna-
tional idea of a “responsibility to protect” as
articulated by the International Commission
on Intervention and State Sovereignty, which
provided a framework for understanding the
relationship between sovereignty and human
rights. The ICISS report of 2001 redefined
state sovereignty in a way that emphasizes
the state’s responsibility to defend human
right. As the report states, “State sover-
eignty implies responsibility, and the primary
responsibility for the protection of its people
lies with the state itself” (ICISS, 2001, ix).
The report indicates that this idea and the
sorts of international interventions implied
by it “herald a new world in which human
rights trumps state sovereignty” (see Badescu,
2009, 2). Some worry that this will be mis-
used by imperialistic power. But the idea that
human rights trump state sovereignty is an
important one, connected to the idea that
individuals have a sort of sovereignty that
cannot be violated by the political sovereign.
Hoffman suggests that the idea of the sov-
ereignty of individuals is a central feature
of liberal political theory: “liberalism con-
ceives of individuals as having a sovereignty
which is independent of the state” (Hoffman,
1998, 85). The problem, however, is that this
notion of individual sovereignty is “abstract”
and ahistorical as Hoffman puts it. In reality,
political forms preexist the individual. The
social contract theory shows how and why
38
individuals might transfer sovereignty to the
state, which then has the power to trump the
sovereignty of the individual—even though
the anarchists have long complained that this
violates the sovereignty of the self.
The notion of sovereignty provides a rich
metaphorical framework for discussions of
a variety topics in religion and metaphysics.
Agamben and Derrida have shown that sov-
ereignty is an ontological concept. Derrida
says, “The sovereign, in the broadest sense of
the term, is he who has the right and strength
to be and be recognized as himself, the same,
properly the same as himself” (Derrida,
2011, 66). Agamben writes, “Potentiality
. . . is that through which Being founds itself
sovereignly, which is to say, without anything
preceding or determining it other than its
own ability not to be. And an act is sovereign
when it realizes itself by simply taking away
its own potentiality not to be, letting itself be,
giving itself to itself” (Agamben, 1998, 32).
Pursuing the metaphor of sovereignty
after Agamben and Derrida reminds us how
thick and rich the notion of sovereignty is.
However, we will confine our discussion
in what follows primarily to political sov-
ereignty within the mainstream of Anglo-
American political philosophy. A fuller
genealogy would include a more extended
discussion of Plato—as well as Aristotle, the
Cynics, and the Stoics. It would consider
Augustine and Aquinas. It would examine
Hobbes and Bodin in more detail. It would
consider Weber’s account of power and cha-
risma, while also including further discussion
of Schmitt’s account of the sovereign excep-
tion. It would include an extensive discussion
of revolutionary liberal-democratic ideas and
Westphalian international law as found in
Grotius, Locke, Pufendorf, Rousseau, and
others. It would also include more details
about the idea of individual sovereignty as

developed by Thoreau and other defenders
of conscientious refusal and civil disobedi-
ence. Finally, it would include a critique of
sovereignty as ideological and the result of
power—from a Marxist or Nietzschean van-
tage point, from ideas found in the Frankfurt
School of critical theory, and from Foucault’s
critique of so-called governmentality. But
let’s turn our attention to contemporary
Anglo-American theory and emerging issues.
CONTEMPORARY POLITICAL THEORY
AND EMERGING ISSUES
In recent years, sovereignty has been reevalu-
ated in light of developments in interna-
tional law and international institutions. In
the post-World War II era, states have joined
monetary and defensive unions, have ceded
sovereignty to federations, and have been
invaded and reconstructed by international
forces which justify their actions in the name
of human rights. These developments have
led some to urge rejection of the concept of
sovereignty or, at least, to allow for the emer-
gence of a post-sovereignty era and the end of
traditional notions of political sovereignty.
The Peace of Westphalia, which ended
the Thirty Years War in 1648, created a sys-
tem of nation states in Europe based upon
a notion described as Westphalian sover-
eignty which holds that states have the right
to determine and organize themselves with-
out external intervention. This right is based
upon a claim to territorial supremacy: a
sovereign state has a right to defend its bor-
ders and exert control within those borders.
The international order has slowly come to
respect basic principles of noninterference,
equality among states, and related notions
constitutive of the system of nation states
39
SOVEREIGNTY
during the past several centuries. While these
ideas developed in the European sphere, they
were gradually exported globally through
European colonialism and imperialism. In
the postcolonial era, former colonial hold-
ings were released from bondage and granted
sovereignty. The present world is carved up
into sovereign states, which are held to have
basic rights to territorial control, noninter-
ference, and a sort of equality as members of
the United Nations.
One significant problem is that sovereign
states often include minority groups who
may want sovereign power for themselves.
Some want control in autonomous regions
within a sovereign territory; others contest for
supremacy in the whole of a state’s territory. A
related problem is that ethnic, religious, and
other affiliations transcend national borders,
creating claims to authority, loyalty, and obe-
dience that point beyond national boundaries
and sovereignty understood in political terms.
Nonetheless, the international system in the
postcolonial era is based upon a community
of sovereign nations, which assumes that
each state has an equal sovereign right to self-
governance and self-defense. The notion of
sovereign equality idea is foundational in the
United Nations Charter, which stipulates in
Article 2, Paragraph 1: “The Organization is
based on the principle of the sovereign equal-
ity of all its members” (also see Article 78).
Sovereign equality in international law views
states externally, treating them as individual
entities. This means that domestic political
arrangements of states are ignored (along
with internal disputes and minority claims),
with the status of sovereign statehood pro-
viding equal recognition at the international
level. The emphasis on sovereign equality is
pluralistic. It aims toward a system in which
states with quite different domestic arrange-
ments are equally recognized as having a
Andrew Fiala
certain political status. This notion has been
described and defended as a form of sovereign
state realism, which accepts state sovereignty
as a fact of political life. From this perspec-
tive, once a sovereign power is established
and acknowledged by the international com-
munity, there is no justification for foreign
interference. Such interference is conceived
as a violation of sovereignty. Critics of this
approach will argue that this permits rogue
states and outlaw regimes to have an equal
place at the international table. Such critics
may advocate liberal internationalism, cos-
mopolitan norms, natural law, and human
rights ideals—holding that the idea of de
facto state sovereignty must be qualified by
other values and norms including the idea of
domestic legitimacy (as understood in liberal-
democratic terms). Critics of sovereign state
realism will argue that sovereignty is not
merely a fact about who holds power and
authority—it also includes a normative claim
about what the responsibilities and obliga-
tions of legitimate sovereign power ought
to be.
One crucial contemporary issue is how
we evaluate the conflict between the norma-
tive idealism of sovereignty as conceived by
liberal internationalists and the descriptive
and historically grounded account of sover-
eignty as conceived by less idealistic realists.
This conflict comes to a head with regard
to the question of intervention and the right
of self-defense. The UN Charter admits that
“members” (conceived as sovereign states)
retain a right of self-defense (as in Article 51).
This implies that sovereign states are entitled
to defend themselves against external interfer-
ence. But some will argue that there are good
reasons to think that interventions ought to be
employed to defend citizens against the mis-
deeds of their own states, especially to prevent
crimes against humanity, ethnic cleansing, and
40
genocide. The notion of “responsibility to pro-
tect” (discussed earlier) has evolved to explain
why, in some circumstances, state sovereignty
is not absolute and ought not be used to pro-
tect injustice and allow oppression.
The modern Westphalian notion of sov-
ereignty has evolved in other ways in recent
decades, as borders became more permeable
under globalization, as national identity is
challenged by the fact of internal diversity,
and as international institutions developed as
restraints on the sovereignty of nations. For
example, the Breton Woods agreements about
international monetary policy and other eco-
nomic integration resulted in a loss of sover-
eignty—as a state’s domestic economic and
fiscal policies were pegged to international
monetary arrangements. Moreover, as capi-
tal and labor flows across borders in the era
of globalization, it is no longer clear that ter-
ritoriality remains an important concept for
political organization. Global corporations
and international banking and trade organiza-
tions (such as the World Trade Organization
and the World Bank) point toward a changed
understanding of borders, territory, and how
this relates to human development and struc-
tures of authority. Remaining conflicts in
international relations and domestic poli-
tics often involve disputes among those who
defend traditional notions of Westphalian
sovereignty and those who see an evolving
“post-sovereign” era. While several centuries
of political philosophy simply presume that
something like Westphalian sovereignty is
natural and normal, this notion is collaps-
ing from within (by the challenges of immi-
gration, multiculturalism, and differential
sovereignty for various autonomous regions
and groups); it is also being challenged from
without by the evolving cosmopolitan scene.
We are left with sovereignty as a muddy
and vague concept. Krasner has shown that

there are a variety of ideas that can be gath-
ered together under the term sovereignty.
Krasner identifies four types of sovereignty:
domestic sovereignty, Westphalian sover-
eignty, international legal sovereignty, and
interdependence sovereignty. These can be
grouped together as a “family resemblance”
concept along Wittgensteinian lines: sov-
ereignty may be understood as a basket or
bundle of properties. As Fowler and Bunck
explain, “while every state has a basket, the
contents are by no means the same” (Fowler
and Bunck, 1995, 70, see Krasner, 1999,
220). The basket or bundle approach to sov-
ereignty is grounded in an empirical method
that begins with facts and works toward gen-
eralizations. It does not start from an a priori
or absolute notion of sovereignty. The a pri-
ori notion of sovereignty as the ultimate or
supreme source is most properly defended by
those who adopt a less empirical approach to
political theory.
Some theorists argue that sovereignty is a
dirty word—imposed by those in power and
grounded in ideological claims—that ought
to be discarded as we move in the direction
of international institutions and cosmopoli-
tan political theory. Henkin writes of sov-
ereignty: “Its birth is illegitimate, and it has
not aged well. The meaning of ‘sovereignty’
is confused and its uses are various, some
of them unworthy, some even destructive of
human values” (Henkin, 1999, 1). Cohen
explains, “it is alleged that the concept of
sovereignty is useless as an epistemological
tool for understanding the contemporary
world and that it is normatively pernicious”
(Cohen, 2012, 2). This allegation is made
from the standpoint of cosmopolitan politi-
cal theory, which wants to reconceive the glo-
bal political scene in a way that looks beyond
the limits of sovereign states as traditionally
understood. But Cohen argues that we must
41
SOVEREIGNTY
be wary of pernicious ideology and possible
double standards in rejecting sovereignty.
Cohen writes that sovereignty in the “clas-
sic, absolutist (predatory) sense remains alive
and well, but only for very powerful states—
including those controlling global govern-
ance institutions .  .  . The direction of the
new world order is, in other words, toward
hierarchy not sovereign equality, and the
appropriate concepts are not cosmopolitan
constitutionalism but ‘grossraum,’ regional
hegemony, neo-imperialism, or empire”
(Cohen, 2012, 4). In other words, one should
note that the concept of sovereignty is used
(and criticized) for ideological purposes.
Rich and powerful states may argue that
weak states lack sovereign protection against
foreign intervention in our post-sovereignty
era, but the rich and powerful states would
protest if a weaker state were to invade and
violate their own sovereignty.
Despite these problems, the concept of
sovereignty continues to be employed. We’ve
already noted that the concept of sovereignty
may be either a descriptive or a normative
concept. Sovereignty may also be understood
as either a concern of domestic hierarchy
and legitimacy or a matter of external rela-
tions among states. This distinction is con-
nected to the distinction between domestic
and comparative political theory and inter-
national relations theory. Sovereignty must
be understood in its relation to different
types of political/legal theory: positive law,
natural law, and contractual or constitutional
theory. Finally, sovereignty points toward the
ontological problem of limits and borders. A
serious philosophical question of sovereignty
remains: whether the sovereign is subject to
the law or outside of the law. The idea that
sovereign power is subject to the law is typi-
cal of constitutional regimes and natural law
accounts (whether liberal or otherwise) and
Andrew Fiala
an emphasis on positive law, while the idea
that sovereign power lies outside the law is
associated with dictatorships and with what
is called legal voluntarism. This issue has prac-
tical implications in the era of torture, extra-
judicial rendition, and ubiquitous surveillance.
Does the sovereign have the right to violate
the law (including the moral law) to ensure
the stability and continuity of the state?
Sovereignty also delimits geographic
regions, creating territories defined by bor-
ders. But the ontological and legal status of
those borders are themselves subject to philo-
sophical skepticism: are they merely conven-
tional or does geography and ethnic identity
have a deeper source in some transcendent
political reality? This question points toward
issues related to transnational labor and cap-
ital markets, the problem of immigration and
citizenship, and emerging trans-border issues
concerning the environment. Is a global
sovereign need to resolve our global issues?
Ophuls once suggested a dilemma: either a
global state or environmental collapse—as
he put it “Leviathan or Oblivion” (Ophuls,
1973). Will our ideological and metaphysi-
cal commitment to sovereign states leave us
unable to solve global issues? Or will we find
a way to resolve these problems within the
current system of diffused sovereignty?
Methodological issues regarding the study
of sovereignty remain unresolved. Ought we
take sovereignty as a given fact of empiri-
cal political theory? Should we appeal to
a normative theory that transcends politi-
cal fact? Can we imagine alternatives and
a standpoint from which to critique such
a central concept? At the level of empirical
description, the idea of sovereignty may be
used to describe who or what has effective
control over a territory. From the descriptive
standpoint, it does not matter how power
and control are achieved—whether by force
42
of arms or at the ballot box. The theory of
“legal positivism” in the philosophy of law
provides one approach to a merely descrip-
tive account of sovereignty. The great legal
positivist Austin, for example, maintains that
the concept of law can be defined in terms
of the commands of a sovereign, which are
backed up by appropriate sanctions. The
sovereign is the source of the commands of
law, which include commands of punishment
for disobedience. Austin further maintains
that there can only be one sovereign—as the
idea that there is a limitation on sovereignty
points toward a regress of authorities. This
regress must stop at some point, at which we
then find the sovereign power or supreme
authority. As Austin puts it, “supreme power
limited by positive law is a flat contradic-
tion in terms” (Austin, 1873, 270). Within
the scope of positive law, the sovereign is the
source of command to which (or to whom)
obedience is required by law. Said differently,
from the standpoint of positive law and
descriptive political science, the sovereign
is the source of de facto habitual obedience.
As Austin concludes, “In respect of positive
law, a sovereign political government which
is established or present, is neither lawful or
unlawful: in respect of positive law, it is nei-
ther rightful nor wrongful, it is neither just or
unjust. Or (changing the expression) a sover-
eign political government which is established
or present, is neither legal or illegal” (Austin,
1873, 336). Austin’s account of positive law
focuses on the fact of the obedience-author-
ity structure, without inquiring into the nor-
mative question of whether obedience ought
to be given or whether sovereignty is legiti-
mate or justified. Related to this is the more
nuanced legal positivism of Hart, who notes
that laws constitute their own authority. Hart
defines sovereignty in terms of the vertical
structure of command and obedience. The

people must obey the sovereign authority,
but the sovereign authority owes obedience
to no other. However, Hart argues that this
is an extremely simplistic image of the law
(Hart, 2012). Hart notes that legal systems
persist through time—beyond the lives of
individual law-givers and their subjects. One
explanation of this is that obedience (and the
related notion of compulsion) is inadequate
to describe the way that persons accept the
legal system (we mostly accept it as a habit
or custom, e.g. taken implicitly without
any explicit notion of “acceptance”—the
sovereign is thus the one who is customar-
ily deferred to). Furthermore, Hart explains
that the idea of a sovereign as a single person
who resides outside of the legal framework
(as found, e.g. in Hobbes or Schmitt) is mis-
leading and in some cases false—as in the
case of democratic governments with a con-
stitutional division of power (Hart’s exam-
ples are the United States and Australia).
As Waldron notes, Hart “knocked the stuff-
ing out of the presupposition of absolute
Hobbesian sovereignty” (Waldron, 2008,
82). Sovereignty after Hart—from a legal
positivist point of view—is merely a notion
describing the status of authoritative norms
within a social system along with the recog-
nition that the social structure and its norms
are part of a complex language game or form
of life (to make Wittgensteinian themes in
Hart’s work explicit here) which is not eas-
ily reduced to the will of a single person or
to a singular command-obedience hierarchy
(see Azmanova, 2012). As Shapiro explains,
Hart’s idea is not that the sovereign makes
the rules but that “the rules make the sover-
eign” (Shapiro, 2009, 2011). Moreover, Hart
emphasizes the normative power of law (as
opposed to habits, customs, etc.) in the social
recognition of certain institutions, standards,
and principles as legally binding.
43
SOVEREIGNTY
While such a positivist approach to sover-
eignty is useful in its own way, one wonders
whether it allows for any critical space from
which to criticize norms or structures of sov-
ereignty. Hayek’s critique of positive law is rel-
evant here. Hayek argued that legal positivists
had no way to avoid the sorts of transforma-
tions of law that occurred, for example, in Nazi
Germany: if law is entirely a matter of human
creation or arbitrary assertion of sovereign
power, there is no way to criticize a totalitar-
ian legal system. While Hayek does not suggest
a simplistic return to traditional natural law
accounts, he does see some value in the idea
that law is not simply created, but also found
(Hayek, 1960/2011). Hayek’s approach empha-
sizes the fact that the rule of law arises spon-
taneously out of orderly interactions among
people. But unlike natural law theorists, Hayek
does not appeal to an external law that pro-
vides a critique of positive or constructed laws.
Rather, Hayek decentralizes sovereignty as the
spontaneous creation of free people involved in
free exchange. Unfortunately, this still leaves us
with the challenge of the sovereignty of natural
law and conscience. It is not clear how a legal
positivist such as Hart or a libertarian critic
such as Hayek would deal with the challenges
of the anarchists and individualists with whom
we began—those who claim a right to violate
the law based upon a claim grounded in natu-
ral law and the sovereignty of conscience.
CONCLUSION
Thousands of years of political philosophy
held that there was a law-giver behind the
law and a normative structure that provided
a proper grounding for the law (in the idea
of the Good, in God’s will, in the notion
of justice or natural law, or in the social
Andrew Fiala
contract, etc.). But in our postmodern era,
the normative and metaphysical ground
of the law is not clear. We may be moving
into an era in which Westphalian political
sovereignty has lost its luster. Political phi-
losophers have directed our attention to the
queer, questionable, and quaint ideas related
to the notion of sovereignty. But the con-
cept remains important—for understanding
international relations, for understanding
domestic power structures, and for thinking
about the value of individual conscience in
opposition to political power. Given con-
temporary movements that point in rival
directions—toward centralized hierarchies
and toward decentralized individualism—it
is clear that we are in the middle of a tran-
sition that will result in a serious transfor-
mation of our understanding of sovereignty.
Future work in political philosophy must
consider and criticize the metaphysical,
ontological, and normative status of the
concept of sovereignty.
WORKS CITED
Agamben, G. (1998), Homo Sacer:
Sovereign Power and Bare Life. Stanford,
CA: Stanford University Press.
Arendt, H. (2005), The Promise of Politics.
New York: Random House.
— (2006), On Revolution. New York:
Penguin Books.
Austin, J. (1873), Lectures On
Jurisprudence: The Philosophy of Positive
Law. London: John Murray.
Azmanova, A. (2012), The Scandal of
Reason: A Critical Theory of Political
Judgment. New York: Columbia
University Press.
44
Badescu, C. G. (2009), “The Responsibility
to Protect: Embracing Sovereignty and
Human Rights,” in N. Shawki and M.
Cox (eds), Negotiating Sovereignty and
Human Rights. Burlington, VT: Ashgate
Publishing.
Beaulac, S. (2004), The Power of Language
in the Making of International Law.
Leiden, The Netherlands: Martinus-
Nijhoff.
Bloom, A. (1991), “Interpretive Essay,” in
The Republic of Plato, 2nd edn, trans. A.
Bloom. New York: Basic Books.
Bluntschi, J. C. (1892), The Theory of the
State, 2nd edn. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Bodin, J. (1992), On Sovereignty.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Cohen, J. L. (2012), Globalization and
Sovereignty: Rethinking Legality,
Legitimacy, and Constitutionalism.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Derrida, J. (2011), The Beast and the
Sovereign. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press.
Donnelly, J. (2003), University Human
Rights in Theory and Practice. Ithaca,
NY: Cornell University Press.
Dworkin, R. (2002), Sovereign Virtue.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
Elshtain, J. B. (2008), Sovereignty: God,
State, and Self. New York: Basic Books
Figgis, J. (1914), The Divine Right of
Kings, 2nd edn. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Fowler, M. R. and Bunck, J. M. (1995), Law,
Power, and the Sovereign State. University
Park, PA: Penn State Press.
Fukuyama, F. (2004), State-Building:
Governance and World-Order in the 21st
Century. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University
Press.

Goldman, E. (1960), “Anarchism,” in E.
Goldman (ed.), Anarchism and Other
Essays. New York: Dover.
Hart, H. L. A. (2012), The Concept of Law,
3rd edn. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hayek, F. (1960/2011), The Constitution
of Liberty, Definitive edn. Chicago:
University of Chicago.
Henkin, L. (1999), “That ‘S’ Word:
Sovereignty, and Globalization, and
Human Rights, Et Cetera,” Fordham
University Law Review, 68, 1–14.
Hoffman, J. (1998), Sovereignty.
Minneapolis, MN: University of
Minnesota Press.
ICISS (2001), Report of the International
Commission on Intervention and State
Sovereignty (http://responsibilitytoprotect.
org/ICISS%20Report.pdf.
Jackson, R. (2007), Sovereignty: The
Evolution of an Idea. Cambridge: Polity
Press.
Jongeneel, J. A. B. (2009), Jesus Christ in
World History. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.
Krasner, S. D. (1999), Sovereignty:
Organized Hypocrisy. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press.
Locke, J. (1764), First Treatise of
Government in Two Treatises of
Government, T. Hollis (ed.), London:
A. Millar et al.; accessed from http://oll.
libertyfund.org/title/222.
Machan, T. R. (2008), “Reconciling
Anarchism and Minarchism,” in R. T.
Long and T. R. Machan (eds), Anarchism/
Minarchism. Burlington, VT: Ashgate
Publishing.
Nozick, R. (1974), Anarchy, State, Utopia.
New York: Basic Books.
Ophuls, W. (1973), “Leviathan or Oblivion,”
in H. Daly (ed.), Toward a Steady State
Economy. San Francisco: W.H. Freeman.
45
SOVEREIGNTY
Philpot, D. (1996), “On the Cusp of
Sovereignty: Lessons from the Sixteenth
Century,” in L. E. Lugo (ed.), Sovereignty
at the Crossroads? Morality and
International Politics in the Post-Cold
War Era. Lanham, MD: Rowman &
Littlefield.
— (2011), “Sovereignty,” in G. Klosko (ed.),
The Oxford Handbook of the History
of Political Philosophy. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Rawls, J. (1971), A Theory of Justice.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
Schmitt, C. (1985), Political Theology.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
— (2008), The Leviathan in the State
Theory of Thomas Hobbes: Meaning and
Failure of a Political Symbol. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Shapiro, S. J. (2009), “What is the Rule of
Recognition (and Does it Exist)?” in M.
D. Adler and K. E. Himma (eds), The Rule
of Recognition and the U.S. Constitution.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
— (2011), Legality. Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press.
Vanberg, V. J. (2007), “Democracy,
Citizen Sovereignty, and Constitutional
Economics,” in J. C. Pardo and P.
Schwartz (eds), Public Choice and the
Challenges of Democracy. Northampton,
MA: Edward Elgard Publishing.
Waldron, J. (2008), “Hart and the Principles
of Legality,” in M. Kramer, C. Grant, B.
Colburn, and A. Hatzistavrou (eds), The
Legacy of H.L.A. Hart: Legal, Political,
and Moral Philosophy. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Walzer, M. (1970), Obligations: Essays
on Disobedience, War, and Citizenship.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
 3
COSMOPOLITANISM
Gillian Brock
INTRODUCTION
Early cosmopolitans, such as the Stoics,
proclaimed that they were “citizens of the
world” (Kleingeld, 2006). These cosmopoli-
tans hoped to reject several dominant eth-
nocentric ideas prevalent at the time and to
proclaim instead that they were members of
a community of human beings bigger than
one’s city of origin, with important responsi-
bilities to others in a wider and larger human
community. Drawing on these ideas of world
citizenship, contemporary cosmopolitans
also encourage us not to let local obliga-
tions crowd out responsibilities to distant
others. Cosmopolitans highlight the respon-
sibilities we have to those whom we do not
know, but whose lives should be of concern
to us. Contemporary cosmopolitans typi-
cally emphasize that every person has global
stature as the ultimate unit of moral concern
and is therefore entitled to equal respect and
consideration no matter what her citizenship
status or other affiliations happen to be.1
But if cosmopolitanism requires us to rec-
ognize everyone’s equal moral worth and
show all equal respect, surely all normatively
defensible views must be cosmopolitan in
flavor, someone might wonder. Is cosmopoli-
tanism trivially true, then? In order to locate
47
the points of tension between cosmopolitans
and those resistant to such approaches, we
need to cover more ground. One fear about
cosmopolitanism is that it might give too
little weight to (or possibly even ignore)
people’s important affiliations and identi-
ties, especially those that stem from their
membership in states. This leads to a set of
concerns that have attracted much attention
which we might phrase in terms of the fol-
lowing set of questions: in endorsing global
obligations must we also thereby reject spe-
cial obligations to those in our state? How,
if at all, does membership in states matter to
our obligations to assist non-compatriots? Is
partiality toward compatriots justified in a
world filled with the more pressing needs of
non-compatriots? Is there any proper scope
for patriotic concern? Does respecting politi-
cal self-determination conflict with commit-
ments to global justice?
In this chapter, we survey some cur-
rent debates among cosmopolitans and
their critics. We begin in the next sec-
tion, “Cosmopolitanism: Two Important
Distinctions,” outlining some common dis-
tinctions typically drawn among kinds of
cosmopolitanisms, before canvassing some of
the diverse varieties of cosmopolitan justice in
the section “What Does Cosmopolitan Justice
Gillian Brock
Require?” The section “Are Compatriots
Special?” explores the grounds on which
compatriots might be thought to be special
and therefore deserving of considerably more
weight in our responsibilities to one another.
We then explore some common concerns
about cosmopolitanism—such as whether
cosmopolitan commitments are necessarily
in tension with other affiliations people typi-
cally have (the section “Must Cosmopolitans
Reject Any Form of Partiality?”) and how we
should deal with issues concerning a perceived
lack of authority in the global domain (the
section “Is the Matter of Legitimate Authority
in the Global Domain Problematic?”). In
the section “Cosmopolitanism in the Real
World,” we look briefly at how the concern
with feasibility of normative ideals has led
some to take up the challenge of devising
public policy that is cosmopolitan in outlook
before offering some concluding remarks on
future directions in these debates. In a vari-
ety of ways, we come to appreciate that the
topics dealt with by cosmopolitans and their
critics encompasses a broad range of issues of
central concern to political philosophers.
COSMOPOLITANISM: TWO
IMPORTANT DISTINCTIONS
We begin by reviewing some of the key dis-
tinctions widely in use in the literature.
1. Identity and responsibility cosmopolit­anism
Being a cosmopolitan is most often character-
ized in terms of being a citizen of the world.
This idea of being a citizen of the world cap-
tures the two central aspects of cosmopoli-
tanism, as it is frequently understood today,
namely it involves a thesis about identity and
48
one about responsibility. As a thesis about
identity, being a cosmopolitan indicates that
one is a person who is influenced by various
cultures. Cosmopolitanism as a thesis about
identity also maintains that belonging to a
particular culture is not an essential ingredi-
ent for personal identity or living a flourish-
ing life: one can select elements from diverse
cultures, or reject all in favor of noncultural
options that are perceived as yet more impor-
tant to particular people in living a flourish-
ing life, as Jeremy Waldron (1992) maintains.
Cosmopolitanism as a thesis about respon-
sibility generates much debate, as discussed
later. Roughly, the idea is that as a cosmopoli-
tan, one should appreciate that one is a mem-
ber of a global community of human beings.
As such, one has responsibilities to other
members of the global community. As Martha
Nussbaum elaborates, one owes allegiance
“to the worldwide community of human
beings” and this affiliation should constitute
a primary allegiance (Nussbaum, 1996, 4).
We discuss responsibility cosmopolitanism in
more detail in several sections later.
2. Moral and institutional cosmopolitanism
The core idea of moral cosmopolitanism is
a commitment to everyone’s equal moral
worth and equal consideration of their inter-
ests. Thomas Pogge has an influential and
widely cited synopsis of the key ideas, as he
sees them:
Three elements are shared by all cosmo-
politan positions. First, individualism:
the ultimate units of concern are human
beings, or persons—rather than, say, fam-
ily lines, tribes, ethnic, cultural, or reli-
gious communities, nations, or states. The
latter may be units of concern only indi-
rectly, in virtue of their individual mem-
bers or citizens. Second, universality: the

status of ultimate unit of concern attaches
to every living human being equally—not
merely to some sub-set, such as men,
aristocrats, Aryans, whites, or Muslims.
Third, generality: this special status has
global force. Persons are ultimate units of
concern for everyone—not only for their
compatriots, fellow religionists, or such
like (Pogge, 1992, 48).
Considerable debate surrounds what the
cosmopolitan commitment requires. Indeed,
cosmopolitanism’s force is often best appre-
ciated by considering what it rules out. For
instance, it rules out positions that attach no
moral value to some people, or weights the
moral value some people have differentially
according to their race, ethnicity, or nation-
ality. Furthermore, assigning ultimate rather
than derivative value to collective entities
such as nations or states is prohibited. If such
groups matter, they matter because of their
importance to individual human persons
rather than because they have some inde-
pendent, ultimate (say, ontological) value.
A common misconception is that cosmo-
politanism requires a world state or govern-
ment. To avoid this mistake, a distinction is
often drawn between moral and institutional
cosmopolitanism. Institutional cosmopoli-
tans maintain that fairly deep institutional
changes are needed to the global system in
order to realize cosmopolitan commitments
adequately and such transformations would
yield a world state. Moral cosmopolitans
need not endorse that view, in fact many are
against radical institutional transformations.
Such theorists maintain that our cosmopolitan
commitments (such as protecting everyone’s
basic human rights or ensuring everyone’s
capabilities are met to the required thresh-
old) can be effectively discharged, via several
suitable arrangements. There are various
49
COSMOPOLITANISM
possibilities for discharging cosmopolitan
duties globally that would not amount to a
world state (as discussed in the section “Is
the Matter of Legitimate Authority in the
Global Domain Problematic?”).
WHAT DOES COSMOPOLITAN
JUSTICE REQUIRE?
Accounts of justice that characterize themselves
as cosmopolitan can originate from a number
of theoretical perspectives. There are, after all,
many different conceptions of how to treat peo-
ple equally especially with respect to issues of
distributive justice, and this is often reflected in
these different accounts. Cosmopolitan justice
could be argued for along various lines, includ-
ing: utilitarian (prominently, Singer, 1972);
rights-based accounts (Shue, 1980, Jones,
1999, Caney, 2005, Pogge, 2008); Kantian
(O’Neill, 2000); Aristotelian or capabilities-
based (Nussbaum, 2000, 2006); contractarian
(Beitz, 1979, Pogge, 1989, Moellendorf, 2002,
Brock, 2009); and sometimes using more than
one approach (Pogge, 1989, 2002, Beitz, 1979,
2009).
There are several different ways of arguing
for cosmopolitan justice widely used in the
literature. One common divide in accounts
of cosmopolitan justice exists between those
who argue for “humanist” and “associativ-
ist” or “relational” approaches. Humanists,
such as Simon Caney, believe that our duties
of justice track our shared humanity. We have
duties of justice toward all human beings in
virtue of our humanity. Associativists or rela-
tional theorists, by contrast, believe duties of
justice track co-membership in some associa-
tion, such as political or economic association.
Unless we are members of some important
association, we have no justice duties toward
Gillian Brock
such persons. On such accounts, if we hap-
pen to come across persons existing on some
distant planet, with whom we have no prior
interactions, we could not have any duties
of justice toward such people (though there
might be some more minimal humanitar-
ian obligations that we have toward them).
Associativists, such as Darrel Moellendorf,
tend to emphasize that all persons are part
of at least one relevant association namely a
global economic association and this is espe-
cially salient in our current era of economic
globalization.
Cosmopolitan approaches to justice are
often contrasted with “statist” accounts.2
For statists, states are an important factor
in determining our duties of justice and they
frequently maintain that the kinds of duties
we have to fellow members of our state
are different from and typically stronger
than the duties we have to nonmembers.
Cosmopolitans tend to place individuals
front and center of their theorizing about
justice, though there might well be deriva-
tive implications concerning duties for states
that flow from their analyses (Moellendorf,
2009). Statists, however, give the fact of
membership in a state a certain kind of pri-
macy of standing which cosmopolitans do
not. There is a prominent debate between
John Rawls and his critics that nicely fol-
lows these tracks and will provide a good
illustration of the differences between the
two approaches. Furthermore, this debate
has been enormously influential in current
debates on cosmopolitan justice, so we dis-
cuss this very briefly next.
In Rawls’s theory of justice for the inter-
national realm, our membership in a “peo-
ple” makes for a very different justice
context, when compared with the views
Rawls famously argues for in A Theory of
Justice (1971). One of the core principles
50
that Rawls believes should govern relations
among peoples in the international domain
is that we should respect each people as free
and equal. Goods such as self-determination
and political autonomy are therefore promi-
nent in this account. In respecting equality
among peoples (rather than individual per-
sons), liberals will need to adopt a foreign
policy that tolerates much diversity, especially
in allowing non-liberal peoples to be admit-
ted as full and equal members of the interna-
tional community of states in good standing.
Rawls believes that we have a duty “to assist
burdened societies to become full members of
the Society of Peoples and to be able to deter-
mine the path of their own future for them-
selves” (1999, 118) but this duty should not
take the form of a Global Difference Principle
as such a principle would not have a target or
a cutoff point, and these targets and cutoffs
are provided by his account which aims at all
people’s political autonomy.
Cosmopolitans have expressed many
criticisms of these views. For instance, they
claim that Rawls ignores both the extent to
which unfavorable conditions may result
from factors external to the society and that
there are all sorts of morally relevant con-
nections between states, notably that they
are situated in a global economic order that
perpetuates the interests of wealthy devel-
oped states with little regard for the interests
of poor, developing ones. Such facts mean
that there is a context of global cooperation
such that distribution according to a Global
Difference Principle is appropriate (Beitz,
1979, Moellendorf, 2002).
Thomas Pogge, arguably the most promi-
nent contemporary cosmopolitan, has done
much to advance arguments which show our
involvement in perpetuating poverty in devel-
oping countries (1994, 2001, 2002, 2008,
inter alia). The international borrowing

privilege and the international resource
privilege provide good examples. Any group
that exercises effective power in a state is
recognized internationally as the legitimate
government of that territory, and the interna-
tional community is not concerned with how
the group came to power or what it does
with that power. Oppressive governments
may borrow freely on behalf of the country
(the international borrowing privilege) or
dispose of its natural resources (the interna-
tional resource privilege) and these actions
are legally recognized internationally. These
two privileges can have disastrous implica-
tions for the prosperity of poor countries
(for instance) because these privileges pro-
vide incentives for coup attempts, they often
influence what sorts of people are motivated
to seek power, they facilitate oppressive gov-
ernments being able to stay in office, and,
should more democratic governments get
to be in power, they are saddled with the
debts incurred by their oppressive predeces-
sors, thus draining the country of resources
needed to firm up new democracies. Local
governments have little incentive to attend to
the needs of the poor, since their being able to
continue in power depends more on the local
elite, foreign governments, and corporations.
Because foreigners benefit so greatly from the
international resource privilege, they have an
incentive to refrain from challenging the situ-
ation (or even to support oppressive govern-
ments). For these sorts of reasons, the current
world order largely reflects the interests of
wealthy and powerful states. Those in afflu-
ent developed countries have a responsibil-
ity to stop imposing this unjust global order
and to make various institutional reforms to
better align the global order with justice. A
number of institutions should be reformed
including the international resource and bor-
rowing privileges (Pogge, 2008).3
51
COSMOPOLITANISM
ARE COMPATRIOTS SPECIAL?
Even the most staunch defenders of views
which advocate favoring the interests of
compatriots do not believe that non-compa-
triots count for nothing. If one came across
a small child drowning in a shallow pond in
a so-called easy rescue case, one would have
a responsibility to perform the life-saving
act of pulling the child to safety, no matter
whether the child were a compatriot or not
(Singer, 1972). We have some basic (even pos-
itive) duties to everyone, irrespective of their
citizenship status. Everyone would concede
this much, at least in the abstract. However,
it seems equally clear, to some at least, that
in certain kinds of matters we may defensi-
bly favor the interests of our compatriots,
typically in decisions concerning the distri-
bution of resources, such as the distribution
of state benefits with respect to health care
or education (Tamir, 1993, Miller, 1995).
In defense of such decisions, it is frequently
claimed that the connections between com-
patriots are more substantial and of the right
kind to generate stronger obligations of jus-
tice (R. Miller, 1998, Hurka, 1997, Blake,
2002). For instance, because we cooperate in
a shared institutional order from which we
derive benefits or which involves significant
coercion, we owe compatriots more concern.
Some theorists have argued that positions
such as compatriot favoritism can be justi-
fied in virtue of the special relations in which
we stand to fellow citizens as well as the spe-
cial projects we undertake together, such as
governing ourselves and building a common
life together (Tamir, 1993, D. Miller, 1995, R.
Miller, 1998).
What relevance does co-membership in
a state have to our obligations and can it
justify having more substantial responsibili-
ties to those with whom we share a state?
Gillian Brock
According to several prominent theorists,
membership in particular states can be rel-
evant to what we owe one another. One cur-
rent debate rages between those who believe
that full egalitarian justice applies within the
state but not outside it, and those who believe
that the state does not and cannot make this
kind of difference to one’s commitment to
egalitarian distributive justice. There are sev-
eral forms of the argument. Here I outline
two variants of this position.
One kind emphasizes the fact that states
are legally able to coerce, whereas this is pur-
portedly not the case in the global sphere, and
so the lack of a global legal coercive author-
ity rules out the need for global equality (R.
Miller, 1998, Blake, 2002). The idea here is
that legal coercion, if it is to be legitimate,
must be justifiable to those whose autonomy
would be restricted. Legal coercion would be
justifiable if no arbitrary inequalities were
permissible in the society and this is the idea
central to traditional egalitarian conceptions
of distributive justice. This form of argument
has been criticized from several directions.
For example, one strategy is to challenge the
idea that coercion is necessary for ground-
ing a concern with egalitarian distributive
justice, and contends that there are other rea-
sons to care about equality in the absence of
coercion. Another line of attack emphasizes
that even if we agree that coercion triggers
egalitarian duties of justice, in fact coercion
is pervasive at the global level if we con-
sider the scope of international law and the
ways in which powerful institutions (such
as the WTO, the IMF, and the World Bank)
impose policies (such as the terms of trade)
on weaker parties, as a condition of belong-
ing to the organization or being able to ben-
efit from it. Thus the necessary condition for
egalitarian duties of justice is met (Cohen
and Sabel, 2006, Abizadeh, 2007).
52
Another attempt to justify distinguishing
between duties to compatriots and duties to
non-compatriots proceeds from an aware-
ness that social cooperation grounds special
duties (Freeman, 2006, Sangiovanni, 2007).
A democratic society is one in which there
is fair social cooperation and in which fair
social cooperation is understood in terms of
the idea that the arrangements that govern
citizens’ lives should be ones that they can
reasonably endorse. Members of a state owe
egalitarian duties of justice to one another
because each member plays a part in uphold-
ing and sustaining the collective goods of
the society, such as maintaining a stable sys-
tem of property rights or doing their part to
ensure society’s security. Reasonably endors-
able social arrangements do not create mor-
ally arbitrary social inequalities. Since there
is no scheme of global social cooperation
of the same type or scale as a state, there is
no similar requirement at the global level.
Several cosmopolitans have challenged the
view that there is no set of global institutions
based on social cooperation (Beitz, 1979,
Moellendorf, 2002). Others contest the nor-
mative view that duties of egalitarian justice
arise only when there is social cooperation,
maintaining instead that justice can require
the very establishment of such institutions of
social cooperation (Abizadeh, 2007, Caney,
2008). Sufficient interaction among agents
may obligate them to ensure that their inter-
actions proceed on fair terms, and this might
require establishing institutional arrange-
ments that can secure or protect such fair
terms.
At any rate, those who defend claims that
our duties to co-members are more exten-
sive than those to others with whom we do
not share membership in a state point to
several key features in attempting to justify
their position. The fact that we are involved

in mutually beneficial cooperation or a
coercive institutional scheme seems very
important to many statists. Others draw
attention to features such as shared national
identity, shared history, or shared efforts in
creating a community or set of institutions
which instantiates much value. In elaborat-
ing on the kind of importance these features
should have, such theorists might point to
the independent value of democracy, self-
determination, or living a life that gives
shared expression to important aspects of
one’s identity. Some theorists (e.g. Tamir,
1993, D. Miller, 2007)  argue that national
membership can be very important to peo-
ple and, moreover, people are entitled to
national self-determination. We therefore
need to make space in any account of our
obligations to one another for respecting
nations and the political autonomy they
need.
Cosmopolitans often take as their point
of departure a so-called luck egalitarian
intuition. Consider how it is a matter of luck
whether one is born into an affluent, devel-
oped country or a poor, developing nation.
Yet where one happens to have been born
tends to have such an important bearing on
how one’s life will go. The current distribu-
tion of global wealth and opportunities does
not track persons’ choices and efforts, but
rather is greatly influenced and distorted by
luck. What is thought to be objectionable
here is that existing social and political insti-
tutions have converted contingent brute facts
about people’s lives into significant social
disadvantages for some and advantages for
others. Persons as moral equals can demand
that any common order that they impose on
one another start from a default assump-
tion of equality and departures from this be
justified to those who stand to be adversely
affected. Many cosmopolitans are persuaded
53
COSMOPOLITANISM
by the luck egalitarian view. This leaves us
with a number of questions:
• Should “the moral arbitrariness of birth-
place” be a factor in determining the
nature of our duties to one another?
Alternatively,
• Should we take as our starting point
important facts about situatedness in par-
ticular societies that many of us seem to
care about a great deal, albeit that this is
somewhat arbitrary from the moral point
of view?
• What weight should membership in states
have and is such weight necessarily in ten-
sion with cosmopolitanism?
• Is there a way to navigate between duties
to those within states and those beyond
them, so we can accommodate the force
of each?
MUST COSMOPOLITANS REJECT ANY
FORM OF PARTIALITY?
Critics of cosmopolitanism often maintain
that cosmopolitans cannot accommodate
special attachments and commitments that
fill most ordinary human beings’ lives with
value and meaning. It is commonly thought
that cosmopolitans must reject attachments
to those in local or particular communities
in favor of an ideal of impartial justice that
the individual must apply directly to all, no
matter where they are situated on the globe.
But this is not a position advocated by many
cosmopolitans.4 Indeed, most contemporary
cosmopolitans recognize that for many peo-
ple, some of their most meaningful attach-
ments in life derive from their allegiances to
particular communities, be they national,
ethnic, religious, or cultural. Their accounts
often seek to define the legitimate scope for
such partiality, by situating these attachments
Gillian Brock
in a context which clarifies our obliga-
tions to one another. Cosmopolitan justice
provides the basic framework or structure
and thereby the constraints within which
legitimate patriotism may operate (see, for
instance, Tan, 2004, 2005). Cosmopolitan
principles should govern the global institu-
tions, such that these treat people as equals
in their entitlements (regardless of nation-
ality and power, say). However, once the
background global institutional structure is
just, persons may defensibly favor the inter-
ests of their compatriots (or co-nationals, or
members of other more particular groups),
so long as such partiality does not conflict
with their other obligations, for instance, to
support global institutions. So cosmopolitan
principles should govern the global institu-
tions, but need not directly regulate what
choices people may make within the rules
of the institutions. One of the strengths of
Tan’s view (e.g. 2004)  is that even though
cosmopolitan justice provides the justifica-
tion for the limits of partiality toward group
members, the value of those attachments is
not reduced to cosmopolitan considerations,
which is arguably a flaw with other attempts
(e.g. Nussbaum, 1996).
Cosmopolitanism is essentially committed
to these two central ideas:
1. The equal moral worth of all individuals,
no matter what borders separate them
from one another.
2. The idea that there are some obligations
that are binding on all of us, no matter
where we are situated.
Acknowledging these two claims leaves
plenty of room to endorse additional obliga-
tions that derive from more particular com-
mitments. So, we see that cosmopolitanism is
54
indeed compatible with having many other
particular commitments and attachments,
including attachments to compatriots and
commitments to co-nationals.
IS THE MATTER OF LEGITIMATE
AUTHORITY IN THE GLOBAL
DOMAIN PROBLEMATIC?
There are some who are skeptical of the
cosmopolitan idea of obligations of justice
that extend globally, at least given our cur-
rent circumstances. Grounds for such skep-
ticism include the fact that since there is no
way to enforce obligations of justice at the
global level, there can be no such obligations
(Nagel, 2005). Another concern revolves
around fears that often accompany undesir-
able results which can ensue when there is a
concentration of power (Kukathas, 2006).
Underlying these concerns is an assumption
that obligations concerning cosmopolitan jus-
tice require a world state, and since we have
reason to fear the potential for world gov-
ernment to lead to oppressive consequences,
we have reasons to fear cosmopolitanism.
While some cosmopolitans do advocate for a
world state (Falk and Strauss, 2001, Cabrera,
2004, 2011, Deudney, 2007, Lu, 2008),
many (probably the vast majority) reject the
assumption that a world state is necessary or
desirable and differentiate between global
government and global governance (Held,
1995, Caney, 2005, Nussbaum, 2006, Brock,
2009). Although we may need some ways to
coordinate management of our transnational
affairs, this need not amount to world gov-
ernment. Supra-state organizations need not
replace state-level ones, such as currently
exists with the European Union or the United

Nations. In these cases, transnational institu-
tions complement rather than replace states.
Different models are available for thinking
through a “post-sovereign” political world
order, which incorporate scope for state-
level institutions, as well as ones which are
sub-state and supra-state level (Pogge, 1992,
Held, 1995).
A frequently raised issue concerns how
divided authority and sovereignty arrange-
ments might work in practice. In fact, we
have examples of divided and delegated
authority that work reasonably well in prac-
tice. States in a federation (such as in the
United States), local and regional authorities
within a state, and the European Union, all
involve divided authority and often function
effectively on a day-to-day basis. Forms of
global governance can be diffuse and over-
lapping, so long as they have clear sites of
accountability. Indeed, whether we like it
or not, we already have a system of global
governance that is just like this, given all
the international bodies that have authority
over various domains that govern our lives
(such as the United Nations, World Trade
Organization, World Health Organization,
or World Bank). Cosmopolitans might
instead focus their arguments on how to
reform this system to make it more respon-
sive to the ideals of moral equality or other
goals of global justice. As Thomas Nagel
(2005) notes, we have transitioned to more
just arrangements in the past by demanding
that the existing concentration of power be
exercised more justly, that is, by working on
what is already there. It is likely that there
will be a similar path to global justice. People
might be motivated to demand more legiti-
macy of the institutions that dominate their
lives if their sense of global solidarity, com-
passion, or empathy for others is increased,
55
COSMOPOLITANISM
as those who advocate education for world
citizenship might maintain (e.g. Nussbaum,
1996).5
COSMOPOLITANISM IN THE
REAL WORLD
Increasingly, philosophers have turned their
attention to making recommendations for
improvements in global policies, arrange-
ments, and institutions often, in the process,
advocating for important changes. I have
already noted some of the proposals Pogge
has made concerning reforms to interna-
tional borrowing and resource privileges
in the section “What Does Cosmopolitan
Justice Require?” Barry and Reddy’s work
(2008) also provides a noteworthy attempt
to outline detailed proposals for how Just
Linkage arrangements can promote fair
trade, creating desirable trading opportuni-
ties for those who offer improved employ-
ment conditions. Several others have detailed
proposals concerning institutional reforms,
for instance to promote global health (Pogge,
2011) or improved taxation and accounting
arrangements (Pogge, 2008, Brock, 2009,
Moellendorf, 2009).
In many ways, the widespread and grow-
ing commitment to the importance of human
rights in regulating our international affairs
is something of a cosmopolitan achievement
in the struggle for global justice. The fact
that we have documents that clearly specify
the entitlements that all human beings have
is quite remarkable, given the diversity of
worldviews and perspectives represented
among the world’s people. Furthermore,
we have an international legal order that
has certain commitments to uphold these
Gillian Brock
entitlements. All those states that are mem-
bers of the United Nations have signed up
to respecting human rights in at least certain
contexts. The cosmopolitan idea that each
person has equal moral worth and deserves
some fundamental protections and entitle-
ments is not just a theoretical position but
has made some significant inroads in interna-
tional law and global policy making, though
this is not to deny that we still have far to go
before the cosmopolitan vision is adequately
instantiated in the world.
In each of the preceding sections, I have
highlighted current points of tension in
debates and shown how one might navigate
a range of issues and challenges that are pre-
sented for cosmopolitanism. However, by
offering possible ways cosmopolitans could
resolve issues or respond to challenges, this
should not mask the fact that all these matters
are still the subject of lively debate. Indeed,
none of the debates raised here are settled.
Every aspect of cosmopolitanism treated
here is still the subject of critical engagement:
from the very ways in which one ought to
define cosmopolitanism to what cosmopoli-
tan commitment entails (see for instance, The
Monist 94, no.4 and Brock, 2013).
In addressing the main issues identified as
salient to various kinds of cosmopolitans and
their critics, more work is needed on a range
of central questions, including:
• How does membership in global and
national associations influence our duties
to one another in the global context?
• To what extent are cosmopolitan and spe-
cial duties reconcilable?
• What significance, if any, does the moral
arbitrariness of birthplace have to
accounts of global distributive justice?
• Do forms of coercion matter to the nature
of our duties to one another and if they
do, how and why does coercion matter?
56
• How, if at all, does equality matter at the
global level? What kinds of reforms to
our global and local institutions do cos-
mopolitan concerns require?
• Are these reforms feasible, even if norma-
tively desirable?
• What account of feasibility ought we to
embrace in discussing which cosmopoli-
tan proposals could feasibly be imple-
mented in our world?
• What might the cosmopolitan recommend
as just policy in specific domains such as
climate change, immigration, fair trade,
health care, taxation, and the like?
These kinds of questions emphasize that
much work remains for all normative theo-
rists concerned with justice in the global
domain and show how the cosmopolitan
position is central to much contemporary
work in political philosophy.
Notes
1
For more on this convergence, see Gillian
Brock and Harry Brighouse (eds), The Political
Philosophy of Cosmopolitanism (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2005) and Gillian
Brock, “Cosmopolitanism Versus Non-
Cosmopolitanism: The State of Play,” The
Monist, 94 (2011), 455–465.
2
A note about terminology might be in order
before we proceed. Those identified as statists
include quite a diverse variety of different posi-
tions including liberal nationalist, civic nation-
alist, or other conventional statist accounts.
I use the term “statist” to include all of these
positions, since what they have in common
is the view that membership in a sub-world
community (such as a state, people, or nation)
matters in determining our obligations to one
another.
3
In the space provided, I cannot possibly do
justice to all the complexities of Rawls’s

sophisticated account or that of his critics,
but for some more detailed exposition, critical
discussion, and defense of the views, see Martin
and Reidy (2007), Samuel Freeman (2006),
David Reidy (2006), Moellendorf (2002), Tan
(2004), and Brock (2009).
4
See, for instance, the essays in Brock and
Brighouse (2005).
5
See, for instance, the Council for Education in
World Citizenship at: http://www.cewc.org.
WORKS CITED
Abizadeh, A. (2007), “Cooperation,
Pervasive Impact, and Coercion: On the
Scope (Not Site) of Distributive Justice,”
Philosophy and Public Affairs, 35:
318–358.
Barry, C. and S. Reddy (2008), International
Trade and Labor Standards. New York:
Columbia University Press.
Beitz, B. (1979), Political Theory and
International Relations. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press.
— (2009), The Idea of Human Rights.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Blake, M. (2002), “Distributive Justice,
State Coercion, and Autonomy,”
Philosophy and Public Affairs, 30:
257–296.
— (2005), “International Justice,” Stanford
Encyclopedia of Philosophy, http://
plato.stanford.edu/entries/international-
justice/.
Brock, G. (2009), Global Justice: A
Cosmopolitan Account. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
— (2011), “Cosmopolitanism Versus Non-
Cosmopolitanism: The State of Play,” The
Monist, 94: 455–465.
— (ed.) (2013), Cosmopolitanism versus
Non-Cosmopolitanism: Critiques,
57
COSMOPOLITANISM
Defenses, Reconceptualisations. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Brock, G. and Brighouse, H. (eds)
(2005), The Political Philosophy
of Cosmopolitanism. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Cabrera, L. (2004), Political Theory of
Global Justice: A Cosmopolitan Case for
the World State. London: Routledge.
— (2011), “World Government: Renewed
Debate, Persistent Challenges,” European
Journal of International Relations, 16:
511–530.
Caney, S. (2005), Justice Beyond Borders: A
Global Political Theory. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
— (2008), “Global Distributive Justice
and the State,” Political Studies, 57:
487–518.
Cohen, J. and Sabel, C. (2006), “Extra
Republicam Nulla Justitia?” Philosophy
and Public Affairs, 34: 147–175.
Deudney, D. (2007), Bounding Power:
Republican Security Theory from Polis
to the Global Village. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press.
Falk, R. and Strauss, A. (2001), “Toward
Global Parliament (Citizen Input on
Globalization),” Foreign Affairs, 80:
212–218.
Freeman, S. (2006), “The Law of Peoples,
Social Cooperation, Human Rights, and
Distributive Justice,” Social Philosophy
and Policy, 23: 29–68.
Held, D. (1995), Democracy and the
Global Order: From the Modern State to
Cosmopolitan Governance. Stanford, CA:
Stanford University Press.
Hurka, T. (1997), “The Justification of
National Partiality,” in R. McKim and
J. McMahan (eds), The Morality Of
Nationalism. Oxford: Oxford University
Press, pp. 139–157.
Gillian Brock
Jones, C. (1999), Global Justice. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Kleingeld, P. (2006), “Cosmopolitanism,”
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy,
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/
international-justice/.
Kukathas, C. (2006), “The Mirage of
Global Justice,” in E. Paul, F. Miller, and
J. Paul (eds), Justice and Global Politics.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
pp. 1–28.
Lu, C. (2008), “World Government,” in E.
N. Zalta (ed.), Stanford Encyclopedia
of Philosophy, http://plato.stanford.
edu/archives/fall2008/entries/world-
government.
Martin, R. and Reidy, D. (2006), Rawls’s
Law of Peoples: A Realistic Utopia?
Malden, MA: Blackwell.
Miller, D. (2000), Citizenship and National
Identity. Cambridge: Polity Press.
— (2007), National Responsibility
and Global Justice. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Miller, R. (1998), “Cosmopolitan Respect
and Patriotic Concern,” Philosophy and
Public Affairs, 27(3): 202–224.
Moellendorf, D. (2002), Cosmopolitan
Justice. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
— (2009), Global Inequality Matters. New
York: Palgrave MacMillan.
Nagel, T. (2005), “The Problem of Global
Justice,” Philosophy and Public Affairs,
33: 113–147.
Nussbaum, M. (1996), “Patriotism and
Cosmopolitanism,” in J. Cohen (ed.),
For Love of Country: Debating The
Limits of Patriotism. Boston, MA:
Beacon Press.
— (2000), Women and Human
Development. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
58
— (2006), Frontiers of Justice: Disability,
Nationality, Species Membership.
Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press.
O’Neill, O. (2000), Bounds of Justice.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Pogge, T. (1989), Realizing Rawls. Ithaca,
NY: Cornell University Press.
— (1992), “Cosmopolitanism and
Sovereignty,” Ethics, 103: 48–75.
— (1994), “An Egalitarian Law of Peoples,”
Philosophy and Public Affairs, 23 (3):
195–224.
— (2001), “Priorities of Global Justice,”
Metaphilosophy, 32: 6–24.
— (2008), World Poverty and Human
Rights. Cambridge: Polity Press.
— (2011), “The Health Impact Fund,” in
S. Benatar and G. Brock (eds), Global
Health and Global Health Ethics.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Rawls, J. (1971), A Theory of Justice.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
— (1999), The Law of Peoples. Cambridge:
Harvard University Press.
Reidy, D. (2006), “Political Authority and
Human Rights,” in R. Martin and D.
Reidy (eds), Rawls’s Law of Peoples:
A Realistic Utopia? Malden, MA:
Blackwell, pp. 169–188.
Sangiovanni, A. (2007), “Global Justice,
Reciprocity, and the State,” Philosophy
and Public Affairs, 35: 3–39.
Scheffler, S. (2001), Boundaries and
Allegiances. Oxford: Oxford University
Press.
Shue, H. (1980), Basic Rights: Subsistence,
Affluence, and U.S. Foreign Policy.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press.
Singer, P. (1972), “Famine Affluence, and
Morality,” Philosophy and Public Affairs,
1 (3): 229–243.

Tamir, Y. (1993), Liberal Nationalism.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Tan, K. (2004), Justice Without Borders:
Cosmopolitanism, Nationalism, and
Patriotism. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
— (2005), “The Demands of Justice and
National Allegiance,” in Brock and
Brighouse (eds), The Political Philosophy
59
COSMOPOLITANISM
of Cosmopolitanism. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press,
pp. 164–179.
The Monist (2011), special issue on
Cosmopolitanism, 94 (4).
Waldron, J. (1992), “Minority Rights and
the Cosmopolitan Alternative,” University
of Michigan Journal of Law Reform, 25:
751–793.
 4
HUMAN RIGHTS
Siegfried Van Duffel
As I’m writing this, Christians are bru-
tally murdering Muslims in the Central
African Republic; people in Syria are being
bombed, starved, and tortured; and homo-
sexuals still face the death penalty in Iran
as well as long prison sentences in countries
like Uganda and Nigeria and persecution
by thugs in many countries. These atroci-
ties and many other disturbing phenomena
are often called “human rights violations.”
What gives them this status? That is a ques-
tion about which there has been a surpris-
ing amount of disagreement among political
philosophers.
Not so long ago, the question “What are
human rights?” would most likely have been
answered with a simple definition. Something
like “Human rights are the rights that we
have simply by virtue of being human.” The
phrase “simply by virtue of being human”
may be harder to unpack than it seems at
first, but one of the commonly held ideas
was that the possession of human rights is
not dependent on any convention or insti-
tution. Human rights, in other words, are
moral rights. This doesn’t prevent them from
becoming enshrined in treatises and conven-
tions or from receiving protection through
legal mechanisms, but legally protected
human rights are also moral rights—rights
61
which we would have had even if these pro-
tections didn’t exist.
This point seems intuitively so obvious
that it is hard to see how anyone could deny
it. Slavery violates a human right, not just
because some UN body agreed on a document
that says that slavery violates a human right.
Surely those who were enslaved before the
second half of the twentieth century had their
human rights violated as well. Not everyone,
however, has shared this intuition. Some have
thought that it is at least awkward, perhaps
even downright incoherent to think of human
rights as somehow “existing” independent of
the declarations that affirm them, or inde-
pendently of any legal framework which
brings them into existence (I take it that this is
the point of Bentham’s famous denouncement
of human rights as “nonsense upon stilts”).
The idea that human rights are essentially
connected to institutions has recently taken
a different form. Under the influence of John
Rawls, several philosophers have developed
what are now called “political theories of
human rights.” A prominent feature of several
of these theories is the suggestion that human
rights are misconceived if taken as an ethical
doctrine rather than part of a distinctly polit-
ical morality. Since this position has become
influential, I shall first discuss two prominent
Siegfried Van Duffel
versions of this account. The relative merit
of political theories versus alternatives will
ultimately depend—among other things—on
how they accommodate our most firmly held
beliefs about the topic. Beitz, in particular,
has argued that his theory provides a better
fit with human rights doctrine and practice
than traditional approaches to human rights.
If he is right, we should indeed abandon the
traditional approach to human rights and
adopt some version of the political theory.
As we shall see, however, the case in favor
of political theories is at least overstated
and the case for abandoning the traditional
approach to theorizing human rights perhaps
misguided. More positively, I shall suggest
another approach—what I call a “descriptive
approach”—that promises to do better on
most of the criteria put forward to evaluate
theories of human rights.
POLITICAL THEORIES OF
HUMAN RIGHTS
One of the most controversial elements in
Rawls’s theory of international relations is
the truncated list of human rights. Rawls
mentions rights to the means of subsistence
(but not to health care or education); to
freedom from slavery, serfdom, and forced
occupation, and to a sufficient (but not nec-
essarily equal) measure of liberty of con-
science; to personal property; and to formal
equality as expressed by the rules of natural
justice (i.e. that similar cases be treated simi-
larly) (Rawls, 1999, 65). Many commenta-
tors have found Rawls’s list of human rights
objectionably illiberal. Such crucial rights
as freedom of expression and association,
as well as the right to democratic participa-
tion are missing from the list. Buchanan has
62
remarked that according to Rawls’s account,
to prevent women or members of a particu-
lar racial or ethnic minority from getting
an education, from voting, or from holding
public office would not count as a violation
of their human rights (Buchanan, 2010, 21).
Rawls’s motivation seems to have been to
avoid charges of parochialism. He remarked
that human rights “as thus understood, can-
not be rejected as peculiarly liberal or special
to the Western tradition” (Rawls, 1999, 65).
This raises two questions: First, why should
we refrain from affirming “peculiarly lib-
eral” human rights? Rawls does not seem
to think much needs to be said in defense of
the need for a “non-parochial” list of human
rights. He simply states that if all societies
were required to be liberal “then the idea of
political liberalism would fail to express due
toleration for other acceptable ways .  .  . of
ordering society” (59). He presents a hypo-
thetical example of a regime, Kazanistan,
which—though it is not perfectly just—
seems to Rawls decent because it protects
this limited number of human rights (and
is not expansionist and has a consultation
hierarchy) and then appeals to the reader’s
intuition to agree with his judgment (76–78).
There is little else by way of an argument.
The other question is how Rawls arrives at
his peculiar list of human rights. It would not
be possible (nor does Rawls intend) to argue
for this selection from actual agreement: even
if such agreement were to exist, it would not
carry the normative weight necessary to jus-
tify a list of human rights. He seems to think
that the list can be justified by employing the
idea of a system of social cooperation. When
these rights are regularly violated, he writes,
“we have command by force, a slave system,
and no cooperation of any kind” (68). Again,
however, this is merely stated, not argued. It
is not clear why, say, a state that used public

resources to support a hereditary elite in lux-
ury and keeps everyone else at the level of
subsistence (Buchanan, 2010, 21)  would
count as a system of social cooperation, even
if this state had a decent consultation hierar-
chy, or why personal property is a prerequi-
site for social cooperation.
Human rights perform a specific func-
tion in Rawls’s theory: their violation can
justify military intervention by foreign pow-
ers (Tasioulas, 2009). He does recognize a
broader set of rights—which he calls liberal
constitutional rights—that are genuinely pos-
sessed by all, but are not properly human
rights because their violation does not give
rise to a (defeasible) reason for the interna-
tional community to forcefully intervene
in a society. This is highly revisionist: while
humanitarian intervention is increasingly
accepted in international law, justifying it is
by no means the only, or even the main, func-
tion of human rights. Liberal and decent soci-
eties, says Rawls, have the right not to tolerate
outlaw states, and they have a duty of assist-
ing burdened societies (i.e. societies which are
unable to become well-ordered on their own).
The duty of assistance must—within the con-
tractarian framework of the law of peoples—
be derived from the self-interest of liberal and
decent societies (Steinhoff, 2012). Similarly,
we might think that the specific list of human
rights could somehow be derived from the
interest of well-ordered societies, perhaps in
creating an international environment free
from instability. However, even if we can
readily think of situations where intervention
to protect human rights serves the interest
of other states in international stability and
peace, it again remains completely unclear
how this interest would ground the specific
list favored by Rawls.
Some of this may explain why Rawls’s spe-
cific treatment of human rights has not been
63
HUMAN RIGHTS
particularly influential. His general approach
to the topic, however, has received consider-
able following. Charles Beitz, for example,
presents what he calls a “practical approach”
to human rights that is inspired by Rawls.
He suggests that “human rights” is an emer-
gent political practice, rather than a norma-
tive idea (Beitz, 2009, xii). Consequently,
talk about human rights being possessed by
humans “simply in virtue of their humanity”
is at best a confusing way of indicating that
they apply to all human beings—confusing
because it falsely suggests that these rights
have some existence independently of the
practice. His approach shares two crucial
features with Rawls’s account. One is that
human rights have a distinctly political role.
According to Beitz, human rights apply in
the first instance to the political institutions
of states, but they may become a matter of
international concern when governments fail
to carry out their duties. When they do so,
human rights have an interference-justifying
role. This role is central to understanding the
discursive functions of human rights, Beitz
maintains, even if it does not exhaust the
range of measures for which human rights
violations might provide reasons. The second
feature that this account shares with Rawls’s
is that it denies that we can adequately theo-
rize human rights through ordinary moral
reasoning. Since human rights is a prac-
tice, we can only understand the concept of
human rights by analyzing what is inherent
in it. If successful, the analysis would rep-
resent a consensus among competent par-
ticipants in the practice, but not necessarily
a consensus about the practice’s normative
contents. Beitz uses the Rawlsian distinction
between concept and conception to clarify
this thought. Different people who have
different conceptions of human rights may
nevertheless share the same concept, because
Siegfried Van Duffel
they could agree on the role of human rights
in practical reasoning about the conduct of
global political life (99).
There is something strangely odd about
this account. While it seems very empirically
oriented, it is also clearly revisionist. The
problem is not with the claim that past theo-
ries of human rights have misdescribed some-
thing essential. It is rather with the thought
that the authors of these theories could have
been mistaken about the very fact that they
were discussing a normative idea. To this,
Beitz might respond that these authors could
well have been discussing a normative idea,
but that they were mistaken in identifying
this normative idea with the idea (or practice)
of human rights. Such a response, however,
is inconsistent with linguistic practice, even
with the language used in UN declarations
and conventions. More importantly, how-
ever, it would only turn the disagreement into
a terminological quibble that could be easily
resolved by distinguishing—as, for exam-
ple, Wellman (2011) does—between “moral
human rights” and “international human
rights.” Beitz, of course, would resist the con-
clusion that a mere terminological decision
could resolve the issue, since he thinks that
conceiving human rights as natural rights has
contributed much of the distortion in philo-
sophical understandings of human rights.
MORAL RIGHTS AND
INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS
How should we conceive the relation
between moral human rights and interna-
tional human rights—meaning the existing
global legal-institutional phenomenon of
human rights? (Buchanan, 2010). At one end
of a spectrum, one could think that these are
64
separate phenomena. Moral human rights
(HR) are the subject of traditional, naturalist,
theories of human rights, while international
human rights (IHR) are the preoccupation of
political theories of human rights. But this is
obviously unsatisfactory. If moral theorizing
strives to be relevant to our actual going-
about in the world, as it certainly should,
then theories of moral human rights should
have the ambition to bear on actual attempts
to legally protect human rights, and hence
on IHR. For example, a theory of HR may
find that some human rights are not yet
protected by international institutions, even
though they ought to be. Or it might con-
clude that many of the supposed human
rights enshrined in international declarations
and conventions are not real (moral) human
rights. This may or may not be a problem. It
could be a problem, for example, if the pro-
motion of otherwise worthwhile social goals
under the guise of human rights damages the
sense of urgency that is properly attached to
a claim that a human right is not sufficiently
protected or has been violated.
If it is implausible or undesirable to think
of moral human rights as entirely independ-
ent of IHR, it would be equally misguided to
shift to the other end of the spectrum. That
is, it would be equally wrong to think that
the rights protected by IHR can only be justi-
fied if for each legal human right there is a
corresponding moral human right. The inter-
national system of human rights treatises and
conventions may serve several goals. One of
those goals should obviously be to further
the protection of moral human rights, but
another possible goal served by IHR could
be to promote peace. Preventing war is of
course also likely to decrease the violation of
moral human rights, but the mere avoidance
of human suffering may be an independent
and sufficient ground for promoting peace

through international human rights legisla-
tion. Again, IHR may have as one of its aims
to further social justice and in the pursuit of
that aim some of its agents could well prom-
ulgate rights that are not moral human rights.
Clearly, the mere fact that some of the rights
incorporated in IHR are not moral human
rights is not in itself sufficient ground to con-
clude that the inclusion of those rights in IHR
is illegitimate. Nor does this stance imply that
theories of moral human rights have no prac-
tical consequences. If we found, for example,
that the introduction of certain legal rights
in IHR in pursuit of otherwise worthy goals
would undermine the system’s effectiveness in
protecting genuine moral human rights, this
would raise serious questions regarding the
desirability of these legal rights. The protec-
tion of moral human rights may not always
take priority over the pursuit of other goals,
but it certainly does in many cases.
It seems that we have reason to value IHR,
whether or not we find that it is best seen as
nothing more than a straightforward attempt
to enforce moral human rights. Hence, even
a significant divergence of HR from IHR
would not automatically justify a demand to
reform the latter. In fact, any theory of moral
human rights would bear a significant bur-
den of justification if it recommended dras-
tic changes in IHR. None of this, however,
warrants the dismissal of normative theories
of HR as irrelevant or misguided when they
aspire to provide a yardstick for the assess-
ment of IHR. The language of the UDHR
and of the most important other conventions
shows that the drafters of these documents
thought of human rights as preexisting moral
rights. If moral philosophers have been mis-
taken in thinking that moral human rights
are relevant, they are surely in good com-
pany. But if the majority of current partici-
pants in the practice of IHR share the idea
65
HUMAN RIGHTS
that the strong moral force attached to many
or most of the rights acknowledged by IHR
is due to the fact that they are (also) preexist-
ing moral rights, as I think they do, then the
illumination of HR is not just a luxury but
quite simply an essential element of a proper
assessment of IHR.
CONSTRAINTS ON THEORIES
OF HUMAN RIGHTS
How should we evaluate a theory of human
rights? A helpful starting point is Allen
Buchanan’s list of desiderata:
1. Consonance. A theory of HR should be
consonant with our most stable intuitions
on the topic.
2. Reasonable fit. It should fit reasonably
with the doctrine and practice of human
rights.
3. Constraint. It should curb human rights
inflation.
4. Content. It should help us determine the
content of various human rights.
5. Guidance. It should help us resolve con-
flicts among human rights.
6. Non-parochialism. It should include a
response to the parochialism objection.
Anyone who agrees with the suggestion
that moral human rights is a distinct idea
that deserves to be taken seriously because of
the influence it (still) has on the practice of
human rights will also agree that desideratum
#1 should take priority over desideratum #2.
However, I shall suggest that even the natural
rights theories that perform best on this cri-
terion (say, those of Gewirth, 1978, Griffin,
2008) fail the desideratum of consonance in
important respects. The main reason for this
is that our intuitions regarding human rights
Siegfried Van Duffel
are the historical offspring of two very dif-
ferent (traditions of) natural rights theories:
theories of property rights (in a very broad
sense) and theories of welfare rights (in a
very broad sense). So even if we find that
no particular natural rights theory satisfies
desideratum #1, it doesn’t rule out the pos-
sibility that different natural rights theories
together satisfy the criterion. However, since
these theories are incompatible in their prac-
tical consequences, the only way we could
regard them as satisfying the criterion of
consonance together is to abandon the per-
spective of normative theorizing. As long as
we are merely trying to find out what human
rights are, that is no objection. I shall point
out later that this way of asking the question
what human rights are will affect the desider-
ata and hence what we expect from a theory
of human rights rather dramatically.
FIVE CHALLENGES AGAINST
NATURALISTIC THEORIES
Theories of HR can be (and have been) chal-
lenged on most of these criteria. Four of the
most significant challenges have to do with
scopes (#1 and #3), the political nature of
human rights (#2), the distribution of cor-
relative duties (#4), and the relation between
human rights and their justification (#6).
1. At the most general level, the issue of
scope is about whether any naturalist theory
of HR is able to give a satisfactory answer to
the question which rights we have. But there
is a problem. Anyone’s view on whether a par-
ticular theory has given a satisfactory answer
to the question which rights we have obvi-
ously depends on one’s view of what counts
as a satisfactory answer. Take, for example,
contemporary libertarian natural rights
66
theories. Libertarians typically deny that we
have any innate moral right to such things as
basic health care or elementary education. For
some political theorists, this in itself serves to
show that the libertarian is not talking about
(international) human rights. The libertarian,
however, is unlikely to be impressed by this,
for she is unlikely to share the political theo-
rist’s view of the relation between HR and
IHR. Most libertarians would condemn the
practice of levying tax on citizens in order
to finance a system of universal health care
or education as a violation of the property
rights of the wealthy. This is not even a case
of a conflict of rights—the rights of property
owners on the one hand and the rights of
the needy on the other—since the libertarian
denies that the needy have moral rights to
such provisions. To the extent that IHR stim-
ulates states to finances systems of universal
health care through taxation, the libertarian
will view it as complicit in the large-scale vio-
lation of the human rights of property own-
ers rather than attempting to protect human
rights. If the political theorist wants to insist
that the libertarian is talking about natural
rights rather than human rights, she may
well do so but it will seem little more than
a word game to the libertarian. After all, the
crucial function of libertarian natural rights
is to distinguish legitimate from illegitimate
uses of government force, which is also the
most important function of human rights for
the political theorist. So while the political
theorist may think that the libertarian has
not even addressed human rights, the liber-
tarian will obviously disagree.
The criterion of consonance as applied
to scope is also likely to leave us begging
the question when intuitions differ. Given
that most right-libertarian theories do not
acknowledge such rights as health care and
education, most of us may find that these

theories are not consonant with “our” most
stable intuitions on the topic. This doesn’t
seem to bother most libertarians, and it is
not immediately clear that it should. Instead,
they may well scorn the suggestion that the
truth about human rights should depend on
the intuitions of even a majority of people.
Unfortunately, the role of intuitions in dis-
covering ethical truth raises problems far too
complex to be pursued here.
What if we take for granted that most of
us (non-libertarians) agree sufficiently on
the scope of human rights for there to be a
benchmark to compare theories of human
rights with? Let us further assume that this
quasi-consensus is fairly close to the list of
human rights endorsed by the most impor-
tant human rights treaties and conventions.
Would this give us a reason to discard natu-
ralist theories of human rights because the
list of rights they generate is simply too short
to be recognizable as a list of human rights?
It would if all naturalist theories were of the
libertarian variety. But that is not the case:
philosophers like Gewirth and Griffin have
built theories that imply much more exten-
sive sets of human rights. So the complaint
about the limited normative reach of natu-
ralistic theories rests on a disregard for the
considerable variety in this group of theories.
The problem of scope takes on a different
form for several of these theories, though,
because it is unclear whether they are able to
prevent rights inflation (#3; see later).
2. What reason might we have to think
that human rights are in the first instance
rights against states? Philosophers are used
to thinking of some rights as moral entities.
In daily life, however, we think of ourselves
as exercising rights primarily in legal/politi-
cal contexts. The main idea that comes to
mind when we think of a right to protest is
a duty of the government not to persecute
67
HUMAN RIGHTS
protesters. When we talk about rights that
we have against other people, we usually
have legal rights in mind. Most of us would
not ordinarily speak of yourself as having a
right against your friend that she goes to the
movies with you because she promised to
do so. I gather that even philosophers who
are prone to talk about promises generat-
ing rights would not use the word “right”
in ordinary life when describing the situa-
tion created by a promise. Compared to this,
it is perhaps a remarkable feat about our
linguistic intuitions that talk about prom-
ises generating rights doesn’t come across
as awkward at all. Because the notion of a
right of a promise doesn’t strike us as a cat-
egory mistake, the divergence in philosophi-
cal work from ordinary linguistic practice is
not normally considered a ground for reject-
ing theories that construe promises as gen-
erating rights. This is important because the
idea that human rights are distinctly political
rather than moral could be seen as receiving
support from linguistic practice in a similar
manner. We are more likely to use phrases
like “human rights violations” when con-
fronted with large-scale violence and oppres-
sion committed by government agents against
civilians, especially because these incidents
are also far more prevalent than, say, simi-
lar violence committed by rogue militia. Still,
since the label “human rights violations” does
not induce a conceptual shock when applied,
for example, to the atrocities committed by
nongovernmental militia in Syria, we should
resist the temptation to take linguistic prac-
tice as sufficient basis for theoretical claims
about human rights.
Another argument brought forward by
proponents of political theories of human
rights is that some human rights presuppose
the existence of modern states. Such rights
as the right to asylum, or to a nationality
Siegfried Van Duffel
are not even conceivable outside the frame-
work of modern nation-states. Does this
show that human rights are specifically mod-
ern, and hence that they cannot possibly be
rights imagined by natural rights theorists
which human beings could have even in a
state of nature? There is a simple answer
to this objection. Such rights as the right to
asylum are derived from more fundamental
rights which do not presuppose the existence
of a state system (see, e.g. Wellman, 2011,
41–70). One of the main grounds for grant-
ing refugees asylum is that they risk persecu-
tion. It is thus easy to see that the right not
to be persecuted is more fundamental than
the right to asylum. Even more fundamen-
tal than the right not to be persecuted is the
right to physical integrity. This right surely
could conceivably exist in a world that has
no modern system of sovereign states (but
see Beitz, 2009, 55).
3. The first complaint against natural rights
theories was that their scope is much more
restricted than that of contemporary human
rights practice. As we saw, this may be true of
some naturalistic theories, but is certainly not
true of all of them. For some of these theories,
the opposite may well be true. That is, they
fail to constrain the proliferation of human
rights. Consider, for example, Griffin’s recent
defense of rights based on personhood.
“Human rights,” Griffin writes, “can be seen
as protections of our human standing, or, . . .
personhood” (Griffin, 2008, 33). To be a per-
son or agent in the fullest sense of which we
are capable, we need three things: autonomy
(being able to choose one’s own path through
life), minimal provision (so that we are able
to act upon our choices), and liberty (others
not forcibly stopping us from pursuing what
we see as a worthwhile life) (33). Griffin
also tells us that human rights “are rights
not to anything that promotes human good
68
or flourishing, but merely to what is needed
for human status” (34). This suggests a very
minimalist interpretation of the requirements
of human rights. Most of us will grow up to
be autonomous beings even without a formal
education. People living in severe poverty are
normally able to act, even if they may not be
able to derive much satisfaction from their life
or achieve many of their goals. Again, people
who are imprisoned may be prevented from
pursuing many of their projects, but not nec-
essarily to such an extent as to be deprived of
their personhood. Thus it seems that the set
of human rights generated by Griffin’s theory
must be exceedingly small—so small as to be
hardly recognizable as a list of human rights.
In fact, the criterion of personhood may not
even prohibit most forms of torture.
Griffin realizes that a strict interpreta-
tion of the agency criterion doesn’t pro-
duce a plausible list of human rights, but he
denies that this is the conception at the core
of his theory. Instead, he claims to have in
mind a “somewhat ampler picture” of some-
one autonomous “who, within limits, is not
blocked from pursuing his or her conception
of a worthwhile life” (34). The crucial ques-
tion is where to draw the line. For exam-
ple: we are told that education is necessary
because it is a condition for effective agency,
but that there are levels of education beyond
what is required by human rights (53).
Since education is almost never needed for a
human being to become an agent, and since
Griffin insists that we do not have a right to
education sufficient for human flourishing,
the theory should be able to tell us something
about the amount of education necessary for
“effective” agency. Griffin, unfortunately,
tells us nothing of the kind, and he is equally
silent regarding the level protection required
by minimal provision. These problems are not
specific to Griffin’s theory. Other versions of

the theory that aims to ground rights in per-
sonhood (like those of Gewirth or Plant) suf-
fer the exact same weaknesses. They start out
with the idea that human rights only require
that we have the things that allow us to be
agents, but—realizing that this is insufficient
for a plausible theory of human rights—con-
tinue that we should have the means for the
effective exercise of our agency. Of course,
no theory could be plausible if it required
that we should have the means for any or
all of our actions to be effective. The prob-
lem is that these theories lack the theoretical
resource to nonarbitrarily limit the amount
of support that human rights require. Griffin
appeals to “practicalities” to plug the gap,
but he doesn’t provide much insight as to
how these are supposed to work (Van Duffel,
2013). Thus the best contemporary natural
rights theories fail to provide a convincing
cure for the proliferation of rights.
The proliferation of human rights and the
inability of natural rights theories to stop
that proliferation may be a serious cause for
concern, but it is not a reason to embrace
political theories of human rights. The phe-
nomenon of human rights proliferation that
disturbs many is internal to the IHR practice.
Some political theories may rule out certain
candidates as incompatible with the idea of
human rights as it is inherent in IHR, but
these theories have as yet not given us a cred-
ible instrument to constrain the proliferation
of human rights.
4. Many of the rights that we have are
correlative to duties of other people. Some
of these duties—so-called negative duties,
like the duty not to kill—can be fulfilled
simply by abstaining from certain actions.
Some rights, however, are correlative to posi-
tive duties, which require others to actually
provide a good or a service. A human right
to subsistence is only meaningful if there is
69
HUMAN RIGHTS
someone who has a duty to provide neces-
sities when they are lacking. The problem is
that most people also believe that you can
have a duty to do something only when you
are able to do it. If a train is about to crash
into a crowd and kill dozens of people, I cer-
tainly have a duty to stop it if I can, but it
doesn’t make sense to say that I have such
a duty if I am unable to fulfill it. A signifi-
cant difference between negative duties and
positive duties, however, is that it is always
possible for everyone to abstain from mur-
dering someone, but we may often be unable
to provide food or education or health care
for everyone in need. If we can only have a
duty when we are able to fulfill it, then we
cannot have a duty to provide health care for
everyone, and if we don’t have this duty then
there can be no human right to health care.
Some have hence concluded that the idea of
social and economic human rights is incoher-
ent (see Cranston, 1967).
This criticism has given rise to an extensive
literature, much of which has been devoted
to defending such human rights as the right
to subsistence, to education, to health care.
Some have questioned the practical import
of the distinction between negative and posi-
tive rights, claiming that protecting a right
to bodily integrity requires that governments
maintain a police force and a judicial system.
Others have pointed out that positive rights
only require that we support institutions
that provide for the needy. Yet others have
maintained that human rights only require
that we do what is in our power to provide
the things that people have a right to. A
fourth suggestion is to restrict the use of the
phrase “human right” to legally enforceable
claims. I have argued elsewhere (Van Duffel,
2013)  that none of these responses are sat-
isfactory, and so we are left with a problem.
Our intuitions regarding moral human rights
Siegfried Van Duffel
seem incoherent because these rights demand
more of us than we might at times be able
to provide. As far as I can see, this problem
is not solved by political theories of human
rights. The fact that they allocate primary
duties to states which are generally better
able to respond to standard threats than indi-
viduals is not sufficient to render the idea of
positive human rights coherent.
5. No matter how dominant the language
of human rights has become in the public
arena, doubts regarding the universality (or,
better, non-parochialism) of human rights
have never entirely disappeared. Indeed, one
of the prime incentives for the development
of political theories may have been the desire
to detach the idea of human rights from sub-
stantive commitments to the liberal tradi-
tion or to any particular normative theory.
Christians, Muslims, and atheists, as well as
conservatives and socialists may agree on
most fundamental human rights even though
they share few or no other normative beliefs.
From a practical point of view, disagreement
on the grounds of these rights is quite unim-
portant as long as we agree on at least the
basic rights. Even though agreement on a
comprehensive list of human rights in the IHR
practice may sometimes seem hard enough to
reach and is likely to remain precarious, it is
certainly easier to attain than agreement on
any substantive theory of moral rights.
Whether naturalist theories of human
rights are indeed parochial is a controversial
matter. In fact, those who assume that they
are usually don’t find it necessary to substan-
tiate their assumption. The reason for this,
I suspect, is that it is not at all clear what
it means to say that a theory is parochial or
culturally specific. Another problem is this:
Suppose that we accept, for the sake of argu-
ment, that existing natural rights theories
are culturally specific. Assuming that these
70
theories and the cultural experience from
which they have emerged have had a sig-
nificant influence on the development of the
human rights movement, how do we know
that the idea of human rights is not culturally
specific as well? Can we just take for granted
that discarding the theory and replacing the
phrase “natural rights” with “human rights”
suffices to shrug off the cultural baggage that
came with the former? This raises another
issue: Is it legitimate to set non-parochial-
ism as a criterion for a proper concept of
human rights? In one sense, human rights
are of course necessarily universal: noth-
ing is a human right if it is not held by all
human beings. But if we think that an idea
or a theory can be parochial, it can hardly be
satisfactory to assume from the outset that
nothing can count as an idea of human rights
unless it is non-parochial. The demand that
it must be non-parochial makes sense if one
intends to build a normative theory, but it
is unwarranted when one is primarily inter-
ested in understanding the concept itself.
HUMAN RIGHTS AS A CULTURAL
PHENOMENON
Although this overview was much too brief to
establish any firm conclusions, the foregoing
discussion may nevertheless motivate us to
explore an alternative to both naturalist and
political theories of human rights. I suggest
that an illuminating way to study the idea
of human rights is to probe the structure of
our beliefs about human rights. Rather than
asking which rights we might have, I shall
suggest that we might profitably ask which
rights we think we have. Call this the descrip-
tive approach. Another way to put this is
that we should think of the idea of human

rights as a cultural phenomenon. How is the
descriptive approach different from that of
(naturalist and political) normative theories?
I can only briefly mention five points.
First, the descriptive approach is not com-
mitted to taking a position regarding the
truth-value of normative claims. Normative
theories of human rights strive to answer
questions such as “Which human rights
do we have?” “What grounds our rights?”
and “Who has duties to provide the things
to which we have rights?” They attempt to
ground rights, for example, in claims about
human nature, or claims about prerequisites
for the legitimacy of states. The descriptive
approach is not interested either in affirming,
or in rejecting the truth-value of normative
claims. It does not deny that normative ques-
tions are important in their own right, but it
leaves these questions aside.
Secondly, normative theories are (or
can be) revisionist with regards to com-
monly accepted beliefs about human rights.
A normative theory could make a case for
the existence of certain human rights that
haven’t made it to any widely accepted list.
Or it could entail that we do not really have
a human right to some of the things that are
widely claimed to be human rights. There
clearly is only a limited stretch on the ability
of normative theories to redraw the bounda-
ries of human rights. If a theory entails too
many claims that run counter to what most
of us are inclined to believe—for example, if
its list of human rights is too sparse or too
capacious—we may conclude that the theory
doesn’t capture the idea of human rights ade-
quately. For obvious reasons, the descriptive
approach cannot be revisionist in the same
way as a normative theory.
A descriptive approach cannot take
beliefs of individuals as basic, but must take
as its subject a cultural tradition as a whole.
71
HUMAN RIGHTS
This opens up a tangle of thorny questions,
like: Is there a group of people whose
beliefs on the topic are similar enough to
allow amalgamation? But answers to such
questions cannot be settled in advance: they
must be the result of the description.
This brings us to the third point, which is
that we may treat normative theories them-
selves as a source of knowledge about the
idea of human rights. Normative ­theorists
are rarely interested in merely stating what
others think: they want to argue what
human rights are, not what we think they
are. However, most normative theorists have
attempted to appeal to widely shared ideas
about human rights, the many articles and
books that they have written on the topic
provide a convenient source of information
for anyone who wants to access these ideas.
That is not to say that the process of bas-
ing claims about what “we” believe about
human rights on a sample of these theories
is entirely unproblematic.
The fourth point will be controversial:
normative theories of human rights not only
provide a good source for studying human
rights as a cultural phenomenon, but also
provide the best available source of its kind.
Studying human rights as a cultural phe-
nomenon essentially is studying the practi-
cal experience which brought into being
the tradition of human rights theories. The
descriptive approach studies theories as theo-
retical reflections on this practical experience
(though these theoretical reflections of course
helped in turn to shape that experience).
Fifthly, the description of human rights
theories must be historical in its scope. This is
because the complex development of the idea
of human rights has left us with theoretical
problems which can only be fully untangled
by taking into account intuitive remnants
from past incarnations of these theories.
Siegfried Van Duffel
Unfortunately I can only give the briefest
possible outline of the story that would
emerge if we put this approach to work.
The experience which has brought human
rights theories into being is that of a cul-
ture which has for some time been influ-
enced by a monotheistic religion. In such
a religion, the basic ethical requirement is
to obey the commands of the author of the
universe. This has engendered a shift in ethi-
cal outlook from a virtue ethics to a law-like
morality (Anscombe, 1958, Williams, 1985).
A necessary component of this ethical out-
look is the idea that human beings have a
will, and hence that all genuine actions are
intentional actions (Dihle, 1982). Religion
further spreads the idea that human beings
have a role to play in God’s plan, and hence
that certain sets of actions are morally
necessary.
From this ethical outlook and its concep-
tion of the requirements of agency, two dis-
tinct (traditions of) natural rights theories
have emerged (Tuck, 1979, Van Duffel, 2010).
The first is a theory of rights to subsistence
or “welfare rights” (in a very broad sense).
It starts from the idea that people must be
able to make decisions and act upon them.
In the religious version, it requires people to
maintain the conditions created by God that
enable people to act upon His will. The secu-
lar version requires us to generate the condi-
tions that allow people to realize their goals.
The second is a theory of “property rights”
(again in a very broad sense). It starts from
the idea that our acts of will have normative
consequences for others. It secularizes the
idea of God’s authority over his creation by
suggesting that human beings create as well
and that they must have a similar authority
over their creation.
A full defense of this approach involves
showing that it resolves the problems that
72
plague the other approaches. I shall, again all
too briefly, indicate how it might do this.
1. The account generated by the descrip-
tive approach will be consonant with our
most stable intuitions on the topic if these
intuitions are nontrivially shaped by the two
traditions of natural rights theories, as indeed
they are. One way in which it is easy to see
the superiority of this approach is that it can
accommodate the fact that our intuitions were
formed by two theories which are practically
incompatible and have generated conflicting
sets of rights (fundamental property rights of
pharmaceutical companies versus rights of
patients, for example, or rights of democratic
majorities versus rights of individuals).
2. An account of human rights should be
able to accommodate both the sense in which
these rights are conceived as interactional
(held by all against all individuals) as well as
the special place of governments both in IHR
and in our intuitions regarding human rights.
One way in which the descriptive approach
is again superior to both naturalist and polit-
ical theories is that it can do this by showing
that these seemingly conflicting intuitions are
the result of the influence of two conflicting
theories of natural rights and the result of the
historical development of the theory of wel-
fare rights.
3. The descriptive approach does not aim
to curb human rights inflation, but rather
aims to explain both the phenomenon of
human rights inflation and the intuition that
this inflation is deeply problematic. It does
this by showing how inflation is the result of
the secularization of the theory of rights to
subsistence (for this point and the next, see
Van Duffel, 2013).
4. The problem of assigning duties correla-
tive to positive rights can also be explained
by the same account. Historically, rights to
subsistence were negative rights, not positive

rights. Hence the correlative duties could not
be excessively demanding. Again the descrip-
tive approach helps us describe human rights
without violating crucial intuitions.
5. The descriptive approach explains the
persistent suspicion that the idea of human
rights is culturally specific, but it does
this without entailing cultural relativism.
Although we may be indeed feel compelled to
reconsider the soundness of current human
rights theories, none of this implies that we
should tolerate cruelty or persecution in the
name of culture.
CONCLUSION
Proponents of political theories are right when
they point out shortcomings of naturalistic
theories of human rights. However, political
theories certainly do not fill the gap left by
theories of moral human rights. At most, they
might fill a hiatus in our theorizing about IHR.
Although the case for the descriptive approach
is tentative and as yet underdeveloped, this
approach may help further our understand-
ing of human rights and the culture in which
theories of human rights developed.
WORKS CITED
Anscombe, G. E. M. (1958), “Modern
Moral Philosophy,” Philosophy, 33: 1–19.
Beitz, C. (2009), The Idea of Human
Rights. New York: Oxford University
Press.
Buchanan, A. (2010), “The Egalitarianism of
Human Rights,” Ethics, 120: 679–710.
Cranston, M. (1967) “Human Rights, Real
and Supposed,” in D. D. Raphael (ed.),
73
HUMAN RIGHTS
Political Theory and the Rights of Man.
Minneapolis, MN: Indiana University
Press.
Dihle, A. (1982), The Theory of Will
in Classical Antiquity. Berkeley, CA:
University of California Press.
Gewirth, A. (1978), Reason and Morality.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Griffin, J. (2008), On Human Rights. New
York: Oxford University Press.
Rawls, J. (1999), The Law of Peoples.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
Steinhoff, U. (2012), “Unsavory
Implications Unsavory Implications of
A Theory of Justice and The Law of
Peoples: The Denial of Human Rights
and the Justification of Slavery,” The
Philosophical Forum, 43(2): 175–196.
Tasioulas, J. (2009), “Are Human Rights
Essentially Triggers for Intervention?”
Philosophy Compass, 4 (6): 938–950.
Tuck, R. (1979), Natural Rights Theories:
Their Origin and Development.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Van Duffel, S. (2010), “From Objective
Right to Subjective Rights: The
Franciscans and the Interest and Will
Conceptions of Rights,” in V. Mäkinen
(ed.), The Nature of Rights: Moral
and Political Aspects of Rights in Late
Medieval and Early Modern Philosophy.
Helsinki: The Philosophical Society of
Finland.
— (2013), “Natural Rights to Welfare,” The
European Journal of Philosophy, 21 (4):
641–664.
Wellman, C. (2011), The Moral Dimensions
of Human Rights. New York: Oxford
University Press.
Williams, B. (1985), Ethics and the Limits
of Philosophy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press.
 5
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
Ovadia Ezra
The concept of distributive justice has been
continuously modified since its first appear-
ance in Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics.
According to Aristotle, distributive justice is
a kind “which is manifested in distribution of
honour or money or the other things that fall
to be divided among those who have a share
in the constitution (for in these it is possible
for one man to have a share either unequal
or equal to that of another)” (Aristotle, 1947,
1130b). In his view, retributive justice “plays
a rectifying part in transactions between man
and man” (ibid.). Aristotle maintains that
“what is just in distribution must be according
to merit in some sense” (ibid.) What Aristotle
meant to say is that justice is a way of suiting
one’s possession or share, to one’s merit and/
or entitlement. If one deserves a larger share of
something, distributive justice requires that his
share in the distribution scheme will represent
his or her privileged position. In this chapter, I
point out the radical changes in meaning that
this term has undergone, and the different
understandings of its current usage.
One thing that has not been changed with
regard to the usage of this concept is the com-
prehensive agreement that distributive justice
refers to the way assets, goods, wealth, capital,
resources, benefits, burdens, and so on should
be distributed within political or social frame-
works. The differences in opinion regarding
75
the meaning of this concept in recent usage
relate to the content of the distributed goods,
to the criteria according to which they should
be distributed, by whom, and recently, to
which range the distribution scheme should
apply. Past discussions of this term limited
its range to the borders of nations, states, or
societies, assuming that goods should be dis-
tributed only among people who belong to
the same political or social framework. Many
of the current discussions, however, extend
the scope of distribution to the world as a
whole. Those who oppose the concept and
implementation of distributive justice at the
domestic sphere also oppose its implementa-
tion at the global level. Here I present some
common theoretical approaches to this con-
cept, and then, consider some ways and prac-
tices involved in promoting just distribution,
both at the domestic and global levels.
Like any other discussion in political phi-
losophy, the meaning and interpretation of
any term is connected to our understanding
of related terms, within the same context.
Dworkin expresses this idea by presenting
his theory of rights as one which is “rela-
tive to the other elements of political theory”
(Dworkin, 1986, 370). In the same way,
Postema thinks that: “to understand the lan-
guage of rights we need to mark out its dis-
tinctive place in this complex of fundamental
Ovadia Ezra
normative notions” (Postema, 1989, 109–
110). “With regard to distributive justice, I
can paraphrase Thomson, who creatively
suggests that we think of morality as a con-
tinent, and of rights as a territory or realm
within that continent” (Thomson, 1990, 3).
The same can be said regarding distributive
justice, and following Thomson we can say
that understanding what is within the realm
of distributive justice requires getting a sense
of where it is situated in the continent of
morality in general, and of justice in particu-
lar. Thus, we must have a general idea of our
moral and political conceptions, and then
we should locate the concept of distribu-
tive justice in its appropriate place. In order
to decide in favor of any of the competing
theories regarding justice, we have to check
the suitability of the concept of distributive
justice in relation to our deepest moral and
political beliefs and presumptions, regarding
human nature, justice, equality, mutuality,
and so on.
The most fundamental presumption
which lies at the basis of any modern discus-
sion within the Western tradition of political
thought regarding distributive justice is that
“All human beings are born free and equal in
dignity and rights” as stated in Article 1 of
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.1
This presumption presents our deepest belief
that in spite of contingent differences between
people, there is an essential and fundamental
equality in value between them, in the sense
that they are all endowed with reason and
conscience (as the cited article reminds us).
What many theorists, as well as politicians
and decision makers deduce from this pre-
sumption is that equal concern should be the
one and only principle of any distributional
scheme, and the sole requirement of such a
scheme. Current debates regarding distribu-
tive justice are aware of the fact that equal
76
distribution of goods or benefits requires
justification. Sometimes an equal distribu-
tion that neglects other considerations is
wrong, inappropriate, or even unjust. Even
Aristotle’s concept of distributive justice
insisted on differential distribution, accord-
ing to merit. Justice requires that we should
distribute different shares to different people,
in accordance with their entitlements.
Equal distribution is sometimes inappro-
priate. Think of a party in which we distrib-
ute the birthday cake. If we give an adult and
a 3-year-old child a piece of the same size, we
are probably making two mistakes. While the
adult may receive a piece that is smaller than
he wants or needs, the young child will prob-
ably get a much larger piece than he or she
can actually eat, and we should not regard
such a distribution as justifiable. The same
piece may be too small for the adult and too
big for the child.
However, we still presume an essential
equality between human beings, and this
assumption forces us to refer to the idea of
equality in every distributional scheme we
wish to justify. Dworkin, who deals with
the basic demands for equal treatment of
human beings, makes a distinction between
what he calls the right to equal treatment,
and the right to treatment as an equal. The
former is “the right to an equal distribution
of some opportunity or resource or burden”
(Dworkin, 1977, 227), such as a person’s
right to an equal vote in democracy. The
latter, the right to treatment as an equal, is
not the right to receive the same amount of
burden or benefit which is distributed, but
the right “to be treated with the same respect
and concern as anyone else” (ibid.). To elab-
orate this idea, Dworkin gives an example
where one has two children, and one of them
is dying from a disease, while the other, even
though he suffers from the same disease,

merely feels unwell or uncomfortable. The
father has only one dose of the medicine.
Equal treatment requires that he should flip a
coin to decide which of the children will have
the only dose of the drug. However, such a
way of deciding on the appropriate distribu-
tion of that medicine will not show equal
concern to the children’s future. Dworkin
concludes from this example that the right to
treatment as an equal is fundamental while
the other right, the right to equal treatment is
only derivative. Sometimes the right to treat-
ment as an equal entails equal treatment, but
many times not. This is one of the fundamen-
tal intuitions that grounds most of the con-
temporary discussions regarding distributive
justice. Most of us understand that if we
really want to realize justice through distri-
bution of goods, benefits, assets, or burdens,
we have to go beyond the formal scheme of
equality and search for a more progressive
and enlightened distribution mechanism.
A LIBERTARIAN APPROACH TO
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
Even though the earlier claim is widely
accepted, there are still modern theorists who
believe that the whole concept of an upper
framework (the state or society) which regu-
lates or controls the distribution of benefits
and burdens among its citizens or members,
or that there are common goods whose distri-
bution should be decided by that framework,
does not cohere with or is not fitting for any
satisfying or moral concept of justice. One of
the most familiar versions of this approach is
Nozick’s theory of justice, which is based on
the idea of entitlement in holdings. Nozick
insists that “The entitlement conception of
justice in holdings makes no presumption
77
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
in favor of equality, or any other overall
end, state or patterning. It cannot merely
be assumed that equality must be built into
any theory of justice” (Nozick, 1974, 233).
Nozick opposes any consideration of equal-
ity in the concept of justice. He also opposes
the whole idea of distributive justice that
redistributes current assets and goods.
Nozick denies that there is any central dis-
tribution or any person or group who is enti-
tled to control resources within the state, or
to jointly decide how the resources should be
“doled out” (Nozick, 1974, 149). The only
justice he believes should prevail is what he
calls “justice in holdings.” According to this
concept:
1. A person who acquires a holding in
accordance with the principle of justice in
acquisition is entitled to that holding.
2. A person who acquires a holding in
accordance with the principle of justice in
transfer, from someone else entitled to the
holding, is entitled to the holding.
3. No one is entitled to a holding except by
(repeated) applications of 1 and 2 (ibid.,
151).
What Nozick wishes to say is that the com-
plete principle of distributive justice would
say simply that a distribution is just “if eve-
ryone is entitled to the holdings they possess
under the distribution” (ibid.). Accordingly,
he rejects any external or governmental
attempt to regulate or control future pos-
session of goods, since there is no legitimate
principle of distribution other than everyone’s
entitlement to their current possession. Any
other distribution might disregard the fact
that there should be a link between the rights
of those who produce goods and wealth, and
are thus entitled to enjoy them, and the way
others decide to distribute those goods.
Ovadia Ezra
Another libertarian objection to the idea
that there should be a collective aggregate
of resources that should be distributed justly
was raised by Hayek, who believes that jus-
tice should remain an attribute of human
conduct, without any collective or social
meaning. Accordingly, the terms “just” or
“unjust” refer only to human conduct, and
“to apply the term ‘just’ to circumstances
other than human actions or the rules gov-
erning them is a category mistake” (Hayek,
1976, 31). Hayek mentions the current use of
social justice and distributive justice as syno-
nyms, and maintains that since justice has
meaning only as a rule of human conduct,
there is no distribution which could be mean-
ingfully described as just or unjust (Hayek,
1978, 58). For Hayek, the phrase social jus-
tice is completely empty, since “no agreement
exists about what social justice requires in
particular instances .  .  . there is no known
test by which to decide who is right if people
differ . . . no preconceived scheme of distribu-
tion could be effectively devised in a society
whose individuals are free” (ibid.).
Hayek says that the commitment to social
justice has unfortunately become “the chief
outlet for moral emotion, the distinguishing
attribute of the good man, and the recognized
sign of the possession of a moral conscience”
(Hayek, 1976, 66). His recommendation is to
regard social justice as religious superstition
which people “must fight when it becomes the
pretext of coercing other men” (ibid.). Hayek
complains that the idea of social justice, in
our current understanding of the term as a
synonym for distributive justice, has received
“a near universal acceptance,” and warns
us that “the prevailing belief in ‘social jus-
tice’ is at present probably the gravest threat
to most other values of a free civilization”
(ibid., 66–67). In the conclusion of his dis-
cussion regarding “social” or “distributive”
78
justice, he presents his view that the phrase
social justice is not “an innocent expression
of good will towards the less fortune” as
most people feel, but “a dishonest insinua-
tion that one ought to agree to a demand of
some special interest which can give no real
reason for it” (ibid., 97). To express the dete-
rioration of the current political discourse
and the endless violence to language when
the term social justice (which he believes to
be meaningless and empty) has given rise to
the expression of “global justice,” when an
ecumenical gathering of American religious
leaders referred to its opposite, namely to
“global injustice,” “as characterized by a
dimension of sin in the economic political
social sexual and class structures and system
of global society” (ibid., 80). Hayek argues
that the understanding of people as separate
individuals denies the relevance of using the
term justice in the context of a distribution
scheme even within the state or society. He
is upset by the thought that people start
thinking of distributive justice in the global
sphere. For Hayek, the concept is fraudulent
and intellectually dishonest.
Hayek’s negative approach to social jus-
tice, and his denial of the appropriateness
of applying the term “justice” to social
frameworks can be a good starting point
for understanding his objection to what he
calls the “near universal acceptance” of the
term. Starting with Mill’s understanding of
“social and distributive justice” gives Hayek
a clue to the meaning of current use of the
term. Hayek says that appropriate reading
of Mill leads to understand the demand for
social justice as “a demand that the members
of society should organize themselves in a
manner which makes it possible to assign
particular shares of the product of society
to the different individuals or groups” (ibid.,
64). This is roughly the way most theorists

have been dealing with distributive justice
during the last four decades. Hayek’s analy-
sis of the common use of the term “social”
(with reference to social justice) considers it
to be not a natural product of society or of
social process, but a conception which some
thinkers wish to impose on society (ibid.,
78). Indeed, the comprehensive use of social
or distributive justice today seems more like
a prescriptive term rather than descriptive.
Hayek argues that when this term came into
general use it meant to convey an appeal to
the ruling classes to concern themselves more
with the welfare of numerous poor people
whose interests had not received appropriate
consideration. It was an appeal to the con-
science of the upper classes to take responsi-
bility for the welfare of the poor. Gradually,
social policy became, according to Hayek’s
analysis, “the chief concern of all progressive
and good people, and ‘social’ came increas-
ingly to displace such terms as ‘ethical’ or
simply good” (ibid., 79). Even though Hayek
exaggerates the dimensions of the process,
his claim is provocative—that the concept
has expanded from the demand to recognize
the unfortunate ones as members of the same
society, to the demand that society ought
to hold itself responsible for the particu-
lar material position of its members (ibid.).
Hayek misleads his readers by saying that
society wants to assure that each member
receives what is “due” to him, but he is right
in his claim that the current understanding of
society is that of a framework which is capa-
ble of being guided in its operation by moral
principles.
Approaches such as those of Hayek or
Nozick that deny that justice ought to be
concerned about inequality, and thus, are
indifferent regarding any inequality within
the society, the state, or the nation. Those
who do believe in such equality feel that
79
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
there is a need for a more egalitarian scheme
of distribution. Current theories of distribu-
tive justice, which share the ideas that Hayek
accuses them of holding, attempt to find
the substantive content of what should be
distributed. They also consider the extent
of distribution and those who should be
the target of the distribution scheme. The
most influential theory of justice in general
and of distributive justice in particular, for
several decades, is Rawls’s theory of justice.
According to Rawls, the main answers to the
earlier question is that we should distribute
what he calls “primary goods,” to the extent
that enables each person to develop his or
her moral capabilities, and that the distribu-
tion scheme should be aimed at improving
the most deprived groups in society.
RAWLS’S EGALITARIAN VIEW
Rawls’s concept of justice is first and fore-
most political and not metaphysical. This
means that justice relates to what Rawls calls
“the basic structure of society,” which is “the
fundamental social institutions and their
arrangement into one scheme” (Rawls, 1979,
9). He refers to those institutions which
regulate or affect the distribution of wealth,
power, and status in society. Barry gives a few
examples for institutions which fall under the
basic structure, among which he includes the
rules which allocate fundamental rights and
privileges, the rules that specify how access
to political decision-making power is gained,
the rules that allow the concentration of pri-
vate decision-making power, the institutions
that determine access to professions and
occupational positions, and “the whole com-
plex of institutions (.  .  . including rules for
the acquisition and inheritance of property
Ovadia Ezra
and the system of taxation and transfers)
that determine the distribution of income
and wealth in society” (Barry, 1989, 146).
According to Rawls’s view, these institu-
tions, which basically determine the access to
resources and means within the social frame-
work, should follow two principles of justice,
the first of which governs the assignment of
rights and duties, and requires that:
1. “Each person is to have an equal right
to the most extensive basic liberty compat-
ible with a similar liberty for others” (Rawls,
1971, 60).
The second principle regulates the dis-
tribution of social and economic primary
goods, and requires that:
2. “Social and economic inequalities are to
be arranged so that they are both (a) to the
greatest benefit of the least advantaged, and
(b) attached to offices and positions open to
all under conditions of fair equality of oppor-
tunity” (ibid., 83).
This second principle, which is known as
the difference principle, can be accommo-
dated to the general conception of justice,
which is its application to all primary goods.
Rawls, who in many senses holds a Kantian
conception with regard to human nature,
considers human beings as rational, free, and
equal, and as such he ascribes to them two
moral powers. The first is the capacity for an
effective sense of justice which is the capac-
ity to understand to apply and to act from
the principles of justice. The second moral
capacity is “to form, to revise and rationally
to pursue a conception of the good” (Rawls,
1980, 525). This power expresses people’s
autonomy. Correspondingly, Rawls pre-
sumes that moral persons are motivated by
two highest order interests: to realize and to
exercise these powers. In addition they have
another interest, not a highest but a higher
interest “in protecting and advancing their
80
conception of the good as best they can,
whatever it may be” (ibid.). Rawls’s basic
idea is that people should have the minimal
requirements for developing their moral abil-
ities, and the difference principle should be
used by the institutions of the basic structure
for fulfilling these requirements.
When Rawls tries to characterize the neces-
sary requirements for developing the two moral
powers, he uses the term basic goods, which he
divides into five sections (ibid., 526):
1. The basic liberties (freedom of thought,
liberty of conscience, etc.)
2. Freedom of movement and free choice of
occupations
3. Powers and prerogatives of offices and
positions of responsibility
4. Income and wealth, understood broadly
as they must be
5. The social bases of self-respect.
Just institutions are those institutions
which regulate the distribution of these
primary goods according to the difference
principle, and thus enable moral persons to
develop their moral powers. What should be
clarified at this point is that neither Rawls,
nor other theorists intend to achieve sub-
stantive at the end of the social process.
They all want to assure the minimal welfare,
resources, or opportunities (in Rawlsian ter-
minology, the minimal amount of primary
goods) that enable human beings to realize
their essential nature as moral persons. In
other words, to provide moral persons with
the minimum they need for maintaining their
moral capabilities.
Such an approach, that considers justice
as related to institutions rather than to indi-
vidual outcomes, identifies distributive jus-
tice with social justice, as for example Barry
does (Barry, 1989, 355). Accordingly, justice

becomes an attribute of institutions, and the
justice of institutions deals with the way they
distribute benefits and burdens. For Barry,
“the currency of social or distributive justice
is one of rights and disabilities, privileges and
disadvantages, equal or unequal opportuni-
ties, power and dependency, wealth (which
is a right to control the disposition of cer-
tain resources) and poverty” (ibid.). To some
extent, distributive justice regards institu-
tions as creators of burdens and benefits, and
is aimed at their appropriate distribution.
The content and meaning of “appropriate”
or “just” distribution and what should be
distributed, to what extent and range is the
subject matter of each theory of distributive
justice.
We have already mentioned Rawls’s view
which refers to “primary goods” as what
should be distributed, and the least advan-
taged groups as those who should have pri-
ority in the distribution. His justification for
this approach was that primary goods are
necessary for the development of a person’s
moral abilities, and that it is rational or logi-
cal for people who want to reduce risks, to
choose this distributional scheme. He uses
the model of people behind a veil of igno-
rance who use the maximin principle which
leads them to make a rational choice based
upon enlightened self-interest, which leads
them to favor of a principle that distributes
resources to the least advantaged group, and
which promotes equality of opportunity.
OTHER SCHEMES OF DISTRIBUTION
DWORKIN’S VIEW
Among many ways of interpreting what
should be distributed, Dworkin’s distinction
81
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
between Equality of Welfare and Equality
of Resources is one of the most illuminat-
ing (Dworkin, 1981). Equality of welfare is
the attempt to make people equal “in terms
of happiness or the extent to which people’s
desires are satisfied” (McKerlie, 1989, 475).
Equality of resources relates to the distribu-
tion of possessions and services like wealth,
property, medical care, and so on (ibid.).
Dworkin prefers the version of equality of
resources, mainly since we cannot really
decide which of people’s desires and expec-
tations would be considered as legitimate,
for whom, and how should we compare the
extent to which people realize their expecta-
tions and desires. Equality of resources is more
applicable and measurable, and can function
as a criterion for comparison between peo-
ple. Thus, for the context of social justice, we
should suit our distributional scheme to the
concept of equality of resources. However,
unlike Rawls, who compares between groups
and imposes his distributional scheme on
groups, Dworkin denies that groups should
function as the reference for distribution
or comparison between people’s classes. In
any event, he considers Rawls’s difference
principle as an interpretation of equality of
resources, but insists that any distribution of
resources should apply only to individuals
and not to classes (Dworkin, 1981).
THE CAPABILITIES APPROACH
(OR THE HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
APPROACH)
This approach was developed and elaborated
by Sen and Nussbaum, and roughly defined
as “an approach to comparative quality-of-
life assessment and to theorizing about social
justice” (Nussbaum, 2011, 18). This approach
focuses on choice and freedom, and main-
tains that the key question for comparing
Ovadia Ezra
between societies and for assessing basic
decency and justice is “what is each person
able to do and to be” (ibid.). Regarding each
individual as an end this approach does not
deal with the total or average well-being,
but with the opportunities which are open
to each individual. Since individuals’ capa-
bilities differ between different individuals
not only in quantity but also in quality, this
approach requires that we try to understand
each person’s capabilities and demand that
government and public policy improve the
quality of peoples’ lives as defined by their
individual capabilities (ibid.).
Similar to Rawls’s demand that peo-
ple should have the minimal quantity of
primary goods to develop their moral
capabilities, Nussbaum believes that each
government has to enable its citizens to pur-
sue a dignified and minimally flourishing
life. Thus, a decent or just political frame-
work should provide all its citizens with
at least a threshold level of what she calls
Central Capabilities. She mentions ten such
capabilities:
  1. Life
  2. Bodily Health
  3. Bodily Integrity
  4. Senses, Imagination, and Thought
  5. Emotions
  6. Practical Reason
  7. Affiliation
  8. Other Species (in the sense of being able
to live with concern for animals, plants,
and the world of nature)
  9. Play
10. Control Over One’s Environment (ibid.,
33–34).
However, this approach insists that we
should think of each individual’s specific
capabilities, and enable him or her to develop
82
these capabilities and enjoy a dignified and
flourishing life.
Unlike Rawls’s theory, which concentrates
on the distribution of primary goods, Sen’s
view concentrates on opportunities. In The
Idea of Justice, Sen presents the capabilities
approach as a “general approach, focusing
on information on individual advantages,
judged in terms of opportunities rather than
a specific ‘design’ for how a society should be
organized” (Sen, 2009, 232). Thus, he rejects
Rawls’s idea of primary goods, as a means
for other things, while emphasizing that dis-
tributional scheme should be concentrated
on opportunities (ibid., 234).
The capability approach is based upon
two concepts. The first is functioning, which
reflects the spectrum of things which a per-
son may value doing or being. This spectrum
includes very basic desires such as being pro-
tected against avoidable disease and complex
states or activities such as being part of a
community. The other concept is capability,
which refers to combinations of function-
ings which are actually feasible for a person.
This makes capability the substantive free-
dom to achieve various lifestyles (Sen, 1999,
75). The capability approach is demand-
ing us to expand the alternative function-
ing combinations from which a person can
practically choose. For this, there is a need
for two types of information: one is what
a person is able to choose, and the other is
what this person actually does, that is which
alternative he or she practically realizes.
The assessment of the realization of justice
according to the capability approach should
not be measured in terms of the resources or
primary goods people actually hold, but in
terms of “the freedom they actually enjoy to
choose the lives they have reason to value”
(Sen, 1992, 81).

DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE AND
EQUALITY OF OPPORTUNITY
The prescriptive demands of many of the
current theories of distributive justice can be
reduced, either directly or indirectly, to the
demand to provide people with real equal-
ity of opportunity. Rawls argues this explic-
itly when insisting on terms of fair equality
of opportunity in his differential principle
of justice, while Sen demands it indirectly
by insisting on people’s freedom to choose,
and this practically means a demand to
enlarge people’s opportunities. The first and
foremost implication of the interpretation
of distributive justice in terms of equality
of opportunity is the claim that distributive
justice does not intend to achieve equality
in consequences, results, or achievements. It
does require that people be able to realize
certain capabilities or essential characteris-
tics we ascribe to them while regarding them
as human beings. Translating this idea into
political theory means that we try to reduce
inequalities in people’s access to goods which
they need, value, or desire (depending on the
theory of distributive justice with which we
deal). Williams, for example, argues that the
concept of equality of opportunity is designed
to secure certain goods for every member of
society. This term becomes relevant to politi-
cal discourse when we deal with access to
three kinds of goods: (1) goods desired by all
or most people; (2) goods which are said to
be earned or achieved; or (3) goods which are
not available to all who desire them. What
we try to assure through a distributional
policy which tries to promote equality of
opportunity, according to Williams’s view, is
that limited goods will not be distributed in
a way that a priori excludes any person who
may desire them. What he means by a priori
83
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
exclusion is an exclusion which is based on
irrelevant, inappropriate, irrational, or
unreasonable grounds in obtaining the lim-
ited goods in question (Williams, 1962, 124–
125). Irrelevant grounds include race, gender,
color, and socioeconomic background. In any
event, what we seek when we translate dis-
tributive justice to equality of opportunity is
to reduce inequalities in people’s accessibility
to goods which are necessary for the realiza-
tion of their essence as human beings.
FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE
For those who consider distributive justice
not only as a theoretical issue but also as a
policy that should be applied, governmental
action is acutely necessary for promoting
justice. However, governmental control of
the just distribution of benefits and burdens,
as well as policy that aims at promoting dis-
tributive justice are not the only means for
achieving this aim. Indeed, the state as the
major framework within which people con-
sider themselves as sharing common (and
often mutual) obligations and loyalties is
the main factor in regulating the distribu-
tion of benefits and burdens among its citi-
zens, first and foremost through legislation
and official practices, statutes, and policy.
But a significant role in reducing social and
economic inequalities in society is fulfilled
by nongovernmental and private bodies and
organizations.
Many social and economic practices have
their roots in the idea of distributive justice,
and they became so frequent and familiar
that their comprehensive acceptance causes
us to forget their principal grounds. The idea
of differential taxation, which takes a larger
Ovadia Ezra
share of taxes from those who earn more and
exempts those who earn a minimal wage,
or even the whole idea of social security,
expresses the concept of distributive justice.
In Rawlsian terms, we have already inserted
certain requirements of distributive justice
into the basic structure of society.
However, there are other, more contro-
versial, policies, such as affirmative action
programs (either through hiring for desired
positions or through the acceptance of
members of deprived groups to prestigious
programs in higher education institutions),
became familiar practices in society, while
being backed, promoted, and even sup-
ported by governments. Another controver-
sial practice is the estate tax or inheritance
tax. This tax in its various versions becomes
an effective, as well as available instrument
to redistribute the incredible wealth which
is sometimes held by a few people in many
modern countries. This tax is one of the most
significant means for reducing economic ine-
qualities in society.
There are many other practices, statues,
regulations, and policies through which gov-
ernments, directly and indirectly, try to mini-
mize poverty, reduce inequality, and promote
distributive justice among their citizens. The
acceptance of these practices as well as of
many others during the last two generations
resulted partly from the acknowledgment of
basic welfare rights that should be assured to
every human being in an enlightened society,
but mainly from the immense accumulation
of wealth which is held in many countries by
very few people and causes incredible ine-
qualities between people who belong to the
same social and political frameworks. These
inequalities pushed governments to carry
out rehabilitation initiatives and legislation
that were meant to reduce these inequalities,
and give people from deprived groups and
84
backgrounds the chance of being full-fledged
members of their society. In any event, many
governmental initiatives to promote distribu-
tive justice remain within the boundaries of
nation-states, expressing social responsibility
for citizens, assuming that this is the duty of
the government.
However, many of the current programs
that promote distributive justice are carried
out either by private or by public nongovern-
mental bodies and institutions (sometimes
with governmental support or coordination,
and many times separately and free of any
governmental involvement). The withdrawal
of governments from many social and wel-
fare domains on the one hand, and the rise
of the civil society as a significant factor in
society and communal life, imposes social
responsibility on many nongovernmental
organizations, some of which are local, but
many are part of international movements
and organizations. These organizations take
responsibility and try to improve the welfare
of people, not only in their own countries,
but also in other deprived areas.
GLOBAL DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
The moral principles that justify distributive
justice within the state can also be used, to
some extent and with appropriate modifica-
tions, at the international level. These prin-
ciples become relevant to the global sphere
if we adopt the idea of the essential equal-
ity in value between all human beings, as
such, regardless of the question where they
live or act. Considering all people as shar-
ing this essential characteristic enables us to
say that the mutual responsibility and soli-
darity among human beings should not end
or stop at the borders of their own political

framework or state. The situation where
there are huge differences in the very basic
elements of human life, first and foremost in
life expectancy and nutrition, between people
in different countries, has made the demand
for international efforts to reduce such ine-
qualities an urgent moral imperative.
In the background of this urgency lay
the appalling statistics on people’s welfare
around the world, which indicate marked
differences between rich and poor countries
even in the twenty-first century. For example,
while the World Bank defines the level of $2
(US) a day as the global poverty line, and the
level of $1.25 as the extreme poverty line, in
2005, about 900 million people lived under
this line.2 Other statistics indicate a differ-
ence of 30 years in life expectancy between
rich countries and poor countries.3 In 2008,
about 8.8 million children under the age of
5 years died, and about 40 percent of them
came from three countries: India, Nigeria,
and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.4
These and other distressing data raised the
demand for global justice, and not only char-
ity, benevolence, or good will.
JUST DISTRIBUTION IN THE
GLOBAL SPHERE
For those who principally accept the idea of
distributive justice within the state, there is
still a need to show why people in a certain
country should care about people in other
countries, with whom they allegedly do
not have any formal or legal relations, and
thus do not feel any communion. In other
words, why should distributive justice and
mutual social responsibility expand beyond
the borders of the nation-state? After giv-
ing a reasonable or accepted answer to this
85
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
question, the discussion should concentrate
on the extent to which rich countries should
help the poor, and why, after all, the duty to
help the poor remains within the framework
of national states and international organi-
zations, rather than being understood as a
duty which is imposed on every human being
wherever he or she lives.
There are several ways to deal with the
first question, regarding the need to disre-
gard the boundaries of states when distrib-
uting resources. One is the humanitarian
approach which was offered by Singer and
elaborated and developed by Barry. This
argument presumes:
1. That the suffering or dying from lack of
food, shelter, or medical care is morally
bad.
2. If we can prevent something bad from
happening with a minimal sacrifice, we
morally ought to do it.
This rationale brings Barry to follow
Singer and conclude that “humanity requires
that rich countries give aid to poor ones”
(Singer, 1972, Barry, 2008).
Another way to justify the transfer of
resources from rich countries to the poor
comes from the concept of justice. Here there
are several ways of justifying this transfer.
One is the claim that there should be a global
distribution of resources, since their natural
location is arbitrary, and in the same man-
ner that we try to repair the arbitrariness of
distribution of resources and wealth within
the state, we should do so at the global
level. This argument presumes that nation-
states have no exclusive rights on the natural
resources which are located on their terri-
tory, and these resources should be globally
redistributed. Such an argument is raised, for
example, by Beitz (2008).
Ovadia Ezra
The idea of Global Distributive Justice
has a more comprehensive view not only on
the distribution of benefits and burdens, but
also on the way we consider peoples’ mutual
interactions and interrelations on this planet.
The essential core of the demand for a global
distributive justice is our belief that the tradi-
tional separation of intranational and inter-
national relations should be broken. Pogge,
one of the most profound current theorists
of Global Justice, and Follesdal give moral
and geopolitical reasons for this conceptual
reorientation. Their political claim is that the
traditional concept of international relations
as consisting only of states is untenable due
to the stature of other factors in the interna-
tional stage, such as multinational corpora-
tions, international organizations, regional
associations, NGO’s, and so on (Follesdal
and Pogge, 2005, 5). The ethical implication
of this political situation is that people’s lives
are now affected by decisions of external
institutions and bodies (the World Bank, the
World Trade Organization, the International
Monetary Fund, etc.), so that it is no longer
morally plausible or adequate to consider
the state governments’ interests as the only
moral and political considerations relevant
for international relations. There is less and
less sense in considering nation-states as
unique and ultimate whether as the owners
of the resources within their territories, or
the unique and ultimate bodies who repre-
sent the interests of their citizens (particularly
in developing countries where governments
rule their citizens by force). Thus there is a
need for expanding both the discussion and
practice of justice beyond the borders of
states, and to consider distributive justice as
something which should be implemented in
the global sphere.
This does not necessarily require that we
should adopt cosmopolitanism as the only
86
or the dominant political conception. Indeed,
cosmopolitanism gives the strongest ground
and justification for a global distributive jus-
tice, since its central idea is “that every human
being has a global stature as an ultimate unit
of moral concern” as Pogge puts it (Pogge,
2002, 169). Pogge, whose central interest is
promoting human rights in the global sphere,
suggests the idea of cosmopolitanism as a
ground for assuring human rights for indi-
viduals wherever they are. His ethical con-
cept of Interactional Cosmopolitanism refers
to the conduct of persons and groups, and
assigns responsibility for the fulfillment of
human rights on other individuals. However,
for the matter of justice, he needs a politi-
cal concept: Institutional Cosmopolitanism.
This concept postulates certain fundamental
principles of social justice, and assigns the
responsibility for the fulfillment of human
rights on international schemes (ibid., 170).
However, even Pogge realizes that “so long
as there is a plurality of self-contained cul-
tures, the responsibility for unfulfilled human
rights does not extend beyond their bounda-
ries” (ibid., 171). In such a world, instead of
imposing principles of justice on rich states,
assuming that it is their moral obligation, the
fulfillment of (mainly welfare and economic)
human rights in developed countries remains
dependent on their benevolence, and many
times is turned into charity. Pogge’s first and
foremost justification for the demand to
impose global justice, that is, “to eradicate
the severe poverty that currently blights the
lives of nearly half of the human population,”
seems to many, particularly in rich countries,
as someone else’s problem (Pogge, 2010, 12).
Even though, as Pogge estimates, a 2 percent
shift in the distribution of global household
income can achieve this aim, there is a need
for a more convincing reason for recruiting
a global effort to redistribute wealth and

income between the rich and poor countries,
since the moral conception of social justice is
still far from being universalistic or univer-
sally accepted.
Pogge thinks that in order to be universalis-
tic, a moral conception (such as that of social
justice) has to fulfill three conditions: First,
it subjects all persons to the same system of
fundamental moral principles; second, these
principles assign the same moral benefits and
burdens to all; and third, these benefits and
burdens are formulated in general terms so as
not to privilege or disadvantage certain indi-
viduals or groups arbitrarily (Pogge, 2002,
92). So far, the global share of moral princi-
ples is far from being a reality, and still people
feel a lot more kinship and relation to people
from their own nationality, culture, religion,
and even race and language. Thus, moral cos-
mopolitism is still far from being acceptable,
and is currently considered as a utopian vision.
Pogge may be right in his claim that the tra-
ditional realm of international relations has
undergone two major transformations—the
proliferation of international, transnational,
supernational, and multinational actors (UN,
EU, IMF, etc.) and the profound influence of
rules and activities of these organizations on
the domestic life of national societies (Pogge,
2010, 14). However, this process has not yet
been expressed in the ethical and political
spheres. Thus, a sincere effort to promote glo-
bal distributive justice should remain within
the political frameworks of states and govern-
ments, within which people still feel a certain
measure of solidarity and mutuality. However,
it should find common denominators where
people in different states feel that their lives
are linked together, and that they share some
segments of life. This can establish, at least to
some extent, mutual responsibility between
people, through the intermediation of their
governments.
87
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
WHY NOT GLOBAL RETRIBUTIVE
JUSTICE AND COMPENSATION
One way to justify the demand for justice
for the peoples of developing countries is
to appeal to principles of retributive jus-
tice. Such an appeal presumes that “many
things which are done in a world of inter-
national trade and economic activity should
be changed because they are in themselves
unjust” (Dower, 1993, 274). This injustice
results from the exploitation of resources and
of cheap labor in the developing countries,
and the demand that rich countries, as ben-
eficiaries of this injustice, should “stop active
injustice as well, and also make recompense
for what has been done” (ibid., 275).
This call for compensation encounters
several difficulties that raise doubts about
its ability to establish a solid moral obliga-
tion on the part of the rich countries, and
an appropriate moral entitlement or a valid
claim for justice on the part of the poor coun-
tries. The main problem is that the acknowl-
edged principles of retributive justice, since
their first use in Aristotle’s writings, require
that compensation be demanded from the
person, institution, or group who is directly
or indirectly responsible for the damage to
be compensated. Additionally, the compen-
sation should be given to the direct or indi-
rect victim of the evil which grounds the
demand for compensation. However, since
we demand justice and not charity (which is
usually an appeal to individuals, and requires
mercy, kindness, and compassion), we wish
to impose the duty to carry out justice on
states. However, even though it is clear that
many of the residents of rich countries were
beneficiaries of past exploitation, it is not
easy to transfer the duty of compensation
to the state. Additionally, some of the cur-
rent rich countries were not involved in past
Ovadia Ezra
exploitation, and some did not exist until
recently as independent states, so imposing
the duty to compensate for something in
which they were not involved would be an
injustice in itself. This problem exists also on
the part of the recipients of the compensa-
tion. A country which was not exploited in
the past, but currently is extremely poor, will
not be assisted according to the principles of
retributive justice.
In any event, the two main reasons for
insisting on the demand for global distributive
justice rather than on demanding retributive
justice are related to the desire to include as
many countries as possible both on the part
of the giving states, as well as on the receiving
states. Currently rich countries which were
not involved in past atrocities or exploitation
(such as Norway, e.g. whose wealth comes
from oil fields which just recently were dis-
covered in its territory) bear the duty to help
poor countries not because of their past guilt,
but because of demands for global distribu-
tive justice (which will soon be presented).
The other reason refers to the identity of the
receiving countries. There are many poor
countries, whose misery does not necessar-
ily result from exploitation, and sometimes it
even results from internal conflicts and civil
wars. If the assistance to poor countries will
be dependent on past (or present) exploita-
tion, such countries will not have a claim to
be assisted, something which might starve
their citizens. The desire to impose the duty
to help poor countries on every rich coun-
try on the one hand, and to include every
poor country on the receiving side, makes
retributive justice insufficient to establish a
demand for imposing principles of global
justice. We should demand justice from rich
states regardless of their liability or account-
ability for past evils, and assist poor coun-
tries regardless of past exploitation. Thus
88
the current attempts to justify the assistance
of poor countries by the rich are frequently
grounded on principles of distributive jus-
tice, with the appropriate adjustments and
modifications of such principles to the global
sphere.
GLOBAL DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE AND
GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE
The urgent need for a global cooperation and
governmental responsibility for global acute
issues was not raised in the context of world
hunger or extreme poverty (which is Pogge’s
and Singer’s main concern) but in the con-
text of the environmental crisis in general,
and the danger of global heat in particular.
Until the end of the twentieth century this
crisis had been considered, like many other
global issues, as something that should be
dealt with exclusively by the developed and
industrialized countries. Most of the coun-
tries considered as the main human cause of
global warming, due to their massive share in
greenhouse gas emission to the atmosphere,
believed that it is their responsibility to
reduce that emission and to reduce the risk of
global heat. Indeed, the last international offi-
cial document before the twenty-first century
that dealt with this issue, the Kyoto Protocol,
was an agreement that imposed burdens only
on countries which were part of “Annex I” to
the protocol, which were basically the indus-
trial countries.5 On developing countries,
this protocol did not impose any obligations
to reduce emissions. This protocol expressed
the separation of the world into rich, indus-
trialized, and developed countries on the one
hand, and poor and developing countries
on the other. Accordingly the world order,
including the share of benefits and burdens,

was considered as something that should be
arranged, controlled, and dominated by the
rich and developed countries. Adopting the
traditional attitude toward the global dis-
tribution of benefits and wealth, which left
the developing countries outside the circle
of decision making, this protocol regarded
developing countries as passive, and thus, left
them outside the circle of the international
efforts to reduce the danger of global heat.
Global distribution of wealth was still con-
sidered to be charity and dependent on the
good will and benevolence of the rich coun-
tries that control the world, for better or for
worse. In the same manner, global distribu-
tion of burdens, such as greenhouse gas emis-
sions, remained a problem for rich countries
to deal with.
The results of the Kyoto Protocol were
disappointing, largely because the major
country responsible for greenhouse gas emis-
sions at that time, namely the United States,
did not join and sign the protocol. Another
factor that raised the need to expand the cir-
cle of states which should reduce greenhouse
emissions was the rapid industrial develop-
ment in some developing countries, first and
foremost, in the most populated states in the
world: China and India. This development
caused an increasing use of energy both for
private use (such as private cars and home
electricity) and for the use of huge indus-
trial corporations and factories which were
immensely enlarged. At this point, develop-
ing countries became a factor that was no
longer marginal when considering the global
distribution of benefits and burdens, at least
with regard to greenhouse gas emission. This
made the Copenhagen conference on climate
change in December 2009, a unique oppor-
tunity for developing countries to express
their presence in the global political sphere,
and their objections to the concept that gave
89
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
domination to the industrial countries on
distributing global burdens and benefits.
Not surprisingly, even at this meeting there
was a secret document that was prepared by
the Danish delegation and a few members of
developed countries, which was called “the
Danish Text.” This document gave the rich
countries the power to dominate the distri-
bution of the huge amount of money that
was supposed to be distributed to poor coun-
tries for their share in the final agreement.
However, this time the developing countries
rejected the idea that the distribution of
benefits and burdens would exclusively be
decided by rich countries, and demanded to
have a say in global issues, maintaining that
their preferences and needs should be seri-
ously considered at the global level.
That conference ended with an informal
agreement between the United States, and
“the BASIC countries,” China, India, Brazil,
and South Africa, which threatened that they
walk out of the conference if the developed
countries forced their own terms on the
developing countries. Even though the final
agreement was imperfect, it raised, for the
first time, the need to associate also poor
countries in decisions regarding the global
distribution of benefits and burdens.6 This
event established a new way of considering
global distributive justice.
Previous environmental disputes such as
the deforestation of rain forests, referred
only to the countries that should be involved
in the solution to those disputes (in this
example, those countries within which there
are rain forests). With regard to the prob-
lems that might be caused by climate change,
every country is involved, at different levels
and to different extents, both in causing the
problem, and more importantly, in resolving
it. The need to reduce greenhouse gas emis-
sions even in poor countries raised other
Ovadia Ezra
problems, such as poverty, health, life expect-
ancy, child mortality, illiteracy, and so on,
as problems that should be globally solved,
through genuine global distributive justice,
and not through charity. In this manner, the
demand that poor countries should share the
burden of reducing emissions to the com-
mon atmosphere would be balanced by the
demand that the rich countries should share
the burden of reducing absolute poverty on
the common planet.
The connection between Global Distributive
Justice and Global Environmental Justice
follows previous attempts to challenge
the exclusive rights of countries to benefit
from the resources which are found within
their territories. These attempts refer to the
arbitrariness of the distribution of natural
resources such as oil and minerals among
states, and demand that at least a small part
of the benefits from these resources should
be globally distributed. Politicians in rich
countries (as well as many libertarian theo-
rists) have difficulties in accepting or even
understanding this type of argument, in the
same manner as politicians in developing
countries such as Brazil have difficulties in
considering the rain forests as something
whose treatment and use should involve glo-
bal considerations. However, the dangers of
the new environmental crisis are much easier
to understand. It is much easier to consider
the atmosphere as common, and the green-
house gas emissions as something whose
usage should involve global considerations,
and should be distributed under conditions
of justice and fairness. The territorial myth
about the exclusiveness of national coun-
tries to use the natural resources beneath
their land is no longer convincing when we
speak about resources which are located
above those countries’ land. Thus, the com-
mon destiny that results from dangers which
90
are located up in the atmosphere becomes
a factor in considering the common destiny
down on earth, as well as beneath it. This is
the new and promising way to enforce global
distributive justice on those for whom moral-
ity and ethical considerations of justice were
not convincing enough until the recent crisis
of climate change appeared. Utterances such
as that of the former US President George H.
W. Bush, that “the American way of life is
not negotiable”7 became no longer relevant
when it was realized that the Chinese and
Indian way of life should also be negotiable.
PRACTICES AND AIMS OF GLOBAL
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE PROJECTS
AND INITIATIVES
We saw earlier that in Domestic Distributive
Justice the minimal demand is only to reduce
outrageous inequalities and to provide each
member of society with the minimal welfare
necessary for developing moral abilities and
preserving human nature. In the same manner,
we do not look for global equality; nor do we
ask that developing countries enjoy the wel-
fare and standard of living in developed coun-
tries (which is significantly varied among and
within the rich countries too). We also content
ourselves with minimizing greenhouse gas
emissions in industrial countries, but we do
not expect them to reach the levels of devel-
oping countries. We will be satisfied with rea-
sonably and responsibly restricting the use of
energy, and with restraining uncontrollable
irresponsibility in the matter of greenhouse
gas emissions. The same modesty and mini-
malism characterizes current initiatives and
practices of global distributive justice.
The first comprehensive and sincere ini-
tiative to reduce extreme poverty began in

1970, and demanded that the governments
of the rich countries should commit 0.7 per-
cent of their Gross National Product (GNP)
to the Official Development Assistance
(ODA) project for the poor countries. This
target had not yet been achieved (and will
not be achieved until 2015), but in 2002, the
United Nations began a comprehensive and
ambitious project that expresses a genuine
desire to realize global solidarity and mutual
responsibility through distributive justice:
the UN Millennium Project.8 This project
has 8 goals and 18 targets. The first goal is to
eradicate extreme hunger and poverty. This
aim is to halve the number of people who
live in extreme poverty and hunger between
the years of 1990 and 2015. The second goal
to be achieved by 2015 is that every girl and
boy everywhere will be able to complete a
full course of primary schooling. Another
goal is to reduce by two-thirds childhood
mortality rates between 1990 and 2015, and
by three-quarters maternal mortality rates.
Other goals are to combat HIV/AIDS and
malaria, and more. What we see is that when
we speak of Global Distributive Justice, we
content ourselves with minimal demands
such as reducing extreme poverty, hoping
that even on these minimal goals, the inter-
national community will be able to establish
a consensus, and allocate financial and mate-
rial resources.
Today there are many projects that are
run by private institutions and NGO’s that
are much smaller than the UN Millennium
Project, but many of them are quite successful.
One example of such a project is The Health
Impact Fund whose president is Pogge. This
project tries to make new medicines which
are protected by patents accessible also to
poor people in poor countries. The project
is financed by governments and donors and
offers patentees the option to forgo monopoly
91
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
pricing in exchange for a reward based on the
global health impact of their new medicines.
Companies who register with this project sell
the medicine globally at cost, and in return
receive for a fixed time, payments based on
the product’s assessed global health impact.
Since this project has a huge budget, which
is divided up in proportion to the assessed
health impact of each product each year,
firms have an interest to earn a share of the
money by developing and distributing new
medicines to obtain the largest possible global
health impact.9 This project promotes global
distributive justice by encouraging medicine
producers, as well as state governments to
go beyond the usual market economy and
consider a more comprehensive and consider-
ate way to benefit from their products. Such
projects have more chance of being successful,
since they offer a model that gives profit to
the producers of goods, and make these goods
available for many who otherwise would not
be able to enjoy them.
Another project is The United Nations
Collaborative Programme on Reducing
Emissions from Deforestation and Forest
Degradation in Developing Countries.
This program was launched in September
2008, and is aimed at Reducing Emissions
from Deforestation and forest Degradation
(REDD) in developing countries. This project
connects many organizations, such as the
Food and Agriculture Organization of the
United Nations (FAO), the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP), and the
United Nations Environment Programme
(UNEP).10 Together with its continuing pro-
gram REDD+, this project hopes to help
developing countries not only to reduce
emissions but also to internalize the ideas
of conservation, sustainable management of
forests, and enhancement of forest carbon
stocks.11
Ovadia Ezra
Projects such as the REDD shows that
the environmental crisis puts people around
the world under common dangers, exposes
them to common threats, and in some sense
creates a common destiny for all people.
Overcoming these threats requires a new
concept of social justice which regards
people as both subjects and addressees of
the demands for justice. The traditional
approach in which distributive justice was
limited only to the national or domes-
tic boundaries becomes less and less rel-
evant, and in many senses has already been
replaced by a more global concept.
Notes
1
http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/
2
http://www.adb.org/Documents/Presentations/
New-Poverty-Estimates/Poverty-Data-
Implications.pdf
3
http://www.commondreams.org/
archive/2007/09/07/3697
4
http://www.unicef.org/childsurvival/
index_51095.html
5
For the English version of the protocol see:
http://unfccc.int/key_documents/kyoto_proto-
col/items/6445.php
6
It demanded of the United States, for
example, to reduce only 4 percent greenhouse
gas emission between 1990 and 2020, while
China should reduce emissions between
25 percent and 40 percent between the years
of 2005 and 2020, and India between
20 percent and 25 percent between 2005 and
2020.
7
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/
2012/jun/19/rio-20-earth-summit-1992-
2012
8
http://www.unmillenniumproject.org/goals/gti.
htm#goal1
9
http://healthimpactfund.org/the-health-impact-
fund-a-summary-overview/
10
http://www.un-redd.org/About
UNREDDProgramme/tabid/583/Default.aspx
11
http://www.un-redd.org/AboutREDD/
tabid/582/Default.aspx
92
WORKS CITED
Aristotle (1947), “Nicomachean Ethics,”
in R. McKeon (ed.), Introduction to
Aristotle. New York: The Modern
Library.
Barry, B. (1989), Theories of Justice.
Berkeley, CA: University of California
Press.
— (2008), “Humanity and Justice in Global
Perspective,” in T. Pogge and
D. Moellendorf (eds), Global Justice.
St. Paul, MN: Paragon House.
Beitz, C. R. (2008), “Justice and
International Relations,” in T. Pogge and
D. Moellendorf (eds), Global Justice.
St. Paul, MN: Paragon House.
Dower, N. (1993), “World Poverty,” in
P. Singer (ed.), A Companion to Ethics.
Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
Dworkin, R. (1981), “What is Equality?
Part 1: Equality of Welfare,” Philosophy
and Public Affairs, 10 (3) (Summer):
185–246; and “What is Equality? Part 2:
Equality of Resources,” Philosophy and
Public Affairs, 10 (4) (Fall): 283–345.
— (1986), A Matter of Principle. Oxford:
Clarendon Press.
— (1977), Taking Rights Seriously.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Follesdal, A. and Pogge, T. (2005),
“Introduction,” in A. Follesdal and
T. Pogge (eds), Real World Justice.
Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Springer.
Hayek, F. A. (1976), Law Legislation and
Liberty, Vol. 2. London and Henly:
Routledge & Kegan Paul.
— (1978), New Studies in Philosophy,
Politics, Economics and the History of
Ideas. London and Henly: Routledge &
Kegan Paul.
McKerlie, D. (1989), “Equality and Time,”
Ethics, 99 (April): 475–491.

Nozick, R. (1974), Anarchy, State and
Utopia. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
Nussbaum, M. C. (2011), Creating
Capabilities. Cambridge, MA: The
Belknap Press of Harvard University
Press.
Pogge, T. (2002), World Poverty and Human
Rights. Cambridge: Polity Press.
— (2005), Global Institutions and
Responsibilities: Achieving Global Justice.
Malden, MA: Blackwell.
— (2010), Politics as Usual. Malden, MA:
Polity Press.
Postema, G. J. (1989), “In Defense of
`French Nonsense: Fundamental Rights
in Constitutional Jurisprudence,” in B.
Zenon and M. Neil (eds), Enlightenment,
Rights and Revolution. Aberdeen:
Aberdeen University Press.
Rawls, J. (1971), A Theory of Justice.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
— (1979), “A Well-Ordered Society,” in
P. Laslet and J. Fishkin (eds), Philosophy
93
DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
Politics and Society, 5th edn. Oxford:
Basil Blackwell.
— (1980), “Kantian Constructivism in
Moral Theory,” Journal of Philosophy,
LXXVII (9): 515–572.
Sen, A. (1992), Inequality Reexamined.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
— (1999), Development as Freedom. New
York: Alfred A. Knopf.
— (2009), The Idea of Justice. Cambridge,
MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard
University Press.
Singer, P. (1972), “Famine, Affluence and
Morality,” Philosophy and Public Affairs,
1(3): 229–243.
Thomson, J. J. (1990), The Realm of Rights.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
Williams, B. (1962), “The Idea of Equality,”
in P. Laslett and W. G. Runciman (eds),
Philosophy, Politics and Society (Second
Series). Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
 6
REASSESSING PUNISHMENT:
RETRIBUTIVE VERSUS
RESTORATIVE JUSTICE
Trudy D. Conway
Justice must always question itself, just as society can exist only by means of the work it does on
itself and on its institutions. (Foucault, 1983)
Punishment is clearly an institutional prac-
tice worth questioning. Yet most of us, rarely
notice or think about it, let alone rigorously
question its rationale, reach, and repercus-
sion. Removed from the everyday activities
of our lives, we are not struck by questions
raised behind the secured doors of court-
rooms and prisons. Yet the questions remain,
haunting lives shaped by the work of these
institutions. Are these institutions focused
on retributive justice (the assigning of what
is justly due to violators of the law), restora-
tive justice (the reparative healing of persons
and relations damaged by offenders), or the
avoidance of injustice (the deterring of disor-
der causing misery); are courts and prisons
institutions for manifesting the power of the
state, furthering individual and communal
well-being or maintaining entrenched societal
structures and orders? Victims and offenders
are thrust into questions not surfacing within
the daily concerns of many persons.
***
95
In June 2013 Paula Cooper, a ­16-year-old
sentenced to death by electrocution, was
released from an Indiana prison at the age
of 43. Cooper had been sentenced to death
for the 1985 petty robbery and brutal
murder of Ruth Pelke, a 78-year-old Bible
teacher. Initially passionately supportive of
Cooper’s execution, Pelke’s grandson Bill
became an equally passionate participant in
national and international efforts to overturn
Cooper’s death sentence (King, 2003, Pelke,
2003). In 1989, the Indiana Supreme Court
commuted Cooper’s sentence to 60  years, a
sentence further reduced for good behavior
and engagement in educational and service
activities. During her imprisonment, Cooper
completed a high school and college degree
correspondence program and served as a
trainer of companion dogs for disabled per-
sons and inmate counselor. Based on her
behavior, Paula received permission to par-
ticipate in a work release program enabling
her to contribute earnings to victim support
programs. Meeting with Cooper upon her
Trudy D. Conway
release, Pelke reiterated his commitment to
supporting her efforts to begin life anew fol-
lowing 28 years of imprisonment. In a 2004
Indianapolis Star interview, Cooper stated
that, “Everybody has a responsibility to do
right . . ., and if you do wrong, you should be
punished,” adding that “rehabilitation comes
from you. If you’re not ready to be rehabili-
tated, you won’t be.”1
JUST RETRIBUTION
Paula Cooper’s punishment, commutation,
and release focus well a range of responses to
fundamental questions about state responses
to illegal wrongdoing. They also bring us to
address the fundamental questions—why and
how should the state punish? Since the time
of Socrates’s imprisonment and execution,
philosophers have grappled with questions
regarding punishment on both theoretical
and practical levels. Historical, sociological,
economic, psychological, and legal consid-
erations have only deepened our awareness
of the complexity of punishment and our
responses to it. The three decade span of the
Paula Cooper case reveals the reassessments
of approaches to punishment found in delib-
erations about punishment since the trial
of Socrates. Shifting historical emphases on
retribution, deterrence, and restoration char-
acterize our deliberations about this human
practice and institution. The last half century
of American society mirrors such shifting
understandings of why and how the state
should punish.
There appears to be agreement that harm-
ful wrongdoing does and should evoke
response; such reasoning is found within
relationships, families, communities, and
civil societies. Failure to respond manifests
a callous disregard of persons who are,
could have been or could still be the targets
96
of such action. Social biologists argue that
instinctual responses of anger are a result of
our evolutionary development, for human
survival required responses conveying that
harmful wrongdoing would not go unad-
dressed. The call for punishment appears to
be traceable to this elemental and visceral
response. In raising children, failures to care
about and respond to harmful wrongdoing,
be it by children or caretakers, justifiably
elicit concern. Callous indifference to harms
done to others reveals a narrow focusing
on self-concern. Aristotle describes anger as
a response to perceived injustice, slight, or
injury, while recognizing the challenge of
responding with righteous anger to the right
person, at the right time, to the right extent,
for the right duration, in the right manner,
and for the right reason (Aristotle, 1941,
1380–1381, 1999, 61–62, 80). Avoiding the
extremes of indifference or inappropriately
tepid anger and the varied forms of excessive
anger, persons are called to work on cultivat-
ing virtuous anger described as a righteous
response leaning more toward the deficient
and evidencing a propensity toward mildness
and away from revenge (Aristotle, 1999, 26).
A person who has cultivated such a response
“is ready to pardon, not eager to exact a pen-
alty” (61). While adumbrating the contours
of such virtuous response, Aristotle cautions
us to recognize the difficulty of hitting such
a mean, resulting in the virtuous response
being “rare, praiseworthy, and fine” (29).
Such righteous anger requires the exercising
of practical wisdom, seasoned deliberation
about how to respond to the anger-evoking
offender.
In a similar way, citizens hold states respon-
sible for responding to harmful wrongdoing.
This development took the power to impose
punishment away from private individuals,
establishing a legal system which retained a

retaliatory principle, requiring that wrong-
doers suffer for their actions, but transferred
its application from victims to the state. In
doing so, the legal system asserted the power
of the state against the law-violating offender,
allowing victims and affiliated persons to play
a role solely as witnesses in a process focused
on due process and the rights of offenders in
the meeting out of punishment for legal viola-
tions. Such a state versus offender approach
conducted through the adversarial roles
of prosecutors and defense attorneys often
sidelines the needs and concerns of victims
and affiliated persons, thereby resulting in
the state focusing on a violation of the legal
system.
Private response came to be replaced by
a civic, suitably restrained system of public
punishment directed by the state through a
legal system providing for trials and pun-
ishment of convicted offenders. States were
invested with the responsibility of respond-
ing to wrongdoing codified as illegal. In vio-
lating laws binding citizens across and within
generations in ways that make shared civic
life possible, offenders anger members of
society who refuse to commit such offenses.
Such offenders not only harm victims, but
also violate the trust, goodwill, and solidarity
essential to communal life. Acting as moral
free-riders, they benefit from, while violating,
the rule of law enabling civic life. The desire
for retaliatory punishment stems from the
expectation that such persons must be held
accountable for the wrongs they have com-
mitted against fellow persons. Offenders are
seen as the proper targets of righteous anger,
followed by the desire to retaliate and make
wrongdoers pay for their crimes in terms of
just reciprocity. Law-abiding citizens seek
to be avenged by and through the law. The
legal system came to be the surrogate of
personal judgment and response channeled
97
REASSESSING PUNISHMENT
through deliberative institutions with codi-
fied guidelines and procedures. Punishment
exacted through a criminal justice system is
thus seen as a matter of just retribution or
deserved “payback” for victims and mem-
bers of society. Some retributivists argue that
in feeling anger and demanding just retribu-
tion, society shows a level of respect for per-
sons committing crimes in holding them to
be free and responsible agents. Just retribu-
tion is thus seen as a matter of rectificatory
justice, whereby we right wrongs, measure
for measure, by making the convicted suffer
as the victim suffered. On the basis of this
reasoning, graver crimes evoke greater anger
and demand greater punishment. Given
this, punishment must entail the infliction
of some kind of pain, harm, deprivation,
or something normally considered undesir-
able and unpleasant. Such punishment must
be administered by some rightful author-
ity according to reasonable standards and
procedures to a person judged guilty of an
offense against some publically codified law
or rule. In focusing on the goal of just retri-
bution, such a conception of punishment has
a clear retrospective orientation. Herein pun-
ishment focuses on condemning and righting
past wrongs by giving offenders what they
deserve. Thus retributive justice (pay back
for wrongs done) allows for just rectification
(righting of wrongs).
Kant, a strong retributivist, sharpens the
focus of such a retributive approach to pun-
ishment, laying the foundation for modern
retributivist approaches.2 While recognizing
a type of natural punishment through which
the evil ways of persons result in their own
suffering, Kant focuses on juridical punish-
ment imposed by the state on offenders. The
state punishes offenders simply and only
because it is the right thing to do, because
justice demands that it render to each what
Trudy D. Conway
each deserves. Thus guilt is the necessary
and sufficient condition of punishment.
According to Kant’s reasoning, in refusing
to constrain their actions within the law
and taking advantage of others’ law abid-
ing, offenders willed their own punishment.
In unbalancing the scales of justice, offend-
ers obligate a legal rectifying of their wrongs.
The standard guiding the determination of
justice must be ius or lex talionis, the right
or law of retaliation, governed by the princi-
ple of equality. Violations of societal laws are
seen as rationally demanding commensurate
retaliation according to the talionic princi-
ple. The courts must use reason to determine
a punishment that fits and thereby equalizes
the crime. Hegel reinforces such retributive
reasoning: “[T]he universal feeling of peoples
and individuals toward crime is, and always
has been, that it deserves to be punished, and
what the criminal has done should be done to
him .. . . [E]quality remains merely the basic
measure of the criminal’s essential desert,
but not of the specific external shape which
the retribution should take .. . . It is then . . .
a matter for the understanding to seek an
approximate equivalence” (128–129). The
exclusive focus of punishment for retributiv-
ists must be justice in response to an offender
having been found guilty of a criminal
offense. As Kant emphasizes, “Juridical pun-
ishment can never be administered merely
as a means to promote some other good for
the criminal himself or for civil society, but
instead it must in all cases be imposed on
him only on the ground that he has commit-
ted a crime; for a human being can never be
manipulated merely as a means to the pur-
poses of someone else .  .  . ” (138). Justice
demands that convicted criminals pay in due
measure for the crimes they have commit-
ted. Consequentialist preoccupations must
not mar the singular focus of punishment;
98
the right of retaliation must be the only
principle regulating the decisions of judicial
deliberators. The principle of equality—like
with like—must set the mode and measure
of punishment thereby ensuring “pure and
strict legal justice” (139). Offenders can
thereby come to recognize, “Accordingly, any
undeserved evil that you inflict on someone
else among the people is one you do to your-
self. If you vilify, you vilify yourself; if you
steal from him, you steal from yourself; if
you kill, you kill yourself” (138). Thus the
right of retaliation (ius talionis), when prop-
erly understood, is the only principle which,
in regulating a public court as distinguished
from private, individual judgment, can
assign both the quality and quantity of just
punishment.
Kant’s strong retributivist reasoning is
shown most clearly in his succinct justifica-
tion of capital punishment—“if .  .  . he has
committed a murder, he must die.” Persons
convicted of murder must be executed
because “there is no juridical substitute that
will satisfy the requirements of legal justice”
(139). There is no equality between life, how-
ever miserable, and death, and therefore there
is no equality between the crime of murder
and the retaliation of it but what is judicially
accomplished by the execution of the crimi-
nal. Kant goes so far as to argue that even
if a civil society is to be dissolved through
the consent of its citizens, execution of mur-
derers must occur prior to such dissolution,
for otherwise the former citizens will bear
bloodguilt as accomplices in a public viola-
tion of legal justice. Justice demands that no
wrong go unrectified through juridical pun-
ishment. But, very importantly, Kant adds the
requirement that such punishment must be
kept free of all inhumane maltreatment and
be administered in accordance with a system
of law that insures that only the deserving

are punished following fair procedures of
judicial deliberation. Kant’s caveat is clear:
justice and justice alone must determine the
justification, end, procedures, and means of
punishment.
Interestingly, attentiveness to these Kantian
stipulations brings some retributivists to cri-
tique forms of punishment judged by Kant to
fulfill the requirements of retributive justice.3
The history of forms of punishment clearly
manifests evolving standards of decency.
We look with horror on past punishments
such as torturous stretching on the rack,
public stockades, chain gang labor, ston-
ing, disemboweling, quartering, gassing, and
electrocuting. Over time, our ways of pun-
ishment have shifted from corporeal forms
of punishing to forms restricting the exer-
cising of rights and range of freedom. Even
in response to extremely heinous crimes, a
retributive approach as articulated by Kant
does not necessarily require doing the same
kind of retaliatory act. It is thus reasoned that
retributive justice requires proportionate, not
strictly identical, punishment. In some cases,
it would be logically impossible to follow a
strict retributivism, for example in the case of
a serial killer. In other cases, moral concerns
restrict our punishment possibilities. Such a
proportionate retributivist approach assumes
there is a range of punishment. A punishment
beyond what is deserved would be unjust to
the convicted offender; a degree of punish-
ment below what is deserved would be unjust
to the victim. The upper limit of retributive
punishment would strictly equal the crime,
fitting the demands of ius talionis exactly
or as close as is possible. While retributively
just, such punishment would be unacceptable
if it was judged to violate morally acceptable
forms of punishment. Just as we refuse to
rape rapists and torture torturers in punish-
ing them, so we must exclude all punishments
99
REASSESSING PUNISHMENT
that entail acts that degrade the punisher or
the punished. Thus the range of punishment
must be set within moral limits. In seeking just
retribution, we must not allow the humanly
degrading acts of offenders to dictate our
punitive response. We stop short of punish-
ments that cross a moral boundary, even if
such punishment meets out what is retribu-
tively deserved. Thus on the basis of evolv-
ing standards of decency, a proportionate,
rather than a strict, retributivism, is required.
In upholding such standards, society clearly
states a refusal to retaliate in kind in all cases.
Such refusals clearly demarcate the difference
between the punished and punisher.
Such reasoning, drawing a limit to kinds
of morally acceptable punishments, can be
seen in the constitutional reviews of punish-
ment in light of the Eighth and Fourteenth
Amendments of the U.S. Constitution
(“Excessive bail shall not be required, nor
excessive fines, nor cruel and unusual punish-
ment inflicted,” and no state shall “deprive
any person of life, liberty or property, without
due process of the law; nor deny to any person
within its jurisdiction the equal protection of
the laws”). To be declared unconstitutional,
punishments need only be shown to be
cruel and unusual or to violate due process.
Heinously cruel acts cannot be punished by
equally cruel responses; punishments cannot
be arbitrarily and randomly applied in unjust
ways. Numerous Supreme Court delibera-
tions have seen the Justices reverse previous
rulings upholding the constitutionality of
types of punishment, in light of such evolv-
ing standards of decency as shown in, for
example, Atkins v. Virginia overturning Penry
v. Lynaugh, Roper v. Simmons overturning
Stanford v. Kentucky/Thompson v. Oklahoma
and Justices Stevens, Powell, and Blackmun’s
reversals on the death penalty in the decades
following Furman v. Georgia (Cohen, 2013).
Trudy D. Conway
In 2008, Baze v. Rees ruled that Kentucky’s
triple cocktail lethal injection method did
not violate the Eighth Amendment, uphold-
ing the primary execution method used in
the then current 35 retention states. Yet seven
Justices wrote separate opinions in this case,
indicating that the Court is far from having
reached a consensus regarding this method
of punishment. It is expected that new chal-
lenges will emerge, as the Court continues to
grapple with the standard expressed in In re
Kemmler in 1890 and still upheld that con-
sistent with the Eighth Amendment, capital
punishment must result in nothing more than
“the mere extinguishing of life” in response
to the heinous taking of life. In an interesting
twist on retributive justification of types of
punishment, retired Justice John Paul Stevens
argued that Justice John Roberts’s opinion in
this ruling evidenced that the Court rejected
the premise that capital punishment serves
a retributive purpose. Drawing on chal-
lengeable assumptions about the practice of
execution by lethal injection, Justice Stevens
reasoned that
The Eighth Amendment has been con-
strued to prohibit needless suffering and
significant risks of harm to the defend-
ant. As a matter of constitutional law,
what was once a gruesome event has been
transformed into a procedure compara-
ble to the administration of anesthesia in
a hospital operating room. By requiring
that an execution be relatively painless,
we protect the inmate from enduring any
punishment that is comparable to the
suffering inflicted on his victim. We have
thus undermined the premise on which
public approval of the retribution ration-
ale is based. (218)4
In an ironic twist of reasoning, lethal injec-
tion, viewed as a more humane punishment in
100
comparison with execution by electrocution
or asphyxiation, is seen by some retributivists
as not fulfilling the demand for retaliatory jus-
tice for heinously cruel offenses. Such current
punishment is here interpreted to fail to return
like with like for capital crimes. Responses
such as this reveal the extent to which
American society continues to wrestle with
the pure demands of retributive justice, while
strongly emphasizing such an approach.
QUESTIONING RETRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
The Pelke family’s immediate response to
Ruth’s murder was to demand punishment
equal to the crime committed. For them,
anything less than that would be a travesty
of justice. Some relatives expressed relief
that the judge “had the guts” to give Paula
exactly what she deserved—a death sen-
tence. Over time Bill Pelke, Ruth’s grandson,
became deeply troubled by the demands of
such retributivist reasoning which seemed
to cast the state in the role of Ruth’s right-
eous avenger. While Kant esteemed the purity
and clarity of retributive justice, Pelke came
to question the narrow restrictedness of this
retrospective approach to punishment. Pelke
began a journey of inquiry bringing him to
take a far more holistic and prospective
approach to punishment and to examine
the concrete realities at play in the powerful
application of punishment. He came to rea-
son that a conception of punishment exclu-
sively and narrowly focused on the state’s
righting past wrongs not only fails to address
the human suffering caused by wrongdoing,
but also results in compounding human suf-
fering over time. He grew increasingly con-
cerned that a purely retributive conception
of punishment bracketed questions about
the sources of criminal behavior and the con-
sistency of application of punishment. Pelke

began to delve deeper into questions about
the powerful reach of institutions exacting
punishment and its impact on communi-
ties. He suspected the narrow focus of just
retribution masked a more elemental desire
for retaliatory, anger-driven revenge. He
recognized that no punishment could ever
truly right the horrific wrong done to his
grandmother. Drawing on the principles that
shaped her deepest convictions, Bill sought
more than a retrospective punishment. He
sought a prospective punishment that might
transform Paula Cooper—what he described
as a civilized type of punishment that also
had a civilizing effect on the offender and
society. Recognizing Paula’s insight that she
would have to be the agent of such transfor-
mation, he advocated a type of punishment
that would set up conditions encouraging
such an effect over time.
Bill sought out members of Paula’s fam-
ily to understand her past and the possibil-
ity of such transformation; his contact with
Paula encouraged such development. As his
understanding of an alternative approach to
punishment deepened, he worked to create
a number of murder victim family member
organizations focused on what came to be
termed “restorative justice.” Through one
of them, he encountered persons like Azim
Khamisa who, on their own, had shaped an
alternate understanding of justice and a way
to live this understanding. Like Bill, Azim
was thrown into reflection on punishment
due to a personal tragedy (King 250–273).
On January 21, 1995, a 19-year-old
California University student named Tariq
Khamisa began the final run of his pizza
delivery shift. Realizing he has been set up
for a pizza-jacking, Tariq attempted to drive
away. At that moment, a bullet shattered the
window taking his life. His father described
the news of his son’s death as a nuclear
101
REASSESSING PUNISHMENT
bomb detonating within him, shattering
him into pieces. Tony Hicks was quickly
named a suspect. Shortly before the murder,
California had passed a “tough on crime”
law allowing adolescents under the age of 16
to be prosecuted as adults. The new ruling
changed everything in Tony’s life. Egged on
to hold a pistol, angered by Tariq’s refusal
to give up the pizzas, and encouraged to
shoot, Tony fired the fatal shot. Azim found
it incredible that three 14-year-olds and an
­18-year-old had been arrested in connection
with his son’s killing. Azim began to be trou-
bled by the chorus of voices crying for just
retribution. From the paralysis of his grief
came his inspiration. Rather than having
Tariq’s killer be the target of his anger, he
would target the forces that contributed to
this senseless act of juvenile violence. Rather
than demanding retaliatory justice, Azim
threw his energy into building a foundation
committed to ending youth violence. With
the support of Tony’s grandfather Ples and
eventually Tony himself, the Tariq Khamisa
Foundation began to thrive. Their shared
commitment to the foundation transformed
their lives, helping them to heal and Tony to
accept responsibility. Tony pleaded guilty to
first-degree murder to avoid the pain a trial
would cause these two families. Expressing
deep regret for his senseless act of violence,
he hoped for Azim’s forgiveness, which in
turn filled Azim with hope for this young
man’s moral transformation. After hear-
ing the sentence of 25  years to life, Azim’s
response focused on restorative rather than
retributive justice. He sought to relieve his
anger by working to heal and restore all
persons affected by Tariq’s murder, and to
work to address conditions contributing to
youth violence and prison recidivism. Azim
and Ples collaborated on a school-based pro-
gram teaching that violence is an evil choice
Trudy D. Conway
with tragically irrevocable consequences for
a wide range of persons. Tony participated
through letters explaining his regrettable
choices and their wide-ranging repercus-
sions. The program’s success led to national
recognition and funding and even more
importantly Tony’s deepening commitment
to living a better life. Azim encouraged Tony
to participate in educational programming
and walk a straight path in prison, leading
toward the possibility of his parole after
25 years and eventual work at their founda-
tion. Azim gained strength through persons
like Bill Pelke who helped from an organi-
zation, Murder Victims for Reconciliation,
which works to reorient the justice system
from retributive toward restorative jus-
tice. Over time both Bill and Azim came to
explore the complex contributing factors of
crime and the gravely unequal functioning
of the criminal justice system as tied to hier-
archies of race and class. The pure demands
of retributive justice began to ring hollow
the more they learned of the power of the
state in selectively and inequitably prosecut-
ing and punishing lower and upper class
criminal behavior set across a racial divide.
Both began to recognize competing strands
of discourse found within their Christian
and Muslim traditions on the purpose and
methods of punishment, pulling toward a
purely, strictly retributive understanding or
toward a more restorative understanding.5
Since the late 1970s, there has been
growing national and global interest in
programs focusing on restorative justice.6
Yet the philosophical reasoning underlying
such programs has been part of the philo-
sophical tradition since its origins in ancient
Greece. Aspects of the broader restorative
approach to punishment affirmed by Pelke
and Khamisa are traceable to the writings
of Plato (1963). In the Laws, Plato issues a
102
cautionary note regarding the risk of right-
eous anger sliding into moral outrage and
issuing in vengeance, since vengeance “is
not judgment—for judgment is, like justice,
a good.” Rather vengeance is a consequence
of moral failing (“iniquity”) and results in
further suffering, for “[h]e that meets it and
he that misses it are alike unhappy, the one
because he gets no healing . . ., the other in
that he is cut off for the salvation of many
another” (Laws, V. 728c). Plato’s comments
on punishment in numerous dialogues do
not deny an important retributive dimen-
sion in punishment, but speak to the need
to avoid reducing punishment solely to this
dimension. Plato clarifies that ideally “judg-
ment by sentence of law is never inflicted for
harm’s sake. Its normal effect is one of two;
it makes him that suffers it a better man, or
failing this, less of a wretch” (Laws 854d).
Punishment must be more than an exercise
in retributive justice, and retribution itself
must be transformed from mere retaliative
matching of “like with like” to bringing
offenders to recognize the harm they have
done and the debt they owe to the victim and
community harmed by their crime. Here, the
emphasis shifts from what the state does to
offenders to what offenders owe to victims.
What is done to offenders is transformed
into what offenders must sacrifice and do.7
Retribution is thus transformed into restitu-
tion and restoration. Plato emphasizes that
“one ought not to return a wrong or an
injury to any person, whatever the provoca-
tion is” (Crito 49d). Herein the focus sub-
tly shifts from doing retaliatory harm to
offenders suffering loss, pain, or sacrifice to
compensate for harm done by them to their
victims. To be so transformed, punishment
must engage offenders as moral beings. In
arguing that punishment must encour-
age recognition of both wrongs done and

the need for restitution to victims for such
wrongs, Plato emphasizes that,
the purpose of the penalty is not to cancel
the crime—what is once done can never
be made undone—but to bring the crimi-
nal and all who witness his punishment
in the future to complete renunciation of
such criminality, or at least to recovery
in great part from this dreadful state. For
all these reasons, and since it has all these
ends in view, the law must take careful
aim at its mark; it must be exact in deter-
mining the magnitude of the correction
imposed on the particular offense, and,
above all, the amount of compensation
to be paid. (Laws 934b)
A purely retributive approach always risks
masking what is rightly termed retaliatory
vengeance. In the Protagoras, Plato explains,
In punishing the wrongdoers, no one con-
centrates on the fact that a man has done
wrong in the past, or punishes him on that
account, unless taking blind vengeance like
a beast. No, punishment is not inflicted by
a rational man for the sake of the crime
that was committed—after all one cannot
undo what is past—but for the sake of the
future, to prevent either the same man or,
by spectacle of his punishment, someone
else from doing wrong again . . . Whoever
stays outside the lines [of the law], it pun-
ishes, and the name given to this punish-
ment both among yourselves and in many
places is correction, intimating that the
penalty corrects or guides. (324b, 326e)
Repeatedly in numerous dialogues, Plato
presents arguments in support of punishment
that is more a matter of restorative justice rather
than merely reducible to retributive justice.
Restorative justice programs, although
varied in practice, focus on a constellation
103
REASSESSING PUNISHMENT
of convictions and principles consistent
with the orientation revealed in Plato’s
comments. Rather than narrowly focusing
on retributive responses to legal violations,
they focus on addressing human harms and
needs—the needs of crime victims, local
communities, and offenders. Crime victims
need the disclosure of truth—a recognition
and acknowledgement of the harm done
by agents and a need to rectify the wrong
in some way. Communities need recogni-
tion of the fact that crime violates shared
values and damages all of us, rendering us
more vulnerable and less secure and trust-
ing. Offenders need to recognize and be held
accountable for the harm they chose to do
to persons and provide restitution or repara-
tion, even if only partial and symbolic due
to penal restrictions on their actions. Our
adversarial judicial system works against
addressing such multiple needs. Often even
when sentenced, offenders are not encour-
aged to take responsibility for their action,
face the harms their actions have produced,
and act to rectify their offenses. Moral repa-
ration for wrongs and harms often goes
unattended. Aristotle describes shame as a
quasi-virtue which opens the possibility of
transformation. But this quasi-virtue in no
way entails reducing the person to a shame-
ful act in a way that counteracts transforma-
tion. Agents who feel shame recognize they
could have chosen otherwise and can now
do so; without this, there is no reason for
associating this response with the virtues.
At the same time recognition of contribut-
ing factors in crime, even the extent to which
harms done to offenders contributed to
their choices, plays a role in the promotion
of self-examination and transformation of
offenders. Punishment should thus focus not
exclusively on retribution, but on bringing
offenders to recognize and respond to the
Trudy D. Conway
need for moral, and in some cases material,
reparation for harms done to persons and
communities. Such a restorative approach
to punishment is far more demanding than
a retributive one. While the American penal
system remains focused on an adversarial
approach strongly oriented toward retribu-
tive justice, a variety of programs and prac-
tices inside and outside prisons foster a far
more restorative justice approach.
At the center of restorative justice is the
recognition of crime as entailing harms done
to persons within communities rather than
mere legal transgressions. Restorative jus-
tice entails a paradigm or “lens” shift from
exclusively punitive responses to reparations
for harms done by persons to persons. Such
harms include material and psychological
damage to victims and affiliates, the ero-
sion of social trust and security, and dam-
age done by offenders to themselves and
their affiliates. Restorative justice programs
require that members of society address
ways of preventing crime and of rehabili-
tating persons who commit crimes, hold-
ing them responsible and accountable, but
also capable of transformation. Refusing to
reduce offenders to their worst acts, such a
restorative justice approach opposes punitive
measures that give up on offenders, defining
them reductively and permanently as crimi-
nals. Many restorative justice programs also
offer the option of restorative mediation
between offenders and victims when volun-
tarily chosen and carefully counseled. Such
encounters play a significant role in both the
moral transformation of persons sentenced
to punishment and the healing process of
crime victims. From such a broad perspec-
tive, punishment must serve multiple inter-
woven ends—(1) protection of the common
good of persons in society, (2) restoration of
public order, (3) restitution for wrongs done
104
to persons, and (4) rehabilitation of offend-
ers. Howard Zehr, a leading spokesperson
of this model, emphasizes that we should
conceive of systems of punishment along a
continuum between retributive and restora-
tive justice approaches and attentively work
to move our criminal justice systems increas-
ingly toward the restorative end of the spec-
trum. Zehr also stresses that the common
focus of both approaches is rectificatory
justice—the righting of wrongs; they differ
in terms of their account of what actually
rights wrongs. Retributive justice is seen as
righting the wrongs done through legal vio-
lations by inflicting proportionate suffering
on the culpable offender. In contrast,
Restorative justice theory argues that
what truly vindicates is acknowledg-
ment of victims’ harms and needs, com-
bined with an active effort to encourage
offenders to take responsibility, make
right the wrongs, and address the causes
of their behavior. By addressing this
need for vindication in a positive way,
restorative justice has the potential to
affirm both victim and offender and to
help them transform their lives. (Zehr,
2002, 59)
Herein the focus shifts to harms done to vic-
tims and communities and offenders coming
to acknowledge the human consequences of
their actions and the need to make restitution
for such harms. Restitution to and support
of victims conveys their suffering is being
taken seriously and encourages offenders to
respond constructively. From such a perspec-
tive, punishment would not be solely retribu-
tive, retrospectively righting wrongs from the
past but would be prospectively directed to
human transformation and restoration in the
context of community. As John Braithwaite
emphasizes,

[R]estorative justice involves a shift
toward an active conception of respon-
sibility, while still finding a more limited
place for passive responsibility than is
standard in criminal jurisprudence. While
passive responsibility means an offender
being responsible for a wrong he has com-
mitted in the past, active responsibility is
a virtue, the virtue of taking responsibil-
ity for repairing the harm that has been
done, the relationships that have been
damaged. Restorative justice is about
creating spaces where not only offend-
ers, but also other concerned citizens will
find it safe to take active responsibility
for righting the wrong done. (342)
Some scholars argue that we must choose
between a punishment paradigm and a restor-
ative paradigm (Ashworth, 1999). But Zehr’s
continuum would seem to argue against such
forced options. As Plato emphasized, we can
reconceive punishment as being a part of or
aiming at restoration of the offender and the
community.
In the United States, restorative justice
approaches have been focused largely on
juvenile offenses and minor adult offenses. A
reorientation toward restorative approaches
to major adult offenses would entail a foun-
dational shift in this criminal justice system.
At present, restorative approaches tend to
supplement rather than replace retributive
approaches. Such a supplemental approach
recognizes that a restorative approach may
be unworkable in all cases, given that recalci-
trant offenders and excessively vindictive vic-
tims may undermine the possibility of such
an approach. While recognizing this, the
wide range of innovative restorative prac-
tices developing in specific countries (such as
New Zealand and Canada), local communi-
ties, and particular corrections facilities fur-
ther a restorative reorientation that balances
105
REASSESSING PUNISHMENT
the settled tendency toward a purely retribu-
tive approach to punishment.
Much can be said in favor of such a
restorative approach to punishment and
efforts to move the criminal justice system
in that direction. Movement toward such an
approach would modify, supplement, or pro-
vide alternatives to the state-pitted-against-
the-offender adversarial model. In other
societies such a restorative model has long
been the norm, as exemplified in the Afghani
jirga practice, Navajo peacemaking courts,
Maori conferencing practices, and aboriginal
sentencing circles in native Canadian com-
munities. In recent years, international atten-
tion has been directed to noteworthy models
of restorative justice, such as South Africa’s
Truth and Reconciliation Commission and
indigenous practices fostering reconcilia-
tion following grave violence, such as the
Fambul Tok practice following the Sierra
Leone internecine war, and the reconciliation
practices following the Rwandan massacres.8
Numerous communities and local courts in
the United States have begun to institutional-
ize incrementally such restorative practices.9
Awareness of this alternative model has very
gradually increased in the United States, but
for the most part American citizens continue
to conceive criminal justice solely in terms
of the retributive model. The stark contrast
between indigenous practices of restorative
justice in other parts of the world and the
predominant Western model of punishment,
which now tends in a far more retributive
direction, raises another set of questions. Is
it the case that more restorative models tend
to be embedded in communities holding a
far more communitarian conception of per-
sons in contrast to more liberal conceptions
emphasizing autonomous selves and pro-
cedural justice focusing on protecting indi-
viduals’ rights? The indigenous restorative
Trudy D. Conway
practices emphasized in response to grievous
harms found in the societies of South Africa,
Rwanda, and Sierra Leone appear to be deeply
rooted in the conception of Ubuntu which
conceives persons as inextricably embedded
in an interconnected network of interpersonal
relations.10 Emphases on restoration, recon-
ciliation, rehabilitation, and reconstruction
stem from this fundamental core conception.
Is it the case that a more liberal polity pulls
toward one end of Zehr’s spectrum and a
more communitarian polity toward the other,
lending toward more retributive or restora-
tive conceptions of punishment?
While we have seen increased aware-
ness of the theory and practice of restora-
tive justice in the United States, significant
changes in the American criminal justice
system work dramatically against moving
this system in a restorative direction. Mass
incarcerations due to three-strike and rigid
mandatory minimum sentencing practices
have resulted in prisons being transformed
into massive human warehouses of con-
victed felons.11 Such practices have resulted
in the United States: having the highest
incarceration in the world with 2¼ million
prisoners; while having 5  percent of the
world’s population, having 25 percent of the
world’s prison population; 1 in every 107
adult Americans being in prison. The esca-
lating prison population over the past three
decades has resulted in massive overcrowd-
ing and fiscal burdens, during a period of
declining crime rates.12 Overcrowding and
stretched resources work against restorative
approaches. In recent times, the outsourc-
ing of prisons to for-profit corporations
that seek to minimize costs and maximize
profits decreases the availability of coun-
seling, spiritual ministry, and rehabilitative,
educational, vocational, and reentry pro-
gramming which contribute to the personal
106
transformation seen in Paula Cooper and
Tony Hicks. Such for-profit prisons risk
reducing offender responsibility, transfor-
mation, and reintegration in communities.
A profit-making business model, an over-
crowded penal environment, and increas-
ing budgetary pressures work against the
orientation Zehr and Braithwaite encour-
age. In addition, relocating prisons from
local communities to remoter rural settings
diminishes the possibility of familial and
communal relations which so often play a
role in personal transformation and reinte-
gration. The constellation of such factors
greatly increases the likelihood of prisons
being transformed into debilitating and
crime ridden holding cells for recidivist
offenders.
Failure to reorient the criminal justice
system in a restorative direction will likely
result in pushing this system toward the
other end of the spectrum—toward a puni-
tive system that increasingly warehouses
an endlessly increasing supply of offend-
ers whose actions once evoked justifiable
anger, who have been removed from local
communities, and are seen now as best for-
gotten, so long as they get their just deserts.
Such an approach fosters recidivism, indif-
ference to the plight of both victims and
offenders, and manifests a glaring failure to
address the complexity of the sources, reali-
ties, and consequences of crime that harms
persons. Such a system tragically ends up
only remotely connected with the noble
concern of justice. Foucault’s warning is
right. To be committed to justice requires
us to devote ourselves to examining cease-
lessly our conceptions and practices of it.
This alone enables us to live justly with one
another. We fail to do so at the risk of per-
petuating a current criminal justice system
only remotely focused on justice. To do so

diminishes not only our practicing of jus-
tice but also in the end our capacity for
even thinking about justice. As Plato rightly
recognized in response to Socrates’ punish-
ment, our humanity is in peril if we fail to
attend closely to justice.
Notes
See http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti-
1 Prentice Hall, 2007), Johnstone and van Ness’s
cle-2343663/Paula-Cooper-released-Grandson-
Bible-studies-teacher-murdered-1986-wants-
killer-meal-shops-released-prison-yesterday.
html
2
See Kant’s Metaphysical Elements of Justice,
2nd edn (Indianapolis, IN: Hackett, 1999).
This chapter focuses on retributive approaches
and contrasting restorative approaches.
Overall, there have been three broad modern
approaches to punishment. From 1780 to
1860, debates focused on Kantian/Hegelian
retributive approaches and Bentham’s utilitar-
ian approach. From 1860 through 1960, utili-
tarian approaches were emphasized, followed
by a more retributive approach from the 1960s
through today. Restorative justice approaches
began to gain attention in the 1980s. For
such a broad historical overview, see Michael
Tonry’s “Thinking about Punishment,” in Why
Punish? How Much? (Tonry, 2011).
3
Jeffrey Reiman offers an example of this
reasoning in his “Justice, Civilization and the
Death Penalty,” Philosophy and Public Affairs,
14, no. 2 (Spring 1985): 130.
4
Justice Stevens went on to add in his separate
opinion, “Quoting from an earlier opinion by
Justice White, I stated that the death penalty
represents ‘the pointless and needless extinction
of life with only marginal contributions to any
discernible social and public purposes’” (218).
5
Pelke still witnesses the divided Christian
conceptions of punishments as played out
in the Southern Bible Belt’s fundamentalist
enthusiasm for the death penalty versus the
abolitionist activism of other Christian denom-
inations. Khamisa’s Pakistani background
discloses tensions between fundamentalist
demands for strict Sharia-based applications
107
REASSESSING PUNISHMENT
of severe punishments and Sufi understand-
ings of Islamic punitive justice as being strictly
applicable only in societies that have already
fulfilled the demands of distributive and eco-
nomic justice.
6
The last four decades have produced a range
of philosophical and theological writings plus
more recent jurisprudence writings such as
John Braithwaite’s Restorative Justice and
Responsive Regulation (New York: Oxford,
2001), Clifford Dorne’s Restorative Justice
in the United States (Upper Saddle River, NJ:
Handbook of Restorative Justice (Cullompton,
UK: Wilan, 2006), and Sullivan and Tifft’s
Handbook of Restorative Justice: A Global
Perspective (London: Routledge, 2008).
7
This shifts the interpretation of “an eye for
an eye” from the punisher damaging the
offender’s eye to retaliate his damaging of the
victim’s eye to the punished restoring the dam-
age done to the eye of the victim. See Buck for
an analysis of the commonly misunderstood
phrase.
8
Documentaries have recorded these varied
practices found in South African, Rwandan,
and Sierra Leone communities. See Facing the
Truth with Bill Moyers (www.films.com), As
We Forgive (www.asweforgivemovie.com), and
Fambul Tok (www.fambultok.com).
9
Howard Zehr’s works offer a good intro-
duction to restorative justice programming
models.
10
See Desmond Tutu, No Future Without
Forgiveness (New York: Doubleday, 1999) for
a discussion of Ubuntu (31–32).
11
In 2003, Ewing v. California ruled that a
25 year-to-life sentence for a third offence
consisting of the theft of three golf clubs did
not violate the Constitution’s ban on cruel
and unusual punishment (583 U.S. 11). All
principled retributivists would condemn the
injustice of such a grossly disproportionate
punishment.
12
http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-
explains/2013/08/economist-explains-8.
In 2011, the Supreme Court ruled that
California must drastically reduce its prison
population to relieve extreme overcrowding
that exacerbates risks of violence, illness, and
death.
Trudy D. Conway
WORKS CITED
Aristotle (1941), “Rhetoric,” in The
Collected Works of Aristotle, trans.
R. McKeon. New York: Random.
— (1999), Nicomachean Ethics, trans.
T. Irwin. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett.
Ashworth, A. (1999), “Some Doubts about
Restorative Justice,” Criminal Law
Forum, 4: 277–299.
Braithwaite, J. (2011), “In Search of
Restorative Jurisprudence,” in M. Tonry
(ed.), Why Punish? How Much?
New York: Oxford, pp. 337–352.
Buck, R. (2013), “Hebrew Scriptures—‘An
Eye for An Eye,’” in V. Schieber, T.
Conway, and D. McCarthy (eds), Where
Justice and Mercy Meet. Collegeville, MI:
Liturgical Press.
Cohen, A. (2013), “Why Don’t Supreme
Court Justices Ever Change Their
Minds in Favor of the Death Penalty?”
The Atlantic (December 10). Available
online: http://www.theatlantic.
com/national/archive/2013/12/
why-dont-supreme-court-justices-
ever-change-their-minds-in-em-favor-em-
of-the-death-penalty/282100/ (accessed
September 23, 2014).
Foucault, M. (1983), “Vous êtes dangereux,”
in Libération (Paris, June 30), 20. Repr.
in Didier Eribon, Michel Foucault, 1989;
tr. 1991.
108
Hegel, G. (1999), “Wrong [Das Unrecht]
from Elements of the Philosophy of
Right,” A. Wood (ed.). New York:
Cambridge University Press.
In re Kemmler (136 U.S. at 447, 34 L. Ed.
519, 10 S. Ct. 930).
Kant, I. (1999), Metaphysical Elements of
Justice, 2nd edn. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett.
King, R. (2003), Don’t Kill in Our Names,
Families of Murder Victims Speak
Out Against the Death Penalty. New
Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers.
Pelke, B. (2003), Journey of Hope . . . From
Violence to Healing. Bloomington, IN:
Xlibris.
Plato (1963), The Collected Dialogues of
Plato, E. Hamilton and H. Cairns (eds).
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Reiman, J. (1985), “Justice, Civilization
and the Death Penalty,” Philosophy and
Public Affairs, 14 (2), 115–148.
Schieber, V., Conway, T., and McCarthy, D.
(2013), Where Justice and Mercy Meet.
Collegeville, MI: Liturgical Press.
Stevens, J. (2011), Five Chiefs: A Supreme
Court Memoir. New York: Little, Brown.
Tonry, M. (2011), Why Punish? How
Much? New York: Oxford.
Tutu, D. (1999), No Future Without
Forgiveness. New York: Doubleday.
Zehr, H. (2002), The Little Book of
Restorative Justice. Intercourse, PA: Good
Books.
 7
WAR
George R. Lucas, Jr
While the topic of this chapter stands
most obviously in sharp relief to the com-
panion chapter on “Peace,” it bears sig-
nificant connection to other topics in this
Companion, ranging from Sovereignty and
Cosmopolitanism, to Immigration and bor-
der control, to revolutions fought for the
sake of liberty, equality, justice, and human
rights.
War—conventionally understood as the
opposite of peace, tranquility, security, and
stability—represents a form of conflict among
nations and peoples in which armed force, or
the threat of armed force, is used by a nation’s
political leadership and elites in order to fur-
ther their nation’s (and perhaps also their
allies’) interests in one or more of the areas
cited earlier. War, in particular, is thought to
represent a form of political conflict between
adversaries in which everyday modes of con-
flict resolution—such as diplomacy, nego-
tiation, sanctions, and compromise—have
proven ineffective or futile. Armed force is
finally resorted to instead, in order to com-
pel the recalcitrant adversary to comply with
a more powerful nation’s will or ambitions
(Orend, 2006, 2008). The nineteenth-cen-
tury Prussian military strategist, Clausewitz
(1830/1976: book I: chapters 1–2), provided
the classic summative assessment of war as
precisely such a “continuation of State policy
109
by other means.” The goal of armed conflict
in pursuit of a nation’s political objectives
is, he argued, to defeat the enemy’s armies,
occupy his cities, and break his will to fight
or resist.
THE STATE-CENTRIC CONCEPTION
OF WAR (REALISM) AND ITS
PRESUPPOSITIONS
This conventional or “classical” understand-
ing of what warfare itself is, as well as when
it might be expected to occur, is highly ana-
lytical, rationalistic, and heavily dependent
upon the underlying paradigm of the nation-
state. Indeed, Clausewitz’s own treatment
of the subject is frequently characterized as
a “Newtonian” conception, steeped in the
metaphors of classical physical mechanics, in
which the political interests of well-defined
nation-states collide like billiard balls, and
the competing “forces” of rival national
armies are exerted like opposing vectors
upon some political “center of gravity” in
order to force political affairs into some final
desired configuration.
Thus, in this conventional or classical
understanding, conflict itself arises almost
inevitably, due to the multiplicity and the
George R. Lucas, Jr
frequent incompatibility of more or less
reasonable state interests (e.g. in acquir-
ing territory or natural resources, providing
for their own individual safety and security,
or expanding profitable trade relations).
Moreover, while an individual nation-state’s
policies, predicated on the pursuit of these
interests, may represent a perfectly rational
or logical course of action for that particular
nation (or coalition of allies), the multiplicity
of such interests virtually guarantees inces-
sant conflict between rival sets of interests
and their competing policy objectives. Hence
an occasional resort to armed force in order
to resolve at least some of these conflicts is
all but inevitable.
This conventional conception of warfare
as stemming inevitably from the perpetual
rivalry among competing state interests is
implicit in the thought of Hobbes (1660),
and is rendered explicit simply by substitut-
ing the condition of individual states in place
of the condition of biological individuals in
a “state of nature.” The implication of this
conception was more clearly and fully artic-
ulated in essays on war and international
relations by the Swiss political philosopher,
Rousseau (1755a, 1755b, circa 1756), and is
largely presupposed as incontrovertible fact
by Clausewitz. In the contemporary era, this
view of political realism or “international
anarchy” has been championed by political
scientists like Waltz (1954).
Realism or international anarchy has
largely supplanted rival theories regarding
the origins of warfare, including conceptions
grounded in the propensities of human behav-
ior, or, alternatively, in the internal political
structure of specific individual states. Those
rival theories variously attempted to portray
warfare as arising from factors such as the
corrupt or misguided policies of defective
or morally unjust states (Marx, 1844, 1845,
110
1848); from defects in the nonrepresentative
structure or internal political organization
of authoritarian and non-rights respecting
states (Kant, 1795); or, most enduringly, from
the competitive, aggressive, or otherwise per-
verse and self-destructive nature of human
beings themselves (ranging from Augustine
[ca. 410 ce] to a host of twentieth-century
social psychologists and cultural anthro-
pologists, notably Freud [1915, 1930/2002],
Allport [1937, 1954, 1960], Morris [1967],
and Jaynes [1976]). While popular in the
middle of the last century, the conceptions of
war that attribute its frequency and perva-
siveness to features of human psychology or
biology have especially fallen into disfavor.
In contrast to these rivals, the virtue of
the conventional conception of international
anarchy is that it both serves to explain the
historical pervasiveness and ubiquity of war-
fare, and offers a foundation for alterna-
tive strategies to avoid it through persistent
recourse to less-violent management of com-
peting state interests. Importantly, the classi-
cal conception scrupulously avoids offering
a moral evaluation of the activity of warfare
itself, or of the adversaries or enemies who
resort to it. While not at all minimizing the
propensity of armed conflict to inflict great
human suffering, misery, or destruction, the
theory of “international anarchy” does not
seek to morally decry or condemn this fea-
ture of armed conflict, so much as it attempts
to account for it.
Specifically, the classical conception
of international anarchy presupposed in
Clausewitz’s description of war, in particular,
does not attribute the causes of armed con-
flict strongly to deviant state structure, nor
rely implausibly on preventing war through
forcing a uniform political organization
on all nations and societies. Neither does
it rest upon a “theory” of “human nature,”

nor otherwise propose (or desire) that indi-
vidual human beings be other than they are.
Instead, the structure and function of indi-
vidual states, like the variant natures and
interests of individual human beings them-
selves, is simply taken for granted as a ran-
dom background feature of the international
community.
As remarked earlier, just as this feature of
ungoverned or lawless individuals in a hypo-
thetical state of nature is a formula for cease-
less conflict in Hobbes, so the actual fact of
an ungoverned multiplicity of states in the
international area is a formula for constant
conflict in Rousseau. The formation of alli-
ances and political coalitions, as well as the
pursuit of modes of conflict resolution that
can defuse the most extreme competition or
bring competing interests into greater align-
ment or equilibrium represent procedural
approaches that follow logically from the
analysis of nation-state competition and con-
flict offered by the resulting “realist” model
of the international system itself.
One glaring conceptual weakness of
this theory is its reliance on the underlying
paradigm of the nation-state as the funda-
mental unit of agency in the international
arena. Yet humankind’s historical experi-
ence of war considerably antedates the
Treaty of Westphalia (1648) that gave rise
to the nation-state system itself—a system
that, indeed, was itself devised as a proposed
“cure” for, or solution to, the perpetual
wars of religious Reformation and counter-
Reformation in Europe that predated it. The
rational foundations of the theory in the col-
lective or common pursuit of the self-interest
of discrete states, in addition, runs afoul of
the problems that plague similar rationalis-
tic theories in other behavioral disciplines
like economics: namely, that the beings
whose behavior is hypothetically governed
111
WAR
by rational principles do not always seem
to behave in accord with such principles in
actual practice.
In particular, with respect to war, there
seem to a variety of other, less “rational”
causal factors that nonetheless play a power-
ful role in fomenting armed conflict, includ-
ing contrasting moral or religious beliefs,
collective or widely shared feelings of ethnic
or national solidarity and pride (sometimes
even in the absence of a formal state struc-
ture), coupled with lingering resentment over
past experiences of cruelty or injustice (often
inflicted during previous armed conflicts), or
the present infliction of cruelty and injustice
by one national or ethnic group on the mem-
bers of other, rival groups, or societies. The
classical conception of war as arising from
the competition of rival nation-state inter-
ests, moreover, is not especially effective in
explaining wars of insurgency and revolution,
in which internal competition for control of
the state itself and its cultural or political
institutions and policies seem to constitute
the paramount factors of conflict that lead to
violence and the use of armed force.
RECENT CHALLENGES TO THE
STATE-CENTRIC MODEL
World Wars I and II in the twentieth cen-
tury, along with the subsequent Korean War
(1950–1953), certainly represent paradig-
matic instances of conventional or classical
warfare of the sort Clausewitz character-
ized, based upon his own experiences of the
Napoleonic wars and the campaigns of
Frederick the Great in Europe during the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The
American war of intervention in Vietnam,
and likewise the intervention of the Soviet
George R. Lucas, Jr
Union in Afghanistan toward the end of
the last century, however, constitute less
clear-cut cases (although both were, at the
time, thought to be conventional conflicts,
or at least “proxy wars” for such interstate
“superpower” rivalries during the so-called
Cold War).
Perhaps the paradigmatic case of classi-
cal or conventional war was the Falklands
War of 1984, in which two sovereign nation-
states, Argentina and Great Britain, led the
leaders of each to focus their rival interna-
tional interests on control of the Falkland
Islands (Malvinas). Their unresolved conflict
over the ownership and control of this oth-
erwise remote and relatively insignificant
territory resulted in a highly choreographed
and symmetric escalation of the use of armed
force against one another, until the stronger
and more determined military power finally
prevailed. In the final analysis, this conflict
constituted nothing short of a perfectly cho-
reographed Clausewitzian ballet (Regan,
2013).
The armed conflict between the nation of
Iraq under the leadership of President Saddam
Hussein, and a UN coalition force under the
command of the United States in early 1991,
however, may well have constituted the last
instance of thoroughly conventional or “clas-
sical” warfare of the Clausewitzian sort for
the foreseeable future. The clashing armies
of the two powers initially appeared to be of
comparable size, material constitution, and
technological might. What proved in fact to
be the vastly superior military technology,
training, and tactical leadership of the ground
forces under US command, however, led to
so devastating a defeat and destruction of the
opposing army in the deserts of Kuwait as
to raise serious questions, especially among
competitors and adversaries of this coalition,
about the viability of conventional armed
112
conflict for the resolution of any future such
political disputes.
Two military strategists in the Peoples’
Liberation Army of China (PLA), for exam-
ple, writing in the immediate aftermath of
the (First) Persian Gulf War, all but proph-
esied the end of any future attempts at a
full-scale conventional use of armed con-
flict, certainly if directed against the United
States or its allies (Liang and Xiangsui, 1999).
Their monograph, entitled “unrestricted war-
fare,” acknowledged that, for the foreseeable
future, no nation could any longer plausibly
expect to oppose the conventional or nuclear
military power of the United States. Far from
eschewing interstate conflict, however, the
authors recommended that the only way for-
ward for China (and, by implication, other
adversaries) was to develop offensive and
defensive capabilities in other areas, includ-
ing economic and legal competition (or “law-
fare;” see Dunlap, 2001), and especially in
the new domain of cyberspace. All of these
sectors, but particularly the cyber domain,
were areas in which developed nations like
the United States were themselves highly vul-
nerable and by no means dominant. Political
adversaries of such nations, the Chinese mili-
tary theorists argued, must be willing to use
their own capabilities to exploit their oppo-
nents’ vulnerabilities in the pursuit of their
national interests. Thus were born the relent-
less, state-sponsored campaigns allegedly car-
ried out by a top-secret branch of the PLA,
“Unit 61398,” based in Shanghai, of cyber
espionage, as well as of alleged covert actions,
such as the planting of trap doors and logic
bombs in vital civilian infrastructures, as
well as massive theft of industrial and classi-
fied military technologies from many nations
throughout the world (Lucas, 2014c).
During roughly the same period, armed
attacks against civilian targets in the United

States, Tanzania, Kenya, the United Kingdom,
France, Mali, Spain, and in the Russian
Federation by so-called Islamic extrem-
ist terrorist organizations (like al-Qaeda)
are likewise thought to have ushered in yet
another new form of unrestricted, “irregu-
lar,” or unconventional warfare, undertaken
this time by organizations with no formal
state affiliation whatsoever, and often absent
any recognizable or well-articulated political
interests or objectives, other than foment-
ing fear and undermining security and the
rule of law itself. Anger, moral and religious
outrage, or festering frustration and resent-
ment, rather than conventional self-interest
or the pursuit of discernable state policy,
seem to constitute both the cause of, and the
apparent justification for, these new forms of
armed conflict. Importantly, in any case, all
these forms of armed conflict appear to lie
entirely outside the predictive or explanatory
power of the nation-state paradigm, and of
Clausewitz’s attendant conception of con-
ventional military strategy.
Perhaps most tragically, in the aftermath
of the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989
and the putative end to the half-century of
the Russo-American “Cold War,” what was
at first heralded as a new era of global peace
and prosperity quickly degenerated into a
succession of humanitarian crises and acts of
genocide in failed and inept states through-
out the world. Nations in a position to assist
or prevent these crises, meanwhile, often
had no compelling “state interests” or poli-
cies at stake, nor had they any compelling
desire to intervene militarily in conflicts not
of their own making. The United Nations
Genocide Convention of 1948, enacted in
the aftermath of World War II in response to
disclosure of the horrors of the Holocaust in
Germany and Eastern Europe, proved to be
ineffective in marshaling the needed military
113
WAR
and humanitarian support from the interna-
tional community. Despite widespread and
gravely erroneous assumptions to the con-
trary, it turned out that the 1948 Convention
required little concrete action on the part
of signatory nations other than a pledge to
refrain themselves from committing or oth-
erwise sponsoring acts of genocide, and to
assist both in actively apprehending, and
refusing to grant either political asylum or
safe harbor within their borders to, indi-
viduals charged with fomenting or carrying
out such acts elsewhere (Lucas, 2014a). This
tragic lacuna led, in the ensuing decade, to
an international movement to define the
“Responsibility to Protect” (R2P, or R to P)
as an additional military obligation on the
part of otherwise sovereign states (Pattison,
2010, Scheid, 2014).
These manifestations of irregular or “post-
modern” war (Eco, 1991, Lucas, 2010)  are
deeply disturbing, in part because they seem
immune to normal “rationalistic” appeals
to state interests that might resolve or amel-
iorate the conflicts, such as compromise or
appeasement (on one hand) or threats of
punishment and retaliation that might nor-
mally serve as deterrents (on the other). They
have proven highly destabilizing, because the
source of the dangers are often unclear, and
the tactics employed by the proponents of
violence are difficult to detect and to defend
against.
The horrific Rwandan Genocide of 1993–
1994, for example, was preceded by only a
few months of sinister political unrest and
the public broadcast of ethnic hate mes-
sages throughout the country whose signifi-
cance was, for the most part, unrecognized
by outsiders. The armed violence that sud-
denly erupted, in turn, was carried out
largely by unorganized mobs armed with
clubs and machetes rather than sophisticated
George R. Lucas, Jr
armaments, who nonetheless managed in
only a short time to massacre nearly 1 mil-
lion victims.
Likewise, the determined al-Qaeda opera-
tives who secretly mastered flight control,
overpowered flight crews, and subsequently
flew commercial aircraft as suicide weap-
ons into the Trade Towers in New York City
and the Pentagon in Washington, DC on
September 11, 2001 proved extremely capa-
ble and resourceful in avoiding detection or
apprehension by security and law enforce-
ment officials. Their activity could at best be
understood as at least analogous to a highly
organized but unique international crimi-
nal conspiracy of the sort that lies utterly
outside the boundaries of conventional
Clausewitzian conceptual framework of con-
ventional warfare.
This, in turn, provokes a final striking fea-
ture of unconventional or “irregular” war-
fare (Lucas, 2009, 2011). First, adversaries
and insurgent interest groups, frustrated by
the radical asymmetries in military power
stacked in favor in conventional forces, adopt
new tactics of disrupting social systems and
attacking the weak links in logistical supply
chains through the use (for example) of suicide
bombers and IEDs, or of cyber attacks, that
throw conventional military forces seriously
off balance. Subsequently, new technologies
owned initially by the besieged conventional
forces become the optimal response. Drone
attacks, for example, are “systemic” in pre-
cisely the same sense as are IEDs and suicide
bombers, disrupting the insurgent’s command
structure, relentlessly hunting him out where
he lives and hides, and so demoralizing him
in return, and hopefully breaking his ability
and will to fight. Massive cyber surveillance
on an almost inconceivable scale likewise
frustrates the most determined attacker, and
carries the cyber fight back to its source.
114
A host of legal and ethical questions and
conundrums arise primarily from this relent-
less tactical arms race, even as the conven-
tional, Clausewitzian understanding of war
is radically transformed by this perennial
“give and take” between political adversar-
ies, and even more between coalitions of
security forces upholding the rule of law, and
international criminals intent on circumvent-
ing that rule.
“MILITARY ETHICS” AND THE
LAWS OF WAR
The comparatively unrestrained use of deadly
force, resulting in widespread destruction
and devastation of property and the death
or injury of hundreds of thousands of human
beings, both combatants and noncombatants,
may hardly seem fertile territory for talking
about morality or legal governance. Indeed,
war, in either its conventional or postmod-
ern manifestations, seems to represent a dra-
matic breakdown of the normal rule of law,
together with the (temporary) abandonment
of moral judgment and restraint.
Clausewitz, indeed, famously warns
against allowing moral scruples to play a
role in the conduct of war. Ethics, and espe-
cially “benevolence born of philanthropy” he
writes,
. . . is an error which must be extirpated;
for in such dangerous things as War, the
errors which proceed from a spirit of
benevolence are the worst. As the use of
physical power to the utmost extent by
no means excludes the co-operation of
the intelligence, it follows that he who
uses force unsparingly, without refer-
ence to the bloodshed involved, must
obtain a superiority if his adversary uses

less vigour in its application (Book I,
chapter 1).1
Interestingly, Clausewitz does not overtly
question the validity of the reasons, let alone
the authority of the State, that lead it to
declare war. But once war is decided upon as
the appropriate course of action, one ought
(he argues) to prosecute the war as fully,
efficiently, effectively, and (presumably) as
mercilessly or pitilessly as possible, lest the
war itself drag on too long, do far too much
damage on its own, and squander the politi-
cal opportunities and purposes for which it
was fought.
Yet, in Book III, when continuing his
analysis of strategy, Clausewitz waxes elo-
quent upon the importance of “moral force”
and the moral qualities of wars, and of the
nations that wage them. Some of this inter-
esting but somewhat chaotic discussion has
to do (at least indirectly) with the qualities of
the reasons of State that lead it to declare and
prosecute war. Presumably, some reasons are
better than others, while some states behave
more admirably and prudently than others in
pursuing their chosen military strategy, and
hence their militaries can be counted upon
to pursue the fight with more vigor, courage,
and enthusiasm on that account. Presumably,
this is a theoretical reflection on the remark-
able but imprecise saying, often attributed to
Napoleon, that: “In War, the Moral is to the
Physical as Three to One.”2
In most other respects, however,
Clausewitz’s “ethical focus” (if we are even
entitled to call it that) is on the military itself
(his focus is almost exclusively upon land
forces, and on the individuals that comprise
a nation’s Army). He observes:
War is a special business, and however
general its relations may be, and even
115
WAR
if all the male population of a country,
capable of bearing arms, exercise this
calling, still it always continues to be dif-
ferent and separate from the other pur-
suits which occupy the life of man ..  . .
However much pains may be taken to
combine the soldier and the citizen in
one and the same individual, whatever
may be done to nationalize Wars, and
however much we may imagine times
have changed since the days of the old
Condottieri, never will it be possible to
do away with the individuality of the
business; and if that cannot be done,
then those who belong to it, as long as
they belong to it, will always look upon
themselves as a kind of guild, in the regu-
lations, laws and customs in which the
“Spirit of War” by preference finds its
expression (Book III, chapter V).
This seems to offer at least a rudimentary
reflection on what might be termed “profes-
sional ethics,” or “the virtues of the profes-
sion of arms.” It is the sort of observation
about the norms, rules, customs, and prin-
ciples that guide and constrain practice, and
inform the members of a specific practice, of
which MacIntyre writes (1981, 1988, 1990).
The norms that govern the aspirations, best
practices, and limits of acceptable practice
arise from the experience of that practice,
and reflections on it, as carried out by mem-
bers of the profession. We will return to this
intriguing suggestion concerning war and
“professional ethics” in conclusion.
Otherwise, it is helpful to note that these
various comments and reflections can be
taken to suggest that there are two broad
moral issues to be addressed with reference
to war. The first concerns when it is appro-
priate and justifiable for a nation or an alli-
ance of nations to abandon other procedures
for conflict resolution, and decide to pursue
George R. Lucas, Jr
their military options. Historically, this first
question (or set of questions) has come to
be designated in the Latin terminology of
medieval law as jus ad bellum, the justifica-
tion for entering into war. The second con-
cerns what primarily interests Clausewitz
himself: namely, what he seems to think of
as the “professional” question of how a war
is best waged by those actually involved in
fighting it. This second discussion of the con-
duct of war, and of the preparation, training,
character, and conduct of combatants in war,
is commonly designated by the Latin legal
idiom, jus in bello.
Historically, there is considerable reflec-
tion, especially in the philosophical literature
of Western culture, on both sets of questions,
which are thought to be conceptually dis-
tinct, although obviously related. The first,
jus ad bellum, is thought to be the purview
primarily of statesmen and political lead-
ers, charged with the welfare and defense of
the State. The second, jus in bello, pertains
primarily to the military forces of the state,
and seems to entail or encompass reflections
on the ethics of the profession of arms itself.
Clausewitz is prescient in hinting at their
interconnection, however, at least in implying
that statesmen and nations which collectively
comport themselves well and honorably, and
exercise prudent judgment in declaring war,
are likely to inspire their militaries to best
professional practice in the field of combat.
Discussion of war and ethics, and (sepa-
rately) of military ethics, are nonetheless
often disparaged as irrelevant, or worse, as
disadvantaging the side that takes such issues
to heart (as Clauswitz himself initially seems
to imply) by constraining them to use their
physical power and material forces more
sparingly, and hence less effectively than their
adversary. The latter is an empirical obser-
vation, however, and there is little evidence,
116
historically or otherwise, that militaries that
honor professional customs (such as refrain-
ing from attacking noncombatants, or mis-
treating prisoners of war) fare any less well
in determining the outcome of the war than
those forces who ignore such customs and
constraints. Indeed, once again, Clausewitz’s
subsequent observations on “moral force”
and the importance of professional demeanor
in Book III seem to imply just the opposite in
practice: that well-trained and professional
military forces (including attention to the
moral principles, customs, and traditions of
the profession of arms) perform with greater
enthusiasm, effectiveness, and hence effi-
ciency in the field than do their adversaries
who lack such “moral force.”
Three decades after the posthumous pub-
lication of vom Krieg, Lieber, a German-
born American legal scholar well acquainted
with Clausewitz’s views on professionalism,
was asked by President Abraham Lincoln to
draft a series of regulations and guidelines
for troops in the Union Army during the US
Civil War. The result, “General Orders #100”
(known traditionally as the “Lieber Code”)
enshrined a great many of these principles
of professional decorum and constraint
regarding the use of force, noncombatant
immunity, treatment of prisoners, and other
matters touched upon earlier. Interestingly,
the result was so admired for enshrining
military professionalism along the general
outlines that Clausewitz had first proposed,
that the American document was subse-
quently adopted as doctrine by Clausewitz’s
own military force, the Prussian Army, from
whence it spread to the military services of
other European militaries and policy-mak-
ing communities, where key elements of
the Lieber Code then served as the founda-
tion for the first Geneva Conventions of the
late nineteenth century, prescribing limits or

constraints on the appropriate conduct of
armed hostilities (Reichberg et al., 2003).
This kind of reasoning about war, to be
certain, has a long history in Western culture,
but it is as far from being merely a Western
cultural artifact as the practice of war itself
(Hensel, 2010). Warfare constitutes a highly
variable form of what anthropologists some-
times term “cultural performance,” and (one
might also observe) such performances are
routinely accompanied by equally unique
forms of cultural discourse concerning the
circumstances under which the performance
is to be staged, and to what extent, and by
whom, against whom, and most importantly,
for what ends (French, 2003, Robinson,
2003). Hence, we find the principal charac-
ters, Arjuna and Krisna, debating precisely
these questions in the Bhagavad Gita, while
laws in ancient India clearly defined those
who were to be exempt from attack in the
midst of war (Morkevicius, 2010, Roy,
2012). The Confucian military strategist,
Sun Tzu (whose much earlier reflections are
often compared with those of Clausewitz),
famously offers delicately nuanced and
understated views on precisely these ques-
tions in The Art of War (1994). In twentieth-
century China, Chairman Mao denounced
his own culture’s earlier forms of discourse
and limitations on the practice of combat as
“asinine,” but then proceeded to proclaim
his own “Eight Points for Attention” govern-
ing the conduct of his own insurgency forces
in their conduct of guerilla war in 1938.
The Qur’an and its accompanying Hadith
declaim frequently and at length upon
when, how, and to what extent to make war
upon unbelievers, along with when, if ever,
Muslims should raise the sword against fel-
low Muslims (Kelsay, 2009).
The renowned political philosopher,Walzer,
writes “For as long as men and women have
117
WAR
talked about war, they have talked about it
in terms of right and wrong . . . . Reiterated
over time,” he observes, “[these] arguments
and judgments shape what I want to call the
moral reality of war—that is, all those experi-
ences of which moral language is descriptive
or within which it is necessarily employed”
(Walzer, 1977). The “necessity” of this moral
discourse, moreover, is not one born of com-
pulsion, but seems quite instead to reflect
the individual or collective agency of human
beings themselves—that is, their freedom,
and their ability, individually and collectively
to deliberate, decide, choose among alterna-
tive courses of action, and finally both act or
refrain from acting, and offer better or worse
accounts of what they have finally chosen to
do, and why. Similar to MacIntyre’s account
of the origins of professional norms in delib-
erative discourse, as noted earlier, “just war
theory” represents the norms collectively
elicited through such reflective discourse by
its practitioners on better and worse forms
of the practice of war itself.
Indeed, one could argue even more plau-
sibly that the discourse about war and its
conduct in any culture is very much akin to
the discourse about a variety of actions or
practices with which all persons of all cul-
tures and epochs are all too familiar—killing,
lying, breaking solemn promises or violat-
ing contracts, betraying loyalty, disobedi-
ence, and law-breaking, for example—all
of which, including going to war, represent
the kinds of practices from which persons in
every known culture and every known his-
torical epoch have been exhorted to refrain.
Yet individuals do these kinds of things all
the time. Usually, such actions are thought
to be wrong, and those engaging in them
are held liable under prevailing principles
of law, morality, and customary behavior
for having engaged in wrongdoing. In what
George R. Lucas, Jr
are unquestionably culturally and histori-
cally dependent fashions, the wrongdoers are
punished, excoriated, imprisoned, exiled, or
executed—unless, that is, they can be found
by their peers to have had justificatory (or at
least, exculpatory) reasons, motives, or inten-
tions in engaging in the otherwise-prohibited
practices. We hold law-breakers (like Gandhi
or King) accountable for violating established
legal norms; we hold “whistle-blowers” (like
Edward Snowden) accountable for violating
obligations of loyalty and betraying their
trust; we hold killers accountable under law
and morality for taking the lives of others.
But in every case, we are led to wonder if
the civil disobedient, the whistle-blower, the
killer, or the liar had good cause for delib-
erately engaging in what seems to us, prima
facie, as wrongdoing.
Warfare, precisely on account of its devas-
tation, death, and destruction, is thought to
be foremost among these things that we ordi-
narily are not supposed to do, even when we
nonetheless proceed to do so anyway. In fact,
the theological, political, or intellectual lead-
ership, or members of the society in general
who are witness to, and presumably wronged
collectively, by such actions may have a right
to pose two significant kinds of questions to
the wrongdoer: (1) “did you have good and
sufficient reasons—justified cause—for your
actions? And, (2) did you go about deciding
and carrying out these normally-prohibited
actions in the right fashion?”
In the case of jus ad bellum, or decisions
to go to war, the justifying reasons, while not
identical, are roughly similar to those gov-
erning decisions to override prevailing norms
in these other cases:
• One should have a compelling reason (or
“just cause”) for overriding the prohibi-
tion against fighting and killing.
118
• One should have taken every possible
measure short of war itself to resolve the
conflicts addressed (“last resort”).
• One’s intentions in resorting ultimately to
warfare must be benevolent rather than
malevolent—the restoration of peace and
satisfaction of the demands of justice, for
example, as opposed to revenge, terror, or
self-aggrandizement.
• There must be some measure of com-
mensurability (or “proportionality”)
between the justifying cause and the
ends to be sought through war, and the
damage and destruction it will surely
bring about.
• Finally, such reasoning on the part of the
responsible decision makers, the “moral
agents,” must be capable of withstand-
ing “peer review” or judicial review (i.e.
they must meet the test of “Publicity,”
in which impartial, reasonable observers
confronted with the same situation could
be expected to elicit the same or similar
judgment).
Exclusive focus in some, more philosophically
inclined cultural traditions on the problem of
warfare has produced additional, nuanced
conditions or criteria that should be con-
sidered, such as, in the case of going to war,
requiring an advance, public declaration to
do so, coupled with some reasonable expecta-
tion that satisfactory or successful resolution
of the conflict is indeed possible and feasible.
However, such demands seem compatible in
principle with the other instances of what I
term a morality of “exceptions,” such as civil
disobedience, so-called whistle-blowing, or
decisions to engage in strategies of promise-
breaking, disloyalty, secrecy, deceit, or decep-
tion. The moral justification of any and all
of these otherwise-distinct actions or policies
requires good justificatory reasons embody-
ing “right intention,” and must be undertaken
only after exhausting less-extreme options,

determining the proportionality between
the harm that will ensue and the good to be
achieved thereby, and usually only if publicly
acknowledged, likely to succeed, and capa-
ble of post-facto review and consensus on
the part of disinterested others (e.g. Lucas,
2014b).
Warfare, unlike the other categories of
activities from which moral agents should
normally refrain, however, embodies some
unique elements that arise from a fundamen-
tal equivocation over agency: that is, over the
“one” or the “we” that makes these determi-
nations. Decisions to deceive, blow the whis-
tle, or break the law most often reside with
individual human beings (or at most, a small
group of persons) capable both of making
them, and of being held accountable for the
results.
The question of collective agency—that is,
“sovereignty,” or possessing the “legitimate
authority” to make decisions that commit a
society to a course of action threatening the
entire body politic with harm, and with being
held accountable for the infliction of harm—
is considerably more vexed. This is especially
true with respective recent developments in
“irregular warfare,” terrorism, and insur-
gency, in which decisions reached by indi-
viduals and small groups may unknowingly
or unwillingly commit a much wider society
to the risk of harm.
In conventional thinking, “sovereignty”
(and hence, legitimate authority) resides
with a representative leader—king, prime
minister or leader of parliament, elected
president—who symbolizes, and is at least
tacitly deputized to speak for, the body poli-
tic. Increasingly in the past century, such
authority is even thought to exceed that of
the heads of individual nation-states, and
requires a collective judgment on the part of
a representative congress of nations, such as
119
WAR
the United Nations, in which the Principle
of Publicity is inherently vested and guaran-
teed. This makes unilateral decisions by indi-
vidual nations to declare war (other than in
exigent circumstances of armed self-defense
in response to an unprovoked attack) deeply
suspect, let  alone decisions by nonstate
actors or organizations (such as the radi-
cal Sunni Islamic organization, al-Qaeda) to
declare war upon others. Indeed, we might
observe that the question of sovereignty and
“legitimate authority” in just war doctrine
now constitutes the single most vexed and
contentious issue in international relations
in the twenty-first century (Johnson, 2014).
Otherwise—and quite unlike an individ-
ual’s personal decision to blow the whistle,
break a promise, or deliberately violate the
law—the decision to go to war commits a
subset of the society, nation, or coalition
(normally its designated military and secu-
rity forces) to carry out this general will on
behalf of the declaring authority. Thus, if
we customarily hold individuals account-
able for making themselves exceptions
to the normal constraints on their justifi-
able behavior, how does this accountability
translate into a canon of expectations and
constraints imposed upon the designated
subset of agents empowered, on the state’s
behalf, to wage its wars? And, even more
problematically, to what extent may one
anticipate that the conventional or tradi-
tional answers to this important question in
the past will automatically “carry over” into
the realm of unrestricted or “irregular” war-
fare in the present, especially when irregu-
lar warfare is waged by agents of the State
against terrorists or insurgents, who utterly
lack any legitimate authority to wage war
themselves, and who are therefore often
contemptuous of any constraints on their
own behavior?
George R. Lucas, Jr
JUS IN BELLO AND PROFESSIONAL
MILITARY ETHICS
Although not nearly so clearly demarcated, such
reflections on better and worse practice, and
on the limits of acceptable practice in the con-
duct of war (jus in bello) likewise pervades the
literature and lore of many historical eras and
cultural traditions, and even predates the more
formalized, reflective, and systematic discourse
pertaining to decisions to engage in war (jus ad
bellum). Once again, in contrast to the mistaken
stereotype that these discussions are of limited
scope and origin in Western culture (let alone
that their provenance lies wholly within some
specific theological tradition), we find these dis-
cussions infused in the reflective literature and
philosophy of cultures and religions stretching
from China through India, to the Middle East
and beyond (Kaplan, 2002). Some of the ear-
liest examples (in addition to the many cited
earlier) are those of Sun-Tzu (The Art of War)
and Socrates (Plato, The Republic), concern-
ing issues such as: when to fight, and when to
refrain from fighting, the proper targeting of
enemy combatants, noncombatant immunity,
and the distinction between true “military
necessity” and indiscriminate and largely gratu-
itous destruction: a fundamental principle often
labeled, “the Economy of Force.”
These and other cultural sources down
through the ages opine, in addition, on who
is liable to attack, the degree of force to be
expended against enemies (once more, the
general consensus is, as little as possible,
and no more than is absolutely necessary to
achieve the legitimate military objective), and
importantly, on who is exempt from attack
(usually those thought to represent no threat
of harm, such as women, children, the elderly,
or enemy prisoners rendered hors de combat
through imprisonment or injury). As often as
not, the impetus for such considerations is a
120
much a matter of prudence and common sense
as of morality, per se. Why on earth, Sun-Tzu
wonders, would a commander risk harm to
his army if the military objective could be
achieved without a single battle? Why on
earth, Socrates asks his students, as they reflect
upon the aftermath of the Peloponnesian War,
would we slaughter the innocent bystanders
and helpless family members of the enemy, or
raze their cities and lands, when we hope to
restore friendly, and economically viable rela-
tionships with them following their defeat?
Perhaps the most famous and fascinat-
ing of these ruminations is found in William
Shakespeare’s play, Henry V, which has
long figured among the required reading of
military academy students in many parts
of the world. The larger play is read for a
variety of reasons, as discussing, for exam-
ple, that elusive topic of “moral force” to
which Clausewitz averred (espirit de corps;
morale). But it is the debate among two ordi-
nary infantry captains in Act IV, Scene vii,
after King Henry has ordered the execution
of French prisoners of war, which is the focus
of our attention. What is striking is that this
drama was at least loosely based on history
concerning a very popular king, and directed
at an audience primarily of laypersons who
would have known the history and largely
shared this respect and fondness for “King
Harry.” And in the incident itself, it is not
knights, peers, or noblemen, but two ordi-
nary commoners, two captains of the infan-
try, charged with organizing and carrying out
the execution, who comment on it:
Henry V (dialogue of two infantry cap-
tains: Act IV, scene VII)
(1) “Kill the prisoners?? ‘Tis expressly
against the law of arms, as arrant a piece
of knavery, mark you now, as can be
offer’t.

(2) Tis the King himself hath ordered it . . .
O, tis a gallant king!
(1) Aye! And them as fled the fight before,
now eagerly comply!”
These lines would have been delivered to
an audience who knew the history, and would
have to be intelligible to them. Here we find
this behavior condemned in the early seven-
teenth century, referring to a war in the six-
teenth, and using the phrase “law of arms”
as if this were a commonly understood term
well before modern legal scholars, such as
Grotius, Vattel, and Pufendorf (Reichberg
et al., 2003), would publish their initial reflec-
tions, let alone centuries before formal stand-
ards, such as the International Laws of Armed
Conflict, would find themselves enshrined in
treaty and black-letter law. This notion of
humane treatment of prisoners is thus an
example of a once-emergent, and now well-
established professional norm among soldiers
at arms.
Such principles, dimly discerned, none-
theless survive the ages in the subsequent
reflections of philosophers, theologians,
and statements in many cultures, languages,
and religions. It was that body of reflection
that Lieber sought to embody in “General
Orders #100.” And in so codifying these
intuitions, the Lieber Code incorporated
what the Dominican priest, Francisco di
Vitoria (1539), decrying the harsh treatment
inflicted on indigenous populations during
the Spanish Conquest, had earlier described
as the “customs and habits of civilized peo-
ples and nations” (jus gentium).
Such fundamental norms and long-prevail-
ing intuitions thus find their circuitous way
into contemporary international law. They are
often mandated in the legislative language of
specific treaties and conventions, such as those
banning the use of certain kinds of weapons
as part of what is termed “the Law of Armed
121
WAR
Conflict” (LOAC), intended to constrain and
manage the application of armed force, or else
mandating proper treatment of war’s victims,
such as refugees and prisoners of war, under
provisions designed to alleviate some of the
worst forms of suffering among war’s victims.
This latter body of legislation is usually termed
“International Humanitarian Law” (IHL).
The demarcation is not sharp, nor always
well observed or understood by lawyers and
even legal scholars, sometimes resulting in a
conflation of, or confusion between the two
distinct legal regimes, the former emanating
primarily from Hague Conventions in the late
nineteenth and early twentieth century, and
the latter contained primarily in Geneva con-
ventions adopted following both World War I
and World War II.
More broadly, however, the central moral
principles underlying both distinct sets
of concerns and drawn, in turn, from the
centuries of reflection encompassed in the
just war tradition itself, are enshrined in
what are often termed the “Five Pillars” of
International Law. These are:
• Prevention of Superfluous Injury and
Unnecessary Suffering
• Military Necessity (the Economy of Force)
• Proportionality
• Distinction (Discrimination or Non­
combatant immunity)
• Command Responsibility (Accountability)
CONCLUSION: RECENT
DEVELOPMENTS IN THE
UNDERSTANDING OF
POSTMODERN WAR
Space does not permit more than a brief men-
tion of two of the most recent developments
in the just war tradition, both of which bear
George R. Lucas, Jr
importantly on the advent of postmodern
war.
The first is now commonly termed jus
post bellum, and describes the need to end
wars properly, so as to inhibit the likelihood
of future outbreaks of violence and armed
conflict. While often attributed to the recent
pioneering work of Brian Orend, an eminent
Canadian scholar of international relations
(2000, 2006), Orend himself attributes the
origins of this concern to Kant, particularly
in the late essay, Perpetual Peace (1795).
Kant, in turn, although often understood to
be a critic of conventional just war think-
ing (e.g. Grotius), nonetheless outlined some
conditions and prerequisites for winding up
wars so as not to have the end of one serve as
cause for the next. In the contemporary era,
Orend cites the excessively punitive nature of
the Treaty of Versailles (1918), ending World
War I, as an example of precisely what Kant
sought to avoid, while the Marshall Plan in
Europe following World War II serves as a
recent example of ending war successfully, in
a manner to inhibit future conflict among the
warring parties (Patterson, 2012, 2013).
Jus post bellum became a prominent fea-
ture in the wars fought in Afghanistan and
Iraq by the United States, NATO, and their
allies during the first decade of the present
century. Often variously called “peace-keep-
ing and stability operations,” nation-building,
hybrid war, or MOOTW in military circles,
jus post bellum and its proper military and
post-military dimensions now constitute a
principal focus of military training and lead-
ership development.
The importance of proper education,
training, and leadership development among
the world’s prominent military forces, in
turn, is the focus of the other (less thor-
oughly explored) dimension of postmodern
war. Termed variously jus ante bellum, or
122
“just preparedness for war,” this new devel-
opment directly addresses the responsibility
of reasonably just, responsible, and at least
minimally rights-respecting nations to equip
and train military forces to properly carry
out their new responsibilities in accordance
with international law, and specifically, to
know how they are expected to behave and
carry out both military and stability/peace-
keeping duties properly, and avoid policies
and actions that will inflame or reignite
the conflict they are attempting to resolve.
Principal among the formulators of this new
dimension of military preparedness for post-
modern war are scholars Wertheimer (2010)
and Van der Linden (2010), while the assess-
ment, evaluation, and reform of various
national programs of military education in
the world’s principal developed nations has
constituted the work and publication of the
“Military Ethics Education Network,” led
by British scholars and military education
reformers Paul Robinson, Don Carrick, and
James Connelly (see Robinson 2008, 2009).
The topic of warfare—what it is, as well as
when and how it is to be waged, brought to
an end, and even prepared for—is under-
standably a complex and somewhat inchoate
topic, owing in part to its longstanding his-
torical ubiquity and its multitude of sources
and experiences. It is not to be wondered
that individuals might find themselves con-
fused, especially regarding topics like the
justification of war, the limitations placed
upon combatants engaged in it, let  alone a
topic such as “military ethics” as a species of
professional ethics and the emergent norms
of practitioners. All have, over the centuries,
been the objects of an extraordinary degree
of confusion, misinformation, and outright
error, perhaps none more so than the nature
and origin of the “just war tradition” itself.
A clear, comprehensive, and authoritative

account of these important matters, however,
might one day prove sufficient to dispel, once
and for all, the remaining vestiges of that
confusion.
Notes
1
Clausewitz’s views on ethics are complicated
and thoroughly unsystematic. He eschews
benevolence and pity, but believes that restrains
(such as not killing the enemy’s prisoners
of war) arise instead as a result of prudence
and the civilizing effects of intellect. He talks
extensively of “moral force” and “character,”
but usually intends the former in the sense of
morale, or esprit de corps, while “character”
refers to those traits and habits, like courage,
calmness, and steadfastness, that aid in the
pursuit of conflict.
2
Although frequently invoked, and presumably
constituting one of Napoleon’s “115 Maxims”
on statecraft, I have never seen this famous
quote properly cited.
WORKS CITED
Augustine (ca. 410) (1998), The City of God
against the Pagans, trans. R. W. Dyson.
New York: Cambridge University Press.
Allport, G. (1937), Personality: A
Psychological Interpretation. New York:
Holt, Rinehart, & Winston.
— (1954), The Nature of Prejudice.
Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
— (1960), Personality & Social Encounter.
Boston, MA: Beacon Press.
Clausewitz, K. (1830/1976), On War, trans.
Howard and Paret (ed.). Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press.
Dunlap, C. (2001), “Law and Military
Interventions: Preserving Humanitarian
Values in 21st Conflicts.” Cambridge,
123
WAR
MA: Harvard University Carr Center for
Human Rights Policy. http://people.duke.
edu/~pfeaver/dunlap.pdf.
Eco, U. (1991), “Reflections on War,” La
Rivista dei libri (April 1, 1991); reprinted
in Eco, Five Moral Pieces, trans. McEwen.
New York: Harcourt, Inc.
French, S. E. (2003), The Code of the
Warrior: Exploring Warrior Values, Past
and Present. Lanham, MD: Rowman &
Littlefield.
Freud, S. (1915), “Thoughts for the Times
on War and Death,” Reflections on War
and Death, trans. A. A. Brill and A. B.
Kuttner. New York: Moffat, Yard & Co.
Freud, S. (1930/2002), Civilization and Its
Discontents. London: Penguin.
Hensel, H. M. (2010), The Prism of Just
War: Asian and Western Perspectives on
the Legitimate Use of Military Force.
London: Ashgate Press.
Hobbes, T. (1660), The Leviathan. http://
oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/
hobbes/leviathan-contents.html.
Jaynes, J. (1976), The Origins of
Consciousness in the Breakdown of the
Bicameral Mind. New York: Houghton
Mifflin & Co.
Johnson, J. T. (2014), Sovereignty.
Washington, DC: Georgetown University
Press.
Kant, I. (1795), Toward Perpetual Peace
and Other Essays, trans. T. Humphrey.
Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing.
Kaplan, R. (2002), Warrior Politics: Why
Leadership Demands a Pagan Ethos.
New York: Random House.
Kelsay, J. (2009), Arguing the Just War
in Islam. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press.
Liang, Q. and Xiangsui, W. (1999),
Unrestricted Warfare. Beijing: PLA
Literature and Arts Publishing House.
George R. Lucas, Jr
Lucas, G. R., Jr (2009), “‘This is Not Your
Father’s War’: Confronting the Moral
Challenges of ‘Unconventional’ War,”
Journal of National Security Law and
Policy, 3 (2): 331–342.
— (2010), “Postmodern War,” Journal
of Military Ethics 9 (4) (December):
289–298.
— (2011), “New Rules for New Wars:
International Law and Just War Doctrine
for Irregular Warfare,” Case-Western
Review of International Law, 677–705.
— (2014a), “Revisiting Armed Humanitarian
Intervention: A 25-year Retrospective,”
in D. Scheid (ed.), Ethics of Armed
Humanitarian Intervention. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, pp. 26–45.
— (2014b), “The Case for Preventive War,”
in D. K. Chatterjee (ed.), The Ethics of
Preventive War. New York: Cambridge
University Press, pp. 46–63.
— (2014c), “Military Ethics and Cyber
Warfare,” in J. T. Johnson and E.
Patterson (eds), Ashgate Handbook of
Military Ethics. London: Ashgate Press.
MacIntyre, A. (1981), After Virtue. South
Bend, IN: Notre Dame University Press.
— (1988), Whose Justice? Which
Rationality? South Bend, IN: Notre Dame
University Press.
— (1990), First Principles, Final Ends, and
Contemporary Philosophical Issues.
“Aquinas Lecture.” Milwaukee, WI:
Marquette University Press.
Marx, K. (1844/2007), Economic &
Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, trans.
M. Milligan. Mineola, NY: Dover Books.
— (1845/1939), The German Ideology
(w/F. Engels). Moscow: The Marx-Engels
Institute.
— (1848/2012), The Communist Manifesto
(w/F. Engels). New Haven, CT: Yale
University Press.
124
Morkevicius, V. (2010), “Hindu Perspectives
on War,” in H. M. Hensel (ed.), The Prism
of Just War. London: Ashgate Press,
pp. 169–191.
Morris, D. (1967), The Naked Ape: A
Zoologist’s Study of the Human Animal.
New York: Random House.
Orend, B. (2000), War and International
Justice: A Kantian Perspective. Waterloo,
ON: Wilfred Lauier University Press.
— (2006), The Morality of War.
Peterborough, ON: Broadview Press.
— (2008), “War,” The Stanford
Encyclopedia of Philosophy, E. N. Zalta
(ed.), http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/
fall2008/entries/war/.
Patterson, E. (2012), Ending Wars Well.
New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
— (2013), Ethics Beyond War’s End.
Washington, DC: Georgetown University
Press.
Pattison, J. (2010), Humanitarian
Intervention and the Responsibility to
Protect: Who Should Intervene? Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Regan, R. (2013), “The Falklands War,” in
Just War: Principles and Cases, 2nd edn.
Washington, DC: Catholic University of
America Press.
Reichberg, G., Syse, H., and Begby, E.
(2003), The Ethics of War: Classical
and Contemporary Readings. London:
Blackwell Publishers.
Robinson, P. (2003), Just War in
Comparative Perspective. London:
Ashgate Press.
— (2008), Ethics Education in the Military,
P. Robinson, J. Connelly, and D. Carrick
(eds). London: Ashgate Press.
— (2009), Ethics Education for Irregular
Warfare, in P. Robinson, J. Connelly,
and D. Carrick (eds). London: Ashgate
Press.

Rousseau, J. J. (1755a/1997), The Origins of
Inequality Among Men. ‘The Discourses’
and Other Early Political Writings, trans.
V. Gourevitch. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
— (1755b/1997), The Political Economy.
‘The Discourses’ and Other Early
Political Writings, trans. V. Gourevitch.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
— (c. 1756/1962), “A Lasting Peace through
the Federation of Europe,” and “The
State of War,” in C. E. Vaughan (ed.),
The Political writings of Jean-Jacques
Rousseau. Oxford: Blackwell.
Roy, K. (2012), Hinduism and the Ethics of
Warfare: from Antiquity to the Present.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Scheid, D. (ed.) (2014), The Ethics of Armed
Humanitarian Intervention. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
125
WAR
Sun-Tzu (ca. 6th Century bce/1994), The
Art of War, trans. R. D. Sawyer. New
York: Basic Books.
Van der Linden, H. (2010), “Just Military
Preparedness,” International Journal of
Applied Philosophy, http://works.bepress.
com/harry_vanderlinden/43/.
Vitoria, F. di (1539/1991), “Di Indis et Di
Juri Belli.” Vitoria: Political Writings,
A. Padgen and J. Lawrance (eds).
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Waltz, K. N. (1954), Man, the State, and
War: A Theoretical Analysis. New York:
Columbia University Press.
Walzer, M. (1977), Just and Unjust Wars.
New York: Basic Books.
Wertheimer, R. (2010), Empowering our
Military Conscience: Transforming
Just War Theory and Military Moral
Education. London: Ashgate Press.
 8
PEACE
Andrew Fitz-Gibbon
THE NATURE OF PEACE AND
THE STATE OF NATURE
Just as history by and large is the history
of wars, so in political philosophy more
is written on war than on peace. In politi-
cal philosophy, peace is most often a nega-
tive concept, being the absence of something
else—the absence of war. More fruitful for
political philosophy has been the analysis of
conditions for, conduct of, and the justice of
war, with an assumption that war, if not a
necessary aspect of social life, is more com-
mon than not. Yet, peace is the backdrop to
the commonly discussed areas within politi-
cal philosophy—human and civil rights,
contracts, justice, property rights, and law.
Without peace, these aspects of common
human life make little sense.
Nonetheless, despite the predominance of
war in political affairs, peace and nonvio-
lence were central ideas behind much politi-
cal activism in the twentieth century. M. K.
Gandhi was the first to use techniques of
nonviolent resistance, first in South Africa
(1893–1914) and then in India (1915–1947).
For Gandhi, nonviolent protest required as
much courage as warfare. The satyagrahis—
those who practice satyagraha, “truth force”
or “love-force”—were to resist oppressive
sanctions by absorbing the violence of their
127
oppressors in their own persons (2001, 3ff).
In time the oppressor would cease violence,
having had a fill of it. He called this the “law
of self-sacrifice,” the “law of nonviolence,”
and the “law of suffering.” Just as the require-
ment of the military is training in how to use
violence effectively, satyagrahis needed to be
trained in how not to be violent (ibid., 92 ff).
Gandhi even called for an official “non-vio-
lent army” of trained volunteers numbering
the thousands who could put themselves in
harmful way to end violence (ibid., 86).
Martin Luther King, Jr relied extensively
on Gandhi’s developed nonviolent tech-
niques (see his “Pilgrimage to Nonviolence”
in King 1986, 54–62). In his “My Trip to the
land of Gandhi,” King says, “True nonviolent
resistance is not unrealistic submission to evil
power. It is rather a courageous confronta-
tion of evil by the power of love, in the faith
that it is better to be a recipient of violence
than the inflictor of it, since the latter only
multiplies the existence of violence and bit-
terness in the universe, while the former may
develop a sense of shame in the opponent,
and thereby bring about a transformation
and change of heart” (1986, 44).
King’s understanding of nonviolence led
him eventually to oppose all war and to make
significant protest of the Vietnam War. He
said, “I have come to the conclusion that the
Andrew Fitz-Gibbon
potential destructiveness of modern weapons
of war totally rules out the possibility of war
ever serving as a negative good. If we assume
that mankind has a right to survive then we
must find an alternative to war and destruc-
tion” (ibid., 60). Gandhi and King held in
creative tension the notion that nonviolence
was a “good,” an end in itself—something
akin to love or truth—with the notion of
nonviolent resistance as a political strategy.
In other words, nonviolence was not merely
a political technique, but the outworking of
a deeper metaphysics.
Since King, nonviolence as a political tool
has been developed most especially by Gene
Sharp (1973a–c, 2005). Sharp analyzed dif-
ferent techniques for using nonviolent pro-
test as a means of achieving political ends.
He suggested 198 different methods of non-
violent action in order to bring about social
change. Peter Ackerman and Jack Duvall
(2000) built on the pioneering work of
Sharp. Ackerman and Duvall analyzed 12
different movements in the twentieth cen-
tury which accomplished social and politi-
cal change by direct nonviolent action. On
close analysis, many of the movements
were not as clearly nonviolent as Ackerman
and Duvall suggest. Such change is accom-
plished by seizing the initiative to control a
conflict to make the opposition give-in to
demands against their will. In practice, non-
violent direct action is far from “peaceful.”
Nonetheless, their conclusion is persua-
sive: nonviolent direct action is a powerful
means of social and political change. Their
organization, the International Center on
Nonviolent Conflict, through its publi-
cations and DVDs was influential in the
overthrow of Serbian leader Slobodan
Milosevic in 2000, and Ukrainian leader
Viktor Yanukovych in 2004–2005. Their
techniques were extensively used in the
128
Arab Spring revolutions of 2010–2011 (see
Gan, 2013, 70).
However, some on the Left criticize non-
violent direct action as politically ineffective
and not going far enough. Ward Churchill
in his Pacifism as Pathology says, “Pacifism
as a strategy of achieving social, political,
and economic change can only lead to the
dead end of liberalism” (Churchill and Ryan,
2007, 33). Yet, in Eastern Europe, it was just
such liberalism that the masses pursued as
Soviet Communism faded.
Those who see nonviolence as more than
a sociopolitical strategy also have criticized
the direction that Sharp, Ackerman, and
Duvall have taken. Barry L. Gan notes a
distinction between “selective nonviolence”
and “comprehensive nonviolence” (2013,
73 ff). Selective nonviolence rejects the use
of violence for pragmatic reasons in order
to accomplish a political aim. The “good” is
not nonviolence itself, but rather the politi-
cal goal. If violence could achieve the goal
more effectively and quickly, then violence
would be used. However, some selective non-
violentists consider nonviolence as always a
better strategy than violence, and so make no
resort to violent tactics. Nonetheless, non-
violence is still considered merely a tool to
use toward some other goal. Comprehensive
nonviolence is the rejection of violence in all
its forms; nonviolence being considered a
good in itself. A comprehensive nonviolentist
will attempt to practice nonviolence in all
aspects of personal, social, and political life.
Comprehensive nonviolentists reject some of
the techniques suggested by Sharp as being
inherently violent.
Gan also suggests that between the
extremes of selective and comprehensive
nonviolence is a wide spectrum of under-
standings and practices. He places Tolstoy,
Gandhi, and King toward the pole of

comprehensive nonviolence, and Sharp,
Ackerman, and Duvall toward the pole of
selective nonviolence.1
Feminism has contributed to understand-
ings of peace through the ethics of care
and other feminist philosophical writing
(see Ruddick, 1990, Noddings, 2003, Held,
2007). Ethicists of care argue that it is, in
part, the impersonal masculinist themes of
political philosophy and ethics (contracts,
rights, and duties) that allow even the con-
templation of war as a good. The ethics of
care, focused on networks of personal caring
relationships, would make war and violence
less likely than other ethical schemes.
Notable organizations involved in paci-
fism and antiwar are the Fellowship of
Reconciliation, founded in 1914 as a
Christian antiwar movement. It has since
become an interfaith organization involv-
ing all faiths and includes those who have
no formal faith commitment (see the col-
lection of writings from the Fellowship of
Reconciliation, Wink, 2000).
Concerned Philosophers for Peace is the
largest organization of antiwar philosophers
in the United States. According to William
Gay:
Since its inception in 1981, Concerned
Philosophers For Peace has become
the largest and most active organiza-
tion of professional philosophers in
North America oriented to the critique
of militarism and the search for a just
and lasting peace. Currently, Concerned
Philosophers For Peace has over 500
members in North America (2003).
Concerned Philosophers for Peace has a
book series in the Rodopi, Amsterdam, Value
Inquiry Books Series, Philosophy of Peace
Series (16 volumes at the time of writing with
3 more in preparation), and a semiannual
129
PEACE
newsletter. This 16-volume collection is the
largest published collection of papers by phi-
losophers on the philosophy of peace.
In some recent political philosophy, a dis-
tinction has been made between “negative
peace” and “positive peace.” Negative peace
is the mere absence of war. Positive peace
has taken on a more full conceptualization, a
condition more akin to the Jewish notion of
Shalom and is a state of well-being, free from
violence. In different presentations, positive
peace is a eudemonic, or else, a loving state.
Duane L. Cady says of positive peace, “the
point is always to build on and broaden our
sense of community by stressing interdepend-
ence, respect, tolerance, common aspirations,
and understanding” (2010, 86).
Johan Galtung analyzes negative peace as:
(a) the absence of violence of all kinds (physi-
cal and psychological; (b) structural violence
(violence embedded in institutions); and (c)
cultural violence (attitudes and values that
tolerate harm) (1996, 31). In moving the
discussion of violence beyond the bounds
of physical violence (to psychological, struc-
tural, and cultural harm), Galtung moves
the discussion of negative peace beyond the
notion of the absence of war. Although a
nation may not be at war, its citizens may be
subject to internal strife and various harms
that Galtung classifies as violence. Positive
peace, then, is not only the absence of war
together with these diverse violent harms,
but also a different kind of human interac-
tion. Michael Allen Fox suggests that positive
peace includes four aspects: (a) subjective (a
state of well-being); (b) objective (a goal
with a process to reach the goal); (c) cosmic
(unity with a larger whole—not merely peace
between human beings, but with other sen-
tient beings and with the environment); and
(d) prescriptive/visionary (guiding principles
and outlook) (2014, 188–193).
Andrew Fitz-Gibbon
HISTORICAL AND MULTICULTURAL
PRECEDENTS
From ancient times, war has been an accepted
part of human interaction. In the ancient
world, arguments against war are few and
far between, though in the Crito Plato argues
that we should never return evil for evil. One
interpretation of Plato would be to say that
retaliation is morally wrong. As the con-
duct of war is largely retaliatory, often with
extreme violence, Plato’s argument might
be taken as an early argument against war
(2011, Crito 48b–c). However, even if this
is a true construction, Plato’s suggestion is a
mere drop of war resistance in a bucketful of
the political acceptance of, and justifications
for, war.
It is not that notions of peace were absent
from the ancient world. The Epicureans pur-
sued ataraxia as the goal of human life—a
state of tranquility untouched by the chances
and changes of life—hence peace. Yet
ataraxia belongs to peace as an inner state.
The pursuit of ataraxia was engaged in with
the knowledge that the world is one of con-
flict and war. There was no Epicurean anti-
war movement in any political sense.
In the East, early Daoist writings can be
interpreted as antiwar. Although in some
interpretative traditions, the Daodejing is
considered a military text, it tends toward
peace, personally and socially, rather than
war (Zhang, 2012). The Daodejing sees
peace as the natural way. War begins with
desire and the dao is to move beyond desire
toward a life of harmony with “the ten thou-
sand things”—all that is. Chapters  30 and
31 of the Daodejing are especially antiwar
seeing weapons as “ominous instruments,”
sometimes translated as “instruments of evil.”
The good ruler “will oppose all conquest by
force of arms” (Waley, 2010, 149). However,
130
it is not true to say that the Daodejing is a
pacifist text. In exceptional circumstances,
when attacked, the good ruler may use force
of arms, but minimally so and with much
regret.
In the Zhuangzi, the treatment of war and
peace is more complex than in the Daodejing.
Scholars now realize that the Zhuangzi is a
text from a number of writers in different
periods, and so it does not speak with merely
one voice (see Lynn, 2008). Those chap-
ters most likely written by Master Zhuang
accept that war is a fact of life and is best
avoided. When government becomes tyran-
nical, it is acceptable to enter war as a last
resort to overthrow such governments. In
common with much other Daoist writing,
the Zhuangzi refrains from making value
judgments about the rightness or wrongness
of actions, and looks rather to a way to man-
age the many changes of life, which includes
violence. However, the “anarchist chapters”
of the Zhuangzi, on the contrary, suggest that
war is always morally wrong, even to allevi-
ate the sufferings of others.
Mozi makes a different argument than the
Daoists against war. He roots his antiwar
sentiment in universal love. Even so, Mozi
is not totally antiviolence. He makes an
argument for war against oppressors on the
basis of justice. Universal love may, at times,
require the strong to act violently on behalf
of the weak (Mo Tzu, 1963, 50–61).
Ancient Buddhism and Jainism share the
concept of ahimsa—nonharm—and from
the sixth-century bce onward had a direct
influence on Hindu thought. Yet, in Buddhist
thought the notion that all of life is suffering,
and that the eightfold path leads one away
from suffering have tended toward a social
conservatism and individualism. As suffering
will be always a part of the human condi-
tion, why try to eradicate it? The best hope

is to become personally nonattached, and
hence avoid suffering. The political attempts
to embrace Buddhism as public policy,
and hence antiwar, have been few and far
between. A notable exception is Aśoka who
ruled most of India from c. 265 to 238 bce
(see Cortwright, 2008, 186). However, more
recently a new tradition, known as engaged
Buddhism, has taken the Buddhist notion of
metta—loving-kindness, as a starting point
for engaged social action to alleviate suffer-
ing and protest war. Vietnamese monk Thich
Nhat Hanh (1992) and the Dalai Lama
(1999) are notable in this regard.
The Western world had to wait for the early
Christian movement for its first brief hiatus
looking toward an antiwar philosophy. For
its first 250  years of existence, Christianity
was a pacifist movement (Hershberger, 1981,
64–70). Christians were forbidden from
being soldiers in the army of empire until
around 174 ce, under the reign of Marcus
Aurelius, though it must be remembered
that early Christianity was a movement
composed of slaves, women, and subaltern
Jewish males. However, when Constantine
embraced Christianity in the early fourth-
century ce, the pacifist religion became the
favored religion of Empire and began its
own justifications for war. Besides some ele-
ments of monasticism and a few minor sects
in the medieval period, Christianity was at
ease with violence, either enacted by the state
against other states in war, or in pogroms,
inquisitions, and crusades. Some Christians
returned to pacifist roots, but not until the
early sixteenth century (see later).
In political philosophy, the possibilities and
procedures for peace depend, in part, on an
understanding of the human condition. What
would human nature look like in its natural
state? Philosophers have been divided. For
Thomas Hobbes, the state of nature is one of
131
PEACE
war of all against all. Peace, in a Hobbesian
world, is only possible by the imposition of
peace by a Leviathan, a governing authority
that guards against the excesses of the natu-
ral state through imposition of law, backed
by force. For John Locke, whose state of
nature is more benign than Hobbes’s—a
tabula rasa—natural reason shows human-
ity to be social, and therefore tending toward
peaceful intercourse rather than violence. In
response to Hobbes, Jean-Jacques Rousseau
gives us a third, more romantic view of the
state of nature. Human beings, neither good
nor bad by nature, tend toward the develop-
ment of peace when unaffected by the tram-
mels of civilization.
Although in each view of the human con-
dition peace is a “good,” the Hobbesian view
tends toward a realism that rejects pacifism,
preferring an enforcing of limited peace.
The Lockean views something closer to a
liberal and reasonable searching for peace.
Romanticism tends toward an unrealistic
utopian view of society where peace would
reign, if only we let it.
Modern philosophers built their under-
standing of human nature—whether fun-
damentally aggressive or pacifistic—from a
careful reading of ancient texts, by obser-
vation of human behavior, and sometimes
because a certain view of human nature
matched well with a religious or ideological
viewpoint. However, recent developments
in brain science have challenged the often-
held view that human beings are ineluctably
aggressive by nature. Suggestions, backed by
science, that human beings are an empathic
species have caused some controversy (see
Rifkin, 2009). At the very least psychologists
seem to have established that the human
being rather than being either always aggres-
sive, or else pacifistic, has the potential for
predation, vengeance, and violence on the
Andrew Fitz-Gibbon
one hand, and for compassion, reason, and
peacefulness on the other (see Pinker, 2011,
483–696).
PACIFISMS
Pacifism is generally taken to mean some-
thing like “opposition to war.” However,
there is no single understanding of pacifism in
the literature. Scholars note these main types
of pacifism: (a) principled opposition to war
in all its forms, but not to all forms of vio-
lence; (b) principled opposition to all kinds
of violence, which includes war; (c) princi-
pled opposition to some kinds of war, such
as in nuclear pacifism, but not to “conven-
tional” war. However, Duane L. Cady (2010)
suggests a moral continuum from warism to
pacifism, with the different versions of paci-
fism melding into each other with no clear
boundaries.
The early sixteenth century saw profound
changes in the political and social landscape
of Europe. Besides the major reforms pro-
duced by Martin Luther, Ulrich Zwingli, John
Calvin, and others, a number of small radical
sects arose—loosely termed Anabaptist—in
part in the wake of the breaking of the
hegemony of the Roman church, and in part
as a reaction to the slow progress of reform
by the magisterial reformers. Once charac-
terized as violent revolutionaries (in some
tellings as proto-Marxist), the sixteenth-
century radicals were rebranded as pacifists
in the historiography of Mennonite scholars
from the 1940s onward (see Estep, 1963,
Hershberger, 1981). Careful, and non-par-
tisan, scholarship places the radicals some-
where in between. The beginning of religious
and political freedom in the sixteenth century
was fertile ground in which many varieties of
132
religious and political groups thrived. Some
radicals were truly revolutionary, though
more often than not of an apocalyptic bent,
while some embraced the pacifism of a non-
violent Christ (Stayer, 1976). Those groups
that gradually embraced pacifism were his-
torically longer lived as movements than the
violent revolutionaries. Although both types
of radical were persecuted by both Catholic
and Protestant state authorities, the peace-
ful sects continued through migration, first
to Eastern Europe, and then to the new
world. These groups we know now as the
Amish, the Mennonites, and the Hutterites,
the historic peace churches. They have
been largely pacifist groups who see them-
selves as islands of holiness in the vast sea
of godlessness—what Stayer terms “separa-
tist nonresistance.” Those within the radical
communities see themselves as within “the
perfection of Christ.” The rest of society is
outside “the perfection of Christ.” The world
is characterized mostly by violence, which
the Anabaptists eschew. Although pacifists,
the Anabaptists had a generally pessimis-
tic view of society and of political author-
ity, though most viewed the government as
God-given. They did not expect society to
become more peaceful (Brock, 1981, 20).
Nonetheless, the peaceful sixteenth-century
radicals influenced the pacifist groups of
the seventeenth century—most notably the
Quakers—and many pacifists since. Whereas
the Anabaptists tended to withdraw from
society, the Quakers under William Penn’s
leadership attempted the “holy experiment”
of a pacifist colony in the new world—
Pennsylvania. The pacifist colony was in
part successful (in relationships with native
Americans and in its generally humanitar-
ian approach to law), but following Penn’s
death Pennsylvania gradually moved away
from its pacifist roots (Brock, 1981, 43–46).

Anabaptist pacifism was of an absolute
kind and has been termed nonresistance,
based on an interpretation of the gospel
text where Jesus says, “Do not resist evil.”
The text was interpreted to include not
only opposition to war or any government
violence—“the sword”—but also any inter-
personal violence. The Anabaptists took the
injunction to “turn the other cheek” quite lit-
erally. Even self-defense was considered mor-
ally wrong. Although few have followed the
Anabaptist extreme of nonresistance, most
notably Leo Tolstoy embraced such radi-
cal pacifism in the late nineteenth century
(1984). Tolstoy differed from the Anabaptists
in holding a more hopeful view of the world.
The Anabaptists considered the world unre-
deemable until some great apocalyptic event.
Hence they did not try to change society, and
simply withdrew into closed communities.
Tolstoy, on the other hand, argued that all in
society should embrace nonresistance.
The Anabaptist stance has often been
considered politically irrelevant—though
in the twentieth century Anabaptist were
also conscientious objectors (see Brock and
Young, 1999). However, scholars have used
Anabaptist-like arguments, that is religious,
to protest war (see, e.g. Hauerwas, 1983,
2004, Yoder, 1994, 1996, 1997).
A different argument against war and
for a peaceful life is the brief but influential
tract by Henry David Thoreau, On The Duty
of Civil Disobedience written originally in
1849, in part as protest both to slavery and
to the Mexican war. Thoreau’s basis is not a
religious one, but is based on the inviolabil-
ity of the individual conscience. Government
has no right to demand anything from citi-
zens (for Thoreau the best form of govern-
ment is no government at all). As government
demand citizens to enter the military, it is the
citizen’s duty to resist, to disobey government
133
PEACE
nonviolently. Thoreau’s view is significant for
political philosophy in its direct challenge of
the legitimacy of government. Libertarians
and anarchists alike have used Thoreau as a
justification for an antigovernment stance.
Thoreau (along with other New England
pacifists) influenced Tolstoy. In turn, Thoreau
and Tolstoy’s work had a direct effect on the
young Mohandas Gandhi, then in South Africa,
and later on Martin Luther King Jr. In process
of time, the religious argument of the teach-
ing of the New Testament—to not resist evil,
to love enemies, and to bless persecutors—was
conjoined with Thoreau’s notion of civil diso-
bedience, based on conscience, to become the
social political strategy of nonviolent resist-
ance, sometimes termed simply nonviolence.
THE PEACE OF LIBERAL,
DEMOCRATIC CAPITALISM
In 1795, Immanuel Kant published his
influential treatise To Perpetual Peace: A
Philosophical Sketch. Kant was not a roman-
tic. With Hobbes, he assumed that “the natu-
ral state is one of war” (1983, 111). For this
reason the state of peace “must therefore be
established,” and is not merely the suspen-
sion of hostilities. Derived from this little
tract, and other parts of the Kantian canon,
political philosophers now speak of the
Kantian Triad—the mutual interplay of: (a)
democracy (which Kant calls a republican
constitution, meaning freedom, equality, and
the rule of law, 112); (b) a “federation of free
states” (115); and (c) cosmopolitanism and
the right of universal hospitality. Although
in Kant’s paper cosmopolitanism is the third
of his conditions for peace, the triad is usu-
ally completed rather with trade and inter-
national cooperation (perhaps after Adam
Andrew Fitz-Gibbon
Smith who argued in Book 5 of The Wealth
of Nations against wars of imperialism as
being too expensive to maintain (see 2000,
277ff). The argument suggests that the best
hope for a peaceful world is one in which
nations favor democracy, international fed-
erations, and free trade.
In brief, the argument is that democracies
do not go to war with each other. The notion
has provoked debate. Much depends on what
counts toward a nation being considered
democratic. However, from careful research
Bruce Russett and John Oneal, in 2001, pre-
sented evidence that, over time, democra-
cies favor peace over war (see discussion in
Gartzke, 2007, Pinker, 2011, 278–288).
Although before its time, Kant’s view of
an international federation is something
like the United Nations to which member
states devolve at least some of their sover-
eignty for the sake of all—effectively a social
contract between nations. Just as individual
citizens give up their right of the lawful use
of violence to the police force and military,
so individual states give up their lawful use
of violence to an international body. Just as
citizens make up the police force and military
of any particular state, so the peacekeeping
force of the United Nations is made up of
military units from member states.
Democratic nations, joined in loose inter-
national confederation, will also freely trade
with each other. This argument is that those
who rely on trade with others are less likely
to go to war with them. Erik Gartzke makes
such an argument, though it is debated. In
simple terms, you do not engage in war with
those upon whom you depend for trade.
Before the wars of the twentieth century,
if a powerful state needed resources, and
another nonstate or less powerful state has
those resources, the first state would simply
take what it needed. This was the dominant
134
story of European imperialism from the
Renaissance until the decolonization begun
after the Second World War. Now, even the
most powerful nations must practice peace-
ful trade with those whose goods and services
they require. For all the suggested ills of mul-
tinational corporations, because of the fiscal
peace they create between nations (often in
conflict in the recent past), some argue that
they may yet be the best hope for a world
free of wars, and hence at peace.2
In 1982, Michael Novak published his The
Spirit of Democratic Capitalism. Although
initially largely ignored in the West, in Eastern
Europe the book became a key text in the
overthrow of Soviet Communism (first pub-
lished underground in Poland in 1984). His
conception of democratic capitalism was a
triad—the three liberations of liberalism—of
a democratic polity, a capitalist system, and
a humanitarian culture of freedom. Missing
from the Kantian triad is the notion of a
humanitarian and free culture. If the Kantian
and Novakian are combined, a tetrad is pro-
duced: democratic polity, an international
federation of nations, free trade between
nations, and a humanitarian culture.
However, such an approach is not a paci-
fist stance. Theorists who suggest that such is
the best hope for a peaceful world also sug-
gest that war is sometimes a necessity, often
in self-defense, and, less frequently, to effect
regime change. Such a conception of peace
is not comprehensively pacifist in the total
opposition to war, but might be realistically
pacifist in seeking to restrain rogue nations—
through force of arms if necessary.
A broad political philosophy of peace
would need to consider all of the earlier. It
would be a synthetic construct that would
include the Kantian triad, combined with a
humanitarian culture. It would take notice of
the various movements of nonviolent direct

action. It would include, too, a considera-
tion of comprehensive nonviolence and an
emphasis on the work of subjective peace.
Political philosophers, who ordinarily do not
take much notice of pacifism, would do well
to look at the work of scholars of war resist-
ance. Pacifists and war resisters, whose aim
must surely be the end of warfare, would be
helped by a more thoughtful analysis of the
Kantian Triad and its contribution to world
peace.
Notes
1
For an extended essay on the implementation
of non-violence, see Nagler (2004). For the
history of peace movements, see Cortwright
(2008). For an eclectic collection of essays on
non-violence, see Zinn (2002). For the history
of non-violence, see Kurlansky (2009). For a
general introduction to peace studies, see Fox
(2014). For an historical collection of essays
on non-violence, see Holmes and Gan (2005).
2
On capitalism and peace, see Gartzke (2007).
For Hegel’s contrary view to Kant—that
perpetual peace is undesirable, that war is
inherent in the dialectic method, see Armstrong
(1933) and Smith (1983). For Rousseau’s less
optimistic view of international peace through
a federation of nations, see Hoffmann (1963).
WORKS CITED
Ackerman, P. and Duvall, J. (2000), A Force
More Powerful: A Century of Nonviolent
Conflict. Palgrave: New York.
Armstrong, A. C. (1933), “Hegel’s Attitude
on War and Peace,” The Journal of
Philosophy, 30 (December 25): 684–689.
Brock, P. (1981), The Roots of War
Resistance: Pacifism from the Early
Church to Tolstoy. Nyack: The
Fellowship of Reconciliation.
135
PEACE
Brock, P. and Young, N. (1999), Pacifism
in the Twentieth Century. Toronto:
University of Toronto Press.
Cady, D. L. (2010), From Warism
to Pacifism: A Moral Continuum.
Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
Churchill, W. and M. Ryan (2007), Pacifism
as Pathology: Reflections on the Role
of Armed Struggle in North America.
Oakland: A.K. Press.
Cortwright, D. (2008), Peace: A History
of Movements and Ideas. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Estep, W. R. (1963), The Anabaptist Story.
Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans.
Fox, M. A. (2014), Understanding Peace: A
Comprehensive Introduction. New York
and London: Routledge.
Galtung, J. (1996), Peace by Peaceful Means:
Peace and Conflict, Development and
Civilization. Oslo: PRIO International
Peace Research Institute, and London:
SAGE.
Gan, B. L. (2013), Violence and
Nonviolence: An Introduction. Lanham:
Rowman & Littlefield.
Gandhi, M. K. (2001), Non-Violent
Resistance (Satyagraha). Mineola, NY:
Dover.
Gartzke, E. (2007), “The Capitalist Peace,”
American Journal of Political Science, 51
(1): 166–191.
Gay, W. (2003), A History of Concerned
Philosophers for Peace. http://
peacephilosophy.org/?page_id=97
(accessed December 19, 2013).
Hanh, T. N. (1992), Peace in Every Step:
The Path of Mindfulness in Every Day
Life. New York: Bantam.
Hauerwas, S. (1983), The Peaceable
Kingdom: A Primer in Christian Ethics.
Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame
Press.
Andrew Fitz-Gibbon
— (2004), Performing the Faith: Bonhoeffer
and the Practice of Nonviolence. Grand
Rapids, MI: Brazos Press.
Held, V. (2007), The Ethics of Care:
Personal, Political And Global. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Hershberger, G. F. (1981), War, Peace, and
Nonresistance; A Classic Statement of a
Mennonite Peace Position in Faith and
Practice. Scottdale: Herald Press.
Hoffman, S. (1963), “Rousseau on War and
Peace,” The American Political Science
Review, 57 (2) (June): 317–333.
Holmes, R. L. and Gan, B. L. (2005),
Nonviolence in Theory and Practice.
Longrove, IL: Waveland.
Kant, I. (1983), Perpetual Peace and Other
Essays. Indianapolis: Hackett.
King, M. L., Jr (1986), I Have a Dream:
Writings and Speeches that Changed
the World, J. M. Washington (ed.). San
Francisco: Harper.
Kurlansky, M. (2009), Non-Violence: The
History of a Dangerous Idea, foreword
by His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
New York: The Modern Library.
Lama, D. (1999), Ethics for a New
Millennium. New York: Berkley.
Lynn, R. J. (2008), “View of War As Seen
in the Zhangzi as Interpreted by Guo
Xiang,” in H.-G. Möller and G. Wohlfart
(eds), Philosophieren Über Den Krieg—
War in Eastern and Western Philosophies.
Berlin: Parega Verlag.
Mo Tzu. (1963), Basic Writings, trans.
B. Watson. New York: Columbia
University Press.
Nagler, M. N. (2004), The Search for
a Nonviolent Future: A Promise of
Peace for Ourselves, Our Families, and
Our World. Maui, HI: Inner Ocean
Publishing.
136
Noddings, N. (2003), Caring: A Feminine
Approach to Ethics and Moral Education.
Berkeley, CA: University of California
Press.
Novak, M. (1982/1991), The Spirit of
Democratic Capitalism. London: IEA
Health and Welfare Unit.
Pinker, S. (2011), The Better Angels of Our
Nature: Why Violence Has Declined.
London: Penguin.
Plato (2011), The Last Days of Socrates.
London: Penguin.
Rifkin, J. (2009), The Empathic Civilization:
The Race to Global Consciousness in a
World of Crisis. New York: Jeremy
P. Tarcher/Penguin.
Ruddick, S. (1990), Maternal Thinking:
Towards a Politics of Peace. London:
Women’s Press.
Sharp, G. (1973a), The Politics of
Nonviolent Action: Part One Power
and Struggle. Boston, MA: Porter
Sargent.
— (1973b), The Politics of Nonviolent
Action: Part Two The Methods of
Nonviolent Action. Boston, MA: Porter
Sargent.
— (1973c), The Politics of Nonviolent
Action: Part Three The Dynamics of
Nonviolent Action. Boston, MA: Porter
Sargent.
— (2005), Waging Nonviolent Struggle:
20th Century Practice and 21st Century
Potential. Boston, MA: Porter Sargent.
Smith, A. (2000), The Wealth of Nations.
New York: Penguin.
Smith, S. B. (1983), “Hegel’s View on War,
the State, and International Relations,”
The American Political Science Review,
77 (3) (September): 624–632.
Stayer, J. M. (1976), Anabaptists and the
Sword. Lawrence, KS: Coronado Press.

Tolstoy, L. (1984), The Kingdom of God is
Within You: Christianity Not as a Mystic
Religion but as a New Theory of Life,
trans. C. Garnett. Lincoln: University of
Nebraska Press.
Waley, A. (2010), Lao Tzu: Tao Te Ching The
Way and Its Power and Its Place in Chinese
Thought. London: The Folio Society.
Wink, W. (ed.) (2000), Peace is the Way:
Writings on Nonviolence from the
Fellowship of Reconciliation. Maryknoll,
NY: Orbis Books.
Yoder, J. H. (1994), The Politics of Jesus.
Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.
137
PEACE
— (1996), When War is Unjust: Being
Honest About Just War Thinking.
Maryknoll, NY: Orbis.
— (1997), For the Nations: Essays Public
and Evangelical. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm.
B. Eerdmans.
Zhang, E. Y. (2012), “Weapons are Nothing
But Ominous Instruments:
The Daodejing’s View of War and Peace,”
Journal of Religious Ethics, September,
pp. 473–502.
Zinn, H. (Introduction) (2002), The Power
of Nonviolence: Writings by Advocates of
Peace. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.
 9
LIBERAL TOLERATION
Robert Paul Churchill
Toleration is indispensable for liberal democ-
racy, both as a public recognized attitude and
disposition among citizens to engage publicly
with one another on the basis of what Rawls
(1993) called the “duty of civility,” and as an
accepted principle that a liberal democratic
state must be neutral between competing con-
ceptions of the human good. Individual toler-
ance, as a personal or civic virtue, is not the
same as neutrality as an institutional norm; this
is because, while individuals can be tolerant
only by choice, constitutional provisions, laws,
or appellate court rulings can, by imposing
limits on government power, thereby establish
an effective measure of neutrality. The major-
ity of literature on toleration has assumed it
to pertain to individuals, particularly beliefs
about the proper behavior of citizens, and
appropriate attitudes and dispositions within a
liberal state. Here, we consider toleration as a
matter relating to individuals before consider-
ing liberal neutrality and related issues.
NECESSARY AND SUFFICIENT
CONDITIONS FOR INDIVIDUAL
TOLERATION
In general, toleration can be understood as
the disposition to forbear from interfering
139
with or using coercion to prevent the expres-
sion of beliefs, views, behaviors, or practices
that one considers seriously objectionable. To
count as serious the objection must be based
on more than personal interest, prudence,
preference, or taste; rather it reflects a con-
sidered judgment that something is seriously
wrong because of its nature or consequences.
For example, a citizen who believes same sex
civil unions are objectionable on moral or
religious grounds is tolerant if she believes,
as well, that her objections—as strong as they
may be—do not provide sufficient grounds
for the legal prohibition of same sex civil
unions or coercive interference with LBGT
partnerships.
These reflections show that, as Rainer
Forst (2012b) indicates, tolerant beliefs,
attitudes, dispositions, and behaviors must
have an “objection component” requiring
that the objection be nontrivial for the tol-
erant individual, as well as an “acceptance,”
or “forbearance” component that, though
in tension with the objection, prevails, or
“trumps,” the objection. The forbearance
condition does not cancel out the objection;
rather, the tolerant individual believes that
the objection is reasonably grounded, but
accepts other, higher-order reasons, to guide
her attitudes and actions. The higher-order
reasons may include, for example, respect for
Robert Paul Churchill
others’ autonomous choices, respect for the
importance of certain beliefs and practices in
other people’s lives, or beliefs about the value
of a reciprocal give-and-take in a pluralistic
society.
By accepting the objection and forbearance
components as necessary conditions for liberal
toleration, we can reduce much of the ambi-
guity, and hence, vacuity that accompanies
many uses of “tolerance” (Churchill, 1997).
Thus, because of the objection condition, we
cannot regard one’s forbearance as a genuine
instance of toleration unless the forbearance
is voluntarily chosen and capable of being
reasonable. If one grudgingly endures or puts
up with something without having considered
that being reasonable recommends forbear-
ance, then one’s attitude or behavior is not
tolerant as understood here. Indeed, citizens
who appear willing to “go along” but offer no
plausible reasons for voluntarily doing so and
express annoyance and disapproval, for hav-
ing to “put up” with a situation, can be sus-
pected of interfering with or obstructing what
they object to should they have the ability to
do so. If the difference between one’s letting
others be versus obstructing them turns on
power, or capacity, alone, then one can hardly
be regarded as tolerant.
By contrast, it is not necessary that toler-
ant persons have the power to prevent or to
interfere with something they find seriously
objectionable (Williams, 1996). There is no
contradiction in conceiving of a powerless
minority, for instance, having serious moral
objections to a practice, such as gambling,
adult theatres, or dog racing, but neverthe-
less tolerating a majority’s interests in these
practices. It is sufficient that members of
such a minority believe that even if they did
have the requisite capacity, they would not
interfere, and that others accept such claims
as sincere.
140
There are other attitudes or dispositions,
variously called “indulgence,” “permissive-
ness,” “indifference,” and “promiscuity” or
“indiscriminateness,” that are carelessly used
as synonymous for “toleration.” However,
by keeping the objection and forbearance
conditions in mind, we can see why these
terms do not connote the same attitudes and
dispositions as liberal toleration. Those who
are indulgent or permissive allow the expres-
sion of views and behaviors they themselves
might not engage in, but either they have
formed no objections or whatever objections
they do form fail to rise to a threshold of sig-
nificance. Because they are not motivated to
object, the indulgent and permissive likewise
need no reasons for forbearance. Similarly,
those who are indifferent and indecisive
should not be confused with the liberally
tolerant. The indifferent and indecisive lack
reasonable grounds for either objection or
acceptance, and are therefore, hardly toler-
ant in a liberal sense.
What can be said then, about the happy-
go-lucky who have an open-handed “live
and let live” outlook? Such generous souls
represent, in Plato’s view (c. 320 bc), both
the flowering beauty of democracy and the
primary reason for democracy’s self-destruc-
tiveness (Republic, IX). Whatever the merits
of Plato’s political philosophy, his criticism of
the promiscuity and profligacy of a democ-
racy cannot be counted as a criticism of lib-
eral toleration. Those, like Plato’s democrats,
who believe themselves committed in prin-
ciple to equally accepting everything cannot
be truly committed to tolerance. Toleration
requires boundaries; if nothing can be con-
ceived to be in the realm of the intolerable
and to be rejected, then toleration is a vacu-
ous concept.
This last consideration indicates that, while
necessary, the objection and forbearance

conditions are not sufficient for toleration.
A third condition, what Forst (2004, 2012b)
calls the “rejection” condition, needs to be
added to our conception of liberal toleration.
Toleration thus lies in the middle ground
between two boundaries. If the tolerable
consists of the realm of beliefs and practices
one finds wrong but still marked by reasons
for forbearance, then a limiting boundary
“above” this consists of the realm of the non-
objectionable. The other boundary separates
the tolerable middle realm from the realm
“below” for which reasons for rejecting cer-
tain beliefs and practices are stronger than
the reasons for forbearance.
The addition of the “rejection” condition in
no way commits us to a static view of the con-
tent of toleration. Deciding whether and where
to draw boundaries is the perennial subject of
debate, dispute, lobbying, influence, and politi-
cal compromise. Moreover, there may be many
different reasons for drawing the boundary
line in one place rather than another. Consider,
for example, a dispute over tolerating the
desecration of the flag but not of religious
icons such as the crucifix or the Qur’an. This
issue involves which type of freedom ought
to prevail—whether freedom of expression
or religious freedom, but there may be other
reasons involved as well, such as respect for
religious or even national security inasmuch as
desecrating holy books and religious icons can
inflame violence (Newey, 1999).
SO-CALLED PARADOXES OF
TOLERATION
Those skeptical that the concept of toleration
is coherent, or that being tolerant is psycho-
logically possible, occasionally speak of one
or more “paradoxes of toleration.” The most
141
LIBERAL TOLERATION
widely cited “paradox” is the “paradox of
moral tolerance” (Mendus, 1988, Horton,
1994). A paradox seems to arise when both
the reasons for objection and the reasons for
acceptance are held to be “moral.” In such
cases, it then seems to be morally required
or right to tolerate what is morally wrong.
As the discussion earlier indicates, the solu-
tion to this puzzle (and thus dissolution of
the apparent paradox) requires a distinction
between various kinds of “moral” reasons
and a ranking of those reasons. For instance,
with respect to abortion, meat eating, gam-
bling, pornography, handgun ownership, and
so forth, persons can consistently (both con-
ceptually and psychologically) regard these
activities as immoral and believe and act on
the conviction that higher-order moral rea-
sons justify their forbearance.
A second “paradox” of toleration arises
out of the apparent possibility of conceiving
of an intolerant person as tolerant, which
seems contradictory. The so-called paradox
of the tolerant racist presumes it possible
for a racist, an anti-Semite, a xenophobe,
and so on to be tolerant of persons against
whom he has an irrational hatred or preju-
dice. Should we be tempted to suppose that
a racist might be tolerant if he could curb
his desire to discriminate against a group
he regards as inferior, and moreover, that
he would become increasingly tolerant the
stronger his racist impulses as long as he
does not act them out?
The effort to formulate this puzzle reveals
why such a “paradox” is fatuous. In the first
place, we must presuppose that the racist
harbors an irrational hatred for members
of the target group, and consequently, it is
extremely unlikely, if not impossible, that the
racist’s objections to the target group will be
reasonable in the minimal sense required by
the objection condition. Second, it makes no
Robert Paul Churchill
sense to regard someone as tolerant or intol-
erant of the characteristics of persons over
which the latter have no control, such as age,
conditions of birth, ethnicity, gender, race,
and sexual orientation (Churchill, 2003,
2007). As persons (generally) are not at lib-
erty to change or alter such ascribed char-
acteristics, it makes no sense to hold them
to blame for possessing them. Third, persons
prejudiced against a group based on a shared
group characteristic, such as being a Jew or a
Muslim, cannot specify how members of the
group could change or behave to be “toler-
able,” except, of course, to cease being mem-
bers of the despised group (by conversion) or
by being displaced or removed (by deporta-
tion or ethnic cleansing). This shows that, in
addition to a blind prejudice, biased persons
are really opposed to toleration itself.
A third so-called paradox is thought
to arise out of efforts to draw boundaries
between what is tolerable and what is intol-
erable (Fish, 1997, Forst, 2004). The so-
called paradox of drawing the limit arises
because drawing limits against things des-
ignated as “intolerable” will be contested in
an open and pluralistic society, thus making
line drawing arbitrary. Yet why presume it
impossible to draw the limits of toleration
in a nonarbitrary, justifiable way? There is a
consensus based on reasonable grounds that
some behaviors, such as child pornography,
smoking in workspaces shared with non-
smokers, bullying in schools, racial profiling,
are intolerable. Some policy issues are indeed
fraught with difficulty—handgun ownership
in America is certainly one—but arbitrary
line drawing can be avoided if both sides
accept that they must not confuse members
of the other side with the ideas or practices
they find objectionable, and both sides accept
the necessity of offering public reasons, as
will be noted in the next section.
142
To be sure, those zealously engaged in
efforts to demarcate the limits of the “intol-
erable” may appropriate the rhetoric of toler-
ance to purse their own one-sided, intolerant
objectives. Such slogans as “no toleration for
the intolerant” (Forst, 2004) reveal the error,
once again, of assuming that persons are pos-
sible “objects” of tolerance or intolerance.
Those inclined to be intolerant of persons
with whom they disagree (the “intolerant”)
signify their opposition to accepting the
norm of toleration in the first place. Hence,
because they deny the basic norm, they sig-
nify a willingness to settle the issue “outside
the game,” as it were, and disparage reason-
able debate and (often) democratic processes
for settling disagreements. If a group remains
intransigent in its denial of the norm of tol-
eration, then those who seek to uphold the
norm are not thereby “intolerant” of the
detractors, but only of their destructive views
and actions.
TOLERATION, THE LIBERAL STATE,
AND NEUTRALITY
A liberal state is one characterized by
the public acceptance of freedom, equal-
ity, and fairness as foundational political
values. Consequently, a liberal state must
accord equal respect to autonomous choices
regarding the good and right. It is a practi-
cal necessity therefore that a liberal state
must accommodate a plurality of interests,
value orientations, and commitments in reli-
gion, ethics, and so on as well as competing
comprehensive visions of human flourish-
ing. Moreover, it must be expected that,
in addition to a plurality of incompatible
interests and values, some disagreements
over the human good will be intractable. As

Rawls (1993) notes, despite the challenges
of accommodating such deep disagreements,
they are perfectly reasonable, for they result
from the free exercise of human reason under
the conditions of open inquiry and freedom
of conscience the liberal state is committed to
safeguarding.
Toleration is thus a necessary norm for a
well-ordered and successfully functioning lib-
eral democracy, and we can distinguish two
ways in which toleration serves as an indis-
pensable regulative norm. Roughly speaking,
there must be toleration with respect to the
public use of force or coercion. Secondly, citi-
zens must be tolerant among themselves. No
liberal state can equally respect a plurality of
conflicting values and visions of the human
good unless there is forbearance regarding
the public use of force or coercion to deter,
interfere, prevent, or punish. In other words,
unlike an illiberal state including an illiberal
democracy, the coercive powers of the liberal
state must not be used in efforts to legislate
morality, to be paternalistic, or to promote
one conception of the good life against oth-
ers. The need for restraints on government
power is generally expressed in democratic
liberal theory as the principle of neutral-
ity where “neutrality” is understood as the
requirement that the liberal state must be
neutral between competing conceptions of
the good (e.g. Simmons, 2007).
While neutrality is a necessary require-
ment for the liberal state, it is incorrect to
regard neutrality as a public norm for citi-
zens. As the conceptual analysis earlier indi-
cates, toleration as an individual attribute
cannot be compelled. However, the power
of the government is limited. Typically,
liberal and democratic polities such as
France and the United States have a writ-
ten constitution establishing a separation
of powers and checks and balances, clauses
143
LIBERAL TOLERATION
or provisions protecting individual rights,
and bodies empowered to strike down laws
or decrees as unconstitutional (e.g. the
Supreme Court in the United States, and the
Constitutional Council in France). In some
polities, notably the United Kingdom, the
constitution is not codified but is made up
of many limitations of power dating back to
Magna Carta (1215) and many reservations
of rights, such as the English Bill of Rights
(1689). In addition, while it is expected that
the liberal state will not penalize beliefs or
practices some citizens, even if a majority,
find repugnant (e.g. X-rated adult films or
hate speech) usually the object of oppro-
brium is arguably within a realm legally or
constitutionally protected against govern-
ment interference (e.g. free speech). These
considerations show that a liberal and neu-
tral state is “tolerant” only in a secondary
sense, that is, in terms of the arrangements
for the use of public power citizens agreed
to be justified.
It is conceivable that liberal outcomes may
be the consequences, or effects, of the for-
bearance of a benevolent despot or autocrat.
However, liberalism cannot be contingent on
the good will of an autocrat. The stability and
continuity of a liberal state depends, in some
meaningful way, on the consent of the citizens
who comprise the civil society supporting the
state. While consent is often discussed as rel-
evant to the justification of the foundational
principles of the liberal sate, the necessity of
accepting the actual procedures that keep the
liberal state running is less often remarked.
Yet, unless a majority of citizens consent (in
some way) to the same “rules of the game”
and on a day-to-day basis, a genuinely liberal
polity would be impossible. Hence, liberal
states need to be democracies.
Citizens must accept as binding democratic
procedures even when they know that those
Robert Paul Churchill
procedures may produce outcomes they find
seriously objectionable. In this sense, then,
citizens must be tolerant of “losses” they
experience within a system they consent to
as formally, or procedurally, just. In addition,
citizens must accept it as a public good that
just democratic procedures can justly resolve
difficult issues, and they must accept it as
reasonable to attach greater importance to
the outcomes of democratic procedures than
to manipulating procedures to advance their
own special interests.
Toleration as a general norm for demo-
cratic citizens within a functioning democ-
racy is far more implicit than explicit. Yet
reliance on just procedures is manifest every
time there is shared understanding of the
reasonable limits of contested interests and
policies. Once all interested parties have had
a fair opportunity to advocate, to express
their views, to vote, to appeal, or to compete
for office and a specific outcome has been
reached through democratic means (e.g. as
results of elections, or Supreme Court deci-
sions), then contestation must cease. An
example is the decision by Vice President Al
Gore to accept the Supreme Court decision
(in Bush v. Gore) that enabled George W.
Bush to become the president-elect in 2000,
even though a continuing recount of Florida
ballots might have shown that Gore car-
ried Florida and won the presidency. As this
example illustrates, accepting the results of a
democratic outcome as final and reasonable
mirrors the combination of the objection and
forbearance conditions necessary for tolera-
tion. Whereas a very strong and principled
objection to an outcome may remain, it is
nevertheless accepted. In this connection, we
also see how critically important it is that
most citizens accept foundational princi-
ples—and neutrality most importantly—as
providing the framework within which
144
democratic processes operate. For unless
citizens are confident that they will not be
subject to loses concerning their deepest
comprehensive visions of human good, they
will not consider themselves able to tolerate
their uncertain fortunes at the ballot box or
as a result of democratic politics.
This feature of toleration can be regarded
as a social capital, or civic virtue, within a
liberal democracy, as we will discuss in the
next section.
THE DUTY OF CIVILITY AND
PUBLIC REASONS
There is a second specification or feature
of the implicit norm of citizen toleration.
Tolerance is not only required to accept func-
tioning democratic procedures, but also as a
form of public interaction in a liberal democ-
racy. Toleration requires that in debating pol-
icy options we recognize one another as equal
participants in self-government. Toleration
also requires that citizens respect each other’s
reasonableness and decision-making capaci-
ties. The willingness to take this view toward
fellow citizens and to be reasonable in debate
must be a form of tolerance, for we would
certainly consider citizens intolerant if they
acted as if they believed that they did not
accept the principle of equal respect, or did
not respect autonomously made decisions
when they found them objectionable in con-
tent or result.
This aspect of toleration bears some
resemblance to the form of social capital
called civic virtue (Almond and Verba, 1989,
Putnam, 2004). It certainly requires that
citizens make every effort to practice what
Rawls called the “duty of civility” (1993);
this is the duty to offer one’s fellow citizens

public reasons when deliberating with them
about the public good. Knowing that contro-
versy occurs against the backdrop of deep,
possibly intractable, disagreements, we must
be able to explain the basis for any law or
policy we advocate by appealing to public
reasons. Reasons are “public” in the required
sense when they are consistent with everyone
else’s status as a free and equal fellow citizen.
Public reasons are thus those reasons whose
status as reasons is shared equally among
citizens.
For instance, debates over the spanking of
children may not advert to religious convic-
tions or cultural traditions, as these are not
public reasons. Their force as reasons relies
on faith or on cultural memberships that can
be reasonably rejected. By contrast, public
reasoning may advert to reasons relating to
parental childrearing practices that alterna-
tively foster or diminish the optimal devel-
opment of children as democratic citizens.
Reasons of the latter kind, open as they are
to empirical investigation, are public for they
do not draw on deep, controversial concep-
tions of human flourishing. In addition, the
well-being and civic virtue of children is an
objective which we can expect all citizens—
whatever their other commitments—to share
as reasons. But reasons adverting to faith or
cultural traditions can be reasonably rejected,
for it can be expected that fellow citizens
with different fundamental values will regard
them as unreasonable.
Rawls claimed that a liberal state retains
its legitimacy only if citizens, in their pub-
lic capacity, commit to the “ideal of public
reason” (1993). Hypothetically, the legiti-
macy of a law or a policy decision would be
a result of its justification being impossible
to reasonably reject. Given the importance of
toleration for democratic and liberal states, it
is not surprising that the historical emergence
145
LIBERAL TOLERATION
of toleration as normative corresponded
(roughly) with the rise of democratic and
liberal forms of governance. All three—tol-
eration, democratic theory, and liberalism—
arose in tandem with increasing claims about
the rights of man, respect for the dignity of
the individual, awareness of the epistemic
limitations of knowledge, and awareness of
the differences between the ineluctable sub-
jectivity of personal experience versus public
responsibilities (Creppell, 2003).
JUSTIFICATIONS OF TOLERATION
Up until the twentieth century, arguments
against intolerance have been more promi-
nent than positive arguments for toleration.
Despite the fact that “intolerance” and “tol-
erance” are not strictly contradictory, the
case against intolerance often has furnished
reasons for greater tolerance. Historically,
there have been two major lines of argument
against intolerance. One has been primarily
epistemic and emphasizes the fallibility of
human reason. Montaigne’s (1533–1592)
widely influential Essays marked a water-
shed in the development of humility and
moral psychology. For Montaigne, it is via
the human body through which we engage
and judge the world (Creppell, 2003), and
our sensory perspectives are always relative
to some time and place, and inevitably sub-
jective. We thus cannot pretend to encounter
life in terms of some grand prearranged plan.
The value of life must be comprehended in
terms of the individual’s encounter with
it: “Life must be its own objective, its own
purpose. Its right concern is to rule itself,
govern itself, put up with itself” (Essays III,
12, 1191). For Montaigne, “Nature brought
us forth free and unbound: we imprison
Robert Paul Churchill
ourselves in particular confines” (Essays III,
9, 1101); society constricts persons through
the habits, tastes, and customs it imprints
upon us. For Montaigne, the mind’s inquir-
ies, when freed from artificial strictures, are
“shapeless and without limits; its nourish-
ment consists in amazement, the hunt and
uncertainty” (Essays III, 13, 1211).
Montaigne’s cultivation of openness to new
experiences, and his sensitivity to his own
uncertainties filled Montaigne with respect
for diversity as well as natural equality. He
reminds us wittily that even “upon the highest
throne in the world, we are seated, still, upon
our arses” (Essays III, 13, 426). Montaigne
argued, in addition, that “There is a porous-
ness between the self and others that prevents
defining oneself and persons one encounters
in unchanging categories” (Creppell, 2003,
89). In Montaigne’s words, “there is as much
difference between us and ourselves as there
is between us and other people” (Essays II,
1, 380). Thus, in consequence of his human-
ism, skepticism, and belief in natural equality,
Montaigne condemned the prejudice, cru-
elty, and intolerance lying behind the wars of
religion, witchcraft persecutions, the use of
torture, and the Spanish colonization of the
Americas. A willingness to resort to violence
presupposes infallibility about good and bad,
right or wrong that defies the human condi-
tion. “To kill people, there must be sharp and
brilliant clarity; this life of ours is too real, too
fundamental, to be used to guarantee these
supernatural and imagined events” (Essays III,
11, 1167). And Montaigne continues, “After
all, it is to put a very high value on your sur-
mises to roast a man alive for them” (Essays
III, 11, 1169). Whatever the credulity persons
attach to their convictions, they cannot be
more probably true, Montaigne surmises, than
the inherent value each of us attaches to his or
her bodily existence in the here and now.
146
In the Philosophical Commentaries of
1685, Bayle also offered an epistemic argu-
ment against intolerance that significantly
influenced the Enlightenment and the moral
sense theorists. Whereas Montaigne argues
that fallibility must be acknowledged as
a result of accepting the human condition
itself, Bayle maintains that fallibility must
be inferred from the limitations of the intel-
lect itself. What Bayle called the “natural
light” of practical reason discloses its own
limitations including an inability to discern
ultimate truths. In addition, Bayle argued
positively for toleration as based on moral
considerations. For Bayle, all humans possess
this natural light, which reveals certain moral
truths to those who consult it with humility
and sincerity of heart. It matters not, Bayle,
claimed what religious faith one professes, or
even whether one is an atheist. The principles
of moral respect and reciprocity revealed by
the natural light cannot be trumped by the
claims of religion because the latter are of an
entirely different epistemological character.
Religion is based on faith, and therefore its
“truths” are those of faith and trust, and not
apprehensions of an objective world.
By far the most important and far-
­reaching argument concerning toleration in
the seventeenth century was Locke’s A Letter
Concerning Toleration (1689). Continuing
the logic of limited government to protect
natural rights for which Locke had argued in
The Second Treatise of Government (1689),
in the Letter Locke turns to the proper sepa-
ration between state or institutional power
versus the freedom of the individual to auton-
omously determine for herself what religious
beliefs and obligations she will take on. Thus
Locke argues that, while it is the duty of the
state to protect the natural rights of citizens,
the “care of the soul” cannot be the state’s
business. As a subjective matter of faith and

belief, true conviction cannot be produced by
coercion; only an outward pretense of con-
formity can result from coercion, and such
a show cannot be pleasing to God. Hence
the state must respect a God-given and inal-
ienable right to the free exercise of religion.
Moreover, as churches themselves exist only
as voluntary associations of their members,
churches have no right to use force to require
membership or to prevent apostasy. Allowing
churches to exercise such powers is inconsist-
ent with a political order based on the con-
sent of the governed.
Locke’s argument for respect for auton-
omy underlying freedom of religion was
incomplete, however. Locke himself believed
it necessary to draw limits to toleration,
disallowing religions that do not accept
limitations on their place in civil society (the
problem with Roman Catholicism, in Locke’s
view). In addition, still believing that moral-
ity depended on belief in a higher being, the
state need not tolerate atheists whose beliefs
threaten the basis of social order. Thus,
Locke’s primary contribution to liberal tol-
eration was his separation between public
and private “domains” and an argument for
limited state power that foreshadowed devel-
opment of the principle of neutrality. Yet,
because Locke continued to think of moral-
ity as derived from religion, he did not offer
an account of how individuals—including
atheists—were capable of using reason alone
to achieve a secular understanding of moral-
ity. It was Mill who was to make that contri-
bution in On Liberty (1859).
Although he rarely uses the terms “tolera-
tion” or “tolerance,” Mill is often regarded
as having offered an extremely insightful and
practical way of relying on public reasons to
settle disputes. Mill distinguished between
“self-regarding” activity, a realm of action
in which the individual should be free from
147
LIBERAL TOLERATION
interference of the government and social
pressure, and “other-regarding” activity, or
the realm of action the government and pub-
lic may reasonably take an interest in. Mill’s
main argument for this distinction is based
on his “harm principle,” according to which
the exercise of social or political power is
legitimate only if necessary to prevent harm
done by one person to another (non-consent-
ing) individual. It is never permissible, Mill
argued, for the state to be paternalistic, pre-
suming it knows the good for an individual
better than the individual knows for herself.
Likewise, it is not permissible for a major-
ity to use law to restrict beliefs, actions, or
practices it finds offensive or immoral, in the
absence of evidence of real harm.
Mill offered two additional sets of argu-
ments that, although expressly presented
in defense of a maximum of individual lib-
erty, also support political (state) and citi-
zen toleration. Thus Mill argues for the free
expression of all thought and opinion on
utilitarian grounds balancing the benefits
of open inquiry and social progress against
social stagnation and blind prejudice as a
result of the suppression of belief, thought,
and discussion. Likewise, Mill argues for
the toleration of “experiments in living” as
providing educational lessons as to the best
ways of enhancing individuality, originality,
and living a fulfilling life.
Many contemporary debates today over the
proper limits of law and public morality take
their starting points from Mill’s On Liberty.
To be sure, whether or not legal restrictions
are enacted against expressions or behaviors
some regard as intolerable (e.g. abortion,
hate speech)—some citizens, and possibly
many, will merely go along with, endure, or
put up with what they find seriously objec-
tionable. As noted earlier, it would be a mis-
take to consider passive and unenthusiastic
Robert Paul Churchill
fellow travelers to be tolerant. Nevertheless,
many important controversies have not been
resolved, or resolved to the satisfaction of
all: among these are physician-assisted sui-
cide, biomedical engineering, the use of mari-
juana and other recreational drugs, high-risk
sports, pornography, and gun ownership.
The resolve of many to resort only to pub-
lic reasons and to disagree respectfully about
which side of the debate on each particular
issue is morally correct bespeaks the continu-
ing relevance of toleration.
Among contemporary political philoso-
phers, the justification of toleration looms
large, given its centrality both for a neutral
government and for the civility and civic
duties of citizens. Yet because toleration
is a fundamental norm of liberalism and is
justified, in turn, by reference to conditions
necessary for liberalism, it is far from clear
that there can be a noncircular or nontrivial
justification of liberal toleration. According
to Kymlicka (1995), for instance, toleration
derives from the respect owed to individu-
als as personally and ethically autonomous
beings with the requisite capacities for
choosing and realizing individual concep-
tions of the good life. However, Kymlicka’s
claim appears already to presuppose that the
good life must be an autonomously chosen
way of life. Therefore, Kymlicka’s definition
seems to beg the question as nonliberals (e.g.
communitarians) could regard it as reason-
ably questioned.
In Forst’s (2012a) view, the problem of
justification is best approached through
what he calls a “discursive principle of justi-
fication.” In Forst’s view “every norm that is
to be binding for a plurality of persons, espe-
cially norms that are the basis of legal coer-
cion, must be justifiable with reasons that are
reciprocally acceptable to all affected as free
and equal persons” (Forst, 2012b). Principles
148
of liberal toleration are norms that certainly
satisfy this principle of justification. However,
Forst’s justificatory principle is really just the
reintroduction of Rawls’s ideal of public rea-
son except that, in Forst’s case, the justifica-
tion made through offering and accepting
public reasons are for fundamental norms,
rather than for policies or other outcomes of
public deliberation. Thus it is not clear that
Forst’s justification takes us very far toward
overcoming the problem of liberal partiality
or circularity.
FURTHER ISSUES FOR RESEARCH
Certainly liberal political theorists, their
critics, and philosophers will continue to be
interested in whether and how liberal tolera-
tion can be justified. One possible way for-
ward is to proceed as Rawls did in Political
Liberalism (1993) with his “Idea of public
reason revisited” (1997). One might then
maintain that toleration, along with free-
dom, equality, and fairness, is a public politi-
cal value that will be secured by the ideal
of public reasoning. The difficulty with this
suggestion is that those participating in the
selection process must already be tolerant
if political reasoning is to proceed purely in
terms of public reasons, that is, in terms of
reasons that do not draw upon deep, con-
troversial conceptions of human flourishing.
Nor does it do to expect toleration to emerge
from an “overlapping consensus” (Rawls,
1993), unless toleration is already present
within deep and comprehensive accounts of
human flourishing.
Forst has claimed that toleration is a
“normatively dependent concept” (2012b)
and certainly Forst is correct insofar as the
principle of liberal toleration does not come

ready made with substantive reasons for
objection, forbearance, and rejection. In this
way, toleration appears to be formal and
much like the Categorical Imperative which
does not supply us with maxims of action
and good intentions, or like the principle of
utility which does not come with substantial
reasons for preferring one policy or one rule
over others. Yet, while we cannot have rea-
sons for objection, forbearance, or rejection
unless we know what situation or condition
we face, toleration may have some moral
content after all. In other words, Forst may
be mistaken in saying that “toleration is not
a virtue or value” and that it “can only be
a value if backed by the right normative
reasons” (2012b). On the contrary, tolera-
tion may acquire some moral content from
natural human responses of reciprocity, as
well as dispositions to resist free riding and
cheating. Studies by cognitive psychologists
(Haidt, 2012)  and in evolutionary biology
(Pinker, 2011) indicate that these basic val-
ues are among the “modules” with which
humans are programmed. This subject
requires further research but points toward
a basis in human psychology for moral
responses. If this approach proves correct,
then it would be clear why reciprocal prac-
tices of tolerating the values of those who
have accepted your own would be attrac-
tive, and why cheating by attempting to
acquire public benefits by special pleading
(e.g. insisting on the truth of one’s “privi-
leged” comprehensive account of the good)
would be condemned.
If there is a biological basis for tolera-
tion, there still remains the age-old riddle
of the chicken and the egg. Is a pluralistic
and tolerant civic society a precondition
for a liberal democratic regime? If so, then
what must be done to create and nurture
a civil society in a place such as Albania,
149
LIBERAL TOLERATION
Belarus, Somalia, South Sudan, and so on
until it can sustain a liberal democracy?
This is a critical question for many socie-
ties presently rent by tribal, clan, or ethnic,
or religious strife. A number of additional
questions also are relevant to the relation-
ship between a tolerant civil society and a
liberal democracy. One is the status of tol-
eration as an individual virtue (Heyd, 1996,
Newey, 1999, Churchill, 2003, 2007)  and
the relationship between this virtue and
civic virtue. Can toleration be taught as
organizations such as the Southern Poverty
Law Center, which distributes the magazine
Teaching Tolerance, presume?
Perhaps the most significant research
issue concerns applications of principles
of liberal tolerance and their limits, both
domestically (McKinnon, 2006)  and inter-
nationally to what Rawls (1999) called
hierarchical but “decent” peoples. In this
connection, Catriona McKinnon (2006)
has helpfully suggested that the harm prin-
ciple be interpreted such that a violation
of rights constitutes a political harm that
ipso facto registers concern about the lim-
its of toleration. On this suggestion, the
way forward in hard cases (e.g. defamatory
expressive acts) is to “consider whether the
complaints of parties in opposition to one
another could be made in terms of their
rights” (McKinnon, 2006, p.  173), where
complaints must be advanced by adverting
to public reasons. Although the most fun-
damental rights, human rights, are far from
fully determinate in scope, the advantage
of McKinnon’s approach is to bring deci-
sions about the limits of toleration into line
with arguments about entitlements and cor-
relative obligations that, though far from
uncontroversial in application, have already
incorporated the universalizing and equal
respect ideals of public reason.
Robert Paul Churchill
WORKS CITED
Almond, G. A. and Verba, S. (1989), The
Civic Culture. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Bayle, P. (1685/1987), Philosophical
Commentaries, trans. A. G. Tannenbaum
(ed.). New York: Lang.
Churchill, R. P. (1997), “On the difference
between non-moral and moral
conceptions of toleration: the case for
toleration as a moral virtue,” in M.
Ravazi and D. Ambuel (eds), Philosophy,
Religion, and the Question of Intolerance.
Albany, NY: State University of New
Your Press, pp. 189–211.
— (2003), “Neutrality, and the virtue of
toleration,” in D. Castiglione and C.
McKinnon (eds), Toleration, Neutrality
and Democracy. Dordrecht and London:
Kluwer Academic, pp. 65–76.
— (2007), “Toleration and deep
reconciliation,” Philosophy in the
Contemporary World, 14 (1) (Spring):
100–113.
Creppell, I. (2003), Toleration and Identity.
New York: Routledge.
Fish, S. (1997), “Mission impossible: setting
the just bounds between church and state,”
Columbia Law Review, 97: 2255–2333.
Forst, R. (2004), “The limits of toleration,”
Constellations, 11: 312–325.
— (2012a), The Right to Justification. New
York: Columbia University Press.
— (2012b), “Toleration,” in E. N. Zalta
(ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of
Philosophy (Summer 2012 edn), http://
plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2012/
entries/toleration.
Haidt, J. (2012), The Righteous Mind. New
York: Vintage.
Heyd, D. (ed.) (1996), Toleration: An
Elusive Virtue. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
150
Horton, J. (1994), “Three (apparent)
paradoxes of toleration,” Synthesis
Philosophica, 9: 16–18.
— (1996), “Toleration as a virtue,” in
D. Heyd (ed.), Toleration: An Elusive
Virtue. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
Horton, J. and Mendus, S. (eds) (1991),
John Locke: ‘A Letter Concerning
Toleration’ in Focus. London:
Routledge.
— (eds) (1999), Toleration, Identity, and
Difference. New York: St. Martin’s.
Kymlicka, W. (1995), Multicultural
Citizenship. Oxford: Oxford University
Press.
Locke, J. (1689/1983), A Letter Concerning
Toleration, J. H. Tully (ed.). Indianapolis,
IN: Hackett.
— (1689/1988), Second Treatise of
Government, P. Laslett (ed.), Two
Treatises of Government. Cambridge:
University of Cambridge Press.
McKinnon, C. (2006), Toleration: A Critical
Introduction. London and New York:
Routledge.
Mendus, S. (ed.) (1988), Justifying
Toleration. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
— (1989), Toleration and the Limits of
Liberalism. Basingtoke: Macmillan.
Mill, J. S. (1859/1974), On Liberty, G.
Himmelfarb (ed.). Harmondsworth:
Penguin.
Montaigne, M. de (1958), The Complete
Essays of Montaigne, trans. D. M.
Frame. Stanford, CA: Stanford
University Press.
Newey, G. (1999), Virtue, Reason, and
Toleration. Edinburgh: Edinburgh
University Press.
Pinker, S. (2011), The Better Angels of Our
Nature. New York: Penguin.

Plato (c. 320 BC/1964), Republic, trans.
P. Shorey, in E. Hamilton and H. Cairns
(eds), The Collected Dialogues of Plato.
New York: Pantheon.
Putnam, R. D. (ed.) (2004), Democracies in
Flux. New York: Oxford University Press.
Ravazi, M. and Ambuel, D. (1997),
Philosophy, Religion, and the Question of
Intolerance. Albany, NY: State University
of New York Press.
Rawls, J. (1993), Political Liberalism. New
York: Columbia University Press.
151
LIBERAL TOLERATION
— (1997), “The idea of public reason
revisited,” Chicago Law Review, 64:
765–807.
— (1999), The Law of Peoples. Cambridge:
Harvard University Press.
Simmons, A. J. (2007), Political Philosophy.
New York: Oxford University Press.
Williams, B. (1996), “Toleration: an
impossible virtue?” in D. Heyd (ed.),
Toleration: An Elusive Virtue. Princeton,
NJ: Princeton University Press,
pp. 18–27.
 10
DEMOCRATIC THEORY
Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley
Democratic theory concerns, among other
things, the nature of the democratic idea, the
distinctive characteristics of the democratic
process including the notion of representa-
tive democracy, and justification of a demo-
cratic form of government. Justification of
democracy can take three forms: focus on
consent in social contract theory; focus on
beneficial consequences in various forms of
democratic instrumentalism; and emphasis
on a notion of public reason. Some politi-
cal theorists, such as Dahl (1989), have also
taken an empirical approach to justification
arguing that the idea of democracy when
fully adopted by a people generally produces
the best feasible (workable) political system
in comparison to feasible nondemocratic
alternatives. This chapter addresses these
central concerns while also identifying some
key issues needing further research.
The democratic idea encompasses notions
of moral and political autonomy and that of
intrinsic equal worth, which also involves a
concept of justice or fairness in the distribu-
tion of society’s goods. These notions are
central to democratic processes and to any
justification of democracy as well as to dis-
cussions of the democratic “public,” since
democracy, in its essential meaning, invests
political power in principle in the people, the
demos. Developing the idea of “the power of
153
the people” brings to fore issues of effective
participation, enlightened understanding,
“public reason,” and principles of “reasona-
bleness” and “reciprocity.” This also leads to
discussion of current theories of democratic
processes and topics such as liberalism, delib-
erative democracy, and more radical theories
including contemporary feminist critiques
and agonistic pluralism. Closely connected
to this discussion is the notion of citizen-
ship. Is citizenship a matter of legal status,
political agency, or self-identity, or all three?
A traditional theory of citizenship focuses on
citizen as agent while a current liberal model
emphasizes constitutional and legal matters.
Key problems of citizenship theory are inclu-
sion, pluralism, and expansion. Discussion
of the question of “political legitimacy” leads
to an overview of social contract theory, and
its concept of justice as well as contempo-
rary criticisms and of theories of democratic
instrumentalism which emphasizes beneficial
consequences of democracy. All these topics
interweave in many ways and encompass as
well the question: should political theory be
a normative, theoretical activity or an empiri-
cal, scientific one. All of this leads also to key
issues demanding exploration by those who
wish to research democratic theory: (1) What
does “rule by the people” ultimately mean
in today’s diverse, and contentious society?
Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley
(2) As globalization and migration of peo-
ples increase what should be the parameters
of citizenship? (3) How does a democratic
society handle controversy and varieties of
political rhetoric? (4) Are views of democ-
racy which are dependent on a Kantian view
of autonomy with its key focus on rational-
ity adequate to deal with socially embedded
human beings with variable rationality and
who may suffer differing degrees of depend-
ence and disability in their life process?
EQUALITY AND AUTONOMY
As stated by one political theorist, one fea-
ture of democracy is the desire of each and
every citizen to stand to other citizens in
a relation of fundamental moral equal-
ity, where any notion of significant moral
differences between persons is decisively
rejected (Fairfield, 2008). A major problem
for democratic theory is to give substance to
the notion of “equality.” Political theorists
describe equality and its worth in various
ways. The notion of equality also relates to
ideas of autonomy, intrinsic moral worth,
and justice. Foundational for much demo-
cratic theory is the Kantian notion of auton-
omy as a capacity to impose an objective
moral law on oneself. Autonomy involves the
ability to speak for oneself, to choose one’s
actions, and to be responsible for one’s acts.
It implies independence in choice and delib-
eration and thus to be free of manipulation
by others. To be autonomous requires two
kinds of conditions: (1) competency and (2)
authenticity. Authenticity involves aware-
ness of one’s desires and values, the capac-
ity to reflect upon them and in practice to
endorse them (Frankfurt, 1987, Dworkin,
1988, Feinberg, 1989). There is considerable
154
disagreement about authenticity. Some argue
for a notion of critical self-reflection, that is,
a rational appraisal of one’s desires, values,
and so on which includes some test for inter-
nal consistency and comparison to so-called
reliable beliefs (Haworth, 1986). Others
criticize the heavy emphasis on the rational
which ignores affective elements of decision
making and issues like relationships, and
commitment to and care for others (Meyers,
2004). Concerning the competency require-
ment, there are issues of social oppression
and inhibiting conditions of personal history
and their impact on authenticity and auton-
omy (Christman, 1991, Mele, 1991)  and
Nussbaum argues that a Kantian account
proposes an account of rationality not satis-
fied by the mentally disabled and maybe not
even by those temporarily dependent or disa-
bled (Nussbaum, 2007).
The competency condition for autonomy
leads to the issue of paternalism, that is,
interference with the choice or deliberation
of another person, against their will on the
grounds that the person interfered with will
be better off or protected from harm. It is
assumed that some persons are not compe-
tent in their own right to make the choice. A
widely accepted example is that of children up
to a certain age. More controversial examples
include the mentally challenged, the mentally
ill, those suffering from severe Alzheimer’s, or
the withholding of relevant information con-
cerning a person’s condition by physicians. In
the political arena one encounters examples
of state paternalism, namely, the belief that
the state “knows best” how persons should
act and moves to protect them. Plato argued
for a paternalistic government led by philos-
opher-kings, while government in contempo-
rary Singapore seeks to oversee a broad range
of behaviors of its citizens. Some argue that
the state engages in paternalism when it seeks

to protect its citizens through legal restric-
tions on various elements of personal behav-
ior such as drug use, wearing seatbelts in
cars, using helmets while riding motorcycles.
Persons treated in a paternalistic manner are
assumed to be less than fully rational. Kant,
for example, argued that only rational beings
qualify as moral persons and thus he excluded
humans who lacked rational capacity as well
as nonhuman beings as moral persons. This
leads to important questions for a democracy,
especially one established on principles of jus-
tice or rational discourse. Thus John Rawls
argues (1971) that justice is owed to all moral
persons, but in Kantian fashion, he sees per-
sons in the “original position” in the social
contract as equal, free, and independent and
capable of public reason. Again, Nussbaum
argues that this excludes the mentally disa-
bled and those even temporarily dependent
or disabled from citizenship and from fair
distribution (Nussbaum, 2007). One hardly
need to be reminded that throughout human
history various human beings have not been
accorded full human and/or moral status
whether women, persons of color, persons of
various minority groups, and still today, chil-
dren. This impacts on concepts of citizenship
and on questions of effective participation in
the democratic process.
Dworkin (2006) argues that in American
democracy most people, in spite of many
great and evident differences, share two very
basic principles that constitute the notion of
“human dignity”: the “principle of intrinsic
value” and the “principle of personal respon-
sibility.” The first principle asserts that each
human life has a special kind of objective
value, a potentiality that demands to be real-
ized. The second principle holds that each
person has a special responsibility to realize
the success of his/her own life, a responsibil-
ity that includes the notion that each person
155
DEMOCRATIC THEORY
exercises his or her own judgment about
what kind of life would be successful. Dahl
(1989) also argues for the idea of “equal
intrinsic worth” as central to the notion of
democracy as “rule by the people,” that is,
rule by a “demos” for it is assumed that the
demos consists of members who are consid-
ered equal for the purposes of arriving at
governmental decisions. Dahl is more specific
arguing that this means that “during a proc-
ess of collective decision-making, the interests
of every person who is subject to the decision
must (within the limits of feasibility) be accu-
rately interpreted and made known” (Dahl,
1989, 87). This notion will be discussed fur-
ther in our overview of issues related to the
democratic process. The notion of personal
responsibility implies certain obligations of
citizens to others. Thus, Dworkin cites Kant’s
notion that one cannot act in a way that
denies the intrinsic importance of any human
life without insulting your own self-respect.
This means, argues Dworkin, that you have
to act in a way that your actions do not show
contempt for the value of other people’s lives.
This principle is crucial for understanding
how democracy can deal with diversity and
pluralism and for an understanding of what
constitutes a “democratic process.”
Finally reverting back to autonomy and
the issue of paternalism, Dahl asserts a strong
principle of equality that assumes that ordi-
nary people are in general qualified to govern
themselves. This returns us to the notion of
competence and to equal consideration of
interests and both are encompassed in what
Dahl calls the “presumption of personal
autonomy,” namely, the view that “no one is
likely to be more qualified than you to be a
better judge of your own good or interest to
act to bring it about” (Dahl, 1989, 99). You,
of course, may choose to delegate choices to
others whom you deem qualified to decide
Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley
the most appropriate means to fulfill your
personal interests. This presumption of per-
sonal autonomy has significant implications
for democratic theory. First, paternalism
needs to be attacked head on. In the absence
of compelling evidence to the contrary, eve-
ryone should be assumed to be the best judge
of his or her own good or interests; the bur-
den of proof is always placed on those who
propose to replace personal autonomy by
paternalism. It should be clear that anyone
whose personal autonomy is permanently
replaced by paternalistic authority would be
maintained in a perpetual state of childhood
and dependence and their intrinsic worth as
human person denied. Thus, it also argues
that every adult member of groups claiming
to be democratic should be considered suf-
ficiently well-qualified to participate in mak-
ing binding collective decisions that affect his
or her good or interests, that is, they should
be considered full citizens of the demos. This
brings us to a discussion of democratic proc-
ess and the notion of citizenship.
A THEORY OF THE DEMOCRATIC
PROCESS: WHO IS A CITIZEN?
In developing a theory of the democratic
process, we will first do so on an ideal level,
that is, we will set out the ideal for such a
process, taking for granted that a perfect
democratic process and a perfect democratic
government may not have or ever will exist in
actuality. Fairfield (2008) argues that democ-
racy “dreams of being an ideal deliberation
community,” one that is radically egalitarian
and that engages in a fully rational conver-
sation in which all participate as respected
equals, where differences are acknowledged
and all voices brought to the table. This is the
156
ideal, but the real question is a question of
inclusion: Does the demos include all adults
(competent persons?) Are all members of the
demos autonomous and capable of fully par-
ticipating in a rational conversation while
remaining tolerant of all participants and
allowing all voices to be heard?
Political theorists generally agree that
one of the important criteria for a demo-
cratic process is effective participation by
those engaged in the democratic decision-
making process. Dahl describes effective
participation in terms of two aspects of a
binding decision-making process: setting
the agenda and deciding the outcome. In
terms of agenda setting, this means that all
citizens ought to have adequate and equal
opportunity for placing questions on the
agenda. Decision making can be delegated
but ultimately it needs to be the demos,
the people, who set the agenda. However,
in the face of pluralism, diversity, and disa-
greements, control of the agenda may not
be in actuality a possibility for many citi-
zens in contemporary democracies. In fact,
the mechanics of politics, certainly in the
United States where power distribution is
often dramatically unequal, demonstrates
that control of agendas more frequently
reflects particular interests and the control
of various advocacy groups and that, in
fact, particular elites exercise almost con-
tinual influences over the agendas and the
decision-making processes. These particu-
lar elites include entrenched bureaucrats, a
small selection of partisan elites, an unrep-
resentative selection of appointed judges,
and a plutocratic hierarchy of corporate
capitalism. Democracy falters when politi-
cal agendas for deliberation are set by the
power elite (Scott, 1998).
The second component of decision making
is the decisive stage where voting produces

an outcome. Ideally, again, in a truly demo-
cratic process each citizen should have an
equal opportunity to express their choice
and that choice should be counted as equal in
weight to the choice expressed by any other
citizen (Dahl, 1989). This stated principle
does not require a particular method of vot-
ing or election. Democratic theory provides
no definitive answer to the question of dem-
ocratic decision-making processes. Is major-
ity rule necessary or problematic? Dworkin,
for example, does not believe majority rule
is a particularly sound method of reaching
truth or securing equality of political power
(Dworkin, 2006). In fact, Schumpeter argues
that democracy is a method of generat-
ing political decisions by granting power to
elites by electoral means (Schumpeter, 1976).
Majority decision making and minority par-
ticipation in democratic processes continue
to be major issues for democratic theory.
Another key decision-making element
concerns the characteristics of the decider,
particularly of competency and autonomy of
citizens. Dahl (1989) suggests the notion of
“enlightened understanding,” which entails
that citizens are capable of comprehending
the issues and are afforded adequate and
equal opportunities to understand means
and ends for achieving their interests and for
grasping expected consequences of proposed
policies and decisions for all. This requires, at
minimum, that there be in a democracy such
rights as freedom of the press and freedom of
assembly. Adequate and relevant information
and discussion opportunities are crucial.
Another key question, then, for democratic
theory is what constitutes a people and who
is a citizen? A citizen is generally defined as a
member of a political community who enjoys
the rights and assumes the duties of member-
ship. However, citizenship can have three dis-
tinct dimensions. First, it can be seen in terms
157
DEMOCRATIC THEORY
of a legal status and in terms of certain civil,
political, and social rights which a citizen
can claim and for which they can seek pro-
tection. Often this can be claimed by right
of birth. Second, a citizen is a political agent
and the question of participation in a soci-
ety’s political institutions comes to the fore-
ground. Third, citizenship has historically
and even today been considered a matter of
identity, both psychological and sociological,
conveying a sense of belonging and seeming
to demand a form of loyalty. There have been
two traditional models of citizenship. The
first, called the “republican model,” is derived
from the experiences of Athenian democracy,
Republican Rome, the Italian city-states, and
various workers councils. The key principle
is civic self-rule. This model stresses politi-
cal agency and active participation in delib-
eration and decision making. The model has
been labeled impractical for today’s world of
social complexity and increasing diversity.
The argument is that today’s heterogeneity
does not allow the kind of “moral unity” and
“mutual trust” that existed in the Greek or
Italian city-states (Walzer, 1989).
The “Liberal model” stresses citizenship as
a legal status and as membership in a com-
munity of shared or common law. This model
emphasizes “negative freedom”; the role of
government is to protect individual freedoms
from interference from other individuals or
authorities. This allows citizens to exercise
their freedoms primarily in the world of
private associations and attachments rather
than in the political domain. Some political
theorists have argued that such a view of
citizenship fosters passivity because ordinary
citizens see political activity as insignificant.
This seems to be the case today in the United
States. Further, such passivity can be danger-
ous for maintaining legal status for if citizens
grow inattentive, the legal and governmental
Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley
security provided by the authorities may
dwindle. This security must be continually
secured, sometimes against these authori-
ties, and thus the passive enjoyment of citi-
zenship requires that at least intermittently
citizens engage in political and legal action
(see Constant, 1819). Mill, Constant, and
other political theorists have argued that the
regular exercise of political liberty is the best
means of moral improvement, which also
opens the minds of the public to the public
interest and to the importance of defend-
ing their freedoms (Constant, 1819, Mill,
1861). This is an instrumentalist defense of
democracy.
A more sustained attack on the liberal view
comes from feminist political theorists. This
model gives primacy to the private sphere
and to the notion of noninterference in the
pursuit of particular interests. However, fem-
inists contend that separating the private and
public political sphere leads to the definition
of the private domain as one of necessity and
inequality which impacts on the citizen sta-
tus of women. Further, they argue that the
private and public spheres are intimately
connected as is exemplified by the fact that
there are laws and policies that structure the
personal and private such as laws about rape
and abortion, childcare, and the allocation
of welfare benefits. Further, some personal
problems have wider significance that can
only be solved collectively through political
action (Pateman, 1989).
At issue here is the challenge of inter-
nal diversity which demands that a citizen
appears as situated in a social world char-
acterized by differences of gender, class, lan-
guage, race, ethnicity, and culture. Feminists
and others argue that a universal notion of
citizen defined in terms of legal status and
blind to various social differences has led to
the extension of rights to some groups but
158
exclusion for others and thus full equality
and integration into the political structure
have not occurred for all citizens. Political
theorists such as Young (1989, 2000) argue
that the “people” must be seen as a “hetero-
geneous public.” Citizens as political partici-
pants start from their situated positions and
attempt to construct a dialogue across dif-
ferences. This, however, requires citizens to
have certain characteristics. Young speaks of
participants who are “public spirited,” who
are open to the claims of others, and who are
not single-mindedly self-interested.
This raises the question: what “virtues”
are required of citizens in a pluralist lib-
eral democracy? There are, of course, dif-
ferent answers (Macedo, 1990, Galston,
1991, Callan, 1997). One virtue advocated
by those from the liberal tradition is “pub-
lic reasonableness.” This seems to be the
ability to listen to others while formulating
a position in a way that is sensitive to and
respectful of different experiences and iden-
tities of fellow citizens. John Rawls speaks
of “reasoned consensus” among citizens;
this involves agreement on general reasons
but can allow disagreement about interpre-
tations (Rawls, 1993). Feminists, of course,
oppose a rational consensus notion because
it tends to stifle diverse voices as well as to
exclude some persons.
To speak of citizen virtues, of course,
requires education in democratic values
as John Dewey recognized in his book,
Democracy and Education (1916). Indeed,
many political theorists have given attention
to the role of education in securing democracy
as well as to the kind of education required
(Gutmann, 1999, Brighthouse, 2006). The
questions in this area are many: Is a common
curriculum required and what is or should be
the common knowledge and values for all cit-
izens? Should it be a curriculum that teaches

respect for difference while also providing
the necessary skills for democratic discussion
across differences? (Leydet, 2011). The ques-
tion of “democratic education” also raises the
question of paternalism in cases of children
whose parents or culture is not democratic.
A THEORY OF THE DEMOCRATIC
PROCESS: THEORIES OF DEMOCRATIC
DELIBERATION
It seems clear that a particular kind of delib-
erative process is required for any society or
organization to be properly called “demo-
cratic.” Democracy, in theory, puts faith in the
power and wisdom of the people. Rousseau
(1993), for example, speaks of the “general
will.” Green and Blanshard argued that the
general will is the foundation of democracy
(Blanshard, 1961, Green, 1986, Fairfield,
2008). However, the concept of the “general
will” is open to many interpretations and not
free from controversy. Joseph Schumpeter,
for example, argues that the general will as
it actually functions in a democratic order
represents an abstraction and that the gen-
eral will cannot be the will of any identifiable
set of people (Schumpeter, 1976, Fairfield,
2008). Dewey and Lippmann engaged in
an extensive debate about the nature of the
“democratic public” in the 1920s (Lippmann,
1925, Dewey, 1927). Lippmann argued that
there was no such entity while Dewey sought
to describe the characteristics needed of the
public if democracy as a way of life and sys-
tem was to survive. The difficulty for demo-
cratic theory is that to speak of the public as
an “agent” seems somewhat spurious because
agency presupposes consciousness, inten-
tionality, and volition at a minimum. Given
the various degrees of participation and
159
DEMOCRATIC THEORY
information possessed by a public as well as
the facts of diversity, disagreement, and often
apathy, how should democratic deliberation
be characterized? Again we find a range of
positions on this question.
One position on this issue is “deliberative
democracy.” Benhabib provides a clear state-
ment of this position when she states that a
legitimate collective decision-making process
in a polity is present when the institutions of
this polity are so arranged that what is con-
sidered in the “common interest of all results
from processes of collective deliberation
conducted rationally and fairly among free
and equal individuals” (Benhabib, 1996, 69).
Rawls sees citizens as reasonable deliberators
who are able to appeal to shared standards
of public reason. This view is related to the
notion of citizenship as a legal status for the
requisite standards is embodied in institu-
tions and institutional documents. Rawls
declares: “Our exercise of political power
is fully proper only when it is exercised in
accordance with a constitution, the essentials
of which all citizens as free and equal may be
reasonably expected to endorse in the light
of principles and ideals acceptable to their
common human reason” (Rawls, 1993, 137,
Fairfield, 2008). There are three basic ele-
ments of deliberative democracy as set out by
Rawls. First, there is “public reason,” which is
a form of rationality that limits reasons that
citizens may give in supporting their public
opinion. These reasons must be consistent
with seeing other citizens as equal. Here, of
course, we have the Kantian understanding
of how respecting others reflects back on
one’s own self-respect. Secondly, of course,
the framework of constitutional democratic
institutions that is the setting for democratic
deliberative processes (Fairfield, 2008).
Finally, there is embedded in the notion of
“public reason” the idea that citizens will
Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley
know and desire to follow public reason and
seek to realize its ideal in their political con-
duct (Rawls, 1999b, 578, Fairfield, 2008).
Guttmann and Thompson stress the
“reason-giving” requirement of delibera-
tive democracy, namely, that leaders should
give reasons for their decisions and should
respond to reasons citizens give in return.
These reasons also ought to appeal to prin-
ciples such as reciprocity, publicity, account-
ability, and equality. Although followers of
the deliberative democracy camp disagree
about the values, status, aims, and scope
of deliberation, they all seem to agree that
deliberative politics involves “working
together in a more cooperative “first-person
plural spirit” (Gutmann and Thompson,
2004, 7). Deliberative democrats assume
that arguments are made in ways everyone
can respect; and that such mutually respect-
ful deliberation will often lead to discovery
of areas of agreement. Two emphases are
present in deliberative democracy: one on
procedure, on the process of deliberation,
and an emphasis on cognitive validity.
These aspects are best captured by
Habermas (1962, 1971, 1975, 1987, 1990,
1996, 1998), who understands democracy as
an institutional order and whose legitimacy
depends on collective will-formation through
discourse. He develops a theory of commu-
nicative reason that locates rationality in
structures of interpersonal linguistic commu-
nication. He argues that all speech acts have
an inherent telos, namely, the goal of mutual
understanding and that human beings possess
the communicative competence to bring about
such understanding. Habermas imagines
discourse occurring in the “public sphere,”
an arena in which individuals participate in
discussions about matters of common con-
cern. He focuses on consensus and views the
lack of consensus as a “failure.” Habermas’s
160
ideal of discursive democracy relies heavily
on the cognitive dimension of the self; there
is a cognitive demand embedded in speech.
Little attention is given to the affective and
other dimensions of self and deliberation in
the public sphere seems immune to the forces
of chaos, diversity, and conflict present in the
real world of human life.
Two schools of criticism thus emerge. The
communitarians focus on the political subject
as socially embedded. Sandel, for example,
rejects any notion of a Kantian disembod-
ied subject and argues for the notion of a
“wider subject,” a subject marked by com-
munity, a common vocabulary of discourse,
and a background of implicit practices and
understandings (Sandel, 1982). MacIntyre
and Taylor argue that the self is embedded
in a social context (MacInytre, 1984, Taylor,
1985). Taylor asserts “Man is a social ani-
mal, indeed a political animal, because he is
not self-sufficient alone, and in an important
sense is not self-sufficient outside the polis”
(Taylor, 1985, 1290). For communitarians,
the emphasis in democratic deliberation is
on community values; participants in the
dialogue focus on their social obligations and
thus a sense of loyalty to a community takes
precedence over individualistic, egoistic cal-
culations, and strategic rationality. However,
communitarian views are criticized because
of their overemphasis on society, which fails
to honor a proper balance between individu-
alism and community.
Feminist critiques of contemporary moral
and political theory have focused on two
contemporary views of the self—the Kantian
and “homo economicus.” The Kantian
ethical subject uses abstract pure reason to
transcend cultural norms and to discover
absolute moral truth whereas the homo eco-
nomicus uses instrumental reason to rank
desires in a coherent order and to figure out

how to maximize desire satisfaction. Both
these views isolate the individual from per-
sonal relationships and larger social forces.
Feminists argue that this minimizes the per-
sonal and moral import of circumstances
about which one has little or no choice and
interpersonal relationships. Feminist theorists
believe political theories based on a Kantian
or economic view of the self are inadequate
because they eclipse family, friendship, pas-
sionate love, and community, and downplay
the difficult of resolving conflicts that arise
between these commitments and personal
values and aspirations. They also ignore
the multiple, sometimes fractious sources of
social identity constituted by one’s gender,
sexual orientation, race, class, ethnicity, and
so forth. Their homogenized rational subject
is not prey to ambivalence, anxiety, obses-
sion, prejudice, hatred, or violence and thus
they overestimate the immunity of the self to
noxious influences, and the reliability of rea-
son as a corrective to distorted moral judg-
ment. A better account of self for moral and
political theory is one understood as socially
situated and murkily heterogeneous (Meyers,
1989, Benhabib, 1992, Jaggar, 1998).
For example, Young is skeptical that dem-
ocratic deliberative processes could lead to
outcomes that would be acceptable to all;
deliberation as defined by Habermas is too
reason-based, and thus excludes forms of
communication that women and other mar-
ginalized people tend to use, such as greet-
ing, rhetoric, and storytelling (Young, 1990).
Young’s approach is similar to that of the
group labeled as “agonists” or “agonistic
pluralists.” Agonism is a political theory that
emphasizes the potentially positive aspects of
certain (but not all) forms of political con-
flict, namely, in the ability to enforce or reen-
force democratic inclusion. This view accepts
a permanent place for such conflict, while
161
DEMOCRATIC THEORY
seeking to show how we might accept and
channel this positively. The agonists argue
that deliberative democracy theorists ignore
the inequalities that set agenda priorities
and constrain the alternatives that political
actors may consider in their deliberations.
Common discourse is itself a complex prod-
uct of structural inequality; it is hegemonic
discourse and often leads to false or distorted
agreement. Young argues that the theory and
practice of deliberative democracy have no
tools for raising the possibility that delib-
erations may be closed and distorted in this
way—it lacks a theory of ideology as well as
an account of the genealogy of discourses
and their manner of helping to constitute
the way individuals see themselves and their
social world (Young, 2001). In this context,
Fairfield argues that what is needed is an ade-
quate phenomenology of democratic speech
which does not oversanitize the language of
politics (Fairfield, 2008, 53–78).
Agonistic feminism is represented in
the works of Honing, Mouffe, and Ziarek
(Honing, 1992, 1993, 2001, Mouffe, 1992,
1993, 2005, Ziarek, 2001). Agonistic views
see the nature of politics as inherently conflict-
ual, with battles over power and hegemony
being the central tasks of democratic struggle.
Advocates of agnostic politics believe that the
“consensus” sought by both liberalism and
deliberative democrats leads to oppression or
injustice by silencing new struggles. It often
leads to paternalism which etymologically
has a male cast, and women and minority
groups have often been characterized as less
“rational.” Mouffe argues that “every con-
sensus exists as a temporary result of a provi-
sional hegemony, as a stabilization of power,
and that it always entails some form of
exclusion” (Mouffe, 2000). Agonists seek to
re­orient political theory to the question: How
should we deal with irreducible difference?
Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley
Adequate political theory should conceptual-
ize democracy so as to optimize the opportu-
nity for people to express their disagreements
and should recognize that conflict may not
be eliminated even given sufficient time for
deliberation. The agonists argue that politics
crafted in the knowledge of the inevitability
of conflicts is paradoxically freer than one
which seeks to shy away from this fact.
JUSTIFICATION OF THE DEMOCRATIC
WAY OF GOVERNANCE
Political legitimacy is about explaining why
the use of political power by a particular body
is permissible and why there is a moral duty
to obey its commands (Rawls, 1993). A typi-
cal way of approaching this question is via
consent: what social arrangements can we all
accept as free persons who have no authority
over one another? The mechanism is a hypo-
thetical agreement, a social contract, a model
of the reasoning of citizens. It embodies the
reasons a person would have for recognizing
and accepting a constraint that is independ-
ent of his desires. The contract can be seen
either in a prudential manner or in an ideal-
ized moral manner. The Hobbesian contract
is prudential, based on instrumental, practical
rationality. The aim of the contract shows that
agreement is an effective way to further one’s
nonmoral aims and interests. Thus Hobbes
would argue that one chooses between a
form of government and life under anarchy.
The Kantian contract is focused on a moral
or political principle that meets certain basic
moral demands such as treating all as free
and equal and not subjecting any person to
the will or judgment of another (D’Agostino
et  al., 2012). In his social contract theory,
Rawls emphasizes the principle of justice “as
162
fairness.” The “original position” of the con-
tract is designed to be a fair and impartial
point of view that is to be adopted in reason-
ing about fundamental principles of justice.
It includes a “veil of ignorance”; the parties
are deprived of all knowledge of their per-
sonal characteristics and social and historical
circumstances. There is an “overlapping con-
sensus,” a term referring to how supporters
of different comprehensive normative doc-
trines (those of religion, political ideology, or
morality)—that entail apparently inconsist-
ent conceptions of justice—can agree on par-
ticular principles of justice that underwrite a
political community’s basic social institutions.
The overlapping consensus depends, in effect,
on there being a morally significant core of
commitments common to each of the main
comprehensive doctrines in the community.
The emphasis is on a notion of “public rea-
son,” in that it identifies central core commit-
ments that all, despite many disagreements,
could in principle accept.
Some political theorists see the liberal-
ist and deliberative democracy position as
purely procedural, for the deliberative situ-
ation is set up so that whatever principles
are generated are by the fact of the genera-
tion: fair. Political legitimacy is created by
appropriately constrained decision-making
procedures (Fabienne, 2008). As noted ear-
lier, much of the criticisms against Rawls and
liberalism are against this rationalized, ideal-
ized, procedural notion of democracy. Again,
Nussbaum focuses on the notion that the
individuals in the original position are equal,
free, and independent; they are not socially
embedded but idealized rational deciders;
they are not, therefore, subject to the com-
plexities of human emotions, social commit-
ments, and dependencies that occur not just
for the disabled but for all persons in their
lifespan.

In addition to social contract theories,
there are also instrumentalist defenses of
democracy. Mill and others, such as Sen,
Habermas, and Dewey, argued that the dem-
ocratic method is strategically and epistemo-
logically better and that it improves the moral
character of the participants (Mill, 1861).
Strategically, democracy forces decision-
makers to take into account the interests,
rights, and opinions of most people in society
(Sen, 1999). Epistemologically, it is generally
more reliable in helping participants dis-
cover right decisions because it emphasizes
discussion and boarder bases of information.
Finally, Mill, Dewey, and Habermas argued
that democracy tends to enhance autonomy,
rationality, and even the morality of the par-
ticipants. Another somewhat instrumentalist
defense of democracy is the observations of
Jaspers that democratic institutions are able
to manage change and transformation in
myriad ways (Jasper, 1953). Democracy is
also a method for managing disagreements
through peaceful means (Fairfield, 2008,
xiv). It should be clear by now that most the-
orizing about democracy is idealized and on
the strictly theoretical level. However, there
are some political theorists who give empiri-
cal arguments for democracy. Thus Dahl
undertakes a comparison of democracies to
other types of governments, and argues that
democracies tend to produce the best politi-
cal systems taken all around (Dahl, 1989).
His criteria of judging the various forms of
government include producing maximum
flexible freedom, promoting human develop-
ment, protecting personal interests, and the
ability for self-correction.
Major questions and issues remain for
future democratic theory research. (1) What
does “rule by the people” ultimately mean
in today’s diverse and contentious soci-
ety? Consensus may not be achievable and
163
DEMOCRATIC THEORY
conflict may be inevitable. A burning ques-
tion for many nations today is the role of
religion in the public sphere. (2) As globali-
zation and migrations of peoples increases
what should be the parameters of citizen-
ship? Will citizenship be expanded to the
global level? Can democracy exist at the glo-
bal level? Central questions that emerge are:
will new forms of citizenship develop such
as multicultural citizenship or post national
citizenship? (Kymlicka, 1995). Will the con-
cept of nationhood be reconstructed? (Miller,
1995). (3) How does a democratic society
handle controversy and varieties of political
rhetoric? The issue of compulsion and per-
suasion in democratic processes is a crucial
one (Kegley and Skowronski, 2013). Should
we be developing a phenomenology of politi-
cal rhetoric as well as of political protest? (4)
Are views of democracy which are dependent
on a Kantian view of autonomy with its key
focus on rationality adequate to deal with
socially embedded human beings with vari-
able rationality and who may suffer differ-
ing degrees of dependence and disability in
their life process? How is democratic theory
to handle the growing social, economic, and
other inequalities present today? Those inter-
ested in democratic political theory research
have much fertile ground to plow.
WORKS CITED
Benhabib, S. (1992), Situating the Self:
Gender, Community and Postmodernism
in Contemporary Ethics. New York:
Routledge.
— (1996), “Toward a Deliberative Model of
Democratic Legitimacy,” in S. Benhabib
(ed.), Democracy and Difference.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley
Blanshard, B. (1961), Reason and Goodness.
London: Allen & Unwin.
Brighthouse, H. (2006), On Education.
London & New York: Routledge.
Callan, E. (1997), Creating Citizens. New
York: Oxford University Press.
Christman, J. (1991), Autonomy and
Personal History. Canadian Journal of
Philosophy, 21 (1): 1–24.
Constant, B. (1819), “The Liberty of
Ancients Compared to Moderns,” trans.
A. Phillips (ed.), The Political Writings of
Benjamin Constant. New York: Oxford
University Press.
D’Agostino, F., Gaus, G., and Thrasher,
T. (2012), “Contemporary Approaches
to the Social Contract,” The Stanford
Encyclopedia of Philosophy, http://plato.
stanford.edu/archives/win2012/entries/
contractarianism-contemporary.
Dahl, R. (1989), Democracy and Its Critics.
New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Dewey, J. (1916), Democracy and
Education: An Introduction to the
Philosophy of Education. New York:
Macmillan.
— (1927), The Public and Its Problems.
New York: Holt Publishers.
Dworkin, G. (1988), The Theory and
Practice of Autonomy. New York:
Cambridge University Press.
Dworkin, R. (2006), Is Democracy Possible
Here? Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press.
Fabienne, P. (2008), Democratic Legitimacy.
New York: Routledge.
Fairfield, P. (2008), Why Democracy?
Albany, NY: SUNY Press.
Feinberg, J. (1989), “Autonomy,” in J.
Christman (ed.), The Inner Citadel:
Essays on Individual Autonomy. New
York: Oxford University Press.
164
Frankfurt, H. (1987), “Freedom of Will and
the Concept of a Person,” in H. Frankfurt
(ed.), The Importance of What We Care
About: Philosophical Essays. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Galston, W. (1991), Liberal Virtues,
Citizenship Virtues and Community
in Liberal Constitutionalism. Oxford:
Clarendon Press.
Green, T. H. (1986), Lectures on the Principles
of Political Obligation and Other Writings,
P. Harris and J. Morrow (eds). Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Gutmann, A. (1999), Democracy and
Education. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
Gutmann, A. and Thompson, D. (2004),
Why Deliberative Democracy? Princeton,
NJ: Princeton University Press.
Habermas, J. (1962), The Structural
Transformation of the Public Sphere: An
Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois
Society, trans. T. Burger. Cambridge, MA:
The MIT Press.
— (1971), Knowledge and Human Interests,
trans. J. Shapiro. Boston, MA: Beacon
Press.
— (1975), Legitimation Crisis, trans.
T. McCarthy. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.
— (1987), The Theory of Communicative
Action, trans. T. McCarthy. Boston, MA:
Bacon Press.
— (1990), Moral Consciousness and
Communicative Action, trans. C.
Lenhardt and S. W. Nicholson.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
— (1996), Between Facts and Norms:
Contributions to a Discourse Theory
of Law and Democracy, trans. W. Rehg
(trans.). Cambridge: Polity Press.
— (1998), The Inclusion of the Other.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Haworth, L. (1986), Autonomy: An Essay
in Philosophical Psychology and Ethics.
New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Honing, B. (1993), Political Theory and
the Displacement of Politics. Ithaca, NY:
Cornell University Press.
— (2001), Democracy and the Foreigner.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Jaggar, A. (1988), Feminist Politics and
Human Nature. Lanham, MD: Rowman
& Littlefield.
Jasper, K. (1953), The Origin and Goal of
History, trans. M. Bullock. New Haven,
CT: Yale University Press.
Kegley, J. and P. Skowronski (2013),
Persuasion and Compulsion in
Democracy. New York: Lexington Press.
Kymlicka, W. (1995), Multicultural
Citizenship. New York: Oxford
University Press.
Leydet, D. (2011), “Citizenship,” The
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy,
http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/
fall2011/entries/citizenship/.
Lippmann, W. (1925), The Phantom Public.
New York: Transactions Publishers.
Macedo, S. (1990), Goods, Virtues &
Diversity in the Liberal State. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
MacIntyre, A. (1984), After Virtue. Notre
Dame, IN: Indiana University Press.
Mele, A. (1991), “History and Personal
Autonomy,” Canadian Journal of
Philosophy, 23 (1): 271–280.
Meyers, D. (1989), Self, Society, and Personal
Choice. New York: Columbia University
— (2004), Being Yourself: Essays on
Identity, Autonomy and Social Life.
Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
Mill, J. S. (1861, 1958), Considerations on
Representative Government. Indianapolis,
IN: Bobbs-Merrill Press.
165
DEMOCRATIC THEORY
Miller, D. (1995), Nationality. New York:
Clarendon Press.
Mouffe, C. (1992), Dimensions of Radical
Democracy: Pluralism, Citizenship,
Community. London; New York: Verso.
— (1993), The Return of the Political.
London; New York: Verso.
— (2000), The Democratic Paradox. New
York: Verso.
— (2005), On the Political, Thinking in
Action. Abingdon; New York: Routledge.
Nussbaum, M. (2007), The Clash Within:
Democracy, Religious Violence, and
India’s Future. Cambridge, MA: Belknap
Press of Harvard University Press.
Pateman, C. (1989), The Disorder of
Women: Democracy, Feminism, and
Political Theory. Stanford, CA: Stanford
University Press.
Rawls, J. (1971), A Theory of Justice.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
— (1993), Political Liberalism, 2nd edn.
New York: Columbia University.
— (1999b), “The Idea of Public Reason
Revisited,” in S. Freeman (ed.), The
Collected Papers of John Rawls.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
Rousseau, J. J. (1993), The Social Contract,
trans. G. D. H. Cole. New York: Knopf.
Sandel, M. (1982), Liberalism and the
Limits of Justice. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Schumpeter, J. (1976), Capitalism, Socialism,
and Democracy. London: Allen & Unwin.
Scott, J. (1998), Seeing Like a State: How
Certain Schemes to Improve the Human
Conditions Have Failed. New Haven, CT:
Yale University Press.
Sen, A. (1999), Development as Freedom.
New York: Knopf.
Jacquelyn Ann K. Kegley
Taylor, C. (1985), Philosophy and the
Human Sciences: Philosophical Papers 2.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Walzer, M. (1989), “Citizenship,” in
T. Bell, J. Farr, and R. Hansen (eds),
Political Innovation and Conceptual
Change. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Young, I. (1989), “Polity and Group
Difference: A Critique of the Ideal of
Universalist Citizenship,” Ethics, 99:
250–274.
166
— (1990), Justice and the Politics of
Difference. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
— (2000), Inclusion and Democracy. New
York: Oxford University Press.
— (2001), “Activist Challenges to
Deliberative Democracy,” Political
Theory, 29 (5) (October): 670–690.
Ziarek, E. (2001), An Ethics of Dissensus:
Postmodernity, Feminism, and the Politics
of Radical Democracy. Stanford, CA:
Stanford University Press.
 11
FEMINISM AND GENDER1
Anca Gheaus
INTRODUCTION
Gender makes a difference to many central
questions in political philosophy: the way
we understand the demands of distribu-
tive and relational justice, the ideal form of
democracy, the division between the private
and the public domains, and the normative
issues raised by the acceleration of globaliza-
tion. We live in societies that are structured by
gender in various ways: most obviously, we
inherit a tradition of differential treatment of
women and men, which bestowed numerous
political, economic, and social privileges on
the latter. The legal discrimination of women
has been the main object of so-called first
wave feminism. Pioneered by philosophers
such as Wollstonecraft and Mill, feminists of
the first wave have insisted on the illegitimacy
of excluding women from political and eco-
nomic life and legally confining them to the
private sphere of the family (or monastery).
In many countries, women are still subject to
legal discrimination, and therefore the aims
of first-wave feminism continue to be highly
relevant in some parts of the world.
Women who live in liberal democracies
today have the same legal standing as men:
for instance, they enjoy the same legal rights
as men with respect to voting, standing for
election, holding property and occupational
167
freedom. Yet, they tend to be underrepre-
sented in politics—particularly at the top
levels—in many professions that are consid-
ered traditionally male and from the higher
end positions of most professions. They also
tend to be more affected by poverty than
men are and receive less pay; they are the
victims of most rapes and domestic violence
and do most of the housework and childrear-
ing—both in their homes and in commodi-
fied form. Finally, their bodies are objectified
through pornography and commodified
through prostitution to a much larger extent
than men’s. Therefore, women appear to
have a lesser share than men in political and
social power, economic assets, and social rec-
ognition. The core belief of feminism is that
people should not suffer disadvantage by
dint of belonging to a particular gender, and
therefore the earlier facts represent core con-
cerns for feminist political philosophy.
Indeed, current feminist political philoso-
phy offers a thorough analysis of all these
issues and their ramifications. According to
Jaggar’s (1983) helpful classification, feminist
thinking comes in several varieties—liberal,
socialist, and radical—reflecting the diversity
of feminist authors’ value and methodological
commitments. More recently added broad cat-
egories include ecofeminism and postcolonial
feminism. Not all normative feminist thinking
Anca Gheaus
is properly understood as a contribution to
political theory which, traditionally, focuses
on questions concerning the legitimate limits
and uses of state power. Because it is restricted
to political philosophy, this chapter mainly
draws on work belonging to liberal and social-
ist feminism. By contrast, the traditions of rad-
ical feminism, ecofeminism, and postcolonial
feminism are more obviously relevant to ethics
and social philosophy, or else they contain sug-
gestions for political changes that are too radi-
cal to assess within the framework of liberal,
egalitarian, and democratic states.
This chapter is also limited to a presenta-
tion of the contribution made by feminism to
political philosophy at the most general level.
It discusses the two main issues in contempo-
rary political philosophy: justice—comprising
theories of fair distributions and of equal rela-
tionships between citizens—and democratic
theory. Theories of justice and democratic
theory are the two main areas of political phi-
losophy: the first is about substantial require-
ments of justice, and the second is about the
procedures through which legitimate politi-
cal decisions can be reached. Gender plays a
role in both, and, in particular, the gendered
division of labor raises difficulties for main-
stream theories in both areas. The last section
outlines new developments in feminist theory:
explorations of the phenomena of implicit
bias, and stereotype threat and thinking about
epistemic injustice in the context of gender; I
explain their potential import for theories of
justice and democratic theories.
RELATIONAL IDENTITIES AND THE
ETHICS OF CARE
Both in their professional and in their pri-
vate lives, women tend to carry most of the
168
responsibilities of meeting other people’s
needs: they are often the main caregivers
for children, ill and disabled individuals,
and the frail elderly. They are also often
expected to take responsibility for main-
taining good relationships between friends,
peers, and colleagues. All these are aspects
of the gendered division of labor which, as
I will show in the following sections, is the
source of much political inequality between
women and men (Okin, 1989a). Unlike other
­inequalities—resulting, for instance, from
violence or outward discrimination—liberal
political philosophy has difficulties identi-
fying the normative status of inequalities
flowing from the gendered division of labor,
because the individual choices that gener-
ate them are typically uncoerced. One of the
main contributions of feminist philosophy
over the past 30  years was to uncover the
moral and political importance of caregiving.
The general conclusion of this body of work
is that the practical and emotional labor done
by women as caregivers should be acknowl-
edged as essential to social cooperation and
rewarded adequately.
First, on the moral importance of caring.
Most generally, care is defined as the activity
of meeting another person’s needs, whether
material or emotional (Tronto, 1993). The
majority of care ethicists follow Noddings
(1982) in the belief that, to qualify as care,
the activity in question must be hands-on
(rather than, say, meeting someone’s needs
indirectly, by paying someone else to provide
necessary services). Others further restrict
the definition to needs that cannot possibly
be met by the person in need herself (Bubeck,
1995). The moral value of meeting needs
can be accounted for by major ethical tradi-
tions, yet direct reference to needs does not
figure in the most influential test of assess-
ing individual moral development, devised

by the psychologist Kohlberg (1981). In the
early-mid-1980s, the psychologist Gilligan
made two important observations: first, that
Kohlberg’s scale of moral development—
according to which reaching moral maturity
depends on individuals’ ability to outgrow
particular attachments to other people and
to reason in terms of rights and duties—was
developed using only male subjects. Second,
that women typically engaged in moral rea-
soning in which others’ needs and relation-
ships between people played a central role.
The female, but not male, subjects of this
research systematically tended to describe
their identities as relational (Giligan, 1982,
1995). Gilligan did not conclude that wom-
en’s absence from Kohlberg’s studies was
inconsequential for his theory and that those
female subjects who talked about needs and
relationships were morally less developed
than subjects able to reason in terms of rights
and duties. Instead, she thought that in her
conversation with girls and women she heard
a different “moral voice,” one equally impor-
tant yet different from the moral “voice of
justice” more familiar from men’s moral rea-
soning. She did not think—as some critics
believe—that women and men are structur-
ally unable to speak both “moral languages”
but merely noted the gendered aspect of
moral reasoning, whatever their explana-
tion may be (Gilligan, 1995). At the time
when Gilligan wrote her book, the topic of
caregiving—that is, a large part of women’s
traditional work—was absent from philoso-
phy. Gilligan’s work broke new ground in
reevaluating the moral importance of care;
following her, many feminists went on to
explore “the ethics of care,” which has since
evolved into a large body of moral and politi-
cal theory.
Much of it has to do with practices of
caregiving within the family, mostly in
169
FEMINISM AND GENDER
childrearing. Ruddick (1989) argued that
people who are primarily responsible for the
hands-on tasks of childrearing—and whom
she calls “mothers” whether they are female
or male—confront three specific tasks: the
physical preservation of the children; their
physical, emotional, and intellectual devel-
opment; and their socialization into accept-
able members of their group. To accomplish
these tasks successfully, mothers develop,
ideally, a number of distinct virtues and the
ability to address daily dilemmas involving
the negotiation of conflicting needs as well as
conflicts between the different tasks of chil-
drearing. She thought that the moral experi-
ence of mothers, and the specific virtues they
develop can be a valuable resource in think-
ing about peaceful conflict resolution in the
political realm. This idea has been further
elaborated by Bubeck (1999). More specifi-
cally, Ruddick argued that “maternal think-
ing” identifies each individual as being, first
and foremost, the result of someone’s loving
work of care, thus providing a specific justi-
fication and motivation for pacifism. Others
relied on the fact that everybody is “some
mother’s child” (in Kittay’s words) to argue
for a politics of responsibility; the thought is
that we all have duties to support others in
their caregiving activities because none of us
could have survived and thrived without it
(Kittay, 1999, Engster, 2007).
Not only is our physical, intellectual, and
emotional well-being the result of the care
we received at the beginning of our lives,
but also care is essential to our very iden-
tity as moral beings. Held drew attention
to the fact that the mothering activity is not
merely reproductive, but a creative activity
because “in bringing up children, those who
mother create new human persons” (Held,
1997, 634). Held describes the relationship
between parents and children as a paradigm
Anca Gheaus
case of moral relationships: it is, par excel-
lence, a situation in which the parents’ exer-
cise of power is voluntarily limited by moral
reasons. This is the ideal context for a child
to learn that might is not right and hence to
get a grasp on the essence of morality (Held,
1993).
Other feminists looked beyond the realm
of childrearing and noted that the moral
development of adults also requires close
relationships such as friendship (Friedman,
1993). Yet others examined the importance
of caring relationships for creating a climate
of social trust, which in turn is necessary
for working political communities and even
more so for just institutions (Baier, 1994).
Beyond the differences in what they choose
to emphasize, care ethicists convey the gen-
eral conclusion that care is necessary if we
are to survive and develop into functioning
and moral adults who together can run a just
political community. Yet, this very important
activity has often been seen as instrumental
in keeping women out or on the margins
of the public domain of politics and the
economy, and for a long time failed to earn
women the status of equal and fully partici-
pating citizens. Echoing de Beauvoir’s (1949)
famous claim that one becomes a woman by
taking on the functions of reproduction and
mothering, some contemporary philosophers
warned that feminists should not embrace an
ethics of care (Dietz, 1985, Card, 1990). Part
of the criticism to the ethics of care—that it is
inherently parochial because it cannot account
for duties owed to strangers with whom we
have no caring relationship, nor the interest
or hope to develop one—is easily addressed:
some care ethicists have aimed from the very
beginning to integrate the importance of care
with that of justice (Tronto, 1993), and oth-
ers have revised or extended their theories in
this sense (Noddings, 2002, Held, 2006). It
170
is more difficult to refute the criticism that
an ethics of care is potentially oppressive,
by glorifying the private, and ideally selfless
activity of caregiving. Yet, care ethicists do
not uphold the value for strategic reasons,
but because they believe it is genuinely ethi-
cally essential. One way to avoid injustice
to caregivers may be to directly compensate
them—through various public policies—for
the work of care they do (Okin, 1989a). The
ideal way, however, is to encourage men to
share equally in the work of care.
To bring men into care as full partners has
been on the political feminist agenda at least
since the late 1960s, and in spite of some
degree of change it still sounds utopian.
Most care work is different from other
types of work due to its emotional and per-
sonal element; for this reason, one cannot
(typically) do it well if one does not wish to
engage in care. Having a relational self—gen-
uinely valuing connection to others—may in
general be a necessary characteristic of a good
caregiver. Feminist psychoanalysis offers
an explanation of why women, rather than
men, tend to take on caregiving: as babies
and then small children we form ourselves in
reaction to the parent who cares for us most
of the time, that is the mother. Thus, female
children find it easier to identify with their
mothers and therefore form a relational self,
while male children strive to separate from
the mother (Chodorow, 1978). On this view,
the overburdening of women with care work
and their ensuing social marginalization as
well as their lack of social recognition and
susceptibility to being dominated (Benjamin,
1988)  are rooted in the psychosexual rela-
tionships between women and men. The
direct involvement of both women and men
in the care for babies and infants holds the
key to change; much of the action, therefore,
is in the private sphere. But, as we shall see,

this does not mean that state involvement is
unwarranted.
JUSTICE AND GENDER
Is state intervention in the private sphere
legitimate, and in what form? How can we
make sense of the gender component of dis-
tributional justice? How does gender affect
other aspects of justice beyond the distribu-
tive one—how does gender figure in the
problem of relational justice? I now turn to
these questions.
The Public and the Private
Many of the problems mentioned in the
introduction are at least partly caused by
decisions made by individuals who interact
with each other in the private sphere: women
(living in liberal democracies) cannot be
legally coerced to do housework and child-
care; yet they often make career decisions
that lead to lower lifetime earnings than
those of men, are more reluctant than men
to engage in politics, or compete for pres-
tigious and powerful positions in various
organizations and end up more often than
men making a living out of pornography or
prostitution. To the extent to which patterns
of interaction are coerced—for instance, in
cases when prostitution is embedded in mod-
ern forms of slavery, or in cases of domestic
violence—they are obviously wrong, and
easily addressed by liberal theories of justice.
(Indeed, in such cases gender seems inciden-
tal, rather than essential, to the problem.)
By contrast, when they result from freely
made decisions of people interacting in their
private capacity they raise difficulties to lib-
eral theories of justice. Traditionally, liberal
171
FEMINISM AND GENDER
thinking has been relying on a distinction
between the public life of individuals, which
is a legitimate subject to regulation, and their
private life, which ought to be free from state
intervention. Feminist philosophy challenges
this foundational liberal belief.
The criticism mounted by Okin (1989a,
1994)  to Rawls’s theories of justice (1971,
1993) on the question of justice in the family
is the clearest expression of the difficulty that
political–liberal theories of justice have with
integrating feminist concerns. The family is a
prime example of “the private.” Traditionally,
the institution of the family has been par-
ticularly instrumental for keeping women
outside political and economic life, social-
izing them into subordination and justify-
ing various forms of violence against them,
including marital rape. An obvious feminist
requirement then is that the family ought to
be internally just in order to be legitimate.
Yet, according to Rawls—who formulated
the most influential account of liberal justice
in contemporary philosophy—the justice of
a society is determined by the justice of its
basic structure, which is that society’s major
political, economic, and social institutions.
These institutions—rather than individual
action or private associations such as the
family—come under the purview of justice.
Rawls’s earlier thinking about justice—
before he moved on to defend political
liberalism—is more amenable to feminist
concerns. Okin (1989a, b) argued that gen-
der concerns are internal to the logic of
Rawls’s early theory of justice (1971) in
two distinct ways. First, she thought that,
in order for the veil of ignorance—Rawls’s
device for determining the principles of jus-
tice—to work in practice, individuals in the
original position have to be able to exercise
empathy as well as reason. Without a con-
cern for others, the process of deliberating
Anca Gheaus
under the veil of ignorance would come to
a standstill. As a consequence, she thought
that Rawls’s theory should be modified to
give up the requirement of mutual disin-
terestedness. Given the limited knowledge
about the self that characterizes the parties
in the original position, plus the fact that
choices in the original position are sup-
posed to be made under the condition of
uncertainty (the parties cannot attach prob-
abilities to particular outcomes), the require-
ment of mutual disinterestedness will make
deliberation impossible. Second, the family
as the site of childrearing is the first school
of justice. Individuals who choose princi-
ples of justice in the original position must
be endowed with a sense of justice, which
cannot be developed in the absence of the
bonds of care that exist between parents
and children and that go beyond parental
duty. Therefore, a theory of justice needs to
acknowledge the merits of care work and
the necessity of caring relationships; in this
sense, justice is rooted in care. But the bonds
of care are not enough to ensure that chil-
dren acquire a sense of justice; for this, one
also needs to be socialized in just families, in
which the distribution of resources and bur-
dens between women and men is fair.
However, from the perspective of politi-
cal liberalism as defended in Rawls’s later
thinking (Rawls, 1993), it is not clear in
which way should the family respond to
the requirements of justice. Specifically, the
earlier considerations about the importance
of care and justice in the family are not suf-
ficient to show that the family should be
internally regulated by justice (Okin, 1994,
Lloyd, 1995). On the one hand, the family
should be regarded as part of the basic struc-
ture of the society because, as the main site
of childrearing, it obviously influences eve-
rybody’s life chances from the start. On the
172
other hand, as voluntary associations, differ-
ent families legitimately reflect a variety of
conceptions of the good, some of which may
indeed be inimical to feminist values. The
principles of justice are supposed to regu-
late the basic structure in order to ensure
that the interaction among a society’s major
political, economic, and social institutions is
just. A safe conclusion is that, at a minimum,
political liberalism will rule out families that
deny women their basic freedoms. But this
does not get close to the feminist aspira-
tion to see families shaped by internally just
arrangements.
A current debate within political phi-
losophy concerns the question of whether
individual actions should also come under
the purview of justice. A positive answer
will be friendlier to feminist goals (Cohen,
1997). But even some defenders of a nega-
tive answer take the side of Okin in consid-
ering it legitimate to regulate certain aspects
of the family. Most prominent examples are
regulating conditions of divorce, including
financial settlements between breadwinners
and homemakers and institutions concern-
ing childcare, which are meant to enable
both women and men to compete for desir-
able social and economic positions (Neufeld,
2009). The latter include flexible work-
ing hours for parents, parental rather than
maternal leaves and subsidized childcare, all
of which have a direct effect on the internal
organization of the family. These proposals
however fall short of addressing the riddle of
how a theory of justice that relies on individ-
uals’ sense of justice could allow individuals
to be socialized in internally unjust families.
If the family and, in general, the outcomes
of private interactions ought to come under
the purview of justice—either because justice
concerns the internal organization of the fam-
ily as part of the basic structure, or because

justice concerns individual action—how can
we assess them as gender just or unjust?
Distributive Justice
Both the metric (resources in general, pri-
mary goods in particular, welfare, capabili-
ties, outcomes) and the principle (equality,
sufficiency, priority) of distributive justice
are contentious issues. This is reflected in the
variety of accounts of gender justice.
Some feminists such as Kittay (1999) fol-
low Rawls in the belief that primary goods
are the correct metric of justice. Like Okin,
she believes that Rawls’s theory of justice is
amenable to a modification that would let
it accommodate feminist concerns. Kittay
notes that dependency is not the exception,
but the norm of social life—we all are, at
times, dependent on others’ care for survival.
Hence she criticizes the mutual disinterested-
ness of parties in the original position as a
normatively unacceptable distortion of social
life. According to Kittay, care is akin to a pri-
mary good: it is necessary for individuals to
survive, let  alone develop and pursue their
idea of a good life. A proper understanding
of social life represents individuals as nodes
in a network of care, in which the burden
of care renders those who carry it particu-
larly vulnerable and needy. Their vulnerabil-
ity results from the emotional charge of care
and from the need to defer their own inter-
ests for the sake of meeting the needs of their
charges. Informal caregiving does not carry
economic rewards, and as a market serv-
ice care is underpaid (Tronto, 1993, 2002,
Bubeck, 1995, Kittay, 1999). Caregivers
ought to be able to depend on people and
structures that support them, and the sup-
port should be made available as a matter
of justice. Kittay, and more recently Engster
(2007) took this account of dependency and
173
FEMINISM AND GENDER
care as a justification of the welfare state.
Bubeck (1995, 1999), who came from a
Marxist background concerned with avoid-
ing exploitation rather than from a Rawlsian
distributive paradigm, gave an account of
gender justice similar in its starting and end-
ing points. Starting from the assumption of
the universal dependency on care, she sug-
gested the creation of a state-run civil service
of caregiving, which would be similar to, or
even replace, the military service.
Kittay’s account may be read as an attempt
to improve the justice of the basic structure
by ensuring that the primary good of care is
fairly distributed via the institutions of the
welfare state, while Bubeck’s suggestion of
a mandatory universal system of caregiving
is obviously at odds with political liberal-
ism. But in both accounts gender plays an
incidental, rather than constitutive role: they
are accounts of gender justice only because
caring is a highly feminized activity. Other
philosophers consider directly the gendered
aspect of typical distribuenda: opportunities,
welfare, outcomes, capabilities. As already
discussed, women fare worse with respect to
at least some desirable social goods such as
political and economic advantage.
Much contemporary thinking about dis-
tributive justice relies on the belief that it
is unjust for people to be disadvantaged by
factors that are not under their control and
for which they cannot be held responsible.
By contrast, different outcomes resulting
from individual uncoerced and informed
choices are just, as long as they reflect indi-
viduals’ level of talent and ambition (but for
a defense of equality of outcomes, includ-
ing between women and men, see Phillips,
2004). This is the difficult question, then:
is there anything unjust in women’s lesser
political participation and economic power
if they result from women’s decision to
Anca Gheaus
focus on childrearing and family making?
Some believe the answer is negative, that
we should take women’s preferences for a
particular combination of work and fam-
ily at face value and strive to accommodate
them (Hakim, 2000). Yet, in a world like
ours, with a history of formal discrimina-
tion against women’s participation in poli-
tics and economic life, women’s domesticity
is not likely to be a merely individual choice
but rather a significant symptom and future
cause of gender injustice (Williams, 2000). It
is not all history. First, social institutions are
structured such that it is difficult to combine
work and family. Second, ambition itself is
socialized and so, to the extent that gender
norms nudge women into domesticity, their
lower political and economic ambition and
unequal outcomes in these spheres ought
to come under criticism (Arneson, 1998,
Mason, 2000).
The likely conclusion of this debate is that
gender justice is incompatible with gender
norms. (An important question, which can-
not be addressed here, is whether all gender
norms are incompatible with gender justice.)
Arneson (1998) suggested that gender justice
obtains when social practices and individual
conduct are regulated such that gender does
not affect one’s life prospects. According to
Robeyns (2007) a society is gender just when
women and men have the same capability
sets, are free to choose without gender-re-
lated constraints on choice, and enjoy “pay-
offs” which are also unstructured by gender
norms. Gheaus (2012) argued that a society
is gender just only if the costs of leading a
gender-neutral lifestyle are, for both women
and men, lower than, or at most equal to,
the costs of gendered lifestyles. Costs in this
context are to be understood very broadly, to
cover financial burdens, time, effort, psycho-
logical discomfort, and so on.
174
Relational Justice
It is counterintuitive that all kinds of social
injustice in general, and gender injustice in
particular, are distributive in nature. Some of
it is relational, concerning how individuals
relate to each other rather than how much
each has compared to others. The demand
that women’s work of care be socially rec-
ognized and rewarded is perhaps the most
widespread concern of relational justice and
gender.
But recognition is not all there is to rela-
tional justice. Young (1990) famously distin-
guished between several forms of injustice
that do not fit naturally in the “distributive
paradigm.” Together they explain, accord-
ing to her, how women are being oppressed
and dominated. The “five faces of oppres-
sion” identified by Young are exploitation,
marginalization, cultural imperialism, pow-
erlessness, and violence. Indeed, women’s
oppression and domination are at least as
salient concerns for feminists as unequal out-
comes in politics and the economy; Haslanger
(2000) has proposed that the very definition
of “woman” incorporates this concern: “S is
a woman iff (df) S is systematically subor-
dinated along some dimension (economic,
political, legal, social, etc.), and S is ‘marked’
as a target for this treatment by observed or
imagined bodily features presumed to be evi-
dence of a female’s biological role in repro-
duction” (Haslanger, 2000, 39).
Yet, antifeminists may express skepticism
about the very existence of gender oppression
in liberal societies, pointing out that women
are active perpetrators of various mecha-
nisms said to oppress them. Cudd (2006),
who takes the oppression of women by men
to be the paradigmatic example of oppres-
sion, answers this potential criticism by
pointing out that often the best overall pay

off for women in particular circumstances
depends on their compliance with oppressive
norms. A bigger worry with an account of
gender justice in terms of oppression is that
the same patriarchal gender norms that hurt
women’s interests can also hurt, in other
circumstances, men’s interests: for instance,
they result in men being more vulnerable to
extreme violence in the public space (particu-
larly in war) and in men having less access to
family life (because there are no “daddy job
tracks,” men are more likely to lose custody
battles, etc.).
DEMOCRATIC THEORY AND GENDER
Relational equality is called by some political
philosophers “democratic equality” to signal
its importance for the well functioning of a
democratic community (Anderson, 1999).
This indicates that, alongside with living in
a society whose institutions, individuals, and
relationships are just, we also care about the
way in which society is being shaped, namely,
through democratic procedures. Feminists
made distinct contributions to democratic
theory by drawing attention to the impor-
tance of deliberative and communicative
democracy in giving women power and voice
and analyzing the way in which the gendered
division of labor has systematically excluded
women from democratic participation.
Deliberative Democracy
Benhabib’s work, influenced by critical the-
ory, focuses on the process of shaping par-
ticular social and institutional arrangements.
On her account, norms of social coexistence
are valid only if they are reached through a
process of deliberation in which all affected
175
FEMINISM AND GENDER
parties participate under conditions of equal-
ity—that is, are equally enabled to voice their
opinions on the issues at stake. Other condi-
tions necessary for the democratic process to
lead to legitimate outcomes are that all par-
ticipants be equally able to bring new issues
into discussion and challenge the very rules
of how the deliberative process is conducted
(Benhabib, 1996). This ideal of democracy
goes hand in hand with Benhabib’s con-
ception of cultures as constantly changing
through dialogue, as well as a conception of
cosmopolitan multiculturalism that strives
to combine diversity and robust equality.
She argued that all citizens of multicultural
societies ought to have the same civil, politi-
cal, and economic rights and should not be
enrolled, against their will, in the culture of
their parents. Rather, she claims that individ-
uals should retain an ability to exit it at any
time (and the right to be accepted by other
cultural groups if, for instance, they marry
one of their members) (Benhabib, 2004).
Benhabib’s ideal of democratic society
is feminist because it gives women a voice
in every aspect of their lives and tries to
delegitimize patriarchal practices without
requiring women to repudiate their culture;
instead, it indicates the conditions in which
multiculturalism need not be bad for women
(to appreciate the complexity of the debate
on feminism and multiculturalism, see Okin
et al., 1999).
Other feminists working on democracy,
such as Young (1990), are less optimistic
than Benhabib about women’s voice in poli-
tics, given their historical marginalization.
Young’s solution to this problem is that dem-
ocratic practices should go beyond the delib-
erative—and hence rational—element and
include forms of communication that have
been traditionally practiced by women (such
as storytelling). Another solution for making
Anca Gheaus
democracies more women-friendly is intro-
ducing female quotas in politics (Phillips,
1995).
The Gendered Division of Labor and
Democracy
The gendered division of labor is also
important for understanding the role of
gender in democratic theory. Pateman
(1988) explained how the tradition of the
social contract theory presupposes the
existence of families: women’s work in the
home makes possible the political activity
of the polity’s members (male citizens, typi-
cally) by providing for their daily needs.
Without such support, they would lack
the time and resources needed to engage in
politics; thus, the social contract between
citizens requires a second, sexual—or mar-
riage—contract between women and men.
One result is the exclusion of women from
political participation. Pateman’s account is
similar to Okin’s claim that “major contem-
porary Anglo-American theories of justice
are to a great extent about men with wives
at home” (Okin, 1989a, 110). But, while
Okin’s main concern is with the require-
ments of justice in the context of a gendered
division of labor, Pateman’s work focuses on
women as citizens. Unlike the first contract,
the second went unrecognized by political
philosophers, thus rendering women and
their contribution to political life invisible.
Pateman’s ultimate goal is to cast doubt
that an organization of social life based
on contracts between individuals can be
an emancipatory strategy for women. As a
consequence of her view, she became one of
the main advocates of the introduction of
a universal, unconditional basic income as
a path toward women’s independence from
men (Pateman, 2004).
176
POLICY AND FEMINIST THEORY
As already mentioned, feminist political phi-
losophers support a variety of policy propos-
als aimed at ensuring a fairer distribution
of the burdens and benefits of social coop-
eration between women and men, and also
at improving the relational status of women.
Many of these proposals have to do with a bet-
ter distribution of care work, like the earlier
mentioned civil service (Bubeck, 1999)  and
with the creation of safety nets for caregivers
(Kittay, 1999). In other cases, the policy justi-
fication lies in enabling both women and men
to engage equally in paid work and family
life. As we have seen, the gendered division of
labor is considered the source of distributive
inequalities between women and men, lower
recognition of women and their work, and
women’s impaired citizenship. Such policies
could result in the generalization of a “car-
egiving parity” model of social organization
which, according to Fraser (1994), would be
better at addressing most of the concerns dis-
cussed earlier: it would help eliminate female
poverty and income inequality, exploita-
tion, marginalization, and lack of recogni-
tion. A comprehensive policy proposal that
would make it possible for women and men
to engage in both paid work and family care
was advanced by sociologists Gornick and
Meyers (2003).
The next logical step for feminist demo-
cratic theory was to devise an understanding
of citizenship that transcends the gendered
division of labor and can therefore equally
empower—perhaps in spite of Pateman’s
skepticism—women and men. Building,
among others, on the ethics of care and
Bubeck’s proposal, Lister (2002) argued for
a redefinition of citizenhood to include an
obligation of caregiving. Lister thinks that
an adequate understanding of citizenship

ought to include the private sphere and so
her policy proposals partly overlap with
those of Gornick and Meyers: employment
regulations to allow parents to combine paid
work and care, including parental leaves and
childcare services. Other policy proposals
are especially useful for including women as
citizens on an equal standing to men, such as
those concerning parliamentary design, pay
and employment equity legislation, and the
creation of adequate safety nets for women
escaping domestic violence.
Another issue on which feminist political
theory can directly feed into public policy is
that of pornography. Pornography is a likely
area that feminists would want regulated for
its effects on women. Some feminists believe
that there is a direct causal connection between
pornography and violence, including sexual
violence, against women (MacKinnon, 1987).
Others think that pornography is, in effect, a
way of subordinating women because porno-
graphic images and words have the illocution-
ary force of communicating that women may
be subject to degrading practices (Langton,
1995). They may also silence women by con-
veying the idea that women’s explicit opposi-
tion to engage in sex (saying “no”) does not
constitute a refusal (Hornsby, 1995). If there
are such causal connections—especially the
more direct ones—they constitute reason
for regulating pornography. Any all-things-
considered judgment would have to take into
account powerful reasons to refrain from its
criminalization: for instance, that this would
deprive of choices women who do not have
many choices in the first place (Nussbaum,
1999).
Recently, there has been much philosophi-
cal interest in more radical policy proposals
meant to improve the general distribution of
wealth in society: the introduction of a uni-
versal, unconditional basic income, or a move
177
FEMINISM AND GENDER
toward property-owning democracy. Both
proposals are very tempting to feminists since
they would lift many women from poverty,
empower all women economically, at least
in the short run, and free them from oppres-
sive marriages and market demands, allow-
ing them to engage in caring (if they wish to)
without the threat of economic dependency
and poverty (Elgarte, 2008). The introduc-
tion of an unconditional basic income could
also lead to more recognition for care work
and support people’s freedom to enjoy care
in non-commodified form (Baker, 2008). Yet,
the very last features are also potentially inimi-
cal to feminist goals because a basic income
would serve as an incentive for some women
to forgo careers and hence eventually regroup
at the lower end of economic distributions
(Robeyns, 2001, Gheaus, 2008). If a universal
basic income or a property-owning democracy
were to replace, rather than supplement, insti-
tutions such as (egalitarian) parental leaves and
subsidized childcare, the detrimental effects on
women would be larger (Bergmann, 2004).
GLOBAL JUSTICE AND GENDER
All the earlier concern domestic politics, but
the acceleration of globalization is pressing
new issues on the feminist agenda: duties to
women living in nonliberal cultures, women’s
migration and transnational employment,
the revival of a culture of domestic servants,
the global transformation of caregiving, and
reproductive tourism.
One debate takes place between cosmo-
politan feminists and those who are more
skeptic about the prospects of intercultural
understanding. Starting from her version of
the capabilities approach rooted in a univer-
salistic account of human values, Nussbaum
Anca Gheaus
(2000) argued that we ought to promote
women’s capabilities independently from the
cultures in which these women happen to live.
Nussbaum’s project is to draw the attention of
middle-class feminists from liberal democra-
cies to the plight of poor women from devel-
oping countries and explain why the liberal
convictions of the first commit them to the
goal of advancing the capabilities of the sec-
ond. Yet, where there are cultural barriers, it is
not obvious that there exist legitimate means
for doing this. Jaggar (2005) has argued that in
order to create such means we must avoid the
assumption that oppression by illiberal cul-
tures is the gravest injustice suffered by distant
women. Material deprivation for instance—it-
self a feminized phenomenon—may be a much
more salient injustice in many cases.
The international migration of women
continues to provide cheap labor for domes-
tic services—primarily care services for chil-
dren, disabled, and elderly persons. The
often exploitative employment conditions of
migrant women came under feminist criticism
(Ehrenreich and Hochschild, 2002). But, given
that even in developed countries welfare states
fail to provide sufficient care services, cheap
migrant labor is often the only solution for
enabling women to pursue a career. This gen-
erates dilemmas for feminists. Some believe,
for example, that feminist commitments to
social justice are incompatible with relying on
domestic servants (Tronto, 2002).
The feminization of migration in combina-
tion with the gendered division of labor has
created shortages of care in migrants’ coun-
tries of origin. Because this phenomenon—
often referred to as “care drain”  —happens
against a background of stark global inequal-
ities, it represents an issue of global gender
justice (Gheaus, 2013). Care drain harms not
only children and others in need of care but
also parents who are physically separated
178
from their children, often for many years
(Hochschild, 2005). An ideal solution to the
problems of global care drain would be the
creation of a global caring society such that
adequate care is provided locally to all those
who need it (Weir, 2005, Kittay, 2008).
Increased mobility across borders also ena-
bles well-off women to obtain cheaper repro-
ductive services using the labor of poorer
women. Thus, women from the so-called third
world countries increasingly serve as surro-
gate mothers to children who are then raised
in richer countries. This expanding practice
raises moral and political issues for all partici-
pants in the transaction: does using a surrogate
necessarily exploit her? (Panitch, 2013) What
are the conditions in which surrogate women
can be said to make an autonomous choice
to engage in surrogacy? Arguing that condi-
tions such as adequate income, education, and
healthcare, as well as freedom from environ-
mental hazards and state violence are neces-
sary for autonomous decisions, Bailey (2011)
concluded that oppression is often unavoid-
able in surrogacy contracts.
NEW FRONTIERS
Gender, Implicit Bias, and
Stereotype Threat
We have seen why gender raises a difficult
problem—at least for liberal theories of
­justice—when inequalities between women
and men arise through free interaction. The
liberal theory assumes that individuals could
take full responsibility for such interactions.
But what if free decisions are to a large extent
driven by unconscious judgment and/or emo-
tional reactions? Psychological research indi-
cates that even people who hold explicit and

sincere egalitarian views make choices that
reflect negative biases against women or racial
minorities. (The best-known test measuring
this is freely available at <https://implicit.
harvard.edu/implicit/>.) Experiments show
that both men and women evaluate differ-
ently vitas and job applications that are oth-
erwise identical depending on whether they
are believed to be from men or from women.
Stereotype threat refers to people’s tendency
to confirm negative stereotypical expectations
that others have of them, especially in social
contexts that make the stereotypes salient.
A growing body of literature explores the
effect of stereotype threat and implicit bias
for inequalities between women and men
in academic philosophy (see, for instance,
Saul, 2013). But the possible application
of these findings is much wider: some of
the inequalities between women and men
are likely to result from unconscious proc-
esses that characterize both the people who
engage in competition for political and
economic positions and those who are sup-
posed to evaluate the former. In this case,
it is far from clear that individuals can be
held fully responsible for their achieve-
ments (or lack thereof). This means that the
“different conceptions of the good” can-
not be straightforwardly invoked to justify
the feminization of certain jobs, women’s
lower earnings, and other kinds of gen-
der inequalities. Similarly, to the extent to
which mechanisms to reduce implicit bias
and stereotype threat are being discovered,
there may be a strong case for their use in
social practices and state institutions (such
as, for instance, job interviews or courts).
Gender and Epistemic Injustice
According to Fricker (2007), epistemic injus-
tice is a distinct kind of injustice that harms
179
FEMINISM AND GENDER
individuals in their capacity as knowers; it
arises when people are being wrongly treated
as unreliable sources of information due to
the hearers’ prejudice. Epistemic injustice can
be testimonial—for instance, when someone
is not believed because she is a woman; or it
can be hermeneutical, when insufficient col-
lective interpretive resources generates dis-
advantages—for instance, when a woman’s
complaint that she has been the subject of
sexual harassment cannot be made sense of
in a linguistic community that lacks the con-
cept of sexual harassment.
Epistemic injustice bears on most of the
issues discussed in this chapter, including fair
distributions, deliberative democracy, and
women’s oppression. First, there is an inter-
esting question about the nature of the harms
at stake in testimonial injustice. According to
Fricker, the deepest harm of epistemic injus-
tice is preventing people to become who they
really are, as knowers. So does the injus-
tice arise because we have a moral right to
become who we are? And does the injustice
have a distributional side: is there a right to
become who you are as much as others do?
Second, the existence of epistemic injus-
tice has direct implications for thinking
about democracy, in particular its delibera-
tive component, since testimonial injustice
can prevent some individuals from having
an equal voice. Similarly, it has consequences
for thinking about domination and exploi-
tation, since having a voice is a main strat-
egy for avoiding these forms of injustice: if
you suffer from persistent epistemic injus-
tice or from hermeneutical injustice, you
are likely to be seriously disadvantaged in
negotiations.
In conclusion, feminist political philosophy
has been making distinctive contributions to
the central issues of justice and democracy.
Over the next years, it is likely that new
Anca Gheaus
developments in our understanding of non-
conscious forms of discrimination and of
nonconscious reactions to discrimination are
likely to fuel debates about gender justice and
about the relationship between gender and
democratic exercises of power.
Note
I am thankful to Sine Bagatur, Andrew Fiala,
1
Lisa Herzog, Lindsey Porter, and Cristina
Roadevin for comments on an earlier draft.
WORKS CITED
Anderson, E. (1999), “What is the Point of
Equality?” Ethics, 109 (2): 287–337.
Arneson, R. (1998), “What Sort of Sexual
Equality Should Feminists Seek,”
Journal of Contemporary Legal Issues,
9: 21–36.
Baier, A. C. (1994), Moral Prejudices: Essays
on Ethics. Harvard: Harvard University
Press.
Bailey, A. (2011), “Reconceiving Surrogacy:
Toward a Reproductive Justice Account
of Indian Surrogacy,” Hypatia, 26 (4):
715–741.
Baker, J. (2008), “All Things Considered,
Should Feminists Embrace Basic
Income?” Basic Income Studies, 3 (3)
Benhabib, S. (ed.) (1996), “Toward a
Deliberative Model of Democratic
Legitimacy,” in Democracy and
Difference: Contesting the Boundaries
of the Political. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
— (2004), The Rights of Others. Aliens,
Residents, and Citizens. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
180
Benjamin, J. (1988), The Bonds of Love.
Psychoanalysis, Feminism and the
Problem of Domination. New York:
Pantheon Books.
Bergmann, B. R. (2004), “A Swedish-Style
Welfare State or Basic Income: Which
Should Have Priority?” Politics and
Society, 32 (1): 107–118.
Bubeck, D. E. (1995), Care, Gender, and
Justice. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
— (1999), “A Feminist Approach to
Citizenship,” in O. Hufton and Y.
Kravaritou (eds), Gender and the Use
of Time. The Hague: Kluwer Academic
Publishers, pp. 401–428.
Card, C. (1990), “Caring and Evil,”
Hypatia, 5 (1): 101–108.
Chodrow, N. (1978), The Reproduction
of Mothering: Psychoanalysis and the
Sociology of Gender. Berkeley, CA:
University of California.
Cohen, G. A. (1997), “Where the action
is: On the Site of Distributive Justice,”
Philosophy and Public Affairs, 26 (1):
3–30.
Cudd, A. (2006), Analysing Oppression.
New York: Oxford University Press.
De Beauvoir, S. (1949), Le Deuxième sexe.
Paris: Gallimard.
Dietz, M. (1985), “Citizenship with a
Feminist Face: The Problem With
Maternal Thinking,” Political Theory, 13
(1): 19–37.
Ehrenreich, B. and A. R. Hochschild (eds)
(2002), Global Women: Nannies, Maid
and Sex Workers in the New Economy.
New York: Holt.
Elgarte, J. (2008), “Basic Income and the
Gendered Division of Labour,” Basic
Income Studies, 3 (3).
Engster, D. (2007), The Heart of Justice.
Care Ethics and Political Theory. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.

Fraser, N. (1994), “After the Family Wage.
Gender Equity and the Welfare State,”
Political Theory, 22 (4): 591–618.
Fricker, M. (2007), Epistemic Injustice:
Power and the Ethics of Knowing.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Friedman, M. (1993), What Are Friends
For?: Feminist Perspectives on Personal
Relationships and Moral Theory. Ithaca,
NY: Cornell University Press.
Gheaus, A. (2008), “Basic Income, Gender
Justice and the Costs of Gender-
Symmetrical Lifestyles,” Basic Income
Studies, 3 (3).
— (2012), “Gender Justice,” Journal of
Ethics and Social Philosophy, 6: 1–24.
— (2013), “Care Drain As An Issue
of Global Gender Justice,” Ethical
Perspectives, 20 (1): 61–80.
Gilligan, C. (1982), In a Different Voice:
Psychological Theory and Women’s
Development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press.
— (1995), “Moral Orientation and Moral
Development,” in V. Held (ed.), Justice
and Care. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Gornick, J. C. and M. K. Meyers
(2003), Families That Work. Policies
for Reconciling Parenthood and
Employment. New York: Russel Sage
Foundation.
Hakim, C. (2000), Work Lifestyle Choices
in the 21st Century: Preference Theory.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Haslanger, S. (2000), “Gender and Race:
(What) Are They? (What) Do We Want
Them To Be?” Noûs, 34 (1): 31–55.
Held, V. (1993), Feminist Morality:
Transforming Culture, Society and
Politics. Chicago: University of Chicago.
— (1997), “Feminism and Moral Theory,”
in D. T. Meyers (ed.), Feminist Social
Thought: A Reader. New York: Routledge.
181
FEMINISM AND GENDER
— (2006), The Ethics of Care Personal,
Political, and Global. New York: Oxford
University Press.
Hochschild, A. R. (2005), “Love and
Gold,” in L. Ricciutelli, A. Miles, and M.
H. McFadden (eds), Feminist Politics,
Activism and Vision: Local and Global
Challenges. London, Toronto: Zed/Innana
Books, pp. 34–46.
Hornsby, J. (1995), “Speech Acts and
Pornography,” in S. Dwyer (ed.), The
Problem of Pornography. Belmont, CA:
Wadsworth Publishing Company.
Jaggar, A. (1983), Feminist Politics and
Human Nature. Lanham, MD: Rowman
& Littlefield.
— (2005), “‘Saving Amina’: Global Justice
for Women and Intercultural Dialogue,”
Ethics & International Affairs, 19 (3):
55–75.
Kittay, E. F. (1999), Love’s Labor: Essays on
Women, Equality, and Dependency. New
York: Routledge.
— (2008), “The Global Heart Transplant
and Caring across National Boundaries,”
The Southern Journal of Philosophy,
XLVI: 138–165.
Kohlberg, L. (1981), The Philosophy of Moral
Development: Moral Stages and the Idea of
Justice. San Francisco: Harper & Row.
Langton, R. (1995), “Speech Acts and
Unspeakable Acts,” in S. Dwyer (ed.),
The Problem of Pornography. Belmont,
CA: Wadsworth Publishing Company.
Lister, R. (2002), Citizenship: Feminist
Perspectives. New York: New York
University Press.
Lloyd, S. A. (1995), “Situating a Feminist
Criticism of John Rawls’s Political
Liberalism,” Loyola of Los Angeles Law
Review, 28: 1319–1344.
MacKinnon, C. (1987), Feminism
Unmodified: Discourses on Life and Law.
Anca Gheaus
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
Mason, A. (2000), “Equality, Personal
Responsibility, and Gender Socialisation,”
Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society,
100 (3): 227–246.
Neufeld, B. (2009), “Coercion, the Basic
Structure, and the Family,” Journal of
Social Philosophy, 40: 37–54.
Noddings, N. (1982), Caring: A Feminine
Approach to Ethics and Moral Education.
Berkeley, CA: University of California
Press, 1982.
— (2002), Starting at Home: Caring and
Social Policy. Berkeley, CA: University of
California Press.
Nussbaum, M. (1999), Sex and Social
Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
— (2000), Women and Human
Development: The Capabilities Approach.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Okin, S. M. (1989a), Justice, Gender, and
the Family. New York: Basic Books.
— (1989b), “Reason and Feeling in
Thinking about Justice,” Ethics, 99 (2):
229–249.
— (1994), “Political Liberalism, Justice, and
Gender,” Ethics, 105 (1): 23–43.
Okin, S. M., Cohen, J., Howard,
M., and Nussbaum, M. (1999), Is
Multiculturalism Bad for Women?
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Panitch, V. (2013), “Surrogate Tourism and
Reproductive Rights,” Hypatia, 28 (2):
274–289.
Pateman, C. (1988), The Sexual Contract.
Stanford, CA: Polity Press.
— (2004), “Democratizing Citizenship:
Some Advantages of a Basic Income,”
Politics and Society, 32 (1): 89–105.
182
Phillips, A. (2004), “Defending Equality
of Outcome,” Journal of Political
Philosophy, 12: 1–19.
— (1995), The Politics of Presence. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Rawls, J. (1971), A Theory of Justice.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
— (1993), Political Liberalism. New York:
Columbia University Press.
Robeyns, I. (2007), “When Will Society Be
Gender Just?” in J. Browne (ed.), The
Future of Gender. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
— (2001), “Will a Basic Income Do Justice
to Women?” Analyse und Kritik, 22 (2):
88–105.
Ruddick, S. (1989), Maternal Thinking.
Towards a Politics of Peace. Boston, MA:
Beacon Press.
Saul, J. (2013), “Implicit Bias, Stereotype
Threat, and Women in Philosophy,” in K.
Hutchison and F. Jenkins (eds), Women
in Philosophy: What Needs to Change.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Tronto, J. (1993), Moral Boundaries: A
Political Argument for an Ethic of Care.
New York: Routledge.
— (2002), “The ‘Nanny’ Question in
Feminism,” Hypatia, 17 (2): 34–51.
Young, I. M. (1990), Justice and the Politics
of Difference. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
Weir, A. (2005), “The Global Universal
Caregiver: Imagining Women’s Liberation
in the New Millennium,” Constellations,
12 (3): 308–330.
Williams, J. (2000), Unbending Gender:
Why Family and Work Conflict and
What to Do About It. New York: Oxford
University Press.
 12
IMMIGRATION AND BORDERS
Shelley Wilcox
INTRODUCTION
Within the past three decades, the ethics
of immigration has emerged as a topic of
considerable interest among political phi-
losophers. The subject includes normative
questions related to various dimensions
of global migration, including territorial
admissions, admission to citizenship, and
the rights and duties of non-citizen resi-
dents. The central question in these debates
is whether liberal democratic states have
a moral right to restrict immigration.1 On
the one side of the issue, philosophers argue
that states have a broad moral right to
select whatever immigration policies serve
their national interest, excluding would-
be immigrants as they see fit. On the other,
proponents contend that a commitment to
fundamental liberal values, such as free-
dom and equality, requires states to main-
tain open borders. This chapter surveys
the main lines of argument in this debate,
beginning with arguments in defense of the
state’s supposed right to exclude would-be
immigrants.
183
ARGUMENTS FOR THE STATE’S
RIGHT TO EXCLUDE
The Conventional View
Early work on the ethics of immigration
typically defends the common intuition that
states have a broad right to control their bor-
ders, including a right to regulate immigra-
tion in accordance with national priorities.
Walzer offers the best-known philosophical
defense of this position (Walzer, 1983). He
understands political membership as a social
good, constituted by the shared understand-
ings of a political community. This implies,
Walzer believes, that members of a political
community should be free to decide who is
admitted to their political community in
accordance with their own understandings of
it. It follows that we must know something
about the nature of liberal democratic com-
munities in order to determine what sorts
of immigration policies are appropriate for
them. However, since political communities
tend to be large and abstract, their natures can
be difficult to grasp. Thus, Walzer compares
Shelley Wilcox
liberal democratic societies to other, smaller
associations that we understand more read-
ily. By examining neighborhoods, clubs, and
families, and the membership policies that
govern them, we can determine which immi-
gration policies are appropriate for liberal
democracies.
The first model Walzer considers is that
of the neighborhood, a loose association of
individuals living in close proximity to one
another. Neighborhoods have no formal
legal admissions policies; although residents
may choose not to welcome newcomers, the
state does not prevent individuals from set-
tling in whatever neighborhood they choose.
Should liberal democratic societies adopt
membership policies analogous to those of
neighborhoods? That is, should liberal states
maintain open borders, permitting prospec-
tive immigrants to settle in whatever country
they wish? Walzer argues that they should
not. Since citizens are deeply committed to
protecting their culture and political life
against perceived threats by outsiders, free
migration at the state level would almost cer-
tainly be resisted at the local level. Such local
closure is undesirable liberal societies; thus,
states must be able to regulate immigration
as necessary to protect the freedom, welfare,
and culture of current citizens.
Based on these considerations, Walzer
suggests that liberal democratic societies are
like clubs: both are free to choose their own
admissions decisions, admitting and exclud-
ing would-be members in accordance with
collective understandings. However, despite
these parallels, Walzer believes the club anal-
ogy fails to capture an essential moral feature
of liberal societies. Unlike club members,
citizens have moral obligations to certain
unchosen groups of outsiders, such as those
with whom they share significant cultural or
ethnic ties. In this sense, liberal democratic
184
societies are like families, “for it is a feature
of families that their members are morally
connected to people they have not chosen,
who live outside the household” (ibid., 41).
This kinship affinity has important implica-
tions for immigrant admissions policies. In
particular, it implies that the relatives of cur-
rent citizens and displaced ethnic nationals
should receive admissions priority.
Walzer also acknowledges an additional
constraint on liberal immigration policies.
Since admissions decisions regulate relation-
ships between members and foreigners, they
are governed by the principle of collective
mutual aid. This principle maintains that a
society is obligated to aid needy outsiders
if the need is acute and the cost of provid-
ing aid is comparably negligible. Affluent
societies can usually fulfill these duties by
transferring some of their wealth to poorer
societies as economic aid. However, in the
case of political asylum-seekers—­individuals
who are fleeing their countries to escape
political or religious persecution—the duties
of mutual aid can be fulfilled only through
territorial admission. Thus, Walzer con-
cludes that liberal states have a broad right
to regulate immigration in accordance with
collective self-understandings, provided
they accept at least some refugees, narrowly
defined.2
Several commentators have raised objec-
tions to Walzer’s argument. One prominent
line of criticism takes issue with the analo-
gies he draws between liberal democratic
states and other associative organizations
(Cole, 2000, Higgins, 2013). For Walzer’s
argument to be persuasive, they argue, it is
not enough for states simply to be like the
associative organizations he identifies; they
must be like them in all morally relevant
respects. However, this simply is not the
case. Consider the analogy between states

and clubs. These associations may share
some idealized features, such as a collec-
tive identity or shared sense of purpose.
However, they differ in several morally rel-
evant respects: most obviously, membership
in states is typically nonvoluntary; states
possess territorial jurisdiction that clubs do
not; and states provide a much wider range
of basic goods to their members than clubs.
Given these differences, critics insist that
Walzer cannot simply derive the right of lib-
eral democratic communities to choose their
membership policies from the fact that most
clubs are free to choose their own members.3
He can only offer the observation that states
and clubs are alike in this respect, but in
absence of further argument, this begs the
question of whether political communities
have a legitimate right to choose any mem-
bership policies they wish.
SELF-DETERMINATION ARGUMENTS
For reasons such as these, most liberal phi-
losophers reject Walzer’s defense of the
state’s supposed right to exclude would-be
immigrants. Nevertheless, some insist that
his argument contains a valuable insight:
membership decisions are tied to collective
self-determination. Recently, several of these
philosophers have attempted to draw out
the normative implications of this connec-
tion, arguing that the right to collective self-
determination includes the right to exclude
would-be immigrants. I will discuss two
prominent arguments here.4 The first main-
tains that the state’s right to exclude follows
from collective right to freedom of associa-
tion, and the second attempts to derive the
right to exclude from the collective owner-
ship of public institutions.
185
IMMIGRATION AND BORDERS
THE FREEDOM OF ASSOCIATION
ARGUMENT
In a widely discussed article, Wellman argues
that the collective right to self-determination
includes a right to close borders, excluding
all would-be immigrants, including refugees
(Wellman, 2008, Wellman and Cole, 2011).
His argument proceeds in two stages. The first
seeks to establish that states have a general
right to self-determination, which includes a
presumptive right to exclude would-be immi-
grants. The second aims to show that this right
is not outweighed by standard egalitarian and
libertarian considerations, and thus that states
may legitimately close borders in practice.
The argument begins with the relatively
uncontroversial claim that individuals have
a basic right to self-determination, which
includes a right to freedom of association.
Using the examples of religion and mar-
riage, Wellman further argues that freedom
of association has both inclusive and exclu-
sive aspects. Freedom of marital association,
for example, includes both the right to marry
one’s willing partner and the right to refuse
to marry any given suitor or to remain sin-
gle altogether. He then suggests that the citi-
zens of states also have a collective right to
self-determination, which includes the right
to choose which would-be immigrants are
admitted into the state or to exclude immi-
grants altogether. In his words:
Just as an individual has a right to deter-
mine whom (if anyone) he or she would
like to marry, a group of fellow-citizens
has a right to determine whom (if anyone)
it would like to invite into its political com-
munity. And just as an individual’s freedom
of association entitles one to remain single,
a state’s freedom of association entitles it
to exclude all foreigners from its political
community (Wellman, 2008, 110–111).
Shelley Wilcox
Wellman is quick to point out that the
state’s right to exclude would-be immigrants
is a presumptive right. As such, it can be
outweighed by competing moral claims. In
particular, two types of cosmopolitan moral
duties—samaritan and relational egalitar-
ian—could, in theory, place limits on the
right to exclude. Samaritan duties, which
are generated by the principle of collective
mutual aid, require affluent states to assist
foreigners living in abject poverty. Relational
egalitarian duties require states to mitigate
inequalities that contribute to oppression
within transnational structural relationships.
However, Wellman insists that in practice,
neither samaritan nor relational egalitar-
ian duties require states to open their bor-
ders because these obligations can be met by
“exporting justice” in the form of material
aid or through military intervention rather
than by admitting immigrants (Wellman,
2008, 129).
By attempting to derive the right to exclude
would-be immigrants from uncontroversial
liberal rights rather than through analogies
between liberal states and other associative
organizations, Wellman’s argument evades
many of the objections to which Walzer’s
position is subject. However, it is not without
its critics. Some reject Wellman’s claim that
the right to freedom of association includes
the right to exclude would-be immigrants.
For instance, Fine points out that the right to
self-determination protects only self-regard-
ing actions; individuals—and importantly,
groups—are not morally free to engage in
behavior that harms others, in the sense of
setting back their significant interests (Fine,
2010). Yet this is precisely what some immi-
gration exclusions do: many would-be immi-
grants have substantial interests in living in
a new state, and barring their entry thwarts
186
these vital interests. Wellman acknowledges
that individuals who cannot live a minimally
decent life in their home countries have a
substantial interest in moving to a new state
in which their basic needs could be met, but
he insists that states can fulfill their duties
to help these needy individuals by trans-
ferring material aid. However, Fine argues
that individuals may also have significant
“familial, social, religious, cultural, political,
or economic” interests that can be met only
by moving to a new state and immigration
restrictions wrongly thwart these interests.
Thus, in many cases, the right to self-deter-
mination does not give liberal states the right
to exclude would-be immigrants.
Other critics object to the second stage
of Wellman’s argument. Wellman acknowl-
edges that some relationships between citi-
zens and outsiders are robust enough to
generate relational egalitarian duties, but
he contends that societies can fulfill these
duties by transferring aid. However, I have
argued that exporting aid is often an inap-
propriate means of fulfilling relational egali-
tarian duties because aid transfers tend to
create the sorts of oppressive relationships
that relational egalitarians reject (Wilcox,
2014). For instance, contributing economic
aid can enable donor nations to dominate
recipient nations, by setting conditions for
its use or by leveraging the possibility of
continued aid to gain an unfair advantage in
negotiations over other policies. Moreover,
aid transfers alone often cannot remedy the
injustices that generate relational egalitarian
duties in the first place, since these injustices
are maintained by ongoing, unfair economic
policies. Critics also reject Wellman’s claim
that samaritan duties can be discharged by
military intervention on similar grounds
(Cavallero, 2014).

THE ASSOCIATIVE OWNERSHIP
ARGUMENT
Pevnick shares Wellman’s conviction that the
prima facie right to exclude immigrants is con-
nected to the right to collective self-determi-
nation (Pevnick, 2011). However, his account
of this connection differs from Wellman’s in
two important respects: he derives the right to
exclude from claims to collective ownership
rather than the right to freedom of associa-
tion; and he acknowledges that in practice, a
broad range of moral duties to outsiders could
outweigh the presumptive right to exclude.
Thus, Pevnick’s version of the self-determina-
tion argument yields something of a middle-
ground position on immigrant admissions.
Pevnick argues that the right to self-deter-
mination is grounded in the special ownership
relationship between citizens and their institu-
tions. Citizens contribute to the creation and
maintenance of state institutions in numerous
ways—through their labor and tax payments
and by obeying the law—and as result of these
efforts, they may claim ownership in state
institutions and the benefits that flow from
them. Collective ownership supplies citizens
with a right to self-determination with respect
to these institutions, including a presumptive
right to decide who will have access to them
and the benefits they produce. Since access
to state institutions is inextricably linked to
access to territory, Pevnick concludes that col-
lective ownership claims include the right to
exclude would-be immigrants.
Pevnick contends that liberal states con-
siderable discretion over immigration poli-
cies; however, he acknowledges that some
would-be immigrants have moral claims
to admission that outweigh the right to
exclude, and in such cases, states must grant
admission to these immigrants. Refugees,
187
IMMIGRATION AND BORDERS
defined as “those fleeing political persecu-
tion and those trapped in abject poverty”
are an obvious case (Pevnick, 2011, 92).
Pevnick also acknowledges four cases of
global inequality that generate stringent
moral duties to outsiders: (a) if one group
falls below some minimal standard of decent
living while another enjoys an excess of
wealth; (b) if inequalities are a direct result
of the past illegitimate actions of a better-
off group; (c) if inequalities threaten to
undermine fair interaction among parties in
robust transnational relationships; and (d)
if inequalities result from the unfair distri-
bution of benefits or burdens within a self-
supporting scheme of social cooperation.
While Pevnick does not explicitly argue that
states must admit immigrants in order to
fulfill these moral duties, he also does not
rule out this possibility. Thus, for example,
if opening borders were a suitable means
for rectifying ongoing inequalities resulting
from a state’s past illegitimate actions, then
the victims of such injustices would have a
strong claim to admission.
Although some commentators applaud
Pevnick for developing a more moder-
ate position on immigration than many of
the other theorists who defend the right to
exclude, critics worry that his arguments
leave many questions unanswered. Pevnick
contends that citizens develop ownership
claims in public institutions by contribut-
ing to their creation and maintenance, and
that these claims include a right to self-
determination with respect to these institu-
tions, including the right to determine who
will have access to them. Some critics doubt
that Pevnick’s theory can offer a satisfac-
tory account of the extent of original citi-
zenship in a newly founded state (Hudson,
2011). Others focus on his position on
Shelley Wilcox
undocumented immigrants, which, they
claim, commits him to circular view. For
instance, I point out that Pevnick’s associa-
tive ownership account seems to imply that
undocumented immigrants, who also con-
tribute to public institutions in various ways,
have legitimate ownership claims in these
institutions, and thus a corresponding right
to help to choose the membership policies
that apply to them. However, Pevnick denies
that undocumented immigrants have legiti-
mate ownership claims in public institutions
because, in his view, they entered the country
without the consent of citizens. This, I sug-
gest, commits his account to a problematic
circularity, according to which the consent
of citizens is necessary to establish a right
to self-determination (because consent is
required for ownership and ownership sup-
plies the right to self-determination) and the
right to self-determination supplies citizens
with the right to consent (Wilcox, 2012).
ARGUMENTS FOR OPEN BORDERS
Some liberal thinkers, most notably Carens,
have raised a broad challenge to arguments
in favor of the state’s supposed right to
exclude immigrants. They argue that fun-
damental liberal principles, such as freedom
and equality, entail not that liberal demo-
cratic states have broad authority to restrict
immigration, but rather that states have a
prima facie duty to maintain open borders.
I will discuss two well-known lines of argu-
ment here. The first derives the duty to main-
tain open borders from the purported right
to freedom of international movement, and
the second draws upon luck egalitarian ide-
als to establish the duty to admit all would-
be immigrants.
188
The Freedom of Movement Argument
Proponents of the freedom of movement
argument maintain that the liberal commit-
ment to liberty requires that states to recog-
nize a basic right to freedom of international
movement. In his early work, Carens
defends this view by arguing that each of
the three main theoretical approaches to
liberalism—utilitarianism, liberal egali-
tarianism, and libertarianism—implies that
liberal states should maintain open borders
(Carens, 1987). Of these approaches, Carens
is most interested in Rawlsian egalitarian-
ism. According to his cosmopolitan reading
of Rawls, parties in the original position are
charged with selecting global principles of
justice rather than domestic principles that
apply only within a particular state. Like
parties in the standard original position,
representatives in the global original posi-
tion would choose a scheme of equal basic
liberties, prioritizing these freedoms over
other principles of justice. Importantly,
Carens contends, they would include a right
to freedom of international movement in
this scheme of basic liberties. Thus, since
right to free international mobility includes
the right to cross national borders, he con-
cludes that liberal states should maintain
open borders.
More recently, Carens has developed a
version of the freedom of movement argu-
ment that foregoes specifically Rawlsian
concepts, drawing instead on the analogy
between domestic freedom of movement and
international freedom of movement (Carens,
1992). Liberals widely acknowledge domes-
tic freedom of movement as a basic right of
liberal citizenship. Carens argues that inter-
national freedom of movement is an equally
important freedom because every reason
one might have for moving to a new state

within a particular country could also apply
to moving across national borders. To name
just a few:
one might want a job; one might fall in
love with someone from another coun-
try; one might belong to a religion that
has few adherents in one’s native state
and many in another; one may wish to
pursue cultural opportunities that are
only available in another land (Carens,
1992, 28).
Thus, since the same fundamental human
interests that support the case for consider-
ing freedom of domestic movement to be a
basic right also support the case for consid-
ering freedom of international movement to
be a basic right, Carens concludes that liberal
states should respect the right to free inter-
national mobility, opening their borders to
would-be immigrants.5
Carens believes that the right to free-
dom of international movement establishes
a strong presumption for open borders.
Nevertheless, he acknowledges that certain
limitations on immigration will sometimes
be justified. In his view, restrictions on par-
ticular liberties, including freedom of inter-
national movement, are legitimate if they
are necessary to preserve those liberties in
the long run. However, because such limita-
tions involve overriding a basic right, they
can be justified only by the weightiest of
reasons and only on the basis of rationales
that are compatible with liberal commit-
ments. Given these considerations, Carens
suggests that states may legitimately limit
immigration insofar as is necessary to main-
tain public order, ensure national ensure
national security, and protect liberal institu-
tions from erosion by immigrants with illib-
eral political values.
189
IMMIGRATION AND BORDERS
The freedom of movement argument has
been enormously influential. However, it has
also been subject to a number of forceful
objections. Some critics charge that Carens
overstates the moral importance of free inter-
national mobility, and thus fails to establish
that freedom of international movement is a
genuine human right. One prominent formu-
lation of this objection, developed by Miller,
rests on the distinction between a basic inter-
est and a bare interest (Miller, 1995). On the
one hand, a basic interest refers something
that is vital to human well-being, such as the
means of subsistence, and thus warrants pro-
tection by a moral right. A bare interest, on
the other hand, is a legitimate interest, but
is generally not important enough to deserve
such protection. Carens maintains that there
is no morally relevant difference between
free domestic movement and free interna-
tional movement; both satisfy basic human
interests. Miller acknowledges that people
have a basic interest in free domestic move-
ment, and he concedes that free international
movement may also be a basic interest in
some cases, such as when immigration is the
only way to escape political persecution or
avoid starvation. However, he insists that
most of the world’s people have only a bare
interest in freedom of international move-
ment. Certainly, many people wish to move to
another country in order to pursue economic
opportunities there or to participate a culture
that does not exist in their home country.
Yet as long they have an adequate range of
opportunities in their home country—that is,
a reasonable choice of occupations, cultural
activities, and so on—then their interest in
free international movement does not war-
rant protection as a basic moral right. Thus,
Miller concludes, freedom of international
movement is at best a remedial right of those
persons whose basic rights cannot be secured
Shelley Wilcox
in their home country; it is not a basic human
right as Carens claims.
THE LUCK EGALITARIAN ARGUMENT
A second leading argument for open borders
draws upon luck egalitarianism. Luck egali-
tarians maintain that distributive arrange-
ments are just to the extent that they track
the distinction between choice and luck.6
More specifically, they argue that social
benefits and burdens should be allocated
on the basis of people’s responsible choices
and not on the basis of circumstances over
which they have no control. Distributive
justice requires minimizing the effects of
factors attributable to brute luck, such as
one’s race, native abilities, intelligence, and
the wealth of the family into which one is
born, on the allocation of social benefits
and burdens. Thus, luck egalitarians tend to
endorse redistributive policies that involve
transferring social benefits from luck-ad-
vantaged persons to those disadvantaged by
bad brute luck.
Most luck egalitarians are concerned with
justice within a single, democratic political
community. However, cosmopolitan luck
egalitarians believe that a commitment to
moral equality entails that distributive prin-
ciples should be applied globally, without
regard to political borders.7 In their view,
justice among citizens of different countries
does not differ significantly from justice
among co-citizens; people have as strong
distributive obligations to foreigners as
they have to their fellow citizens. The luck
egalitarian argument for open borders draws
upon this cosmopolitan insight, together
with a commitment to luck equality, which
maintains that the goal of distributive justice
190
is to eliminate inequalities based on factors
attributable to brute luck.
The argument begins with the uncontro-
versial claim that the country into which one
is born is a matter of brute luck, just as one’s
race or family wealth. Proponents then argue
that since global economic inequalities among
individuals are determined primarily by the
countries into which they are born, these ine-
qualities are also attributable to brute luck. It
follows, they claim, that justice requires elim-
inating global economic inequalities among
individuals. Borders maintain such inequali-
ties by preventing individuals born in poor
countries from accessing the opportunities
and social benefits available in affluent soci-
eties. Thus, the argument concludes, global
justice requires affluent societies to maintain
open borders.
Some of the most prominent liberal advo-
cates of the open borders position endorse
versions of the luck egalitarian argument.
For instance, Carens condemns immigra-
tion restrictions as tantamount to a geo-
graphical caste system, in which national
borders serve to protect and preserve the
underserved wealth of affluent countries.
As he puts it, “[c]itizenship in Western lib-
eral democracies is the modern equivalent
of feudal privilege—an inherited status that
greatly enhances one’s life chances. Like feu-
dal birthright privileges, restrictive citizen-
ship is hard to justify when one thinks about
it closely” (Carens, 1987, 252). Furthermore,
Carens argues, immigration restrictions can-
not be justified “on the grounds that those
born in a given territory or born of parents
who were citizens are more entitled to the
benefits of citizenship than those born else-
where or born of alien parents. Birthplace
and parentage are natural contingencies that
are ‘arbitrary from a moral point of view’”
(Carens, 1987, 261).

The luck egalitarian argument for open
borders successfully evades the most promi-
nent objection to the freedom of interna-
tional movement argument—namely, that
free international movement is not a genu-
ine human right. However, the argument has
been subject to a number of forceful objec-
tions. Some critics, such as Wellman, contend
that the argument overstates the normative
force of luck equality (Wellman, 2008). To
defend this claim, Wellman appeals to a
familiar thought experiment comparing two
cases of inequality. The first case, which rep-
resents luck equality, includes two independ-
ent societies, A and B. Members of A are
considerably better off than members of B,
but no one in either society is aware of the
disparity between them. The second case,
which represents another form of equality,
relational equality, includes a single society,
C. Members of C are aware that some of
their fellows are faring considerably better
or worse than they are and these disparities
affect the relationships among them, render-
ing some individuals vulnerable to oppres-
sion. Wellman believes that the inequalities
in the second case are significantly more
troubling than those in the first. Thus, he
concludes, although moral claims generated
by relational equality are stringent enough
to outweigh the state’s interest in excluding
immigrants, those generated by luck equality
are not.
Other critics of the luck egalitarian argu-
ment acknowledge that affluent states have
weighty redistributive duties to outsiders,
but deny that opening borders is an appro-
priate way to fulfill these obligations. For
instance, Pogge argues that migration will
not solve the problem of poverty, for two
reasons (Pogge, 2006). First, the number of
needy persons in the world far exceeds the
number of immigrants that affluent countries
191
IMMIGRATION AND BORDERS
could admit. Thus, open borders would leave
much poverty unmitigated. Second, increased
migration to affluent countries will not help
the worst-off. Assuming that affluent coun-
tries may legitimately place some upper limit
number of immigrants they admit, prospec-
tive immigrants will have to compete for the
available positions. Affluent countries are
likely to prefer immigrants with the skills,
education, and native endowments that are
perceived to be in the national interest. Since
the better-off are typically relatively advan-
taged in terms of these characteristics, they
are more likely to be admitted. This advan-
tage also extends to remittances. It is often
argued that remittances by those who have
been admitted to and allowed to work in one
of the affluent countries help to ease poverty
in their home country. While it is true that
many immigrants send money home, the
families to whom this money is being sent are
often among the more privileged in the poor
country in question.
FEMINIST ARGUMENTS
Many of the feminist philosophers who have
written on immigration also are critical of the
mainstream arguments for open borders. In
particular, they charge that these arguments
fail to account for the gendered aspects of
immigration and the normative implica-
tions that follow from these features. Thus,
although they tend to support open borders
policies, most feminist philosophers defend
these policies on alternative grounds.
Early feminist philosophers of immigra-
tion typically argue that formally gender-
neutral immigration restrictions often work
to the detriment of women immigrants in
practice. For instance, I have argued that
Shelley Wilcox
recent US immigration admissions policies
disproportionately disadvantage women
migrants (Wilcox, 2005).8 During the 1980s
and early 1990s, the United States enacted
a series of legislation designed to limit the
entry of unskilled immigrants by shifting
the balance from family-based to employ-
ment-based immigration preferences, and by
restructuring the latter to favor highly skilled
and well-educated immigrants. This legisla-
tion is formally gender neutral in the sense
that it does not explicitly make distinctions
on the basis of sex or gender. However, it
disproportionately disadvantages women
migrants in practice because women com-
prise the majority of immigrants who enter
on family reunification visas. Moreover, in
the context of a society that devalues work
traditionally performed by women, laws
aiming to exclude unskilled workers also dis-
proportionately disadvantage women labor
migrants in practice, since feminized lines of
work, such as childcare and domestic labor,
are typically considered to be unskilled.
Many recent feminist arguments focus on
what theorists refer to as “global care chains”
(Hochschild, 2000, 2002, Kittay, 2008, 2009,
Weir, 2008). These chains, which link women
around the world, are established through
the transnational exchange of domestic serv-
ices. Global care chains are often initiated
when relatively well-off northern or Western
women enter the paid labor force and hire
other women, usually poorer women from
developing countries, to care for their children
and other dependents. Migrant careworkers
often must leave their own children behind in
their home countries to be cared for by even
poorer careworkers or family members who
may already have caregiving responsibilities
or be engaged with paid labor. Many factors
have contributed to the production of global
care chains. In wealthy countries, the entry
192
of women into the paid workforce, without
corresponding increases in public provisions
for childcare or the redistribution of caring
responsibilities between genders, has created
a high demand for paid domestic labor. In
poor countries, the supply of domestic labor
has been stimulated by a scarcity of well-pay-
ing jobs and in many cases, a growing reli-
ance on remittances. Cuts in public services
in developing countries have also encouraged
women to migrate as a means for earning the
income to pay for newly privatized services
for their children, such as healthcare and
education.
Feminist critics of global care chains typi-
cally argue that traditional theories of justice
have difficulty articulating the precise nature
of the harm that they produce. Most cosmo-
politan theories of justice focus on unjust
global distributions, but it is not clear that
care should be understood as a distributive
good. Other features of care chains also resist
traditional ethical evaluation. Careworkers
are not overtly coerced to migrate, and each
party in the global care chain appears to
benefit from her participation: women who
employ migrant caregivers are able to pursue
opportunities in the public sphere; migrant
caregivers are able to send money home;
and their children and sending nations ben-
efit economically from these remittances.
Migrant caregivers are uniquely vulnerable
to exploitation and workplace abuses, and
they and their children suffer from their long
absences. However, it could be argued that
each of these harms is counterbalanced by
significant gains (Kittay, 2008, 2009).
Some feminists, such as Kittay and Weir,
argue that a feminist ethics of care is bet-
ter suited to theorizing global care chains
(Kittay, 2008, 2009, Weir, 2008). In particu-
lar, care ethics emphasizes several key nor-
mative features and practices that traditional

theories tend to overlook: concrete specificity;
acknowledgement of human dependence and
vulnerability; and a relational understanding
of the self. Care ethics focuses on the ethical
significance of relationships formed through
dependency, such as those between caregiv-
ers and their charges. For instance, Kittay
argues that intimate relationships between
specific individuals, in which caring and
affection are the norm, play a vital role in
forming and sustaining individuals’ self-iden-
tities. When these relationships are disrupted,
people suffer harm to their sense of self and
self-respect. It follows, she contends, that the
harm involved in global care chains lies in
their threat to the core relationships that are
constitutive of self-identity.
To protect dependents and caregivers
from the harms that are generated by frac-
tured relationships, Kittay believes the right
to give and receive care should be recog-
nized as a basic human right (Kittay, 2008,
2009).9 However, she insists that the recogni-
tion of a properly formulated right to care
would not eliminate global care chains on
its own. Care chains will persist until care,
whether provided by professionals or within
family networks, is socially recognized and
economically supported. Caregiving respon-
sibilities should also be more fairly distrib-
uted between genders and paid work should
be organized with the recognition that all
workers—male and female, rich and poor—
are responsible for providing care. Unlocking
care chains will also require mitigating the
unjust background conditions that force
women to choose between providing finan-
cial support for their families and being with
and providing face-to-face care for them.
However, open immigration policies will also
play an important role. To begin, specific
open borders provisions should be adopted
to make it easier for careworkers and their
193
IMMIGRATION AND BORDERS
families to move freely across national bor-
ders. Ultimately, however, eliminating care
chains will require restructuring the global
economy so that no one is forced to leave her
home country to find decent working and
living conditions.10
By including the unjust background con-
ditions that shape current migration flows
in their analyses, feminist philosophers are
able to offer nuanced normative recommen-
dations concerning real-world immigration
policies. However, some critics may object
to the nonideal theoretical methodologies
that these analyses employ. To determine the
ways in which background injustices bear on
immigration arrangements, feminists must
take certain features of the current, nonideal
world as given, at least for the time being.
These features include the background injus-
tices that are relevant to immigration, such
as sexist assumptions about value of care-
work and the relative importance of family
life and economic production. Feminists also
tacitly presuppose additional features of the
current political landscape, such as a pre-
sumptive right to regulate immigration. To
the extent that these assumptions preclude
critical inquiry into the fundamental moral-
ity of such features, critics contend, feminist
arguments inadvertently contribute to the
legitimization of unjust arrangements.
CONCLUSION
As globalization has intensified, the ethical
issues raised by global migration have become
increasing urgent. Philosophers of immigra-
tion have helped to clarify these issues and
to chart a normative course toward their suc-
cessful resolution. Their efforts have broad-
ened the discipline of political philosophy,
Shelley Wilcox
directing us away from questions pertain-
ing solely to the nation-state, toward those
that arise within global contexts. In doing
so, philosophers of immigration challenge
many of the core assumptions in political
philosophy—for instance, that territorial
borders are morally justified—while joining
forces with other theorists of global justice to
develop persuasive accounts of our duties to
outsiders.
Notes
1
Other questions concern what states owe to
refugees (see Shacknove, 1985, Dummett,
2001, Kukathas, 2002, Benhabib, 2004,
Gibney, 2004, Nine, 2010) and non-citizen
residents, including guestworkers and
undocumented immigrants (see Bauböck,
1994, Dummett, 2001, Wilcox, 2004, 2005,
Bosniak, 2006, Miller, 2008, Shachar, 2009,
Pevnick, 2011); what selection criteria states
may legitimately use to guide admissions
policies (see Carens, 1988, Joppke, 2005,
Miller, 2005, Wilcox, 2007, 2008, 2014,
Wellman, 2008, Blake, 2012); and what
states may require of immigrants seeking citi-
zenship (Wilcox, 2004). These philosophers
consider these questions within the context of
liberal democratic states, asking, for instance,
whether such states can legitimately refuse
to admit would-be immigrants who are com-
mitted to illiberal political values. However,
many of these issues also arise with regard to
non-liberal states. For instance, philosophers
may be interested in the ethics of guest-
worker programs in China or Qatar.
2
The previous summary of Walzer’s view draws
upon Wilcox (2009).
3
Some critics also reject Walzer’s claim that
clubs are morally free to choose any member-
ship policy they wish. See Cole (2000) and
Higgins (2013).
4
For a third, liberal nationalist version of the
self-determination argument, see Miller (1995).
Fine provides an excellent overview of the
self-determination arguments for the right
194
to exclude in her recent survey of the debate
(Fine, 2013).
5
Philip Cole offers an alternative version argu-
ment of freedom of international movement
argument. In his view, acknowledging the right
to exit any state as a core liberal right commits
one to recognizing a corresponding right to
freedom of international movement because
without a right to enter and settle in a new
state, the right to exit is useless (Cole, 2000).
6
Rawls’s work initiated the contemporary dis-
cussion of the role of luck in theories of justice.
Prominent luck egalitarians include Arneson
(1989, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2006), Cohen
(2000, 2008, 2011), Dworkin (2000, 2002,
2003), Tan (2008, 2012), and Tempkin (1993,
2003a,b).
7
Cosmopolitan luck egalitarians include Beitz
(1979), Caney (2005), and Tan (2008, 2012).
8
See also Narayan (1995).
9
See also Weir (2008).
10
The previous summary of feminist approaches
to migration draws upon Parekh and Wilcox
(2014).
WORKS CITED
Arneson, R. J. (1989), “Equality and Equal
Opportunity for Welfare,” Philosophical
Studies, 56: 77–93.
— (1999), “Egalitarianism and
Responsibility,” Journal of Ethics, 3:
225–247.
— (2000), “Luck Egalitarianism and
Prioritarianism,” Ethics, 110: 339–349.
— (2001), “Luck and Equality,” Proceedings
of Aristotelian Society, 75: 73–90.
— (2006), “Luck Egalitarianism:
An Interpretation and Defense,”
Philosophical Topics, 32: 1–20.
Bauböck, R. (1994), Transnational
Citizenship: Membership and Rights
in International Migration. Aldershot:
Edward Elgar.

Beitz, C. (1979), Political Theory and
International Relations. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press.
Benhabib, S. (2004), The Rights of
Others Asylum, Residents and Citizens.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Blake, M. (2012), “Immigration,
Association, and Antidiscrimination,”
Ethics, 122: 748–762.
Bosniak, L. (2006), The Citizen and the
Alien: Dilemmas of Contemporary
Membership. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
Caney, S. (2005), Justice Beyond Borders: A
Global Political Theory. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Carens, J. (1987), “Aliens and Citizens: The
Case for Open Borders,” The Review of
Politics, 49: 251–273.
— (1988), “Nationalism and the Exclusion
of Immigrants: Lessons from Australian
Immigration Policy,” in M. Gibney (ed.),
Open Borders, Closed Societies, The
Ethical and Political Issues. Westport,
CA: Greenwood Press, pp. 41–60.
— (1992), “Migration and Morality:
A Liberal Egalitarian Perspective,”
in B. Barry and R. Goodin (eds),
Free Movement: Ethical Issues in the
Transnational Migration of People and
of Money. University Park, PA: The
Pennsylvania State Press, pp. 25–47.
Cavallero, E. (2014), “Association and
Asylum,” Philosophical Studies, 169:
133–141.
Cohen, G. A. (2000), If You’re An
Egalitarian, How Come You’re So Rich?
Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
— (2008), Rescuing Justice and Equality.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
— (2011), On the Currency of Egalitarian
Justice and Other Essays in Political
195
IMMIGRATION AND BORDERS
Philosophy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
Cole, P. (2000), Philosophies of
Exclusion: Liberal Political Theory and
Immigration. Edinburgh: Edinburgh
University Press.
Dummett, M. (2001), On Immigration
and Refugees. London and New York:
Routledge.
Dworkin, R. (2000), Sovereign Virtue.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
— (2002), “Sovereign Virtue Revisited,”
Ethics, 113: 106–143.
— (2003), “Equality, Luck and Hierarchy,”
Philosophy and Public Affairs, 31:
190–198.
Fine, S. (2010), “Freedom of Association is
Not the Answer,” Ethics, 120: 338–356.
— (2013), “The Ethics of Immigration: Self-
Determination and the Right to Exclude,”
Philosophy Compass, 8: 254–268.
Gibney, M. (2004), The Ethics and Politics
of Asylum: Liberal Democracy and
the Response to Refugees. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Higgins, P. (2013), Immigration Justice.
Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Hochschild, A. R. (2000), “Global Care
Chains and Emotional Surplus Value,”
in W. Hutton and A. Giddens (eds),
On the Edge: Living with Global
Capitalism. London: Jonathan Cape,
pp. 131–146.
— (2002), “Love and Gold,” in B.
Ehrenreich and A. R. Hochschild (eds),
Global Woman: Nannies, Maids and
Sex Workers in the New Economy. New
York: Metropolitan Books, pp. 15–30.
Hudson, J. (2011), Review of Immigration
and the Constraints of Justice: Between
Borders and Absolute Sovereignty,
by Ryan Pevnick, Notre Dame
Shelley Wilcox
Philosophical Reviews: https://ndpr.
nd.edu/news/24785-immigration-and-
the-constraints-of-justice-between-open-
borders-and-absolute-sovereignty/.
Joppke, C. (2005), Selecting by Origin:
Ethnic Migration in the Liberal State.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
Kittay, E. (2008), “The Global Heart
Transplant and Caring across national
Boundaries,” The Southern Journal of
Philosophy, 46: 138–165.
— (2009), “The Moral Harm of Migrant
Carework: Realizing a Global Right to
Care,” Philosophical Topics, 37: 53–73.
Kukathas, C. (2002), “Immigration,” in H.
LaFollette (ed.), The Oxford Handbook
of Practical Ethics. New York: Oxford
University Press, pp. 567–590.
Miller, D. (1995), On Nationality. Oxford:
Clarendon Press.
— (2005), “Immigration: The Case for
Limits,” in A. Cohen and C. H. Wellman
(eds), Contemporary Debates in Applied
Ethics. Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 193–206.
— (2008), “Immigrants, Nations, and
Citizenship,” The Journal of Political
Philosophy, 16: 371–390.
Narayan, U. (1995), “‘Male-Order’ Brides:
Immigrant Women, Domestic Violence,
and Immigration Law,” Hypatia, 10:
101–119.
Nine, C. (2010), “Ecological Refugees, States
Borders, and the Lockean Proviso,” Journal
of Applied Philosophy, 27: 359–375.
Parekh McGushin, S. and Wilcox, S. (2014),
“Feminist Perspectives on Globalization,”
The Stanford Encyclopedia of
Philosophy, http://plato.stanford.edu/
archives/sum2014/entries/feminism-
globalization/.
Pevnick, R. (2011), Immigration and the
Constraints of Justice: Between Open
196
Borders and Absolute Sovereignty. New
York: Cambridge University Press.
Pogge, T. (2006), “Migration and Poverty,”
in R. Goodin and P. Pettit (eds),
Contemporary Political Philosophy: An
Anthology, 2nd edn. Oxford: Blackwell,
pp. 710–720.
Shachar, A. (2009), The Birthright Lottery:
Citizenship and Global Inequality.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press.
Shacknove, A. (1985), “Who Is a Refugee?”
Ethics, 95: 274–284.
Tan, K.-C. (2008), “A Defense of Luck
Egalitarianism,” Journal of Philosophy,
105: 665–690.
— (2012), Justice, Institutions, and Luck:
The Site, Ground and Scope of Equality.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Temkin, L. (1993), Inequality. New York:
Oxford University Press.
— (2003a), “Egalitarianism Defended,”
Ethics, 113: 764–782.
— (2003b), “Exploring the Roots of
Egalitarian Concerns,” Theoria, 69:
125–151.
Walzer, M. (1983), Spheres of Justice: A
Defense of Pluralism and Equality. New
York: Basic Books.
Weir, A. (2008), “Global Care Chains:
Freedom, Responsibility and Solidarity,”
The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 46:
166–175.
Wellman, C. H. (2008), “Immigration and
Freedom of Association,” Ethics, 119:
109–141.
Wellman, C. H. and Cole, P. (2011),
Debating the Ethics of Immigration: Is
There a Right to Exclude? New York:
Oxford University Press.
Wilcox, S. (2004), “Culture, National
Identity, and Admission to Citizenship,”
Social Theory and Practice, 30: 559–583.

— (2005), “American Neo-Nativism and
Gendered Immigrant Exclusions,” in B.
Andrew, J. Keller, and L. Schwartzman
(eds), Feminist Interventions in Ethics
and Politics: Feminist Ethics and Social
Theory. Lanham, MA: Rowman &
Littlefield, pp. 213–232.
— (2007), “Immigrant Admissions and
Global Relations of Harm,” Journal of
Social Philosophy, 38: 274–291.
— (2008), “Who Pays for Gender
De-Institutionalization?” in A. M.
González (ed.), Gender Identities in
197
IMMIGRATION AND BORDERS
a Globalized World. Amherst, NY:
Humanity Books, pp. 53–74.
— (2009), “The Open Borders Debate on
Immigration,” Philosophy Compass, 4: 1–9.
— (2012), Review of Immigration and the
Constraints of Justice: Between Borders
and Absolute Sovereignty, by Ryan
Pevnick, Ethics, 122: 617–622.
— (2014), “Do Duties to Outsiders Require
Open Borders? A Reply to Wellman,”
Philosophical Studies, 169: 123–132;
article initially appeared as 10.1007/
s11098-012-9902-y in 2012.
 13
THE FUTURE(S) OF POLITICAL
PHILOSOPHY
Matthew Voorhees and J. Jeremy Wisnewski
INTRODUCTION
Everyone knows that predictions can be
wildly mistaken. From Margaret Thatcher’s
proclamation that she would not live to see a
female Prime Minister in Britain to Einstein’s
claim that nuclear power is impossible, we
get things wrong—and often with gusto. This
seems to be true across the board, but per-
haps nowhere near so visibly as in the acad-
emy—and within the academy, predicting the
future of philosophy is perhaps as dubious
an enterprise as one is likely to find.
Kant claimed to have solved the crucial
problems of philosophy. Not so many years
later, Hegel claimed the same thing, pro-
nouncing an end to the history of philoso-
phy. In the following century, oblivious to
the errors of his predecessors, Wittgenstein
once again claimed to end philosophy—and
he had the audacity to claim to end it on two
different occasions, in two different ways.
It will come as no surprise, then, that the
following is in one respect a work of con-
ceit. No one can say with any certainty what
the future of an academic discipline will be.
Sometimes forecasters get things right, but
such success is usually a matter of luck. To
undertake to describe the future(s) of political
199
philosophy is a guessing game, and one that
is likely to be characterized by a good deal of
wishful thinking.1
Could Plato have anticipated work in
political philosophy concerned with, for
example, the role of the internet and social
media in fostering a deliberative democracy?
Could Locke have predicted the current
debate over intellectual property, or Hobbes
the debate over the use of public funds for
stem cell research? These rhetorical ques-
tions point to the central limitation on any
prediction we might offer: Political philos-
ophy, at least in part, must respond to the
world in which it finds itself. To predict its
future accurately would thus require predict-
ing the future of the world itself—its chang-
ing social arrangements, technological feats
and challenges, and emerging issues. We can-
not possibly hope to do that here, or frankly,
anywhere else.
Our aim in what follows is thus a more
modest one. While we cannot know the
future(s) of political philosophy, we can
highlight areas of emerging and continuing
interest, as they appear at this particular his-
torical moment in time, from our particu-
lar points of view. This does not mean that
we have only our hunches to go on. Recent
Matthew Voorhees and J. Jeremy Wisnewski
computer software makes it possible to iden-
tify broad patterns in political philosophy by
algorithmically examining academic data-
bases (such as JSTOR). We have used such
software in our attempt to identify trends in
publications over the past two decades. This
sort of technology-driven empirical research,
on the rise in recent years, may itself become
more common in the future. Our approach
is thus largely descriptive rather than pre-
scriptive. There are certainly areas that we
think ought to be explored in the future. Our
task, however, is to describe those areas that
seem likely to be important in years to come.
Because political philosophy itself reflects
and speaks to events in the political world,
we should expect certain questions and
problems to be more prominent than others.
Issues involving cosmopolitanism, diversity,
democratic politics, surveillance, cyber con-
flict, and human rights are sure to garner the
attention of philosophers and political theo-
rists in the future. The extent to which any
of these issues gains prominence, of course,
depends on a variety of factors, including the
important challenges faced by higher educa-
tion: budget cuts, legislative pressures, and
the apparent rise of online courses. We con-
sider some of these issues at the end of this
chapter.
THE LAST 20 YEARS
In an attempt to assess the future(s) of pol-
itical philosophy in a way that is grounded
in the state of the discipline, we endeavored
to analyze the publication record of six lead-
ing journals in political philosophy over the
past two decades.2 Obviously, deciding on a
list of journals is itself a political undertak-
ing. Journals tend to favor certain kinds of
200
questions, certain kinds of analysis, as well
as certain historical figures over others. In an
attempt to limit our own theoretical biases,
we opted to utilize a well-established aca-
demic resource: JSTOR. The journals avail-
able through JSTOR are some of the most
visible in political philosophy and polit-
ical theory, and thus represent some of the
favored sources for many working in the
field. Utilizing JSTOR also provided a rela-
tively accessible source for data on publish-
ing trends over the last two decades.3
There are obvious limitations to both the
number of journals we chose to examine, as
well as the range of topics typically treated
in these journals. Much excellent work in
political philosophy is published in ven-
ues not available through JSTOR—indeed,
some might even argue that most truly excel-
lent work is found elsewhere. Nevertheless,
the high visibility of the journals in JSTOR
makes it a good resource for examining what
is happening in mainstream political philoso-
phy, even if the snapshot provided does not
allow us to see what is happening in the dis-
cipline as a whole.
There is of course nothing magical about
the number of journals chosen. We might have
just as easily chosen 30 high-quality journals,
or we might have chosen only 5. Despite
only examining six journals, these journals
nevertheless span work in both historical
and contemporary political philosophy, both
Anglo-American and “continental” tradi-
tions, and include venues publishing work in
critical race theory and feminist philosophy.
There will undoubtedly be many who find
the list inadequate. There is a straightfor-
ward reason for this: the list is inadequate,
as any list must be. Political philosophy is a
wide river, and excellent research appears in
a wide variety of venues. Important articles
sometimes appear in journals that are less
 THE FUTURE(S) OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
well-known, or in well-known journals that
do not focus on political theory. Moreover,
much important work in political philosophy
is done in scholarly monographs (rather than
articles). For all of these reasons, the results
we report here are tentative at best. They
represent the simple fact that any sampling,
by definition, will be selective. Nevertheless,
while selectivity encourages recognizing the
fallibility of one’s results, it need not entail
inaccuracy.
We collected articles for the previous
20 years from six journals available through
JSTOR. We then utilized the program
MALLET4 to produce some basic algorith-
mic topic modeling. We set our topic list at
20. MALLET then analyzed our collection of
texts and generated topics—a list of which
can be found in Appendix A. The term “topic”
is standard in these kinds of approaches to
textual analysis, though the term “discourse”
might in fact be better. As a quick look at
Appendix A will show, a “topic” in this con-
text is a set of terms used together in pre-
dictable ways. As Ted Underwood suggests,
“The great thing about topic modeling is
that it maps the actual discursive contours of
a collection, which may or may not line up
with ‘concepts’ any writer ever consciously
held in mind.”5 In this respect, the “topics”
generated by MALLET are often orthogonal
to the standard topics we talk about in politi-
cal philosophy.
As one might expect, automated analy-
sis often produces messy results. Common
terms are linked with topics in multiple
ways, and the links are not always useful (the
term “moral,” e.g. appears in 5 of the 20 top-
ics; “university” appears in 66). The data, as
usual, require interpretation.7
The topics that resulted from the analy-
sis were in many ways predictable: liberal-
ism, justice, and Rawls, as one might expect,
201
appeared frequently.8 Work on the history
of political philosophy frequently dealt with
the social contract tradition—with Hobbes,
Locke, and Rousseau. Mill and Nietzsche
also appeared with greater frequency than
other notables from the history of philoso-
phy (e.g. Montesquieu, Cicero). Judging by
word counts within topics, at least three top-
ics crucially involved the history of political
philosophy (9, 13, 14). Of the topics gener-
ated by the program, two centered on issues
related to sex, gender, and race (8, 10).9 This
is perhaps a product of the inclusion of the
journal Hypatia in our set of six journals,
and likely does not reflect the actual percent-
age of work being done on these topics (it
might be more or less, depending on one’s
sample). Nevertheless, given the reasons for
using JSTOR journals given earlier, the result
is still rather significant: critical race theory
and feminist political philosophy have made
advances toward entering the mainstream.
Likewise, work in applied political philoso-
phy appears to be rather healthy: issues
regarding labor practices, political par-
ties, egalitarian social policies, welfare, and
healthcare were significant enough to gener-
ate two topics roughly devoted to such areas
of interest (15, 18).
In what follows, we will make some edu-
cated guesses about the future of political
philosophy, drawing on the analysis we have
utilized where appropriate to contextualize
our claims.
POLITICAL THOUGHT: APPROACHES
AND CONCERNS
To undertake a philosophical endeavor, in
one respect, is to work out one’s relation-
ship with the past. The great questions of
Matthew Voorhees and J. Jeremy Wisnewski
previous generations are, with stunning fre-
quency, very similar to the questions we find
ourselves confronting. It is thus not surpris-
ing that traditions develop in all of the fields
of philosophy—that any general philosoph-
ical area will have its own historical conver-
sations and trajectories, and that one will be
called upon to respond to this tradition to
the extent that one decides to ask such ques-
tions at all.
The future of political philosophy, we
thus have reason to believe, will not involve
abandoning its past. There is little doubt
that Hobbes will still be read and responded
to even as the central positions in political
philosophy evolve in a way that reflects the
changing social and political reality around
us. This stands to reason. The history of phi-
losophy provides the background against
which certain questions make sense, certain
answers can be given, and certain objec-
tions raised. In this respect, asking about the
future of political philosophy involves asking
not only what will be different from the past,
but also how the past itself will be dealt with,
appropriated, and utilized. Thus we expect
that scholars will continue to be interested in
historical approaches to political philosophy,
and to illuminate the ways in which political
ideas reflect their historical and cultural con-
texts. Of course, such historical approaches
are not cut off from contemporary con-
troversies and concerns; if anything, these
approaches help us better understand the
ways in which contemporary political philos-
ophy is itself an outgrowth of and response
to the practical problems and questions that
animate contemporary politics.
However, the history of political thought is
but one of the many approaches available to
scholars; proscriptive and critical approaches
associated with particular authors or polit-
ical projects will continue to be essential to
202
political thought. For example, as we discuss
later, Rawlsian scholars continue to develop
his ideas and bring them to bear on new
questions and political concerns. Postcolonial
thinkers will continue to explore the leg-
acies of colonial rule and the challenges of
national sovereignty in developing coun-
tries. Of course, it is a mistake to think of
the study of political philosophy in either/or
categories, as if political thought is historical,
or proscriptive, or critical; such approaches
are neither discrete nor mutually exclusive.
Thus, for example, feminist interrogations of
canonical texts and authors promise to shed
important light on the history of political
ideas and to guide our critical reexamination
of core political concepts. In light of the dif-
ferent approaches to the study of political
ideas, it therefore might make more sense to
think about the future of political philosophy
in terms of areas of concern that are likely
to be approached from a variety of theoret-
ical or methodological perspectives. These
areas themselves overlap in interesting and
important ways. Three areas seem especially
promising.
One area of political philosophy that
is generating scholarly interest and spur-
ring vigorous debate concerns the global
and international dimension of politics. We
expect that cosmopolitanism will continue
to be an important area of scholarly con-
cern in the years to come. What many schol-
ars see as the hegemony of Neoliberalism
has linked the political and economic fates
of the Western and developing worlds, and
although the nation-state remains the pri-
mary location of sovereignty and citizen-
ship, political theorists are increasingly
attuned to the political and economic dimen-
sion of core political concepts at the global
level. Cosmopolitan approaches to political
thought are prompting important new ways
 THE FUTURE(S) OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
of rethinking political institutions so as to
understand both the possibilities and the
challenges of global governance, and these
approaches suggest significant revisions to
Westphalian conceptions of sovereignty
that are necessary if we are to envision the
conditions of international political institu-
tions. As the political and economic forces
that shape our lives become more global and
trans-national in scope, so must the concepts
through which we examine and understand
these forces. As such, cosmopolitan political
thought promises to make important con-
tributions to a wide range of related topics:
the possibilities of global justice and ethical
judgment, concerns about global inequalities,
the promises and limitations of human rights
discourses, and the meaning of democratic
citizenship and institutions.
A second ongoing area of scholarly inter-
est concerns questions about inclusion,
exclusion, and difference as political com-
munities become increasingly pluralistic and
multicultural—or in some cases, increasingly
recognize the ways in which they already
are pluralistic and multicultural. Scholars
working in feminist, critical race, and queer
theory have long sought to problematize
the overly tidy distinction between public
and private that characterizes liberal poli-
tics and have helpfully questioned liberal-
ism’s universalist pretensions. We have no
reason to doubt that the insights of scholars
in these traditions will continue to inform
discussions about difference and inclu-
sion, and to help us theorize more inclusive
approaches to politics that are both sensitive
to the demands of equality and alert to the
dangers of essentialism. Much recent work
on multicultural politics has been done by
scholars in countries with long (although by
no means unblemished) histories of cultural
diversity, like the United States and Canada.
203
A growing sensitivity to the political claims
of the First Nations has been particularly
noticeable in Canada, informing the work of
a range of important political thinkers (see
Taylor, 1994, Kymlicka, 1995, Tully, 1995).
However, pluralism and multiculturalism
are also becoming important in countries—
especially in, but by no means limited to,
Europe—that have not had the same history
of internal cultural diversity but which are
increasingly developing such diversity due to
immigration and the legacy of colonialism.
The insights of postcolonial and non-West-
ern theorists are likely to figure prominently
as these debates unfold.
Finally, we expect that democratic theory
will continue to generate significant schol-
arly interest. The waves of popular protests
across the Middle East and the implications
of these protests for the potential democra-
tization of political institutions in the region
will raise important questions about popular
sovereignty, democratic deliberation, and civil
society, and political philosophy has much
to contribute to these questions. In addition
to Rawls, Habermas remains an important
touchstone for democratic theorists, who
continue to show interest both in working
out the details of his ideal speech situation
and in translating the formal conditions that
guide his theory into concrete institutions
and practices. Additionally—and particularly
in the context of formal political institutions
that do not privilege democratic accountabil-
ity—the role of civil society in locating and
fostering forms of democratic deliberation
promises to be an especially important area
of democratic thought. In this area of politi-
cal philosophy, we can clearly see the ways
in which the future directions and topics of
political philosophy are inextricably linked.
For example, feminist and critical race schol-
ars continue to highlight the ways in which
Matthew Voorhees and J. Jeremy Wisnewski
ideal speech conditions reflect privileged
forms of discourse and serve the interest of
those who use these forms. Cosmopolitan
theorists raise questions about the qualities
of, and opportunities for democratic citizen-
ship in an increasingly globalized politics:
How can citizens take action on problems
that are global in their scope and implica-
tions? To what extent are international insti-
tutions and governmental bodies responsive
to citizens’ input? How might we conceive of
civil society in a cosmopolitan context? The
important questions in democratic theory will
benefit from a robust exchange among vari-
ous philosophical schools and approaches.
THE RAWLS INDUSTRY
It is a truism in the United States that John
Rawls reinvigorated political philosophy—
that he pulled it, barely alive, from the death
grips of positivism. This is undoubtedly an
overstatement, but one that contains a par-
ticular truth. Few books have had the kind
of influence that A Theory of Justice had.
Rawls continues to hold a prominent place
in political philosophy and theory, and there
is little reason to think that this will change
in the near future. This prominence speaks
to the general ascendency of liberal democ-
racy as both a practical ideal and a theoreti-
cal commitment; not surprisingly, the words
“Rawls” and “Rawlsian” appeared most
frequently in the topic associated with lib-
eralism and justice (topic 5 in our MALLET
analysis). Rawls’s attempt to reconcile clas-
sical liberalism’s emphasis on individual
liberty with a vision of justice which privi-
leges economic equality and the welfare state
remains an attractive project to many politi-
cal thinkers, particularly in the United States
204
where—unlike many other Western democ-
racies—such reconciliation remains politi-
cally contentious. In the years following the
publication of A Theory of Justice, and with
Rawls’s various amplifications and restate-
ments of that project in his subsequent work,
a sizeable and vigorous scholarly debate has
developed and it shows no real signs of slow-
ing down. We have little reason to doubt that
scholars associated with the Rawlsian project
will continue to refine, develop, and extend
his core arguments.
Of course, Rawls’s project has—and
doubtless will continue to have—its crit-
ics and detractors, and the development of
Rawlsian scholarship will likely be driven
in large part by these critiques and the
responses to them. One particular area of cri-
tique has been especially important and will
likely continue to drive Rawls scholarship.
Although Rawls explicitly contextualizes his
project within what he call the “fact of rea-
sonable pluralism,” we expect that scholars
will continue to debate the compatibility of
Rawlsian liberalism (and no doubt, liberal-
ism more generally) with robustly pluralistic
and multicultural societies. Feminist and crit-
ical race scholars have long drawn attention
to the ways in which the “veil of ignorance”
which grounds Rawls’s social contract the-
ory serves to bracket precisely those kinds of
embodied experience that such critics insist
must be central to an inclusive view of equal-
ity and justice. Rawls’s view of the original
position thus reiterates the difference blind-
ness of classical liberalism at a time when
critiques of formal equality are increasingly
gaining ground.10 Rather than representing
a vision of justice that is compatible with
a variety of particular conceptions of the
good (what Rawls refers to as “comprehen-
sive doctrines”), such scholars suggest that
Rawls’s conception of justice turns on a kind
 THE FUTURE(S) OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
of liberalism that itself functions as a com-
prehensive doctrine—one which precludes
the meaningful inclusion of racial, sexual,
and cultural difference (see Pateman, 1988,
Okin, 1994, Abbey, 2007).
A second area of critique of Rawlsian
thought—one which we only mention
here—has to do with the relevance of his
theory of justice to the increasingly inter-
national and cosmopolitan dimensions of
politics. Although Rawls has attempted to
handle some of these dimensions in his later
work, many continue to find his account
problematic (see Reidy, 2004). This may
speak to some of the broader difficulties
of applying classical liberalism’s under-
standing of citizenship and government to
global political practices and institutions,
but in light of the continued prominence of
Rawls’s political thought, and the growing
importance of international political institu-
tions; we expect this to be a robust area of
scholarly debate.
APPLIED POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
Political theory has never been shy about
weighing in on the issues of the day. Plato
made arguments about the legitimacy of cen-
sorship, the proper role of education, the dis-
tribution of wealth, and much more besides.
It would be quite surprising if this traditional
occupation of political philosophers ceased
being an area of intense theoretical work. A
core question, of course, concerns which top-
ics are likely to be of interest in the future. It’s
quite difficult to ignore those topics that are
currently of much interest: intellectual prop-
erty, domestic spying, privacy, income ine-
quality, torture, and the relationship between
money and politics are all ripe for continued
205
theoretical work. This reflects an underly-
ing reality: namely, the topics that will inter-
est political philosophers will be those that
present themselves as the most pressing con-
cerns of the day.
This can be illustrated by consider-
ing the state of research on the ethics and
politics of torture. Prior to 2002, ethics
research on torture was quite rare. Some
work was of course done on the histori-
cal arguments given for torture, as well
as the position various philosophers had
taken on the practice. Nearly no one was
investigating why torture was wrong, and
even fewer were arguing that it was in
fact acceptable in particular instances.11
When torture came forcefully into pub-
lic view during the Bush administration,
things changed dramatically. In the years
during and since the Bush administration,
many academic books and dozens of arti-
cles have been published on torture—some
defending its use, some claiming that it
is never acceptable. A relative silence has
been replaced with what becomes a highly
technical and nuanced debate about nearly
every aspect of torture—what it is, when it
might be used, how one is to understand its
effects on persons, its relationship to state
authority, what it reveals about the nature
of pain, and so on. Had someone written
this chapter in 2000, it seems doubtful that
this explosion of work would have been
predicted. It is even doubtful that it could
have been predicted.12
Our current political predicaments may
thus not be much indication of what theo-
retical interests will occupy the attention of
future philosophers. Certain current topics
nevertheless seem to merit some attention,
simply given the extent to which they have
garnered the attention of theoretical work in
recent years. In what is sometimes called “the
Matthew Voorhees and J. Jeremy Wisnewski
digital age,” it is hardly surprising to find
that several current topics in political phi-
losophy have been on the rise. Surveillance
has been much in the news in the United
States (and elsewhere) recently, and has been
at the heart of a good deal of public debate.
The extent to which citizens are entitled to
private lives—and the extent to which our
activities are to be understood as part of
these private lives—will likely continue to be
the subject of intense debate in coming years.
The ability to collect information about citi-
zens is at an all-time high—one that makes
Foucault’s panopticon seem more prescient
than ever. The subsequent use of this infor-
mation in planning things like unmanned
drone strikes makes the issue of surveillance
much more pressing. Indeed, the increased
use of remote combat by governments like
the United States has already sparked a good
deal of public debate. Political philosophy
has followed suit. As this debate continues
in the public sphere, it is likely that increased
attention will be paid to the theoretical issues
underlying the use of these technologies, as
well as the arguments used both in favor of
and against them.
The digital age has also spawned what has
come to be known as “cyberwarfare”: the use
of computer software for spying, hijacking,
destroying, or disrupting those computing
systems essential to the operations (mili-
tary, commercial, and otherwise) of a given
country. The US Department of Defense has
recognized this venue as another theater of
conflict (or “operational domain,” as the
Pentagon has called it), and has established
a formal organization (US Cyber Command)
to counter cyber attacks—attacks that have
been increasing exponentially in recent years.
According to the US Deputy Secretary of
Defense, William J. Lynn III, “the danger of
cyberwarfare rivals that of traditional war”
206
(Lynn, 2010, 2011). Given the resources
being poured into developing both cyber
weapons and defenses against those weap-
ons, it is likely that this thoroughly contem-
porary form of conflict will be of increasing
importance in the future. It is thus reason-
able to suspect that political philosophy will
become increasingly concerned with under-
standing it—what it is, when it is justified (if
ever), how it relates to traditional just war
doctrine (if it does), and how current inter-
national law applies to it. A fair amount of
work has emerged on this topic in recent
years. It is likely that the energy devoted to
these topics will only increase.13
Events of the recent past have also pro-
duced new work on issues involving terror-
ism, income inequality, and the relationship
between religion (in particular, Islam) and
politics. The continuing relevance of these
issues suggests that work in applied politi-
cal philosophy will continue to be devoted to
their exploration and elaboration.14
REALITY CHECK: THE DIMINUTION
OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY IN
CONTEMPORARY CULTURE
The issue of the future of political philoso-
phy is not simply an issue of what topics
will be explored, or what theoretical devel-
opments we should expect to see. The ques-
tion of the future of political philosophy is
also a question about the place political phi-
losophy will come to occupy in our cultural
conversations.
In the United States, things do not look
good. The most common political philoso-
phy explicitly appealed to by those in gov-
ernment appears to be that of novelist Ayn
Rand, the patron saint of the US “Tea Party.”
 THE FUTURE(S) OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
The standards of argumentation and reason-
ing that professional philosophers maintain
find little accommodation in current politi-
cal discourse. Persons appeal to their favored
first principles, and seem to regard such
appeal as ultimately simply a matter of pref-
erence. Grand-standing about the validity of
particular principles thus appears to coexist
with a strange subjectivism about the justi-
fication of these first principles. Appeals to
evidence are present, but it is often an appeal
to evidence reminiscent of the sophistic tradi-
tions rather than the philosophical ones: one
appeals to what helps the conclusions one
wants, and ignores whatever evidence does
not (see MacIntyre, 1981).
Could political philosophy play a role in
the legislative bodies of the United States?
Our faith in this possibility is by no means
high at present—but it is at least a possibil-
ity. In many respects, the future of political
philosophy will be determined alongside the
role that political philosophy plays in a given
culture. The more value a culture places in
political theorizing, the more resources it will
place in fostering and maintaining a robust
political discourse. The less such things are
valued, the less we should expect to see
political theory in a state of relative health.
There have been historical instances in which
political philosophy was prized by the politi-
cal leadership or by the populace at large. In
such contexts, it will come as no surprise, we
discover some of the most fruitful and lasting
contributions to political philosophy.
This point has an immediate bearing on
the question of the future of research in polit-
ical philosophy. First, the esteem in which
a culture holds any intellectual pursuit will
partially determine the resources it devotes
to that enterprise, and also the number of
persons drawn to it. Second, if political
philosophy has no bearing on the political
207
deliberations of legislative, executive, and
judicial bodies—such as is the case in times
when political theory is held in ill-repute—
the very point of political philosophy seems
to be called into question.
Consider the following: if we can have no
hope that political philosophy might have
some affect on political reality, even if quite
indirect, what is the point in engaging in it?
The issue is more pressing in the case of pol-
itical philosophy, perhaps, than in other areas
of philosophy. There may well be a point to
studying Platonic dialogues regardless of
their applicability to modern day problems.
But presumably an investigation of justice,
or legitimate authority, or power, has as its
aim more than merely comprehension and
the improvement of one’s analytical skills.
Presumably one attempts to construct a the-
ory of justice, for example, in order to con-
tribute to the construction of a just society
(even if only indirectly). If political philoso-
phy has no bearing on our political future,
then it will itself have no future—save being
a boutique hobby for intellectuals who are
predisposed to considering its themes. In
this respect, the future(s) of political phil-
osophy are connected in certain fundamen-
tal ways with how political philosophy is
perceived—as well as used and abused—by
both the general public and those in the halls
of power.
The issue of the perception of political
philosophy looms large in recent events in
higher education as well. For political phil-
osophy to make any significant impact, we
require a culture characterized by a literacy
of political theory. The chances of creating
such a culture seem increasingly endangered
by developments in higher education. Two
major issues worth considering in the cur-
rent context are (1) budget cuts in traditional
areas of humanities research and (2) the rise
Matthew Voorhees and J. Jeremy Wisnewski
of “MOOCs”—massive open-enrollment
online courses.
It would be foolish to think that these
largely practical concerns will have no affect
on the future of research in political philos-
ophy. As departments are cut down in (to)
size, course offerings scaled back, and PhDs
forced out of the academic community, we
should likewise expect to see less diversity in
the kinds of research conducted within the
political theory community. While this will
not automatically result from a decrease in
the number of those engaging in political
philosophy research, it is nevertheless likely:
as fewer people tackle the questions of politi-
cal philosophy, we will see either fewer ques-
tions addressed or fewer novel answers given
to the questions addressed—and very likely,
we will see both.
Worries like this one were among the moti-
vations of the philosophy department of San
Jose State University when they decided to
reject the call to utilize MOOCs in 2013.15 To
maintain a standardized, internet-delivered
course in political philosophy (regardless
of its source) would diminish the diversity
essential to healthy philosophical discourse.
Crucially, at no point was the issue over the
quality of the course lectures the depart-
ment was being asked to use. The course
(“Justice”—still available freely online) was
one developed by Harvard Professor Michael
J. Sandel, who ultimately agreed with the
worries expressed about the mandatory use
of his course.16
To limit the number of perspectives in
political philosophy, to reiterate, is to risk
diminishing its future. As funds to depart-
ments are cut, faculty lines replaced by
technological innovations, and resources
moved away from those who are actually
conducting research in political theory, we
should expect to see a subsequent diminution
208
in both the quality and the diversity of polit-
ical theorizing. The core issue here is not that
one can watch Sandel’s lectures on Justice.
It is surely a good thing that these lectures
(and other lectures by political philosophers
at other institutions) are freely available for
anyone who is interested and who has inter-
net access, regardless of economic standing,
geographical location, or even background
education. The issue here—and both the
members of the philosophy department at
San Jose State University and Sandel seem to
agree on this point—is with the use of free
resources to replace actual faculty members,
each with their own perspectives on issues in
political theory, and each taking part in the
ongoing dialogue that is philosophical reflec-
tion. To lose participants in this dialogue, by
whatever means, is to threaten the future of
political philosophy itself.
CONCLUSION
As we have emphasized throughout this
chapter, if political philosophy takes its cue
from events and controversies in our polit-
ical world, any prediction about the future
is inescapably speculative—clearly, there
is no crystal ball we can consult to foresee
the events and controversies that will arise.
We live in a world in which environmental
changes confront us with difficult questions
about the sustainability of our energy, food,
and communities, in which the possibility of
vast and sudden economic crises force us to
rethink the function and extent of govern-
mental regulation, and in which terrorism
and counterterrorism require us to reflect on
the political and legal implications of surveil-
lance, technology, and warfare. No doubt, the
various approaches to political philosophy
 THE FUTURE(S) OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
will continue to help us critically examine pol-
itical developments and frame our responses
to them. There is a certain irony in the fact
that as the world faces the kinds of challenges
that political philosophy is most qualified—
and indeed necessary—to explain, the study
of political thought is itself being undermined
by the budgetary considerations and cur-
ricular priorities of legislators and university
administrators. This is likely to be an import-
ant additional area for political theorists to
reflect on and speak to in coming years.17
APPENDIX A
0 social science knowledge theory human sci-
entific epistemic research view work cog-
nitive nature theories important empirical
evidence epistemology world questions
1 law constitutional legal court constitu-
tion judicial review government american
supreme state public power rights justice
madison courts laws speech
2 harm case cases person moral responsi-
bility people morally act life make claim
killing argument responsible wrong risk
affairs death
3 university political review philosophy
journal professor science john theory edi-
tor book published articles david volume
ethics sage politics international
4 moral book social theory human chap-
ter ethics ethical rights view essays work
account argues philosophical issues phi-
losophy university discussion
5 moral human book theory mill justice lib-
eral practical political legal view ethical
ethics social university argues law good
principles
6 rights justice moral freedom state human
theory political principles principle rawls
209
law argument basic conception claim peo-
ple respect idea
7 power body subject human identity dif-
ference relation experience language
world theory terms trans work discourse
order sense form meaning
8 women sexual men social gender black
family white sex woman children race
racial male marriage female child rape
lesbian
9 political natural de rousseau locke hob-
bes nature university power state men
man human ed people liberty govern-
ment civil law
10 feminist women press philosophy hypatia
feminism university work feminists gen-
der philosophical ed theory studies ethics
beauvoir philosophers issues social
11 life people make time story sense experi-
ence world art made great find kind feel
fear things long past live
12 moral reason reasons good rational view
account action practical agent person
theory make sense claim argument fact
kind kant
13 political politics theory history modern
social american thought historical work
book world intellectual ideas pp review
philosophy contemporary arendt
14 human religious political philosophy reli-
gion politics god life good socrates aris-
totle nietzsche christian man plato nature
divine strauss pp
15 social economic people equality labor
resources market welfare work public
society property individuals poor distri-
bution egalitarian health level equal
16 war international states state national
global world rights united military
human western european foreign power
violence nation nations economic
17 political public democratic liberal democ-
racy social citizens politics liberalism theory
Matthew Voorhees and J. Jeremy Wisnewski
religious cultural community groups univer-
sity citizenship society group deliberative
18 political policy american party state pub-
lic government politics national support
democratic presidential republican par-
ties congress states president members
university
19 moral care human ethics love book life
caring virtue relationships trust person
children friendship nature good part uni-
versity relationship
Notes
1
The phrase “political philosophy” is typically
utilized in philosophy departments, while “pol-
itical theory” is typically utilized in political
science departments. Although these phrases
may reflect differences between disciplines, we
regard these differences as less important than
the shared set of concerns that animate each.
For this reason, we use the terms interchange-
ably in what follows.
2
The journals reviewed, in alphabetical order,
are as follows: Ethics, Hypatia, Philosophy
and Public Affairs, Political Theory, Polity,
Review of Politics. These are, admittedly, only
a handful of the journals in the disciplines of
philosophy and political science that publish
work on political philosophy (The American
Political Science Review, e.g. typically pub-
lishes an article by a political theorist in each
volume), but in our selection of journals we
wanted to privilege those journals available
through JSTOR that often emphasize political
philosophy.
3
Indeed, JSTOR provides a website specifically
for such data: http://about.jstor.org/service/
data-for-research.
4
For information on the program, please
visit http://mallet.cs.umass.edu/. For an
introduction to topic modeling, see Mark
Steyvers and Tom Griffiths, “Probabilistic
Topic Modelling,” in T. Landauer, D.
McNamara, S. Dennis, and W. Kintsch (eds),
Handbook of Latent Semantic Analysis:
A Road to Meaning (Hove: Psychology
210
Press, 2007). The article is available here:
http://psiexp.ss.uci.edu/research/papers/
SteyversGriffithsLSABookFormatted.pdf (last
accessed December 26, 2013).
5
http://tedunderwood.com/2012/04/01/what-
kinds-of-topics-does-topic-modeling-actually-
produce/ (last accessed December 26, 2013).
6
This is presumably due to in-article citations
listing university presses. MALLET does
not distinguish all significant terms from all
insignificant ones in its analysis. This is actually
useful, as it allows surprising correlations to
emerge which might not otherwise. For our
purposes, though, it is likely best to ignore this
particular term as it appears through the topics.
7
See Appendix A for the raw topic lists pro-
duced by our use of MALLET. The order of
the topics is irrelevant to the frequency of said
topics.
8
According to the Google citation index,
Rawls’s work has been cited nearly 100,000
times in the texts in Google’s database (as of
December 2013). Rawls’s name appeared in
topic 5 nearly 8,000 times.
9
One might well count topic 19 as well, given
the prominence of the terms “care” and “vir-
tue,” which arguably represents care ethics—an
ethical approach historically associated with
feminism.
10
Our Mallet study appears to support this point
about feminist critiques of Rawls. The words
“Rawls” and “Rawlsian” appear most fre-
quently in the topic associated with liberalism
and justice (topic #5), but their second most
frequent appearance is in the topic associated
with gender and race (topic #8).
11
Stephen Kershnar was making the argument
that torture ought to be used as punishment
prior to 2002, and Michael Levin was arguing
that it was acceptable in ticking-bomb cases.
On the other side of things, Henry Shue and
Christopher Tindale were examining what was
morally problematic about the practice.
12
It is worth mentioning that our MALLET anal-
ysis was blind to this development. The term
torture appeared nearly 2,000 times—1,100
of which in association with topic 4—far less
than many other terms. This reflects, at least
in part, the sample journals available through
JSTOR. It also reflects the fact that many of
articles on torture have appeared in the last
 THE FUTURE(S) OF POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
6–7 years. To see the increase in publications
on torture would require a diachronic analysis.
13
This is, of course, a prediction. The term
“cyber” appears only rarely in our MALLET
analysis (under 50 times in its various forms).
Various (minimal) references to surveillance
and the use of computing are also present.
14
The term “religion” appears approximately
10,000 times in our MALLET analysis.
Variation of the term “terror” and the term
“inequality” likewise occur several thousand
times.
15
http://chronicle.com/article/The-Document-an-
Open-Letter/138937/
16
http://chronicle.com/article/Michael-Sandel-
Responds/139021/
17
We would like to thank Mark Wolff for his
expertise in carrying out our MALLET analy-
sis. We would also like to thank Robert Tracey
for some initial data collection.
WORKS CITED
Abbey, R. (2007), “Back toward a
Comprehensive Liberalism? Justice as
Fairness, Gender, and Families,” Political
Theory, 35 (1) (February): 5–28.
Kymlicka, W. (1995), Multicultural
Citizenship: A Liberal Theory of Minority
Rights. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
211
Lynn, W. J. III (2010), “Defending a New
Domain: The Pentagon’s Cyberstrategy,”
Foreign Affairs (September/October).
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/
articles/66552/william-j-lynn-iii/
defending-a-new-domain.
— (2011), “The Pentagon’s Cyberstrategy,
One Year Later,” Foreign Affairs
(September 28). http://www.
foreignaffairs.com/articles/68305/william-
j-lynn-iii/the-pentagons-cyberstrategy-
one-year-later.
MacIntyre, A. (1981), After Virtue. Notre
Dame, IN: Notre Dame University
Press.
Okin, S. M. (1994), “Political Liberalism,
Justice, and Gender,” Ethics, 105 (23):
23–43.
Pateman, C. (1988), The Sexual Contract.
Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Reidy, D. A. (2004), “Rawls on International
Justice: A Defense,” Political Theory, 32
(3) (June): 291–319.
Taylor, C. (1994), Multiculturalism.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Tully, J. (1995), Strange Multiplicity:
Constitutionalism in an Age of Diversity.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
 14
GLOBALIZATION, COSMOPOLITICS,
DECOLONIALITY: POLITICS FOR/OF
THE ANTHROPOCENE
Eduardo Mendieta
DECOLONIZING POLITICAL
PHILOSOPHY
Closing a book of this type calls for a consid-
eration of the tasks ahead for political phi-
losophy. In the following, therefore, I aim to
provide a map of the conceptual and philo-
sophical challenges we must meet in order
to develop a political philosophy for our
times and for the future that we should be
collectively constructing. In light of the most
recent debates within political philosophy in
particular and social theory in general, the
main agenda is how to “provincialize” and
“historicize” Europe and the West, while
also undertaking the project of epistemologi-
cal, conceptual, and theoretical decoloniza-
tion. I will approach this agenda through
the reconstruction and exegesis of Enrique
Dussel’s call for “destruction” of the history
of political philosophy (Dussel, 2011, xv). In
the second half of the chapter, I consider the
contemporary material conditions of possi-
bility for the projection and imagining of col-
lective futures in terms of a discussion of the
Anthropocene, the proposed name for a new
era in the history of our planet, which I argue
213
allows us to focus the challenges we face in
a world that has grown ever more interde-
pendent and also more fragile.
It may be argued that philosophy is not
only the compendium of humanity’s dialogue
with itself across time, but also the encyclo-
pedia of utopias, unfilled hopes, and dreams
of an undamaged and dignified humanity.
Hegel’s famous formulation that “philosophy
. . . is its own time apprehended in thoughts”
(Hegel, 2008, 15)  meant also that philoso-
phy is a portrait of humanity at a given time.
Philosophy is always in relationship to time.
Philosophy, we could claim, is the autobiog-
raphy of human thinking, but like all auto-
biographies, it is thus a particular type of
temporal device. Therefore, all philosophy
is by definition historicized and historically
material. Philosophy is caught in time, it is
of time, and it is for time. It is temporalized
and it temporalizes. This is what Hegel’s
phrase means, for “apprehended” (gefasst),
can also be translated as to cease, to grasp, to
gather and grab, to bring together and join.
Philosophy gathers the time of humanity in
thought. For this reason, we can also see why
and how philosophy is caught in the politics
Eduardo Mendieta
of time, of making time, of keeping time, of
giving time, of closing time. In these closing
reflections, I would like to think about the
time from which we think and the time for
which we think. We think from a tempo-
ral juncture that we are trying to diagnose.
This temporal diagnosis, however, is meant
to have some future consequences. Keeping
time and mapping time—a chronology is a
map of time, after all—are ways in which
we set temporal trajectories, that is, ways in
which we temporalize our future. The future
is constructed, just as much as the past is
always fabricated.
Where are we when we are keeping world
time, the time of humanity? In what time are
we when we philosophize about the future
of humanity? The last three decades have
spawned a series of very intense and conten-
tious debates about the name we ought to
give our time. Some have argued that we live
in the age of postcolonialism and postmod-
ernity. Others have argued about the unfin-
ished project of modernity and the second,
or reflexive modernity. Others have argued
in favor of naming our times as the age of
globalization. Others have, instead, urged
a name that also implies a moral and pol-
itical imperative: the age of cosmopolitan-
isms. Others, yet, argue that we live in an age
of post-Americana Pax and post European
hegemony. There are many more proposed
names, including a newly emerging name,
“the Anthropocene,” which focuses on the
global impact that human civilization, cul-
ture, and politics has had on the biosphere.
These names are all contentions because they
are all partial and they all reflect a particular
place on the map of the earth and the chron-
ology of world history. Every place on a map
is also a conjuncture of world time. When we
try to name our times, we are also placing
ourselves in relationship to our geotemporal
214
location and those of other societies and
cultures. This means that any form of philo-
sophical self-reflexivity has also to involve
a reflection about how we describe, “com-
prehend,” cease our times, and thus those
of others. All timelines or periodization that
facilitate and mediate any philosophizing
or theorizing are temporalizing practices.
Theory is a chronotopological dispositif
(Mendieta, 2001). To this extent, all theor-
izing must engage in a critique of its own
temporalizing, or by the same token, detem-
poralizing effects.
This is precisely what Argentine-Mexican
philosopher Enrique Dussel has invited
us to do in his monumental A Politics of
Liberation: A Critical World History, first
published in 2007 and translated in 2011
(Dussel, 2011). In the introduction, Dussel
calls for a “destruction” or “deconstruction”
of the extant histories of political philosophy
in order to properly put in perspective the
tasks ahead. In order to be able to construct
a proper world history of political philoso-
phy, we are called to dismantle those with
which we are familiar, or those with which
and through which we think, without even
being away that we assume them. In order
to dismantle the existing history of political
philosophy, Dussel identifies seven limits, or
let us call the distorting prejudices. The first
limit is a deeply rooted Hellenocentrism that
suffuses all histories of political philosophy.
The Greeks, Athens, Plato, Aristotle, and
the Stoics are taken as the point of depar-
ture for all political thinking, neglecting not
only the Egyptians and Mesopotamians, but
also the extent to which Confucianism and
the Semitic religious traditions prior to the
time of Athenian enlightenment had already
inaugurated a critique of politics, political
power, political authority, raising questions
of legality and legitimacy. Dussel notes, for
 GLOBALIZATION, COSMOPOLITICS, DECOLONIALITY
instance, that demos is an Egyptian word
that means village. The word’s etymology is
neither Greek nor Indo-European. He also
notes that the etymology of the word dike,
justice, lies in duku, from the Akkadian,
which is a Semitic language. Dussel has made
a stronger claim in the introduction to his
Ethics of Liberation, which also provides us
with a world history of ethical systems, which
begins with the Egyptians, and their Book of
the Dead, namely that Hellenocentrism cuts
us off from a long history of intense ethical,
political, and philosophical reflection that is
the very source of what we take to be origi-
nal in the Greeks (Dussel, 2012). In fact, the
time between 800 and 200 bc, which Jaspers
called the “Axial Age,” was period in human
history when religious critique was also
political critique, which is also evident in the
work of the Greeks (Jaspers, 1953).
The second chronotopological distor-
tion or limit that must be transgressed is
the Westernization of political philosophy.
By this, Dussel means that most histories of
political philosophy, in the West and Europe,
marginalize, at best, or excise, at worst, the
Eastern Roman Empire, Byzantium, and the
role of Constantinople, Venice and Genoa in
the evolution of political thinking from the
collapse of the Roman Empire through the
Renaissance. Along with many other schol-
ars, Dussel has argued that the Renaissance
itself would not have been possible without
the massive migrations from Byzantium
to Venice, Florence, and Genoa due to the
capture of Constantinople by the Turks in
1453.
The third limit that needs to be overcome
is the relentless Eurocentrism of most histo-
ries of political philosophy, which exclude
consideration of the contributions from
non-European and non-Western philo-
sophical traditions, such as the Egyptian,
215
Mesopotamian, Chinese, Islam, as well as
the Aztecs, Mayan, and Incas. Generally,
the consideration of these cultures is left to
anthropology, ethnography, or “Area Study”
specialists, who engage these cultures in very
circumscribed and delinking perspectives.
This inveterate Eurocentrism is always mar-
ried to an Orientalism that is as distorting
of Europe as it is of its putative “others.”
Both the Westernization and Eurocentrism
of histories of political philosophy project
what has been called Occidentalism, a fiction
as false and distorting as that produced by
Orientalism, a fiction that proclaims that the
“occident” is the pinnacle of human civiliza-
tion and the avant-garde in the time line of
universal history (Dussel, 1994). Overcoming
Eurocentrism, thus, requires that we dis-
mantle both Occidentalism, and its shadow,
Orientalism (Mendieta, 2010).
The fourth limit that Dussel identifies
is that of very self-serving periodizations.
These periodizations follow invidious, self-
congratulatory, and self-aggrandizing tem-
poral distinctions. It is taken for granted that
the history of political philosophy should
follow the trajectory that tells a very spe-
cific “occidentalist” narrative. It begins with
the Greeks, continues with the Romans, the
beginning of the Middle Ages, which some-
times is divided into late Antiquity and/or
early Middle Ages, and Late Middle Ages,
which then is followed by the Renaissance,
generally only circumscribed to the Italian
city states, then to be followed by the birth of
the Modern period with Hobbes, Locke, and
Rousseau to then be followed by the German
and French Enlightenments, and so on. This
chronology has become so de rigueur as to
become pedestrian. This chronology, how-
ever, reveals to what extent all similar chro-
nologies are chronotopological maps. For
this chronology privileges Central Europe to
Eduardo Mendieta
the detriment of Mediterranean and Eastern
Europe (Byzantium). Here we only need to
note that this chronology makes no sense if we
place ourselves in China, the modern Middle
East, India, or pre-Colombian America. In
fact, what the Gulbenkian Commission on
the Restructuring of the Social Sciences did
for the Social Sciences needs to be done for
both political philosophy in particular and
philosophy in general, namely to correlate the
disciplinarization of knowledge into certain
“faculties” that unconsciously but effectively
excluded the non-West from the production
of knowledge (Wallerstein et al., 1996).
The fifth conceptual limit that must be
superseded, or at least made explicit, is the
secularism that is sine qua non to most histo-
ries of political thought. This secularism is an
ideological effect of a certain view not only
of the political, but also of the relationship of
societal progress and the legitimacy of politi-
cal institutions. In the West, rationalization
qua modernization has been tied to the thesis
of the secularization of society. Religion(s)
persists, however, and yet societies, whether
Western or non-Western, are only consid-
ered “modern” if they are allegedly secular.
Yet even a country, as modern as the United
States, is nonetheless deeply religious and
could hardly be considered fully secular, or
the paragon of secularity. It is always the reli-
gion of the “other” that we find objectiona-
ble, even as we are blind to our own religious
commitments.
The sixth conceptual limit Dussel identi-
fies is what he calls theoretical, intellectual
colonialism that continues to neglect both
the philosophical political concerns of the so-
called global South, and the persistent privi-
leging of the Metropolitan preoccupations,
narratives, and chronologies. Even when
thinkers are thinking in postcolonial con-
texts, they continue to orient their research
216
through the agendas and canons established
in the colonial and imperial universities and
think tanks. This is the type of thinking
and philosophizing that is of our time, but
that at the same time is out of our time. It
belongs to the age of postcolonialism, glo-
balization, and different forms of cosmopoli-
tanism, but it remains “colonized” political
philosophy. Colonized political philosophy
detemporalizes by naturalizing and dehistor-
icizing Western and Eurocentric narratives
and chronologies.
The seventh limit has to do with what
Dussel himself has called somewhere else the
“myth of modernity,” a myth that entails the
exclusion of the discovery of the Americas
from the narrative of “modernity” (Dussel,
1994). For Dussel, there is no way to discuss
the “project of modernity” without a careful
consideration of the ways in which colonial-
ism provided the material conditions of pos-
sibility for economic development in Europe.
But more than providing the material wealth
that would underwrite the economic growth
of Europe, the so-called New World also pro-
vided the intellectual, theological, and philo-
sophical impetus for the development of some
of the foundational doctrines and concepts
that constitute the philosophical ground for
modern political philosophy. Figures such as
Bartolomé de las Casas, Ginés de Sepúlveda,
Francisco de Vitoria and Francisco Suárez,
argues Dussel, should be considered and
studied as the first political philosophers of
modernity, before Bodin, Hobbes, Locke,
and Rousseau. They are after all the first phi-
losophers, theologians, thinkers who tried to
develop a political philosophy that would
address the plurality of peoples and religions
in a context in which the Judeo-Christian
religions had become one religion among
many others. The “Americas” have been con-
stitutive of the very project of Europe, both
 GLOBALIZATION, COSMOPOLITICS, DECOLONIALITY
materially and conceptually; yet these roles
have been either neglected or entirely denied.
We have to do a history of political phi-
losophy in reverse, to use the expression by
Germán Arciniegas, or read back into Europe
what it took from America while erasing that
appropriation (Arciniegas, 1986).
The persistence of this neglect and denial
have to do with what Anibal Quijano has
called the “coloniality of power,” by which
he means at the very least that contemporary
power relations among colonial powers, and
between imperial and postcolonial nations
and cultures are suffused and always already
refracted by their colonial past, which is
hardly part, and that remains ever present
(Quijano, 2000). The coloniality of power is
the persistence of modes of thinking racial,
sexual, and ethnic relations established dur-
ing the colonial period. For Quijano, as well
as for Dussel, we cannot speak of moder-
nity without coloniality, and thus we should
always speak of the modernity/coloniality
duet. The coloniality of power, we could add,
conditions what could be called “the colonial-
ity of epistemology,” or “coloniality of knowl-
edge” (Lander, 2000). By this we mean that
metropolitan, colonial, and imperial interests
and perspectives set the agenda for political
philosophy; colonial and imperial institu-
tions are taken to be normative and the cul-
mination of allegedly exemplary and putative
“normal” paths of development, which meth-
odologically and conceptually perpetuate an
agnotological process (i.e. the active process
of the production of ignorance, erasure, and
forgetfulness of the expropriation of knowl-
edges from other cultures) that expropriates
the contributions to political philosophy by
subalterns and former colonial outposts.
Decolonizing political philosophy thus
requires that we acknowledge and confront
the “epistemology of ignorance” imposed by
217
the “coloniality of knowledge” (Sullivan and
Tuana, 2007). Decolonizing political philoso-
phy thus requires that we be attentive to the
“coloniality of power” and the “coloniality
of epistemology” that condition the kinds of
questions we ask, the kinds of narratives we
assume and project, and the kinds of knowl-
edges we expropriate or appropriate without
acknowledging their sources.
Dussel’s call for a “deconstruction” of
contemporary histories of political philoso-
phy turns out to be in fact a call for the
decolonization of political philosophy. The
seven limits that he identifies have to do
with the ways in which political philosophy
in general wittingly or unwittingly, overtly
or covertly, avowedly or disavowedly relies
on and projects chronologies and temporal-
izing narratives that either recognize or deny
what Fabian has called the “coevalness” of
other cultures (Fabian, 1983). To decolo-
nize political philosophy then requires that
we dismantle political philosophy as a chro-
notopological dispositif that relegates some
to an immemorial and stagnant past and
other to the very avant-garde of a future that
is only theirs. This means ceasing to philoso-
phize the political without theodicies and
soteriologies or triumphalist and develop-
mentalist narratives of progress.
POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY FOR THE
ANTHROPOCENE
One succinct definition of the political is
that which has to do with the creation of
collective possibilities through deliberation,
in which a collectivity addresses itself both
a subject and object of its deliberations. In
this sense, the political is about projecting
and making possible collective or communal
Eduardo Mendieta
futures. The future is always the product
of politics. But there is no future that is not
projected from some actuality, some present.
When we think about what kind of future
we can project and construct today, we have
to begin with the present conditions of pos-
sibility. There is no better way than to sur-
vey the present conditions of possibility than
through the term “Anthropocene,” a term
recently coined by Nobel Prize winner Dutch
chemist Paul Crutzen in an essay in Nature
(Crutzen, 2002). This new age in the history
of the planet refers to the human-induced
massive, irreversible, and unpredictable
transformation to the earth’s environment,
en toto, from the atmosphere to the seas.
According to Crutzen, in the last three cen-
turies the world population has increased
by a factor of 10 to more than 7 billion. The
United Nations estimates that by 2050 the
world population will reach 9.6 billion. The
cattle needed to feel this teeming humanity,
which produces the methane that affects the
atmosphere, has risen to 1.4 billion. Humans
exploit close to half of the land surface of the
planet. Tropical forests are rapidly being cut
to clear space for cattle and farming, decreas-
ing the ability of green areas to absorb car-
bon dioxide. Half of the available potable
water in the world is already being used. The
burning of fossil fuels and the expansion of
agriculture have accelerated the concentra-
tion of “green house” effects—carbon diox-
ide by 30 percent and methane by more than
100  percent—climbing to the highest levels
in the last 400 millennia. Crutzen points
out that most of these severe and irrevers-
ible trends have been “largely caused by only
25% of the world population” (Crutzen,
2002, 23). The accumulation of all these
green house gases has resulted and will con-
tinue to impact the rise of the temperature of
the earth. The Intergovernmental Panel on
218
Climate Change (IPCC) estimates that the
planet’s atmosphere will warm up between
1.4 and 5.8 degrees centigrade. Some of the
most immediate and evident consequences
of such warming are the unleashing of severe
weather and the transformation of global
climates. Something that Crutzen does not
point out is that now most of humanity lives
in cities, and that most of the growth in urban
areas will take place in the global south.
Something else that is not noted by Crutzen
but which should be part of the diagnosis
of the Anthropocene is that the warming of
the planet is accelerating desertification in
already very vulnerable areas of the planet.
This means that more and more humans
will be displaced from the countryside into
the growing cities of the planet. The megaur-
banization of the planet is de facto turning
into a megaslumization of humanity. Finally,
while Crutzen does note that only 25 percent
of the world population is responsible for
most of the pollution and consumption that
is driving the ecological crisis, he fails to note
that some of the causes of the present eco-
logical crisis have to do with global relations
and trends established when Europe began
the process of colonization of the Americas,
Africa, and Asia. Whoever speaks of the con-
temporary ecological crisis must also address
the colonial and imperial archeology of the
forms of power that condition how world
resources are consumed and by whom. The
ecological crisis is itself a political effect of
the world colonialism and imperialism built
over the last 600 years.
Whether we call this a “new period” or
“age” of the planet the “Anthropocene” or
the “anthropozoic” era is itself a political
question. The “facts” and “trends” of this
new age are also the battleground of politi-
cal deliberation. Yet, it is clear that whatever
horizon of futurity we want to deliberate
 GLOBALIZATION, COSMOPOLITICS, DECOLONIALITY
about must include all the evidence about
the cataclysmic and irreversible changes
in the earth due to anthropogenic factors.
These “planetary” factors have to be con-
sidered against the background of a series
of framework conditions for the interaction
of humanity in the coming future. Here, we
can only identify these new social–political
framework conditions and indicate how they
impact and condition the development of a
political philosophy for the anthropocene,
beyond Eurocentrism and after the decoloni-
zation of political philosophy.
We now live, although not equita-
bly and within the same temporalities, in
what Luhmann called the “world society”
(Luhmann, 2012). We may be citizens of spe-
cific nation-states, but we are all part of thick
and overarching webs of institutions, from the
economy and transnational legal systems to
the projection of a global imaginary through
world cinema, literatures, and music. This
means that our fates, hopes, and imaginar-
ies are now interlinked in ways never before
possible or imagined. This “world society” is
made ever more cohesive and interdependent
through the emergence of a “global public
sphere” that is partly enabled by the world
wide web, and also by the numerous non-
government organizations (NGOs) that are
continuously bringing to the attention of the
world public crises, crimes, and challenges in
many different regions of the world, which
nonetheless have global impact. It is part of
this global public sphere to be heterogeneous,
decentered, and ever emergent (Mendieta,
2013). At the same time, we have the emer-
gence and growing institutionalization of
what can be called a “global order guided by
human rights.” Human rights have become
the gold standard for all kinds of legiti-
mate political and legal orders. Interestingly,
the juridification of human rights and the
219
growing “soft power” (power of persuasion
and suasion, rather than military or violent
power) of the world court and world criminal
court has given rise to what could be called
the “Human Rights-Politics Paradox.” On the
one hand, it is only within nation-states, with
their respective constitutional guarantees of
citizenship rights, that can effectively enforce
the moral and legal principles embodied in
human rights; on the other hand, the sover-
eignty of these nation-states is questioned and
challenged from the standpoint of human
rights. To this extent it could be claimed we
live in a post-national age, but not yet in the
age of a global constitutionalism that guar-
antees and secures for all human beings their
basic human rights. Finally, we live in an age
in which the inequities between the poor and
the wealthy have grown abysmally, exacer-
bating questions of global justice. Enduring
global inequities, established during the colo-
nial and imperial periods, furthermore, is
being exacerbated by what could be called
the “monetization of financial risk” at the
global level. This is in fact one dimension of
the “world society” of which we have become
unwilling members, namely the emergence
of a global economy that now includes the
financial sector as a productive element of the
economy. This is why economic crises in one
country, or even one part of the world, can no
longer be contained within nations or even
economic blocs. The integration of financial
markets at the global level means that incur-
ring financial risks, such as betting on hedge
funds and derivatives, can tap national econ-
omies by shifting failures to local national
budgets, while privatizing the profits derived
from these risks. In the age of the world soci-
ety, the globalization of financial markets
has become the latest tool of neoimperialist
expropriation. Economic crises are the latest
form of imperial pillage.
Eduardo Mendieta
We live in an age of unprecedented interde-
pendence and asymmetrically lived vulnera-
bilities. We live in the age of new assemblages
and also massive expulsions, to use Sassen’s
language (Sassen, 2014). Political philoso-
phy is called to rethink its basic categories of
analysis and to dismantle its methodological
Eurocentrism and conceptual colonialism,
as Kerner put it very aptly (Kerner, 2013).
One way in which it can begin to do both
things is by engaging in a reflection about
how all thinking is a chronotopological
device, a method for granting time, or taking
time away. The narratives that have guided
most of political philosophy over the last
500  years, those of secularization, enlight-
enment, modernity, progress, development,
have placed the invented West and homog-
enized Europe at the zero hour of world his-
tory, at the 12 o’clock of the day on the clock
of universal history, the time from which all
others can be seen as lagging behind, always
too late, never ever able to be on time.
Appadurai has written about the future as a
cultural fact (Appadurai, 2013). Echoing him,
I have argued here that political philosophy
is precisely about imagining, projecting, and
constructing collective futures. We cannot do
this collectively so long as the colonial past
continues to frame how we think about our
challenges and the future remains mortgaged
to the vision of progress projected by both
Occidentalism and Orientalism. A political
philosophy that dismantles this chronoto-
pogical matrix may be one that thinks from
the standpoint of developing global institu-
tions that take as a point of departure the
achievements of the regime of human rights;
it would also be one that takes up the unfin-
ished tasks of the constitutionalization of a
global legal regime that secures the self-de-
termination of peoples while also juridifying
the new globalized financial market. It will
220
thus have to be a political philosophy that
calls for more democracy, and the renewed
task of submitting global economy to the
political regulation of political actors.
WORKS CITED
Appadurai, A. (2013), The Future as a
Cultural Fact: Essays on the Global
Condition. New York and London:
Verso.
Arciniegas, G. (1986), America in Europe:
a history of the New World in Reverse.
San Diego, CA: Harcourt Brace
Jovanovich.
Crutzen, P. J. (2002), “Geology of Mankind”
Nature, 415: 23.
Dussel, E. (2012), Ethics of Liberation in
the Age of Globalization and Exclusion.
Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
— (2011), Politics of Liberation. A Critical
World History. London: SCM Press.
— (1994), 1492. El Encubrimineto del
Otro. Hacia el origen del “mito de la
modernidad” Conferencias de Frankfurt.
Octubre de 1992. La Paz, Bolivia: Plural
Editores.
Fabian, J. (1983), Time and the Other: How
Anthropology Makes its Object. New
York: Columbia University Press.
Hegel, G. W. F. (2008), Outlines of the
Philosophy of Right. Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Jaspers, K. (1953), The Origin and Goal of
History. New Haven, CT: Yale University
Press.
Kerner, I. (2013), “Differences in Inequality:
Tracing the Socioeconomic, the Cultural
and the Political in Latin American
Postcolonial Theory,” desiguALdades.
net Working Papers Series 60. Berlin:
 GLOBALIZATION, COSMOPOLITICS, DECOLONIALITY
desiguALdades.net International Research
Network on Interdependent Inequalities
in Latin America.
Lander, E. (2000), La colonialidad del saber.
Eurocentrismo y ciencias sociales. Buenos
Aires: UNESCO-CLASCO.
Luhmann, N. (2012), Theory of Society,
Vol. 1. Stanford, CA: Stanford University
Press, pp. 83–99.
Mendieta, E. (2001), “Chronotopology:
Critique of Spatiotemporal Regimes,” in
W. S. Wilkerson and J. Paris (eds), New
Critical Theory: Essays on Liberation.
Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield
Publishers, pp. 175–197.
— (2010), “Postcolonialism,
Postorientalism, Postoccidentalism: The
Past That Never Went Away and the
Future That Never Arrived,” in May,
T., Emerging Trends in Continental
Philosophy. Vol. 8. The History of
Continental Philosophy, A. D. Schrift
(ed.). Durham: Acumen, pp. 149–172.
221
— (2013), “World Society, Public Sphere
and Cosmopolitanism,” in R. Raúl
Fornet-Betancourt, H. Schelkshorn,
and F. Gmainer-Pranzl (eds), Auf dem
Weg zu einer Gerechten Universalität:
Philosophischen Grundlagen und
Politischen Perspektiven. Aachen:
Wissenschaftsverlag Mainz, pp. 127–139.
Quijano, A. (2000), “Coloniality of Power,
Eurocentrism, and Latin America,”
Nepantla: Views from the South, 1 (3):
533–580.
Sassen, S. (2014), Expulsions: Brutality
and Complexity in the Global Economy.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Sullivan, S. and Tuana, N. (eds) (2007), Race
and the Epistemologies of Ignorance.
Albany, NY: SUNY Press.
Wallerstein, I. (1996), Open the Social
Sciences: Report of the Gulbenkian
Commission on the Restructuring of the
Social Sciences. Stanford, CA: Stanford
University Press.
 CHRONOLOGY

BEFORE THE COMMON ERA 800: Charlemagne crowned emperor

1215: Magna Carta
ca. 650: Draco the Lawgiver 1221–1274: Aquinas
638–558: Solon 1285–1347: William of Ockham
495–425: Pericles 1469–1527: Machiavelli
470–399: Socrates 1478–1535: Thomas More
460–395: Thucydides 1483–1546: Martin Luther
445–365: Antisthenes (founder of Cynicism) 1516: Thomas More publishes Utopia
431–404: Peloponnesian War 1517: Luther’s 95 Theses
427–347: Plato 1583–1645: Hugo Grotius
412–323: Diogenes the Cynic 1588–1653: Robert Filmer
384–322: Aristotle 1588–1679: Thomas Hobbes
336–323: Reign of Alexander the Great 1618–1648: Thirty Years War
334–262: Zeno of Citium (founder of 1625: Grotius publishes On the Laws of
Stoicism) War and Peace
106–43: Cicero 1648: Peace of Westphalia
100–44: Julius Caesar (reigned from 49–44) 1651: Hobbs publishes Leviathan
63 bce—14 ce: Augustus Caesar (reigned 1632–1694: Samuel von Pufendorf
form 27 bce–14 ce) 1632–1704: John Locke
27 bce–180 ce: Pax Romana 1642–1651: English Civil War
1688: Glorious Revolution
1689: Locke publishes Two Treatises of
Government and Letter Concerning
COMMON ERA Toleration
1689–1755: Charles de Secondat, Baron
4 bce—65 ce: Seneca Montesquieu
55–135: Epictetus 1712–1778: Jean-Jacques Rousseau
121–180: Marcus Aurelius 1724–1804: Immanuel Kant
306–337: Reign of Constantine 1729–1797: Edmund Burke
354–430: Augustine 1732–1790: Adam Smith
534: Justinian’s Code 1743–1826: Thomas Jefferson

223
CHRONOLOGY
1748–1832: Jeremy Bentham
1748: Montesquieu publishes The Spirit of
the Laws
1754: Rousseau publishes Discourse on the
Origin and Basis of Inequality Among
Men
1756: Burke publishes A Vindication of
Natural Society: A View of the Miseries
and Evils Arising to Mankind From Every
Species of Artificial Society
1756–1836: William Godwin
1759–1797: Mary Wollstonecraft
1762: Rousseau publishes Of The Social
Contract, Or Principles of Political Right
1770–1831: George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
1775–1783: American Revolution
1781: Bentham publishes Principles of
Morals and Legislation
1789–1799: French Revolution
1791: Godwin publishes Enquiry
Concerning Political Justice and Its
Influence on Morals and Happiness
1790–1859: John Austin
1790: Burke publishes Reflections on the
Revolution in France
1792: Wollstonecraft publishes Vindication
of the Rights of Women
1795: Kant publishes Perpetual Peace: A
Philosophical Sketch
1797: Kant publishes The Metaphysics of
Morals (including Science of Right)
1806–1873: John Stuart Mill
1809–1865: Pierre Proudhon
1814–1876: Mikhail Bakunin
1817–1862: Henry David Thoreau
1818–1883: Karl Marx
1821: Hegel publishes Elements of the
Philosophy of Right
1840: Proudhon publishes What is
Property?
1844–1900: Friedrich Nietzsche
1848: Marx and Engels publish Communist
Manifesto
224
1849: Thoreau publishes Civil Disobedience
1859: Mill publishes On Liberty
1859–1952: John Dewey
1860–1935: Jane Addams
1861: Mill publishes Considerations on
Representative Government
1864–19020: Max Weber
1869–1940: Emma Goldman
1869–1948: Mohandas K. Gandhi
1882: Bakunin publishes God and the State
1887: Nietzsche publishes On the
Genealogy of Morals
1888–1985: Carl Schmitt
1895–1973: Max Horkheimer
1898–1979: Herbert Marcuse
1899–1973: Leo Strauss
1903–1969: Theodor W. Adorno
1905–1982: Ayn Rand
1905: Weber publishes The Protestant Ethic
and the Spirit of Capitalism
1906–1975: Hannah Arendt
1907–1992: H. L. A. Hart
1909–1997: Isaiah Berlin
1914–1918: First World War
1917: Russian Revolution
1919: Weber publishes Politics as Vocation
1919: Schmitt publishes Political Theology
1921–2002: John Rawls
1926–1984: Michel Foucault
b. 1929: Jürgen Habermas
1930–2004: Jacques Derrida
1931–2013: Ronald Dworkin
1932: Schmitt publishes The Concept of the
Political
b. 1934: Enrique Dussel
b. 1935: Michael Walzer
1938–2002: Robert Nozick
1939–1945: Second World War
b. 1943: Chantal Mouffe
1944: Horkheimer and Adorno publish
Dialectic of Enlightenment
1945: Founding of the United Nations
b. 1949: Slavoj Žižek

b. 1947: Martha Nussbaum
1947–1991: Cold War
1949–2006: Iris Marion Young
1950: Adorno et al. publish The
Authoritarian Personality
1951: Arendt publishes The Origins of
Totalitarianism
b. 1953: Michael Sandel
b. 1953: Thomas Pogge
1953: Strauss publishes Natural Right and
History
1959: Strauss publishes What is Political
Philosophy?
1961: Hart publishes The Concept of Law
1962: Habermas publishes The Structural
Transformation of the Public Sphere
1963: Arendt publishes On Revolution
b. 1962: Will Kymlicka
1964: Marcuse publishes One-Dimensional
Man
1969: Berlin publishes Four Essays on Liberty
1970: Arendt publishes On Violence
1971: Rawls publishes A Theory of Justice
1974: Nozick publishes Anarchy, State,
Utopia
225
CHRONOLOGY
1975: Foucault publishes Discipline and
Punish
1977: Walzer publishes Just and Unjust Wars
1981: Habermas publishes Theory of
Communicative Action
1982: Sandel publishes Liberalism and the
Limits of Justice
1983: Walzer publishes Spheres of Justice
1990: Young publishes Justice and the
Politics of Difference
1993: Rawls publishes Political Liberalism
1995: Kymlicka publishes Multicultural
Citizenship
1998: Nussbaum publishes Sex and Social
Justice
1999: Rawls publishes The Law of Peoples
2000: Negri and Hardt publish Empire
2002: Pogge publishes World Poverty and
Human Rights
2005: Mouffe publishes On the Political
2006: Nussbaum publishes Frontiers of
Justice: Disability, Nationality, Species
Membership
2007: Dussel publishes Politics of Liberation
(translated to English in 2011)
 GLOSSARY1
Absolutism:  Term used to describe regimes
or systems of thought that are totaliz-
ing, exceptionless, and all-encompassing.
Absolutist regimes are autocratic: all
power is invested in the ruler. Absolutist
monarchs ruled Europe in the eighteenth
century. Defenders of enlightened abso-
lutism argued that the best form of gov-
ernment was one in which a benevolent
central authority had absolute power. See
also totalitarianism.
Alien:  A person residing within a coun-
try who is not a citizen of that country.
Aliens may be permitted to visit, live, and
work within a country based upon a pro-
cess involving visas and official permits.
Illegal aliens are those who are in a coun-
try in violation of that official permitting
process.
Anarchy/Anarchism:  A theory of government
(and related political movements/parties)
that denies the legitimacy of governmen-
tal rule. While anarchism is often skeptical
and critical of political power, anarchism
can also advocate the positive goal of creat-
ing a stateless society based on voluntary
association. Anarchists emphasize indi-
vidual autonomy, the importance of con-
sensus and unanimity in deliberation, and
a radical critique of structures of social and
political control. From Greek an-archos
(without rule or principle).
227
Aristocracy:  A form of governmental orga-
nization ostensibly focused on rule of
the good or best (in Greek aristos means
“good” or “excellent”). In practice, aris-
tocracies are constructed as governments
ruled by wealthy landowners and nobil-
ity.
Asylum:  Those who suffer persecution under
a given political organization may ask for
asylum from another entity with political
power (or religious power). When the right
to asylum is invoked, the organization
that provides sanctuary may offer protec-
tion for the asylum-seeker. International
law recognizes the rights of asylum-seek-
ers. Also certain spaces within sovereign
states—such as embassies—may be places
of asylum for those fleeing persecution.
Authoritarian(-ism):  A form of government
that emphasizes central control and hier-
archical structures of power. Focused on
structures of command and obedience
that supersede individual judgment and
personal autonomy. Contrasted with
non-authoritarian structures and regimes,
which are open to dissent, pluralistic, and
individualistic.
Autocracy:  A form of government that invests
absolute power in one person—the auto-
crat, who rules autocratically (or without
constraint). Autocracy comes from Greek:
auto—meaning “self”—and—cracy/kra-
GLOSSARY
tos—meaning “rule”). Autocracy implies
independence and self-sufficiency in rul-
ing. While the term is not necessarily
pernicious, autocracy has negative conno-
tations, since autocratic rule tends to be
despotic and absolutist.
Autonomy/Autonomous:  Literally “self-rule”
(auto = self; nomos = rule/law). As a norma-
tive principle autonomy establishes a right
to self-rule, self-control, and self-determi-
nation, that is connected to claims about
individual rights. It can also be employed
to describe regions or groups that have a
legal right to self-governance or national
self-determination. Autonomy is a cen-
tral concern for theories of human rights
and for Kantian/deontological theories of
morality and politics.
Balance of Power:  A circumstance in which
different sovereign powers or parts of
government are held in check or bal-
anced in opposition to other powers or
parts. The balance of power can produce
power sharing arrangements between
various parties. In federal systems, there
is a balance of power between local enti-
ties and the federal government. In mixed
governments with a separation of power,
there is a balance between the parts of
government. In international affairs, the
balance of power is understood in terms
of opposing spheres of interest, alliances,
and power differentials among nations. In
international relations, the issue of bal-
ance of power is connected with questions
about hegemony and structural conflicts
understood in terms of unipolar, bipolar,
or multipolar models.
Buffer Zones:  Border areas that are estab-
lished in order to prevent or inhibit inter-
action across borders. Often employed
along contested international borders as
a way of preventing border skirmishes
and cross-border violence. Also described
as areas of separation, zones of neutrality
(or neutral zones), or demilitarized zones.
In contemporary international relations,
228
buffer zones are often monitored by inter-
national peacekeeping forces.
Bureaucracy:  Large organizations consisting
of various offices (bureaus) and officials
(bureacrats). Bureaucracy often refers
to the system of unelected officials who
make up the apparatus of government—
the hierarchical structure of offices orga-
nized in what is called the civil service.
Bureaucracy can be used pejoratively to
indicate a set of excessively complicated
rules, regulations, and procedures. Some
social theorists follow Max Weber in
understanding bureaucracy as part of
efficient modernization necessitated by
increasing complexity and the division of
labor—creating what Weber described as
the “iron cage” of bureaucratic life. Crit-
ics—notably the critical theorists of the
Frankfurt school—argue that bureaucra-
cies breed so-called bureaucratic ratio-
nality that tends toward conformism,
legalism, and deference toward author-
ity.
Capitalism:  A form of economic organi-
zation that is based upon commitment
to private ownership of property and
the ability to make profit by exchanges
of labor and goods in an open market.
Capitalism is based upon wage labor, in
which labor is exchanged for monetary
compensation. Capitalism developed in
the modern period out of previous feu-
dalism. It was challenged as an economic
system by communism in the twentieth
century. Capitalism is often associated
with liberal, democratic forms of gov-
ernment, since liberal democracies tend
to emphasize the importance of the right
to private property. Liberal democracies
tend to embrace laissez-faire capital-
ism, while socialist governments tend
to impose more regulations on the mar-
ket. More authoritarian and central-
ized regimes (such as China) have also
embraced a version of capitalism known
as state capitalism.

Citizen/Citizenship:  A citizen is a person who
belongs to a national political entity and
has the rights, protections, and responsi-
bilities of full members of that political
group—related to the idea of national-
ity. Citizenship may be defined as mere
belonging, often understood either as eth-
nic identity (so-called jus sanguinis or right
of blood citizenship) or as a birth-right of
native born persons (so-called jus soli or
right of the soil citizenship). In the United
States, those born within the borders of
the United States are citizens by birth. In
other nations, citizenship is defined by the
blood of one’s parents. Citizenship can
also be acquired through a process of nat-
uralization: naturalized citizens are those
who have acquired citizenship through a
deliberate process by which they swear
allegiance to their newly acquired nation.
Citizens may have more rights than non-
citizens in some nations—including rights
to work, rights to education, healthcare,
and so on. In this regard, citizens are pro-
tected by civil rights. Citizenship may also
be accompanied by responsibilities includ-
ing the duty to serve in the military, the
obligation to vote, the requirement of jury
service, and so on.
Civilization:  An idea describing a level of
political and economic development that
involves the creation of cities, includ-
ing sedentary people, division of labor,
surplus wealth, political and religious
hierarchy. The term “civilization” and
“civilized” are sometimes used to indi-
cate a distinction between more primitive
forms of development. This way of orga-
nizing things indicates a developmental
hierarchy, with civilization viewed as an
advancement over less primitive forms
of life. The term civilization is also used
to identify broad trans-national cultural
identities. This idea has been employed
to describe a supposed clash of civiliza-
tion (e.g. as found in the work of Samuel
Huntington).
229
GLOSSARY
Civil Disobedience:  The act of disobeying
a law, while accepting punishment for
disobedience, employed in an effort to
protest against unjust law. Civil disobe-
dience is often employed as a nonviolent
technique of social protest. Unlike in acts
of conscientious objection or refusal, the
laws violated in civil disobedience are
not necessarily the laws viewed as unjust.
Civil disobeyers may violate parade
and assembly regulations, hoping to be
arrested as an act of protest against other
unjust laws. This method has been widely
employed in civil rights protests around
the world—inspired by ideas and activi-
ties of Thoreau, Gandhi, King, and others.
Unlike violent revolution, which aims to
overthrow the legal system, civil disobe-
dience occurs out of what Rawls calls
“fidelity to law”—with the idea that the
legal system is basically just, even though
the law being protested is unjust.
Civil Liberties:  Civil liberties are basic liber-
ties afforded to citizens. Often this includes
rights or liberties, such as to freedom of
speech, freedom of assembly, and freedom
of religion. These liberties are associated
with the private choices of individual
citizens. These rights are often primar-
ily conceived of as negative rights. Civil
liberties are usually extensively defended
within liberal regimes. This concept is
closely connected with the notion of civil
rights and sometimes the terms are used
interchangeably. However, the notion of
civil liberties focuses more specifically on
protecting individuals from governmental
coercion in spheres of private concern.
Civil Rights:  Civil rights are the rights of cit-
izens. While civil liberties are understood
in negative terms as the basic liberties of
private individual citizens, civil rights can
be understood to include a broader range
of political rights and positive rights. They
usually include the right to participate in
governmental decision making through
the right to vote and petition the govern-
GLOSSARY
ment, the right to due process including
the right to have a speedy and fair trial
by jury, and so on. Civil rights can extend
toward a broader set of positive rights
that includes a right to fair wages, fair
housing, freedom from employment dis-
crimination, the right to work, the right
to education, and other welfare rights.
Unlike human rights that extend to all
humans, civil rights may only extend to
citizens.
Civil Society:  The sphere of human activity
outside of governmental/political life. In
Hegelian theory, civil society (Bürgerliche
Gesellschaft) is located midway between
merely private lives of individuals (where
morality is a primary concern) and the
political life of the national community
(where law and legislation are primary
concerns). This middle sphere includes
business interests, unions, and other
social organizations. A key component of
civil society is the voluntary nature of its
organizations. While laws regulate social
and business life, participation in the
institutions of civil society is voluntary.
Some theorists—such as Walzer and Put-
nam—point out that robust civil society
is an essential feature of stable polities,
since civil society allows for the develop-
ment of lateral relationships of trust that
bind pluralistic polities together despite
their internal diversity. One feature of the
extra-legal and voluntary coordination of
civil society is a set of virtues that allow
for social interaction: tolerance, nonvio-
lence, solidarity, and civility. See also pub-
lic sphere.
Civility:  A social virtue that allows for
productive and harmonious interaction
among diverse people. Civility includes
basic norms of politeness and etiquette. It
also includes more robust norms and rules
for social interaction, political debate, and
public deliberation. Closely related to tol-
erance, civility is understood as grounded
in basic agreement about the norms of
230
civil society, which bind citizens together
in a common project despite their differ-
ences.
Collectivism:  A theory of social and politi-
cal organization that emphasizes group
cohesion and unity often focused on
centralized and hierarchical political
organization. Or collectivism may focus
on the need for consensus and esprit de
corps. Collectivism in mass society may
be opposed to a more traditional, organic
notion of community. In this sense, collec-
tives are mere groups gather together en
masse, while communities are groups who
cooperate and share things in common.
Communes or intentional communities
are often understood in opposition to the
collectives of mass society. Collectivism is
also opposed to individualism.
Colonialism:  A theory and practice of inter-
national expansion aimed at exploita-
tion of either an occupied territory or
resettlement in that territory by foreign-
ers. Colonialism includes hierarchical and
hegemonic social and political structures,
similar to imperialism. Colonialism aims
at establishing some form of governance
over a foreign polity, while imperialism
aims more at exploitation and military
control. In some versions, colonialism
(like imperialism) was justified by some
version of the ideology known as the
white man’s burden—the idea that Euro-
pean powers had a moral obligation to
uplift, educate, and liberate backward
and uncivilized peoples across the globe.
Colonialism was ended with liberation
movements around the globe, leading the
development of post-colonial theory.
Common Good:  The good as defined in
terms of what is good for the commu-
nity or collective. In traditional Christian
social justice teaching, the common good
is understood as the sum total of good for
each individual as a whole. In utilitarian-
ism, the common good can be understood
in terms of the greatest happiness for the

greatest number. Related concepts include
the public welfare, public interest, or
­commonweal.
Commons:  The commons is what is not
owned in a system of private property. It is
shared resources and spaces that are open
for communal use. Commons include
oceanic and atmospheric resources. Some
resources may be understood as commons
within a nation, while other commons are
open for international use. See also trag-
edy of the commons.
Commonwealth:  A political order that is
oriented around the common good, the
commonweal, or public welfare. The term
“commonwealth” is also used to indicate
national identity (as in the Common-
wealth of Australia) and federations of
nations (as in the former British colonies
that are associated in the Commonwealth
of Nations—formerly the British Com-
monwealth). Commonwealth signifies
an affiliation based on shared culture,
language, and political values. As a name
for a national government, “common-
wealth” indicates a “republican” form of
government—that is government focused
on public welfare rather than the private
satisfaction of the ruling nobility.
Commune/Communalism:  A commune is
a social group organized along coop-
erative lines and based upon notions of
shared communal resources, mutual-
ity, and reciprocity. In some cases, com-
munes have been established as separate,
counter-cultural communities that isolate
themselves from the larger social whole.
Communalism is an anarchist or radically
decentralized alternative to state-centered
socialism/communism, which emphasizes
the development of small scale and auton-
omous communes.
Communism:  A form of economic (and
political) organization that focuses on
communal ownership of property, includ-
ing the abolition of private property and
ending the profit/market system of capi-
231
GLOSSARY
talism. Communism may be understood
as the most radical development of social-
ism, which aims in the direction of sub-
stantive equality. In the nineteenth and
twentieth centuries, communism devel-
oped especially through the influence of
Karl Marx toward the call for global rev-
olution against capitalism, which had a
lasting impact on global politics. Commu-
nal ownership of goods and cooperation
aims, in Marxist terms, to distribute goods
to each individual according to their need.
Unlike ancient and modern communal-
ism, which focused on separate, local, and
self-sufficient communes, communism is
generally viewed as a global movement
that aims at a global transformation of
economic and social relations away from
the class distinctions of capitalism toward
the development of a class-less society in
which workers share ownership in the
means of production.
Communitarianism:  A form of social and
political organization that emphasizes
the importance of community and tra-
dition. Offered as a response to liberal
individualism, communitarianism focuses
on the connection between the individual
and the community. Communitarians
de-emphasize negative liberty and high-
light the community’s role in establishing
norms that define the meaning and pur-
pose of individuality. Communitarians
emphasize the need for responsibility,
responsiveness, and reciprocity within a
community. Communitarians may also
emphasize the importance of community
support for individuals based upon some
notion of positive rights.
Conscientious Objection/Refusal:  The act of
refusing to comply with a legal command
based upon a claim of private conscience.
Unlike civil disobedience, conscientious
refusal is not necessarily a strategic effort
to break the law in order to foster social
change (although it can be that as well).
Instead, conscientious refusal and objec-
GLOSSARY
tion are acts of noncompliance based
upon the claim that the command that is
refused violates the objector’s moral judg-
ment. Conscientious objection is often
based upon religious principles or moral
ideals that are in opposition to the law.
Constitution:  The basis structure of a
social/political organization. A constitu-
tion may be written or codified in a set
of foundational documents, which clarify
organizational structure, institutional
responsibilities and power, and proce-
dures. An un-codified or unwritten con-
stitution exists (as in the United Kingdom
or Canada) in the series of precedents
and cases that make up the history of
governmental organization. Written con-
stitutions may also be supplemented by
customary developments and case law
precedents. Written constitutions may
furthermore be altered by constitutional
amendments.
Conservatism:  The ideology of those who
emphasize tradition and who are resis-
tant to radical change. Conservatives are
interested in preserving or conserving
some traditional status quo. Historically,
conservatism (as associated with Edmund
Burke) was opposed to the radical and
revolutionary changes that occurred dur-
ing the era of the French Revolution.
Conservatism is pejoratively described as
reactionary. In liberal democratic polities,
conservatism has tended toward libertar-
ian domestic ideals and realist interna-
tional values which are associated with
right-wing parties. Conservatism is often
understood in opposition to progressiv-
ism.
Coup d’etat:  A revolutionary transfer of
power that strikes quickly, often by vio-
lence (such as assassination or a mutiny
of military officers). While revolutions
often involve the movements and actions
of the masses, coups usually involves the
actions of small groups—often rival par-
ties within the ruling classes.
232
Cosmopolitanism:  An ideal of trans-na-
tional community grounded in norms and
values that unite people across the globe.
Although it has ancient roots, cosmopoli-
tanism has developed in modern European
contexts with a focus on an international
order that would preserve peace among
nations, as developed out of natural law
theory. In contemporary usage, cosmopol-
itanism is oriented around universal norms
about human rights and shared humanity
that develop out of liberal political theory.
It is associated with the growth of inter-
national institutions, globalization, and a
concern for global justice.
Crime:  A violation of law that is liable to be
punished. In positive law theory, a crime
is an act that violates stipulated laws. The
positive law approach includes the idea
that if there is no law against something,
then it is not a crime to do it, ruling out ex
post facto and retroactive administration
of new laws. The natural law theory dif-
fers in holding that there are some actions
that are criminal violations of the natural
law, even if there is no positive law deem-
ing those actions to be criminal. Criminal
law in liberal democracies usually includes
the idea that criminal deeds must also be
accompanied by criminal intent (so-called
mens rea). A different notion of crime
focuses only on the deed itself in a sys-
tem of “strict liability.” Some violations of
private law or common law—in torts and
contracts—are not punishable by courts
but are administered by civil law courts
(as opposed to criminal courts). See also
war crimes.
Crimes Against Humanity:  A notion devel-
oped in international law which is used to
condemn particularly odious assaults on
human dignity, especially the systematic
misdeeds of states associated with per-
secution, ethnic cleansing, and genocide.
The notion of crimes against human-
ity developed through international war
crimes tribunals held after World War II

(the Nuremburg and Tokyo tribunals),
which clarified three categories of war
crime: crimes against the peace, crimes
against humanity, and genocide. The
International Criminal Court was estab-
lished by the Rome Statute of 1998, and
instituted in 2002 in The Hague. The
Rome Statute clarifies that crimes against
humanity include widespread and system-
atic murder, enslavement, sexual crimes,
torture, apartheid, and so on.
Critical Theory:  An approach to social, cul-
tural, and political criticism associated
with the Frankfurt School and authors
such as Horkheimer, Adorno, Marcuse,
and more recently, Habermas. By employ-
ing post-Marxist ideas about ideology,
materialism, and the importance of dialec-
tical reasoning, the critical theorists offer
critical insight into contemporary political
structures. Critical theory employs social
scientific knowledge and historical data
in a critical (non-neutral) fashion, usually
with the aim of opposing domination and
promoting liberation.
Culture:  Social, moral, political, linguistic,
and intellectual habits of a people or civi-
lization. Culture is the product of educa-
tion and habituation (cf. German Bildung)
and can thus be understood as “second-
nature,” as character, or as the ethos or
way of life of a group. Culture can point
toward hierarchical classification—as cul-
tured (or civilized) individuals are viewed
as superior to the uncultured. Culture is
related to “cultivation”—as cultured indi-
viduals are cultivated or educated into the
norms and customs of a people or civiliza-
tion. Culture can thus be organized into
high- and low-cultures (including pop-
culture)—and dominant cultures can be
resisted by various sub-cultures. Culture
is often viewed as a unitary set of values,
associated with a nation. However, there
is a growing awareness of cultural diver-
sity, the problem of cultural relativism,
and the challenge of multiculturalism.
233
GLOSSARY
Cultural Relativism:  The idea that values and
norms are relative to a given culture. This
implies a meta-ethical and skeptical claim
that there are no transculturally absolute
values, which are accepted (or ought to
be accepted) by all persons in all cultures.
Cultural relativism is often asserted as a
descriptive claim: it is a fact that some
values are relative to culture. Defenders of
objective and universal values will argue
that there are some non-relative norms
that transcend cultural diversity. Cultural
relativism thus poses a challenge to claims
about universal human rights. See also
relativism.
Deliberative Democracy:  A form of decision
making based upon free and open pub-
lic deliberation. Contrasted with merely
preference- or interest-based voting (as
is assumed in most secret balloting),
deliberative democracy aims to establish
consensus based upon public reasoning.
Members are expected to provide and
defend the reasons for their opinions and
conclusions in public. Short of unanimity,
the goal of deliberative democracy is to
ensure that minority opinions are heard
and responded to while finding ways to
include multiple perspectives within a plu-
ralistic polity, and while viewing members
as rational co-participants in the endeavor
of reasonable public discussion.
Democracy:  A form of governmental organi-
zation based on rule by or of the people (in
Greek demos means “people”). Democ-
racy primarily identifies the structure of
power in a political system: democratic
governments will place power in the peo-
ple to some degree and in some fashion.
Direct democracy allows for direct vot-
ing by citizens. Representative democracy
allows the people to elect representatives
to the governing body. There are a vari-
ety of ways that democratic representa-
tion can occur, including winner-take all
elections in single-member districts (as in
the United States and the United King-
GLOSSARY
dom) and proportional representation of
various sorts (as in many European coun-
tries). A variation is representation by lot
or sortition (which is called demarchy).
Another variant would base policy deci-
sions upon random-sampling of public
opinion. Democracy can also be used to
describe the purposes and limits of politi-
cal power, with democratic governments
ruling in the interests of the people. Lib-
eral democracy is a democratic form of
government with limitations imposed by
the rights of the people, including protec-
tions of individual rights. See also delib-
erative democracy; liberalism.
Despotism:  Despotism is rule by a sover-
eign who has absolute, unlimited power.
This sovereign may be a monarch or a
group but the sovereign is despotic when
its rule is absolute. Despotism often con-
notes arbitrary and cruel rule that is not
restricted by moral or legal principles.
However, it is possible for there to be
enlightened or benevolent despotism,
where the despot rules absolutely but in
the interest or for the well-being of the
people. See also autocracy, tyranny.
Distributive Justice:  Concern for the dis-
tribution of social goods, including
income, wealth, vocational and educa-
tional opportunity, health care, and other
sources of well-being. Principles of dis-
tributive justice vary according to relative
ranking of key values especially equality,
efficiency, and liberty. Some forms of dis-
tributive justice want to ensure substan-
tial equality. Other forms want to ensure
fair and equal opportunity. Still others
will emphasize the importance of liberty
and free exchanges, even if this results in
unequal distributions. Distributive justice
can be strictly utilitarian—aiming to max-
imize the greatest happiness for the great-
est number. Or it can emphasize (as John
Rawls does) maximin rationality.
Divine-Right:  A principle of ruling that
grounds the sovereign’s power and
234
l­egitimacy in a religious claim that gives
the sovereign the “divine right” to rule. As
such, the sovereign who rules by divine
right has no human limits on power: his
power is only limited by God, who grants
him the right to rule.
Division of Labor:  The way that specific
tasks and roles are coordinated in a soci-
ety. This results in specialization and can
produce class distinctions. The division of
labor can be necessitated by the nature
of technology and production; and it
can reflect differences in talent and abil-
ity among persons. However, Marxists
complain that the division of labor is also
structured by ideology and differential
social power. Adam Smith and Emile Dur-
kheim held that progress and advance-
ment result from increased specialization
leading to a complex division of labor.
Dynasty:  A historical sequence of rulers who
come from the same family or group. In
traditional hierarchical societies, dynas-
ties consist in lines of power that are
passed down from one generation to
the other, usually according to patrilin-
eal rules of succession. In more contem-
porary settings, the term dynasty can be
used to describe ongoing political success
of a party or group, which may or may
not have a familial connection.
Egalitarian/ism:  A basic commitment to
equality. It can be a descriptive claim about
basic equality among human beings, for
example, maintaining the human beings
are created with equal rights or equal dig-
nity. It can be a normative claim about the
need to create equality (by removing social/
political barriers that produce inequality).
Equality can be understood in a variety of
ways. It can be understood as substantive
equality, in which individuals should have
the same amount of things; or equality of
outcome, which focuses on eliminating
unequal results from social transaction. It
can be understood as political equality, in
which individuals should have the equal

opportunity to influence political out-
comes (as in the principle of “one person,
one vote”) or in which persons should be
treated equally by the law. It can also be
understood in terms of equality of oppor-
tunity, in which barriers to education,
careers, and other opportunities should be
eliminated. Egalitarianism is opposed to
caste, class, ethnic, and racial hierarchies
that are based upon unequal treatment
and unequal consideration for individu-
als of these different groups. Egalitarian-
ism may also be opposed to meritocracy,
when meritocracy creates unequal social
hierarchies—however, the idea of equality
of opportunity may permit unequal out-
comes that have meritocratic results.
Empire:  A hierarchical transnational or
super-national power, ruling over other
nation-states, provinces, and sub-national
geographic units. Empires can be estab-
lished by conquest or by less violent
transfers of sovereignty (as in feudal
marriages). Empires can use military and
police power to establish direct rule over
imperial possessions. Or empires can use
less overt means of influence to estab-
lish hegemonic control—including both
economic and cultural power. Empires
vary in terms of the amount of central-
ized authority exerted on client states and
imperial possessions—from loose alli-
ances to direct control. A recent theory
of globalization (by Hardt and Negri)
describes the emerging capitalist global
order as an Empire.
Enlightenment:  Enlightenment literally sig-
nifies awareness, awakening, or edifica-
tion. In the history of Western Philosophy,
the Enlightenment (also called the Age of
Reason) was a period in the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries during which
philosophers criticized traditional systems
of religious, social, and political author-
ity. In European political philosophy, the
Enlightenment is the time during which
Medieval and feudal ideas about society
235
GLOSSARY
and government were superseded by lib-
eral, democratic, and capitalist theories.
Some enlightenment authors (such as Vol-
taire) thought that enlightened despots
might rule in the interest of the people.
But enlightenment political philosophers
such as Locke supported revolutionary
movements against despotic rule based in
ideas about human rights and the impor-
tance of liberal and democratic reform of
government.
Environmentalism:  A social movement or
set of concerns directed beyond mere
concern for human beings and toward
concern for the broader surround-
ing world. Environmental concern can
include or be focused on anthropocen-
tric concerns—as in the idea of envi-
ronmental justice, which seeks to apply
principles of social justice and distribu-
tive justice to environmental harms and
benefits. Environmentalism can also
be nonanthropocentric, in which case
it is concerned with the well-being of
nonhuman beings including inanimate
objects, individual animals, animal spe-
cies, habitats, ecosystems, the biosphere,
or even the planet itself. Environmental-
ism shows up in political philosophy in
terms of the problem of representing the
interests of nonhuman beings, in terms
of the problem of environmental justice,
and in terms of thinking about interna-
tional solutions to global environmental
problems such as climate change.
Ethics:  The study of behavior derived from
the Greek word ethos which means hab-
its, customs, or character traits. Philo-
sophical ethics has three main branches.
Metaethics focuses on problems arising in
the analysis of ethical concepts and ethi-
cal reasoning. Normative ethics focuses
on concrete theories of what is good or
justice. Applied ethics focuses on the
application of normative theories to con-
crete problems. Although some want to
distinguish ethics from morality, there is
GLOSSARY
no firm distinction between the two. See
also mores/moral/morality.
Ethnic Cleansing:  See genocide.
Fascism:  An autocratic or dictatorial form
of social and political organization
that emphasizes national unity, military
strength, and centralized authority. Fas-
cism developed in the twentieth century
as a reaction against both international
communism and liberal democracy. Asso-
ciated with Mussolini and Hitler, fascism
is oriented around mythic symbolism
about power and ethnic/national identity.
Fascism does not tolerate opposition or
minority parties. In recent decades, fas-
cism has been used as a pejorative term to
describe centralized political power that
relies upon security apparatus, secretive
surveillance, and military force. See also
totalitarianism.
Federalism:  A theory of sovereign power
and political hierarchy that distinguishes
between constitutive part (localities, states,
provinces, regions, etc.) that are united
together in one federation. The balance of
power between the parts and the federal
government may be worked out in vari-
ous ways. Most federal systems allow for
local control of a range of issues. Federal-
ism has been contrasted with imperialism
and with the unitary state as a strategy for
maintaining unity and control over large
geographic areas. Federalism is often pre-
sumed to result from negotiated settle-
ment among the confederated parties and
not merely out of military domination.
Federalism allows for greater pluralism
by allowing local populations or sub-
national groups to maintain autonomy
and self-determination, including reli-
gious and linguistic autonomy, as well as
local control of fiscal policy, taxation, and
criminal justice.
Feminism:  A critical social and political
theory that focuses on the oppression
and exclusion of women. Feminism can
be understood as an activist social move-
236
ment that aims to liberate women. It can
also be understood as a broadly focused
critique of male-dominance as it shows up
in patriarchal social institutions, popular
culture, religion, and philosophy. Some
feminists (so-called liberal feminists)
emphasize that the liberation of women
must be grounded in an expansion of
human rights in a way that includes issues
that concern women. Other feminists
(so-called radical feminists) focus their
critique on hierarchical structures based
on “gendered” concepts, such as cultural
norms about masculinity and femininity.
See also gender.
Feudalism:  A form of social, political, and
economic organization typical of Europe
during the so-called Medieval period.
This system emphasized a hierarchy of
nobilities tied together by pledges of mili-
tary support and by economic centraliza-
tion through the manorial (or seigniorial)
system in which peasants were tied to
land possessed by the Lord of the Manor.
Feudalism also included a third class—
the clergy. The three classes or estates of
medieval or feudal social system were
the nobility, the clergy, and the common-
ers/peasantry. In feudal social structures,
membership in a class was determined by
birth (with the exception of the clergy).
Feudalism in Europe gave way to liberal-
ism and capitalism.
Free market:  See Laissez-Faire Capitalism.
Freedom:  A condition in which there is lack
of restriction, constraint, or necessity. The
word “freedom” can be traced to Germanic
roots—as related both to Freiheit (free-
dom) and Friede (peace). Freedom is a con-
dition in which choices are not determined,
in which one is permitted or licensed to
choose to act. The Latin root for the same
idea gives us the synonym liberty, from
which we derive ideas about civil liberties.
Freedom includes related notions such as
independence, self-control (autonomy),
and self-governance. Liberty and freedom

can be defined either as negative or posi-
tive (following a distinction made popu-
lar by Isaiah Berlin). Negative freedom or
negative liberty is understood as lack of
constraint, grounded in protection against
the interference of others and the interfer-
ence of the state. Positive freedom or posi-
tive liberty is understood as the ability to
direct actions toward ends of one’s own
choosing. Liberal political regimes tend to
emphasize negative freedom—aiming to
restrict state interference in the actions of
individuals. Communitarians and social-
ists tend to emphasize positive freedoms
and rights—asserting that freedom must
be supported by economic opportunity,
education, and political rights.
Game Theory:  Game theory examines the
ethics, logic, economics, and psychol-
ogy behind decision strategies. Various
models and hypotheses are explored in
game theory in order to understand the
costs and benefits of decision procedures.
Much depends on how the game theoretic
situation is constructed. For example, one
must consider whether a game is a zero-
sum game (in which gains and losses are
balanced among losers and winners) or
whether there can be a net gain shared by
the players. The game theoretic situation
must also consider the number of play-
ers, issues related to power sharing, and
the question of knowledge and decision-
making in conditions of ignorance. These
models are often applied both in domestic
political theory—to understand voting,
power sharing, and political strategy—
and in international relations theory—to
understand strategic issues related to alli-
ances, war-making, and issues related to
the balance of power. See also prisoner’s
dilemma, tragedy of the commons.
Gender:  Gender is located in the basic
dichotomy between male and female,
masculine and feminine. There are impor-
tant debates about the status of gender:
whether it is biological or socially con-
237
GLOSSARY
structed, and about the extent to which
gender should enter into questions of dis-
tributive justice. Some radical theorists
hold that there is a continuum disguised
by the simple dichotomy between mascu-
line and feminine, arguing that gender is a
socially constructed set of norms intended
to organize human life into simplistic cat-
egories. Others—natural law theorists,
for example—argue that gender distinc-
tions reflect natural phenomena and that
basic gender distinctions are essential for
reproduction. Gender is also reflected
in the division of labor in society, with
roles, tasks, and careers viewed as either
feminine or masculine. The gendered divi-
sion of labor is connected with histori-
cal exploitation of women, poor wages
for female occupations, degradation of
the private sphere, and feminine virtues
(such as caring and nurturing) and other
aspects of inequality for women. See also
feminism.
Genocide:  Genocide is literally the killing
of a people (a genos). While there are
many examples from history of mass kill-
ing based on ethnic and national identity,
the term was coined during the 1940s to
describe the Nazi’s attempt to exterminate
the Jewish people. Modern centralized
political conditions, mechanized means
of killing, and racist ideology make con-
temporary genocide a sui generis prob-
lem. The designation of acts of killing as
genocide is a politically fraught process,
as genocide is viewed as one of the worst
crimes. Related terms include ethnic
cleansing and crimes against humanity.
Ethnic cleansing may be viewed as a more
limited effort to purge a land of certain
sorts of people (which may include mas-
sacre or only forced deportation), while
genocide aims more deliberately at the
physical destruction/extermination of
that people. See also war crimes.
Globalization:  A process by which the world’s
markets, cultures, and political systems are
GLOSSARY
becoming united and homogenized. One
interpretation of globalization highlights
the increasing integration of global finan-
cial systems and other economic interrela-
tion. Other interpretations of globalization
focus on cultural and technological inter-
relatedness along with the spread of a
common political ideology. Globalization
is often understood as a descriptive fact
about the integration of the global econ-
omy and the world’s cultures. But critics
of globalization argue that this is a per-
nicious force driven by the self-interest
of dominant economic forces. Defenders
of globalization argue that globalization
increases productivity, profit, and global
development, while also fostering progres-
sive social and political change.
Government:  The system by which politi-
cal power and control are organized. In
a narrow sense, government refers to
the specific administration of power at a
given time, focused primarily on the party
and persons who are governing. This nar-
row sense of the term is often employed in
British English; in American English, this
sense of the term is associated with the
term administration. In a broader sense,
government is the entire political system
organized across time and including a
variety of administrations (or govern-
ments in the narrow sense). The broader
concept of government includes the laws,
the bureaucratic apparatus, as well as the
specific persons and parties who share
power within that system.
Group Rights:  See identity politics.
Hegemony:  To have hegemony is to have
power and control over something. The
Greek term hegemon means leader. While
the idea of leadership may be value-neu-
tral, hegemonic power is often under-
stood as external power undergrided by
manipulation, force, and threats of force.
Hegemony can be based upon military
supremacy. But hegemony can also rest
upon cultural and economic power. The
238
notion of cultural hegemony, as described
by Gramsci, is used to explain how domi-
nant social groups dominate the masses
by way of ideology. However, hegemony
may be understood in a more neutral way
to describe the structure of power, alle-
giance, and obedience—whether freely
consented to or not.
Human Rights:  Human rights are moral and
legal entitlements, which create a duty on
the part of others. A right is a claim to a
certain sort of treatment that establishes
a responsibility for others to respond to
that claim. Negative rights establish pro-
tections against infringements by oth-
ers and by the state (related to the idea
of negative freedom or negative liberty).
Positive rights make claims for more pro-
active support for agency, dignity, and
autonomy. Human rights are supposed to
universal and inalienable, which implies
that they are more than merely civil rights
(which are rights guaranteed to citizens
within a polity). Human rights apply to all
human beings, regardless of citizenship.
They thus establish basic norms that limit
and direct legitimate state power. In recent
decades, a body of human rights policies
and international law has developed, with
the United Nations’s “Declaration of
Human Rights,” for example, mandating
recognition of the inherent dignity of all
human beings. Often human rights claims
are grounded in natural law and under-
stood in terms of natural rights.
Idealism:  In general, idealism is oriented
around the idea that ideas should guide
judgment and behavior. In political phi-
losophy and especially in theories of
international affairs, idealism is the claim
that ideas have power in political life and
that moral norms ought to guide judg-
ment and behavior. This idea is opposed
to realism—which either denies that ideas
are efficacious or that they ought to be
used as a guide for behavior. Idealists
generally believe that concepts like jus-

tice or human rights should be considered
as primary concerns. They also tend to
hold that political life ought to be guided
by disinterested reason—as opposed to
manipulation and self-interest. As a corol-
lary, idealists tend to believe that people
are both reasonable and motivated by
moral notions. Idealism tends to be linked
to liberal internationalism, such as the
approach supported by Woodrow Wilson,
which holds that states ought to intervene
in the domestic affairs of other states in
pursuit of democratizing changes that will
produce a just and stable international
order. Related to this is the democratic
peace thesis in international relations,
which holds that as polities become lib-
eral and democratic—and thus share
moral and political norms—they will tend
not to fight one another. Related to this is
the neo-conservative idealism of the early
twenty-first century that sought to create
regime change by interventions aimed at
nation-build and democratization. Crit-
ics of idealism will claim that it can be an
ideological façade that betrays interest in
empire and hegemony.
Ideology/Ideological:  An ideology is the set
of ideas, beliefs, and norms that are shared
by a group. While the term ideology can
be employed in a value-neutral fashion to
describe a set of beliefs (similar to the term
Weltanschauung, world-view, or orienta-
tion), the term can also be employed in
pejorative fashion to describe beliefs that
are not held for legitimate reasons. This
pejorative understand of ideology is often
transformed into the adjective ideologi-
cal. Ideological beliefs are not grounded
in truth or reason, rather they serve spe-
cific interests. Ideology, in the pejorative
sense, can be understood as delusion,
self-deception, or false-consciousness. In
Marxism, ideology is associated with the
idea that the ruling ideas are the ideas
of the ruling class—serving the interests
of the ruling class and accepted by oth-
239
GLOSSARY
ers because of the hegemonic power of
that class. Building upon this relativistic
notion of ideology, some defend the cre-
ation and dissemination of ideology as
a way of promoting social cohesion and
development.
Identity Politics:  The politics of identity
(or identity politics) describes social and
political movements that are focused on
recognition of the claims and rights of so-
called identity groups, which are social
groups organized and defined by certain
characteristics or traits: homosexuals,
blacks, Christians, women, and so on.
Identity politics has primarily been asso-
ciated with struggles for recognition of
minority and disempowered groups. Iden-
tity politics includes consciousness-raising
and developing solidarity among mem-
bers of the group. It also includes work-
ing for official recognition and inclusion
of group members in political institutions
and organizations. Sometimes it is con-
nected to claims about differential group
rights, understood as rights that allow
social groups to maintain their identity.
See also struggle for recognition; multi-
culturalism.
Imperialism:  A political effort to create
empire by extending control over a for-
eign territory—usually by military con-
quest. Imperialism is also a historical term
used to designate the era of European
expansion especially in the nineteenth
and twentieth centuries (the so-called age
of imperialism), during which the British
Empire grew along with other imperial
ventures by European powers (and later
by the United States). A related term is
the idea of cultural imperialism (similar
to cultural hegemony), which is the idea
that cultural ideas—religious, moral, eco-
nomic, and so on—are disseminated by
a dominant power, often accompanied
by military power. While empires and
imperialism have existed since ancient
times, modern imperialism develops
GLOSSARY
out of previous colonialism. As Hannah
Arendt explains in Origins of Totalitari-
anism, imperialism has a more totalitar-
ian orientation—seeking to establish total
control over the occupied territory—than
colonialism, which permits some form of
local autonomy. A newer version of impe-
rialism—known as neo-imperialism—
uses economic power and nontraditional
military power to establish hegemonic
control. See further discussion at empire.
Individualism:  A normative theory that
emphasizes the importance of the indi-
vidual—as opposed to an emphasis on
the community or social whole. Liberal
political systems tend to be individual-
istic since they recognize the rights of
the individual as defenses against social
interference in the life of the individual.
Communitarian and socialist regimes
tend to emphasize the connections that
individuals have as well as responsibilities
that individuals have to the community.
Individualism can also be understood as
indicating methodological and ontologi-
cal presuppositions. Ontological individ-
ualism and methodological individualism
in the social sciences assume that the indi-
vidual is the basic unit of social reality
or social ­analysis—the atomic parts who
join together to make up social wholes (as
in so-called atomic individualism).
Jus cogens:  Peremptory (or overriding)
norms of international law, related to the
law of peoples and to natural law.
Jus gentium:  See law of peoples.
Jus naturale:  See natural law.
Justice:  Justice is the concept of what is right
(or wrong and therefore unjust). There
are a variety of accounts of justice and
what is just. Some theories of justice focus
on social organization, including Plato’s
account of the proper hierarchical organi-
zation of society. Other theories of justice
focus on what is owed to people in light of
basic rights and laws. Justice can be con-
cerned with retribution for past wrongs.
240
It can also be focused on redistributing
social goods in a way that is fair or equi-
table. Justice can also be considered as a
virtue for individuals. Justice is generally
held to be the minimal requirement of
social organizations and behavior, with
benevolence and goodness understood as
going beyond mere justice. Justice is often
qualified by the specific area of concern:
as in “distributive justice,” “retributive
justice,” and so on.
Just War Theory:  An account of justice in war
that focuses on two primary concerns: jus
ad bellum and jus in bello. Jus ad bellum
is concerned with the justification of war-
fare and focuses on considerations such as
just cause, right intention, proportional-
ity, and legitimate authority. Jus in bello
is concerned with justice within warfare
and focuses on considerations such as
discriminating between combatants and
noncombatants, respect for prisoners of
war and other conventions of war, and
avoiding the use of intrinsically immoral
means (such as rape). The just war theory
developed along with the natural law the-
ory’s idea of the law of peoples, holding
that moral principles ought to regulate
international behavior including warfare.
Laissez-Faire Capitalism:  The idea that
markets should be left alone, free from
interference by the government. Laissez-
faire principles can be applied domesti-
cally and internationally. The hope of
the laissez-faire ideal is that markets and
the free enterprise system will regulate
themselves in light of basic laws of sup-
ply and demand, if the state would merely
allow them to function by their own
logic. Opposed to laissez-faire economies
are command economies (also known as
planned economies) in which the state
controls production and distribution of
goods.
Law of Peoples:  A theory of law and eth-
ics that holds that there are custom-
ary norms that hold across or between

peoples, nations, and individuals from
diverse political and legal frameworks.
In Roman and Christian natural law tra-
dition, this was known as jus gentium—
the law of peoples or nations—which is
merely customary and is not as binding as
jus naturale or natural law—and which
could also be distinguished from civil
law in terms of its inter-national scope.
Related to the idea of the law of peoples
is the concept of jus cogens, which is the
set of so-called peremptory (absolute and
invariable) norms that ought to govern
international law. In contemporary set-
tings, the law of peoples has been con-
nected with the notion of international
humanitarian law, including human
rights doctrines. The idea of the Law of
Peoples may also be understood (as in
John Rawls’s later work) as developing
from some form of international con-
tractarian account.
Leftism/Left-Wing:  The Left (or Leftism)
in political discourse is associated with
a concern for equality and social justice.
The designation of Leftism developed
out of the arrangement of parties in the
Estates General during the French Revo-
lution: anti-monarchist parties were situ-
ated on the left. Leftism has generally
been opposed to hierarchical social and
political arrangements. In the nineteenth
Century historical context, Leftists shared
much in common with liberals who
emphasize liberty and equality, although
Leftists have usually been understood as
residing further out on the political spec-
trum, associated with communism and
anarchism. In contemporary political
life, less extreme Leftism has come to be
associated with socialist and progressive
political concerns (as opposed to libertar-
ian and conservative concerns currently
associated with the Right). These con-
temporary Left-Wing concerns include a
concern for the environment, opposition
to militarism, sympathy for feminism, as
241
GLOSSARY
well as critical perspective on capitalism
and globalization. See also right-wing/
rightist.
Legal Positivism:  A theory in the philosophy
of law and political theory that holds that
the power of law is grounded in the social,
political, and legal institutions that posit
the law. Unlike the natural law tradition,
which holds that there is a natural law
that transcends legal systems, legal posi-
tivism either denies or ignores supposedly
transcendent sources or standards of jus-
tice. Legal positivism is often understood
as viewing the law as a social construction
and attempting to keep legal concerns dis-
tinct from moral concerns. See also posi-
tive law.
Liberalism:  Liberalism is primarily concerned
with liberty and equality. Liberalism asserts
the importance of human and civil rights
and is thus connected with democratic
political structures. While there are varia-
tions on liberalism—from the classical
liberalism of John Locke to John Rawls’s
political liberalism—the liberal ideal aims
to create a just and fair society that is not
grounded on hierarchical and static social
and political arrangements. There is sub-
stantial variation among liberals, with
some liberals endorsing laissez-faire capi-
talism and others defending the idea of the
welfare-state. In general, a liberal political
position will emphasize both liberty and
equality, while offering various ways of
adjusting these values along with other
political concerns. Liberal regimes tend
to emphasize state neutrality and official
toleration—allowing diverse groups (reli-
gious or sub-cultural) to exist without
the state picking sides in disputes about
morality, religion, and so on.
Libertarianism:  Libertarianism is the idea
that liberty is the primary political value.
Libertarians generally advocate a minimal
state—with some libertarians advocating a
version of anarchism. Libertarianism may
be focused primarily on economic policy,
GLOSSARY
emphasizing laissez-faire capitalism. But
libertarian concerns may also extend to
social policy, with libertarians emphasiz-
ing individual choice with regard to reli-
gious, moral, and other issues. In general,
libertarians emphasize individualism and
the importance of individual autonomy as
opposed to collectivism and socialism.
Liberty:  See Freedom.
Marxism:  A radical revolutionary form of
socialism associated with the philosophy
of Karl Marx. See Communism.
Meritocracy:  A political system in which rul-
ing power is concentrated in the hands of
those with special talents, knowledge, and
capabilities. Meritocracy is opposed to
traditional nepotistic and dynastic forms
of political hierarchy that are based upon
patronage, cronyism, and other distri-
butions of power not based upon merit.
Meritocracies allow for social mobility
based upon merit. While some meritoc-
racies may create inequalities and hier-
archies, true meritocracies should be
receptive to the achievement of talented
and ambitious individuals. Meritocracies
usually include some mechanism for test-
ing and evaluating talent—as in civil ser-
vice examinations, licensing procedures,
and other forms of educational sorting
that are associated with modern bureau-
cracies and the civil service.
Mixed Government:  Any form of political
organization structured by combining
different types of ruling bodies chosen
among various possibilities: democracy,
oligarchy, aristocracy, monarchy, and so
on. Ancient political philosophers such as
Aristotle and Cicero imagined both pure
and mixed constitutional forms and frame-
works. These authors argued that mixed
government might work to avoid nega-
tive outcomes associated with the pure
forms of government. In modern politi-
cal philosophy, the idea of mixed govern-
ment is associated with Montesquieu and
with the constitutional ­framework of the
242
United States. The idea of mixed govern-
ment is connected with the idea of a sepa-
ration of power and a system of checks
and balances through which the parts of
government limit one another.
Modus Vivendi:  Literally “means of life,”
a modus vivendi represents an accom-
modation among people that permits co-
existence without substantial agreement,
as in a truce, détente, or overlapping con-
sensus. A modus vivendi does not require
deep agreement, although it can produce
civil peace and an end to violence. See
also toleration.
Monarchism:  Monarchism is literally the
idea that there is one ruling person—the
monarch. Defenders of monarchy—from
Plato to the present—will argue that
sovereign power ought to be united in
one person. In Plato’s vision of the phi-
losopher-king, the monarch would be a
wise and virtuous person who ruled for
the good of the common wealth. Similar
ideas can be found in modern ideas about
enlightened absolutism or benevolent
despotism. The notion of “the monar-
chy” is often used to describe a system of
royal and dynastic power. Constitutional
monarchies (or limited monarchies) are
political structures in which the monarch
presides as the head of state but in which
the monarch’s power is effectively lim-
ited by other parts of government and by
established principles relating to the rights
of citizens. In some polities, the monarch
(and the nobility more broadly construed)
has been demoted to a merely ceremonial
function, such that the monarch has no
effective power but is still retained as a
figurehead and symbol of the nation. See
also autocracy.
Mores/Moral/Morality:  The term mores is
used to describe the customs, conventions,
dispositions, and typical behavior and
beliefs of a people. Mores is a Latin version
of the Greek concept ethos. Moral may be
used as a normative term ­implying good-

ness: as in a “moral person.” But moral
may also be used as a merely descriptive
term indicating that questions of good-
ness (or evil) are at stake: as in a “moral
dilemma,” which is a question concern-
ing what is good or evil. Morality may be
used as a descriptive term to account for
the customary comportment of people.
But morality may also be understood as
a more theoretical framework of norms.
For further discussion of theoretical dis-
tinctions in moral theory and the study of
morality, see ethics.
Multiculturalism:  As a descriptive term mul-
ticultural refers to the fact of diversity,
indicating that there multiple cultural
frameworks exist. A multicultural society
is one that includes plural cultures. Mul-
ticulturalism is a normative theory about
how best to deal with cultural diversity.
Multiculturalism is pluralistic in the sense
that multiculturalism tolerates, accom-
modates, and even celebrates diversity.
Multiculturalism is understood in terms
of various solutions to issues of cultural
identity and power-sharing that point
beyond mere nondiscrimination and bare
toleration. Multicultural societies may
allow for differential rights depending
upon ethnic or cultural identity—as in the
different rights permitted to First Nations
in Canada or in the case of power-sharing
among linguistic, cultural, and religious
minorities in places such as Switzerland
or India. Sub-national groups may be per-
mitted to have different rights regarding
a range of issues—family structure, reli-
gious observance, military service, and so
on—including limited sub-national sov-
ereignty (perhaps related to a version of
federalism). Opposed to multiculturalism
is a vision of national unity, inclusivity,
and unitary citizenship. See also plural-
ism, relativism, identity politics.
Nation:  A nation is a collection of people
who share something in common. It
often connotes geographical and ­political
243
GLOSSARY
unity and can be used as a synonym
for country, commonwealth, or state.
However, nation—and the related term
nationality—can be used to connote eth-
nic, tribal, or cultural identity that ranges
across state borders. Similarly, a political
entity or state can include more than one
nationality—as in the case of so-called
multinational states. Opposed to this is
the idea of the nation-state, which pre-
sumes a more homogeneous sort of ethnic
and political unity.
Nationalism:  Nationalism can be under-
stood as ideas and beliefs emphasizing
national-level political organization.
Nationalism can be understood as synon-
ymous with patriotism. However, nation-
alism can have the negative connotation
of unquestioned loyalty to and irrational
identification with the nation conceived
along ethnic lines. Another negative con-
notation associates nationalism with ideas
about the superiority of one’s own nation.
In a less negative sense, nationalism can
be understood as asserting self-determi-
nation and independence—in opposition
to imperial or colonial domination or
forms of multinational grouping. Nation-
alism can also be understood as asserting
national identity claims across local and
regional differences.
Natural Law:  A tradition in thinking about
the normative source of morality and law,
which holds that moral, legal, and politi-
cal norms can be found in nature and
understood by reason. The natural law
tradition is opposed to the idea of posi-
tive law, which holds that law is merely
man-made and transient. The natural law
tradition maintains that there are eternal
and immutable laws, which have a nor-
mative power that transcends particular
legal frameworks and customary morality.
The natural law tradition may be associ-
ated with Christian thinking about divine
sources of normativity. The Christian and
European source of natural law has led to
GLOSSARY
criticisms of the natural law theory (and
related notion of natural rights) in con-
temporary international law. However,
non-theological natural law accounts
may be developed based upon claims
about human nature, which may avoid
the charge of Eurocentrism and Christo-
centrism. In general, the natural law the-
ory holds that there are objective values
which can be used to criticize positive law
and which establish universal norms. Also
see Law of Peoples.
Natural Rights:  Natural rights are entitle-
ments that we have “by nature” in accord
with some form of natural law theory.
Natural rights are viewed as transcending
merely civil rights or legal rights—which
are rights afforded by the legal or political
system. Some attempt to contrast natural
rights with human rights by arguing that
natural rights are grounded in God and
the natural law, while human rights are
merely human creations. However, most
view natural rights and human rights as
virtually synonymous. See also human
rights.
Negative Rights:  Rights that involve protec-
tions against harms and encroachment, as
opposed to positive rights. See also civil
liberties.
Nonviolence:  Nonviolence is a basic com-
mitment to avoid violence in social and
political life. It is often a central tenet of
pacifism. However, nonviolence is also a
strategy that can be employed by those
who are not committed (or absolute) pac-
ifists. Nonviolent civil disobedience and
nonviolent social protest aim to trans-
form social and political life by employing
nonviolent methods, which can include
strikes, rallies, sit-ins, walk-outs, boy-
cotts, noncooperation campaigns, and so
on. Strategies of nonviolence have been
developed in the past century following
especially the work of Gandhi and King,
both of whom led nonviolent social justice
campaigns. Gandhi’s concept of ahimsa
244
(non-violence) is a source—and is derived
from Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain religion
and philosophy. See also pacifism, peace.
Oligarchy:  Rule by the few. Oligarchy usu-
ally implies rule of those who have wealth
and property. But plutocracy is a more
precise term for rule of the rich. Other
forms of oligarchy can be based upon rule
by military junta, a committee of elders, a
racial elite, or even a group of noble fami-
lies (as in aristocracy). Oligarchies may be
more efficient than more broadly demo-
cratic systems. But oligarchies typically
have to employ some form of coercion or
ideology to restrict governmental power
from more broadly democratic structure.
Oppression:  Cruel and unjust treatment
based upon differentials of social power.
Oppression can be temporary or system-
atic and enduring. Oppression can be
overt or implicit. In some cases, oppres-
sion results from institutionalized struc-
tures and ideologies—such that oppressed
people do not imagine things differently.
Oppression that encounters resistance may
be reacted to with repressive measures.
Although oppression and repression are
closely related, repression is better under-
stood as overt effort to prevent resistance
to oppression, while oppression is more
sustained and systematic power.
Overlapping Consensus:  A concept asso-
ciated with John Rawls’s approach to
political philosophy and his ideas about
reasonable pluralism. Rawls suggest that
it is possible for diverse people to find
common agreement about political frame-
works and principles of justice despite
substantial disagreements about morality,
metaphysics, and religion. Overlapping
consensus occurs when there is agreement
despite such differences. See also modus
vivendi, toleration.
Pacifism:  A commitment to peace. Pacifism
can be understood as a principled and
absolute opposition to war and violence.
But pacifism can also be understood as an

opposition to violence and war in partic-
ular circumstances. See also nonviolence,
peace.
Patriotism:  Patriotism is identification with
and loyalty to a country, including a sense
of duty and obligation for the good of the
nation. Patriotism may be connected to
ethnic and nationalistic identity claims.
But a broader form of liberal or constitu-
tional patriotism may be possible, which
is grounded in loyalty and dedication to
the more abstract and less nationalistic
norms of a constitutional system. See also
nationalism.
Peace:  Peace can be understood as a mere ces-
sation of violence, such as results from a
truce that creates a mere modus vivendi. Or
peace can be understood to require a more
substantial agreement about basic goods,
including a shared sense of justice and
social harmony, as described, for example,
in the Catholic tradition as the tranquility
of order. See also nonviolence, pacifism.
Pluralism:  Pluralism may be understood as a
descriptive claim about the fact of diver-
sity. Pluralistic approaches to theory uti-
lize diverse methodologies and concepts.
Pluralistic societies contain diverse groups.
Pluralism may also be understood as a
normative ideal that claims that there is
value in diversity and that celebrates mul-
tiplicities of perspectives and ideas. Rawls
and other contemporary liberal political
philosophers maintain that it is possible
to develop overlapping consensus from
out of so-called reasonable pluralism. See
also multiculturalism, relativism.
Polarity:  A concept in international relations
used to describe power relationships, con-
centrations of power, and various forms
of achieving balance of power. Unipolar
models of international relations main-
tain that there is one dominant hegemon
or superpower. Bipolar models emphasize
two-sided power structures. Multipolar
models focus on more than two parties
engaged in a balance of power.
245
GLOSSARY
Political Rights:  Those rights that are related
to political representation and participa-
tion, including the right to vote, the right
to organize political parties, the right
to petition the government, the right to
­assemble and demonstrate, and so on.
Also see civil rights.
Positive Law:  Positive law consists of laws
established by political authorities and
legal systems, also called statutory law.
Positive law has been posited, that is,
proclaimed and established. Positive law
is often opposed to natural law, which is
not necessarily posited by any authority
or contingent upon an agency or institu-
tion that posits the law. Positive law is the
primary concern of legal positivism.
Positive Rights:  Entitlements that involve
more than merely negative prohibitions
against harm and encroachment; as
opposed to negative rights. See civil rights,
welfare rights.
Postcolonial Theory:  An approach to social
and political theory that focuses on power
differentials and cultural structures and
that responds to European colonialism
and Western imperialism. Postcolonial
theories attempt to make sense of global
disparities, revolutionary politics, and
other issues from a perspective interested
in historical Eurocentrism and dialectical
relations between center and periphery.
Prisoner’s Dilemma:  A scenario imagined in
game theory that is used to model problems
in strategic decision making, especially the
difficulty of cooperative behavior for self-
interested parties. The model involves two
criminals who are arrested and offered a
deal for betraying each other. Given the
initial set-up rational, self-interested par-
ties end up betraying each other, thus fail-
ing to cooperate and ending up with less
than optimal outcomes. This model has
been used to explain political phenomena
including failures to cooperate in domes-
tic and international circumstances. See
also tragedy of the commons.
GLOSSARY
Privacy:  Privacy concerns what is outside
of public scrutiny and regulation. While
privacy and private relations may be nar-
rowly construed in terms of what individ-
uals do with their own bodies, thoughts,
and relationship, privacy may also be
extended to include non-public matters
conducted by clubs, unions, and busi-
ness interests. Privacy rights include the
right to keep secrets, the right to be free
from surveillance, and the right to asso-
ciate with others without supervision or
scrutiny. Privacy is an important value in
modern liberal political systems, along
with related ideas about the importance
of tolerance and freedom of conscience
(and religion).
Private Sphere/Private Sector:  The non-po-
litical realm of domestic and individual
life—as opposed to the public sphere.
The private sphere is often construed in
a broad enough fashion to include the life
of business and the economy, as well as
the rest of what is often called, follow-
ing Hegel, civil society. Most narrowly,
the private sphere is what individuals are
concerned with in their own lives and in
the life of the family (often pejoratively
associated with a gendered distinction
that views the private sphere as “femi-
nine”). In contemporary usage, the phrase
“private sector” is often used to describe
non-governmental business interests
and economic transactions (where some
portion of the economy is also run by
the government—the so-called public
sector)—and there is an ongoing debate
about the appropriate relation between
these sectors in an economy. See civil soci-
ety, privacy, public sphere
Progressive/Progressivism:  Progressivism
may be understood as the enlightenment
faith in progress in history, especially the
development of republican and democratic
forms of government. In contemporary
political rhetoric, “progressive” is often
used as a synonym for liberal or Left-wing.
246
While the term appears to be opposed
to conservatism, some conservatives
describe themselves as ­progressive—as in
the Canadian “Progressive Conservative”
party. A more appropriate antonym for
progressive is regressive, which indicates
a deliberate turn away from progress. The
term progressive is also used to describe
a structure of taxation in which richer
people pay more—for example, when
those with a higher income pay a higher
percentage in taxes. This form of taxation
is progressive in the political sense insofar
as it redistributes wealth and moderates
inequality. See also reactionary.
Public Sphere/Public Reason:  The public
sphere is opposed to the private sphere,
as the place of public deliberation. Hab-
ermas’s history of the public sphere
(Öffentlichkeit) indicates that a robust
public sphere develops along with lib-
eral political institutions and technolo-
gies of publication including news media
and educational systems. In the liberal
public sphere, norms of tolerance and
civility allow for dialogue about public
goods based upon shared principles and
norms of public reason. There is a debate
about the status afforded to official pub-
lic deliberation (in political assemblies)
as opposed to informal and non-official
public reflection (in the media, etc.). One
may differ with regard to the status of
the norms that govern official political
deliberation and public (but not official)
discourse.
Race/Racism:  Race is a category that
attempts to classify individuals by bio-
logical features (usually phenotypic dif-
ferences in skin tone, facial features, hair
texture, etc.). Racial categorization has
been central to colonialism, the slave trade,
apartheid regimes, and ongoing inequality
(both domestic and global). At one time,
racial differences and a racialized hierar-
chy were supposedly grounded in empiri-
cal science (as, e.g. in Nazi race science).

However, empirical science indicates that
racial differences are usually merely super-
ficial differences and family resemblances
among human beings. The emerging field
of critical race studies attempts to under-
stand the history of the concept of race
and its lasting impact on social and politi-
cal institutions and practices. Racism is
unjustifiable and pernicious discrimina-
tion against (or in favor of) a racial group.
Some focus on racial distinctions can be
used for benevolent purposes (as with
regard to efforts to study and alleviate
disparate health or educational outcomes
for diverse racial groups). Racism can be
overt and explicit—and written into the
law (as in an apartheid regime). Or racism
can be implicit, in social norms, customs,
and practices that produce unequal results
for member of different racial groups—in
which case, it is best described as struc-
tural racism. See also structural discrimi-
nation.
Reactionary:  Reactionary parties or opinions
are opposed to social and political change
and want to move back toward more tra-
ditional forms of social and political orga-
nization. In contemporary usage, the term
reactionary is often used pejoratively by
progressives who reject far-right version
of conservatism that is opposed to liberal,
socialist and other “progressive” social
and political ideas. See progressive.
Realism:  In international affairs, realism
emphasizes the struggle for power. Real-
ists view the international realm as lack-
ing any legal or moral framework that
could limit the pursuit of power and self-
interest. Realists recommend strategies
that respond to this fact, while avoiding
idealism and optimism about political
behavior. Realists assess the world in
terms of balances of power, hegemonic
structures, spheres of influence, and so
on. They advise the use of both soft and
hard power to increase influence, without
worrying about moral limits on the use
247
GLOSSARY
of propaganda, surveillance, or violence.
Realists focus on pragmatic and strate-
gic concerns such as deterrence, suprem-
acy, and containment of threats. Realist
often ground their criticism of moralis-
tic idealism in empirical generalizations
about history and the nature of political
life (and human psychology). Structural
realist will also note that the structure
of international relations remains anar-
chic—because there is no international
sovereign who could resolve international
conflict—while denying the importance
of international law and other cosmopoli-
tan forms of international cooperation.
Realism can also be used to describe an
approach to the ethics of war, which holds
that there are no moral limits to what can
be done in war. In this usage, realism is
understood as the opposite of pacifism.
See also idealism.
Realpolitik:  An idea about how political
parties strategize and take action that is
grounded in realism about the nature of
social and political life, where realism
is understood as offering an assessment
of political reality that is not subject to
idealistic or moralistic interpretation.
Realpolitik offers a point of view on
political reality that recognizes the strug-
gle for power and recognition. It counsels
manipulation of social and political forces
in the effort to consolidate power. See also
realism.
Recognition:See struggle for recognition.
Refugee:A refugee is a person who has
escaped from a conflict by taking refuge
or seeking sanctuary in a neutral country
or specified locale, where they seek to be
free from harm. Moral and legal regula-
tions governing the treatment of refugees
include basic rules of hospitality and
humanitarian law as well as developing
international law, regulated by the office
of the United Nations High Commis-
sioner for Refugees (the UNHCR). How-
ever, refugees often remain displaced and
GLOSSARY
dispossessed in camps and with ambigu-
ous political status while conflicts con-
tinue. See also asylum.
Regressive:  As the opposite of progressive,
regressive means moving in a backward
direction (see also reactionary). In dis-
cussion of taxation, a regressive tax is
one that taxes the rich at a lower rate
(the strict opposite of a progressive tax).
Other forms of taxation—a sales tax, for
­example—can have regressive outcomes—
since this creates the worst impacts for
those with less income, who pay a larger
percentage of their income on sales taxes
than richer individuals.
Relational Justice:  An idea of justice focused
on stabilizing and nurturing relationships.
Rather than applying abstract law and
focusing on desert and retribution, rela-
tional justice focuses on building and sup-
porting those relationships that constitute
social and political identity (drawing
especially upon ideas found in feminist
theory). Relational justice is similar to
restorative justice.
Relativism:  Relativism is a theory about the
status of norms, which holds that there is
no absolute, eternal, or objective standard
for normative evaluation. Relativists hold
that values are best understood in rela-
tion to specific contexts: values are “rela-
tive to” historical or cultural contexts.
Relativism can be understood as a merely
descriptive claim about diversity of val-
ues, which holds that empirical research
shows us that values vary according to
context. Metaethical relativism builds
upon this descriptive fact to conclude
that there are no culturally transcendent
or unconditional values. See also cultural
relativism, multiculturalism, pluralism.
Repression:  See oppression.
Republic/Republican:  A republic is a form
of political organization focused on the
good of the commonwealth or the public
good. This is opposed to political orga-
nization that exploits people or that is
248
grounded the private claims of a ruling
party or family; republican forms of gov-
ernment emphasize equality before the
law. Republicanism is usually understood
as closely related to democratic gover-
nance. But the primary focus of a republi-
can form of government is the well-being
and legal equality of the people who make
up the commonwealth. Thus non-demo-
cratic forms of government may claim
to be republics (e.g. as in the “People’s
Republic of China”). One issue is the
question of who counts in terms of the
people to be included within the public
(with republican movements occasionally
understood as aiming to unite a people
divided by colonial power or in some
instances aiming to drive out foreign rul-
ers or minority ethnic groups). Another
issue is the extent to which equality and
hierarchy are permitted within republican
states. The Roman Republic, for example,
was hierarchically organized. So-called
republican states have allowed slavery
or denied rights to women. Contempo-
rary republican movements tend to be
opposed to monarchy and aristocracy and
the arbitrariness of non-constitutional
rule (whether monarchic or popular),
while focusing on legal equality. In the
United States, Republican is the name for
one of the two major parties (the Demo-
cratic party is the other major party) and
in American political discourse Republi-
canism is associated with both fiscal and
social conservatism grounded in a claim
about the primacy of basic liberties and
the common good.
Restorative Justice:  Restorative justice is
focused on finding ways to heal and
restore communities that have been dam-
aged by crime. It can include strategies
of forgiveness, mercy, and rehabilitation.
While it offers a critical response to the
more stringent approach of retributive
justice, restorative justice accepts the fac-
ticity of crime, responsibility, and guilt.

But unlike retributive justice, restorative
justice responds to those issues in a way
that aims to find acceptable closure for
both victims and offenders. Restorative
justice is interested in developing produc-
tive alternatives to incarceration as well
as rehabilitation for offenders. An exam-
ple of restorative justice is the “truth and
reconciliation” approach utilized in South
Africa after the demise of apartheid. See
also relational justice.
Retributive Justice:  Retributive justice empha-
sizes retaliation based in a theory of just
deserts. The principle of lex talionis (law
of retaliation) is strictly retributive, requir-
ing the return of harm for harm or—as in
the idea of “an eye for an eye.” Retribu-
tive justice limits revenge by establishing
an upper limit for punishment so that one
does not exact more than is due. Retribu-
tive justice also establishes a lower limit of
what sort of punishment gives due respect
to the victim and his or her injury. Retrib-
utive justice can be contrasted with more
consequentialist focus on restorative jus-
tice or prevention and deterrence—where
the goal of the criminal justice system is to
produce good consequences for the com-
munity in the long run. Retributive justice
is less concerned with consequentialist
reasoning and more concerned with giv-
ing criminals what they deserve. See also
restorative justice.
Rights:  See human rights; natural rights.
Right-Wing/Rightist:  Right-wing parties
and ideologies are conservative and/
or reactionary. The distinction between
Right-wing and Left-wing parties (or Left-
ists and Leftism) derives from the French
Revolution, where the parties seated on
the right in the French parliament were
supportive of the traditional hierarchy of
the old regime. Some Right-wing parties
are conservative supporters of libertar-
ian ideas about free markets. Other “far
right” parties may be racist and national-
istic and more sympathetic to state power.
249
GLOSSARY
Rightism (and a rightist) usually connotes
an extreme Right-wing (reactionary, rac-
ist, etc.) position. See also Leftism/Left-
wing.
Satyagraha:  This Sanskrit term is associ-
ated with Gandhi’s strategies of nonvio-
lent social protest. It can be translated as
“truth force” or “soul force.” In Gandhi’s
strategy of nonviolent protest, satyagraha
is insistence on truth (and thus upon jus-
tice and fair treatment). It is not passive.
Rather it is active resistance to injustice—
but based upon principled commitment to
nonviolence and the idea of unity between
means and ends—where truth, non-
violence, and justice are viewed as both
the only appropriate means for political
action and the goal of such action.
Separation of Powers:  The idea of distin-
guishing among political powers—typi-
cally focused on the distinction between
legislative, executive, and judicial power.
This idea of what Cicero called “mixed
government” attempts to avoid concen-
tration of power in one person or branch
of government in order to avoid despotic
abuse of power. The idea was developed
by Montesquieu and is a fundamental
principle of the Constitution of the United
States of America, where the idea—asso-
ciated with James Madison—is that the
different branches of government should
restrain one another through a system of
checks and balances.
Social Contract:  A theory of social organi-
zation that explains the origin and legiti-
macy of government. Some versions of
social contract (or compact) theory (as in
Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau) attempt to
imagine a historical account of the emer-
gence of civil society and government
from out of the state of nature, which
would have involved the consent of those
who agree to transfer their natural rights
to a central governing force. Other more
contemporary versions of the social con-
tract theory (as in Rawls) acknowledge
GLOSSARY
that there may not have been a historical
contracting event but still employ a ver-
sion of the social contract idea as a heuris-
tic to explain how agreement about moral
and political values might occur and to
describe what that agreement might con-
sist in. Social contract theories point in
a liberal direction since they ground the
authority of the government on the con-
sent of the governed, often assuming that
the importance of consent is grounded in
some basic idea of natural rights.
Social Democracy:  A political ideology and
movement intended to transform society
in a socialist direction through the use of
peaceful, democratic means (as opposed
to the proposed violent transition imag-
ined by Marxists). Social democrats
emphasize communitarian values and are
critical of capitalism and the emphasis on
merely negative rights associated with so-
called libertarian democracy. Social dem-
ocrats are not fundamentally opposed
to restrained forms of capitalism, as so-
called democratic socialists often are.
Social democracy is based upon com-
mitment to political processes of inclu-
sion, nonviolence, and social welfare,
often arguing that these ideas enhance
democracy by increasing the quality of
participation and civic virtue. Post-war
European countries have been largely
influenced by social democratic ideas. See
also welfare state.
Social Justice:  Social justice is a commit-
ment to welfare grounded in respect for
the dignity of persons and the common
good. The idea of social justice is cen-
tral to natural law and Catholic social
teaching, which includes a broad com-
mitment to alleviating poverty, improving
the quality of life, labor, and healthcare,
and diminishing violence. Social justice is
often connected with the idea of distribu-
tive justice, focused on reducing inequal-
ity and providing fair access to social
goods and economic opportunities. While
250
social justice concerns can be found in the
Christian tradition, social justice emerges
as a concern in contemporary utilitarian-
ism and socialism.
Socialism:  Socialism is a political theory
and movement concerned with the soci-
etal ownership and distribution of basic
goods. Socialism is usually understood as
being opposed to capitalism, when capi-
talism is understood as defending private
ownership, marketplace distributions, and
libertarian social and political policies.
Socialists want to restrain markets and
control private property, with the goal of
minimizing inequality and empowering
the majority of the working class. Social-
ism comes in a wide variety of types—from
anarchist and separatist socialism (some-
times described as communalism) to radi-
cal revolutionary state-centered socialism
(i.e. twentieth-century Communism) to
reformist and democratic socialism that
wants to find ways to accommodate capi-
talism and private property without giv-
ing up on labor rights and social equality.
See also communism.
Sovereignty:  Supreme authority or power
within a territory including the right to
make law and administer justice. This
includes the right to take life, liberty, and
property in the name of social order and
justice. Sovereignty is an important con-
cept for international relations—as sov-
ereign states are understood as individual
entities and afforded sovereign equality.
In domestic terms, sovereignty can be
organized and understood in a variety of
ways: as the will of the monarch (volun-
tarism), as the will of the people (popu-
lar sovereignty), or as a mix of forms
and institutions. Sovereignty may also be
understood in absolute terms (as a basic
right of nonintervention that ought not
be violated) or a contingent upon the
legitimacy or justice of domestic political
arrangements or recognition by the inter-
national community.

State:  A state is a basic entity of politi-
cal organization. In Weber’s influential
description, a state is a political organi-
zation that possesses a monopoly on the
use of force in a given territory—which
implies autonomy from external control
and the ability to defend borders. States
can be organized into larger structures—
empires, confederations, and so on. States
can contain smaller organizational units.
This diversity of levels of organization
makes it difficult to establish with pre-
cision exactly what counts as the basic
unity of political organization. A further
problem is that states can contain inter-
nal division and strife that prevents effec-
tive control or the exercise of the sorts of
rights and responsibilities associated with
states (as in so-called failed states).
State Capitalism:  A form of economic and
political organization in which the state
owns and runs business enterprises for
profit. Unlike socialist political organiza-
tions in which state ownership is aimed
at social welfare, equality, and the like,
state capitalism is oriented toward mak-
ing a profit. Unlike free-market (laissez-
faire) or liberal capitalism, where the state
avoids undue interference in private busi-
ness ventures, state capitalism can involve
substantial control over the domestic
economy. While the concept may focus
primarily on domestic organization, state
capitalism may also be used to describe
the role of state-based economies in inter-
national markets. Advocates of global free
trade may argue that state capitalism (e.g.
as in China) is inefficient and prevents
fair competition on the international
market. Defenders of state capitalism will
argue that state control of profit-seeking
ventures allows for greater control and
greater distribution of social benefits.
State of Nature:  A pre-political condition
described by social contract theorists,
who explain in various ways how politi-
cal organization developed out of primi-
251
GLOSSARY
tive conditions. Descriptions of the state
of nature may have some basis in archae-
ological and anthropological fact. How-
ever, the early modern social contract
theorists often based their understanding
of the state of nature on generalizations
not grounded in the historical record: for
example, in Hobbes’s description of the
state of nature as a state of war in which
life would be solitary, poor, nasty, brut-
ish, or short; or in Rousseau’s description
of the state of nature as belonging to his
idealized conception of the noble savage.
The state of nature is best understood
as an imagined or constructed thought-
­experiment which is used to express
fundamental conceptions about human
nature and political life.
Statelessness:  Some refugees, displaced per-
sons, and exiles end up in the politically
tenuous position of being stateless. State-
less persons have lost citizenship rights
either through their own voluntary renun-
ciation of their original citizenship or
through coercive expulsion or through the
dissolution of a previous political affilia-
tion (as when a state collapses, dissolves,
or is incorporated into another state).
Stateless persons are often refugees who
are unable to find a country with whom
they can affiliate. Stateless persons exists
outside the boundaries of ordinary politi-
cal life and especially vulnerable to human
rights violations. Agamben equates the
stateless condition with the idea of homo
sacer—the “sacred man” who is liable to
being killed because he resides in an extra-
legal limbo. The United Nations has taken
steps to eradicate statelessness.
Structural Discrimination:  Structural dis-
crimination (including structural racism)
is discrimination that occur not because
of overt expressions of bias or prejudice
but, rather, because of structural prob-
lems that create unequal outcomes. It
can also be described as institutional or
organizational discrimination. Institu-
GLOSSARY
tions can be organized in ways that can
create sexist, racist, or classist results.
Unlike overt racism or sexism, the nega-
tive results of institutional structures may
not be intended by any agent operating
within the system. For example, a system
in which it is easier for men to succeed
than for women (because of childcare
and family leave regulations) may not
intend to discriminate against women or
produce inequality, even though inequal-
ity results. Related to this are discrimina-
tory outcomes resulting from stereotypes
and media caricatures that can disem-
power members of minority groups. See
also racism.
Struggle for Recognition:  The concept of the
struggle for recognition is associated with
the master–slave dialectic as found in
Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit. Hegel
suggested that social life could be under-
stood as a struggle for recognition. This
concept was developed in Marxism, Criti-
cal Theory, and the work of Francis Fuku-
yama who argued that liberal-democracy
provided a solution to the struggle for
recognition. The usual solution is mutual
recognition, which does not involve dom-
ination and hierarchy. The importance of
the concept is that it claims that social
struggle cannot be merely understood
in terms of the pursuit of material self-
interest. Rather, social struggle is about
the desire to be recognized as an agent
worthy of respect. Charles Taylor and
Axel Honneth use this idea to explain
so-called identity politics. Nancy Fraser
has explained that social problems occur
when persons suffer the burden of subor-
dination of status. See also multicultural-
ism, identity politics.
Suffrage:  The ability to vote; also known
as “the franchise” as in “political fran-
chise.” Suffrage also includes the idea of
being eligible to be elected. In the his-
tory of democracy, suffrage has gradually
been expanded toward universal suffrage,
252
which opens voting and office holding to
all citizens.
Tyranny:  Tyranny is understood as a per-
nicious, predatory, cruel, despotic, and
oppressive government. The term derives
from the Greek tyrannos, which at one
time simply meant ruler. A tyrannical gov-
ernment is usually understood as monar-
chical or autocratic—headed by a tyrant,
who is a despotic ruler, especially one who
rules for his own self-interest. However,
specific laws and policies (of a variety of
government) can be condemned as tyran-
nical when they are oppressive. See also
autocracy, despotism.
Theocracy:  A theocracy is government based
on religion. Theocratic regimes are run by
clerics, under religious law and with an
implicit or explicit claim about legitimacy
based in the will of God. In a less precise
usage, the term theocracy or the adjective
theocratic can be used as a description for
laws or policies that are based on religious
ideas or religious law.
Tolerance/Toleration:  The terms tolerance
and toleration are often used interchange-
able, although there is an important dis-
tinction between tolerance as a virtue
(which can be developed within individu-
als or associations) and toleration as a
constitutional or legal policy of neutral-
ity and impartiality. Tolerance as a virtue
implies the habit of non-judgmentalism. It
may be understood as a minimal sort of
modus vivendi, which grudgingly accom-
modates the fact of diversity. But it can
also be a more robust affirmation of dif-
ference. Toleration as a political and legal
principle implies that the state is neutral
in moral or religious disputes. The terms
are also applied in discussions of racial
and ethnic issues—as ideas that encourage
acceptance of racial and other differences
and overcoming prejudices and stereo-
types. Toleration is typically thought to
be an essential feature of liberal regimes.
See also liberalism.

Totalitarianism:  Totalitarianism is used to
describe systems of governance that aim
for complete control over the lives of the
populace. Totalitarian government does
not tolerate dissent and requires con-
formity. Totalitarian governments aim
beyond mere external conformity and obe-
dience toward ideological purity and una-
nimity. Totalitarian regimes are opposed
to openness, nonconformity, and liberty.
Totalitarian ideology is closely related to
fascism, often understanding the polity as
an organic whole which must be coordi-
nated and organized in an all-encompass-
ing and comprehensive fashion.
Tragedy of the Commons:  A problem that
arises in discussions of economic ratio-
nality and game theory, which holds
that self-interested individuals will tend
to overuse common areas and shared
resources, since no one will want to obey
limits that are not also obeyed by oth-
ers. Without an authority able to impose
limitations on use, tragic outcomes result
as the productivity and sustainability of
common resources will be destroyed by
overuse. See also prisoner’s dilemma.
Unitary State:  A state in which sovereignty
and control are strictly organized by cen-
tralized power. Unlike a confederation or
a system based on federalism, in which
power is shared between local and pro-
vincial structures and the national gov-
ernment, a unitary state avoids this sort
of power sharing. Unitary states may be
monarchic and absolutist or democratic,
liberal, and/or republican. The question
of unity is about issues such as federalism
or a separation of powers.
Utopia:  A utopia is an idealized form of
social or political organization. The term
utopia was coined by Thomas More in
the sixteenth century as a play on two
Greek terms: atopia (no place) and euto-
pia (good place). A utopia is thus under-
stood as an ideal that is also fictional and
perhaps unattainable. Utopian specula-
253
GLOSSARY
tion involves imagining ideal worlds and
can help clarify values and principles.
Critics of utopian speculation in political
philosophy argue that speculative utopias
are too focused on a priori ideals and that
utopias distract us from real-world con-
cerns. A related term dystopia is used as
the opposite of utopia, to describe nega-
tive worlds and bad outcomes.
War:  War is a sustained armed struggle with
political intent, usually focused on the
goal of obtaining control over territory.
However, there are a variety of wars—
from international wars involving federa-
tions of nations allied against one another
to civil wars, cross-border incursions, and
small skirmishes and battles. Theories of
the morality of war include just war the-
ory, realism, and pacifism.
War Crimes:  War crimes violate principles
governing proper behavior in war. Dis-
putes about the status of the norms
governing behavior in war ask whether
war crimes are merely conventional (a
result of treaties and agreements among
nations) or whether there is a natural law
or law of peoples which transcends con-
ventional morality. The concept of a war
crime is related to the norms of the just
war theory. The concept of war crimes
has developed in recent decades with the
advent of post-war tribunals (e.g. the
Tokyo and Nuremburg tribunals) and
with the development of international
law and institutions. These tribunals and
treaties establish that war crimes include
crimes against the peace (unjustified
aggression), crimes against humanity,
and genocide. War crimes include mis-
treatment or slaughter of prisoners, the
use of poison gas, the use of civilians as
shields, rape, ethnic cleansing, and so on.
A remaining difficulty is how war crimes
are to be tried and punished. See also just
war theory.
Welfare State:  The welfare state is concerned
with promoting social welfare. Mod-
GLOSSARY
ern bureaucratic welfare states generally
include a system of social security, social
insurance, or a social safety net, as well
as a system of public health care, public
education, unemployment compensa-
tion, nutritional support, and so on that
provide basic welfare benefits for all citi-
zens. A key idea is that the state ought to
be concerned with social justice and the
welfare of its citizens. Critics of welfare
states will argue that welfarism under-
mines individual initiative and promotes
dependency. Communist/socialist critics
will argue that capitalist welfare states do
254
not go far enough in terms of social redis-
tribution of goods. Defenders will argue
that social welfare is one of the primary
purposes of political association and that
capitalist economies benefit in the long
run from public welfare. See also social
democracy, social justice.
Note
1
Special thanks to Chisanga Chanda for her
work on this glossary.
 RESEARCH RESOURCES1
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
<http://plato.stanford.edu/cite.html>
One of the best internet resources in phi-
losophy features lengthy scholarly entries on
a wide variety of topics and philosophers.
Entries are written by leading scholars in
the field and updated regularly. Contains a
search engine and extensive cross references
between entries. Articles include extensive
bibliographies. Includes other academic tools
including those that teach how to cite and
format bibliographies. Entries on the website
can be read on via PDFs, Kindle, iPhone, and
Android applications.
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy <http://
www.iep.utm.edu/>
Another online database of peer-reviewed
articles. The Internet Encyclopedia has infor-
mation similar to the Stanford Encyclopedia;
however, it is not clear that the articles are
updated with the frequency of the Stanford
Encyclopedia. Entries in the IEP focus on
topics such as the History of Philosophy;
Metaphysics and Epistemology; Philosophical
Traditions; Science, Logic, and Mathematics;
and Value Theory.
255
Philosophy Papers Online <http://philpapers.
org>
Philosophy Papers Online, also known as
PhilPapers, is project of the Center for Digital
Philosophy. It provides an online research
tool in philosophy. PhilPapers is an extensive
index of scholarly articles and books in philos-
ophy, with a useful search engine and outline
that organizes content according to subject-
matter. Useful for students interested in the
History of Western Philosophy; African and
Asian Philosophy; Continental Philosophy;
European Philosophy; Philosophies of the
Americas; Anthropologies; and so on. While
links to some entries may be unavailable or
may require permission, this website is still a
valuable resource that can be supplemented
by libraries that provide access to electronic
journal.
The Online Library of Liberty <http://oll.­
libertyfund.org>
A useful internet resource that includes an
extensive archive of primary source material,
especially classic texts concerning the phi-
losophy of liberty and political philosophy
in general. The website has free electronic
RESEARCH RESOURCES
versions and EBooks of classical and con-
temporary books about Individual liberty
and Limited Government from disciplines
of Economics, History, Law, Literature,
Philosophy, Political Theory, Religion, War,
and Peace. The online library is very well
organized and easy to use. It categorizes its
entire collection by the Latest Additions;
Authors by Period; Women on Liberty; and
Titles by Subject.
The American Philosophical Association
<http://www.apaonline.org>
The American Philosophical Association is
an organization of philosophers in the United
States. The website allows Student Association
Membership for students at accredited
American and International colleges and uni-
versities. Valuable for research concerning
contemporary issues in philosophy such as
Feminism, Hispanic/Latino Issues, Indigenous
Issues, LGBT Issues, the Black Experience,
Technology, Law and Medicine. The APA
website includes information about proceed-
ings, addresses, newsletters, and meetings of
the American Philosophical Association in its
three divisions: Eastern, Central, and Pacific.
The European Philosophy of Science
Association
<http://www.epsa.ac.at>The European
Philosophical Association is also an organi-
zation of philosophers in Europe. The
European Association is very similar to the
American Philosophical Association. It was
recently established (2007) and does not
have a variety of publications, journals, and
newsletters as the APA. Nonetheless, it is
useful for students interested in European
Philosophy. The website is also great for links
256
and dates regarding conferences and major
activities of the organization.
The British Philosophical Association <http://
www.bpa.ac.uk>
The British Philosophical Association is an
important organization and internet resource
for articles, journals, and books centering
on European contemporary philosophical
issues. What makes the British Philosophical
Association distinctive is that its membership
gives access to Oxford journals and books
published by Routledge.
Radical Philosophy Association <http://
www.radicalphilosophyassociation.org>
The Radical Philosophy Association is a
membership-based organization that pub-
lishes peer-reviewed articles on the adverse
effects of capitalism, racism, sexism, homo-
phobia, disability discrimination, and envi-
ronmental damage around the world.
The North American Association for Social
Philosophy <http://www.pitt.edu/~nassp/
nassp.html>
The North American Association for Social
Philosophy (NASSP) is one of the largest
associations focused on social and political
philosophy. The organization holds annual
meetings and publishes Journal of Social
Philosophy. The organization also sponsors
the Social Philosophy Today book series.
International Society for Military Ethics
<http://isme.tamu.edu/>
The International Society for Military
Ethics (ISME) holds an annual conference

on military ethics and issues related to the
ethics of war. The ISME website includes
links to case studies, publications, and other
resources in the field of military ethics and
the ethics of war.
Association for Political Theory <http://
www.apt-us.org/>
The Association for Political Theory is
an organization whose aim is to promote
teaching and research in political theory
and political philosophy. The organization
hosts an annual meeting. The APT web-
site includes links to journals publishing
in the field of political theory as well as
calls for papers for other organizations and
journals.
Concerned Philosophers for Peace <http://
peacephilosophy.org>
Concerned Philosophers for Peace is an
organization of philosophers interested in
the philosophy of peace and nonviolence.
The organization meets annually as well as
holding sessions at the divisional meetings
of the American Philosophical Association.
The organization publishes a newsletter and
also sponsors a philosophy of peace book
series.
The American Political Science Association
<http://www.apsanet.org>
The American Political Science Association
(APSA) is the disciplinary association for
political scientists in the United States.
Its website provides an excellent internet
research tool. It publishes three leading peer-
reviewed journals: The American Political
Science Review; Perspectives on Politics; and
257
RESEARCH RESOURCES
Political Science and Politics. These journals
may be beneficial for students interested in
contemporary topics in political science.
This is a membership-based Association.
Students interested in opportunities in gov-
ernment and politics may find this organiza-
tion useful.
International Association for the Philosophy
of Law and Social Philosophy <http://ivron-
line.org/>
The International Association for the
Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy
(IVR—for Internationale Vereinigung für
Rechts-und Sozialphilosophie) is an interna-
tional organization that host a world con-
gress focused on topics in philosophy of law,
social philosophy, and political philosophy.
The IVR includes national branches includ-
ing a UK branch (http://www.law.qmul.ac.uk/
research/centres/clsgc/ivr/index.html) and
the American Section of the International
Association for the Philosophy of Law and
Social Philosophy (AMINTAPHIL) http://
amintaphil.philosophy.utah.edu/. Both the
UK branch and AMINTAPHIL hold meetings
focused on a topic in social, legal, or political
philosophy.
The American Society for Political and Legal
Philosophy <http://www.political-theory.org/>
The American Society for Political and
Legal Philosophy (ASPLP) is a scholarly
organization dedicated to scholarship in
legal and political philosophy. It publishes
NOMOS an annual volume dedicated
to cutting edge research in these areas.
According to the ASLP website, “The
ASPLP leadership has included some of
the most distinguished and accomplished
RESEARCH RESOURCES
scholars in political and legal philoso-
phy including John Rawls, Lon Fuller and
Judith Shklar.”
Open Library <https://openlibrary.org>
Open Library has over 1 million free EBooks
available online. Students of philosophy and
politics may take particular interest with
the website because it gives instant access
to books that may no longer be in print or
might be difficult to find at popular online
and local bookstores.
The Office of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Human Rights <http://
www.ohchr.org/>
The Office of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Human Rights creates a
wide range of publications on topics related
to human rights. This is a great research tool
for students interested in or concerned about
human rights violations around the world.
The website is also great because it provides
free access to publications and handbooks
from other active organizations such as
Freedom House <http://www.freedomhouse.
org>; Amnesty International <http://www.
amnesty.org>; Human Rights Watch <http://
www.hrw.org>.
258
United Nations Human Development Report
<www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home.
html>
The annual Human Development Report
by the United Nations is the best of several
sources for students interested in economic
analytical data concerning the alleviation
of Global Poverty; Building Democratic
Societies; Preventing Crisis; Protecting the
Environment; Halting and Reversing HIV/
AIDS; Empowering Women; Growing
National Capacity; and so on.
Carnegie Council for Ethics and International
Affairs <http://www.carnegiecouncil.org/
index.html>
The Carnegie Council publishes the jour-
nal Ethics and International Affairs. They
hold meetings and support research in top-
ics of concern for political philosophers. The
Carnegie Council website includes useful
links and information, including links to lists
of films of interest and a monthly column on
current events/issues.
Note
1
Thanks to Chisanga Chanda for her assistance.
 ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY
Arendt, H., The Origins of Totalitarianism
(New York: Harcourt, 1951). An account
of the development of totalitarian
political organization focused primarily
on Nazism and Stalinism. The book
also contains important discussions of
anti-Semitism, racism, and the function
of ideology and terror within a lawful
government grounded on oppression and
domination.
— On Revolution (New York: Penguin,
1962). An examination of American
and French revolutions that explores
the importance of liberty and pluralism
and a robust public sphere. A central
problem is the contrast between the
dynamic revolutionary spirit of the
revolutionary generation, which aims to
found a new constitution, and the less
dynamic and anti-revolutionary result of
constitutionally bound political life.
— On Violence (New York: Harcourt,
1970). An attempt to define and explain
the differences between violence, power,
force, strength, and authority. Arendt
suggests that violence is a tool that can
create obedience; but authority and
power are not merely created by violence.
Beitz, C., Political Theory and International
Relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press, 1973). Concerned with
259
extending principles of distributive justice
to the international realm. Denies the
Hobbesian assumption that states are
entities that can be considered in isolation
from principles of justice. An important
text for understanding cosmopolitanism.
Berlin, I., Four Essays on Liberty (Oxford
University Press, 1969—reprinted as
Liberty, Oxford, 2002). Contains the
important essay, “Two Concepts of
Liberty,” which clarifies the distinction
between positive and negative liberty.
Berlin argues that these two concepts are
often confused and that the distinction
indicates the need for a pluralistic
approach that recognizes rival goods.
Cohen, J. L., Globalization and
Sovereignty: Rethinking Legality,
Legitimacy, and Constitutionalism
(Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2012). A book considering the
newly emerging international order
under the United Nations, including
critiques of hegemony and hierarchy and
a call for international norms respecting
human rights, political autonomy and
sovereignty, as well as constitutional
principles.
Cohen, J., Philosophy, Politics, Democracy:
Selected Essays (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 2009). Cohen
ANNOTATED Bibliography
defends and describes the relation
between democracy and reasoned
discourse, while opposing cynicism about
political life (which holds that politics is
merely about power struggles).
Dussel, E., Politics of Liberation: A
Critical Global History (London: SCM
Press, 2011). Dussel is a prominent
Latin American philosopher who has
published several major works in which
he criticizes the Eurocentric bias in
political philosophy and in philosophy
generally. In this book, Dussel attempts to
deconstruct the Greek-centric and Euro-
centric lenses that structure our thinking
about philosophy and politics, while
applying insights gleaned from liberation
theology.
Dworkin, R., Law’s Empire (Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press, 1986).
Dworkin argues against the sort of legal
positivism he associates with H. L. A.
Hart. Dworkin maintains that there are
norms of consistency and interpretation
that apply beyond merely historical
positivism. These norms include keeping
faith with institutional and historical
precedent. Dworkin uses the example of
Judge Hercules as an ideal adjudicator
who should in principle be able to reach a
correct conclusion in hard cases of law.
— Sovereign Virtue (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 2000). A
book focussed on equality as a primary
value in both political structures and
distributive justice. A clear articulation
of the idea of liberal egalitarianism, in
which governmental redistributions seek
to remedy disadvantages resulting from
bad luck.
Foucault, M., Discipline and Punish (New
York: Pantheon, 1977—originally
published in French in 1975). This
260
book is a genealogical account of the
development of modern technologies of
power and discipline—and their relation
to the emergence of subjectivity—with a
special focus on prisons and schools.
Fukuyama, F., The Origins of Political
Order: From PreHuman Times to the
French Revolution (New York: Farrar,
Strauss, & Giroux, 2011). An account of
the evolution of political organizations.
The first of a two volume account of the
evolution (and potential devolution) of
democracy.
Geuss, R., Philosophy and Real Politics
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, 2008). A critical examination of
political philosophizing that criticizes
abstract, idealizing approaches, while
emphasizing politics as a craft or skill
that is historical located and motivated
by various interests, forces and needs.
Gewirth, A., The Community of Rights
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1996). An account of universality
and equality in human rights, which
maintains that state intervention and
active community support are necessary
components of rights protection.
Habermas, J., The Structural Transformation
of the Public Sphere (Cambridge, MA:
MIT Press, 1989—originally published
in German in 1962). Habermas’s account
of the development of the public sphere
during the Enlightenment and beyond.
This demonstrates the historical basis of
Habermas’s ideal of public deliberation
and legitimation.
— Theory of Communicative Action,
vols I and II (Boston, MA: Beacon,
1984/7—originally published in
German in 1981). Habermas’s theory
of how norms and legitimation develop
within communicative acts and within

communities of discourse. The shared
assumption of linguistic communication
is the goal of understanding, which
involves mutuality.
— Between Facts and Norms (Cambridge,
MA: MIT Press, 1996—originally
published in German in 1992).
Habermas’s account of the relation
between public discourse/deliberation
and the legal system. One focus is the
derivation of “rights” from principles of
intersubjectivity and public discourse.
Another focus is the legitimation of law
as a concretion of mutual understanding
(and not merely as external authority).
Hart, H. L. A., The Concept of Law, 3rd
Edition (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2012—originally published 1961). One
of the most important works defending
the idea of legal positivism. Hart argues
that laws and legal institutions have
a normative power that results from
general recognition of their validity.
Hayek, F., The Road to Serfdom (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1944).
An argument against centralized
governmental control of the economy
(socialism) and defense of free market
libertarianism.
— The Constitution of Liberty (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1960). A
defense of classical liberalism in political
thought focused on protecting individual
liberty against coercion by others or by
the state. Protection of liberty occurs best
under the “rule of law”: public law helps
to limit the arbitrary will of despotic
government.
Horkheimer, M. and T. Adorno, Dialectic
of Enlightenment (Amsterdam: Querido,
1947; English translation in 1972 by
John Cumming; more recent translation
by Edmund Jephcott—Stanford, CA:
261
ANNOTATED Bibliography
Stanford University Press, 2002). A
seminal text of the Frankfurt School of
critical theory. Focused on development
of totalitarian social and political
systems, with a related interest in
propaganda and the culture industry.
Kymlicka, W., Multicultural Citizenship
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995).
A defense of minority group identity and
rights, including specific representation
and legal exemptions for certain racial,
religious or ethnic groups.
Marcuse, H., One-Dimensional Man
(Boston, MA: Beacon, 1964). An
important work of critical theory, which
argues against the tendency of large
social and political entities to reduce
and eliminate opportunities for critique,
while dominating thought through both
productive activity and consumer culture.
The solution is refusal and negation.
Miller, D., On Nationality (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1995). A defense of
nationalism and national identity—
against both liberals and globalists who
view nationalism as old-fashioned and
multiculturalists who advocate for sub-
national identity.
Mouffe, C., On the Political (New York:
Routledge, 2005). Mouffe defends
agonistic pluralism—or antagonistic
political struggles—against idealizing
attempts to avoid the reality of political
struggle. For Mouffe, reconciliation and
consensus are not sufficient to rule out
the unruly aspects of democracy and
political life.
Negri, A. and M. Hardt, Empire
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 2000). Examines the imperial
aspects of the emerging unipolar world.
Focused on the institutional structures
of contemporary globalization, the book
ANNOTATED Bibliography
argues that there is a new post-national
capitalist structure called “Empire” that
dominates the globe.
Nozick, R., Anarchy, State, Utopia (New
York: Basic Books, 1974). Nozick’s
libertarian text offers a reconstruction of
social contract/state-of-nature arguments.
Nozick argues in defense of what is
called a “minimal state.” Nozick presents
arguments against distributive justice,
including a critique of John Rawls’s
work.
Nussbaum, M.C., Sex and Social
Justice (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1998). A feminist approach to
international justice issues, focused
on the “capabilities approach.” This
attempts to be sensitive to local and
cultural differences, while also providing
a critical framework for discussing the
oppression of women.
— Frontiers of Justice: Disability,
Nationality, Species Membership
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 2006). An extension of Rawlsian
liberal ideas to “marginal cases,”
including considerations of the disabled,
immigrants and noncitizens, and non-
human animals.
Oakeshott, M., On Human Conduct
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1975).
An analysis of political life based upon
the idea of civil associations as voluntary
and reciprocal associations based upon
human intelligence and understanding
(and thus not compulsory association or
organic holism).
Pocock, J. G. A., Politics, Language, and
Time: Essays on Political Thought and
History (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1989). An explanation and defense
of the history of political thought. Brings
contemporary historical methodologies to
262
bear on the texts of the canon of political
philosophy.
Pogge, T., World Poverty and Human Rights
(Cambridge: Polity Press, 2002—revised
second edition, 2008). Pogge’s analysis
of global injustice results in a call for
redistribution of global income and
wealth. This is a now classic text in the
growing literature of cosmopolitanism.
Popper, K., The Open Society and Its
Enemies, 2 vols (London: Routledge,
1945). An analysis of illiberal political
philosophy from Plato to Hegel and on
to twentieth-century totalitarianism.
Popper defends democracy and liberal
“open societies” against the utopian hope
of totalitarian idealisms. While Popper’s
reading of the history of philosophy is
tendentious, his advocacy of the open
society (and his mis-reading of Hegel) has
been influential.
Rawls, J., A Theory of Justice (Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press, 1971).
The definitive modern liberal account
of distributive justice (and “justice as
fairness”) based upon a hypothetical
contract made by rational agents who
agree upon principles of justice under a
“veil of ignorance” in what Rawls calls
“the original position.” Two principles of
justice are derived: the liberty principle
and the difference principle.
— Political Liberalism (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1993).
Extension of Rawls’s ideas about
justice as fairness that develops out of
“reasonable pluralism.” Examines the
possibility of establishing “overlapping
consensus” among people who
fundamentally disagree about their
“comprehensive schemes” or worldviews.
— The Law of Peoples (Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press, 1999).

Rawls’s consideration of international
law and relations. Rawls imagines an
international agreement arising out of an
international “original position” in which
representatives of “peoples” deliberate
about international relations. Discusses
the difference between ideal theory
and non-ideal theory (including how
well-ordered liberal states should relate
to “decent hierarchical societies” and
“burdened states” and “outlaw regimes”).
Sandel, M., Liberalism and the Limits
of Justice (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1982). A critique
of liberal political theory that is one
of the primary texts associated with
so-called communitarian criticism. Sandel
argues that the thinness of Rawls’s
veil of ignorance divorces us from our
most deeply held values including our
commitment to a vision of the good life.
Schmitt, C., Political Theology (originally
published 1919; Schwab translation first
published by the University of Chicago
Press, 1985). Theory of sovereignty that
relates secular political power to religious
ideas. Schmitt examines the limits of
law in a so-called state of emergency
to indicate that sovereign power
resides outside of the law. A theory of
sovereignty that was influential for anti-
liberal political movements during the
twentieth century.
— The Concept of the Political (first
published 1932; Schwab translation first
published by the University of Chicago
Press, 1996). Schmitt’s notorious defense
of extra-legal dictatorship. Schmitt argues
that a central political distinction is the
difference between enemy and friend in
the state of war. This distinction leads to
a critique of liberal polities, which permit
non-friends to be citizens. The solution is
263
ANNOTATED Bibliography
a more organic polity in which citizenship
and friendship are closely intertwined.
Sen, A., The Idea of Justice (Cambridge,
MA: Harvard University Press, 2009).
Sen’s contribution to the critique of
liberalism and Rawlsian political
philosophy. Sen’s focus is comparative
justice, grounded in actual arrangements
in the real world—as opposed to an
idealized theory of justice.
Strauss, L., Natural Right and History
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1953). Strauss’s historical inquiry
into the question of whether there
is something called “natural right”
which transcends history or whether
“historicism” and related skeptical ideas
such as “positivism” and “nihilism” are
correct. Related to this is the question
of whether political philosophy itself is
possible—as a theory of abstract and
absolute truth about political life—or
whether political philosophy is merely
historically located.
— What is Political Philosophy? (Chicago:
University of Chicago, 1959). Several
important essays by Strauss are collected
here, including the title essay, which
argues that political philosophy is enquiry
about the good life.
Walzer, M., Just and Unjust Wars (New
York: Basic Books, 1977). Walzer’s
now classic restatement of the just war
tradition, with significant examples taken
from recent history. Walzer examines
controversial topics such as war crimes,
terrorism and supreme emergencies.
Several newer editions have appeared
with updates related to contemporary
issues.
— Spheres of Justice: A Defense of Pluralism
and Equality (New York: Basic Books,
1983). Walzer’s account of the complexity
ANNOTATED Bibliography
of justice, based upon the notion of
“complex equality” and various spheres in
which—and across and through which—
justice is considered and distributed.
Walzer reminds us that domination across
spheres is unjust and that distributions
within each sphere should be based upon
independent criteria.
Weber, M., The Protestant Ethic and the
Spirit of Capitalism (originally published
1905—Kalberg translation 2010,
Oxford: Oxford University Press). Work
of sociology and political philosophy
that relates economics to religion and
spiritual, ethical practice. Influential on
subsequent sociology of religion and
theories of economics.
— The Vocation Lectures: Science
As a Vocation, Politics As a
Vocation (originally published
1917/1919—Livingstone translation
2004, Indianapolis: IN: Hackett). Theory
of political life and leadership, as well
as theory of science. The “Politics as
264
Vocation” essay is famous for introducing
the idea that political authority possesses
a monopoly on the use of violence; as
well as the idea of administration or
bureaucracy.
Young, I. M., Justice and the Politics of
Difference (Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press, 1990). An important
contribution to feminist theory of politics.
Young argues that democratic theory
has too long assumed a homogeneous
polity (usually defined by and in terms
of the white, male ruling class). Young
calls for more participation and for more
opportunities for participation for groups
previously excluded.
— Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2001). Feminist
lens applies to issues in political
philosophy, especially democratic theory
and liberalism. Focuses on the way that
certain modes of discourse exclude (or
include) marginalized groups. Includes a
call for global democratic institutions.
 Index

absolutism  35, 227 Bodin, J.  35, 38, 216

Adorno, T.  233, 261 bureaucracy,  35, 156, 228
agonism  153, 161–2, 261
ahimsa  130, 244 Cambridge School  23–4, 28
see also nonviolence Canada  105, 203, 242
anarchy/anarchism  4, 6, 36–8, 133, capitalism  133–5, 156, 228, 240, 251
162, 227 and communism/socialism  231, 250
Daoist  130 care chains  192–3
international  110 care ethics  129, 168–71, 192–3
anthropocene  213–20 Carens, J.  188–90
anthropocentric/-ism  235 China  26, 89, 112, 117, 120, 216,
anthropology  4, 7–8, 10, 110, 117, 215, 251 228, 248, 251
Aquinas, T.  4, 37, 38 Cicero  201, 242, 249
Arendt, H.  7, 34–5, 239–40, 259 citizenship  229, 238, 243, 251
Aristocracy  227, 244, 248 cosmopolitanism  47, 51, 55, 163, 202,
Aristotle  4, 6–7, 10–13, 20–1, 75–6, 96, 204–5
103, 214, 242 democracy  153–8, 203
associative ownership argument  187–8 immigration  183, 187–90
asylum  67–8, 113, 184, 227 sovereignty  36
Augustine  4, 5, 7, 38, 110 women  176
Austin, J.  42 civil disobedience  33, 37, 118, 133, 229,
authoritarian(-ism)  2, 110, 227 231, 244
autocracy  227, 234 civility  139, 144–5, 148, 230
autonomy  228 civilization  4, 131, 214–15, 229
and democracy  153–63 civil rights  127, 229–30, 238, 241, 244
Kantian  154 civil society  84, 230
of individuals  36, 68, 80 cosmopolitan  204
of political groups  50, 52–3 democratic theory  203
and surrogacy  178 Kant on crime in  98
and toleration  140–8 liberal-democratic  142, 149
Locke and religion  147
Beitz, C.  49–52, 62–4, 85 private sphere  246
Benhabib, S.  159, 161, 175 social contract  249
Berlin, I.  237, 259 Clausewitz, C.  109–17, 120

265
Index

Cohen, J.  2, 259 capitalism  228

Cohen, J. L.  41, 259 cosmopolitanism  51, 190
collectivism  230 deliberative democracy  153, 159–61,
colonialism  5, 39, 230 175, 233
Eurocentrism  3, 213–20 distributive justice  76
see also postcolonial feminism/gender  167–8, 171, 175–80
communism  231 immigration  183–5
and capitalism  228 peace  133–5
Soviet  128 right in  62, 72
see also Marxism; socialism social contract  35–6
communitarianism  105–6, 148, 160, 231 toleration  139–46, 149
Confucianism  27, 117, 214 despotism  34, 234
conscientious objection/refusal  33, 37, 39, Dewey, J.  2, 3, 158–9, 163
133, 229, 231 distributive justice  9, 16, 49, 52 Chapter 5
conservatism  232, 239, 241, 246 (75–93), 234, 240, 250
constitution/constitutionalism  6, 8, 11, 41, environmentalism  235
153, 232 feminism and gender  173–4, 237
democratic deliberation  159 luck  190
division of power  43, 143 divine right of kings  7, 35, 234
globalized  220 division of labor  4, 228, 234, 237
Kantian  133 gender  168, 175–6, 178
Rawls  159 domination  6, 35, 89, 174, 179, 233, 236,
rights  63, 219 252
toleration  139 Dunn, J.  23–4, 27
U.K.  143 Dussel, E.,  213–16
U.S.  99–100, 143 Dworkin, R.  36, 75–7, 81, 155, 157
contract/contractarian  see social contract/
social compact egalitarian/ism  234–5
cosmopolitan/cosmopolitanism  4, 7, 16–18, closed/open border  185–6, 188
47–56, 202–5, 232 cosmopolitanism  52–3
distributive justice  86 democracy  156
Eurocentrism  214, 216 distributive justice  79–81
feminism  175, 177 luck  190–1
immigration  186, 188, 190, 192 see also equality
peace  133 empire  235
sovereignty  36, 40–1 see also imperialism
coup d’etat  51, 232 enlightenment (and The Enlightenment)  28,
crimes against humanity  40, 232–3, 237, 252 146, 215, 220, 235
critical race theory  200–4, 246–7 environment/environmentalism  42, 88–90,
critical theory  39, 175, 233, 252 208, 235
cultural imperialism  174, 239 equality  204
cynicism  6, 38 cosmopolitanism  50, 53, 55
democracy  154–6
Dahl, R.  153, 155–7, 163 distributive justice  76–7, 79–80, 83
Daoism  130 feminism  158, 168, 173
democracy/democratic  2, 6, 8, 13, 14, 37, global equality  52, 90
53, 153–63, 203–4, 233–4 punishment principle  98

266
 Index

relational  175 Galtung, J.  129

rights  62 game theory  237, 245, 253
sovereign equality  39, 41 Gandhi, M.K.  37, 118, 127–8, 133, 244,
see also egalitarian/ism 249, 2239
ethics  7, 9–10, 235 gender  167–80, 237
feminism  168–71, 192 see also feminism
military  114–22 genealogy  5, 28–9
rights  61, 67, 72 and agonism  161
torture  205 of sovereignty  34–9
ethnic cleansing  40, 142, 232 genocide  40, 113, 232, 237, 253
Eurocentric/Eurocentrism  1, 3–5, 8, 15, 18, Geuss, R.  7, 25
215–17, 219–20, 244–5 Gewirth, A.  65, 67, 69
Europe  5–6, 8, 26–7, 39, 111, 113, 116, globalization  40, 50, 154, 163, 167, 177,
122, 128, 132, 134, 203, 213–5, 193, 213–20, 237–8, 241
220, 227, 230, 232, 234–6, 239, global justice  4, 47, 55, 78, 85–91, 177–8,
243, 245 190, 219
European Union  54–8 see also cosmopolitan/cosmopolitanism

fascism  236, 253 Habermas, J.  24–5, 160–1, 163, 203, 233,
federal/-ism  35, 228, 236, 253 246
feminism  7, 17, 167–80, 202–3, 236, 237 Hart, H. L. A.  33, 42–3
consciousness-raising  15 Hayek, F.  33, 43, 78–9
democracy  153, 158 Hegel, G.W.F.  2, 6, 8, 11, 15, 20, 21, 25–6,
immigration  190–3 98, 199, 213, 230, 246, 252
Kant critique  160–1 hegemony  41, 161, 228, 235, 238–40
peace  129 Hellenocentrism  214–15
Rawls critique  204 Hinduism  26, 117, 130
feudalism  35, 190, 228, 235, 236 Hobbes, T.  5, 11, 21, 28–9, 35, 43, 110–11,
Foucault, M.  6, 8, 24, 39, 95, 106, 206 131, 133, 162, 202, 215–6, 249, 251
freedom  2, 11, 12, 15, 81–2, 236–7 homo economicus  160
assembly  157, 229 Horkheimer, M.  233
association  185–6 human rights  3, 9–10, 36–40, 61–73, 200,
conscience  143 203, 228, 230, 232, 233, 235, 236, 238,
expression  141 239, 241, 244, 251
feminism  172, 177 cosmopolitanism  49, 55–6
Kant  133–4 distributive justice  86
movement  188–90 Eurocentrism  219–20
negative  157; toleration  149
see also negative liberty under liberty
open borders  183 idealism  238–9, 247
press  157 identity politics  239, 253
punishment  99 ideology/ideological  2–4, 8, 39, 41–2, 131,
Rawls  62, 80 161–2, 216, 233, 234, 239
religious  132, 141, 146–7, 229 immigration  10, 17, 40, 183–94
speech  17, 229 imperialism  39, 41, 134, 218, 230, 236,
see also liberty 239–40, 245
Fukuyama, F.  9, 33, 252 India  85, 89–90, 117, 120, 127, 131, 243

267
Index

individualism  43–4, 48, 130, 160, 231, punishment  105

240, 242 sovereignty  34–7
international law  2, 9–10, 14, 16, 33–4, toleration  139–49
39, 206, 227, 232, 238, 240, 241, 244, libertarian/-ism  9–10, 241–2, 249–50
247, 253 distributive justice  77–9
of armed conflict  121 rights  66–7
cosmopolitanism  52, 56 sovereignty  37, 43
humanitarian law  121, 241 liberty  236, 241–2
human rights  63, 122 civil  229
International Monetary Fund (IMF)  52, democracy  158
87, 96 distributive justice  234
Islam  27, 102, 113, 117, 119, 142, 206, 215 movement  188
negative/positive  9, 231, 236–8
jus ad bellum  116, 118, 120, 240 Rawls  80, 204
jus ante bellum  122 rights  37, 62, 68, 238
jus cogens  240, 241 toleration  147
jus gentium  121, 241 totalitarianism  253
see also law of peoples US Constitution  99
jus in bello  116, 120–1, 240 see also freedom
jus natural  240–1 Locke, J.  1–2, 11, 37, 131, 146–7, 235,
see also natural law 241, 249
jus post bellum  122 luck egalitarian argument  190–1
just war theory  16, 117–22, 206, 240
MacIntyre, A.  22–3, 28, 115, 117, 160, 207
Kant, I.  25, 80, 97–100, 122, 133–5, 154–5, marginalization  161, 170, 174–6, 215
159–62, 199, 228 Marx, K.  1–3, 6, 8, 11–12, 15, 21, 110, 231
King, M.L.  15, 37, 118, 127–8, 133, 229, Marxism  22, 29, 132, 173, 231, 233–4,
244 239, 242, 250, 252
Kittay, E.  169, 173, 176, 178, 192–3 meritocracy  235, 242
Kymlicka, W.  148, 163, 203 migration  154, 163, 177–8, 183–4, 191,
193
law of peoples  63, 240–1, 253 military ethics  114–21
legal positivism  33, 42–3, 241 see also just war theory
legal voluntarism  37, 42 Miller, D.  51, 53, 163, 189
legitimacy  33, 35, 40–1, 55, 71, 133, 145, mixed government  228, 242, 249
153, 160, 162, 216 modus vivendi  3, 242, 244, 245, 252
lex talionis  98, 249 monarchy/-ism  6, 34–7, 227, 234, 242,
liberal/liberalism  3, 17, 203–5, 228, 229, 248–50, 252–3
232, 234–5, 237, 239–41, 245–6, Montesquieu, Baron de  201, 242, 249
250–2 morality  24–3, 230, 235
cosmopolitanism  50 democracy  163
democracy  153, 157, 162 distributive justice  76, 90
feminism  158, 167–8, 171–4, 178 human rights  61, 72
human rights  62–3 immigration  193
immigration  183–90 military  114, 117–18, 120
internationalism  40 parents  170
peace  133–4 religion  147

268

toleration  143, 147
see also ethics
multiculturalism  175, 203, 233, 239,
243, 245
nationalism  243, 245
nation-state  4–5, 68, 84–6, 109–11, 113,
119, 194, 202, 219, 235, 243
NATO (North Atlantic Treaty
Organization)  122
natural law  4–6, 33, 36–7, 40–1,
43, 232, 237–8, 240–1, 243–5,
250, 253
natural rights  37, 64–6, 68–70, 72, 146,
254
see also human rights
negative rights  37, 72, 229, 238, 244–5,
250
see also liberty positive rights
Nietzsche, F.  3, 6, 8, 28–9, 39
nonresistance  122–3
nonviolence  2, 16–7, 127–9, 133, 135,
244–5, 249–50
Nozick, R.  16, 36, 77, 79
Nussbaum, M.  48–9, 54–5, 81–2, 154–5,
162, 177–8
Oakeshott, M.  19–25, 28
Occidentalism  5, 215, 220
Okin, S.  168, 170–3, 175–6
oligarchy  6, 14, 242, 244
oppression  15, 40, 67, 154, 161, 174–5,
178–9, 186, 191, 236, 244
Orientalism  5, 215, 220
overlapping consensus  3, 148, 162, 242,
244–5
pacifism  16–7, 127–35, 169
paternalism  3–4, 17, 34, 143, 147, 154–6,
159, 161
patriotism  36, 47, 54, 243, 245
peace  127–35, 242, 244–5
crimes against  233, 253
democratic  133, 239
global/cosmopolitan  113, 232
human rights  63–4
Kant  122, 133
269
Index
peace-keeping  122, 228
peacemaking  105
peace of Westphalia  39
positive/negative  129
see also war
Plato  1–3, 5, 6, 10–11, 13–6, 34–5, 38,
102–3, 105–6, 120, 130, 140, 144, 205,
207, 214, 240, 242
pluralism  2, 39, 140, 142, 149, 153,
155–6, 158, 161, 203–4, 230, 233,
236, 243–5
Pocock, J. G. A.  23–4, 29
Pogge, T.  48–51, 55, 86–8, 91, 191
political theory  9–10, 12–14, 20–2, 41,
153, 160–1, 168–9, 200–1, 205, 207–8,
210n. 1
political science  5, 12–14, 23–5, 34, 42
popular sovereignty  35, 113, 250
positive law  33, 37, 41–3, 232, 243–5
see also legal positivism
positive rights  69, 82, 229–31, 238, 254–5
see also liberty negative rights
postcolonial  1, 3, 39–42, 167–8, 202–3,
214, 216–7, 245
see also colonialism
prisoner’s dilemma  237, 245, 253
private/public spheres  7, 91, 147, 157–8,
167–8, 170–2, 177, 203, 246
progressive/-ism  232, 246, 248
property 
intellectual  199, 205
personal/private  62–3, 228, 231, 250
property-owning democracy  177
right to  37, 52, 62, 66, 72, 79, 99,
127, 167
public reason/deliberation  2, 142, 144–5,
147–9, 153, 155, 158–60, 162, 230,
233, 246
punishment  14, 16, 42, 95–107, 113,
229, 249
race/racism  49, 83, 87, 102, 142, 158, 161,
190, 201, 246–7, 251–2
see also critical race theory
Rawls, J.  3, 9–11
civil disobedience  37, 229
contract  11
Index
cosmopolitanism  50
democracy,  155, 158–60, 162
distributive justice  79–84, 234
feminism  171–3
history of philosophy  22, 24–5
human rights  61–3
immigration  188
law of peoples  241
liberalism  241
pluralism  245
the Rawls industry  204–5
toleration  139, 144–5, 148–9
see also overlapping consensus
realism  2–6, 40, 109–11, 131, 238, 247
Realpolitik  247
recognition  see struggle for recognition
reconciliation  102, 105
Fellowship of Reconciliation  129
Truth and Reconciliation  105
see also restorative justice
refugee  10, 68, 184–5, 187, 247
relational justice  49, 167–71, 174–6,
186, 248
relational egalitarianism  181, 186
relational selfhood  193
relativism  9–10, 22, 73, 233, 248
repression  see oppression
republic/republican  133, 157, 231,
246, 248–9
responsibility to protect  38, 50, 113
restorative justice  95–106, 248–9
retributive justice  75, 87–8, 95–106,
240, 249
rights  see human rights; natural rights
Rorty, R.  3, 6, 28
Rousseau, J.J.  4, 21, 38, 110–11, 131, 159,
249, 251
Ruddick, S.  129, 169
Sandel, M.  160, 208
satyagraha  127, 249
Schmitt, C.  19, 26–7, 35, 38, 43
Schumpeter, J.  157, 159
Sen, A.  81–3, 163
separation of powers  143, 228, 242, 249
Singer P.,  49, 51, 85, 88
Skinner, Q.  22–9
270
social contract/ social compact  1, 4, 6, 9,
11, 35, 38, 134, 153, 155, 162–3, 176,
201, 204, 249–51
social democracy  250
socialism  9, 231, 242, 250
social justice  65, 78–81, 86–7, 92, 178, 230,
235, 241, 244, 250
Socrates  2, 8, 11, 14, 34, 96, 120
sovereignty  33–44, 55, 119, 202–3, 219,
243, 250
state of nature  4, 7, 11, 68, 110–11, 127,
131, 249, 261
structural discrimination/racism  247, 251–2
structural inequality  161
structural violence  129
struggle for recognition  6, 239, 252
suffrage  252
see also vote/voting
territoriality  39–40, 90, 185
theocracy  6, 251
Thoreau, H.D.  37, 39, 133, 229
tolerance/toleration  17, 62–3, 139–49, 230,
241–4, 246, 252
torture  17, 42, 68, 99, 146, 205, 233
totalitarianism  43, 227, 236, 240, 253
tragedy of the commons  231, 237,
245, 253
tyranny  14, 35, 130, 234, 252
unitary state  236, 253
United Kingdom  113, 143, 232–3
United Nations  9, 39, 55–6, 91, 113, 119,
134, 218, 238, 247, 251
United States  12, 35, 43, 55, 89, 105–6,
112, 122, 129, 143, 156–7, 192, 203–4,
206–7, 216, 229, 233, 239, 242, 248
Universal Declaration of Human Rights 
76, 238
utopia  2–6, 10–12, 87, 131, 170,
213, 253
Vincent, A.  22–3
virtue  7, 13–4, 36, 72, 103, 105, 115, 139,
144–5, 149, 158, 169, 230, 237, 240,
250, 252
Aristotle  7, 103
 Index

civic virtue  139, 144–5, 149, 150, 230, 250 cyberwar  206
democratic  158 irregular/unconventional war  113–4,
feminism  169, 237 119
forms of government  14 war crime  232–3, 253
justice  240 see also just war theory peace
leadership  13 Weber, M.  38, 228, 251
professional ethics  115 welfare rights  66, 72, 84, 230, 245
responsibility  104–5 welfare state  173, 178, 204, 241,
shame  103 253–4, 260
sovereignty  36 Wellman, C.H.  64, 68, 185–7, 191
tolerance  139, 144, 149, 252 Westphalian Peace/sovereignty  38–41, 44,
virtue ethics  72 111, 203
Vitoria, F.  121, 216 Williams B.  72–3, 140
vote/voting  13, 62, 66, 144, 156–7, 167, Wittgenstein, L.  6, 41, 43, 199
229, 233, 235, 237, 245, 252 World Trade Organization (WTO)  40, 52,
55, 86
Walzer, M.  37, 117, 157, 183–6, 230 World War  111, 113, 121–2, 134,
war  2, 16, 109–23, 232–3, 237, 240, 244, 232
247, 253
civil war  88, 116 Young, I. M.  158, 161, 174–5

271