A Critical Assessment of Robert George's Criticism of John Rawls' Idea of Public Reason

2011 ◽  
Author(s):  
Suzie Chiodo
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Public Reason ◽  
Critical Assessment

Shared intentions, public reason, and political autonomy

2019 ◽  
Vol 49 (6) ◽  
pp. 776-804 ◽  
Author(s):  
Blain Neufeld
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Public Reason ◽  
State Power ◽  
Public Justification ◽  
Political Autonomy ◽  
Public Reasoning ◽  
Corporate Body ◽  
Gerald Gaus

AbstractJohn Rawls claims that public reasoning is the reasoning of ‘equal citizens who as a corporate body impose rules on one another backed by sanctions of state power’. Drawing upon an amended version of Michael Bratman’s theory of shared intentions, I flesh out this claim by developing the ‘civic people’ account of public reason. Citizens realize ‘full’ political autonomy as members of a civic people. Full political autonomy, though, cannot be realised by citizens in societies governed by a ‘constrained proceduralist’ account of democratic self-government, or the ‘convergence’ account of public justification formulated recently by Gerald Gaus and Kevin Vallier.

La Idea de “Razón Publica” (y su Revisión) en el Último Rawls

2003 ◽  
Vol 11 (22) ◽  
pp. 5-31
Author(s):  
Fernando Aranda Fraga ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Public Good ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Public Reason ◽  
Political Liberalism ◽  
The Political ◽  
Theory Of Justice ◽  
Key Topics ◽  
Political Philosopher

In 1993 John Rawls published his main and longest work since 1971, where he had published his reknowned A Theory of Justice, book that made him famous as the greatest political philosopher of the century. We are referring to Political Liberalism, a summary of his writings of the 80’s and the first half of the 90’s, where he attempts to answer the critics of his intellectual partners, communitarian philosophers. One of the key topics in this book is the issue of “public reason”, whose object is nothing else than public good, and on which the principles and proceedings of justice are to be applied. The book was so important for the political philosophy of the time that in 1997 Rawls had to go through the 1993 edition, becoming this new one the last relevant writing published before the death of the Harvard philosopher in November 2002.

Religion in the EU: Using Modified Public Reason to Define European Human Rights

2009 ◽  
Vol 10 (11) ◽  
pp. 1439-1468 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian M. Awe
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Public Reason ◽  
The European Union ◽  
The Public ◽  
Common Value ◽  
Novel Approach ◽  
Dialectical Process ◽  
Comprehensive Doctrines ◽  
The Eu

At the current stage of its evolution, the European Union (“Union” or “EU”) has reached a juncture where many leaders and scholars believe that greater integration is both desirable and necessary. Presumably, a primary method by which greater solidarity and integration can be achieved within the EU is through the public inclusion of common value-laden concepts – as defined through a dialectical process – present within comprehensive doctrines such as religion. To date, however, an effective and inclusive means for utilizing religion in this manner has yet to be formulated. In response, this article takes two prominent paradigms – Jurgen Habermas' intersubjective discourse theory and John Rawls' liberalism – to approach the problem and draws from them a new solution that, while tied to their theoretical underpinnings, is nonetheless a novel approach to achieving greater integration within the Union. Under this new framework, the process of legislatively defining human rights allows the morality common to European comprehensive doctrines – including official and unofficial religions – to bolster the Union's solidarity, legitimacy, and democracy both procedurally and substantively.

For the People, By the Viewpoints? Realism and Idealism in Public Reason

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (5) ◽  
pp. 527-557
Author(s):  
Athmeya Jayaram
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Public Reason ◽  
The People ◽  
Political Norms

Abstract Since John Rawls, public reason theorists have attempted to show how liberal political norms could be acceptable to people with diverse religious and ethical viewpoints. However, these theories overlook the importance of the distinction between acceptability to realistic people and acceptability to viewpoints, which matters because public reason theories are committed to the former, but only deliver the latter, thereby failing to justify liberal norms. Public reason theories therefore face a dilemma: abandon realistic people and lose normative appeal, or retain realism and find a new way to justify liberalism.

What Scope for Ethics in the Public Sphere? Principled Autonomy and the Antinomy of Practical Reason

2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 485-498
Author(s):  
Maureen Junker-Kenny
Keyword(s):  
Public Sphere ◽  
Practical Reason ◽  
John Rawls ◽  
Public Reason ◽  
Human Agency ◽  
Jürgen Habermas ◽  
The Public ◽  
Jurgen Habermas ◽  
The Public Sphere

Concepts of ‘public reason’ vary according to the underlying understandings of theoretical and practical reason; they make a difference to what can be argued for in the public sphere as justified expectations to oneself and fellow-citizens. What is the significance for the scope of ethics when two neo-Kantian theorists of public reason, John Rawls and Jürgen Habermas, propose a reduced reading of the ‘antinomy’ highlighted in Kant’s analysis of practical reason? The desire for meaning, unrelinquishable for humans, is frustrated when moral initiatives are met with hostility. Kant resolves the antinomy between morality and happiness by invoking the concept of a creator God whose concern that our anticipatory moral actions should not fail encourages the hope on which human agency relies. Defining the scope of ethics by the unconditional character of reason ( Vernunft) rules out the minimisation of ethics to what can safely be expected to be delivered.

Rational Reasonableness: Toward a Positive Theory of Public Reason

2012 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gillian K. Hadfield ◽  
Stephen Macedo
Keyword(s):  
John Rawls ◽  
Public Reason ◽  
Common Knowledge ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Moral Problem ◽  
Positive Theory ◽  
Constitutional Design ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Diverse Society

Abstract Why is it important for people to agree on and articulate shared reasons for just laws, rather than whatever reasons they personally find compelling? What, if any, practical role does public reason play in liberal democratic politics? We argue that the practical role of public reason can be better appreciated by examining the confluence of normative and positive political theory; the former represented here by liberal social contract theory of John Rawls and others, and the latter by rational choice or game theory. Citizens in a diverse society face a practical as well as a moral problem. How can they have confidence that others will reciprocate their commitment to supporting governing principles that depart from their own ideal conceptions of truth and value in order to be reasonable to all? Citizens face a practical problem of mutual assurance that public reason helps them solve, and solve as a matter of common knowledge. The solution, on both views, requires citizens’ reciprocal commitment to basing law on a system of shared reasons. Both views place public reason at the core of liberal democratic politics in conditions of diversity, and for quite similar reasons. Our argument illustrates the (often) complementary roles of positive and values-based analysis in constitutional design.

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