When Should We Disagree about Politics?

This chapter explores when we should, from an epistemic point of view, disagree about politics by asking the question: when do we have the epistemic duty to object to assertions we take to be false or unwarranted? It begins by highlighting that the duty to object is best understood as an imperfect, rather than a perfect, duty, and hence that there are imperfect epistemic duties, in addition to moral ones. The chapter examines one specific account of imperfect moral duties: Liam Murphy’s collective view that includes what he calls the Compliance Condition that understands imperfect duties as belonging to groups or collectives, but denies that we need to “pick up the slack” from non-complying members. After showing that we should reject the Compliance Condition, the chapter outlines a view according to which the duty to object is an imperfect epistemic one that belongs to groups. It concludes by applying these considerations specifically to the political domain and highlighting the ways in which distinctive issues arise when we disagree about political matters.

Moral Rationalism and Demandingness in Kant

We discuss Kant’s conception of moral rationalism from the viewpoint of recent debates, which have distinguished different forms of moral rationalism. We argue that Kant’s version, ‘silencing’, is different and stronger than currently held versions of moral rationalism and that it also differs from versions of silencing that contemporary thinkers advocate. We then discuss Kant’s version of silencing in the context of the moral demandingness debate and argue that silencing can make a perfect duty very demanding. However, it is important that whilst in cases of conflict between duty and personal happiness the normative standing of the latter is silenced, silencing does not require that agents do all they can in the case of imperfect duties. We finally indicate the kind of latitude imperfect duties allow for, according to Kant’s strong form of moral rationalism.

Kant's ethical standpoint and the problem of moral integrity

The aim of this paper is to emphasize the importance of the problem of moral integrity in Kant's ethical teachings. First, we tried to locate the moral integrity within Kant's original teachings, considering its relationship to the notions of dignity, duty, respect and autonomy. In the wake of further conceptualization of the problem of moral integrity, particularly interesting seemed the issue of threats of moral integrity, which we illustrated. The second part of the paper is concerned with critics to charge that Kant does not provide a satisfactory treatment of the moral integrity of the individual because his insistence on impartiality. In response to critics, we offered a presentation of the main arguments of Barbara Herman, where she is trying to improve the Kantian position. Nevertheless, the focus of argumentation which attempts to defend Kant is on the suggestions made by Henning Jensen. His suggestions call our attention to a little known part of Kant's original text, which explicitly shows the existence of perfect duties to oneself. It is also argued that perfect duty to oneself is at the same time the duty of higher order, determined as the right of humanity in our own person. Jensen manages to find the possibility of establishing moral integrity within Kant's conception and to preserve the essential significance of moral law in Kant's ethics.

L'intervention humanitaire peut-elle être conçue comme un «devoir parfait»?

ABSTRACTThis article examines the claim recently put forward by Terry Nardin, Kok-Chor Tan, and Carla Bagnoli that humanitarian intervention ought to be conceived, not as an imperfect duty (a duty of assistance to the victims of crimes against humanity left to the discretion of the members of the international community), but—assuming that the permissibility conditions have been satisfied—as a perfect duty (an unconditional obligation demanded by justice). After explaining why such a position can be considered as legitimate, it underlines some of its difficulties and provides the elements of a response in order to overcome them.

Kantian Ethical Duties

Perfect ethical duties have usually puzzled commentators on Kant's ethics because they do not fit neatly within his taxonomy of duties. Ethical duties require the adoption of maxims of ends: the happiness of others and one's own perfection are Kant's two main categories. These duties, he claims, are of wide obligation because they do not specify what in particular one ought to do, when, and how much. They leave ‘a latitude for free choice’ as he puts it. Perfect duties, however, such as the duties of respect, to avoid suicide, lying, and servility, do not appear to require the adoption of ends but only the performance or omission of specific types of actions. The puzzle is how these duties can be ethical, and therefore wide. Faced with this difficulty, Mary Gregor denies that perfect ethical duties are wide. She claims that they are an ‘anomaly’ and that they do not belong to ethics proper but to moral philosophy in general. She argues that these duties are derived from the categorical imperative, instead of, as Kant himself appears to have thought, the first principle of virtue. Taking a very different approach, Onora O'Neill finds the perfect/imperfect distinction of little importance and suggests doing without it altogether. Most other interpreters also assume that ‘wide’ is opposed to ‘perfect’ so that a wide perfect duty is a conceptual impossibility.