Why there is no issue between Habermas and Rawls

Journal of Philosophy

Volumn 99, Issue 3, 2002, Pages 111-128

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EID: 0242440606     PISSN: 0022362X     EISSN: 19398549     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/3655639     Document Type: Article

References (15)

1. Habermas, "Reconciliation through the Public Use of Reason: Remarkson John Rawls's Political Liberalism, " this JOURNAL, XCII, 3 (March 1995):109-31;
2. Rawls, "Reply to Habermas, " this JOURNAL, XCII, 3 (March 1995):132-80.
3. See, for example, Habermas's Between Facts and Norms, William Rehg, trans. (Cambridge: MIT, 1996), p. 153. Habermas distinguishes between moralityand ethics. Ethics is grounded in culturally specific values, while morality isgrounded in universal principles of justice.
4. For an account, see Norman Daniels, Justice and Justification (New York:Cambridge, 1996).
5. "Discourse Ethics: Notes on a Program of Philosophical Justification" in Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action, Christian Lenhardt and Shierry Weber Nicholsen, trans. (Cambridge: MIT, 1990).
6. I discuss these two ways of understanding the moral point of view in moredetail in Collective Rationality and Collective Reasoning (New York: Cambridge, 2001), chapter 6.
7. For discussion of this point, see Michael Rosen, "Utopia in Frankfurt: Realism and Optimism in the Life's Work of Jürgen Habermas"(a review essay discussing two recent works by Habermas), The Times Literary Supplement, n. 5036 (October 8, 1999), pp. 3-4.
8. The Theory of Communicative Action, Volume 1, Thomas McCarthy, trans.(Boston: Beacon, 1984).
9. See also "Discourse Ethics, " p. 105.
10. For Habermas, communicative action is "action oriented to reachingan understanding." The understanding he has in mind is specifically anunderstanding about what to do that can provide a basis for social coordination;see The Theory of Communicative Action, pp. 94-101.
11. For an interpretation of Habermas that stresses this point, see Jon Elster, "The Market and the Forum: Three Varieties of Political Theory, " in Elster and Aanund Hylland, eds., The Foundations of Social Choice Theory (New York: Cambridge, 1986), pp. 103-32;
12. reprinted in James Bohman and Rehg, eds., Deliberative Democracy: Essayson Reason and Politics (Cambridge: MIT, 1997), pp. 3-33.
13. For a view of this sort, see Gilbert Harman, "Moral Relativism Defended, " Philosophical Review, LXXXIV (January 1975): 3-22. Harmanunderstands moral judgments to be relative to motivational attitudes that takethe form of intentions to adhere to an agreement on the understanding thatothers (in the relevant community) intend to adhere to it as well. The preciseform of the agreement is determined by bargaining, in which people bring to beardifferent amounts of bargaining power. So the interpretation of impartiality inthe resolution of conflicts of interest that is constituted by the agreementreflects this fact.
14. See "Remarks on Discourse Ethics, " in Justification and Application, Ciaran Cronin, trans. (Cambridge: MIT, 1993), pp. 19-111, here p.32.
15. The Common Mind: An Essay on Psychology, Society, and Politics (New York:Oxford, 1993).