Liberal republicanism and the role of civil society

Democratization

Volumn 4, Issue 3, 1997, Pages 26-44

  Thomas, Alan ^a  

^a KING'S COLLEGE LONDON   (United Kingdom)

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EID: 1842550340     PISSN: 13510347     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/13510349708403524     Document Type: Article

References (60)

1. A claim made, for example, by J. Cohen and A. Arato in Civil Society and Political Theory, (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1994) on pp. 22-3.
2. This diagnosis holds true save for those marginal cases where 'communitarianism' reflects a utopian rejection of any political theory for a modern society. I have in mind here the work of Alasdair MacIntyre, which is not intended as a contribution to the politics of the modern nation state but as an alternative to such politics (making his strong objection to being called a 'communitarian' quite well motivated), see 'Reply to My Critics' in R. Horton, and S. Mendus (eds.), After MacIntyre: Critical Perspectives on the Work of Alasdair MacIntyre (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1994). I will be focusing on the work of Charles Taylor and Michael Walzer as representatives of the communitarian position. I am indebted to the 'après la lutte' discussions (to borrow Seyla Benhabib's useful phrase) of Taylor, Walzer and Dworkin: Charles Taylor, 'Cross Purposes: The Liberal/Communitarian Dispute' reprinted in Philosophical Arguments (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995; Michael Walzer, 'The Communitarian Critique of Liberalism', Political Theory, Vol.18, No.1 (Feb. 1990), pp.6-23; 'Ronald Dworkin, 'Liberal Community', California Law Review, Vol.77, No.3, (1989), pp.479-504.
3. This diagnosis holds true save for those marginal cases where 'communitarianism' reflects a utopian rejection of any political theory for a modern society. I have in mind here the work of Alasdair MacIntyre, which is not intended as a contribution to the politics of the modern nation state but as an alternative to such politics (making his strong objection to being called a 'communitarian' quite well motivated), see 'Reply to My Critics' in R. Horton, and S. Mendus (eds.), After MacIntyre: Critical Perspectives on the Work of Alasdair MacIntyre (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1994). I will be focusing on the work of Charles Taylor and Michael Walzer as representatives of the communitarian position. I am indebted to the 'après la lutte' discussions (to borrow Seyla Benhabib's useful phrase) of Taylor, Walzer and Dworkin: Charles Taylor, 'Cross Purposes: The Liberal/Communitarian Dispute' reprinted in Philosophical Arguments (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995; Michael Walzer, 'The Communitarian Critique of Liberalism', Political Theory, Vol.18, No.1 (Feb. 1990), pp.6-23; 'Ronald Dworkin, 'Liberal Community', California Law Review, Vol.77, No.3, (1989), pp.479-504.
4. This diagnosis holds true save for those marginal cases where 'communitarianism' reflects a utopian rejection of any political theory for a modern society. I have in mind here the work of Alasdair MacIntyre, which is not intended as a contribution to the politics of the modern nation state but as an alternative to such politics (making his strong objection to being called a 'communitarian' quite well motivated), see 'Reply to My Critics' in R. Horton, and S. Mendus (eds.), After MacIntyre: Critical Perspectives on the Work of Alasdair MacIntyre (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1994). I will be focusing on the work of Charles Taylor and Michael Walzer as representatives of the communitarian position. I am indebted to the 'après la lutte' discussions (to borrow Seyla Benhabib's useful phrase) of Taylor, Walzer and Dworkin: Charles Taylor, 'Cross Purposes: The Liberal/Communitarian Dispute' reprinted in Philosophical Arguments (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995; Michael Walzer, 'The Communitarian Critique of Liberalism', Political Theory, Vol.18, No.1 (Feb. 1990), pp.6-23; 'Ronald Dworkin, 'Liberal Community', California Law Review, Vol.77, No.3, (1989), pp.479-504.
5. This diagnosis holds true save for those marginal cases where 'communitarianism' reflects a utopian rejection of any political theory for a modern society. I have in mind here the work of Alasdair MacIntyre, which is not intended as a contribution to the politics of the modern nation state but as an alternative to such politics (making his strong objection to being called a 'communitarian' quite well motivated), see 'Reply to My Critics' in R. Horton, and S. Mendus (eds.), After MacIntyre: Critical Perspectives on the Work of Alasdair MacIntyre (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1994). I will be focusing on the work of Charles Taylor and Michael Walzer as representatives of the communitarian position. I am indebted to the 'après la lutte' discussions (to borrow Seyla Benhabib's useful phrase) of Taylor, Walzer and Dworkin: Charles Taylor, 'Cross Purposes: The Liberal/Communitarian Dispute' reprinted in Philosophical Arguments (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995; Michael Walzer, 'The Communitarian Critique of Liberalism', Political Theory, Vol.18, No.1 (Feb. 1990), pp.6-23; 'Ronald Dworkin, 'Liberal Community', California Law Review, Vol.77, No.3, (1989), pp.479-504.
6. I will at various points relate my discussion to that of Mark Philp, in 'Republicanism and Liberalism: On Leadership and Political Order - A Review', Democratization, Volume 3, No. 4, (Winter 1996), pp.383-419. This informed and interesting survey of the recent revival of republican thinking offers a direct challenge to the central line of argument in this article. For it suggests that the kind of hybrid theory I will be developing is fatally unstable and that civic republicanism forms an integral 'package' of views that must be taken as a bundle, or not at all. While this view has the great merit of making republicanism a definite identity rather than a bundle of loosely related themes and emphases, some aspects of the position Philp outlines are unacceptable to me, especially the emphasis on elite leadership that he brings to the fore. Fortunately, I believe some of Philp's more challenging contentions can be resisted and I will address them in footnotes throughout this paper and explicitly in section V.
7. The leading exponents of this new form of liberalism are Judith Shklar, John Rawls and Charles Larmore. See John Rawls, Political Liberalism, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993); Charles Larmore, Patterns of Moral Complexity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987); 'Political Liberalism', Political Theory, Vol.18, No.3 (Aug. 1990), pp.342-7; 'The Right and the Good', Philosophia, Vol.20, Nos.1-2 (1990), pp. 15-32; Judith Shklar, 'The Liberalism of Fear', in Nancy Rosenblum (ed.), Liberalism and the Moral Life, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989), pp.21-38. I will not defend my commitment to this form of liberalism here, but my reasons for endorsing this form of liberalism are set out in 'The Contextual Defence of Liberalism', unpublished ms.
8. The leading exponents of this new form of liberalism are Judith Shklar, John Rawls and Charles Larmore. See John Rawls, Political Liberalism, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993); Charles Larmore, Patterns of Moral Complexity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987); 'Political Liberalism', Political Theory, Vol.18, No.3 (Aug. 1990), pp.342-7; 'The Right and the Good', Philosophia, Vol.20, Nos.1-2 (1990), pp. 15-32; Judith Shklar, 'The Liberalism of Fear', in Nancy Rosenblum (ed.), Liberalism and the Moral Life, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989), pp.21-38. I will not defend my commitment to this form of liberalism here, but my reasons for endorsing this form of liberalism are set out in 'The Contextual Defence of Liberalism', unpublished ms.
9. The leading exponents of this new form of liberalism are Judith Shklar, John Rawls and Charles Larmore. See John Rawls, Political Liberalism, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993); Charles Larmore, Patterns of Moral Complexity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987); 'Political Liberalism', Political Theory, Vol.18, No.3 (Aug. 1990), pp.342-7; 'The Right and the Good', Philosophia, Vol.20, Nos.1-2 (1990), pp. 15-32; Judith Shklar, 'The Liberalism of Fear', in Nancy Rosenblum (ed.), Liberalism and the Moral Life, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989), pp.21-38. I will not defend my commitment to this form of liberalism here, but my reasons for endorsing this form of liberalism are set out in 'The Contextual Defence of Liberalism', unpublished ms.
10. The leading exponents of this new form of liberalism are Judith Shklar, John Rawls and Charles Larmore. See John Rawls, Political Liberalism, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993); Charles Larmore, Patterns of Moral Complexity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987); 'Political Liberalism', Political Theory, Vol.18, No.3 (Aug. 1990), pp.342-7; 'The Right and the Good', Philosophia, Vol.20, Nos.1-2 (1990), pp. 15-32; Judith Shklar, 'The Liberalism of Fear', in Nancy Rosenblum (ed.), Liberalism and the Moral Life, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989), pp.21-38. I will not defend my commitment to this form of liberalism here, but my reasons for endorsing this form of liberalism are set out in 'The Contextual Defence of Liberalism', unpublished ms.
11. The leading exponents of this new form of liberalism are Judith Shklar, John Rawls and Charles Larmore. See John Rawls, Political Liberalism, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993); Charles Larmore, Patterns of Moral Complexity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987); 'Political Liberalism', Political Theory, Vol.18, No.3 (Aug. 1990), pp.342-7; 'The Right and the Good', Philosophia, Vol.20, Nos.1-2 (1990), pp. 15-32; Judith Shklar, 'The Liberalism of Fear', in Nancy Rosenblum (ed.), Liberalism and the Moral Life, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989), pp.21-38. I will not defend my commitment to this form of liberalism here, but my reasons for endorsing this form of liberalism are set out in 'The Contextual Defence of Liberalism', unpublished ms.
12. Bernard Williams, 'Fair State: Review of John Rawls, Political Liberalism', London Review of Books, Vol.15, No.9, (13 May 1993), pp.7-8.
13. Perfectionism is the moral doctrine that the aim of life is perfection or the realisation of a substantive vision of the good; expressivism is the complementary doctrine that our political arrangements should express our highest moral ideals.
14. Thus Neo-Aristotelian utopianism is visible in the political philosophy of both the right and the left: for the former see Leo Strauss, Natural Right and History (Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press, 1953) and for the latter, Horkheimer and Adorno's Dialectic of Enlightenment, translated by John Cumming, (New York: Continuum Books, 1982).
15. Thus Neo-Aristotelian utopianism is visible in the political philosophy of both the right and the left: for the former see Leo Strauss, Natural Right and History (Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press, 1953) and for the latter, Horkheimer and Adorno's Dialectic of Enlightenment, translated by John Cumming, (New York: Continuum Books, 1982).
16. I take this characterisation from Charles Larmore's insightful discussion in Patterns of Moral Complexity.
17. The historical revival of interest in the civic republican tradition is exemplified by, inter alia, Isaiah Berlin and Quentin Skinner. I will discuss Skinner's work below. See Berlin's seminal study, 'The Originality of Machiavelli', in Myron P. Gilmore (ed.), Studies On Machiavelli (Florence: Sansoni, 1972). The account of civic republicanism in early modern Europe, presented by Skinner takes the argument further. Skinner has developed the theory of freedom implicit in the ideal of citizen virtù in 'The Republican Ideal of Political Liberty', pp.293-309, and 'Pre-humanist Origins of Republican Ideas' pp.121-42, both in G. Bock, Q. Skinner and M. Viroli (eds.), Machiavelli and Republicanism, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990); 'The Idea of Negative Liberty', in R. Rorty, J. Schneewind and Q. Skinner (eds.), Philosophy in History, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), pp. 193-221.
18. The historical revival of interest in the civic republican tradition is exemplified by, inter alia, Isaiah Berlin and Quentin Skinner. I will discuss Skinner's work below. See Berlin's seminal study, 'The Originality of Machiavelli', in Myron P. Gilmore (ed.), Studies On Machiavelli (Florence: Sansoni, 1972). The account of civic republicanism in early modern Europe, presented by Skinner takes the argument further. Skinner has developed the theory of freedom implicit in the ideal of citizen virtù in 'The Republican Ideal of Political Liberty', pp.293-309, and 'Pre-humanist Origins of Republican Ideas' pp.121-42, both in G. Bock, Q. Skinner and M. Viroli (eds.), Machiavelli and Republicanism, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990); 'The Idea of Negative Liberty', in R. Rorty, J. Schneewind and Q. Skinner (eds.), Philosophy in History, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), pp. 193-221.
19. The historical revival of interest in the civic republican tradition is exemplified by, inter alia, Isaiah Berlin and Quentin Skinner. I will discuss Skinner's work below. See Berlin's seminal study, 'The Originality of Machiavelli', in Myron P. Gilmore (ed.), Studies On Machiavelli (Florence: Sansoni, 1972). The account of civic republicanism in early modern Europe, presented by Skinner takes the argument further. Skinner has developed the theory of freedom implicit in the ideal of citizen virtù in 'The Republican Ideal of Political Liberty', pp.293-309, and 'Pre-humanist Origins of Republican Ideas' pp.121-42, both in G. Bock, Q. Skinner and M. Viroli (eds.), Machiavelli and Republicanism, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990); 'The Idea of Negative Liberty', in R. Rorty, J. Schneewind and Q. Skinner (eds.), Philosophy in History, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), pp. 193-221.
20. The historical revival of interest in the civic republican tradition is exemplified by, inter alia, Isaiah Berlin and Quentin Skinner. I will discuss Skinner's work below. See Berlin's seminal study, 'The Originality of Machiavelli', in Myron P. Gilmore (ed.), Studies On Machiavelli (Florence: Sansoni, 1972). The account of civic republicanism in early modern Europe, presented by Skinner takes the argument further. Skinner has developed the theory of freedom implicit in the ideal of citizen virtù in 'The Republican Ideal of Political Liberty', pp.293-309, and 'Pre-humanist Origins of Republican Ideas' pp.121-42, both in G. Bock, Q. Skinner and M. Viroli (eds.), Machiavelli and Republicanism, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990); 'The Idea of Negative Liberty', in R. Rorty, J. Schneewind and Q. Skinner (eds.), Philosophy in History, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984), pp. 193-221.
21. The clearest statement of this argument is in Charles Taylor, 'Cross Purposes: The Liberal/Communitarian Dispute', and 'Irreducibly Social Goods', both reprinted in Philosophical Arguments, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995).
22. Charles Larmore, 'Political Liberalism', p.341.
23. It is important to emphasise that this conception, while a minimally moral conception, is itself moral. It draws on a moral power of 'reasonableness' and cannot solely be derived from, for example, a capacity for coummunicative rationality. This marks a key difference between the approaches of Rawls, Habermas and Larmore.
24. I offer support for this claim of Larmore's in my own account of the nature of moral reasoning in Value and Context (forthcoming). This focus on the reflective recognition of the fact of under-determination differs from Rawls's similar account of the 'burdens of judgement'.
25. In Value and Context (forthcoming) I explain why the recent revival of interest in Neocasuistical models of practical reasoning, interesting though such proposals are, fail to overcome the under-determination problem. For the most ambitious such rehabilitation of an Aristotelian view, see Henry S. Richardson, Practical Reasoning About Final Ends (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995)
26. Charles Larmore, 'Political Liberalism', p.342.
27. The phrase is of course Rawls's. The importance of this point makes it unclear to me why Philp argues that liberalism fails to take the separation of the moral and the political seriously enough. 'Republicanism and Liberalism', p.391.
28. Charles Larmore, 'Political Liberalism', p.349.
29. Jeremy Waldron, 'Theoretical Foundations of Liberalism', Philosophical Quarterly, 37 (1987), pp.127-50, 130.
30. Charles Larmore, 'Political Liberalism', pp.350-51.
31. This point has emerged as central to the 'public reasons' defence of liberalism, a line of argument developed in several forms by different theorists. For a representative sample of the literature, see Fred d'Agostino, Free Public Reason: Making It Up As We Go (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1995); James Bohman, Public Deliberation (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996).
32. This point has emerged as central to the 'public reasons' defence of liberalism, a line of argument developed in several forms by different theorists. For a representative sample of the literature, see Fred d'Agostino, Free Public Reason: Making It Up As We Go (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1995); James Bohman, Public Deliberation (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996).
33. Charles Larmore, 'The Foundations of Modern Democracy', The European Journal of Philosophy, Vol.3, No.1 (April, 1995), pp.55-68, especially p.60.
34. Taylor, 'Cross Purposes: The Liberal/Communitarian Dispute', the quotation is from footnote 15. Interpolations in square brackets are mine. :
35. A point on which Rawls and I are in agreement, see Political Liberalism, pp.205-6.
36. See the discussion in chapter six of Pettit's The Common Mind (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992). Taylor is, however, surely correct to separate out the issues of holism versus atomism, which concern the ontology of the social world and the necessity or otherwise in social explanations of appeal to supra-individual structures, from that of individualism versus collectivism, which is properly an issue of political policy, or as Taylor puts it, an 'advocacy' issue. This important distinction is central to the argument of 'Cross-Purposes'.
37. Pettit, The Common Mind, p.313.
38. I here report the self-understanding of many Quebecois, without necessarily endorsing the truth of the sociological claim which I am in no position to assess.
39. Represented at one extreme by J. Schumpeter, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy (New York: Harper & Row, 1942) at the other by Peter Bachrach, The Theory of Democractic Elitism: A Critique (Boston, MA: Little, Brown, 1967).
40. Represented at one extreme by J. Schumpeter, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy (New York: Harper & Row, 1942) at the other by Peter Bachrach, The Theory of Democractic Elitism: A Critique (Boston, MA: Little, Brown, 1967).
41. Taylor further believes that the goods of a life can be structured by the architectonic good of a whole life, whereas Walzer remains content with the plurality of the value spheres of a modern pluralist society. They share the view that the understanding of goods takes priority over principles of right.
42. Michael Walzer, 'The Civil Society Argument', in C. Mouffe (ed), Dimensions of Radical Democracy, (London: Routledge, 1992), p. 104.
43. The exaggeration lies in the claim Only'; see the pertinent observations of Kymlicka and Norman, who note that spheres of free association may not be untainted by parochialism, in 'The Return of the Citizen', Ethics, Vol.104, No.2 (Jan. 1994), pp.352-81, especially p.363.
44. Susan Hurley, unpublished ms. presented at the LSE Government Department seminar on political theory; Larmore, 'The Foundations of Modem Democracy', pp.55-68; Judith Shklar, 'The Liberalism of Fear'. Once again this suggest a line of response to Philp's critique, which treats republicanism as the political tradition best equipped to accommodate a justified degree of cynicism about human motivation -. liberalism is no more optimistic than republicanism about the potential for political evils and in its political liberal version emerges from a shared sense of social evils while abstaining from contested conceptions of the good.
45. Susan Hurley, unpublished ms. presented at the LSE Government Department seminar on political theory; Larmore, 'The Foundations of Modem Democracy', pp.55-68; Judith Shklar, 'The Liberalism of Fear'. Once again this suggest a line of response to Philp's critique, which treats republicanism as the political tradition best equipped to accommodate a justified degree of cynicism about human motivation -. liberalism is no more optimistic than republicanism about the potential for political evils and in its political liberal version emerges from a shared sense of social evils while abstaining from contested conceptions of the good.
46. Susan Hurley, unpublished ms. presented at the LSE Government Department seminar on political theory; Larmore, 'The Foundations of Modem Democracy', pp.55-68; Judith Shklar, 'The Liberalism of Fear'. Once again this suggest a line of response to Philp's critique, which treats republicanism as the political tradition best equipped to accommodate a justified degree of cynicism about human motivation -. liberalism is no more optimistic than republicanism about the potential for political evils and in its political liberal version emerges from a shared sense of social evils while abstaining from contested conceptions of the good.
47. It is the crucial intertwining of these two phenomena that represent an ideal of a location for the public use of reason as a critical check on political power outside the mechanisms of the state, an ideal of J. Habermas in The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere translated by Thomas Burger (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1992). That work was a narrative of rise and fall of the concept of the public sphere constituted out of civil society, but the emancipatory potential of an historically revised concept is to the fore in Between Facts and Norms, translated by William Rehg (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996).
48. It is the crucial intertwining of these two phenomena that represent an ideal of a location for the public use of reason as a critical check on political power outside the mechanisms of the state, an ideal of J. Habermas in The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere translated by Thomas Burger (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1992). That work was a narrative of rise and fall of the concept of the public sphere constituted out of civil society, but the emancipatory potential of an historically revised concept is to the fore in Between Facts and Norms, translated by William Rehg (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996).
49. Cohen and Arato, Civil Society and Political Theory, Ch.8.
50. The terminology is Nancy Fraser's, in her 'Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy', in Craig Calhoun (ed.), Habermas and the Public Sphere, (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1992), pp.109-42.
51. Does this imply that the family, for example, is essentially private? In my view yes, but the institution of the family is not thereby immune from political criticism. I would point to Foucault's late concern with undermining a juridical model of the self's relation to itself as epitomising a form of criticism which is both focused on the 'private' use of reason and which finds such a use to be inherently politicised. A concern to extend the boundaries of social criticism does not have to eradicate the sociological categories of the private and the public which are of continuing theoretical relevance - the category of civil society will certainly have to be eradicated too.
52. Cohen and Arato, Civil Society and Political Theory, Introduction.
53. For historicist and regionalist analyses, see Jenö Szücs, 'Three Historical Regions of Europe' and Mihaly Vajda, 'East-Central European Perspectives', in John Keane (ed.), Civil Society and the State (London, 1988).
54. Taylor, 'Invoking Civil Society', in Philosophical Arguments (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995), pp.204-24.
55. Taylor, 'Invoking Civil Society', p.221.
56. Mark Philp, 'Republicanism and Liberalism: On Leadership and Political Order - A Review'.
57. This marks an important difference between my version of the theory and Rawls's which claims Io be neutral on meta-ethical issues. For further explanation of the basis of this difference, see my Value and Context, forthcoming. Briefly, I have been persuaded by Onora O'Neill's argument that Rawls's methodology cannot remain neutral within moral philosophy, narrowly conceived and that the problems we face in the extension of our resources of moral knowledge to the political domain is precisely what generates Larmore's 'underdetermination problem' and the impetus to a 'strictly political doctrine'; Onora O'Neill, 'Constructivisms in Ethics', in Constructions of Reason (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp.206-18.
58. Susan Hurley, Natural Reasons: Personality and Polity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989).
59. Larmore, 'The Foundations of Modern Democracy'.
60. Thanks for many helpful comments and criticisms to Kathryn Brown. The comments of an anonymous reviewer for this journal were both constructive and helpful. Thanks also to the Editors of this journal for providing me with a proof copy of Mark Philp's paper so that I could respond to some of his arguments.