From morality to politics and back again: Feminist international ethics and the civil-society argument

Alternatives

Volumn 29, Issue 3, 2004, Pages 239-263

  Hutchings, Kimberly ^a  

^a LONDON SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 7744221244     PISSN: 03043754     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/030437540402900301     Document Type: Review

References (105)

1. Since the publication of Carol Gilligan's In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women's Development (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982), which made the famous argument that women approach moral reasoning differently from men, the literature in feminist ethics has burgeoned. A useful brief introduction to the field is Elisabeth Porter, Feminist Perspectives on Ethics (London: Longman, 1999). See also Elizabeth Frazer, Jennifer Hornsby, and Sabina Lovibond, eds., Ethics: A Feminist Reader (Oxford, U.K.: Blackwell, 1992); and Eve Browning Cole and Susan CouItrap-McQuin, eds., Explorations in Feminist Ethics (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992).
2. Since the publication of Carol Gilligan's In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women's Development (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982), which made the famous argument that women approach moral reasoning differently from men, the literature in feminist ethics has burgeoned. A useful brief introduction to the field is Elisabeth Porter, Feminist Perspectives on Ethics (London: Longman, 1999). See also Elizabeth Frazer, Jennifer Hornsby, and Sabina Lovibond, eds., Ethics: A Feminist Reader (Oxford, U.K.: Blackwell, 1992); and Eve Browning Cole and Susan CouItrap-McQuin, eds., Explorations in Feminist Ethics (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992).
3. Since the publication of Carol Gilligan's In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women's Development (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982), which made the famous argument that women approach moral reasoning differently from men, the literature in feminist ethics has burgeoned. A useful brief introduction to the field is Elisabeth Porter, Feminist Perspectives on Ethics (London: Longman, 1999). See also Elizabeth Frazer, Jennifer Hornsby, and Sabina Lovibond, eds., Ethics: A Feminist Reader (Oxford, U.K.: Blackwell, 1992); and Eve Browning Cole and Susan CouItrap-McQuin, eds., Explorations in Feminist Ethics (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992).
4. Since the publication of Carol Gilligan's In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women's Development (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982), which made the famous argument that women approach moral reasoning differently from men, the literature in feminist ethics has burgeoned. A useful brief introduction to the field is Elisabeth Porter, Feminist Perspectives on Ethics (London: Longman, 1999). See also Elizabeth Frazer, Jennifer Hornsby, and Sabina Lovibond, eds., Ethics: A Feminist Reader (Oxford, U.K.: Blackwell, 1992); and Eve Browning Cole and Susan CouItrap-McQuin, eds., Explorations in Feminist Ethics (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992).
5. As I argue elsewhere, this is a view common to both "idealist" and "realist" traditions in the study of international politics. See Kimberly Hutchings, International Political Theory (London: Sage Publications, 1999).
6. See Alison Jaggar, "Feminism in Ethics: Moral Justification," in Miranda Fricker and Jennifer Hornsby, eds., The Cambridge Companion to Feminism in Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000).
7. See, for example, Porter, note 1, in which the fields of application of feminist ethics are all located within the liberal state. They include health care, business, citizenship, sexuality, pornography, and reproduction.
8. For instance, Sarah Ruddick bases her argument for a global feminist pacifist ethic on the practices of mothering in a Western nuclear family. See Maternal Thinking: Towards a Politics of Peace (London: Women's Press, 1989). Fiona Robinson extrapolates from Gilligan's ethic of care (formulated on the basis of research into U.S. students' decisions on abortion) in order to ground a globalized ethic of care. See Globalizing Care: Ethics, Feminist Theory, and International Relations (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1999).
9. For instance, Sarah Ruddick bases her argument for a global feminist pacifist ethic on the practices of mothering in a Western nuclear family. See Maternal Thinking: Towards a Politics of Peace (London: Women's Press, 1989). Fiona Robinson extrapolates from Gilligan's ethic of care (formulated on the basis of research into U.S. students' decisions on abortion) in order to ground a globalized ethic of care. See Globalizing Care: Ethics, Feminist Theory, and International Relations (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1999).
10. See Chandra Mohanty, Ann Russo, and Lourdes Torres, eds., Third World Women and the Politics of Feminism (Bloomington: Indiana University-Press, 1991); and Vivienne Jabri and Eleanor O'Gorman, eds., Women, Culture, and International Relations (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner, 1999).
11. See Chandra Mohanty, Ann Russo, and Lourdes Torres, eds., Third World Women and the Politics of Feminism (Bloomington: Indiana University-Press, 1991); and Vivienne Jabri and Eleanor O'Gorman, eds., Women, Culture, and International Relations (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner, 1999).
12. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
13. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
14. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
15. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
16. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
17. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
18. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
19. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
20. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
21. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
22. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
23. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
24. The terms public sphere and civil society are both highly contested within contemporary ethical and political-theory literatures. The former term owes much of its recent revival to Habermas's use of the concept as a crucial element of "lifeworld" in modernity, in which communicative rationality dominates over strategic or "system" concerns. See Jürgen Habermas, The Theory of Communicative Action, vols. 1, 2 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984; 1987); The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989); Craig Calhoun, ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992). For Nancy Fraser's very useful critical engagement with Habermasian conceptions of the public sphere in the context of feminist concerns, from which I take the distinction between hegemonic and subaltern publics, see Fraser, "Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy," in Calhoun, Habermas and the Public Sphere, mentioned above; and "Struggle over Needs: Outline of a Socialist-Feminist Critical Theory of Late Capitalist Political Culture," in Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989). See also Patricia Owen's article in this issue of Alternatives, "Xenophilia, Gender, and Sentimental Humanitarianism in the Official Public Sphere" for a critical account of how discourse within the public sphere may be constrained and distorted by hegemonic influences. The meaning of the term civil society is notoriously hard to pin down, but its return to prominence in ethical and political theory owes much to the significance of civil-society movements in Latin America and Eastern Europe in the 1970s and 1980s and to disillusionment with state-based democratic politics on the part of the Left in established Western liberal and social democracies since the 1970s. See John Keane, ed., Civil Society and the State: New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988); and Simone Chambers and Will Kymlicka, eds., Alternative Conceptions of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002). More recently a literature has grown up around the concept of "global civil society," in which INGOs and boundary-crossing social movements are often portrayed as the location for morally inspired (communicative) politics as opposed to the power politics of states and elites (strategic rationality). See Mary Kaldor Global Civil Society: An Answer to War (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity Press, 2003); John Keane Global Civil Society? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and Marlies Glasius, Mary Kaldor, and Helmut Anheier, eds., Global Civil Society 2002 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). In the case of both Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young, whose civil-society arguments are discussed below, the Habermasian influence is very clear (though neither would embrace his dialogic model uncritically). They both make strong links between the idea of public discourse between nonstate actors and the norms inherent in communicative reason and, in Young's case, slip easily between the vocabularies of public sphere and civil society. Both argue strongly in their democratic theory for what Benhabib terms a "twin track" approach, in which civil-society activity within the public sphere acts in tandem with, and as a positive influence on, democratizing developments at the level of the state or of interstate governance. See Seyla Benhabib, The Claims of Culture: Equality and Diversity in the Global Era (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002); Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
25. In this article, I focus on the work of Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young. Other examples would include, most notably, Nancy Fraser (see Unruly Practices, note 7, and Justice Interruptus London: Routledge, 1997) and most of the contributors to the volume edited by Johanna Meehan, Feminists Read Habermas (New York: Routledge, 1995). Habermas's discourse ethics and the theory of deliberative democracy that follows from it have been a major inspiration for this feminist work. See Jürgen Habermas, Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action (Cambridge: Polity, 1990) and Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996). See also Seyla Benhabib and Fred Dallmayr, eds., The Communicative Ethics Controversy (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992).
26. In this article, I focus on the work of Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young. Other examples would include, most notably, Nancy Fraser (see Unruly Practices, note 7, and Justice Interruptus [London: Routledge, 1997]) and most of the contributors to the volume edited by Johanna Meehan, Feminists Read Habermas (New York: Routledge, 1995). Habermas's discourse ethics and the theory of deliberative democracy that follows from it have been a major inspiration for this feminist work. See Jürgen Habermas, Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action (Cambridge: Polity, 1990) and Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996). See also Seyla Benhabib and Fred Dallmayr, eds., The Communicative Ethics Controversy (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992).
27. In this article, I focus on the work of Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young. Other examples would include, most notably, Nancy Fraser (see Unruly Practices, note 7, and Justice Interruptus [London: Routledge, 1997]) and most of the contributors to the volume edited by Johanna Meehan, Feminists Read Habermas (New York: Routledge, 1995). Habermas's discourse ethics and the theory of deliberative democracy that follows from it have been a major inspiration for this feminist work. See Jürgen Habermas, Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action (Cambridge: Polity, 1990) and Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996). See also Seyla Benhabib and Fred Dallmayr, eds., The Communicative Ethics Controversy (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992).
28. In this article, I focus on the work of Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young. Other examples would include, most notably, Nancy Fraser (see Unruly Practices, note 7, and Justice Interruptus [London: Routledge, 1997]) and most of the contributors to the volume edited by Johanna Meehan, Feminists Read Habermas (New York: Routledge, 1995). Habermas's discourse ethics and the theory of deliberative democracy that follows from it have been a major inspiration for this feminist work. See Jürgen Habermas, Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action (Cambridge: Polity, 1990) and Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996). See also Seyla Benhabib and Fred Dallmayr, eds., The Communicative Ethics Controversy (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992).
29. In this article, I focus on the work of Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young. Other examples would include, most notably, Nancy Fraser (see Unruly Practices, note 7, and Justice Interruptus [London: Routledge, 1997]) and most of the contributors to the volume edited by Johanna Meehan, Feminists Read Habermas (New York: Routledge, 1995). Habermas's discourse ethics and the theory of deliberative democracy that follows from it have been a major inspiration for this feminist work. See Jürgen Habermas, Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action (Cambridge: Polity, 1990) and Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996). See also Seyla Benhabib and Fred Dallmayr, eds., The Communicative Ethics Controversy (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992).
30. In this article, I focus on the work of Seyla Benhabib and Iris Marion Young. Other examples would include, most notably, Nancy Fraser (see Unruly Practices, note 7, and Justice Interruptus [London: Routledge, 1997]) and most of the contributors to the volume edited by Johanna Meehan, Feminists Read Habermas (New York: Routledge, 1995). Habermas's discourse ethics and the theory of deliberative democracy that follows from it have been a major inspiration for this feminist work. See Jürgen Habermas, Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action (Cambridge: Polity, 1990) and Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996). See also Seyla Benhabib and Fred Dallmayr, eds., The Communicative Ethics Controversy (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992).
31. I use the term feminist international ethics throughout this article to refer to the justification, articulation, and application of feminist moral norms across the boundaries of states.
32. The key works to which I refer are Seyla Benhabib, note 7; Benhabib, Situating the Self: Gender, Community, and Postmodernism in Contemporary Ethics (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992); Iris Marion Young, note 7; Young, "Asymmetrical Reciprocity: On Moral Respect, Wonder, and Enlarged Thought" and "Communication and the Other: Beyond Deliberative Democracy," both in Young, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy, and Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), pp. 38-74; and Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990); Gayatri Spivak, A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999); Spivak, "Cultural Talks in the Hot Peace: Revisiting the 'Global Village,'" in Pheng Cheah and Bruce Robbins, eds., Cosmopolitics: Thinking and Feeling Beyond the Nation (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1998); and " Gender and International Studies," Millenium 27, no. 4 (1998): 809-831.
33. The key works to which I refer are Seyla Benhabib, note 7; Benhabib, Situating the Self: Gender, Community, and Postmodernism in Contemporary Ethics (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992); Iris Marion Young, note 7; Young, "Asymmetrical Reciprocity: On Moral Respect, Wonder, and Enlarged Thought" and "Communication and the Other: Beyond Deliberative Democracy," both in Young, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy, and Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), pp. 38-74; and Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990); Gayatri Spivak, A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999); Spivak, "Cultural Talks in the Hot Peace: Revisiting the 'Global Village,'" in Pheng Cheah and Bruce Robbins, eds., Cosmopolitics: Thinking and Feeling Beyond the Nation (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1998); and " Gender and International Studies," Millenium 27, no. 4 (1998): 809-831.
34. The key works to which I refer are Seyla Benhabib, note 7; Benhabib, Situating the Self: Gender, Community, and Postmodernism in Contemporary Ethics (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992); Iris Marion Young, note 7; Young, "Asymmetrical Reciprocity: On Moral Respect, Wonder, and Enlarged Thought" and "Communication and the Other: Beyond Deliberative Democracy," both in Young, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy, and Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), pp. 38-74; and Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990); Gayatri Spivak, A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999); Spivak, "Cultural Talks in the Hot Peace:
35. The key works to which I refer are Seyla Benhabib, note 7; Benhabib, Situating the Self: Gender, Community, and Postmodernism in Contemporary Ethics (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992); Iris Marion Young, note 7; Young, "Asymmetrical Reciprocity: On Moral Respect, Wonder, and Enlarged Thought" and "Communication and the Other: Beyond Deliberative Democracy," both in Young, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy, and Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), pp. 38-74; and Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990); Gayatri Spivak, A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999); Spivak, "Cultural Talks in the Hot Peace: Revisiting the 'Global Village,'" in Pheng Cheah and Bruce Robbins, eds., Cosmopolitics: Thinking and Feeling Beyond the Nation (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1998); and " Gender and International Studies," Millenium 27, no. 4 (1998): 809-831.
36. The key works to which I refer are Seyla Benhabib, note 7; Benhabib, Situating the Self: Gender, Community, and Postmodernism in Contemporary Ethics (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992); Iris Marion Young, note 7; Young, "Asymmetrical Reciprocity: On Moral Respect, Wonder, and Enlarged Thought" and "Communication and the Other: Beyond Deliberative Democracy," both in Young, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy, and Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), pp. 38-74; and Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990); Gayatri Spivak, A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999); Spivak, "Cultural Talks in the Hot Peace: Revisiting the 'Global Village,'" in Pheng Cheah and Bruce Robbins, eds., Cosmopolitics: Thinking and Feeling Beyond the Nation (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1998); and " Gender and International Studies," Millenium 27, no. 4 (1998): 809-831.
37. The key works to which I refer are Seyla Benhabib, note 7; Benhabib, Situating the Self: Gender, Community, and Postmodernism in Contemporary Ethics (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992); Iris Marion Young, note 7; Young, "Asymmetrical Reciprocity: On Moral Respect, Wonder, and Enlarged Thought" and "Communication and the Other: Beyond Deliberative Democracy," both in Young, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy, and Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), pp. 38-74; and Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990); Gayatri Spivak, A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999); Spivak, "Cultural Talks in the Hot Peace: Revisiting the 'Global Village,'" in Pheng Cheah and Bruce Robbins, eds., Cosmopolitics: Thinking and Feeling Beyond the Nation (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1998); and " Gender and International Studies," Millenium 27, no. 4 (1998): 809-831.
38. The key works to which I refer are Seyla Benhabib, note 7; Benhabib, Situating the Self: Gender, Community, and Postmodernism in Contemporary Ethics (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992); Iris Marion Young, note 7; Young, "Asymmetrical Reciprocity: On Moral Respect, Wonder, and Enlarged Thought" and "Communication and the Other: Beyond Deliberative Democracy," both in Young, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy, and Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), pp. 38-74; and Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990); Gayatri Spivak, A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999); Spivak, "Cultural Talks in the Hot Peace: Revisiting the 'Global Village,'" in Pheng Cheah and Bruce Robbins, eds., Cosmopolitics: Thinking and Feeling Beyond the Nation (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1998); and " Gender and International Studies," Millenium 27, no. 4 (1998): 809-831.
39. The key works to which I refer are Seyla Benhabib, note 7; Benhabib, Situating the Self: Gender, Community, and Postmodernism in Contemporary Ethics (Cambridge, U.K.: Polity, 1992); Iris Marion Young, note 7; Young, "Asymmetrical Reciprocity: On Moral Respect, Wonder, and Enlarged Thought" and "Communication and the Other: Beyond Deliberative Democracy," both in Young, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy, and Policy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), pp. 38-74; and Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990); Gayatri Spivak, A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Toward a History of the Vanishing Present (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999); Spivak, "Cultural Talks in the Hot Peace: Revisiting the 'Global Village,'" in Pheng Cheah and Bruce Robbins, eds., Cosmopolitics: Thinking and Feeling Beyond the Nation (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1998); and " Gender and International Studies," Millenium 27, no. 4 (1998): 809-831.
40. My concern in this article is not with a critique of the conception of politics, as such, at work in Benhabib and Young, though there are clearly some parallels with some of my arguments here and those of critics (which would also include Young) of the moralization of politics in theories of deliberative democracy. See Chantal Mouffe, "Democracy, Power, and the 'Political,'" in Seyla Benhabib, ed., Democracy and Difference: Contesting the Boundaries of the Political (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996); and Young, note 10, Intersecting Voices, pp. 60-74. Here I focus on the inadequacies of the theorization of morality that is the other side of the coin of the democratic (political) theories of both Young and Benhabib, and my argument is specifically with the political terms (egalitarian liberal and democratic) in which the moral ideals of Benhabib and Young are articulated.
41. My concern in this article is not with a critique of the conception of politics, as such, at work in Benhabib and Young, though there are clearly some parallels with some of my arguments here and those of critics (which would also include Young) of the moralization of politics in theories of deliberative democracy. See Chantal Mouffe, "Democracy, Power, and the 'Political,'" in Seyla Benhabib, ed., Democracy and Difference: Contesting the Boundaries of the Political (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996); and Young, note 10, Intersecting Voices, pp. 60-74. Here I focus on the inadequacies of the theorization of morality that is the other side of the coin of the democratic (political) theories of both Young and Benhabib, and my argument is specifically with the political terms (egalitarian liberal and democratic) in which the moral ideals of Benhabib and Young are articulated.
42. Benhabib, note 7.
43. Benhabib, note 10.
44. Benhabib, note 7, pp. 36-37.
45. Ibid., pp. 82-104.
46. Ibid., p. 4.
47. Ibid., p. 39.
48. See Benhabib and Dallmayr, note 7.
49. Ibid., p. 37.
50. Ibid., pp. 39, 107.
51. Ibid., p. 106.
52. Benhabib, note 10, pp. 148-177.
53. Benhabib, note 7, pp. 34-35.
54. Ibid., pp. 170-171; Benhabib, note 10, pp. 121-124.
55. Ibid., pp. 170-171; Benhabib, note 10, pp. 121-124.
56. Benhabib, note 7, p. 36.
57. See my development of this critique of Benhabib in Kimberly Hutchings, "Feminism, Universalism, and the Ethics of International Politics," in Jabri and O'Gonnan, eds., note 6, pp. 17-37; and " Moral Deliberation and Political Judgement: Reflections on Benhabib's Interactive Universalism," Theory, Culture, and Society 14 (1997): 132-142.
58. See my development of this critique of Benhabib in Kimberly Hutchings, "Feminism, Universalism, and the Ethics of International Politics," in Jabri and O'Gonnan, eds., note 6, pp. 17-37; and " Moral Deliberation and Political Judgement: Reflections on Benhabib's Interactive Universalism," Theory, Culture, and Society 14 (1997): 132-142.
59. Hutchings, note 26, pp. 140-141. Benhabib herself would deny this conclusion: she argues that discourse ethics is not closed to any specific content, in the way that more substantive (or "substitutionalist") moral theories are, and that this is its great strength. See Benhabib, note 7, pp. 13-14. However, although any opinion may be expressed in the process of "discursive validation," some opinions contradict the norms underpinning the discursive exchange (they entail a "performative contradiction" for anyone who has accepted those norms) and it becomes impossible for them to be taken seriously.
60. Benhabib, note 7, p. 147.
61. Young, note 10, Intersecting Voices.
62. Ibid., p. 41.
63. Ibid., p. 59.
64. Ibid., p. 50. Young draws on Levinas and Irigary in formulating her notion of "asymmetrical reciprocity," a move that, as we shall see below, is in interesting tension with the Habermasian elements in her conception of communicative ethics.
65. Ibid., p. 53.
66. Young is critical elsewhere of overly moralized conceptions of politics, as are other critics of an overrationalized account of deliberative democracy (see note 11, above), but this is not her key point here.
67. "Just because social life consists of plural experiences and perspectives, a theory of communicative ethics must endorse a radically democratic conception of moral and political judgment": Young, note 10, Intersecting Voices, p. 59.
68. Young, Justice and the Politics of Difference, note 10, pp. 168-173.
69. Young, note 10.
70. Young, note 7.
71. Ibid., p. 10.
72. Young, note 10, Intersecting Voices, pp. 60-74. See Benhabib's response to this critique in "Toward a Deliberative Model of Democratic Legitimacy," in Benhabib, note 1.1.
73. Young, note 7, pp. 57-77.
74. Ibid., 79; Young, note 10, Intersecting Voices, pp. 62-65.
75. Ibid., 79; Young, note 10, Intersecting Voices, pp. 62-65.
76. "Normative judgment is best understood as the product of dialogue under conditions of equality and mutual respect": Young, note 10, Intersecting Voices, p. 59.
77. See Young's adaptation of the system/lifeworld distinction: Young, note 7, pp. 158-159.
78. In Inclusion and Democracy, Young labels the two axes of injustice as "oppression" and "domination" (Young, note 7, p. 31). Each of these are defined in terms of an opposition to "self-development" and "self-determination," respectively. By "self-development," Young means the development of the individual's capacities, intellectual, practical, emotional, and communicative, to the fullest extent. By "self-determination" she means the ability to "participate in determining one's action and the condition of one's action" (p. 32). For Young, while the risks of oppression are largely, though by no means wholly, to do with economic power, the risks of domination are located in political power. See pp. 31-32.
79. Ibid., pp. 167, 190.
80. See note 45, above.
81. Young (note 7, p. 270) writes: "In Chapter 5 I discussed the important function of civil society in fostering independent public spheres through which individuals and groups expose the activities of powerful state and economic actors, express their opposition to or criticism of some of those activities, and hold powerful actors accountable. Global democratic processes could not be very strong without such public spheres that in principle included all the world's peoples. Already the possibilities of transportation and communication in the world today see the formation of incipient public spheres composed of active citizens in global civil society."
82. Ibid., p. 271.
83. I b i d.
84. I b i d.
85. Benhabib, note 7, pp. 144-145, 147.
86. Benhabib frequently makes reference to the notion of moral learning, both individual and collective. She derives this from Habermas (Benhabib, note 7, p. 39). She is also insistent on the role of imagination in enabling the appreciation of the perspectives of concrete others (ibid., p. 170). Young, as noted above, stresses the possibility of creation within the moral encounter, in which new vocabularies are invented (Young, note 10, Intersecting Voices, p. 53). However, both thinkers give priority to the norms inherent in communicative reason as the framework within which learning takes place and imagination in exercised. It is discourse or communication in accordance with egalitarian norms through which moral transformation is able to happen.
87. Of course, Benhabib would deny that there is any vicious circularity here, because of the possibility of ongoing processes of "recursive validation" in properly conducted public discourse. However, even if one were to accept that anything might be properly debated within the public sphere (regardless of performative contradiction), it would still be the case that the discourse had its exclusivities at any given point in the ongoing discursive cycle.
88. Spivak, note 10, p. 340. I consider Spivak's diagnosis of transnational feminism to be unnecessarily jaundiced. Much feminist work in the area of development has struggled to reverse the logic of modernization and learn from the experience and analysis of women at the sharp end of global injustice. See, for example, B. Ackerley, "Women's Human Rights Activists as Cross-Cultural Theorists," International Journal of Feminist Politics 3, no. 3 (2001): 311-346). However, although I would not endorse the sweeping nature of Spivak's claims, I would argue that they do have some resonance with dominant top-down approaches to international development and help to explain the nature of the alternative mode of moral relation to which Spivak's argument points.
89. Benhabib, note 7, pp. 178-186; Young, note 7, pp. 265-271.
90. Benhabib, note 7, pp. 178-186; Young, note 7, pp. 265-271.
91. Spivak, note 10, A Critique, p. 332. Fraser borrows from Spivak in mining the term subaltern counterpublic (see Fraser, note 7, "Rethinking the Public Sphere," p. 140 n.21).
92. Spivak, note 10, A Critique, p. 332. Fraser borrows from Spivak in mining the term subaltern counterpublic (see Fraser, note 7, "Rethinking the Public Sphere," p. 140 n.21).
93. Spivak, note 10, A Critique, p. 333.
94. Benhabib, note 7, p. 40.
95. Ibid., p. 271.
96. Spivak, note 10, "Cultural Talks," p. 340.
97. For both Benhabib and Young, what is learned or imagined in encounter with other may be validated only through an egalitarian communicative encounter.
98. Although I do not think Spivak is right to lump all transnational feminisms together in relation to this charge (see note 55, above), a case could certainly be made that this is what Benhabib and Young, in their shift from the ground of liberal-capitalist states to the sphere of global civil society, both accept.
99. Spivak, note 10, "Cultural Talks," p. 340.
100. Spivak, note 10, "Gender and International Studies," p. 824.
101. Spivak, note 10, A Critique, pp. 248-279.
102. Ibid., p. 265.
103. Ibid., pp. 256-264.
104. Ibid., p. 259.
105. Ibid., p. 199.