Robert B. Talisse

Deliberativist responses to activist challenges A continuation of Young’s dialectic

In a recent article, Iris Marion Young raises several challenges to deliberative democracy on behalf of political activists. In this paper, the author defends a version of deliberative democracy against the activist challenges raised by Young and devises challenges to activism on behalf of the deliberative democrat.

Does public ignorance defeat deliberative democracy

Abstract Richard Posner and Ilya Somin have recently posed forceful versions of a common objection to deliberative democracy, the Public Ignorance Objection. This objection holds that demonstrably high levels of public ignorance render deliberative democracy practically impossible. But the public‐ignorance data show that the public is ignorant in a way that does not necessarily defeat deliberative democracy. Posner and Somin have overestimated the force of the Public Ignorance Objection, so the question of deliberative democracys practical feasibility is still open.

Two‐faced liberalism: John Gray's pluralist politics and the reinstatement of enlightenment liberalism

Abstract In Two Faces of Liberalism, John Gray pursues the dual agenda of condemning familiar liberal theories for perpetuating the failed “Enlightenment project,” and promoting his own version of anti‐Enlightenment liberalism, which he calls “modus vivendi.” However, Grays critical apparatus is insufficient to capture accurately the highly influential “political” liberalism of John Rawls. Moreover, Grays modus vivendi faces serious challenges raised by Rawls concerning stability. In order to respond to the Rawlsian objections, Gray would have to reinstate the aspirations and principles characteristic of Enlightenment theories of liberalism.

A Farewell to Deweyan Democracy

The revival of pragmatism has brought renewed enthusiasm for John Deweys conception of democracy. Drawing upon Rawlsian concerns regarding the fact of reasonable pluralism, I argue that Deweyan democracy is unworthy of resurrection. A modified version of Deweyan democracy recently proposed by Elizabeth Anderson is then taken up and also found to be lacking. Then I propose a model of democracy that draws upon Peirces social epistemology. The result is a non-Deweyan but nonetheless pragmatist option in democratic theory.

Physician Deception and Patient Autonomy

Bennett Foddy (2009) argues in favor of the use of placebos when no (other) effective treatments exist. This is a controversial position that we challenge. We begin with a logical point. Foddy (2009) notes “a strong and growing consensus” on the efficacy of placebos “as treatments for. . . unpleasant psychological symptoms” (4). Later he claims that “[P]lacebos are not, strictly speaking, a treatment” because they “perform no action on a person’s body” (4). But if placebos are not a treatment, then it is difficult to make sense of Foddy’s repeated claim that they are, under certain conditions, the best treatment option. An equivocation runs throughout the target article. On the one hand, Foddy states that placebos are not treatment because they are physiologically inert; on the other hand, he champions the use of placebos as treatment on the grounds that they are efficacious psychologically. The equivocation may seem harmless enough; however, it plays a pivotal role in covering over presuppositions and confusions in Foddy’s overall argument. It is important to note that Foddy’s (2009) argument is not about placebos per se, but deception by health care professionals—specifically physicians. In fact, though Foddy notes that placebos (as pills) trade off a “conditioned association between treatment and benefit” (4), one could run his argument, mutatis mutandis, for any physiologically inert item or practice; on Foddy’s view, given the right circumstances, physicians may have a duty to prescribe chanting, crystals, séances, or even donating large sums of money to a guru. The crucial datum for Foddy is that deception, when appropriately executed, can have beneficial medical consequences. He argues that, for some conditions, no (other) effective treatments exist, and deception has at least some chance of creating a positive/beneficial outcome. Therefore, he concludes, deception is warranted. The view that under certain circumstances physicians should deceive their patients raises worries concerning patient autonomy. Foddy (2009) is understandably eager to allay these concerns. He argues that there are two reasons why the use of placebos when (other) treatments are not available cannot be seen as an act of limiting or coercing choice. First, choice is not limited by deception because no other alternatives exist. Second, deception is not coercive because placebos are not, in fact, a treatment and coercion implies forced treatment. So while a patient might refuse to a round of chemotherapy because it has toxic side effects,

Toward a Social Epistemic Comprehensive Liberalism

For well over a decade, much of liberal political theory has accepted the founding premise of Rawls’s political liberalism, according to which the fact of reasonable pluralism renders comprehensive versions of liberalism incoherent. However, the founding premise presumes that all comprehensive doctrines are moral doctrines. In this essay, the author builds upon recent work by Allen Buchanan and develops a comprehensive version of liberalism based in a partially comprehensive social epistemic doctrine. The author then argues that this version of liberalism is sufficiently accommodating of the fact of reasonable pluralism. The conclusion is that the founding premise of political liberalism admits of a counterexample; there is a version of comprehensive liberalism that is sufficiently pluralistic.

Rawls on pluralism and stability

Abstract Rawls ‘s political liberalism abandons the traditional political‐theory objective of providing a philosophical account of liberal democracy. However, Rawls also aims for a liberal political order endorsed by citizens on grounds deeper than what he calls a “modus vivendi” compromise; he contends that a liberal political order based upon a modus vivendi is unstable. The aspiration for a pluralist and “freestanding” liberalism is at odds with the goal of a liberalism endorsed as something deeper than a modus vivendi compromise among competing comprehensive doctrines. A liberalism that is supported “for its own sake” rather than as a compromise must necessarily be based on some conception of the good, of the sort that political liberalism eschews.

Sustaining democracy: folk epistemology and social conflict

When political philosophers ask whether there is a philosophical justification for democracy, they are most frequently concerned with one of two queries. The first has to do with the relative merits of democracy as compared with other regimes. The second query has to do with the moral bindingness of democratic outcomes. But there is a third query we may be engaging when we are looking for a philosophical justification of democracy: what reason can be given to democratic citizens to pursue democratic means of social change when they are confronted with a democratic result that seems to them seriously objectionable or morally intolerable? In this paper I develop an epistemological response to the third query. The thesis is that we have sufficient epistemological reasons to be democrats. The epistemological norms that we take ourselves to be governed by can be satisfied only under certain social conditions, and these social conditions are best secured under democracy.

AN EPISTEMOLOGICAL DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACY

Abstract Folk epistemology—the idea that one cant help believing that ones beliefs are true—provides an alternative to political theorists inadequate defenses of democracy. It implicitly suggests a dialectical, truth-seeking norm for dealing with people who do not share ones own beliefs. Folk epistemology takes us beyond Mills consequentialist claim for democracy (that the free array of opinions in a deliberative democracy leads us to the truth); instead, the epistemic freedom of the democratic process itself makes citizens confident that evidence for ones beliefs have not been distorted by a corrupt system. Since the starting point of folk epistemology is the meta-conviction that people believe that what they believe is true, it should also serve as a starting point for more rigorous scholarship that seeks to understand why people believe what they believe, instead of dismissing them as “irrational” if one disagrees with their beliefs.

Democracy and ignorance: Reply to Friedman

Abstract Several distinct epistemic states may be properly characterized as states of “ignorance.” It is not clear that the “public ignorance” on which Jeffrey Friedman bases his critique of social democracy is objectionable, because it is not evident which of these epistemic states is at issue. Moreover, few extant theories of democracy defend it on the grounds that it produces good outcomes, rather than because its procedures are just. And even the subcategory of democratic theories that focus on epistemic issues take the state of epistemic justification, not the condition of reaching the truth, to be the touchstone of democratic legitimacy.