Theological Origins of Modernity Michael Allen Gillespie Liberalism and Enlightenment in Eighteenth-Century Germany James Schmidt Hobbes's Contempt for Opinions: Manipulation and the Challenge for Mass Democracies Geoffrey M. Vaughan America's Contents and Discontents: Reflections on Michael Sandel's America Rogers M. Smith Humanism and Antihumanism in Lasch and Sandel Tom Hoffman Toleration and Multiculturalism Ryszard Legutko The Postmodern Identity of Russia -- and the West Boris Maizel Misfortune, Welfare Reform, and Right-Wing Egalitarianism Patrick Boleyn-Fitzgerald The Limitsof Instrumental Rationality in Social Explanation Doug Mann Democracy Despite Voter Ignorance: A Weberian Reply to Somin and Friedman David Ciepley

Michael Allen Gillespie | Theological Origins of Modernity

Abstract: Most critiques of modernity rest on an inadequate understanding of its complexity.  Modernity should be seen in terms of the question that guides modern thought.  This is the question of divine omnipotence that arises out of the nominalist destruction on Scholasticism.  Humanism, Reformation Christianity, empiricism, and rationalism are different responses to this question.

James Schmidt | Liberalism and Enlightenment in Eighteenth-Century Germany

Abstract: The eighteenth-century controversy among Moses Mendelssohn, Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi, and Immanuel Kant undermines the tendency to equate liberalism with the Enlightenment.  While the defender of the Enlightenment, Mendelssohn, championed defended such traditional liberal values as religious toleration, his arguments were often illiberal.  In contrast, many of the views of his anti-Establishment opponent, Jacobi, are remarkably liberal.  Kant’s essays from the mid-1780s advanced a liberal conception of politics but a view of Enlightenment that was quite distant from those of both Mendelssohn and Jacobi.

Geoffrey M. Vaughan | Hobbes’s Contempt for Opinions: Manipulation and the Challenge For Mass Democracies

Abstract: Thomas Hobbes denied both that opinion provides access to truth and that it ought to be protected from political manipulation.  Hobbes knew that his contempt for opinion put him at odds with the classical tradition of political philosophy.  What he could not have known was that it also would put him at odds with modern, liberal democracy, which protects opinion-the opinions of the public -- that it cannot invest with truth value.

Rogers M. Smith | America’s Contents and Discontents: Reflections on Michael Sandel’s America

Abstract: Michael Sandel’s Democracy’s Discontent traces America’s woes to an erosion of community and a loss of a sense of collective self-governance.  He recommends a more communitarian, republican public philosophy as the cure. His book illuminates many important historical and contemporary issues, particularly the link between systems of political economy and visions of citizenship.  His methods are, however, too impressionistic to support his empirical claims. he particularly neglects the role of civic republicanism in America’s history of racial, gender, and religious discrimination.  Hence his call for Americans to minimize liberal doctrines of individual rights in favor of communally minded republicanism is not fully persuasive.

Tom Hoffman | Humanism and Antihumanism in Lasch and Sandel

Abstract: Christopher Lasch’s True and Only Heaven and Michael Sandel’s Democracy’s Discontent are similarly motivated criticisms of consumer society.  However, Lasch identifies the ideals animating American consumer society as stemming from a broader human impulse, the roots of which he explores and criticizes.  This strategy allows Lasch to place his critique of consumerism alongside criticisms of a full range of humanist ideals.  Sandel, who articulates a more narrowly focused criticism of consumer society, never links its underlying imperatives to a broader humanism, thus failing to recognize how his alternative, civic republicanism, might share some of the same problems.

Ryszard Legutko | Toleration and Multiculturalism

Abstract: By showing toleration- which is usually interpreted as a personal attitude- through the lens of peaceful coexistence, Michael Walzer links toleration to political arrangements.  The consequence of this approach is to blur basic political categories such as the state, political power, culture, and political creed.  Moreover, while Walzer clearly prefers an immigrant society as embodying the practice of toleration more fully than any other regime, he fails to identify either its cultural or its political preconditions.

Boris Maizel | The Postmodern Identity of Russia -- and the West

Abstract: In contrast to societies where socialization takes place through the transmission of anonymous and hence overpowering traditions, the typical way of socialization for Western people is through productive dialogue guided by the search for objectivity.  Postmodernism, however, fosters a form of dialogue in which people should not look for objective knowledge but should simply register their diverse opinions.  Just this type of dialogue has been the norm in Russia for centuries.  As a result, Russian cultural and political initiative has been dominated by an all-powerful state.  In the West, we now witness a similar process, as the culture of nonjudgmental relativism consolidates its dominance over an increasingly postmodern society.

Patrick Boleyn-Fitzgerald | Misfortune, Welfare Reform, and Right-Wing Capitalism

Abstract: A close look at the rhetoric in America’s recent welfare-reform debate has both surprising and important implications for political philosophy.  Political philosophers typically presume that opponents of redistribution are motivated by considerations other than equality.  Recent arguments for welfare reform, however, have been formulated in a manner consistent with most contemporary egalitarian ideals or the adequacy of those theories of equality.

Doug Mann | The Limits of Instrumental Rationality in Social Explanation

Abstract: The goal of social explanation is to understand human action, both individual and collective.  To do so successfully we must explain action on three distinct (but intertwined) levels: the actors’ intentions, the meaning that actors and interpreters ascribe to action, and the structural ideals that govern action.  Each level of explanation has certain types of rationality associated with it.  Only on the level of intentionality does instrumental rationality assume a prime importance, yet even there it must compete with normative and expressive accounts of action.

David Ciepley | Democracy Despite Voter Ignorance: A Weberian Reply to Somin and Friedman

Abstract: Ilya Somin finds in the public’s ignorance of policy issues a reason to reduce the size and scope of government.  But one cannot restrict the range of issues that may be raised in a democracy without it ceasing to be a democracy.  Jeffrey Friedman argues that, since feedback on the quality of private goods is superior to feedback on the quality of public policies, “privatizing” public decisions might improve their quality.  However, the quality of feedback depends on the nature of the nature of the good, not who provides it; and the absence of reliable feedback on a good may actually justify government involvement, to correct information asymmetries.  More fundamentally, voter ignorance of policy issues is a problem only if we assume that the point of democracy is to secure voter control of policy.  Max Weber, however, advocated democracy as the best available mechanism for securing strong and responsible leadership.

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