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46Deweyan Democracy DefendedSouthwest Philosophy Review 28 (1): 197-207. 2012.This paper defends Deweyan democracy against the attack levelled against it by Robert Talisse. The problem with Talisse’s critique, I argue, is that Rawlsian concerns about reasonable pluralism are a propos only for political theories of justice ⎯ for theories, that is, that make definitive pronouncements about, or offer principled limits to, the coercive power of the state ⎯ and Deweyan democracy is not (or is not centrally) a theory of justice in this respect. My argument, in short, is that o…Read more
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221The Continuing Relevance of John Dewey (review)Education and Culture 30 (2): 103-105. 2014.The Continuing Relevance of John Dewey: Reflections on Aesthetics, Morality, Science, and Society
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363Egalitarians, sufficientarians, and mathematicians: a critical notice of Harry Frankfurt’s On InequalityCanadian Journal of Philosophy 46 (2): 145-162. 2016.This critical notice provides an overview of Harry Frankfurt’s On Inequality and assesses whether Frankfurt is right to argue that equality is merely formal and empty. I counter-argue that egalitarianism, properly tweaked and circumscribed, can be defended against Frankfurt’s repudiation. After surveying the main arguments in Frankfurt’s book, I argue that whatever plausibility the ‘doctrine of sufficiency’ defended by Frankfurt may have, it does not strike a fatal blow against egalitarianism. T…Read more
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169Liberalism, Ethnocentrism, and Solidarity: Reflections on RortyJournal of Philosophical Research 34 55-68. 2009.In this paper I defend Richard Rorty against two critics of his moral and political philosophy—Will Kymlicka and Robert Talisse—to whom Rorty himself never responded directly. I argue that Kymlicka misrepresents Rorty’s so-called “ethnocentrism” by giving it a needlessly affirmative reading, and that Talisse, by failing to appreciate the distinction between “making truth claims” and “proposing experiments” misunderstands both Rorty’s use of Darwin and his antifoundational liberalism
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William James on Justice and the Sacredness of IndividualityIn Susan Dieleman, David Rondel & Christopher J. Voparil (eds.), Pragmatism and Justice, Oxford University Press. pp. 309-323. 2017.In this chapter I introduce and defend the democratic individualism in William James’s thought. Drawing on the work of George Kateb and others, I show how what James calls the “democratic respect for the sacredness of individuality” can be understood in terms of four inter-related commitments: (1) A commitment to the principle that each person’s individuality counts equally; no one’s more or less than anyone else’s. (2) A commitment to the principle that each individual should be able to flouris…Read more
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443Raz on Authority and DemocracyDialogue 51 (2): 211-230. 2012.ABSTRACT: I argue that Joseph Raz’s service conception of authority cannot convincingly account for the nature and source of democratic authority. It cannot explain why decisions made democratically are more likely to be sound than decisions made non-democratically, and therefore, why democratic decisions might be understood as constituting moral reasons for action and compliance independently of their instrumental dimensions. My argument is that democratic authority cannot be explained complete…Read more
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Introduction: Perspectives on Pragmatism and JusticeIn Susan Dieleman, David Rondel & Christopher J. Voparil (eds.), Pragmatism and Justice, Oxford University Press. pp. 1-17. 2017.
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284G.A. Cohen and the Logic of Egalitarian CongruenceSocialist Studies 8 (1): 82-100. 2012.In this article, I argue that G. A. Cohen’s defense of the feminist slogan, “The personal is political”, his argument against Rawls’s restriction of principles of justice to the basic structure of society, depends for its intelligibility on the ability to distinguish—with reasonable but perhaps not perfect precision—between those situations in which what Nancy Rosenblum has called “the logic of congruence” is validly invoked and those in which it is not. More importantly, I suggest that the phil…Read more
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232The Idea of Justice Amartya Sen Cambridge, MA: Belknap, 2009, 496 pp. ISBN-13: 978-0674036130 (review)Dialogue 49 (1): 165-168. 2010.
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29Jan Narveson and James P. Sterba , Are Liberty and Equality Compatible? Reviewed by (review)Philosophy in Review 31 (2): 135-137. 2011.
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347Appraising Justice as Larger LoyaltyContemporary Pragmatism 12 (2): 302-316. 2015.This paper critically examines Richard Rorty’s “justice as larger loyalty” proposal. While Rorty is right, I argue, to reject the Kantian idea of a strict bifurcation between justice and loyalty, the former corresponding to reason the latter corresponding to sentiment, my argument is that it is nevertheless a mistake to follow Rorty in conceiving of justice as he recommends we should. This is not an endorsement of the rationalistic Kantian view Rorty rejects. Rather, I argue that there are compe…Read more
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