Ivan Mladenovic

In this paper I will discuss a recent attempt of justifying democracy and its authority. It pertains to recently published papers by Niko Kolodny, which complement each other and taken together practically assume a form of a monograph. It could be said that Kolodny's approach is a non-standard one given that he avoids typical ways of justifying democracy. Namely, when a justification of democracy is concerned, Kolodny maintains that it is necessary to offer a kind of an independent justification. It is not so much that he insists that the usual approaches are wrong as much as that an independent justification is necessary in order to discern what it is that gives them their significance. Kolodny's independent justification of democracy is based on the idea of social equality. In this paper I will try to reconstruct and critically assess Kolodny's approach by paying special attention to the question of democratic authority.

Since political polarization significantly impacts contemporary politics and democracy, much of the research in the social sciences is dedicated to this topic. In recent times, philosophers joined the discussion related to the research on political polarization, primarily in the fields of political philosophy and political epistemology. The main aim of this paper is philosophical analysis of some dominant explanations of political polarization, but also to propose solutions for a way out of political polarization from the perspective of political philosophy. In a nutshell, to find solutions for a way out of political polarization, I will be looking in the direction of boosting epistemic rationality and fostering communication in conditions of tolerance and equality.

Collective intentionality is of central importance in social ontology. In this paper, we will discuss its role in Searle’s understanding of social ontology and institutional reality. The first section of the paper will reconstruct Searle’s understanding of social ontology and his identification of necessary elements for constructing institutional reality. In this section, we will discuss the notions of imposition of function, of collective intentionality, and of constitutional rule. The second section will critically re-examine the notion of collective intentionality. The third section will contrast Searle’s understanding of institutional reality with the one based on evolutionary game theory. Taking into account that Searle describes his position as naturalistic, the main task of this section will be to examine to what extent the alternative theory, also naturalistic in its character, can address certain problems, which remain insolvable in the framework of Searle’s theory.

The usual justifi cations of democracy attach central importance to fair decision-making procedures. However, it is being increasingly emphasized that it is necessary to address epistemic considerations to justify democracy and democratic authority. In her book Democracy and Truth: The Conflict between Political and Epistemic Virtues, Prijić-Samaržija defends the view which places emphasis on the necessity of epistemic justification of democracy. In this paper, I will discuss her criticism of epistemic proceduralism, which can be considered major contemporary framework for epistemic justification of democracy. Within the framework of epistemic proceduralism, for justifying democracy and democratic authority it is necessary to take into account both political and epistemic values. Nevertheless, Prijić-Samaržija thinks that epistemic proceduralism is not sufficiently epistemic and that it reduces epistemic to political values. I shall argue that epistemic proceduralism can be defended from this kind of criticism.

In this paper I analyze Cecile Laborde's conception of justificatory secularism. Laborde points out that in her formulation and defense of the conception of justificatory secularism, she follows Rawls' conception of political liberalism to a certain extent. For that reason, I first provide a sketch of Rawls' conception of political liberalism. Then I focus on justificatory secularism, trying to show to what extent it displays similarities with the conception of political liberalism, but also how it differs. I am interested in whether justificatory secularism represents a better alternative to the conception of political liberalism or whether these two conceptions should be considered complementary.

In her book Democracy and Truth: The Conflict between Political and Epistemic Virtues, Snjezana Prijic Samarzija advocates a stance that not only political, but also epistemic values are necessary for justification of democracy. Specifically, she mounts defense for one particular type of public deliberation on epistemic grounds. In this paper, I will discuss the following issue: What connects this type of public deliberation to the wider context of justification of democracy? I will attempt to explain why Prijic Samarzija's stance can be understood as a version of deliberative epistemic instrumentalism and to discuss the role played by the public deliberation within this framework.