Th is work advances a theory that forms a unifi ed picture of what I call “social morality,” and the ways that it relates to the political order. It draws on a wide variety of tools and methods: game theory, experimental psychology, economics, sociological theories of cultural evolution, theories of emotion and reasoning, axiomatic social choice theory, constitutional political economy, Kantian moral philosophy, prescriptivism, and analyzes reasoning, and how it relates to freedom in human aff airs. Th e book is motivated by one central concern: can the authority of social morality be reconciled with our status as free and equal moral persons in a world characterized by deep and pervasive yet reasonable disagreements about the standards by which to evaluate the justifi ability of claims to moral authority? If it cannot — if the authority of social morality requires that some simply obey others — then our morality is authoritarian. In contrast, a social order that is structured by a nonauthoritarian social morality is a free moral order: a moral order that is endorsed by the reasons of all, in which all have reasons of their own, based on their own ideas of what is important and valuable, to endorse the authority of social morality. Such a social and moral order is “an order of public reason” — it is endorsed by the reasons of all the public. Only if we achieve an order of public reason can we share a cooperative social order on terms of moral freedom and equality. Only in an order of public reason is our morality truly a joint product of the reasons of all rather than a mode of oppression by which some invoke the idea of morality to rule the lives of others.

https://philpapers.org/archive/GAUPT-2.pdf

Precis – The Order of Public Reason: A Theory of Freedom and Morality in a Diverse and Bounded World

This article rejects the received view that Post-Truth is a new, unprecedented political phenomenon. By showing that Truth and Post-Truth share the same genesis, this article will submit the idea o...

Truth, lies and tweets: a consensus theory of post-truth

Deliberative Democracy and the Power of Majorities. On Tolerating Majorities. Majoritarian Beliefs and Neo-Republicanism. On Separation and Anticlericalism. Italy and the Principle of (Strict) Church-State Separation.

https://eprints.luiss.it/1354/2/20141211-rudas_neyra-abstract-eng.pdf

The Power of Majorities and Church-State Separation

This chapter aims at defending modus vivendi as a way of including what I call ‘non-reasonable’ people in a liberal society. After clarifying who the ‘non-reasonable’ are, I will argue for a specific modus vivendi as a form of political settlement that allows both reasonable and non-reasonable people to live together without coercion, in a peaceful and relatively stable way. Modus vivendi is the proper way to cohabit efficaciously with others, despite their conflicting views. I will argue as follows: first, I start by focusing on so-called ‘non-reasonable’ people. I claim that non-reasonable people may actively take their place within liberal citizenship. Second, I try to understand why the ‘non-reasonable’ should be willing to obey laws in a permanent way. Laws and institutions need the ‘stability of obedience’: they must guard themselves against the unpredictability of citizens’ conduct in order to maintain a secure civic society. This is a central point: one does not merely have to hope that ‘non-reasonable’ people show a factual openness and become part of a liberal society, but one must deal also with their reasons to be part of it. The aim is to argue for reasons for them to be actively part of a society that is not ideal for those who do not endorse its moral fundamentals. I propound that non-reasonable people may comply with liberal institutions via a modus vivendi supported both by reasons and practices, the intersection of which serves as a guarantee of stability. Finally, I will draw some conclusions.

Modus Vivendi and the Motivations for Compliance

The recent renaissance of work on conventions, informal institutions, and social norms has reminded us that between the state and individual choice is a network of informal social rules that are the foundation of our cooperative social life. However, even those who appreciate the importance of social norms are reluctant to say that they are about real morality. The first part of the essay examines why this is so. The problem, I suggest, is a widely-embraced view according to which moral judgment is an individual decision about a type of truth that is largely independent of social facts. I show that this popular conception undermines effective social norms and moral conventions. The second part of the essay analyzes the conditions under which effective conventions can be made consistent with diverse individual judgments as to what is morally acceptable — and so conventions can be understood to concern what is genuinely moral. The key, I argue, is the idea of a publicly justified morality as modeled by a hypothetical social contract.

Why the Conventionalist Needs the Social Contract (and Vice Versa)

Disagreement, Peerhood, and Compromise

In Th e Order of Public Reason, Gerald Gaus defends an innovative and sophisticated convergence version of public reason liberalism. Th e crucial concept of his argumentative framework is that of “social morality”, intended as the set of rules apt to organize how individuals can make moral demands over each other. I claim that Gaus’s characterization of social morality and its rules is unstable because it rests on a rejection of the distinction between the normative and the descriptive. I argue that such rejection is motivated by certain practical aims Gaus wishes his theory to achieve. His method and his idea that morality needs to be understood both as the dictate of impartial reasoning and as a social and historical fact come from the need for his theory to perform the task of settling the problem of order. I discuss Gaus’s philosophical attitude and, fi nally, distinguishing between “therapeutic” and “evaluative” approaches, I present some points of discussion for understanding the role and scope of political philosophy in general.

/pdf/gerald-gaus-and-the-task-of-political-philosophy-lo5myo0k0d.pdf

Gerald Gaus and the Task of Political Philosophy

Kevin Vallier, Liberal Politics and Public Faith. Beyond Separation

Maria Paola Ferretti, The Public Perspective. Public Justification and the Ethics of Belief London: Rowman & Littlefield, 2018. Hardback ISBN 978-1-78,660-872-7, 133 €. 196 pages

G. Bistagnino

Papers

Disagreement, Peerhood, and Compromise

Gerald Gaus and the Task of Political Philosophy

Kevin Vallier, Liberal Politics and Public Faith. Beyond Separation

Maria Paola Ferretti, The Public Perspective. Public Justification and the Ethics of Belief London: Rowman & Littlefield, 2018. Hardback ISBN 978-1-78,660-872-7, 133 €. 196 pages

Epistemology of Disagreement: Mapping the Debate