Justice by Means of Democracy

Justice by Means of Democracy
Author: Danielle Allen
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 291
Release: 2023-04-28
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 022677709X

"Danielle Allen revisits Rawls' landmark A Theory of Justice to make the case that justice, which she defines as the necessary conditions for human flourishing, requires the protection of political equality or the ability of all people who wish to participate in the political process, to do so on an equal footing. She argues that Rawls, and other thinkers in his wake who focused on protection of individuals from intrusion of the state, as well as many economists with their focus on utilitarian approaches to public policy, have neglected political equality which has led to the denial of justice to many in our society. At a time when economic and political inequality have increased dramatically, and political inequality is threatened by efforts to limit the ability of many to engage in the most basic political right, voting, this book could not be timelier. This book builds on Allen's Berlin Lectures on COVID that we just published in arguing that policymaking fails when it excludes whole communities from participation in the political process. This manuscript is based on the Berlin Lectures that Allen originally intended to deliver in 2020. Allen substituted the lectures on policymaking for COVID given the urgency of the pandemic"--

Education, Justice & Democracy

Education, Justice & Democracy
Author: Danielle Allen
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 366
Release: 2013-03-04
Genre: Education
ISBN: 022601293X

Education is a contested topic, and not just politically. For years scholars have approached it from two different points of view: one empirical, focused on explanations for student and school success and failure, and the other philosophical, focused on education’s value and purpose within the larger society. Rarely have these separate approaches been brought into the same conversation. Education, Justice, and Democracy does just that, offering an intensive discussion by highly respected scholars across empirical and philosophical disciplines. The contributors explore how the institutions and practices of education can support democracy, by creating the conditions for equal citizenship and egalitarian empowerment, and how they can advance justice, by securing social mobility and cultivating the talents and interests of every individual. Then the authors evaluate constraints on achieving the goals of democracy and justice in the educational arena and identify strategies that we can employ to work through or around those constraints. More than a thorough compendium on a timely and contested topic, Education, Justice, and Democracy exhibits an entirely new, more deeply composed way of thinking about education as a whole and its importance to a good society.

Difference without Domination

Difference without Domination
Author: Danielle Allen
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 366
Release: 2020-11-30
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 022668122X

Around the globe, democracy appears broken. With political and socioeconomic inequality on the rise, we are faced with the urgent question of how to better distribute power, opportunity, and wealth in diverse modern societies. This volume confronts the dilemma head-on, exploring new ways to combat current social hierarchies of domination. Using examples from the United States, India, Germany, and Cameroon, the contributors offer paradigm-changing approaches to the concepts of justice, identity, and social groups while also taking a fresh look at the idea that the demographic make-up of institutions should mirror the make-up of a populace as a whole. After laying out the conceptual framework, the volume turns to a number of provocative topics, among them the pernicious tenacity of implicit bias, the logical contradictions inherent to the idea of universal human dignity, and the paradoxes and problems surrounding affirmative action. A stimulating blend of empirical and interpretive analyses, Difference without Domination urges us to reconsider the idea of representation and to challenge what it means to measure equality and inequality.

Democracy in the Time of Coronavirus

Democracy in the Time of Coronavirus
Author: Danielle Allen
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 134
Release: 2022-02-16
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 0226815625

Democracy in crisis -- Pandemic resilience -- Federalism is an asset -- A transformed peace: an agenda for healing our social contract.

Caring Democracy

Caring Democracy
Author: Joan C. Tronto
Publisher: NYU Press
Total Pages: 248
Release: 2013-04-12
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0814782787

Americans now face a caring deficit: there are simply too many demands on people’s time for us to care adequately for our children, elderly people, and ourselves.At the same time, political involvement in the United States is at an all-time low, and although political life should help us to care better, people see caring as unsupported by public life and deem the concerns of politics as remote from their lives. Caring Democracy argues that we need to rethink American democracy, as well as our fundamental values and commitments, from a caring perspective. The idea that production and economic life are the most important political and human concerns ignores the reality that caring, for ourselves and others, should be the highest value that shapes how we view the economy, politics, and institutions such as schools and the family. Care is at the center of our human lives, but Tronto argues it is currently too far removed from the concerns of politics. Caring Democracy traces the reasons for this disconnection and argues for the need to make care, not economics, the central concern of democratic political life. Joan C. Tronto is a Professor in the Political Science Department at the University of Minnesota. She is the author of Moral Boundaries: A Political Argument for an Ethic of Care (Routledge).

Justice Is an Option

Justice Is an Option
Author: Robert Meister
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 305
Release: 2021-04-19
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 022673451X

More than ten years after the worst crisis since the Great Depression, the financial sector is thriving. But something is deeply wrong. Taxpayers bore the burden of bailing out “too big to fail” banks, but got nothing in return. Inequality has soared, and a populist backlash against elites has shaken the foundations of our political order. Meanwhile, financial capitalism seems more entrenched than ever. What is the left to do? Justice Is an Option uses those problems—and the framework of finance that created them—to reimagine historical justice. Robert Meister returns to the spirit of Marx to diagnose our current age of finance. Instead of closing our eyes to the political and economic realities of our era, we need to grapple with them head-on. Meister does just that, asking whether the very tools of finance that have created our vastly unequal world could instead be made to serve justice and equality. Meister here formulates nothing less than a democratic financial theory for the twenty-first century—one that is equally conversant in political philosophy, Marxism, and contemporary politics. Justice Is an Option is a radical, invigorating first page of a new—and sorely needed—leftist playbook.

Democracy, Power, and Justice

Democracy, Power, and Justice
Author: Brian Barry
Publisher:
Total Pages: 584
Release: 1989
Genre: Law
ISBN:

Bringing together a selection of twenty-one major articles and essays by renowned political theorist Brian Barry, this collection presents his theories of how social institutions ought to work as well as how they actually do work, and elucidates the connections between the two kinds of theory. The book includes an introduction that explains the context within which each essay was written, and a discussion of subsequent developments that are relevant to its arguments.

Rescuing Justice and Equality

Rescuing Justice and Equality
Author: G. A. Cohen
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 449
Release: 2009-07-01
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0674029658

In this stimulating work of political philosophy, acclaimed philosopher G. A. Cohen sets out to rescue the egalitarian thesis that in a society in which distributive justice prevails, people’s material prospects are roughly equal. Arguing against the Rawlsian version of a just society, Cohen demonstrates that distributive justice does not tolerate deep inequality. In the course of providing a deep and sophisticated critique of Rawls’s theory of justice, Cohen demonstrates that questions of distributive justice arise not only for the state but also for people in their daily lives. The right rules for the macro scale of public institutions and policies also apply, with suitable adjustments, to the micro level of individual decision-making. Cohen also charges Rawls’s constructivism with systematically conflating the concept of justice with other concepts. Within the Rawlsian architectonic, justice is not distinguished either from other values or from optimal rules of social regulation. The elimination of those conflations brings justice closer to equality.

Interactive Democracy

Interactive Democracy
Author: Carol C. Gould
Publisher:
Total Pages: 303
Release: 2014
Genre: Democracy
ISBN: 9781316053782

How can we confront the problems of diminished democracy, pervasive economic inequality, and persistent global poverty? Is it possible to fulfill the dual aims of deepening democratic participation and achieving economic justice, not only locally but also globally? Carol C. Gould proposes an integrative and interactive approach to the core values of democracy, justice, and human rights, looking beyond traditional politics to the social conditions that would enable us to realize these aims. Her innovative philosophical framework sheds new light on social movements across borders, the prospects for empathy and solidarity with distant others, and the problem of gender inequalities in diverse cultures, and also considers new ways in which democratic deliberation can be enhanced by online networking and extended to the institutions of global governance. Her book will be of great interest to scholars and upper-level students of political philosophy, global justice, social and political science, and gender studies.

Democracy on Purpose

Democracy on Purpose
Author: Franklin I. Gamwell
Publisher: Georgetown University Press
Total Pages: 380
Release: 2001-10-12
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9781589013087

Western moral and political theory in the last two centuries has widely held that morality and politics are independent of a divine reality. Claiming that this consensus is flawed, prominent theologian Franklin I. Gamwell argues that there is a necessary relation between moral worth and belief in God. Without appealing to the beliefs of any specific religion, Gamwell defends a return to the view that moral and political principles depend on a divine purpose. To separate politics from the divine misrepresents the distinctive character of human freedom, Gamwell maintains, and thus prevents a full understanding of the nature of justice. Principles of justice define "democracy on purpose" as the political form in which we pursue the divine good. Engaging in a dialogue with such major representatives of the dominant consensus as Kant, Habermas, and Rawls, and informed by the philosophical writings of Alfred North Whitehead, this book makes the case for a neoclassical metaphysics that restores a religious sensibility to our political life.