Henry Richardson – författare

Is morality fixed objectively, independently of all human judgment, or do we "invent" right and wrong? Articulating the Moral Community argues that neither of these simple answers is correct. Its central thesis is that, working within zones of objective indeterminacy, the moral community-the community of all persons-has the authority to introduce new moral norms. Unlike political communities, which are centralized, non-inclusive, and backed by coercion, the moral community is decentralized, inclusive, and not coercively backed. This book explains in detail how its structure arises from efforts by individuals to work out intelligently with one another how to respond to morally important concerns. Developing a novel theory of dyadic rights and duties based on this phenomenon, the book argues that conscientious efforts of this kind provide moral input, authoritative only over the parties involved. After sufficient uptake and reflective acceptance by the moral community, however, these innovations become new moral norms.This account of the moral community's moral authority is motivated by, and supports, a type of normative ethical theory, constructive ethical pragmatism, which-to use an unfashionable distinction defended in the book-rejects the consequentialist claim that rightness is to be defined as a function of goodness and the deontological claim that principles of right stand fixed, independently of the good. It holds, rather, that what we ought to do depends on our continuing efforts to specify the right and the good in light of each other.

Is morality fixed objectively, independently of all human judgment, or do we "invent" right and wrong? Articulating the Moral Community argues that neither of these simple answers is correct. Its central thesis is that, working within zones of objective indeterminacy, the moral community-the community of all persons-has the authority to introduce new moral norms. Unlike political communities, which are centralized, non-inclusive, and backed by coercion, the moral community is decentralized, inclusive, and not coercively backed. This book explains in detail how its structure arises from efforts by individuals to work out intelligently with one another how to respond to morally important concerns. Developing a novel theory of dyadic rights and duties based on this phenomenon, the book argues that conscientious efforts of this kind provide moral input, authoritative only over the parties involved. After sufficient uptake and reflective acceptance by the moral community, however, these innovations become new moral norms.This account of the moral community''s moral authority is motivated by, and supports, a type of normative ethical theory, constructive ethical pragmatism, which-to use an unfashionable distinction defended in the book-rejects the consequentialist claim that rightness is to be defined as a function of goodness and the deontological claim that principles of right stand fixed, independently of the good. It holds, rather, that what we ought to do depends on our continuing efforts to specify the right and the good in light of each other.

Is morality fixed objectively, independently of all human judgment, or do we "invent" right and wrong? Articulating the Moral Community argues that neither of these simple answers is correct. Its central thesis is that, working within zones of objective indeterminacy, the moral community-the community of all persons-has the authority to introduce new moral norms. Unlike political communities, which are centralized, non-inclusive, and backed by coercion, the moral community is decentralized, inclusive, and not coercively backed. This book explains in detail how its structure arises from efforts by individuals to work out intelligently with one another how to respond to morally important concerns. Developing a novel theory of dyadic rights and duties based on this phenomenon, the book argues that conscientious efforts of this kind provide moral input, authoritative only over the parties involved. After sufficient uptake and reflective acceptance by the moral community, however, these innovations become new moral norms.This account of the moral community''s moral authority is motivated by, and supports, a type of normative ethical theory, constructive ethical pragmatism, which-to use an unfashionable distinction defended in the book-rejects the consequentialist claim that rightness is to be defined as a function of goodness and the deontological claim that principles of right stand fixed, independently of the good. It holds, rather, that what we ought to do depends on our continuing efforts to specify the right and the good in light of each other.

John Rawls is the pre-eminent political philosopher of our time. His 1971 masterpiece, A Theory of Justice, permanently changed the landscape of moral and political theory, revitalizing the normative study of social issues and taking stands about justice, ethics, rationality, and philosophical method that continue to draw followers and critics today. His Political Liberalism (rev. ed., 1996) squarely faced the fundamental challenges posed by cultural, religious, and philosophical pluralism. It should be no surprise, then, that turn-of-the-century searches of the periodical indices in philosophy, economics, law, the humanities, and related fields turn up almost three thousand articles devoted to a critical discussion of Rawls's theory. In these Volumes we reprint a wide-ranging selection of the most influential and insightful articles on Rawls.This Volume presents a selection of the secondary literature most important to understanding the development and the main outlines of the view that Rawls set out in A Theory of Justice [TJ]. The articles reprinted in this Volume provide a window into the evolution of Rawls's views prior to TJ and cover the most controversial aspects of his compelling new articulation of the social-contract tradition.

John Rawls is the pre-eminent political philosopher of our time. His 1971 masterpiece, A Theory of Justice, permanently changed the landscape of moral and political theory, revitalizing the normative study of social issues and taking stands about justice, ethics, rationality, and philosophical method that continue to draw followers and critics today. His Political Liberalism (rev. ed., 1996) squarely faced the fundamental challenges posed by cultural, religious, and philosophical pluralism. It should be no surprise, then, that turn-of-the-century searches of the periodical indices in philosophy, economics, law, the humanities, and related fields turn up almost three thousand articles devoted to a critical discussion of Rawls's theory. In these Volumes we reprint a wide-ranging selection of the most influential and insightful articles on Rawls.The articles in the present volume reflect the critical discussion of the two principles of justice as fairness - Rawls's theory - and his most general ideas about their justification, namely Kantian constructivism and reflective equilibrium.

John Rawls is the pre-eminent political philosopher of our time. His 1971 masterpiece, A Theory of Justice, permanently changed the landscape of moral and political theory, revitalizing the normative study of social issues and taking stands about justice, ethics, rationality, and philosophical method that continue to draw followers and critics today. His Political Liberalism (rev. ed., 1996) squarely faced the fundamental challenges posed by cultural, religious, and philosophical pluralism. It should be no surprise, then, that turn-of-the-century searches of the periodical indices in philosophy, economics, law, the humanities, and related fields turn up almost three thousand articles devoted to a critical discussion of Rawls's theory. In these Volumes we reprint a wide-ranging selection of the most influential and insightful articles on Rawls.This volume reprints articles representing criticisms of Rawls's justice as fairness, as presented in his 1971 book, A Theory of Justice (TJ], that involve comparing his view to distinctly identifiable opposed points of view, and also covers attempts to extend the principles of justice as fairness, or his style of social contract view, beyond the subject­matter of the basic structure of society, to which TJ largely confines itself.

John Rawls is the pre-eminent political philosopher of our time. His 1971 masterpiece, A Theory of Justice, permanently changed the landscape of moral and political theory, revitalizing the normative study of social issues and taking stands about justice, ethics, rationality, and philosophical method that continue to draw followers and critics today. His Political Liberalism (rev. ed., 1996) squarely faced the fundamental challenges posed by cultural, religious, and philosophical pluralism. It should be no surprise, then, that turn-of-the-century searches of the periodical indices in philosophy, economics, law, the humanities, and related fields turn up almost three thousand articles devoted to a critical discussion of Rawls's theory. In these Volumes we reprint a wide-ranging selection of the most influential and insightful articles on Rawls.The articles in the present volume are among the most probing pieces of critical literature on Rawls's discussions of moral psychology and community. Their content, range and influence demonstrate both how important these topics are to Rawls's work and how far-reaching their implications are taken to be.

John Rawls is the pre-eminent political philosopher of our time. His 1971 masterpiece, A Theory of Justice, permanently changed the landscape of moral and political theory, revitalizing the normative study of social issues and taking stands about justice, ethics, rationality, and philosophical method that continue to draw followers and critics today. His Political Liberalism (rev. ed., 1996) squarely faced the fundamental challenges posed by cultural, religious, and philosophical pluralism. It should be no surprise, then, that turn-of-the-century searches of the periodical indices in philosophy, economics, law, the humanities, and related fields turn up almost three thousand articles devoted to a critical discussion of Rawls's theory. In these Volumes we reprint a wide-ranging selection of the most influential and insightful articles on Rawls.As is clear from his reliance on ideas found in political culture and his refusal to claim truth, the political turn in Rawls's later work led him to a much more modest conception of political philosophy. The papers in this volume examine the political turn in Rawls's work, its implications for political philosophy, and the ideas in A Theory of Justice which seem to anticipate it.