Reading Group

I’m grateful to Zofia for the excellent summary and questions. Let me say something about her question in order:

On her (1): Zofia asks whether there is really much point to hopeless ideal theory if we really know it won’t be met. I wrote that one of the benefits of such theory is that we can surprise ourselves, but suppose we really do know that certain standards will never be met. She’s write that, since we’re limiting our concern here to standards that are not beyond people’s abilities, I would insist that it is usually pretty hard to really know that they won’t ever be met. But I hasten to emphasize that my defense of hopeless aspirational theory does not rest on this conjecture. The fact, if it is one, that a certain kind of normative political theory will never be met, is not a defect in the theory. More concessive theory is valuable and important too, of course.

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Summary

Much research demonstrates that voters are largely ignorant about the issues and institutions at stake when they vote. Some research also suggests that voters are selfish and irrational. Such poor voter performance might be thought to pose problems for an epistemic theory of democracy since if the performance is bad enough democracy may not deliver on its epistemic promise – it might fail to outperform choosing policies ‘with a roulette wheel’ (262). Estlund has two answers to the challenge posed by the reports about voters’ poor performance. The main answer consists in showing that there is in general value in theories that demand of people that they behave better than they in fact behave or are ever likely to behave.

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Thanks again to Jonathan for the very useful summary and comments. I’ll consider his three questions in order.

First, Jonathan raises a small exegetical question. Does Rawls suggest the kind of democracy/contractualism analogy of the kind I’m discussing? Nothing in my argument depends on this, but it’s still interesting. Here’s the passage I use in support of my claim that he uses the analogy:

The guarantee of fair value for political liberties is included in the first principle of justice because it is essential in order to establish just legislation and also to make sure that the fair political process specified by the constitution is open to everyone on a basis of rough equality. The idea is to incorporate into the basic structure of society an effective political procedure which mirrors in that structure the fair representation of persons achieved by the original position.

Jonathan says that Rawls could just mean that the original position is fair and so by mirroring it in actual political procedures would also be fair, and good in that way. This, Jonathan says, wouldn’t be the same as saying that since the choices in the hypothetical original position constitute justice, choices in a structurally similar real procedure would tend to be similar, thus tracking justice. So on Jonathan’s possible reading the fairness of the original position would be a kind of fairness that has nothing to do with the subsequent claim that choices made in that kind of fair procedure count as principles of justice for a social basic structure. That way this same kind of fairness could be thought of as a value in real institutions quite apart from anything about what kinds of substantive decisions they would make.

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Summary
In this chapter, David wants to distinguish his epistemic argument for democracy from what he calls the democracy/contractualism analogy (I’m going to refer to this simply as the analogy or the analogy argument). The analogy rests on two key claims. The first is that justice or moral rightness is best understood via some version of moral or political contractualism. The second claim is that democratic outcomes have the capacity to track the requirements of justice or morality because democratic institutions can be arranged in a manner that is sufficiently similar the structure of the hypothetical choice situation of whatever theory of contractualism is favoured. David rejects the analogy because he believes this latter claim is false. If democracy does track justice (something David obviously doesn’t want to deny) it is not because democratic institutions mimic the features of a hypothetical contract scenario.

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Thanks to Loren for the great summary and questions. Loren is largely sympathetic, so, as a reward, this can be more brief than most weeks. But he does raise two concerns.

First, Loren proposes a way of avoiding the disjunction problem. He says that we might suppose there is one correct way of enumerating the alternatives, leading to n alternatives, and then take individual competence to be above 1/n. “After all, we might reply that the assumption of slightly better than random voter competence presupposes correct specification of the choice problem.” I’m not sure what a correct specification of the problem would mean. Suppose we are deciding about building a bridge. We could build a cheap bridge, an expensive bridge, or no bridge. Suppose the best thing is to build a cheap bridge. If we ask the voters to choose between these three options, random competence would be 1/3. If we give them two choices: Build a bridge (cheap or expensive), or build no bridge, random competence is .5. I don’t know what it would mean to say one of these is the correct way to put the question. In any case, Loren says that even if there is a correct or privileged way to enumerate the alternatives it would remain unclear who should get to make that decision. I don’t know how to evaluate that point because I don’t get the idea of a privileged enumeration. For all I can tell, if there is a privileged enumeration it might be beyond reasonable objection. So I might benefit from some clarification of this suggestion. Read the rest of this entry »

If your account of democratic authority uses the term “epistemic” then sooner or later you’re going to have to deal with the Jury Theorem. And here is where David takes up the gauntlet.

I’ve made that seem rather dramatic, but by this point in the book the gauntlet isn’t especially heavy! After all, in preceding chapters we’ve seen a model form of deliberation, a distinction between formal and substantive epistemic value, and a careful distinction between a “test” for finding the correct answer to some shared problem (such as majority rule), and a “testing system” (such as a constitutional democracy within which majoritarian decision procedures are embedded). The Jury Theorem, as tantalizing as it may be to some democratic theorists, does not appeal to discussion and argument, relies on claims about voter competence and the substantive correctness of some choices, and it applies in the first instance to specific tests (voting and majority or plurality rule), not to a testing system per se.

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Blain’s summary is accurate and helpful, and he raises several good questions. I take those up before turning to questions by the other participants.

Blain’s first worry is whether, in the absence of an account that would give us clear boundaries for the reasonable or the qualified, we are unable to go forward with this kind of approach at all. Is any way of going forward bound to be unacceptably ad hoc? I try to indicate an alternative to this defeatist position. I mention this methodological stance briefly in several places, including pp. 63-64, p. 217, and p. 286, note 3. Notice that the wish for clear boundaries is no particular support for Blain’s second concern, that the principle of acceptability should be defended by resting it on a deeper principle of respect. It might seem as though having such a deeper account would also give us the boundaries we want. But I see no general reason to think it would. Suppose the duty not to lie is based on the categorical imperative. That’s very little help in in knowing what the exceptions are to this duty, or whether (as Kant thought) there are none. Depth and specificity are quite independent features of moral theories.

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In this chapter Estlund asks the question whether an ‘epistocracy of the educated’ — whether, as J.S. Mill recommends, the educated should receive more votes than the uneducated — could satisfy the ‘qualified acceptability requirement’, that is, be a political principle to which no qualified objection could be levelled. Most epistocratic proposals are defeated because they could not satisfy the qualified acceptability requirement, as there exists qualified disagreement in pluralist societies over who counts as ‘wise’ with respect to political matters. Thus epistemic proceduralism rules out ‘invidious comparisons’ amongst citizens with respect to their normative political wisdom (as explained in chapter II). However, given the widespread view that a ‘good political education’ promotes good political decision-making, and that under Mill’s proposal all citizens would have at least one vote, can the Millian proposal for additional votes for the educated satisfy the qualified acceptability requirement?

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In order to ensure that there is sufficient time to discuss chapter 11, we’re going to delay the other scheduled posts for the reading group by one week. The revised schedule is as follows:

Chapter 12 ‘The Irrelevance of the Jury Theorem’

Apr. 7, 2008, Loren King

Chapter 13 ‘Rejecting the Democracy/Contractualism Analogy’

Apr. 14, 2008, Jonathan Quong

Chapter 14 ‘Utopophobia: Concession and Aspiration in Democratic Theory’

Apr. 21, 2008, Zofia Stemplowska

‘Author’s Comments’

Apr. 28, 2008, David Estlund

I wanted to put up a post where people could make suggestions for further reading groups, after the conclusion of the marvelous “Democratic Authority” discussion we’ve had. If there are many suggestions, I’ll put up a poll to see which are the most popular and likely to attract broad participation. Also, if there is a lot of interest in two quite different books, then nothing stops people from organising those groups separately.

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Thanks to Rebecca for the great summary and questions about this chapter, and to Jonathan and Ben for pitching in. The chapter proposes a way to combine, in broadly deliberative approach to democracy, a central role for an ideal deliberative situation with a similarly central place in democratic practice for activities other than deliberating. I suggest that an ideal deliberation can be used as a template by which to identify actual deviations. Where there are deviations that clearly insert power over reason in favor of a particular point of view, the epistemic core of my approach recommends efforts to restore the epistemic balance. Where this can’t be done by removing the skewing element of power, it can sometimes be done by injecting power on the other side of the question in a way that attempts to neutralize the first, skewing element. The thing to emphasize is that this will often be yet a further departure from the ideal deliberative situation. An abuse of power by a certain company or industry that tilts the political system in their favor might responsibly be answered by a boycott. A boycott is primarily an exercise of brute market power, and not a rational argument in response to the company’s view. I suggest that this is a way to keep deliberation in its place: central to the theory, less central to political practice.

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[David’s response to Harry on chap. 9 is now below this post, so don’t miss it — SCM]

Summary

In this chapter, Estlund seeks to identify the correct role played by an ideal deliberative situation in democratic theory. He argues that while in practice, democratic communication should not aim to resemble ideal deliberation, nonetheless the idea has an important function as a template through which to examine real-life instances of democratic communication and identify deviations from the ideal. Real deliberative practices and institutions should not aim to mirror the model deliberative situation because when epistemic distortions arise as a result of deviations from the ideal, it may be justified to employ further deviations to remedy these. This leads him to defend a model of wide civility for the informal political sphere, which makes room for sharp, disruptive and even suppressive forms of participation under certain circumstances. This wide version of civility is appropriate only for the informal public sphere, however. In formal political institutions such as the courts and legislatures the norms of narrow civility still apply. In summary then, it seems that there are three main arguments at work in this chapter: (1) that the appropriate way to think of the ideal deliberative situation is not as a set of prescriptions for citizens to aim at, but rather as an analytical tool for diagnosing and remedying failures; (2) that there might be good epistemic reasons to reject the narrow civility inherent in model deliberation in favour of a wider version; and (3) that while the use of countervailing deviations from the ideal might be appropriate in the informal political sphere, formal instances of political deliberation ought still to be governed by the requirements of narrow civility.

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Thanks to Harry for the excellent summary and comments. His two comments really amount to a single challenge: Since a smaller-than-universal sample of the population could deliberate or vote with as much epistemic value as the universal franchise, doesn’t epistemic proceduralism end up endorsing non-democratic political institutions after all?

It’s one challenge, but with two parts. So, first, is it true that a sample could be trusted (beyond qualified disagreement) to deliberate with as good effect as if the whole adult population were enfranchised? Then, second, if so, would deliberation and/or voting by a sample count as democratic?

There’s a third question in play, raised when Harry writes, “Democracy is, in part, justified because we have an obligation to allow other people to play a full role in determining how our collective affairs will go, precisely because they have a stake in how things will go.” Here the question is not what counts as democratic, but whether we are obligated to enfranchise all adult citizens. Read the rest of this entry »

Synopsis.

Chapter 9 advances the first stage of an argument which is completed in chapter 10. I’ll just concentrate on the part of the argument that is presented in chapter 9, but it is worth seeing where it is going. The burden of the two chapters is to show that feasible democratic procedures have substantially more than random probability of finding the correct answers to what society should do. Chapter 9 only argues that an imaginary situation which Estlund calls a model epistemic deliberation would have a substantially better than random chance of getting the right answers, but he also says that this model is not an ideal for which it would be sensible to strive. Rather, it illustrates how an ideal democracy could be justified epistemically, and the subsequent chapter will argue that feasible democratic procedures for which it would be sensible to strive are relevantly like this “ideal”. The point is to “defeat a certain kind of sceptic, the one who denies that any (nonutopian) democratic arrangements could tend to perform better than random”.

How does the argument of this chapter work, then?

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Again, I’m gratified to see such a clear and accurate summary of the chapter. Let me start with Simon’s excellent questions, drawing connections to Jonathan’s where appropriate.

Simon’s question (1) is whether the system of justice that arises in Juristic Prejuria has some unique claim to obedience or whether other schemes might also arise and place similar claims on people’s obedience. This question grants, at least for the sake of argument, that the case for the jury system’s original authority goes through. It then asks, since it goes through for this arrangement, why wouldn’t it go through for multiple parallel arrangements? So the specific challenge in (1) is not to the argument for the original authority of the jury system. But if parallel arrangements can make an equal claim to authority then the authority of the jury system seems to be limited by those other possibilities. It will only work as an analogy for the authority of a whole political system if it grounds unique authority. Read the rest of this entry »

The argument of this chapter is an analogy between the authority of democracy and the authority of a jury trial system. A jury system that possesses certain qualified epistemic features (i.e. epistemic benefits that no qualified point of view could reject) also possesses authority. This authority is “original” since it does not depend on prior authorisation through consent or some political procedure. Analogously, a democratic system that possesses similar qualified epistemic features, also possesses original authority. Most of the chapter is spent developing the case for the authority of a jury system, so I will focus on that. I imagine that some may be more interested in the strength of the analogy between democracy and the jury system, but I think there is a lot to be done looking at the analogue itself.

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Thanks to David (I’ll call him David L. lest readers get confused about the multiple Davids on the screen) for his excellent summary and questions. The first issue he raises is about my appeal to symmetry between consent and non-consent. I say that it’s interestingly asymmetrical if consent is sometimes null but non-consent never is. David L. is quite right that symmetry of this kind is not automatically an important thing, and so it’s no basis for thinking that non-consent must also be capable of being null. But Jonathan is also right, I think, to say that we might find the asymmetry morally puzzling. That’s all I had in mind. The asymmetry just opens up a question. After that, it does no argumentative work. I refer back to the question of symmetry once or twice as I argue for normative consent, but only to stay clear about what it was that was initially puzzling.

David L.’s main concern is focused around my airplane crash example. I should say that I don’t intend that example to elicit strong predictable intuitions. (It is not like the famous trolley problems in that way.) Rather, it is just a story I can use to illustrate what it is that I want to claim. It has also proven very useful to my critics in helping them make clear just where they think I go wrong. You’re welcome.

The main line of worry seems to be that I haven’t clearly or adequately answered what I call the direct authority objection, which holds that normative consent is superfluous. As David L. points out, the crucial distinction is between what conditions materially entail authority, and what conditions morally ground authority. So it’s important first to see that these are two separate things. I give as an example the fact that all present facts about masses, forces, etc., must materially entail all the moral facts. (This claim is available to lots of different metaethical views, though not all, I admit.) But those facts don’t morally ground or support the moral facts. For example, the micro-physical facts that entail that I consent to your using my pen do not morally ground your permission even though they do guarantee it by way of guaranteeing that I consent. Read the rest of this entry »

(I’ve switched the last two posts around, so that David E’s response to the chapter 6 discussion is now beneath David L’s chapter 7 discussion. Please don’t overlook the former. SCM)

In chapter VII, ‘Authority and Normative Consent,’ Estlund takes up the challenge of justifying one agent’s authority over another. X enjoys a morally justified claim to authority over Y if and only if the mere fact that X instructs Y to f provides Y with a (prima facie or defeasible) moral duty to f. Estlund seeks to offer a novel justification for authority, which he labels normative consent. On this view, if an agent acts wrongly in refusing to consent to another’s authority, then that refusal is void and the situation is as it would have been had the agent consented to the other’s authority. For example, if for some reason I act wrongly in refusing to consent to your determining how I should spend my afternoon, then my failure to consent is null and the situation is as if I had consented - or in other words, I have a duty to acknowledge your authority by spending my afternoon as you direct me to do.

I focus here on the three main tasks Estlund undertakes in this chapter: (1) making the case for normative consent as a (but not necessarily the only) genuine source of authority; (2) a defense of normative consent against some objections likely to be made to it; and (3) a brief description of how a normative consent argument for authority might encompass (and so improve?) some other arguments for authority extant in the literature on political obligation.

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Daniel gives a very nice summary of the chapter and raises a few questions. First, he wonders whether the fact that democratic procedures might generate trust, and so compliance, is an epistemic or non-epistemic reason in its favor. Before taking that up, however, I want to quibble with his description of the options. He says that I’m mainly distinguishing between values intrinsic to a collective decision procedure on one hand, and consequentialist considerations on the other. That might not be the best way to put it, since while my theory brings in non-procedural values, it is not consequentialist. (I should say, I’m using “consequentialist,” to contrast with “deontological,” not in the broader way that some use it so that virtually any normative theory could receive a consequentialist formulation. On the latter use, there’s no interesting question about whether there is a consequentialist theory of democracy, since there would be no contrast class.) On my view, democracy is not recommended on the basis of its maximizing good consequences. It is recommended because (and when) the laws that are passed are legitimate and authoritative. They are legitimate and authoritative owing, in certain ways, to the decision procedure’s having some tendency to produce just or correct outcomes. That part is instrumental in a certain sense, but not necessarily consequentialist. The accounts of authority, legitimacy, and justice could all be deontological for all I’ve said. I’m not suggesting that Daniel misunderstood this, but my view is always at risk of being misunderstood to be consequentialist, and so I’m at pains to use that term advisedly. (I address the issue at pp. 164-167, in Chapter IX.)

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This chapter, as I read it, has four main articulations. First, Estlund sums up the basis case for epistemic proceduralism, on the basis of the arguments of the foregoing chapters. Second, he considers and rejects a final form of procedural theory, termed rational deliberative proceduralism, which views the value of procedures as residing in their being reason-generating. Third, Estlund spells out the kind of normative authority that epistemic proceduralism does, and does not possess. Fourth, he elaborates on what it might mean for a procedure to be accurate with respect to the justice of a policy proposal.I will focus on the first three articulations. I will raise some questions, but also highlight what I take to be some philosophical IOUs that Estlund takes out in this chapter.

I take this to be a pivotal chapter in the book in the following sense: it is here that he moves from the critical case against correctness theories and pure procedural ones, and towards the statement of his positive cas for epistemic proceduralism. This chapter provides us with the main structural features of the view, and provides us with a sense of the burden of argument that it must take up to be vindicated. Some of my questions will attempt to show just how demanding that burden is. Read the rest of this entry »

The main issue that has come up in this week’s comments concerns my rejection of fair proceduralism. My argument against it was that procedural fairness can’t prefer a fair democratic procedure to a random selection of outcomes, since both are equally fair. The question arising now is whether, nevertheless, there isn’t something that can be said for fair democratic procedures favoring them over random procedure, but without bringing in any epistemic features.

One idea is that either the idea of fairness or the idea of equality incorporates a concern for more rather than less of the distributed power, as opposed to caring only for an equal distribution. I doubt that either of these concepts includes such a thing. A coin flip (which gives each person zero expected influence or power) is sometimes a perfectly fair way to decide something even if voting (which increases each person’s expected influence above zero) is available. As for equality, it is patently satisfied by a random procedure since all equally have no influence. Christiano argues that we would only care about an equal distribution of something if we also cared about having more rather than less of it. First, this doesn’t show that equality includes that second concern. We might (or might not) just have two concerns: equality of x, and more of x. Second, the concern for an equal share of procedural power looks like a counterexample to the claim that we never have the concern for equal distribution without also wanting more of the distributed thing. It seems perfectly comprehensible to be satisfied with a random procedure in some context, but to insist that if anyone is to have power or influence all should have it equally. Suppose the question is which of several designs should be chosen for the new public fountain. I might be happy to have this decided randomly. So I don’t care about having any influence. However, I would object if some were given a vote in the matter while I was not. I want equal influence but I don’t care if any of us has any. So it is not true, as a general matter, that to value an equal distribution of x entails positively valuing more x over less. So I think neither the idea of fairness nor the idea of equal distribution can favor voting over a random procedure.

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In the previous chapter, David showed that procedural fairness could not by itself justify democracy. According to “fair proceduralism”, a law that is the outcome of a democratic vote is legitimate because everyone had an equal role in determining the outcome, regardless of whether it is good or just by other standards. Yet since a coin flip also provides equal input, fair proceduralism must incorporate some substantive value, such as the principle that outcomes should be positively sensitive to voter preferences.

Chapter 5 confronts a possible response to this argument, a response based on a partial concession. Yes, we have to appeal to substantive values to justify democracy, but we can do so with respect to the intrinsic characteristics of decision-procedures, without making any claims about their tendency to yield good decisions or (incidentally) to generate other desirable outcomes. We thus avoid any substantive assessment of political decisions / outcomes (except for endorsing the preservation of democracy, which is an outcome, but the outcome that consists in the continued functioning of our intrinsically-valued procedure). David calls this position “intrinsic democratic proceduralism” (86). The chapter criticizes 3 versions of this doctrine: Habermas, Cohen, and Waldron. Read the rest of this entry »

As usual, I’d like to offer some comments in response to points and questions raised in this week’s comments following Ben’s terrific summary of my Chapter 4. Sorry again for the length, but I’ve tried to briefly address most of the points that have come up.

First on Ben’s comments: Ben grants that a random choice procedure is procedurally fair, but denies that it is democratic. I agree that obviously it isn’t democratic. But that is not yet any argument against it, because it may be that the decision procedure needs only to be procedurally fair. So any attempt to justify democracy solely on the ground that it is procedurally fair seems forced to say that a random (and non-democratic) procedure is equally justified, being equally fair. Ben argues that democracy includes some element of what I call aggregativity. I agree. He says that the theorist who wants to ground democracy in fairness might just mean that what’s required is a procedurally fair treatment of everyone’s votes or preferences. I agree. My argument is that this shows that they appeal to something more than mere procedural fairness. They add a principle requiring a link between the output and individual inputs, a principle that is not part of the concept of procedural fairness (as shown by the example of a random choice procedure). So I think there’s nothing in that first comment of Ben’s that we disagree about, but I hope this clarifies what I’m arguing for.

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Here is the fourth installment of our reading group on Democratic Authority, which focuses on chapter 4, “The Limits of Fair Procedure.”

Summary

Estlund starts this chapter by applying the Euthyphro problem to democratic decision-making: are outcomes good because they are democratically chosen or democratically chosen because they are good? Estlund accepts that democracy is a matter of the collective authorization of laws, which is a procedural arrangement. While an infallible benevolent dictator might be able to bring about substantively just outcomes, there would be nothing democratic about that. Estlund’s argument, however - which occupies this chapter and the next - is that recent democratic theory has focused too exclusively on fair procedures to the exclusion of the independent rightness of decisions. This chapter criticizes the idea that procedural fairness can alone justify democratic procedures and begins criticizing normative social choice theory (e.g. Arrow), while chapter five continues the argument with focus on ‘deep deliberative democracy’.

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Again, I really appreciate all the excellent and challenging discussion so far. I am glad to have the chance to reply. Sorry this is rather lengthy, and still doesn’t address nearly all the points.

I assert and employ what I call a “qualified acceptability requirement” in a schematic form, leaving largely open which views count as qualified (although I fill in bits of it at crucial points). I don’t go deeper into moral philosophy in order to provide a moral argument for it. Many people object to the whole approach, which is very similar to that of Rawls’s political liberalism. What I do by way of defense is to defend it against several lines of objection. Several commentators have wished I gave a “direct” argument for it. To say, however, that the theory “needs” to do so seems to require an awful lot. Is a theory not entitled to any beginning premises? If there are objections to the premises, that’s one thing. I defend against what I take to be the more important ones, and no doubt there are others that would need to be answered. But apart from the evaluation of specific objections, the theory doesn’t seem much damaged by noting that the premises are not themselves supported by deeper argument. What theory could be immune from that objection?

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Here is the third installment of our reading group on Democratic Authority, which focuses on chapter 3, “An Acceptability Requirement.”

Summary

This chapter begins by restating the problem of the book, which is: Why not epistocracy? We know from the previous chapter that Estlund denies the Authority Tenet, which says that those with political wisdom are warranted in ruling over those without it. The problem with the Authority Tenet is that it rests on an illicit inference from expertise to authority, which Estlund calls the expert/boss fallacy. But what exactly makes this inference illicit? Why aren’t experts entitled to be bosses?

To answer this question, this chapter introduces and defends a family of principles, called acceptability requirements, which are meant to block the expert/boss inference and thereby defeat the case for epistocracy. The argument of the chapter proceeds in two main parts: the first defends the idea of an acceptability requirement against the twin objections of over- and under-inclusiveness; the second part argues that an acceptability requirement must appeal to the truth, which provides a basis for responding to the claim (advanced most forcefully by Raz) that “epistemic abstinence” renders incoherent political liberalism and other theories that make political recommendations on the basis of something other than the truth. Read the rest of this entry »

I have some thoughts about the terrific discussion, so far (through comment 7), of my Chapter 2. I can’t take everything up, but I hope this offers some clarification where people asked for it.

In addition to his excellent summary, Jonathan raises some good questions about my defense against the charge that I beg the question in favor of democracy. Let me review my argument briefly, and then respond to the challenges that have come up. Before reviewing the argument, it might help avoid confusion to remind us all of the distinction between authority (the power to require action), and legitimacy (permissibility of enforcement). The reason is that it’s not entirely clear which concept is mainly at stake here. This points to something that will probably come up later, that it’s not very clear what role, if any, the general acceptability requirement plays in my account of authority, as distinct from legitimacy. In the passages at issue here, I use the term “authority” often, without clearly acknowledging the difference between that and legitimacy. All I can say here is that, despite appearances, I think the general acceptability requirement also plays a role in questions of authority, though I will not try to say exactly how that works here. For present purposes, don’t worry too much about the legitimacy/authority distinction, and then we can see later whether bringing that distinction in cause further difficulties for what I say. Read the rest of this entry »

Hi everyone, and welcome to the second week of our Estlund reading group where we’ll be discussing chapter 2, ‘Truth and Despotism’.

Summary

The chapter begins with a worry, expressed by Arendt, that appeals to truth in politics can be despotic. Saying something is true seems to foreclose any further debate or disagreement. Truth appears to be a conclusion we reach at the end of discussion or reasoning, and so if we base our politics around claims of truth, it looks as if we are saying no further discussion or reasoning is necessary - the answers have already been determined. But shouldn’t politics fundamentally be about discussion and debate? Arendt claimed that at least philosophical truths (as opposed to factual truths) have no place in politics because they will despotically foreclose dispute. I’m going to call this the despotism objection to truth in politics (my term not Estlund’s). There is, however, a very different sort of worry about truth in politics. On this view, the problem with appeals to truth in politics is not that they preclude disagreement or debate, but rather that they engender too much disagreement, or disagreement that is too fractious and divisive. It’s this kind of worry that might explain some political liberals’ belief that we ought abstain from appeals to truth in politics.

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[Simon has advised me to submit this as a “post” rather than as a “comment.” As I write, there are 19 comments. I’ll insert a comment to mark the point at which I posted these remarks]

This might be a good time to jump in and respond to a few of the points that have been raised in the discussion of Chapter 1. Let me first say that Jonathan’s summary is excellent, and gets this off to a great start.

Obviously, Chapter 1 is a condensed run-through of many of the themes and arguments of the book. So I think the best plan is for me to respond only rather quickly on issues that will come up again in more detail later in the book. Some of the points raised this week don’t get any further attention in the book, so I’ll say what I can now. There are just too many points to respond to. If I skip something that any of you thinks is especially important, feel free to push me on it and I’ll take it up if I can.

I might also say that I would ask people not to quote what I say here in published work without checking with me, a courtesy I’ll extend to you all as well. (This raises interesting questions, of course, about what, these days, counts as a publication.) Maybe it goes without saying, but I am not putting the time and thought into this that I would if I regarded it as part of my published output. It wouldn’t be possible to do that and keep rolling in a timely way. It’s like a conversation at a conference. I (or you) might well trip up, or contradict myself, maybe fixing it a few days later, maybe not, etc. It’s not that I live in fear of having my mistakes exposed publicly. I just think that if we treat blogs and related things as part of the published literature we are going to wreak a lot of havoc unnecessarily. This issue could trigger a whole thread of its own, but we don’t want to get off on that tangent. Enough said. Back to democracy.
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Welcome to the first instalment of our virtual reading group on David Estlund’s Democratic Authority: A Philosophical Framework. Today’s post will focus on chapter 1, which offers a synopsis of the book’s central arguments and conclusions.

Summary

Estlund begins by noting the apparent tension between democracy and political quality. The masses seem ill-suited to making the best political decisions, and thus many democratic theorists see their primary task to be one of explaining why democracy is valuable or desirable despite the risk it poses to making good decisions. Estlund takes a different approach. He claims that it is in fact democracy’s tendency to produce good decisions that explains democracy’s legitimacy and authority. Legitimacy, according to Estlund, refers to the moral permissibility of the state issuing and enforcing commands due to the process by which they were produced, whereas authority refers to the power of one agent to morally require or forbid actions by others through commands (p. 2). Estlund’s central thesis is that ‘democratically produced laws are legitimate and authoritative because they are produced by a procedure with a tendency to make correct decisions’ (p. 8).

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