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Political Theory

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

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Full-Text Articles in Philosophy

"Those Stubborn Principles": From Stoicism To Sociability In Joseph Addison’S Cato, Christine Dunn Henderson, Mark Yellin Mar 2014

"Those Stubborn Principles": From Stoicism To Sociability In Joseph Addison’S Cato, Christine Dunn Henderson, Mark Yellin

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Joseph Addison’s 1713 play, Cato: A Tragedy, dramatizes the final days of Cato the Younger’s resistance to Julius Caesar before his eventual suicide at Utica in 46 BC. Although Addison initially seems to present Cato as a model for emulation, we argue that Addison is ultimately critical of both Cato and the Stoicism he embodies. Via the play’s romantic subplot and via his work as an essayist, Addison offers a revision of the Catonic model, reworking it into a gentler model that elevates qualities such as love, friendship, and sympathy and that is more appropriate to the type of peaceful …


The Labor Theory Of Justice, Chandran Kukathas Jan 2014

The Labor Theory Of Justice, Chandran Kukathas

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Justice is the first virtue of social institutions as truth is of systems ofthought. So John Rawls famously proclaimed in the beginning of hismasterwork, A Theory of Justice. A theory however elegant and economical must be rejected or revised if untrue. Laws and institutions no matterhow efficient and well arranged must be reformed or abolished if unjust.Justice, perhaps unlike some other values, was not something we mightreadily trade a little of in exchange for other benefits.1In his critique ofRawls, Rescuing Justice and Equality, G. A. Cohen proposes to take justicemore seriously while at the same time conceding that justice might …


Understanding Hayek, Chandran Kukathas Jan 2010

Understanding Hayek, Chandran Kukathas

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Although some of this will be familiar to a number of you all,I will talk a bit about Friedrich A. Hayek since I am goingfirst. I’ll say a little bit about his life, how he came to theideas that he became so famous for espousing, and then a little bitabout his liberalism and the contribution he has made to liberaltheory and to intellectual life.


Traditions Of Philanthropic Order, Christine Dunn Henderson Jan 2009

Traditions Of Philanthropic Order, Christine Dunn Henderson

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Individuals act more or less simultaneously as economic agents, citizens, and participants in civil society. Their interactions and their ways of fulfilling these roles take many forms. Not all of them can be said to be self-organizing, yet in several instances patterns of organization emerge spontaneously without being deliberately designed. Of course, the market economy—or “catallaxy,” as F. A. Hayek called it—remains the best example of such “spontaneous orders.” But there are others. Gus diZerega (2000), for example, has identified science and democracy as being similarly constituted by self-referential, self-organizing (some authors prefer the term autopoietic) processes. In this paper …


Trust (And Social Capital) In Cultural Theory, Marco Verweij Jan 2005

Trust (And Social Capital) In Cultural Theory, Marco Verweij

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

No abstract provided.


The Case For Open Immigration, Chandran Kukathas Jan 2004

The Case For Open Immigration, Chandran Kukathas

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

People favor or are opposed to immigration for a variety of reasons. It is therefore difficult to tie views about immigration to ideological positions. While it seems obviousthat political conservatives are the most unlikely to defend freedom of movement,and that socialists and liberals (classical and modern) are very likely to favor more openborders, in reality wariness (if not outright hostility) to immigration can be foundamong all groups. Even libertarian anarchists have advanced reasons to restrict themovement of peoples.


Nationalism And Multiculturalism, Chandran Kukathas Jan 2004

Nationalism And Multiculturalism, Chandran Kukathas

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

If any issue dominates contemporary political theory, it is how to deal with cultural diversity and the claims –moral, legal, and political – made in the name of ethnic, religious, linguistic, or national allegiance (Kymlicka,2001: 17). Today, governments are confronted by demands from cultural minorities for recognition, protection,preferential treatment, and political autonomy within the boundaries of the state. Equally, international societyand its political institutions, as well as states themselves, have had to deal with demands from various peoplesfor political recognition as independent nations, and for national self-determination. The turbulent politics ofthe contemporary world may account in part for this development: …