Philosophy Commons^™

Politics For Angels, William Kanwischer

Honors Projects

How many idealizing assumptions may we make when doing political philosophy? May we assume our citizens more rational than they are, or our governments more efficient than in reality? These questions lie at the center of the debate between ideal and non-ideal theorists. Ideal theorists believe it permissible to engage in counterfactual assumptions about citizens and states when doing political philosophy, and non-ideal theorists think the opposite. In this paper, I will argue against a particular defense of ideal theory given by David Estlund, who argues that the low probability that a standard of justice will be met does not …

The Politics Of Dissent: How Living Within The Truth Threatens Autocracy And Catalyzes Democratic Progress, Carter A. Hanson

Student Publications

This article examines Václav Havel’s The Power of the Powerless in the context of a broader ideation of dissent, primarily using Hannah Arendt’s The Origins of Totalitarianism and William Connolly’s The Fragility of Things as supplements. Havel’s argument remains relevant over thirty years after its initial publication, and his ideas regarding dissent as a fundamental challenge to authoritarian untruth are valuable and deserve further exploration. From this conceptualization, a “politics of dissent” is proposed as a means to express dissatisfaction with authoritarian government and to reevaluate democratic social and political discourse.

Why There Is No Ethical Reason Not To Vote (Unless You Come Down With Covid-19 On Election Day), Scott Davidson

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

'I don't like the candidates,' 'I don't know enough to make a decision,' 'I don't want to give this election legitimacy' – an ethicist takes on nonvoters.

Rancière’S Equality And James’S Pragmatism: Renewing Our Democratic Republic Through A Revised View Of Intelligence, Matthew Schmitz

Educational Studies Summer Fellows

The prevailing theory of intelligence in American society encourages restrictive treatment of others and endorses a dull impression of human capabilities. In the process of poking at their domestic opponents, modern Democrats and Republicans combine to expose our collective shortcomings on this front. Our discourse too often focuses on jockeying for position and too rarely focuses on the rich intellectual community we inhabit. Through an analysis of William James’s Pragmatism and Jacques Rancière’s The Ignorant Schoolmaster, I look to recapture a liberating view of intelligence that enables us to revise our interpretation of citizenship in an American democratic republic. …

Commentary On Léa Farine, “Public Deliberation And Epistemic Parity In Direct Democracies”, Dale Hample

OSSA Conference Archive

Farine's paper connects to some other accounts of argument norms.

An Eco-Political Theory Of Territory, Jonathan Kwan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this dissertation, I advance a novel eco-political theory of territory that grounds a people’s territorial rights in its right to political self-determination understood as inextricably and normatively bound up with its right to ecological integrity and duty of ecological sustainability. I develop a social ontology of the people as the holder of territorial rights based on its members’ place-based common activities that aim at their own independent governance rather than in terms of state institutions, cultural nationhood, ethnogeography, political identity, or shared conceptions of justice. The common activities of a people generate a group right to democratic self-determination since …

Habits Of The Heart: Poetry And Democracy, David Hassler

The International Journal of Ethical Leadership

No abstract provided.

2011 Inamori Ethics Prize Speech: Democracy And Freedom Under Law: The Obligations Of Lawyers, Beatrice Mtetwa

The International Journal of Ethical Leadership

transcript

Ethical Validity: An Ethical Validity Claim For Discourse Ethics, Jamie B. Lindsay

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Discourse ethicists generally are anti-realists about moral rightness, in that the rightness of moral norms is a matter of discursive justification, and is not grounded in or by any objective feature of the world. Put differently, the position is that rightness is wholly constructed by our moral practices. Further, discourse ethics and liberal theories of justice more broadly generally rely on a distinction between goods that are generalizable, and goods that are in some way context-bound and particularistic. Jürgen Habermas’ discourse ethics makes the distinction wholly formal, abstaining from any theoretical commitment to which goods are generalizable and leaving this …

St. Thomas Aquinas And The Third Hellenization Period, Demetri Kantarelis

Economics, Finance and International Business Department Faculty Works

In this paper, I assert that currently the world has been experiencing the Third Hellenization Period that started with the Italian Renaissance, instigated by the teachings of the theologian and philosopher St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274 CE). Unlike philosophers in previous periods (First and Second Hellenization as well as Medieval), St. Thomas preached that Truth is a function of both Natural Revelation and Supernatural Revelation. This resulted in, simultaneously, Christianizing Aristotle (St. Thomas’ most referenced philosopher) and Aristotleizing Christianity, thus opening up the doors to human reason that had been muted during the Medieval centuries.

I also assert that the basic …

Keeping Faith With Nomos, Steven L. Winter

Law Faculty Research Publications

No abstract provided.

@Usa Vs. @Realdonaldtrump: The Decline Of Democracy In 280 Characters Or Less, Bryn Edwards

CMC Senior Theses

From threats, to hate speech, to potential criminal statements, Donald Trump has made use of Twitter like no president or world leader before him. His presidency and communication strategy have been defined by his “tweetstorms” and a consequent slew of legal issues. The prolific rate of his tweeting has made large-scale analyses difficult as they quickly become dated.

Nevertheless, this thesis has aimed for a more holistic analysis by uniquely linking trends in his tweeting to its perceived social consequences, situating this work in a long line of analyses of presidential rhetoric and media strategies. Moreover, it assesses Trump’s use …

Suffrage Over Suffering: How Disenfranchisement Erodes The Legitimacy Of Democratic Punishment, Kendall Hollimon

CMC Senior Theses

In this thesis I analyze both retributive and consequentialist justifications for punishment to understand the foundation for disenfranchisement as punishment. I then argue that although some of these justifications can condone disenfranchisement, the practice of disenfranchising criminals damages the democratic process, thus delegitimizing the punishments that societies democratically decide to impose.