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We seem to be losing the ability to talk to each other about - and despite - our political differences. The liberal tradition, with its emphasis on open-mindedness, toleration, and inclusion, is ideally suited to respond to this challenge. Yet liberalism is often seen today as a barrier to constructive dialogue: narrowly focused on individual rights, indifferent to the communal sources of human well-being, and deeply implicated in structures of economic and social domination. This book provides a novel defense of liberalism that weaves together a commitment to republican self-government, an emphasis on the value of unregulated choice, and an appreciation of how hard it is to strike a balance between them. By treating freedom rather than justice as the central liberal value this important book, critical to the times, provides an indispensable resource for constructive dialogue in a time of political polarization.

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Abbreviations -- Introduction: The Task before Us -- I. TOWARD A PRAGMATIC THEORY OF POLITICAL JUSTIFICATION -- 1 The Tyranny of Minimalism -- 2 Prospectivism and "The Will to Believe" -- 3 Narrative and Moral Reasoning -- II PRAGMATISM AND DEMOCRACY -- 4 Against a Second Pragmatic Acquiescence -- 5 Against Deweyan Democracy -- III POLI TICAL LIBERALISM -- 6 Political Liberalism and the Limits of the Political -- 7 Public Reason and Public Institutions -- 8 The Fact of Reasonable Pluralism -- Conclusion: Liberalism after Minimalism -- Index

AbstractContemporary critiques of the administrative state are closely bound up with the distinctively American doctrine that republican freedom requires that the legislative, executive, and judicial powers be exercised by separate and distinct branches of government. The burden of this essay is to argue that legislative delegation and judicial deference to the administrative state are necessary, or at least highly desirable, features of a democratic separation of powers regime. I begin by examining the historical and conceptual roots of the separation of powers doctrine, paying particular attention to the unique way in which it was adapted to fit the American case. I then examine three concerns that the resulting constitutional system raises about the republican freedom of those who are subject to it—which I call the accountability, legitimacy, and stability concerns—and argue that the administrative state is a useful, albeit imperfect, tool for reducing the unavoidable tension between these concerns. The thrust of this discussion is to push us away from "in principle" objections to the administrative state, and back toward the kinds of prudential considerations that are associated with ordinary liberal politics. More importantly, the aim of the essay is to encourage sober reflection on the real dangers that face the American constitutional system under current circumstances.

Abstract:The ideal theory debate rests on two conflicting claims: that justice is "the first virtue of social systems" (justice first), and that a just society is one in which "everyone accepts and knows that the others accept the same principles of justice" (universal consent).Justice firstholds that questions about the meaning of justice — and thus about what an ideally just society would look like — must be settled before we can effectively pursue justice. However,universal consententails a project of justification that can only take place over time. I propose that we avoid this impasse by treating freedom rather than justice as the "first virtue" of a liberal society. Liberal freedom has two distinct and complementary dimensions, which give rise to two distinct and complementary moral aims: on the one hand, to create the social conditions that make responsible agency possible (republican freedom), and on the other hand to carve out a social space within which the demands of responsible agency are relaxed or absent (market freedom). Striking the appropriate balance between these two dimensions of liberal freedom is irreducibly a matter of judgment. A freedom-centered liberalism therefore requires that we treat justice as the endpoint rather than the starting point of political action, thus severing the link between legitimacy and consent.

In this article I call into question the claim that philosophical pragmatism provides the basis for an "epistemic" defense of democracy. I have two aims in doing so. First, I want to call into question the claim that a substantive political position of any kind can be derived from pragmatic premises, and thus to shed light on the proper contribution that pragmatism -- as a theory of inquiry -- has to make to normative reasoning about politics. Second and more importantly, I believe that the failure of the pragmatic version of the epistemic defense of democracy raises further questions about the project of defending democracy in epistemic terms, and that the pragmatic theory of inquiry, properly understood, provides a more fruitful way of approaching the question of democratic legitimacy: one that is doubt -- rather than belief-centered. Adapted from the source document.