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The distinction between ideal and non-ideal theory is a tool that can help us understand how to make moral and political progress. Ideal theory provides a goal for us to reach, and non-ideal theory tells us what to do in our current, non-ideal state. Throughout my dissertation, I argue that we need both of these kinds of theory in order to make progress. I also argue that we need to apply these tools to particular problems in order to get a better understanding of the theoretical questions at stake. To that end, I investigate three particular problems. Chapter One is devoted to showing that we need ideal theory to make sustained societal progress over time. But because we are unable to agree on a complete ideal, we should work together to create incomplete ideal theory, which can then guide our progress. Chapter Two shows how we can use the ideal/non-ideal distinction to resolve two longstanding tensions in moral and political philosophy. We disagree about how much our moral theories should yield to our flaws, and we also disagree about how to interpret the voluntarist constraint: what it means for "ought" to imply "can." I show that we need ideal theory of morality, which uses a thinner version of the voluntarist constraint and does not yield to our flaws, to provide an ultimate standard. But we also need non-ideal theory, which uses a thicker version, to guide our actions. Chapter Three tackles beneficence. Does our duty to the very poor increase when others inevitably fail to comply with that duty? It may be that we only have to do our fair share—that even in the non-ideal world, we only have to do what we would have had to do in the ideal. I show that this view is plagued by counterexamples. Many consequentialists hold the alternative view, that we must pick up others' slack, but their interpretation of this view is extremely demanding. I argue that we should look to an alternative moral theory. Two versions of deontology, intuitionism and Kantianism, require us to do more when others are doing less without also making extreme demands.

Some realists in political theory deny that the notion of feasibility has any place in realist theory, while others claim that feasibility constraints are essential elements of realist normative theorising. But none have so far clarified what exactly they are referring to when thinking of feasibility and political realism together. In this article, we develop a conception of the realist feasibility frontier based on an appraisal of how political realism should be distinguished from non-ideal theories. In this realist framework, political standards are feasible if they meet three requirements: they are (i) politically intelligible, (ii) contextually recognisable as authoritative, and (iii) contestable. We conclude by suggesting that our conception of realist feasibility might be compatible with utopian demands, thereby possibly finding favour with realists who otherwise refuse to resort to the notion of feasibility.

The following article responds to a realist critique of ideal theory in the "official" liberal democratic account of civil disobedience classically offered by John Rawls. The shortcomings the critical theorist, Robin Celikates (2014:236), identifies in Rawls's account follow, "at least, in part, from treating ideal theory as an independent starting point and working towards a definition of this decidedly nonideal political practice from there". The research aims, firstly, to identify and to explain a significant weakness in "new realist" political theory, and, secondly, to offer direction from our recent historical past to contemporary struggles for social justice in South Africa today, which suffer from such weakness in practice. The Freedom Charter is identified as the embodiment of a set of ethical ideals which exceeds but which may complement Tully's approach. . Mainstream historical sources are used, firstly, to identify a serious shortcoming with a dominant approach in political theory, and, secondly, to identify a significant factor that frustrates the effectiveness of "service delivery" protests today.

This article advances the case for 'normative behaviourism' – a new way of doing political philosophy that tries to turn facts about observable patterns of behaviour, as produced by different political systems, into grounds for specific political principles. This approach is applied to four distinct problems at the heart of the ideal/non-ideal theory and moralism/realism debates: (1) How to distinguish good from bad idealisations; (2) how to rank options of variable feasibility, cost, and danger; (3) how to distinguish legitimate acceptance of a given political system from acceptance based on coercion or false consciousness; and (4) how to translate abstract principles into concrete institutions. Objections against the general viability of normative behaviourism, and against the types of behaviour it tracks, are also considered.

At the heart of Kant's legal-political philosophy lies a liberal, republican ideal of justice understood in terms of private independence (non-domination) and subjection to public laws securing freedom for all citizens as equals. Given this basic commitment of Kant's, it is puzzling to many that he does not consider democracy a minimal condition on a legitimate state. In addition, many find Kant ideas of reform or improvement of the historical states we have inherited vague and confusing. The aim of this paper is to untangle both puzzles by exploring Kant's idea of self-governance. I argue that Kant's idea of self-governance gives us a very good starting point for thinking about how to leave room for a variety of political systems—different ideals—that have grown out of and responding to different contingent historical and cultural circumstances. It also helps us id entify those areas where we want to take extra care to build in safeguards to secure stability and to take sufficiently seriously humankind's truly nasty sides. Autogovernança e Reforma no Republicanismo Liberal de Kant - Teoria Ideal e Não-Ideal na Doutrina do Direito em Kant No centro da filosofia jurídico-política de Kant está um ideal liberal, republicano de justiça compreendido em termos de independência privada (não-dominação) e sujeição às leis públicas que garantem a liberdade para todos os cidadãos como iguais. Dado este compromisso básico de Kant, é intrigante para muitos que ele não considere a democracia uma condição mínima para um Estado legítimo. Além disso, muitos consideram as idéias de Kant quanto à reforma ou melhoria dos estados históricos que herdamos, vagas e confusas. O objetivo deste artigo é desembaraçar os dois quebra-cabeças explorando a ideia de auto-governança de Kant. Eu argumento que a ideia de auto-governança de Kant nos dá um bom ponto de partida para pensar em como deixar espaço para uma variedade de sistemas políticos — diferentes ideais — que cresceram e responderam a diferentes contingências históricas e circunstâncias culturais. Também nos ajuda a identificar as áreas em que queremos ter um cuidado extra para construir salvaguardas para garantir a estabilidade segura e para levar suficientemente a sério os lados verdadeiramente desagradáveis da humanidade.

This paper focuses on the arguments in favor of extending distributive justice beyond national borders. Within the contemporary literature of normative political philosophy, we find arguments for either a global or European extension of distributive justice. Philosophers in favor of the European extension are also often supportive of extending to yet other places, but then the following philosophical question arises: Would the establishment of social justice at the level of the EU encourage or discourage the achievement of global justice? Such a question comes from a 'non-ideal theorizing' approach to evaluating whether or not the organization of distributive justice at the EU level would constitute an approximation to global justice and, thus, be considered as transitionally just. It proposes two positions, namely continuity and discontinuity approaches; the former claims that the extension to the European level encourages global justice while the latter claims it is discouraging. In considering the EU as having a privileged international bargaining power to contribute efficiently to global justice, the paper sides with the continuity approach while proposing an adjustment. The main argument, which is called a compatibility proviso, requires taming the potential harmful effects of the European level, in order to achieve the ideal of global justice in a 'pareto optimal' manner. The proviso strengthens the continuity approach by removing two risks: (1) the extension may stop once the distributive justice is organized at the EU level; but also that (2) such a deepening of the EU integration might be in itself harmful to global justice.

I present a new challenge to the Rawlsian insistence on ideal theory as a compass orienting concrete policy choices. My challenge, focusing on global politics, consists of three claims. First, I contend that our global ideal can become more ambitious over time. Second, I argue that Rawlsian ideal theory's level of ambition might change because of concrete policy choices, responding to moral failures which can be identified and resolved without ideal theory. Third, I argue that we currently face such potentially transformative choices. I conclude that these choices are analytically prior to, rather than derivative from, global ideal theory.

Von Gerechtigkeitstheorien wird gemeinhin erwartet, dass diese handlungsleitend sein können. Gleichzeitig dominierten in den vergangenen Jahrzehnten sogenannte ideale Theorien den Diskurs um Gerechtigkeit, die auf kontrafaktischen Annahmen basieren, welche nicht die Realität abbilden. Gemäß der Mainstream-Auffassung konfligiert dieser ideale Charakter nicht mit dem Desideratum der Handlungsleitung: Ideale Theorien zeichnen die (vollkommen) gerechte Gesellschaft als ein Ziel, dem es entgegenzustreben gilt. Um dieses Ziel zu erreichen, brauche es darüber hinaus eine nicht-ideale Theorie, die mehr an der empirischen Wirklichkeit ausgerichtet ist und es als Ziel hat, bestehende Ungerechtigkeiten durch entsprechende Handlungsanweisungen zu beseitigen. Dieser Auffassung nach ist ideale Theorie somit zwar nicht selbst handlungsleitend, wohl aber eine notwendige Bedingung für Handlungsleitung. Dass ideale Theorie dieser Funktion gerecht werden kann, stößt hierbei zunehmend auf Widerspruch. Dabei lassen sich im Wesentlichen drei Gruppen von Fundamentalkritiken unterscheiden, die alle drei in der Konklusion münden, dass ideale Theorie nicht zur Handlungsleitung unter Realbedingungen beitragen kann: Erstens, Kritiken, denen entsprechend ideale Theorie nicht zur Genese von Handlungsanweisungen fähig und nötig ist; zweitens, Kritiken, denen entsprechend ideale Theorie nicht anwendbar auf das Hier-und-Jetzt ist; drittens, Kritiken, entsprechend denen idealer Theorie der Bezug zur Gerechtigkeit fehlt. In der vorliegenden Arbeit verteidige ich ideale Theorie gegen jede dieser drei Kritiken. Dafür (re-)konstruiere ich als erstes die Unterscheidung in ideale und nicht-ideale Theorie, stelle dann die Kritiken dar und formuliere schließlich entsprechende Entgegnungen. Dabei akzeptiere ich das Desideratum der Handlungsleitung und argumentiere dafür, dass alle drei Kritiken scheitern. ; Theories of justice are commonly expected to be able to guide actions. At the same time, the debate led on justice during the last decades was dominated by so called ideal theories. These theories are based on contrafactual assumptions, which do not portray the reality. According to the mainstream-view, this ideal character is not detrimental for the desideratum of action-guidingness: ideal theories describe the (fully) just society as an aim one ought to strive for. To accomplish this goal, however, a non-ideal theory is needed, which is rooted in the empirical reality and seeks to eliminate injustices through recommendations of actions. On this account, ideal theory is not action-guiding itself, albeit a necessary condition for action-guidingness. However, the idea that ideal theory can fulfil this function is increasingly disagreed with. Three main groups of fundamental critiques can be distinguished, which all three lead to the conclusion that ideal theory cannot contribute to action-guidingness under real-life conditions: Firstly, critiques, according to which ideal theory is neither able nor necessary to create recommendations for actions; secondly, critiques, according to which ideal theory is not applicable to the here-and-now; thirdly, critiques, according to which ideal theory does not connect to justice. In this thesis I defend ideal theory against each one of these three critiques. To do so, I, firstly, (re-)construct the distinction between ideal and non-ideal theory. Thereafter, I present the three critiques and formulate replies to them. In doing so, I accept the desideratum of action-guidingness and argue that all three critiques fail.

La suposición de la obediencia estricta, y las demás características de la sociedad bien ordenada (SBO), es una considerable idealización que hace Rawls de las circunstancias históricas reales en las que existen las sociedades contemporáneas. De allí la objeción de que todo el proyecto de la justicia como equidad es inútil, pues de nada sirve saber cuáles serían los principios de la justicia para una SBO que solamente existe en la teoría. Los objetivos de este artículo son aclarar el significado de la suposición de una SBO del que se ocupa una teoría ideal, indicar las relaciones de este tipo de teoría con la metodología de la filosofía política y la noción de factibilidad y reevaluar la objeción de inutilidad a la luz de estas consideraciones. Se propone una respuesta doble a la objeción de inutilidad derivada de obra de Rawls. ; The assumption of strict obedience, and other features of the well ordered society (WOS), is a great idealization that Rawls does from the actual and historical circumstances in which contemporary societies exist. From there comes the objection according to which the whole Project of justice as fairness is just useless, for it has no purpose at all to know what would it be the principles of justice for a well ordered society that only exist in theory. The aims of this paper are to make clear the meaning of the well ordered society's assumption - the society which the ideal theory takes care of -; to point out the links between this kind of theory and the methodology of the political philosophy and the notion of feasibility; and to look again the useless objection in the light of the above considerations. Before the useless objection, it is proposed a twofold answer that could be inferred from Rawls work.

In the past decade, the value of so-called ideal theory has become a major point of dispute among political theorists. While critics of ideal theory accuse this approach of "idle utopianism", its advocates fault the critics for conceding to "cynical realism". This dissertation examines two charges against ideal theory. The demandingness charge states that ideal theory fails to acknowledge the constraints on justice set by the empirical conditions that prevail in our world, and that it therefore produces invalid principles. The uselessness charge states that ideal theory, even if it tells us what justice would require under exceptionally favorable circumstances, offers no information valuable for guiding action in the nonideal circumstances characteristic of today's societies. The two charges target the idealized assumptions made in ideal theory, in particular the assumption of full compliance. By assuming full compliance, the critics argue, ideal theory ignores the way real-world agents' motivational limitations render the pursuit of its proposed principles infeasible or undesirable. In four free-standing articles, I examine when and why noncompliance due to motivational limitations puts constraints on justice, and how this affects the status and usefulness of ideal theory. I argue that motivational limitations constrain justice in ideal theory if we hold that justice is action-guiding in the sense that it confers actual duties on individual agents, and that the distribution of collective duties to individuals requires reasonable expectations of others' compliance. In nonideal theory, adopting an actualist standpoint will lead us to conclude that not only the noncompliance of others, but also our own foreseeable noncompliance constrains what justice can demand. I further argue that how this affects the usefulness of ideal theory depends, on the one hand, on how we interpret crucial concepts such as "action-guidance", and, on the other, on which task we expect political theory to perform. My findings shed new light over the complex conflict lines that underlie the current dispute, and urge debaters to render explicit and argue for the assumptions upon which they rest their judgments about ideal theory.

Numerous philosophers allege that the "general theory of second best" poses a challenge to the Target View, which asserts that real-world reform efforts should aim to establish arrangements that conform to the constitutive features of ideally just states of affairs. I demonstrate two claims that are relevant in this context. First, I show that the theory of second best fails to present a compelling challenge to the Target View in general. But, second, the theory of second best requires ideal theorists to undertake certain kinds of causal and comparative analyses that are typically thought to lie outside the remit of conventional ideal theory.

Based on three recently published books on climate justice, this article reviews the field of climate ethics in light of developments of international climate politics. The central problem addressed is how idealised normative theories can be relevant to the political process of negotiating a just distribution of the costs and benefits of mitigating climate change. I distinguish three possible responses, that is, three kinds of non-ideal theories of climate justice: focused on (1) the injustice of some agents not doing their part; (2) the policy process and aiming to be realistic; and (3) grievances related to the transition to a clean-energy economy. The methodological discussion underpinning each response is innovative and should be of interest more generally, even though it is still underdeveloped. The practical upshot, however, is unclear: even non-ideal climate justice may be too disconnected from the fast-moving and messy climate circus.

The central aims of this paper are to create a potential concept for what an ideal social housing program could look like and then to determine the extent to which the social housing program in Vienna, Austria has brought this ideal to reality. The social housing program in Vienna was chosen due to its popularity as a program and its generally positive reputation. The paper proceeds by first offering potential definitions for social housing, its ideals, and potential indicators for ideal fulfillment. Then, I take influence from the frameworks of assemblage theory and path-dependency theory to analyze the material, temporal, and fluctuating impacts of social housing policy in Vienna, making reference to how these impacts do or do not fulfill the ideals of social housing.

ohn Rawls is widely regarded as one of the most influential philosophers of the twentieth century, and his work has permanently shaped the nature and terms of moral and political philosophy, deploying a robust and specialized vocabulary that reaches beyond philosophy to political science, economics, sociology, and law. This volume is a complete and accessible guide to Rawls' vocabulary, with over 200 alphabetical encyclopaedic entries written by the world's leading Rawls scholars. From 'basic structure' to 'burdened society', from 'Sidgwick' to 'strains of commitment', and from 'Nash point' to 'natural duties', the volume covers the entirety of Rawls' central ideas and terminology, with illuminating detail and careful cross-referencing. It will be an essential resource for students and scholars of Rawls, as well as for other readers in political philosophy, ethics, political science, sociology, international relations and law.

This work addresses the applicability of Rawls's theory of justice in non-ideal circumstances. The goal, more particularly, is to assess the urgency role that Rawls and some of his interpreters confer to justice of fairness under non-ideal circumstances. In Rawls's case, the urgency role means, in sum, that infringements to the first principle of justice (the basic liberties principle) must be treated as more serious and urging than infringements to the second principle. The paper's main conclusion is that a "strong" understanding of this role has unbearable consequences, worse still than those entailed by the same relation of lexical priority between the two principles under the (ideal) condition of strict compliance. The problem is that, in circumstances of no strict compliance, scarcity of political means needed to make institutional improvements may impose total neglect of second principle issues until the first principle is wholly satisfied.