"This book makes a very ambitious proposal. The proposal is that Catholic social thought can contribute significantly to revivifying the American experiment in liberal democracy. That there is a need, and urgent need, for such a revival is today widely recognized by thinkers across the political and philosophical spectrum. Some of the essays here are polemical and others apologetic, but the book taken all in all is a proposal. As such, it must make its case sometimes in conversation with and sometimes against other proposals that are advanced in the public square of democratic discourse." [Foreword].
This book continues and revises the ideas of justice as fairness that John Rawls presented in A Theory of Justice but changes its philosophical interpretation in a fundamental way. That previous work assumed what Rawls calls a "well-ordered society," one that is stable and relatively homogenous in its basic moral beliefs and in which there is broad agreement about what constitutes the good life. Yet in modern democratic society a plurality of incompatible and irreconcilable doctrines—religious, philosophical, and moral—coexist within the framework of democratic institutions. Recognizing this as a permanent condition of democracy, Rawls asks how a stable and just society of free and equal citizens can live in concord when divided by reasonable but incompatible doctrines? This edition includes the essay "The Idea of Public Reason Revisited," which outlines Rawls' plans to revise Political Liberalism, which were cut short by his death. "An extraordinary well-reasoned commentary on A Theory of Justice...a decisive turn towards political philosophy." —Times Literary Supplement
In Christian Human Rights, Samuel Moyn asserts that the rise of human rights after World War II was prefigured and inspired by a defense of the dignity of the human person that first arose in Christian churches and religious thought in the years just prior to the outbreak of the war. The Roman Catholic Church and transatlantic Protestant circles dominated the public discussion of the new principles in what became the last European golden age for the Christian faith. At the same time, West European governments after World War II, particularly in the ascendant Christian Democratic parties, became more tolerant of public expressions of religious piety. Human rights rose to public prominence in the space opened up by these dual developments of the early Cold War. Moyn argues that human dignity became central to Christian political discourse as early as 1937. Pius XII's wartime Christmas addresses announced the basic idea of universal human rights as a principle of world, and not merely state, order. By focusing on the 1930s and 1940s, Moyn demonstrates how the language of human rights was separated from the secular heritage of the French Revolution and put to use by postwar democracies governed by Christian parties, which reinvented them to impose moral constraints on individuals, support conservative family structures, and preserve existing social hierarchies. The book ends with a provocative chapter that traces contemporary European struggles to assimilate Muslim immigrants to the continent's legacy of Christian human rights.
One of the sharpest recent debates over media ethics has centered around what has been variously called public or civic or communitarian journalism. This special issue examines some of the underlying concerns of communitarian journalism including the relationships between individual and community and the connecting role of journalism; negative vs. positive freedoms; constitutional vs. marketplace mandates; universal vs. situational/professional values; individual vs. corporate vs. democratic loyalties; commitment and compassion vs. detachment and professional "distance;" and "talking to" vs. "talking with." Authors of these essays include some of the best-known practitioners and critics of contemporary journalism. They wrote these papers as part of a 2-year lecture series funded by the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation and hosted by the University of South Florida, St. Petersburg.
Has the United States become more pluribus than unum? In terms of the nation's political beliefs, Robert Booth Fowler answers both yes and no. While his study affirms significant diversity among an elite cadre of public intellectuals, it vigorously denies it in a general public that collectively adheres to the same set of liberal core values. Enduring Liberalism pursues two objectives. One, it explores the political thought of public intellectuals and the general public since the 1960s. Two, it assesses contemporary and classic interpretations of American political thought in light of the study's findings. Fowler interprets the writings of public intellectuals like Robert Bellah, Jean Bethke Elshtain, Michael Walzer, William Bennett, Seymour Martin Lipset, William Galston, and others, as well as survey data of American political attitudes, to spotlight this oft-ignored divide between citizens and high-profile commentators, whose contentious debates are mistakenly assumed to reflect countrywide rifts. Fowler's argument is straightforward, but the interpretation is controversial. He recounts how the consensus liberal view in post-World War II American political thought collapsed among public intellectuals during the tumult of the 1960s and remains so to this day. His book examines the resultant diversity among contemporary public intellectuals, focusing on three predominant themes: concern for community, worry about the environment, and interest in civil society. In marked contrast to these disputatious commentators, Fowler finds the realm of popular opinion to be characterized by much greater consensus. Indeed, there seems to be a trend toward an even more general embrace of the liberal values that characterize our attitudes toward the individual, individual liberty, political equality, economic opportunity, and consent of the governed. Liberal values-above all the celebration of the individual and individual rights-have revolutionized the so-called private realms of life like family and religious communities to an extent unimagined in the 1950s. From these conclusions, Fowler demonstrates that most interpretations of American political thinking have exaggerated the extent of conflict and diversity in our nation's often raucous policy disputes. But he also cautions us not to overstate the public's widely shared liberal values and, by doing so, miss opportunities to facilitate problem solving or to recognize the ways in which our reform efforts may be constrained.
This book draws upon the authors understanding and findings from four qualitative studies conducted within two Canadian provinces as well as an amalgam of relevant documents of the Catholic Church, the academic writings of others, and media reports. It is from those sources that the authors attempts to shed some light on the phenomenon of the inclusion of non-Catholic students within 10 dimensions: social/ cultural, political, financial, legal, racial, administrative, pedagogical, psychological, spiritual, and philosophical. The data from these four studies is from constitutionally protected and funded Catholic high schools. The other sources of data are both national (Canadian) and international. Dr. Donlevy is the Associate Dean (Interim): Graduate Division of Educational Research in the Faculty of Education at the University of Calgary and the Vice-Chair of the University of Calgary’s Conjoint Faculties Research Ethics Board. He has taught grades 4-12 (inclusive), been a school principal, and is permanently certified as a teacher in both Alberta and Saskatchewan. He has negotiated on local levels for both the Alberta Teachers’ Association and the Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation. He is also a member of the Saskatchewan Law Society, having become a barrister & solicitor in 1985.
Communitarianism, as a movement, is clearly a dominant theme within New Labour's educational policy. How does this affect education and the life and work of schools? Research has shown that there is a correlation between academic achievement and the strength of community life and awareness within a school. The aim of this book, therefore, is to introduce communitarian thought to classroom teachers and to those working in education. The book contextualizes the current debates within education around the many topical ideas being developed by communitarian thinkers, including: character building; the role of parents; the community and the individual; values education and citizenship; community education; and standards and ethos in schools. Throughout, the book makes specific reference to the practical implications for both primary and secondary schools as well as for further education colleges. This is a timely book that should be of interest to all those working in schools and with children and young people. It aims to be a guide to this important and highly influential movement that is shaping our educational future.
In contemporary political philosophy, there is much debate over how to maintain a public order in pluralistic democracies in which citizens hold radically different religious views. The Political Problem of Religious Pluralism deals with this theoretically and practically difficult issue by examining three of the most influential figures of religious pluralism theory: John Rawls, Jacques Maritain, and Alasdair MacIntyre. Drawing on a diverse number of sources, Kozinski addresses the flaws in each philosopher's views and shows that the only philosophically defensible end of any overlapping consensus political order must be the eradication of the ideological pluralism that makes it necessary. In other words, a pluralistic society should have as its primary political aim to create the political conditions for the communal discovery and political establishment of that unifying tradition within which political justice can most effectively be obtained. Kozinski's analysis, though exhaustive and rigorous, still remains accessible and engaging, even for a reader unversed in the works of Rawls, Maritain, and MacIntyre. Interdisciplinary and multi-thematic in nature, it will appeal to anyone interested in the intersection of religion, politics, and culture.
