Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dk4vv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T14:17:12.306Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

1 - Just Liberal Democracy

from Part I - Theory

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 July 2021

Raphael Cohen-Almagor
Affiliation:
University of Hull
Get access

Summary

The opening chapter revolves around the questions: What does liberalism purport to include within the defence of neutrality? What scope is available for conceptions of the good to meet, to mingle and to rival each other? In order to answer these questions, we need to understand what liberal democracy is about, what its ground rules are and how we can distinguish liberal democracies from illiberal societies. To address these important questions, the chapter avails itself of the Rawlsian justice as fairness theory which greatly influenced the liberal discourse during the past century. The Rawlsian theory of justice is supplemented with Kantian and Millian ethics. The chapter elucidates two important concepts without which it is impossible to imagine any liberal democracy: respect for others, inspired by Kantian and Rawlsian philosophies, and the Harm Principle derived from J. S. Mill’s ethics. It is the Harm Principle that guides us in prescribing boundaries to conduct. The necessity in introducing boundaries is further explained by the concept of the ‘democratic catch’.

Type
Chapter
Information
Just, Reasonable Multiculturalism
Liberalism, Culture and Coercion
, pp. 23 - 44
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×