Feminist critiques of deliberative democracy have focused on the abstraction, impartiality and rationality of mainstream accounts of deliberation. This paper explores the claim, common to many of these critiques, that these features are problematic because they are gendered, and that a more women-friendly account of democracy would embrace corporeality, contextuality and the affective. While acknowledging the merit of such a claim, the paper nonetheless suggests that the pursuit of social justice and democratic inclusion actually leads many feminists to embrace a (...) modified account of deliberative democracy, albeit in a modified account form. This can be explained by the dialogical conception of impartiality offered by theories of deliberative democracy. The paper suggests that the embrace of deliberative democracy by feminist theorists is a positive move, to be more widely acknowledged. Moreover, once acknowledged, feminists have much to offer deliberative democrats in terms of considering what the pursuit of dialogic impartiality might entail. If conceived as demanding both a 'lack of bias' and 'inclusivity', attention needs to be focused squarely on the issue of inclusion, and the institutional and material conditions for securing inclusion in deliberation. (shrink)

The deconstruction of all 'principled positions' creates a value vacuum which, in turn, leads to a state of ethical and political paralysis. The contributors to Principled Positions ponder these dilemmas and try to build bridges between the modernist absolutes of truth, value and justice and the anti-totalising spirit of postmodernism.

This article examines discourses invoked in the UK debates about prostitution and trafficking in women. The authors suggest that there are three striking features about these discourses: the absence of the sex work discourse, the dominance of the public nuisance discourse in relation to kerb-crawling and the dominance of moral order discourses in relation to trafficking. At a time when the UK is about to revise its sex laws, it is important to consider the discourses that frame prostitution policies in (...) other European countries, with a view to broadening the range of policy options. In this context, the authors compare the UK with the Netherlands, where a sex work discourse has framed debates. This comparison indicates that UK prostitution discourses could be shaped by discourses other than those of public nuisance and moral order and may open up new policy options. (shrink)

This article explores feminist arguments for group representation and suggests that there are three distinct theoretical frameworks on which these arguments are based: an equality perspective leading to a strategy of inclusion, a difference perspective leading to a strategy of reversal and a diversity perspective leading to a strategy of displacement. I focus in particular on the defence of group representation developed by Iris Marion Young, because this is made from a diversity perspective, which offers the most theoretically satisfying account (...) of subjectivity but is (perhaps because of this) least likely to endorse group representation. Young’s thought is particularly interesting because it attempts to resolve some long-standing dilemmas in feminist political thought. In particular, Young aims to combine a deconstructive strategy of displacement with a model of group representation by developing a relational (rather than interest or identity-based) conception of social groups, by using theories of deliberative democracy. To do so she develops a second conception of objective judgement, which displaces the apparent dichotomy between impartiality and particularity. Although the concept of social groups is compelling, the concept of objective judgement is less so and further work could usefully be done to establish whether a diversity perspective can successfully displace the dichotomy between impartiality and partiality, and so offer a coherent defence of group representation. (shrink)

Spanning nearly two decades, from 1980 to 1996, this Reader investigates the debates which have best characterized feminist theory. Including such articles as Pornography and Fantasy, The Body and Cinema, Nature as Female, and A Manifesto for Cyborgs, the extracts examine thoughts on sexualtiy as a domain of exploration, the visual representation of women, what being a feminist means, and why feminists are increasingly involved in political struggles to negotiate the context and meaning of technological development. With writings by bell (...) hooks, Alice Jardine, and Andrea Dworkin, this mulit-cultural Reader reflects the dynamic nature of feminist debates and the genuine diversity within current feminist theory. Capturing the sense of the rapid movement within feminist theory and criticism, Feminisms is ideal for anyone interested in feminism and the history behind it. (shrink)

The pursuit of equal citizenship has been complicated by two recent developments: the emergence of multi‐level governance (and with it the growing importance of local, regional and global levels of citizenship practices) and the emergence of group recognition claims (which signal the growing importance of particularised experiences and multiple inequality agendas). These developments shape the way citizenship is both practiced and analysed. Mapping neat citizenship models onto distinct nation‐states and evaluating these in relation to formal equality is no longer an (...) adequate approach. Comparative citizenship analyses need to be considered in relation to multiple inequalities and their intersections, and to multi‐level governance and trans‐national organising. This, in turn, suggests that comparative citizenship analysis needs to consider new spaces in which struggles for equal citizenship occur and new dynamics interactions between them. (shrink)

The public/private dichotomy has long been the object of considerable attention for feminists. We argue that, by focusing their attention on a divide which has declined in importance, feminists may fail to keep up with the current means by which sexual inequalities are perpetuated. Furthermore, by concentrating on this divide feminists risk reproducing such dichotomous thinking in their own work, discursively perpetuating that which they had initially hoped to displace. We begin by surveying feminist critiques of the public/private dichotomy, consider (...) recent moves to go beyond critique, yet suggest that the dichotomy continues to be a framing concern within feminist work. We then survey the way in which space has been understood within geography, and consider the implications of adopting a relational conception of space for analysis of public and private in political theory. We offer a broader framework for examining the ways in which sexual inequalities are reproduced in contemporary society. We therefore open up the possibility that over time inequalities may be mediated to a greater or lesser degree by spatial divisions. This places a further pressure on the assumption that the public/private divide, or some variation thereof, must be at the heart of feminist theorizing. (shrink)

Offers an outline for a new ethical practice - one responsive to the need for critical autonomy and grounded in a new sense of the human subject. The author demonstrates how difficult it is to give an account of oneself, and how this lack of self-transparency and narratibility is crucial to an ethical understanding of the human.

But what if in order to save 0nc’s life one has to ki]1 another person? In some cases that is obviously permissible. In a case I will call Villainous Aggrcssor, you are standing in :1 meadow, innocently minding your own business, and 21 truck suddenly heads toward you. You try to sidestep the truck, but it tums as you tum. Now you can sec the driver: he is a mam you know has long hated you. What to do? You cannot (...) outrun thc truck. Fortunately, this is not pure nightmare: you just happen to have em antitank gun with you, and can blow up the truck. Of course, if you do this you will kill thc driver, but that does not matter; it is morally permissible for you to blow up thc truck, driver and 211, in defense of your life. (shrink)

A look at political ethics covers cruelty, hypocrisy, snobbery, betrayal and misanthropy, and is accompanied by a description of modern public opinion about ...

Debate about the responsibilities of affluent people to act to lessen global poverty has dominated ethics and political philosophy for forty years. But the controversy has reached an impasse, with the main approaches either demanding too much of ordinary mortals or else letting them off the hook. In Distant Strangers I show how a preoccupation with standard moral theories and with the concepts of duty and obligation have led philosophers astray. I argue that there are serious limits to what can (...) be demanded of ordinary human beings, but that this does not mean we must abandon the moral imperative to reduce poverty. Drawing on findings from behavioral economics and psychology, I show how we can motivate better-off people to lessen poverty without excessively taxing their moral virtue. And I argue that this approach is not just pragmatically but morally appropriate. (shrink)

Projective contents, which include presuppositional inferences and Potts's conventional implicatures, are contents that may project when a construction is embedded, as standardly identified by the FAMILY-OF-SENTENCES diagnostic. This article establishes distinctions among projective contents on the basis of a series of diagnostics, including a variant of the family-of-sentences diagnostic, that can be applied with linguistically untrained consultants in the field and the laboratory. These diagnostics are intended to serve as part of a toolkit for exploring projective contents across languages, thus (...) allowing generalizations to be examined and validated crosslinguistically. We apply the diagnostics in two languages, focusing on Paraguayan Guaraní, and comparing the results to those for English. Our study of Paraguayan Guaraní is the first systematic exploration of projective content in a language other than English. Based on the application of our diagnostics to a wide range of constructions, four subclasses of projective contents emerge. The resulting taxonomy of projective content has strong implications for contemporary theories of projection, which were developed for the projective properties of particular subclasses and fail to generalize to the full set of projective contents. (shrink)

The celebrated author of _Gender Trouble_ here redefines Antigone's legacy, recovering her revolutionary significance and liberating it for a progressive feminism and sexual politics. Butler's new interpretation does nothing less than reconceptualize the incest taboo in relation to kinship -- and open up the concept of kinship to cultural change. Antigone, the renowned insurgent from Sophocles's _Oedipus,_ has long been a feminist icon of defiance. But what has remained unclear is whether she escapes from the forms of power that she (...) opposes. Antigone proves to be a more ambivalent figure for feminism than has been acknowledged, since the form of defiance she exemplifies also leads to her death. Butler argues that Antigone represents a form of feminist and sexual agency that is fraught with risk. Moreover, Antigone shows how the constraints of normative kinship unfairly decide what will and will not be a livable life. Butler explores the meaning of Antigone, wondering what forms of kinship might have allowed her to live. Along the way, she considers the works of such philosophers as Hegel, Lacan, and Irigaray. How, she asks, would psychoanalysis have been different if it had taken Antigone -- the "postoedipal" subject -- rather than Oedipus as its point of departure? If the incest taboo is reconceived so that it does not mandate heterosexuality as its solution, what forms of sexual alliance and new kinship might be acknowledged as a result? The book relates the courageous deeds of Antigone to the claims made by those whose relations are still not honored as those of proper kinship, showing how a culture of normative heterosexuality obstructs our capacity to see what sexual freedom and political agency could be. (shrink)

Incisively and stylishly written, this book constitutes an open challenge to reconsider the fundamental question of the relationship of law to society.

Temporal concepts are fundamental constructs of human cognition, but the trajectory of how these concepts emerge and develop is not clear. Evidence of children’s temporal concept development comes from cognitive developmental and psycholinguistic studies. This paper reviews the linguistic factors (i.e., temporal language production and comprehension) and cognitive processes (i.e., temporal judgment and temporal reasoning) involved in children’s temporal conceptualization. The relationship between children’s ability to express time in language and the ability to reason about time, and the challenges and (...) difficulties raised by the interaction between cognitive and linguistic components are discussed. Finally, we propose ways to reconcile controversies from different research perspectives and present several avenues for future research to better understand the development of temporal concepts. (shrink)

A political philosophy classic from one of the foremost political thinkers of the twentieth century After Utopia was Judith Shklar’s first book, a harbinger of her renowned career in political philosophy. Throughout the many changes in political thought during the last half century, this important work has withstood the test of time. In After Utopia, Shklar explores the decline of political philosophy, from Enlightenment optimism to modern cultural despair, and she offers a critical, creative analysis of this downward trend. (...) She looks at Romantic and Christian social thought, and she shows that while the present political fatalism may be unavoidable, the prophets of despair have failed to explain the world they so dislike, leaving the possibility of a new and vigorous political philosophy. With a foreword by Samuel Moyn, examining After Utopia’s continued relevance, this current edition introduces a remarkable synthesis of ideas to a new generation of readers. (shrink)

I There are a great many ways in which a thing can be good. What counts as a way of being good? I leave it to intuition. Let us allow that being a good dancer is being good in a way, and that so also is being a good carpenter. We might group these and similar ways of being good under the name activity goodness, since a good dancer is good at dancing and a good carpenter is good at carpentry. (...) Everything good at doing something D is good in a way, and for each activity D, being good at D-ing falls into the class of ways of being good which I call activity goodness. Again, let us allow that being a good hammer is being good in a way, and that so also is being a good butter knife. We might group these ways of being good under the name equipment goodness, since a good hammer is good for use in hammering nails and a good butter knife is good for use in buttering bread. Everything good for use in achieving a purpose P is good in a way, and for each purpose P, being good for use in achieving P falls into the class of ways of being good which I call equipment goodness. Again, let us allow that tasting good is being good in a way, and so also are looking good, sounding good, and so on. The class here is aesthetic goodness. Is all goodness goodness-in-a-way? Intuitively, the answer is yes: it seems right to think that everything is good only insofar as it is good in one or more ways. (shrink)

Western ideology takes biology as the cause, and behavior and social statuses as the effects, and then proceeds to construct biological dichotomies to justify the “naturalness” of gendered behavior and gendered social statuses. What we believe is what we see—two sexes producing two genders. The process, however, goes the other way: gender constructs social bodies to be different and unequal. The content of the two sets of constructed social categories, “females and males” and “women and men,” is so varied that (...) their use in research without further specification renders the results spurious. (shrink)

Two visual world experiments investigated the processing of the implicature associated with some using a “gumball paradigm.” On each trial, participants saw an image of a gumball machine with an upper chamber with orange and blue gumballs and an empty lower chamber. Gumballs dropped to the lower chamber, creating a contrast between a partitioned set of gumballs of one color and an unpartitioned set of the other. Participants then evaluated spoken statements, such as “You got some of the blue gumballs.” (...) Experiment 1 investigated the time course of the pragmatic enrichment from some to not all when the only utterance alternatives available to refer to the different sets were some and all. In Experiment 2, the number terms two, three, four, and five were also included in the set of alternatives. Scalar implicatures were delayed relative to the interpretation of literal statements with all only when number terms were available. The results are interpreted as evidence for a constraint-based account of scalar implicature processing. (shrink)

Women’s status in the Western world has improved enormously, but the revolution that would make women and men truly equal has not yet occurred. I argue that the reason is that gender divisions still deeply bifurcate the structure of modern society. Feminists want women and men to be equal, but few talk about doing away with gender divisions altogether. From a social constructionist structural gender perspective, it is the ubiquitous division of people into two unequally valued categories that undergirds the (...) continually reappearing instances of gender inequality. I argue that it is this gendering that needs to be challenged by feminists, with the long-term goal of doing away with binary gender divisions altogether. To this end, I call for a feminist degendering movement. (shrink)

A compelling set of lectures on political obligation that contributes to ongoing debates in political theory and intellectual history This stimulating collection of lectures by the late Judith Shklar on political obligation is paired with a scholarly introduction that offers an overview of her life, illuminates the connections among her teaching, research, and publications, and explains why her lectures still resonate with us and contribute to current debates in political theory and intellectual history.