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Public justification versus public deliberation: the case for divorce

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Kevin Vallier
Kevin Vallier*
Affiliation:
Philosophy Department, Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, USA
*
*Email: kevinvallier@gmail.com
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Abstract

I drive a wedge between public deliberation and public justification, concepts tightly associated in public reason liberalism. Properly understood, the ideal of public justification imposes no restraint on citizen deliberation but requires that those who have a substantial impact on the use of coercive power, political officials, advance proposals each person has sufficient reason to accept. I formulate this idea as the Principle of Convergent Restraint and apply it to legislators to illustrate the general reorientation I propose for the public reason project.

Keywords

philosophypolitical philosophypublic reason liberalismpolitical liberalismdeliberative democracypolitical theory
Type
Articles
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 45 , Issue 2 , April 2015 , pp. 139 - 158
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Journal of Philosophy 2015

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