Playing Political Philosophy

Extract

Ronald Beiner wants to have it both ways. We know this because, near the end of his book, he tells us that he is a “dualist,” someone for whom “philosophy and citizenship are defined by radically distinct purposes: the job of philosophy is to strive unconditionally for truth, and the job of citizenship is to strive for good and prudent judgment about the common purposes of civic life, and each should focus strictly on fulfilling its own appointed end without worrying too much about the other.” So there needs to be “a steady appreciation of the fundamental chasm between what we (as citizens) need in the world of practice and what we (as human beings) need from the world of theory” (224). This, however, would be abhorrent to most of the political philosophers Beiner covers. Because they are not dualists but monists; to them, theory and practice should be one.