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The Politics of Emotion: Liberalism and Cognitivism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 April 2017

Susan James
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Extract

Liberal political theorists commend a comparatively orderly form of life. It is one in which individuals and groups who care about different things, and live in different ways, nevertheless share an overriding commitment to liberty and toleration, together with an ability to resolve conflicts and disagreements in ways that do not violate these values. Both citizens and states are taken to be capable of negotiating points of contention without resorting to forms of coercion such as abuse, blackmail, brainwashing, intimidation, torture or other types of violence. In explaining what makes such a state of affairs possible, such theorists have tended to present the citizens of liberal polities as more or less rational individuals who are aware of the advantages of a pluralist, yet co-operative way of life, and understand what it takes to maintain them. Liberalism works best, they have suggested, when, and because, individuals understand its benefits, and therefore act broadly in accordance with the norms it prescribes.

Type
Papers
Information
Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplements , Volume 58 , May 2006 , pp. 231 - 244
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy and the contributors 2006

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References

1 See for example Bubeck, Diemut, Care, Gender and Justice (Oxford: Oxford University Prress, 1995Google Scholar; Held, Virginia, The Ethics of Care: Personal, Political, and Global (Oxford University Press, 2005).Google Scholar

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