Civic respect, political liberalism, and non-liberal societies

Abstract

One prominent criticism of John Rawls’s The Law of Peoples is that it treats certain non-liberal societies, what Rawls calls ‘decent hierarchical societies’, as equal participants in a just international system. Rawls claims that these non-liberal societies should be respected as equals by liberal democratic societies, even though they do not grant their citizens the basic rights of democratic citizenship. This is presented by Rawls as a consequence of liberalism’s commitment to the principle of toleration. A number of critics have claimed that Rawls’s treatment of these non-liberal societies is symptomatic of a more general problem with political liberalism, namely, its reliance on toleration as its ‘fundamental principle’. Against this view, I argue that the principle of toleration should not be understood as political liberalism’s ‘fundamental principle’. This is revealed through a consideration of the normative basis of what Rawls calls the ‘Liberal Principle of Legitimacy’. A correct understanding of political liberalism’s ‘fundamental principle’, which I claim is a principle of equal ‘civic respect’ for citizens, shows that Rawls’s toleration of non-liberal societies is in fact a misapplication of political liberalism to the global domain. Moreover, I explain that political liberalism must assert that the principle of equal civic respect for citizens is the correct principle to govern the public political relations of citizens in all pluralist societies, and that most ‘decent hierarchical societies’ are pluralist in nature. Identifying political liberalism’s fundamental principle as that of equal civic respect for citizens helps to render political liberalism, in both the domestic and international domains, a more coherent and compelling approach to thinking about fundamental political issues.

Shared intentions, public reason, and political autonomy

“…12.My formulation of civic respect here draws upon Neufeld (2005). (There I propose that civic respect provides the correct basis for social cooperation amongst citizens in pluralist societies.)…”

Political Liberalism, Autonomy, and Education

“…One way to understand how citizens can be reasonable persons is to see reasonableness as involving a form of mutual respect (see Edenberg 2016). Given its political context, this conception of mutual respect can be termed 'civic respect' (Neufeld 2005(Neufeld , 2019. Civic respect has four features:…”

Toleration, decency and self-determination in The Law of Peoples

“…These three facts are central to our discussion of international toleration in LP as they seem to cast a shadow over the idea of decent hierarchical peoples. They are the basis of a significant alleged inconsistency between Rawls' domestic and international theories of justice (see Neufeld, 2005). First, decent hierarchical peoples are, at least to some extent, pluralistic in nature.…”

“…They are the basis of a significant alleged inconsistency between Rawls' domestic and international theories of justice (see Neufeld 2005). First, decent hierarchical peoples are, at least to some extent, pluralistic in nature.…”

“…This is precisely the objection I address in the first part of the paper. The latter claims, in short, that the very idea of a decent people is incoherent with Rawls' understanding of reasonable pluralism and sanctions the oppressive use of state power by the government of a decent hierarchical people (see Neufeld 2005;Caney 2002). 1 In the same way, while many have criticized Rawls' account of human rights (see for example, Buchanan 2000), much less attention has been given, in the Rawls-friendly literature, to the actual choice of principles in the first international original position of LP and whether the latter can be understood and justified without giving in to a desire for moral compromise with decent peoples.…”