Study Unit 5

Study Unit 5
Political Philosophy
What is political philosophy?
Definition
SEE THE SA PHIL GLOSSARY for English, Zulu, Sestwana, and Afrikaans definitions-
http://saphilglossary.com/
• Political philosophy can be defined as philosophical reflection on how best to

arrange our collective life – our political institutions and our social practices, such as
our economic system and our pattern of family life.
Historical background of political philosophy?
• In 1956 Peter Laslett claimed that ‘political philosophy is dead.’
• Isaiah Berlin rejected Laslett’s view and claimed that the twentieth century had
produced ‘no commanding work of political philosophy’.
• This means that there is no single, influential, or dominant text or set of ideas
within the field of political philosophy that stands out as being universally
accepted or regarded as the definitive authority.
• One reason offered for the temporary marginalization of political philosophy in

the Analytic tradition was the rise of political science.
Political philosophy vs Political Science
• Political philosophy- concerns itself with the fundamental concepts of politics –
authority, justice, liberty, rights, equality, democracy and totalitarianism, and
analysis of particular political orientations such as socialism, Fascism,
conservatism, liberalism and Marxism.
• Political philosophy examines principles and justifications, and is speculative,

critical and evaluatory; political science examines practices and structures, and
it is descriptive and empirical.
• Political science is about government, states, political parties, institutions,

citizenship, systems of power, control and policing, and the distribution of
economic and social resources.
John Rawls (1921–2002)
• His father was a lawyer and his mother, Anna Abell Stump Rawls, was an
activist for female suffrage.
• Her interests undoubtedly had an effect on Rawls’ interests.
• Rawls’ theory was motivated by a desire to formulate a practical political
theory.
• His thinking about politics was motivated by a strong desire to find ways in
which political conflict can be avoided or managed, in which reconciliation can
be achieved when it occurs, and in which the best reasonably possible political
order can be devised.
• Equality can be achieved only if liberty is restricted.
• Liberty results in inequalities because the differences between people in starting
point, talent, energy, and luck quickly produce them.
• He believed that a fair society could accommodate citizens who were both
individually free and in germane respects equal.
• The first question Rawls addressed was one of method: how is one to approach the
task of formulating a conception of justice that will be recognized as reasonable by
any reflective citizen?
• His answer is to generalize the idea of a ‘social contract’- SEE THE SA
PHIL GLOSSARY for English, Zulu, Xhosa, Sestwana, and Afrikaans
definitions- http://saphilglossary.com/.
• By asking what kind of socio-political arrangement people would choose to

accept if, as it were before being born, they could do so. Pg 460
• People behind the veil of ignorance would apply what is known as a ‘maximin’
strategy for choosing what kind of society it should be, this being a strategy in
game theory that makes the most of the least that can be reliably anticipated in a
given situation.
• On this basis, he says, people in the original position would choose to see the
following two principles of justice in operation:
• First, that each member of society should have an equal right to the greatest
degree of basic liberty compatible with everyone else’s basic liberty.
• Second, that inequalities in society should be so arranged that they provide the
greatest benefit possible to the least advantaged, and should not prevent offices
and positions from being open to everyone under conditions of ‘fair equality of
opportunity’.
• The first principle has priority over the second, and ‘fair equality of opportunity’ has
priority over ensuring that the least advantaged have the best deal possible for
them in their circumstances.
• Rawls’ governing idea, that justice is fairness, postulates a society whose
institutions and structures have a ‘basic structure’ that ensures a distribution of
social goods and burdens to which reflective citizens will consent and in which
they will cooperate.
Feminist philosophy
• Political philosophy is the arena where, apart from the theory of knowledge, feminist
thinking has had the most impact.
• Differences of view about the nature of social and political subordination and how to end
it constitute the main substance of the discussion in feminist political theory.
• It might be thought that because concepts of justice and equality are central targets of
enquiry in political philosophy there is no need for a particular feminist approach.
Feminist philosophy
“An immediate point is that because almost all debate about these
concepts has been conducted by men in the setting of a male-
dominated world, there is a serious question about whether their
understanding of these concepts, and in particular what it is like to live in
circumstances in which they do not apply, can fully accommodate
women’s perspectives on them”
Feminist philosophy
• An immediate point is that because almost all debate about these concepts
has been conducted by men in the setting of a male-dominated world, there
is a serious question about whether their understanding of these concepts,
and in particular what it is like to live in circumstances in which they do not
apply, can fully accommodate women’s perspectives on them. READ THE
WORK EXAMPLE ON PG 467
Feminist philosophy
• One feminist approach is to ask whether, in connection with the concerns that
discussions of justice address.
• The concept of justice is the right one to use; perhaps notions of need and care are
more fundamental.
• Family example on pgs 467-468- These remarks merely hint at the importance and
extent of one aspect of feminist philosophy, which ranges more widely than the
political.
• One significant example is the question of gender bias in theorizing about the
nature of knowledge.
• This invokes the idea of ‘situated knowledge’, that is, knowledge whose acquisition
and justification are shaped by the circumstances of the knowing subject
Feminist philosophy
• On the face of it this might seem to justify including consideration of feminist
perspectives wholly under the rubric of ‘feminist political philosophy’.
• Many of the deficits suffered by women in relation to getting and using knowledge
are the result of social, political and economic subordinations.
• These subordinations consist in women not only being excluded from education,
but being treated as having inferior intellects and as handicapped by the
dominance of their emotions and bodily enslavement to hormones, pregnancy and
physical weakness, ect.
Feminist philosophy
• Feminist philosophy arose contemporaneously with the increasing influence of
social and political feminism in the second half of the twentieth century, and is
set to be a major component of all future thinking.
• What compels the interest in feminist epistemology and value theory is the
achievement of feminist political theory in tackling the fundamental barrier to
both.

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Study Unit 5

• Political philosophy can be defined as philosophical reflection on how best to

• One reason offered for the temporary marginalization of political philosophy in

• Political philosophy examines principles and justifications, and is speculative,

• Political science is about government, states, political parties, institutions,

• By asking what kind of socio-political arrangement people would choose to

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