The Daniel Webster Project in Ancient and Modern Studies at Dartmouth College
Fourth Annual Ancient and Modern Conference of the Daniel Webster Project.
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Third Annual Ancient and Modern Conference of the Daniel Webster Project.
Personal Autonomy, Political Philosophy, and Democracy
Saturday, November 20th , 2010
1 Rockefeller Center
James Murphy, Faculty Director
Personal autonomy is a prominent value in contemporary democratic societies, looming over people’s quotidian lives and individuals’ roles as democratic citizens. Autonomy holds real and lasting importance to liberals, too, with many liberals giving it pride of place as the quintessential liberal value. Liberal political philosophers often suggest that personal autonomy is at the core of liberalism itself, with some contending that autonomy is in fact a crucial human right.
Personal autonomy also enjoys popularity in pedestrian quarters. A variety of people seem to believe that one should ideally pursue values and aims that one reflectively endorses, agreeing that people ought to be self-critical in order to live good lives. And standards and ideals of personal autonomy are promoted in popular educational schemes, as part of efforts to create people who are critical, self-directed, and capable of participating positively as citizens in democratic public life.
This conference aims to analyze and assess the idea of personal autonomy, in an effort to move forward on a series of difficult philosophical issues that plague discussions of the topic. Whereas autonomy may be manifest in group, national, institutional, or other forms, the panels and discussions focus more narrowly on personal autonomy and its centrality to political philosophy and democracy. The conference has four central and consecutive goals, reflected in the structure and order of its four panels. First, the conference aims to lay bare and assess the major competing conceptions of personal autonomy, to consider whether there might be some particular conception (or conceptions) of autonomy that is (or are) most useful or appropriate to adopt for the purposes of political philosophy. Second, the conference shall address the question of whether personal autonomy is needed, at the individual level, for a good life. Third, the conferees will consider the extent to which personal autonomy may be required for democratic citizenship. Fourth, the discussion will concentrate on the question of whether there may be a new ideal or standard of personality that political philosophers should endorse, to advance philosophical discussion and deliberation. Such a standard might take form as a reworked and revised conception of autonomy; or, a new standard could be different in nature, stemming from a non-autonomous ideal of personal existence.
To accomplish these aims, this conference brings together a group of internationally distinguished political philosophers and political theorists, each of whom has made important contributions to the literature on personal autonomy. While the participants’ views differ considerably, their sustained focus will assist in making headway on the important issues that the conferees shall tackle.
Conference Structure
Each panel will feature one main paper and two or three commentators, each selected from the list of scholars given here.
Panel 1: Personal Autonomy: Competing Conceptions
There exist various different versions and understandings of personal autonomy. Some emphasize critical reflection or mental independence as the sine qua non of autonomy, while others focus more properly on the authenticity of an autonomous person’s desires, beliefs, values and goals. Certain versions of personal autonomy identify procedural neutrality as key to the concept; these differ from more “substantive” conceptions, those demanding that particular conditions, norms, or values be met in order for someone to count as autonomous. Still other views point to the importance of an actor’s personal history, emphasizing that an adequate conception of autonomy must address how an actor came to endorse her various beliefs and commitments. And, among these understandings, some conceptions of autonomy are non-individualistic, as one finds with “relational” views of autonomy that theorists at times endorse.
In what ways are these various senses of personal autonomy distinct from one another, and to what extent do the differences matter? Is there one particular version of personal autonomy that is most conceptually defensible, or especially significant for social and political philosophy?
Susan Shell is Professor and Chair of Political Science at Boston College. She is the author of Kant and the Limits of Autonomy (Harvard University Press, 2009), The Embodiment of Reason: Kant on Spirit, Generation and Community (University of Chicago Press, 1996), The Rights of Reason: A Study of Kant’s Philosophy and Politics (University of Toronto Press, 1980). She is also the co-editor (with Robert Faulkner) of America at Risk: Threats to Liberal Self-Government in an Age of Uncertainty (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2009). She has also written on Rousseau, German Idealism, and selected areas of public policy.
Richard Dagger is the E. Claiborne Robins Distinguished Chair in the Liberal Arts at the University of Richmond, where he teaches in the Political Science Department and the Program in Philosophy, Politics, Economics, and Law. He is the author of Civic Virtues: Rights, Citizenship, and Republican Liberalism (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997), along with numerous articles in such journals as Ethics, American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Criminal Justice Ethics, Review of Politics, and Law and Philosophy.
Rob Reich is Associate Professor of Political Science and Courtesy Professor in the School of Education at Stanford University. He is the author of Bridging Liberalism and Multiculturalism in Education (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002) and a contributor to Democracy at Risk: Toward a Political Science of Citizenship (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution, 2005). Reich has also written a series of articles and book chapters, including “Multicultural Accommodations in Education,” in Citizenship and Education in Liberal-Democratic Societies: Teaching for Cosmopolitan Values and Collective Identities, ed. Walter Feinberg and Kevin McDonough (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), pp. 299-324; and “Minors Within Minorities: A Problem for Liberal Multiculturalists,” in Minorities Within Minorities: Equality, Rights, and Diversity, ed. Jeff Spinner-Halev and Avigail Eisenberg (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 209-26.
Panel 2: Personal Autonomy and the Good for Persons
In what ways, and to what extent, is personal autonomy important for a good life? Should personal autonomy enjoy pride of place as the central source of human dignity, and might its achievement be the highest good for persons? Is autonomy a crucial component of a good existence, or necessary for a good life? Is there something intrinsically valuable about personal autonomy? Could it be that people who are more autonomous as more virtuous, ceteris paribus?
John Kekes is Professor Emeritus at the State University of New York at Albany. He is the author of a number of books in political philosophy and ethics, including: Against Liberalism (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1997); A Case for Conservatism (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1998); The Illusions of Egalitarianism (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2003); The Roots of Evil (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2005); and The Art of Life (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2005).
George Sher is Herbert S. Autrey Professor of Philosophy at Rice University. His research interests lie in moral psychology, in political philosophy, and, lately, in some of the connections between them. His most recent book, Who Knew? Responsibility Without Awareness (Oxford University Press, 2009) is an attempt to understand how agents can be responsible for acts of whose wrongness or foolishness they are unaware. In that book, he develops some themes that he introduced in my earlier book In Praise of Blame (Oxford, 2006) - - most notably, the idea that blame and responsibility are less closely linked to control than many have imagined. Within political philosophy, George Sher remains interested in the problems about liberalism and perfectionism that he discussed in Beyond Neutrality: Perfectionism and Politics (Cambridge, 1997). Most recently, he’s been thinking about ideas about responsibility imply about luck egalitarianism--that is, the view that inequalities are only unjust when they arise through no fault or choice of the affected parties.
Panel 3. Personal Autonomy and Healthy Democracy
How important is personal autonomy for democratic citizenship? Ought individual citizens to possess personal autonomy, or work to acquire it, for the sake of their duties and roles as democratic citizens? In political deliberations and society-wide decision making, to what extent are autonomous people helpful or required? Should personal autonomy be promoted by democratic government, and, if so, to what extent?
Lucas Swaine is Associate Professor of Government at Dartmouth College. He is the author of The Liberal Conscience: Politics and Principle in a World of Religious Pluralism (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006), and of two forthcoming articles on personal heteronomy: “Deliberate and Free: Heteronomy in the Public Sphere” (Philosophy & Social Criticism, 2009); and “Heteronomous Citizenship: Civic Virtue and the Chains of Autonomy” (Educational Philosophy and Theory, 2009). Swaine’s publications also include articles in a number of journals, including Contemporary Political Theory, Ethics, Journal of Political Philosophy, Critical Review, and Journal of Church and State.
John Christman is Associate Professor of Philosophy, Political Science, and Women’s Studies at Penn State University. He has written widely on the topic of autonomy. His works include “Relational Autonomy, Liberal Individualism, and the Social Constitution of Selves,” Philosophical Studies, Vol. 117 (2004): 143-164; “Liberty, Autonomy, and Self-Transformation,” Social Theory and Practice, Vol. 27 (2001): 185-206; and “Political Autonomy and Liberal Legitimacy,” in Personal Autonomy: New Essays on Personal Autonomy and its Role in Contemporary Philosophy, ed. James Taylor (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006), pp. 277-298. Christman has also co-edited a book entitled, Autonomy and the Challenges to Liberalism: New Essays (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), and published an edited volume on autonomy called The Inner Citadel: Essays on Individual Autonomy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989).
Natalie Stoliar is Chair and Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy, McGill University. Before coming to McGill, she taught at the University of Melbourne, Monash University, and the Australian National University. She is the author of articles in feminist philosophy, moral psychology, and the philosophy law, and is co-editor of Relational Autonomy. Feminist Perspectives on Autonomy, Agency and the Social Self.
Second Annual Ancient and Modern Conference of the Daniel Webster Project.
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~patriotism/mtc/Ethics_of_Patriotism_Conference.html
First Annual Ancient and Modern Conference of the Daniel Webster Project.
Socrates or Rousseau: Ancient and Modern Perspectives on Liberal Education
First Annual Ancient and Modern Conference of the Daniel Webster Program at Dartmouth College’s Rockefeller Center
Rationale
Our conference on Socrates and Rousseau will have three main aims: First, to explore the challenge that ancient theories of education pose to modern ideals and practices. The presuppositions of modern educational practice are often tacitly assumed and taken for granted. For example: Is teaching to be guided by the interest of the pupil or by the objective structure of knowledge? Are some subject-matters and some ideas pedagogically more important than others? How do we compare the value of the natural sciences to the value of the humanities? The best way to surface and to critically engage modern ideas is by the provocation of ancient ideas. Second, to explode the simplistic and crude caricatures we often encounter in discussions of Socratic and Rousseauean pedagogy. Socrates is often depicted as an ancient Martha Nussbaum: a secular cosmopolitan intellectual who champions personal autonomy against the claims of historical traditions. Rousseau is often depicted as the father of Benjamin Spock and John Dewey; he is said to champion permissive parenting and progressive education. We shall discover here a Socrates and a Rousseau quite remote from these familiar caricatures. Third, we shall consistently bring the insights of these thinkers to bear on current issues of reform in higher education.
Conference Program: Nov. 21 and 22, 2008.
Friday Evening, Nov. 21: 6:00 PM: Opening Reception and Dinner.
8:00 PM: Keynote Address by Professor Paul W. Gooch, President of Victoria University in the University of Toronto.
“The Mission of Socrates and the Mission of Higher Education”.
The mission of Socrates begins with a personal quest to understand the relation between knowledge and virtue, assessing his own epistemic and moral achievements in personal discussions with his fellow Athenians. Plato, convinced that reason alone cannot tame desire, transforms that mission into a political vision for creating a just society in which the capable few are educated to rule the many who lack the ability to leave the dark cave of illusion. Twenty-five centuries later, institutions of higher education must struggle with tensions between personal quest and social vision. Liberal education focuses on the individual, aiming to bring the student out of the cave of naïve assumption and simplistic solution. Society, however, looks to universities for useful graduates who will contribute to the goals it values, and therefore encourages mass education. What emerges, for higher education today, from Socratic mission and Platonic vision? and what may a Socrates learn from our contemporary educational challenges?
Saturday Morning: First Session: Socratic Pedagogy.
9:00: Paper: Mark McPherran, Professor of Philosophy, Simon Fraser University. “Examining the Self: Love, Reason, and Socratic Midwifery”.
Outside the domain of classical studies, the Socratic Method—the elenchos—is frequently presented as a relatively theory-free teaching device, suitable for use in all disciplines from art to law to engineering as a way of testing student knowledge claims (so long as its subjects possess a healthy commitment to the law of non-contradiction). However, its effective use requires a full consideration of the psychological, cultural, and ethical factors surrounding the relationship between the elenchos-wielder and his or her interlocutor. One of the best ways to approach such topics is to turn to the fountainhead of the elenchos: Plato’s Socrates. Once one does so, however, one is presented with a host of puzzles generated by the way that Socrates grounds his elenctic method in a revolutionary moral theory underwritten by Socrates’ equally revolutionary religious commitments. Modern sensibilities can also be disconcerted by Socrates’ seemingly antidemocratic and sophistical tendencies, and by his disingenuous and cruel use of both shame and erôs in the pursuit of his therapeutic, educational mission. This paper explores several of these puzzles in an attempt to delineate the relevancy of Socratic philosophizing in the modern classroom.
9:45: Paper: Gareth Matthews, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, University of Massachusetts, Amherst. “Two Forms of Socratic Method”.
The law school professor who uses the “Socratic Method” of relentlessly asking students questions rather than lecturing to them may be in no doubt as to what would be acceptable answers to those questions. By contrast, Socrates, in the early dialogues of Plato, seems to be sincere in claiming not to know what the right answers to his questions are. What are the assumptions behind the law professor’s method? What could be the virtue of philosophical questioning from the starting point of “Socratic Ignorance”?
10:30: Break.
11:00: Commentator: Jacob Howland, McFarlin Professor of Philosophy, University of Tulsa.
11:20: Commentator: Richard O. Brooks, Professor of Law Emeritus, Vermont Law School.
11:40: Questions from Audience and General Discussion.
12:30: Break for Lunch.
Saturday Afternoon: Second Session: Rousseau as Pedagogue.
2:00: Paper: Clifford Orwin, Professor of Political Science, University of Toronto and the Hoover Institution of Stanford University: “Education toward compassion—or away from it? Rousseau versus Plato.”
Some (most recently Laurence Cooper) have argued that Rousseau’s Emile owes a great deal to Plato’s Republic. Obviously, Rousseau intended it as his response to and reworking of the Republic. On the issue of compassion, however—so clearly crucial to Emile but less obviously so to the Republic as well—it is hard to read Emile as other than a radical critique of the Republic and Plato’s low estimation of this sentiment. (Radical but not, as we shall see, unqualified.).
2:45: Paper: Arthur Melzer, Professor Political Science, Michigan State University: Richard Velkley, Celia Scott Weatherhead Professor of Philosophy, Tulane University.
4:20: Commentator: Christopher Kelly, Professor of Political Science, Boston College.
5:00: Questions from Audience and General Discussion.
Webster Project Conferences.
Here is a description of our upcoming conferences in comparative ancient and modern studies.