Electric Agora (archive)

Tag: liberalism

  • Why I am Not a Rortyan but Would Like to Be

    By Jay Jeffers ___ There is no rivalry like an intrastate rivalry. In the state of Pragmatism, the game of the week is always Richard Rorty vs. Hilary Putnam. Nothing ever gets settled, but the effort is there. This is the third and likely final entry in an ongoing attempt to settle a few things.…

  • Whose Racism? Which Enlightenment?

    By Kevin Currie-Knight ___ Like so much else, the Enlightenment seems to be a flash point in the contemporary culture wars. Some, like Douglas Murray and Stephen Pinker, suggest that we are moving too far away from “enlightenment values” like liberty, equality, and the idea of a universal human nature (to which they oppose the…

  • An Ethical Response to Fascism

    by E. John Winner ___ There can be a profound difference between confrontation and conflict. Confrontation simply involves facing the world as it is, and facing others as they are. Doing so can bring out the most creative of our resources; the most charitable toward others. Conflict can establish unbreachable barriers between ourselves and others,…

  • The Interdependence of Activists and Skeptics

    by Kevin Currie-Knight ____ It started as a casual conversation between myself and a colleague, but quickly went in a heated and interesting direction. She and I were talking about our teaching, and I mentioned some class readings and discussions my sections were doing on a particular issue that my colleague and I both care…

  • on authority [and rousseau’s fork]

    by Daniel A. Kaufman ___ Hannah Arendt maintained that one has authority, when one commands obedience from others, not by exercising power over them, but because they recognize and respect one’s right to do so. [1] To accept authority, then, is to accept hierarchy, which, in turn, is to accept a substantial if not formal…

  • Liberalism, Diversity and Social Cohesion

    by Kevin Currie-Knight ___ I am not as sure as I once was, and I suppose that means I’m doing this “getting older” thing right. What am I not so sure of? For the last ten years or so, I have been convinced that the technological and cultural inertia toward increased diversity and pluralism is…

  • Cancel Culture is a Misdiagnosed Problem

    by Kevin Currie-Knight ____ I’ve wanted to write this article for a while. Every time, though, I postpone for some reason. Not to worry, of course, because examples of what we call cancel culture abound. The trend seemingly has no expiration date. Whenever I worry that the examples I am going to use will become…

  • Free Speech and Academic freedom in 2020: A Conversation with David Ottlinger

    by Daniel A. Kaufman ____ EA’s own David Ottlinger and I discuss the ongoing efforts to silence, de-platform, and otherwise “Cancel” Professor Kathleen Stock, of the University of Sussex for her work and activism on sex and gender related issues; the Daily Nous’s treatment of this subject; and the more general question of the capacity…

  • Liberalism and the Question of “Cancel Culture”

    by Kevin Currie-Knight Cancel culture – the idea that it is increasingly hard to voice unpopular ideas without risking serious consequence – is illiberal. At least that seems to be an increasingly (and maybe ironically) prevalent view. But, in important way, it is arguably quite liberal. Maybe cancel culture is both liberal and illiberal depending…

  • The Good Old Liberal Consensus

    by Daniel A. Kaufman ___ The editors have invited us to “examine a single philosopher or school, maybe a movement,” so that we might “consider how what passed for wisdom then may or may not help us now.”†  Undoubtedly, there are many areas in which we have surpassed the wisdom of our predecessors, but one…