Pragmatism. Practice and the Possibility of Progress

Chapter 3 Pragmatism. Practiceand the possibility of progress “The ethical life belongs to human beings,livingtogether in ever largergroups, and working out their shared liveswith one another.Philosophy’stask is to facilitatethis working out.” — P. Kitcher 1Cosmopolitanism as apersonal wayoflife Cosmopolitanism and egalitarianism are not onlytheoretical normative ideals. They can become alived practice when theyare endorsed by individual agents, shape theirethos, and influencehow agents feel and think, talk and act about global issues. The third essential feature of my theory of cosmopolitan responsibility is its pragmatic nature for which Itake some inspiration from the rich and diverse philosophical tradition of US-Americanpragmatism, notablyfrom the works of John Dewey.¹⁴⁵ Although the inspiration is more general thansystemat- ic, the following chapter will introduce several elements of apragmatist approach to ethics that Isuggest to integrate into the proposed theory of cosmopolitan responsibility. To be clear,Ido not aspire to develop acomprehensive account of pragmatic ethics, which is admittedlyinitself less acoherent moral philosophical theory than aspecific perspective on the means and aims of ethics.¹⁴⁶ Neither do Ipropose afull pragmatist account of (global) justice.¹⁴⁷ The fact that Dewey’sbiography shows him personallyanactive cosmopolitan, involved in manyprogressive social movements around the world, shall onlybebrieflymentioned here. For his engagement in Turkey,China, Mexicoand elsewhere, cf. the biographybyMartin (2002).— Dewey himself does not particularlystress the cosmopolitan implications of his ethics himself. Nevertheless,therehavebeen several attempts in the literaturetoreadhim as acosmopolitan in general, as wellasavaluable contributortothe project of aglobal ethics (Waks 2009,Hickman 2010). Particularly fruitful, in this regard, wereattempts to takeupDewey’sthinkinginpolitical theory and theories of international relations (Cochran 1999,Bray2011). Good overviews areprovided by LaFollette(2000), Anderson (2010a), Pappas (1998), Serra (2009) and Welchman (1995).– Yet, even for asingle pragmatist philosopher likeDewey,itisdif- ficulttoidentify the concretecontentofhis ethics.AsPappas has it: “When reading Dewey […]it is importanttoresist the philosophical habitoftryingtofind a ‘system.’ Abetterapproach is to become acquaintedwith his moral vision. But this task is complicated by the fact that Dewey did not consolidatehis ideas about ethics in asingle work. He scatteredhis ideas throughouthis manybooks and essays.Insome cases he even presented them in aparagraphortwo placed OpenAccess. ©2020 Jan-Christoph Heilinger,published by De Gruyter. This work is licensed under the CreativeCommons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 License. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110612271-005 120 Pragmatism In asomewhat piecemeal approach then, Isimplyseek to present selected elements of pragmatist and neo-pragmatist reasoningabout ethics which together point towardsaplausible alternative to avariety of conventional philosophical thinking about the role and goals of ethics. Central to the pragmatic approach is the role of individual experience,the importance of personal habits and pat- terns of conduct as away to turn considered values into justified action, asys- tematic method for moralinquiry that makes room for normative pluralism, and an optimisticbelief in the possibilityofprogress in living together.These elements also shape the ethos of cosmopolitan responsibility. Pragmatism is often metwith reproach of refusingtoprovide asubstantial normative criterion for decision making and assessment and being concerned in- stead simply with ‘whatever works’.Iftrue, anarrowfocus on ‘whatever works’ would make for avery uninteresting view,particularlyinethics, since ethics should provide appropriatereasons for the normative views held and actions un- dertaken. While astrict ‘whatever works’ hence cannot constituteaworthwhile aim of the ethical project (nor of anyphilosophical undertaking), the reproach against pragmatism nevertheless catches well one distinctive feature of pragmatist ethics:namelythat philosophicalreasoninginethics should take into account how the theoretical tools employed make adifferenceinpractice. Acentral claim in pragmatism is that ideas, includingnorms and values, cannot prove their “truth” independentlyfrom practical implementation, i.e. they have to be put to ‘work’.Inthe words of James: “truth happens to an idea” (James 1909, 574). Truth,onthis understanding,isnothing but the successful use of ideas in practice.Pragmatism is hence concerned, first,with the acute circumstances under which certain problems appear;and,secondly, with the impact theories and ideas actuallyhaveinsuch circumstances, i.e., how they work with regard to overcomingordealing with perceivedproblems. In this pragmatic sense,moralityisnot adetached intellectual enterprise of establishing adeterminate and substantiveset of rules and principles to guide human behaviour,but should be understood as acollective,social undertaking, as acontinuingprocess, an ongoingchallengetofigureout how to deal best with the givenproblems in the context of humans living together. almost parentheticallyinthe midst of apassagedevoted to another philosophical topic” (Pap- pas 1998, 100). It has been notedthat the notion of justiceislargely absent in Dewey’swritings (Dieleman, Rondel et al. 2017). While recentlysome have started to address this lacuna (Talisse 2017,Rondel 2018), my own attempttoadvance the project of aglobal political ethics can, as is explained in this chapter,drawdirectlyfrommanypragmatist insights. Cosmopolitanismasapersonal way of life 121 This first,tentative characterisation invites abrief recapitulation of the con- creteproblem for which the turn towardpragmatism seems to me particularly useful. At issue in this book is, ultimately, the problem of how humans should live together under conditions of globalisation, which are currentlyshaped by enormousinequalities in distribution, massive asymmetries in power and influ- ence, and persisting domination and structuralinjustice. In this context it is still unclear how exactlyindividuals should act and institutional arrangements should look like in order to allow and support good livesfor all and agood living together of all. This is the massive,current ethical challengeofthe ethical project.Inaddressingit, Kitcher,for example, foresees also arole for moral philosophy: “The ethical life belongstohuman beings, living togetherineverlarger groups,and workingout their shared liveswith one another.Philosophy’stask is to facilitatethis workingout.” (Kitcher 2012,2). Iagree and my writing thus aspires to contribute to the task of figuring out how individuals should think and act in order to live well together underthe de facto circumstances of cosmopolitanism. These global circumstances generate ajointlyshared sphere of interaction that can alsobecaputured in pragmatic perspective.For Dewey,the actual inter- actionsbetween people who live together,beitinsmaller or largergroups,give rise to what he calls “the public”.The public is constituted by all who are in one wayoranother influenced or affected by the other’sactions. In ThePublic and Its Problems,Dewey writes We take then our point of departurefromthe objective fact that human acts have consequences upon others,that some of these consequences areperceived, and that their percep- tion leads to subsequent effort to control action so as to securesome consequences and avoid others.Followingthis clew,weare led to remark that the consequences areoftwo kinds,those which affect the persons directlyengaged in atransaction, and those which affect others beyond those immediatelyconcerned. In this distinctionwefind the germ of the distinction between the privateand the public. When indirect consequences arerec- ognized and thereiseffort to regulatethem, somethinghavingthe traits of astate comes into existence. (Dewey 1927,244) This distinction givesalay of the land in which problems of global justice and global ethics are embedded: the fact that some of our actions impact on others, even if this is in amediated and indirect manner, generates awide-rangingand inclusive field of interaction in which there is aneed for individual actions (and thus their consequences) to be regulated. Iamlessconcerned here with Dewey’s notion thatthis bringsabout alreadysomething similar to “astate”.The estab- lishmentofajoint interactional sphere—in which there is mutualinfluence, the consequences of which are perceivable, and hence at least some effort is 122 Pragmatism made to regulate individual actions—is sufficient.Dewey further specifies “the public” by stating that it “consists of all those who are affected by the indirect consequences of transactions to such an extent thatitisdeemed necessary to have thoseconsequences systematicallycared for” (Dewey 1927,245 – 246). Such adefinition of “the public” as unconstrained by nationalboundaries is of fundamental importance to my purpose here. The relevant form of apublicis created by the interactions and relationships between agents; and particularlyso when the impact of some agent’saction on others is harmful or damaging.¹⁴⁸ Dewey defends auniversal egalitarianism when he assumesthat all persons mat- ter equally, since “other persons are selvestoo” and “the good is the same in quality wherever it is found” (Dewey 1922, 202).All this points to apotentially global scope of the Deweyan

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