The Idea of a Realistic Utopia

University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2017 The Idea Of A Realistic Utopia Collin Anthony University of Pennsylvania, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations Part of the Philosophy Commons Recommended Citation Anthony, Collin, "The Idea Of A Realistic Utopia" (2017). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 2168. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2168 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2168 For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Idea Of A Realistic Utopia Abstract The purpose of this dissertation is to articulate the proper aims and limits of political philosophy by expanding upon John Rawls’s idea of a realistic utopia and applying it to various debates in contemporary political philosophy. First, I defend the importance of ideal theory in constructing a theory of justice and respond to various critics, such as Amartya Sen and others, who argue that ideal theory is neither necessary nor sufficient for our worko t advance justice in society. Second, I argue that empirical facts must be included in our reasoning about fundamental principles of justice, contrary to theorists such as G.A. Cohen who argues that political theorizing should proceed independently of such facts. Finally, I conclude with some reflecting thoughts on the importance of articulating a conception of justice that avoids hopelessly utopian ideals. In doing so, I defend the vision of a realistically utopian society as one that both answers our most fundamental interests and also provides us with the best chance of realizing justice in the world. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Philosophy First Advisor Kok-Chor Tan Subject Categories Philosophy This dissertation is available at ScholarlyCommons: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2168 THE IDEA OF A REALISTIC UTOPIA Collin J. Anthony A DISSERTATION in Philosophy Presented to the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2017 Supervisor of Dissertation ________________________ Kok-Chor Tan, Professor of Philosophy Graduate Group Chairperson ________________________ Samuel Freeman, Avalon Professor of the Humanities and Professor of Philosophy and of Law Dissertation Committee Samuel Freeman, Avalon Professor of the Humanities and Professor of Philosophy and of Law Errol Lord, Assistant Professor of Philosophy THE IDEA OF A REALISTIC UTOPIA COPYRIGHT 2017 Collin James Anthony iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First of all, I would like to thank my dissertation supervisor, Kok-Chor Tan, and my committee members, Samuel Freeman and Errol Lord, for their patience and helpful guidance throughout the years. Special thanks are also in order for Adrienne Martin for her openness and honesty about the various challenges of the dissertation process. I must also express my sincerest gratitude to my dear friend, Govind Persad, for his mentorship and his friendly philosophical engagements. Sriram Sridharan, Karthik Sethuraman, Shirley Leung, Seth Shannin, Bezhou Feng, Eric Chen, Luke Reilly, and Chris Ceperley are also due thanks for their enduring friendship throughout my time in Kings Court English College House. I must also thank my mother for her unwavering love and support throughout the course of my life. Finally, I must thank Krimo Bokreta, Jorge Santiago-Aviles, Marta Rivas-Olmeda, Cam Grey, Ann Vernon-Grey, and the other members of the KCECH community for making Penn more than just a place of scholarly pursuits, but a place for social enrichment. iv ABSTRACT THE IDEA OF A REALISTIC UTOPIA COLLIN ANTHONY KOK-CHOR TAN The purpose of this dissertation is to articulate the proper aims and limits of political philosophy by expanding upon John Rawls’s idea of a realistic utopia and applying it to various debates in contemporary political philosophy. First, I defend the importance of ideal theory in constructing a theory of justice and respond to various critics, such as Amartya Sen and others, who argue that ideal theory is neither necessary nor sufficient for our work to advance justice in society. Second, I argue that empirical facts must be included in our reasoning about fundamental principles of justice, contrary to theorists such as G.A. Cohen who argues that political theorizing should proceed independently of such facts. Finally, I conclude with some reflecting thoughts on the importance of articulating a conception of justice that avoids hopelessly utopian ideals. In doing so, I defend the vision of a realistically utopian society as one that both answers our most fundamental interests and also provides us with the best chance of realizing justice in the world. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS……………………………………………………………….III ABSTRACT…………………………………………………………………………………..IV PREFACE……………………………………………………………………………………..VI CHAPTER 1. Three Dichotomies in Political Philosophy ……………….1 CHAPTER 2. The Idea of a Realistic Utopia …………………………….....13 CHAPTER 3. Justice and Ideal Theory…………………………………………28 CHAPTER 4. A Reply to Amartya Sen………………………………………....87 CHAPTER 5. Justice and Empirical Facts……………………………………126 CHAPTER 6. Embracing a Hopeful Ideal…………………………………….198 BIBLIOGRAPHY………………………………….……………………………………….227 vi PREFACE This work in political philosophy explicates and defends Rawls’s idea of a realistic utopia in order to respond to many debates that have arisen in the contemporary philosophical literature surrounding the nature of justice. These debates include: the relevance of utopianism and realism, the relationship between principles of justice and empirical facts, and the importance of ideal theory in constructing a conception of justice. Not surprisingly, new work is produced within these topics at a healthy pace and some of this material could not be fully explored in this dissertation. One work that is worthy of note is Gerald Gaus’s book, The Tyranny of the Ideal, which was published after my chapter on ideal theory had already been drafted and completed.1 As such, despite its importance, my dissertation does not directly address its main arguments, and only refers to it in a limited capacity . Nevertheless, many of the ideas advocated for here can be expanded upon and applied to his work, which I will leave for future research and exploration. 1 Gaus, Gerald. The Tyranny of the Ideal. Princeton University Press, 2016. 1 Chapter 1: Three Dichotomies in Political Philosophy2 I. The Purpose of the Dissertation The purpose of this dissertation is to explore three dichotomies that can be said to characterize several debates in political philosophy: realism vs. utopianism, ideal vs. nonideal theory, and fact-sensitivity vs. fact-insensitivity. Each of these dichotomies involves interrelated issues surrounding the methods of political philosophy, the nature of justice, and the proper goals and aspirations we should have when constructing a theory of justice. The claim that I defend is as follows: the idea of a realistic utopia—an important idea that appears in the work of John Rawls—is the most appropriate framework for resolving these three dichotomies and will yield important insights about the goals and methods of political philosophy. In developing the idea, I argue that Rawls’s understanding of justice represents a position that (a) establishes the importance of ideal theory, (b) requires a sensitivity to empirical facts, and (c) provides a vision of society that is utopian, yet is still realistically achievable. Before turning to our explication of these dichotomies, let me illustrate the importance of these questions with an example. Suppose a socialist egalitarian asserts that justice requires the complete equality of resources among all persons, and that we reply with the following: “Your conception of justice is unachievable—human beings will never be able to act in ways to sustain perfect equality of resources due to human 2 All notes to Rawls’s work after the first citation will follow this notation: Theory of Justice (TJ), Political Liberalism (PL), Justice as Fairness (JF), The Law of Peoples, (LP), “Kantian Constructivism,” (KC), and Collected Papers (CP). 2 motivational limitations and imperfect human institutions. Consequently, your conception of justice must be false as it is clearly infeasible and incompatible with our human nature.” Imagine that the socialist replies: “That is no objection to my theory at all, for I am not making any background assumptions about human behavior, psychology or social institutions. If we hold human psychology as an irrelevant variable, my theory is without flaw. Justice mandates perfect equality. If it turns out that human beings are hopelessly selfish, then so much the worse for humans. The content of justice is not undermined by our imperfect nature and our inability to realize it.” These exchanges are not uncommon in debates surrounding the demands of justice, and they highlight important issues about some sources of disagreement between different schools of thought. From this example, we can see that error, if there exists any, is much more likely to be the result of different underlying assumptions about what should and should not be taken for granted when theorizing about political philosophy in the first place, and not the result of logical flaws in conclusions drawn from the stated premises. For, it may very well be true that if human psychology

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