Contemplative Education is a field of practice and scholarship that emphasizes engagement in contemplative practices. It is not clear, however, what conception of contemplation ought to animate members of this field. Furthermore, although advocates of Contemplative Education express certain commitments to pluralism about contemplative practice, it is not clear to what extent those commitments get upheld. Through a close examination of three practices across three chapters—on theoria, mindfulness, and testimonio—this study draws out certain features of contemplative thinking while also offering members of Contemplative Education new conceptual resources and intellectual traditions to draw from in their own work. The final chapter makes a case for thinking of these three practices, and all contemplative practices within Contemplative Education, as fundamentally interested in the cultivation of ‘egalitarian reverence’: an evaluative attitude that extends basic human dignity to oneself and others, paired with a faithful sense of devotion to, and awe in light of, the ideal of democratic equality.

As the title indicates, this three-essay dissertation explores the relations between value pluralism and liberal democracy. The first essay, “Negative versus Positive Freedom: Making Sense of the Dichotomy,” starts with the puzzling appeal of the negative-versus-positive-freedom dichotomy. Why has this distinction, despite forceful criticisms against it, continued to dominate mainstream discourses on freedom in contemporary political theory? Does it grasp something fundamental about the phenomenology of freedom? In this essay I examine four main approaches to making sense of the appeal of this dichotomy, and the challenges they each face. Both the conventional, naive contrast between “freedom from” and “freedom to,” and the revisionist strategy to distinguish between the “opportunity-concept” and the “exercise-concept” of freedom, upon close scrutiny, fail to survive MacCallum’s triadic argument against all dichotomous views on the concept of freedom. The third account, which reduce the negative/positive dichotomy of freedom to the divide between “phenomenal” and “nounemal” conceptions of the self, or of the range of preventing conditions, is both interpretively misleading and conceptually uninformative, as I illustrate by using Berlin’s discussion on self-abnegation as an example. In the fourth place, I analyze why both the historical bifurcation account that take the negative/positive dichotomy of freedom as merely genealogical, on the one hand, and the republican critique of it based on the presumably sublating conception of non-domination, on the other hand, are unsatisfying. Finally, I argue that grounding the negative/positive dichotomy of freedom on the idea of value pluralism avoids the pitfalls of those approaches examined. According to this account, the dichotomized instantiation of freedom is necessary insofar as we live not in isolation but with other moral agents. The “negative” freedom instantiated in the access to an extensive sphere of permissible choices and actions, and the “positive” freedom instantiated in the access to collective decision-making and democratic self-government, reflect two equally genuine yet incommensurable modes of freedom as a basic value. Many believe that value pluralism and liberalism are ultimately incompatible, however, since liberalism implies the prioritization of liberal values over other basic values, which is contradictory to the value pluralist idea that all basic values are equally genuine and incommensurable. The next two essays take up this challenge, arguing on the contrary that a persuasively elaborated version of value pluralism is not only compatible with liberal commitments, but can also provide distinctive grounds for liberal democracy and have significant political implications. In the second essay, “Value Pluralism and Its Compatibility with Liberalism,” I explain the methodology of my argument, elaborate three key concepts underlying value pluralism – value objectivity, value incompatibility, and value incommensurability – and then develop an account of modal heterogeneity of value instantiation, as opposed to valuative hierarchy. Whereas valuative hierarchy is in tension with value incommensurability, the idea of modal heterogeneity allows that different values have different modes of instantiation that warrant differentiated prioritization of certain values in relevant practical contexts, without implying anything about the comparative moral worth of relevant values. I use a mathematical analogy to illustrate the modal heterogeneity of value instantiation, as well as how we may accord freedom a special institutional role on the basis of its modal specialty vis-à-vis other basic values, rendering liberalism compatible with value pluralism. The argument is completed in the third essay, “Value Pluralism, Liberal Democracy, and Political Judgment,” where I compare my account based on the idea of modal heterogeneity, developed in the second essay, with three existing versions of liberal pluralism. Whereas Berlin’s argument from choice, Crowder’s proposal of pluralist virtues, and Galston’s presumption of expressive liberty all fail to pass either the Jump Test or the Trump Test, my modal account overcomes these two basic difficulties faced by liberal pluralism. The rest of the essay discusses three main political implications of the modal account of liberal pluralism. First, it helps us better understand the nature of demarcating and overstepping the so-called “frontiers” of a “negative” area of permissible choices and actions free from interference, or put another way, of balancing the protection of civil liberties and rights, on the one hand, with the procurement of certain important social goods through policies, on the other hand. Second, the modal account entails the dichotomization argument for democracy, and as a consequence supports not only liberalism, but liberal democracy. Recognizing the tension between negative and positive modes of freedom as immanent to the dynamic of liberal democracy, value pluralists nonetheless have reason to cherish, rather than to decry, such dynamic. Third, the modal account also suggests we appreciate the contentious yet indispensible role of political judgment in democratic life, and attend to the normative theorizing of its implications. On the one hand, it recommends institutional designs that diversify forms of political decision-making, such as by introducing adequate mechanisms of checks and balances and establishing relevant sites of expertise. On the other hand, it calls for the appreciation of the ideal of statespersonship, even in a liberal democratic society.

This dissertation introduces a research puzzle relatively unexplored by both liberal theorists and critics of liberalism, which I term an irony of liberal universalism: while liberalism aims to guarantee the autonomy of all individuals, the expansion of liberalism through imposition became one of the external factors that interfere with individuals’ autonomous judgment. I suggest that the legacy of imperialism has created an environment in which “non-Western” actors adopt liberal values in a marginalized and alienating way, even when they decide to utilize those values as their vehicle of emancipation. This is because these actors adopt liberal values under the collective narrative that liberal modernity is a condition for becoming a developed nation or a strategic choice for international recognition. Unlike the existing literature, which has largely focused on viewpoints fundamentally critical of liberal morality, my research takes a distinctive approach of problematizing the harm of liberal imperialism as a liberal within a liberal framework of individual autonomy and self-authorship. By taking this approach, I aim to develop a liberal theoretical framework that resolves “non-Western” actors’ alienating relationship with liberalism marked by the counterproductive notion of “Westernization.” To achieve this goal, I envision a situated model of liberalism, which contrasts with the dominant model of liberalism, typically consisting of a priori normative standards. As the first step of this broader goal, this research reconstructs individual autonomy, one of the foundational concepts of the liberal political model, in a relational and situated direction. Drawing on the feminist theory of relational autonomy, I propose individual autonomy as critical appropriation: the capacity to construct one’s life by appropriating existing life-constructing materials and justifying one’s judgment from critical challenges posed by meaningful others. To maintain their individuality as well as their critical and reflective capacities, “non-Western” actors should critically interact both with traditionalist views that oppress them in the name of cultural integrity and with paternalistic attitudes or imperialistic ideologies of “the West” that seek to impose perspectives external to their society as universal normative standards. Critical appropriation captures this dynamic reflective process more accurately than the existing conception of individual autonomy typically defined as self-government. Moreover, I propose critical appropriation as a more attractive and persuasive conception of individual autonomy for any contemporary society dealing with issues of pluralism and cultural imperialism, either “West” or “non-West.” In fact, I argue that critical appropriation can provide a liberal conceptual framework that helps us move beyond the persistent dichotomy of “liberal West” and “non-liberal Rest.”

This thesis is a critique of the prominent strand of contemporary liberal political theory which maintains that liberal political authority must, in some sense, rest on the free consent of those subjected to it, and that such a consensus is achieved if a polity’s basic structure can be publicly justified to its citizenry, or to a relevant subset of it. Call that the liberal legitimacy view. I argue that the liberal legitimacy view cannot provide viable normative foundations for political authority, for the hypothetical consensus it envisages cannot be achieved and sustained without either arbitrarily excluding conspicuous sectors of the citizenry or commanding a consent that is less than free. That is because the liberal legitimacy view’s structure is one that requires a form of consent that carries free-standing normative force (i.e. normative force generated by voluntariness), yet the particular form of hypothetical consent through public justification envisaged by the view does not possess such force, because of its built-in bias in favour of liberalism. I also argue that the liberal legitimacy view is the most recent instantiation of one of two main strands of liberal theory, namely the nowadays dominant contract-based liberalism, which seeks to ground liberal political authority in a hypothetical agreement between the citizens. My case against the liberal legitimacy view, then, contributes to the revitalisation of the other main approach to the normative foundations of liberalism, namely the substantivist one, which legitimates liberal political authority through an appeal to the substantive values and virtues safeguarded and promoted by liberal polities.

Ondřej Lánský The Examination of One Form of the Atlantic Modernization's Moral Background Abstract This thesis deals with critique of fundamental moral pattern of the Atlantic social space, that shapes some important features of social, political, and human action in the global era and endorses legitimacy of the reigning social order. The main task of this thesis is to show pathological moments of the contemporary development of global society through comparison of some constitutive features of Atlantic and Latin-American societies. The most important theoretical basis for this thesis is Axel Honneth's theory of recognition. As articulations of constitutive features of social normativity (ergo as expressions of shared social imaginaries of social configuration) are used chosen social philosophical concepts: John Rawls' liberalism and Enrique Dussel's philosophy of liberation. The thesis contains therefore four steps in three main chapters. Firstly the author sociologically analyzes the concept of social esteem in the context of theory of recognition. Secondly he examines John Rawls' normative theory of justice. Thirdly the author points some aspects of Rawls' theory, which allow certain interpretation and critique of the social esteem and of the liberal definition of moral legitimacy of the Atlantic...

Modernity has generally been interpreted as a radical expression of human progress in the light of the advances of modern science and technology. According to Alasdair MacIntyre, however, modernity is a project "doomed to failure". Given the progressive-linearity of the modern model of rationality, the past has, in principle, been ruled out as a source of moral-political wisdom and guidance. From the perspective of modernity, the present (as the progressive moment of the future) has therefore nothing to learn from past traditions. MacIntyre contends that the moral confusion within modernity comes from its loss of telos, mediated in terms of the past. Modernity therefore harbours a paradox based on its inability to provide a philosophical justification for establishing the possibility of human solidarity in the present, while simultaneously affirming its faith in the future. In this regard, MacIntyre's work is an important contribution to the philosophical debate on modernity. / Philosophy / M. A. (Philosophy)

Thesis (PhD)--University of Stellenbosch, 2002. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The tradition of liberalism in South Africa has played a significant role in shaping the country's multi-party democracy. Yet, there are several gaps within the tradition of liberalism which can be associated with an aversion towards majority rule, equalising opportunities through affirmative action measures, and a focus on securing political rights as opposed to substantive rights for all citizens. It is my contention that weaknesses within the liberal tradition could be minimised if a more credible conception of liberalism is constructed within the parameters of a deliberative framework of democracy. In this dissertation I make an argument for a defensible form of liberalism which can be achieved through a rational, reflexive discourse-oriented procedure of deliberative democracy. Deliberative democracy in turn can engender a form of citizenship which recognises the need for citizens to care, reason and engage justly in political conversation with others. KEYWORDS: Liberalism, communitarianism, deliberative democracy and South Africa. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Die tradisie van liberalisme in Suid-Afrika het 'n noemenswaardige bydrae gelewer tot die totstandkoming van die land se veelparty demokratiese bestel. Afgesien hiervan, verskyn daar vele gapings binne die liberale tradisie wat hoogstens vereenselwig kan word met 'n teenkanting teen meerderheidsregering, skepping van gelyke geleenthede deur regstellende aksies en 'n fokus eerder om politieke regte liewer as ook substantiewe regte vir alle burgers te bekom. Ek redeneer dat tekortkominge binne die liberale tradisie geminimaliseer kan word indien 'n meer vededigbare begrip van liberalisme gekonstrueer word binne die perke van 'n beredeneerde demokratiese raamwerk. Ek voer aan dat 'n verdedigbare vorm van liberalisme bewerkstellig kan word deur 'n rasionele, refleksiewe diskoersgeoriënteerde prosedure van beredeneerde demokrasie. Op die beurt kan beredeneerde demokrasie 'n vorm van burgerskap teweegbring wat die belangrikheid van omgee en redenering erken, en ook terselfdertyd burgers betrek op 'n geregverdige wyse in gesprekvoeing met ander persone. SLEUTELWOORDE: Liberalisme, gemeenskapsgerigte liberalisme, beredeneerde demokrasie en Suid-Afrika.

Modernity has generally been interpreted as a radical expression of human progress in the light of the advances of modern science and technology. According to Alasdair MacIntyre, however, modernity is a project "doomed to failure". Given the progressive-linearity of the modern model of rationality, the past has, in principle, been ruled out as a source of moral-political wisdom and guidance. From the perspective of modernity, the present (as the progressive moment of the future) has therefore nothing to learn from past traditions. MacIntyre contends that the moral confusion within modernity comes from its loss of telos, mediated in terms of the past. Modernity therefore harbours a paradox based on its inability to provide a philosophical justification for establishing the possibility of human solidarity in the present, while simultaneously affirming its faith in the future. In this regard, MacIntyre's work is an important contribution to the philosophical debate on modernity. / Philosophy, Practical and Systematic Theology / M. A. (Philosophy)

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