Title from title page of PDF (University of Missouri--St. Louis, viewed February 23, 2010). Includes bibliographical references (p. 47-49).

Faculty of Humanities School of Literature and Language Studies 8703354e kate.skinner@mweb.co.za / The dissertation tracks the media development and diversity policy positions of the South African government with a particular focus on the establishment of the Media Development and Diversity Agency. It tracks the reasons for the reduction in the Agency’s funding and the curtailing of its mandate. The dissertation argues that a powerful coalition of forces including the commercial media sector and the Department of Finance (now National Treasury) impacted on the policy process to drive government thinking in a more market-driven direction. It explores the implications of this market thinking for the deepening of media development and diversity in the country. Further, the research looks at an alternative critical political economy of the media vision – firstly, in terms of how this vision was scuppered in the policy process, but also how it might be resurrected. The critical political economy of the media school argues that development and diversity issues are not unproblematically served by the market and commercially driven media systems. Critical political economists of the media call for a number of state intervention including anti-monopoly legislation, subsidies for struggling more marginalised media sectors and so forth. Also, they call for the development of a core non-commodified, citizenship-orientated and inclusive public service media sector.

Much of contemporary mainstream political philosophy operates under the assumption that if reasonable people deliberate about matters of basic justice in the right conditions, agreement will emerge. This assumption implies that although reasonable people will likely disagree about private matters concerning the nature of the good life, they will nonetheless agree about public matters of justice. I reject this assumption, and in this dissertation I argue that reasonable people are likely to experience deep and persistent disagreements about matters of basic justice. I concede that there are some domains of justice where broad agreement has been achieved in modern democratic societies, namely those concerning the scope and content of civil and political liberties. However, when it comes to the scope and content of economic liberties, there is little agreement to be had. This is because reasonable people can be committed to radically different premises about matters of basic justice as well as the fact that basic agreed-upon concepts can be interpreted and interconnected in significantly different ways. Even in ideal theory, then, where we restrict ourselves to idealized reasonable people, rational consensus is not a feasible goal on certain core matters of justice. From here, I turn to the realm of non-ideal deliberation about justice and explore the difficult problem of rational political ignorance. I further discuss the effects of the Internet on non-ideal political deliberation, and I look at the ways in which online deliberation can fuel normal cognitive biases and deepen political polarization. I argue that matters of economic justice are characterized by both moral pluralism and epistemic complexity, both of which tend to be downplayed within the deliberative enclaves that proliferate on the Internet. How are we to deal with these problems of political disagreement and polarization? To help answer this question, I turn to the tradition of American pragmatism, and especially the writings of William James, to suggest a re-orientation of political philosophy away from the assumption of rational consensus and toward a more humble, but more constructive, vision in which the philosopher attempts to fashion new ideals that might help overcome currently entrenched disagreements.

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In this essay, the Scanlonian contractualist formula will be understood as follows: Within the domain of morality of what we owe to each other, an action is morally wrong if it follows principles that similarly motivated people can reasonably reject. Consequently, the concept of ‘reasonable rejection’ is the operative element in moral valuation, thus begging the question of what it is for a rejection to be reasonable. The problem of circularity in Scanlon’s contractualism builds upon a reading according to which Scanlon’s explanation of what it is to be ‘reasonably rejected’ seems to be understood as ‘when the action is morally wrong’. If this is the case, then Scanlon’s contractualism refers to its own thesis when performing moral valuations: that is wrong which can be reasonably rejected, and for an action to be reasonably rejected it must be morally wrong. The problem of circularity apparently renders Scanlon’s contractualism ‘empty’ as it cannot explain what it is for an action to be morally wrong without referring to its own thesis. In this essay I will try to clarify the difference between welfarist and structural charges of circularity. I will argue that the structural charges of circularity are due to a fallacious constructivist reading of What We Owe to Each Other. As I understand Scanlon, the constructivist reading places Scanlon’s theory too close to the contractualist tradition. I will also argue that critics holding Scanlon’s contractualism to be circular have failed to note that his theory only claims to cover a narrow domain of morality. Where critics hold Scanlon’s contractualism to refer to its own thesis when performing moral valuations I will argue that the theory refers to moral domains outside that of what we owe to each other. Hopefully my discussion on constructivism and circularity will shed some light on the simple brilliance and practical applicability of Scanlon’s contractualism. I will give a brief overview of What We Owe to Each Other before I present the critique put forth by Onora O’Neill, Mark Timmons and Joseph Raz. Then I will show how Scanlon treats the problem of circularity in his book, and how his defense targets substantial and not structural charges of circularity. I will then show that the structural critique is fallacious by analyzing the domain of morality that Scanlon’s contractualism targets. Finally I will try to apply Scanlon’s formula on personal relationships and on environmental issues. As of this point I will refer to Scanlon’s thesis as ‘contractualism’ while other theories following the contractualist tradition will be referred to as ‘contractarian’.

Abstract: This thesis examines the foundations of individual human rights. The general thought that informs the discussion is that rights and values are two different kinds of moral discourse. Hence, any attempt to simply state rights in value terms will be problematic because the agent-relative character of values does not lend itself to grounding/ explaining interpersonal rules, like rights. The thesis outlines agent-relative values, showing their plausibility, and then proceeds to show how rights perform a different function. The attempt to move from talk about what is right to what rights we have is termed the ‘moralist fallacy’. Rights are kinds of restrictions that others face on their actions when they are promoting their own good. Axiology is about how best to achieve one’s objective agent-relative good; so values involve trade offs and calculations agents can perform about what is in their best interest, while rights are not open to trade offs and calculations because they are restrictions that agents face when they are pursuing their own good. The main problem the thesis discerns is how rights can be concerned with protecting the concerns of others when what people legitimately care about are their own concerns. Two different views of the motivational legitimacy of rights are examined—the agent well being view and the agent-recipient view. On the former, rights are motivationally appealing and justified because abiding by them can be shown to be part of what constitutes an agent’s (who is subject to abiding by rights) well being; on the latter view, abiding by rights constitutes part of the recipient’s (who has the rights) well being. Taken separately these two views are problematic. Rights legitimacy would seem to require something from both views. But since these views are contraries they do not seem open to combination either. The thesis will attempt to provide a solution to reconciling the agent well being and agent recipient views while trying to retain the nature of rights as restrictions not open to trade offs or reducible to value talk. Rights function as restrictions, but why do they function this way and how are they justified when what people are mostly concerned with is their own agent-relative good? Rights must be a separate kind of moral claim, not reducible to talk about what values we have in order for rights to have the motivational and justificatory strength they need for interpersonal validity and to resist paternalist interferences. Rights will have this strength if they are based on something that all value pursuers require—such as recognition of one’s legitimate claim to possess oneself. First possession based on first come, first serve will provide legitimacy for a system of rights because it will appeal to and motivate agents by relating rights-respect to their well being. I will argue that abiding by others’ rights is in one’s best interest because doing so is a wise choice—while one might believe that not abiding by others’ rights might give one the best outcome, one cannot be sure about this and so ought to choose to abide by rights as a general policy. Also, agents ought to make sure that they voice their concerns over rights violations of others. Even though this may not be to their immediate benefit, it is rational for agents to speak out on this issue and reinforce rights–respecting behaviour because making the system effective will ultimately be in their own long-term self-interest. The thesis also tries to make sense of how rights are compossible and when rights might face thresholds beyond which they no longer hold.

Abstract: This thesis examines the foundations of individual human rights. The general thought that informs the discussion is that rights and values are two different kinds of moral discourse. Hence, any attempt to simply state rights in value terms will be problematic because the agent-relative character of values does not lend itself to grounding/ explaining interpersonal rules, like rights. The thesis outlines agent-relative values, showing their plausibility, and then proceeds to show how rights perform a different function. The attempt to move from talk about what is right to what rights we have is termed the ‘moralist fallacy’. Rights are kinds of restrictions that others face on their actions when they are promoting their own good. Axiology is about how best to achieve one’s objective agent-relative good; so values involve trade offs and calculations agents can perform about what is in their best interest, while rights are not open to trade offs and calculations because they are restrictions that agents face when they are pursuing their own good. The main problem the thesis discerns is how rights can be concerned with protecting the concerns of others when what people legitimately care about are their own concerns. Two different views of the motivational legitimacy of rights are examined—the agent well being view and the agent-recipient view. On the former, rights are motivationally appealing and justified because abiding by them can be shown to be part of what constitutes an agent’s (who is subject to abiding by rights) well being; on the latter view, abiding by rights constitutes part of the recipient’s (who has the rights) well being. Taken separately these two views are problematic. Rights legitimacy would seem to require something from both views. But since these views are contraries they do not seem open to combination either. The thesis will attempt to provide a solution to reconciling the agent well being and agent recipient views while trying to retain the nature of rights as restrictions not open to trade offs or reducible to value talk. Rights function as restrictions, but why do they function this way and how are they justified when what people are mostly concerned with is their own agent-relative good? Rights must be a separate kind of moral claim, not reducible to talk about what values we have in order for rights to have the motivational and justificatory strength they need for interpersonal validity and to resist paternalist interferences. Rights will have this strength if they are based on something that all value pursuers require—such as recognition of one’s legitimate claim to possess oneself. First possession based on first come, first serve will provide legitimacy for a system of rights because it will appeal to and motivate agents by relating rights-respect to their well being. I will argue that abiding by others’ rights is in one’s best interest because doing so is a wise choice—while one might believe that not abiding by others’ rights might give one the best outcome, one cannot be sure about this and so ought to choose to abide by rights as a general policy. Also, agents ought to make sure that they voice their concerns over rights violations of others. Even though this may not be to their immediate benefit, it is rational for agents to speak out on this issue and reinforce rights–respecting behaviour because making the system effective will ultimately be in their own long-term self-interest. The thesis also tries to make sense of how rights are compossible and when rights might face thresholds beyond which they no longer hold.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2009. / Open access. Includes bibliographical references (p. 124-127). Print copy also available.

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I denna uppsats presenteras en undersökning av gymnasiala styrdokument för religionsämnet i Sverige och Norge. Styrdokument som varit föremål för analys är Religionskunskap 1 och Religion og etikk, vilka betraktas i denna uppsats som en betydande dimension av framtida medborgares meningsskapande process på livsåskådningsområdet. Syftet med undersökningen har varit att förklara denna dimension av meningsskapande genom att undersöka vad som konstituerar innehållet i styrdokumenten och hur pluralism konstitueras i dessa. Undersökningen tar sin utgångspunkt i John Deweys begrepp transaktion samt Michael Foucaults maktperspektiv. Begreppet transaktion innebär att gymnasielevernas meningsskapande process på livsåskådningsområdet är oavhängigt styrdokumentens innehåll i form av ett meningserbjudande. Maktperspektivet förklarar styrdokumentens innehåll som ett normativt påbjudande av detta meningserbjudande på gymnasieskolans institutionella villkor. I undersökningen har diskursanalytisk metod använts för att identifiera de övergripande diskurser och ämnesdiskurser som konstituerar styrdokumenten. Tillämpning av diskursanalytisk metod har inneburit noggrann läsning av det textuella innehållet för att identifiera de regelbundenheter som kan sägas konstituera en viss diskurs. De identifierade diskurserna har sedan analyserats i ett andra steg utifrån ett pluralistiskt perspektiv för att undersöka hur pluralismens innebörder mångfald, individualism och tolerans konstitueras i dessa. Resultatet av diskursanalysen visar att respektive styrdokument konstitueras av en överordnad övergripande diskurs i form av faktakunskap- och färdighetsdiskurs och underordnade ämnesdiskurser i form av religionsdiskurs, fostransdiskurs, sociologi/samhällsdiskurs, vetenskapsdiskurs, filosofi/humanismdiskurs, globaliseringsdiskurs samt existentialismdiskurs. Religion og etikk konstitueras även av en ytterligare ämnesdiskurs i form av fred- och konfliktdiskurs. Det pluralistiska perspektivet påvisar att begreppet pluralism och dess innebörder sammantaget är uttryckt i högre utsträckning i Religion og etikk jämfört med Religionskunskap 1.