Liberal Purposes: Goods, Virtues, and Diversity in the Liberal State

Cambridge Studies in Philosophy and Public Policy

by William A. Galston

This book is a major contribution to the current theory of liberalism by an eminent political theorist. It challenges the views of such theorists as Rawls, Dworkin, and Ackerman who believe that the essence of liberalism is that it should remain neutral concerning different ways of life and individual conceptions of what is good or valuable. Professor Galston argues that the modern liberal state is committed to a distinctive conception of the human good, and to that end has developed characteristic institutions and practices--representative governments, diverse societies, market economies, and zones of private action--in the pursuit of specific public purposes that give unity to the liberal state. These purposes guide liberal public policy, shape liberal justice, require the practice of liberal virtues, and rest on a liberal public culture. Consequently the diversity characteristic of liberal societies is limited by their institutional, personal, and cultural preconditions.

Genres: Philosophy

355 pages, Hardcover

First published August 30, 1991

Reviews

[Caleb · Rating 3 out of 5]

In this book Galston attempts to provide an alternative account of liberalism; one that explicitly draws upon an account of the goods promoted by and the virtues required by liberal polities. He challenges Walzer's promotion of deliberative democracy as failing adequately account for the way in which the rights of minorities may be protected, and MacIntyre's rejection of liberalism as hinging on inadequate attention to the actual practice of liberal societies, which, Galston argues, are not primarily characterized by emotivism or asocial notion of the self, despite what its most prominent theorists have claimed. More to this point, Galston argues that MacIntyre's claim that efficiency as the ultimate value of the managerial elite, dominates modern societies, as the sole mode of legitimating political power, ignores the other important liberal mode of legitimation of consent or democracy. Likewise, Galston further argues that MacIntyre's criticisms of modern liberal societies (and political theories) as fragmented by moral conflict and taking that conflict as a given ignore the problem of conflict concerning external goods.

Galston then criticizes prominent liberal theorists, including Rawls for failing to appreciate the nature of the conflict between liberalism and traditional conservative, typically religious, doctrines. Where Rawls, Larmore, and others maintain that procedural liberalism is undergirded by a thin moral doctrine regarding moral personhood and respect that is or at least should be acceptable to all, they fail to appreciate that the issue is not so much whether this doctrine is acceptable but rather whether it should be given lexical priority over other tenants of various comprehensive doctrines. At least for traditional Christians, this is certainly not the case. So the ability of persons to determine their ends so long as the cohere with (Rawlsian) principles of justice will carry no weight when this claim is used to defend actions the permissibility of actions, which adherents of traditional perspective view to be wrong, i.e., any of the controverted issues at the center of the culture wars.

Furthermore, as Rawls, Larmore, amongst others have noted, liberalism is neutral in its impact on traditional communities, since it tends to undermine their reliance on hierarchical notions of authority and thick cultural norms. Rawls dismisses this as something that cannot be avoided, without noting the impact of this admission. For, as Galston argues, it changes the calculation in the original position. With this problem in sight, someone in the original position will be inclined not only to adopt the principles of justice but also to insert a proviso that they will adhere to those principles only so long as they are not a member of a traditional community whose existence is threatened by liberal society. In other words, it is not rational to commitment unconditionally to the principles of justice since it is always possible that this will mean the death of one's culture and identity.

Galston outlines a list 'liberal goods' in attempt to provide a thicker but still 'thin' account of the good. It is not necessary to recount this list in detail as it contains familiar items like rationality, freedom, and capabilities; more to the point is to ask what the purpose is behind introducing this list.

Galston suggests that his account of goods provides a better basis for explaining the value of liberal norms and institutions. But here is where the problem comes in. Its clear that a major aim of the book is to mediate the conflict between traditional conservatives and liberals. Along these lines, Galston makes two suggestions the first involves something called 'functional conservativism.' This is the idea traditional doctrines should, as far as possible, be interpreted and presented in terms of their contribution to the liberal goods noted previously. The problem with this is that when liberalism is presented as more comprehensive, as involving more directly robust moral values, then it is extremely unlikely that an instrumental account of traditional norms will ever succeed when it they come into conflict which such values. Galston gives the example of divorce, arguing that it should be much harder in cases where children are involves, since stable families play a major role in developing healthy, prosperous, and autonomous adults. But in this type of conflict (traditional) norms that may have some impact on various liberal goods (i.e., the development of autonomy) are pitted directly against liberal values, i.e., the autonomy of the divorcing spouses. So if you increase the political salience of liberal values, as Galston attempts to do, you make it unlikely that this type of instrumentalist argument could ever be effective. Similarly, Galston argues that problems involving the clash between traditional mores and liberal values should be settled pragmatically, so that traditional mores are accommodated when possible, without denying the principle that liberal states should promote liberal values. But again, if you increase the salience of liberal values then you increase the weight of those values in any sort of clash. So, again, with a focus on a thicker notion of liberal values, traditional mores cannot but appear as irrational taboos, as opposed to illiberal but admirable modes of life that should be accommodated.

What is more, in his account of liberal goods, Galston does not give a role to the notion of the common good, especially the rule of law. The liberal state is presented as merely instrumental valuable, a way to promote liberal goods for individuals. But arguably this individualist bias is not enough to explain what is valuable about life in a liberal democracy, including especially the rule of law and representative institutions, where the issue is not only instrumental benefits but also the status that is guaranteed citizens.

Despite all of this, Galston's book is insightful and well worth reading, thirty years after it was published, especially considering the current political crisis.