POLITICAL KNOWLEDGE AND PUBLIC VIRTUES

Denis Coitinho

Submitted September 27, 2022

Published 2022-10-05

Artículos de investigación y ensayos filosóficos

No. 2 (2022): Analítica

POLITICAL KNOWLEDGE AND PUBLIC VIRTUES

Denis Coitinho ⁺⁻

PDF (Español (España))

Citación:

DOI: ND

Published: 2022-10-05

How to Cite

Coitinho , D. (2022) “POLITICAL KNOWLEDGE AND PUBLIC VIRTUES”, Analítica, (2), pp. 63–97. Available at: https://revistas.up.ac.pa/index.php/analitica/article/view/3167 (Accessed: 24 November 2024).

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to reflect upon the scope of political knowledge as a counterpoint to the epistocratic argument defended by Jason Brennan in Against Democracy. To this end, I will begin by presenting Brennan’s conception of knowledge and ignorance, together with his interpretation of the nature of politics. I will then investigate the meaning of knowledge and ignorance from the standpoint of virtue epistemology. Following this, I will analyze the very essence of the political domain and consider the public virtues of prudence and civic friendship. Lastly, I will discuss the phenomenon of moral progress, in order to show that tribalism is neither the essence of human moral nature nor a preclusion of political knowledge and that there is thus no conclusive reason for defending the restriction of public participation in the political process.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Anna, J. (2011) Intelligent Virtue. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Aristotle. (1999) Nicomachean Ethics. Transl. Terence Irwin. 2a. Ed. Indianapolis: Hackett.
Aristotle. (1995) Politics. Transl. Ernest Barker, revised by Richard Stalley. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Brennan, J. (2017) Against Democracy. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
Buchanan, A. (2020) Our Moral Fate: Evolution and the Escape from Tribalism. Cambridge, MAS: The MIT Press.
Buchanan, A. and Powell, R. (2018) The Evolution of Moral Progress: A Biocultural Theory. New York: Oxford University Press.
Chisholm, R. (1957) Perceiving: A Philosophical Study. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Gettier, E. (1963) Is Justified True Belief Knowledge? Analysis, Vol. 23, No. 6, p. 121-123, 1963.
Mill, J. S. (1975) Three Essays: On Liberty, Representative Government, and The Subjection of Women. Edited by Richard Wollheim. New York: Oxford University Press.
Nozick, R. (1990) The Examined Life: Philosophical Meditations. New York: Simon and Schuster.
Peels, Rik. (1990) What is Ignorance? Philosophia, Vol. 38, p. 57-67.
Rawls, J. (1999) The Domain of the Political and Overlapping Consensus (1989). In: Rawls, J. Collected Papers. Edited by Samuel Freeman. Cambridge, MAS: Harvard University Press, 1999, p. 473-496.
Rawls, J. (2001) Justice as Fairness: A Restatement. Edited by Erin Kelly. Cambridge, MAS: Harvard University Press.
Scwarzenbach, S. A. (1986) On Civic Friendship. Ethics, Vol. 107, No. 1, p. 97-128, 1996.
Singer, P. (2011) The Expanding Circle: Ethics, Evolution, and Moral Progress. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Sosa, E. (2007) A Virtue Epistemology: Apt Belief and Reflective Knowledge, Vol. I. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Tholen, B. (2018) Political Responsibility as Virtue: Nussbaum, MacIntyre, and Ricoeur on the Fragility of Politics. Alternatives: Global, Local, Political, Vol. 43, No. 1, p. 22-34.
United Nations. (2020) Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), 1948. Acesso em 05 de agosto de 2020. https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/