Is Political Philosophy Impossible ? Thoughts and Behaviour in Normative Political Theory

includes index and biblioraphy

Introduction ...1 What is this book about ? ...1 Synopsis of chapter 1 ...6 Synopsis of chapter 2 ...15 Synopsis of chapter 3 ...20 Who am i to say this ? ...23 What could you avoid reading ? ...25 1 Symptom : Interminability ...26 Overview ...26 Three questions : OQ,FQ,GQ ...26 Rawls and a few of his rivals ...41 A reassessment of the problem and a switch in literature ...46 Isaiah berlin : From value pluralism, to universal evils to liberalism ...47 Rewls second set of answers : from reasonableness to liberalism ...50 United by an ideal of democracy? ...55 United by an ideal of tolerance? ...61 Stuart hampshire and a second argument from universal evils ...66 Joseph raz: practical reason as a guide to political morality ...70 Alasdair maclntyre : Competing traditions as a guide to morality ...77 Rorty`s liberalism by redescription ...83 A variety of further responses : Denial, judgement, deferral ...86 Interminability described : The impossibility thesis introduced ...90 The impossibility thesis sustained ...95 Summary of arguments and a sketch of what follows ...98 2 Diagnosis : Mentalism ...99 Introduction ...99 What mentalism is ...99 Mentalism`s techniques ...107 Three types of mentalist evidence and a synopsis of why mentalism fails ...120 The evidence for failure, part 1 : impartial choices ...124 The evidence for failure , Part 2 : considered judgements ...131 The evidence of failure, Part 3 : Intuitve choices of absstract principle ...138 Normative dissonance in full view ...153 Objective and clarifications ...157 The problem restated ...165 3 Cure : Normative behaviourism ...166 Introduction ...166 Normative behaviourism : A brief sketch ...166 Preliminaries, part 1 : Facts principles, thoughts, and behaviour ...167 Preliminaries, part 2 : Reasonable objections, causes/ purposes, reliable tendencies and the case for experimental optimism ...177 A mormative behaviourist argument in favour of social liberal democracies ....185 An explanatory theory of social liberal democracy`s sucess ....198 The relationship between normative behaviourism, psychological behaviourism political behaviouralism, and political science more generally ...210 Reasons to be convinced by social liberal democracy ...229 Normative behaviourism defended against five objections ...237 Conclusions ...254