Event overview
A talk by Professor Alexandre Lefebvre, Department of Government and IR, University of Sydney
What would it mean for liberalism to be depicted as a self-standing way of life? Or, to use terms favoured by liberal political philosophers, what would it mean for liberalism be a depicted as comprehensive doctrine: not in the sense of being an offshoot of some other kind or worldview (whether religious or secular), but as itself an ethos and system of moral beliefs that encompasses the whole of one’s life and which needs no other source or support? In this paper, I argue that one version of liberalism “as a way of life” can be found in John Rawls’s work, and more particularly, in what is basically the only under-explored area of his philosophy: the moral psychology developed in Part III of A Theory of Justice, along with a series of unpublished essays and lectures from his papers archived at Harvard University. My goal will be to sketch a liberal way of living from Rawls that, while not for everyone, and very clearly not for use as a political or constitutional blueprint, is ambitious, attractive, and available for us today.
This event is hosted by the Research Unit for Contemporary Political Theory, Dept. of Politics and IR.
Dates & times
| Date | Time | Add to calendar |
|---|---|---|
| 10 Dec 2018 | 6:00pm - 8:00pm |
Accessibility
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