Ludvig Beckman

Från höger och vänster framträder just nu rörelser i Sverige och i många andra länder som anser sig tala för folket. Att all politisk makt utgår från folket kallas med ett hävdvunnet uttryck för folksuveränitet och är den självklara utgångspunkten i en demokrati. Men vilka är ”folket” i folkstyret? En förvirrande situation har uppstått där föreställningen om det suveräna folket underblåser kritiken mot demokratins, folkstyrets, organisering. Så hur kan och bör vi förstå demokratins löfte om att makten utgår från folket? All makt åt folket ger läsaren ögonöppnande perspektiv och redskap till ett kritiskt – och självkritiskt – granskande av demokratins mest grundläggande princip.

Om en bortglömd idé

All makt åt folket

Emil Uddhammar

Debate about the concept of virtue is a persistent theme in academic discourse. One strand of thinking attempts to examine and reconstruct ethical theories with the aim of formulating a new morality or ethics. A second strand of thought, more strongly represented in this work, attempts to explore the social and political world deploying the concept of virtue. Thus, this volume crosses the established borders of academic disciplines in order to provide a richer and more comprehensive understanding of the place of virtues in contemporary western societies. The editors hold that the dominating virtue of our culture and society is the virtue of independence. Yet independence, or individual autonomy, is contingent upon a diverse, and so far ill-understood, set of cultural, biological, economic, ethical, and political practices. The idea of individuality is in other words supervening on a web of formal and informal relations. This volume therefore attempts to improve our understanding of the prevailing ethos of independence as well as of the mechanisms and practices sustaining it. Virtues are examined in specific contexts. Authors explore what we can learn about our dependence on virtues from the archaic Greek culture. They examine the relevance of virtue-ethics to the understanding of day-to-day practices. And they look at the place of virtues in understanding the norms of independence and liberty. Other contributions attend to the virtues of independence and its challenges, examining possible philosophical challenges, questioning whether independence is always a virtue, and how the virtues of justice fare given a commitment to the virtues of independence. The final portion of the book explore the empirical consequences of the virtues of independence. Among the questions addressed are how personal independence affects political and economic institutions, and the connections between norms of independence and the growth of modernity. This volume is an important contribution to contemporary understanding of what constitutes virtuous and ethical behavior. Ludvig Beckman teaches political theory in the department of government at Uppsala University. He is the author of The Liberal State and the Politics of Virtue, and has written several articles on liberal political thought. Emil Uddhammar is research director at the City University of Stockholm, and is the co-editor (with Richard Swedberg) of Sociological Endeavor, a festschrift in honor of Hans L. Zetterberg.

Virtues of Independence and Dependence on Virtues

det kritiska studiet av politiska texter och idéer

Grundbok i idéanalys

At the start of the new millennium there has been a growing awareness that traditional political institutions and ideologies do not correspond to the demands and aspirations held by many individuals and groups. Ideals and interests previously without much impact on the political debate have gained access to the public arena. These new claims include demands for recognition of homosexuals and their rights, affirmation of the particularities of indigenous peoples, sensitivity to the cultures and languages of immigrants, respect for children and their needs, solidarity with people of the developing countries and their fight for independence, care for nature, animals, attention to the social status of women, and so on. As a consequence, many governments now regulate and support many different conceptions of the good life and its virtues.In this volume, schematically divided into two parts, Ludvig Beckman challenges the common view that support for the good life, the politics of virtue, is in conflict with liberal principles. In clear, analytical language he addresses the question of what a state should do. Chapter 1 attempts to specify the meaning of "liberalism"; chapter 2 discusses the meaning of tolerance and makes more specific the notion of "virtue"; chapters 3 and 4 assess ethical and political liberalism as exemplified by the writings of Ronald Dworkin and John Rawls. In part two, chapter 5 discusses the clash between norms of justice and conceptions of virtue in the family; chapter 6 explores the meaning of the idea of an ethically neutral state; chapter 7 explores three different arguments for the neutral state as found in the work of Ronald Dworkin; chapter 8 presents an analysis of the idea of the neutral state with the theory of John Rawls put under scrutiny; chapter 9 explains why the attempt to justify the neutral state by referring to modified skepticism fails and proposes a distinction between being skeptical and being critical.Participating in the current debate on communitarianism, The Liberal State and the Politics of Virtue will be particularly interesting to people engaged in the public debate on ethics, morality and the state. It will also be of interest to teachers and researchers in the fields of politics and philosophy.

Ludvig Beckman

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