Christopher J. Voparil

Susan Dieleman

David Rondel

Introduction : Perspectives on Pragmatism and Justice / Susan Dieleman, David Rondel, and Christopher J. Voparil -- Justice as a Larger Loyalty / Richard Rorty -- Abnormal Justice / Nancy Fraser -- Pragmatism's Contribution to Nonideal Theorizing: Fraser, Addams, and Rorty / Christopher J. Voparil -- Empirical Approaches to Injustice : Elizabeth Anderson and the Pragmatists -- Ideal and Actual in Dewey's Political Theory / Matthew Festenstein -- Justice in Context / Ruth Anna Putnam -- Realism, Pragmatism, and Critical Social Epistemology / Susan Dieleman -- Social Inequality, Power, and Politics : Intersectionality in Dialogue with American Pragmatism / Patricia Hill Collins -- Pragmatism and Dreams of Justice : Between Radical Black Philosophy and Deweyan Democracy / V. Denise James -- Contesting Injustice : Why Pragmatist Political Thought Needs Du Bois / Colin Koopman -- Pragmatism, Racial Injustice, and Epistemic Insurrection : Toward an Insurrectionist Pragmatism / José Medina -- An Aesthetics of Resistance : Deweyan Experimentalism and Epistemic Injustice / Paul C. Taylor -- Setting Aside Hope : A Pragmatist Approach to Racial Justice / Shannon Sullivan -- Reconsidering Deweyan Democracy / Hilary Putnam -- Dewey and the Problem of Justice / Peter Manicas -- (What) Can Pragmatists Think About Justice? : Pragmatism and Liberal Egalitarianism / Robert B. Talisse -- A Pragmatist Account of Legitimacy and Authority : Holmes, Ramsey, and the Moral Force of Law / Cheryl Misak -- William James on Justice and the Sacredness of Individuality / David Rondel

Pragmatism and Justice

Christopher Voparil

The essays in this volume answer to anxieties that the pragmatist tradition has had little to say about justice. While both the classical and neo-pragmatist traditions have produced a conspicuously small body of writing about the idea of justice, a common subtext of the essays in this volume is that there is in pragmatist thought a set of valuable resources for developing pragmatist theories of justice, for responding profitably to concrete injustices, and for engaging with contemporary, prevailing, liberal theories of justice. Despite the absence of conventionally philosophical theories of justice in the pragmatist canon, the writings of many pragmatists demonstrate an obvious sensitivity and responsiveness to injustice. Many pragmatists were and are moved by a deep sense of justice-by an awareness of the suffering of people, by the need to build just institutions, and a search for a tolerant and non-discriminatory culture that regards all people as equals. Three related and mutually reinforcing ideas to which virtually all pragmatists are committed can be discerned: a prioritization of concrete problems and real-world injustices ahead of abstract precepts; a distrust of a priori theorizing (along with a corresponding fallibilism and methodological experimentalism); and a deep and persistent pluralism, both in respect to what justice is and requires, and in respect to how real-world injustices are best recognized and remedied. Ultimately, Pragmatism and Justice asserts that pragmatism gives us powerful resources for understanding the idea of justice more clearly and responding more efficaciously to a world rife with injustice.

'Pragmatism and Justice' is an interdisciplinary volume of new and seminal essays by political philosophers, social theorists, and scholars of pragmatism which provides a comprehensive introduction and lasting resource for scholars of pragmatist thought and questions of justice

Susan Dieleman

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