Disenchantment and democracy : public reason under conditions of pluralism

Abstract

An examination of the relationship between the disenchantment of the world and democracy is necessary in order to appreciate the source and scope of the contemporary challenge of pluralism.  In the absence of indisputable markers of certainty and authority, the possibility of justice and social integration is predicted upon a form of public reasoning that enable citizens to work out the terms of their political association together.  However, I argue that the dominant conceptions of public practical reasoning (John Rawl’s notion of public reason and Jürgen Habermas’ discourse ethics) end up imposing unjustified limits on the activity of exchanging public reasons.  This has the effect of undermining public reason’s community-sustaining role.  I suggest that a less constraining and more agnostic conception of public reason in terms of a focus on the activity of citizenship in which struggles within and over the terms of citizenship are taken to be a central feature of constitutional democratic political identity.  In doing so, I seek to problematize the picture of social harmony prevailing in contemporary political philosophy.  I then try to illustrate and to enrich this argument through a discussion of current debates around multiculturalism and the struggles for recognition of cultural minorities.  Aboriginal politics in Canada is used as a case-study.  The importance of the practice of citizenship, as opposed to the end-results, is stressed throughout the thesis.

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