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Political Liberalism and Public Reason: A Critical Notice of John Rawls, Political LiberalismAuthor(s): Onora O'NeillSource: The Philosophical Review, Vol. 106, No. 3 (Jul., 1997), pp. 411-428Published by: Duke University Press on behalf of Philosophical ReviewStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2998399 .

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ThePhilosophicaleview, ol. 106, No. 3 (uly 1997)

Political Liberalism and Public Reason: A Critical

Notice ofJohn Rawls, Political Liberalism

Onora O'Neill

Since the publicationofJohn Rawls's Political iberalism1 n 1993the verywords of its titlehave gained a new meaning. Previouslythe thoughtthat liberalism was a political doctrine would have

seemed an uninteresting ommonplace, although manywriterswould have insistedthat iberalism lso comprisesa culture, mo-rality,nd a tradition,nd quite a numberwouldhave thought hatthe foundationsof liberalismare moral and metaphysical atherthan merelypolitical.The viewthat iberalism s political,but notmerelypolitical,had long been shared byliberalsand bymany oftheir critics,ncludingtheir numerousrecent communitarian rit-

ics, who objected principally o the nonpoliticalaspectsof liberal-ism,such as liberal morality r liberal culture.Some of thesecriticshad few, r at least fewer, bjectionsto many of the key elementsof liberalpolitics.

Rawls hoped to meet these criticson their own ground by ac-ceptingthata comprehensive iberalpositioncannotbe vindicatedand byshowing how a less ambitious,merelypolitical,version ofliberalismcould be vindicated.His conception of political iberal-

ism was less ambitious n two ways. n the first lace its substantivenormativeclaims were confined to the domain of politics:all heaspired to was a liberal theoryof ustice. Secondly,he argued thatliberalismcould dispense withmetaphysicaland moral founda-tions: liberal ustice could be vindicated as political not meta-physical. 2Since the publication of PoliticalLiberalism,he term'political liberalism' has increasinglybeen used to indicate this

quite specificversion of liberalism,whose normativeclaims aremerelypolitical,and whichpurportsnot to drawon comprehen-sivemoral doctrines, or on unsustainablemetaphysical laims.

Yet Rawlssupportshis version of political liberalismwithelabo-rate reasons: not for him a simple assertionof commitment o

'New York:Columbia Universityress,1993; hereafter L.2JohnRawls, Justice s Fairness:Political Not Metaphysical JFPM),

Philosophynd PoliticalAffairs 4 (1985): 223-51.

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ONORA O'NEILL

liberal politics,or a postmodernistgesture at the impossibilityfconvincingarguments.On Rawls's account political liberalism s

supported by public reason. Although political liberalism s lessdemandingthan the broader liberalismswhich presuppose,forex-ample, a metaphysics f the person,or a comprehensive ccountof the good, it is no mere liberalismof context or choice, such ascommunitarians r postmodernists oo mayendorse.

Two differentypes fquestion can be raised of Rawls'spoliticalliberalism. The first sks whethera merelypolitical liberalism s

enough. Numerous recent writers ave suggestedthata strongeror widerformof liberalism-for example, a perfectionistiberal-ism, or one thatprovidesan account of liberalvirtues nd cultureas well as an account ofliberal ustice-is needed. The second askswhetherRawlssucceeds in showing hat limited iberalism,whosenormative laimsare merelypolitical,can do withoutmetaphysicsand without comprehensive ccount of morality. an Rawls'sver-sion ofpolitical iberalismbe sustainedon thebasis of the account

of public reason withwhichhe hopes to back it? Can any formofliberalism, ven a limitedmerelypoliticalformof liberalism, owithoutmetaphysicalfoundations,withouta metaphysics f theperson,and without comprehensivemoral theory?

A vastamount has been writtenbout the first f thesequestionsand quite a lot about the second. As I read it,the second questionreaches deeper. The most fundamentalpartsof Political iberalism

are the discussionsofpublic reason,and themost centralquestionthat can be raised about the workis about the adequacy of theproposed conception of public reason. Here I shall address onlythis aspect of Political Liberalism.

1. The rational and the reasonable

A central plank of Political iberalism,s of some of the earlierver-

sions of the lecturesand articles fromwhich it grew, s the claimthatif liberal thinking s to do withoutmetaphysical oundationsits ambitions mustbe limited. Rawls argues that fwe are to takefull cognizance of the ineliminable pluralismof modernity,ndindeed recognize that a plurality f moral and religiousoutlookslies withinthe limits of reason, we will be able to justify nly alimited form of liberalism.Disagreementsabout comprehensive

conceptions of the good willbe irresolvable.Only in the domain

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POLITICAL LIBERALISM

of politics can a version of liberalismbe justifiedto all reasonableothers.More precisely,ll thatcan be ustified o reasonable others

are claims about the principlesof ustice and the basic structureof a just society, ecause pluralism .. is the natural outcome ofthe activities f human reason under enduringfree institutions(PL, xxiv). Questions of culture,morality nd tradition re there-fore bracketed in a reasoned account of ustice; liberal politicalthoughthas simply o accept the ineliminable moral and religiouspluralismof the modern world, nd more particularly f its iberal

polities.On Rawls's view,political principlesand institutions an be jus-tifiedfor those who differ n their fundamentalmoral and meta-physical utlook only fthey re the focus of a possible overlappingconsensus (PL, 10), and then only f those who disagree share ca-pacities forrationalitynd reasonableness. So ifthose who differdeeplyare to findreasons forsharing ven a conception ofjustice,allwill depend on theforms frationalitynd reasonablenessavail-

able to them.It is the account of the reasonable and the rationalthat will bringout the bases of theprinciplesofright nd justicein practicalreason (PL, xxx).

Rawls does not make any verynovel claim about rationality. enotes that t is intrinsicallyncomplete, and can lead onlyto con-clusionsthatare conditional on seekingcertainends (such as endsdesired): Hume's conception of reason as the slave of thepassionsand Kant's hypothetical mperative re ancestorsofcontemporary

viewsofrationality. owever,giventhepluralism fmodernity,ndhence the pluralism of the ends of modern agents, rationalityalone cannot provide enough to guide convergence evenon anaccount f usticebetween the partisansof these ends. Any widelyshared ustification f principlesof ustice must,Rawlsclaims, ap-peal not onlyto the rationalbutto the reasonable. Yet hisconcep-tion of the reasonable is not easyto discern.

Rawls views the ideas of the reasonable and of the rational ascomplementarybut distinct PL, 51-53). Neitherit seems can bederived fromthe other,yetboth are needed.3 The claim that der-

3Rawls asts doubt on the projectof deriving he rationalfrom he rea-sonable, and suggests hat attempts o do so-he instances that byDavidGauthier,MoralsbyAgreementOxford:Oxford University ress,ClarendonPress, 1986)-bring in a substantive onception of the reasonable,for ex-ample in setting ut the constraints nder which rationalitys to operate

if t s to reach reasonable conclusions.He also denies thathis earlierwork

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ONORAO'NEILL

ivation n either direction s impossible awaitsclarification fbothideas. An initial,partial clarifications given bycertain reasonsfor

thinking hatboth are indispensable.On Rawls'sviewmerelyationalpersonswill ack any sense ofjustice, n thattheywillnot recognizethe claimsof others, nd merelyeasonableersons will ack ends oftheirownto advance bymeans of (fair)cooperation.This negativestatement f the matter hows thathe construes both notions asincorporatingmore than a formal tructure or rationalor reason-able deliberation.Rationalitys not merelythe capacityto follow

means-endsand component-composite easoning, but a matter fpursuing, o of having,ends of one's own. Reasonableness is notmerely formalrequirement,but a commitment o pursue endsof one's own subject to procedures thatcan be justifiedto othersas fairprocedures.Reasonable justifications annot appeal to com-prehensiveconceptions ofthe good, since these are not shared byall. To be reasonable is rather matter f being willing oproposeand honor fairtermsof cooperationand to recognizethe burdens

of udgments and accept theirconsequences (PL, 49 n).The burdens of udgment aspect of the reasonable is impor-

tant to the shape of the entireargumentofPolitical iberalism,utdoes not I thinkraise difficulties orRawls'sconception ofpublicreason; rather t is a matter f nsisting n the limits f any processofpublicreasoning.Reasonableness involves willingness oacceptthe burdens of udgment in that it recognizes that there are

manysources of disagreementthat cannot be eliminatedbyrea-sonable procedures (PL, 54-58). The burdens of udgment placeunavoidable constraints n the search forreasonable agreement,and in Rawls'sview they nsure thatno agreementon comprehen-siveconceptionsof the good, and hence no justification f liberalmorality nd culture to those of otherpersuasions, s attainable.

The other aspect of reasonableness is the core ofRawls'sargu-ment. It is also the source of greater puzzlement, n partbecause

he offers number of formulations hatare not quite equivalent.

sought to derivethe reasonable from he rational, nd specifically orrectsa comment nA TheoryfJusticeTJ) (Cambridge:Harvard Universityress,1971), in whichhe stated that the theoryof ustice is simplypartof thetheoryof rationalaction (TJ,53 n). Nevertheless,Rawls does not show,and holds that t may not be possible to show,thatthe rational cannotbederived fromthe reasonable: that t cannot is simply conjecture (PL,

53).

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The central definition emphasizes willingness to stand by principles

and standards that otherswill accept as the hallmark of reasonable-

ness:

Persons are reasonable ... when ... they are ready to propose prin-

ciples and standards s fair erms f cooperationand to abide by themwillingly, iventhe assurancethat otherswill ikewisedo so. (PL, 49)

On this account, being reasonable is clearly not a matter of being

impartial: reasonable persons remain motivated by their own ends,

rather than by any conception of the general good.4 Equally, it isnot a matter of pursuit of mutual advantage: persons may be rea-

sonable even when their desires preclude the identification of any

mutually advantageous outcome. Reasonableness is in the first

place a second-order, procedural notion, a matter of being pre-

pared to propose, to listen to, and to abide by proposals that con-

strain the pursuit of ends if otherswill acceptthe same constraints.

The conditional clause in this formulation appears, as Rawls

points out (PL, 50), to identifyreasonableness very closely with acommitment to a form of second-order reciprocity,or rather rec-

iprocity about second-order principles, and to be mute where no

such reciprocity can be expected. A conditional willingness to

agree if there re terms hat will (or would) be agreedon byall binds

nobody when the condition does not obtain. Yet we would often

think that certain standards and principles were reasonable even

without such assurance-and othersunreasonable even with that

assurance. In short we would often think that willingness to agree

on standards or principles if otherswill agreeon themtoois neither

necessary nor sufficient for reasonableness. It might be thought

insufficient because a convergence of wills could (on many ac-

counts) still be unreasonable (imagine that it is motivated by a

desire to form a cartel that excludes third parties). It might not

be thought necessary because standards or principles that are em-

inently fair and reasonable may not attract a convergence of wills.Too great an emphasis on the others' willingness o converge on

standards or principles appears paradoxically to render this con-

40f course there are other conceptionsof public reason or public us-tification hat build in notions of impartiality.or example, Brian Barrywrites, To saythat principlecould not be reasonably ejectedby anyonecovered by it ... is a wayof sayingthat t meets the test of impartiality

(TheoriesfJusticeBerkeley:UniversityfCaliforniaPress,1989), 372).

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ONORAO'NEILL

ception of reasonableness hostage to what we might otherwise see

as others' unreasonableness.

However, in a variant formulation of his conception of reason-

ableness Rawls relaxes the condition that others be willing to agree

to standards and principles proposed, and construes reasonable-

ness as a matter of willingness to accept terms which all can ac-

cept (PL, 50)5 or to govern their conduct by a principle from

which they and others can reason in common (PL, 49 n). The

significant difference here is the reference to willingness to abide

by principles and standards which all can rather than wouldor willaccept. This second conception of reasonableness is apparently

modal rather than motivational:reasonableness is a matter of pro-

posing and accepting only principles that others too can accept,

but is not conditional on an assurance or expectations that they

will do so.

2. Public Reason and Citizens

As Rawls sees it, the reasonable is public in a way the rational is

not (PL, 53)-hence the appropriateness of the term 'public rea-

son'. In being reasonable

we enter as equals the publicworldofothersand stand readyto pro-pose, or to accept,as the case maybe, fairterms f cooperation. (PL,53)

Public reason seeks to identify principles of cooperation by a pro-cess of public ustification.6 ustification s thought of as justification

toan audience,and in the case of political justification that audience

is the public. However, depending on how we understand the idea

of reasonableness, public reason could take either of two forms.

On one account it would be a matter of living by principles or

standards ifwe are assured that they will be acceptedby others. On

the other it would be a matter of living by principles or standardsif we are assured that they could befollowedor adopted by others,

whether or not they in fact accept them.

Neither of these conceptions views public reason merely as a

5See also Rawls, Kantian Constructivismn Moral Theory, Journal fPhilosophy7 (1980): 515-72, at 528.

6Cf. Fred D'Agostino,FreePublicReason:Making t UpAs We Go (New

York:OxfordUniversityress, 1996), 3.

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process that ust happens to produce agreement: not everyformof persuasion or negotiation or convergenceof views s a process

that ustifies. We are concerned withreason, not simplywithdis-course (PL, 220). The puzzle, however, s to understandwhichsorts of process can count as public reasoning, and whether thatprocess requiresactual or only possible convergenceon principlesand standards.

The slide betweenmotivational nd modal conceptions of rea-sonableness mightnot matter fRawls were to offer closer spec-

ification fproceduresthatreasonablepersons mustfollow n mov-ing towards greement,or of the motives that ie behind reason-able agreement.For example, ifhe based his account of the rea-sonable on claimsabout the individualmotivation easoners bringto action,then he mightbe able to argue thatwe are assuredthatif reasonable beings can agree, they will do so, and so that themotivationaland the modal conceptions of reasonableness areequivalent.But since he does not base his account of reasonable-

ness on an appeal to the procedures or the motivation f reason-able beings, the presumed equivalence of the formulationsmayseem problematic.

There are some passages which suggest that Rawlsdoes supplyan account of the motivationalbasis of reasonable action,in par-ticularthose in whichhe speaksof reasonable personsas having asenseof ustice.However,the sense of ustice turnsout to be the

capacity to understand,to apply and to act fromthe public con-ception of ustice which characterizesthe fair terms of coopera-tion (PL, 19). In identifying sense ofjusticeas a capacityoapplyand act on fairtermsofcooperation,ratherthan as thepossessionof certain desires r motivationhat lie behind fair cooperation,Rawls distanceshis account of ustice fromthosewhichcan drawon claims about individuals'fundamentalor second-orderdesiresor motives such as altruism, isinterested ympathy,umanity) o

show how moral or politicalconclusionsare to be ustified.He doesnot aim to ustify rinciplesor standardsby showingthat ndivid-uals with a certain motivational tructurewill come to agree onthem. His moral psychologys to be philosophical notpsycholog-ical. 7

7 Moral Psychology: hilosophical not Psychological s the title fpart

8 of Lecture 1 (86-88) in Political iberalism.

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ONORA O'NEILL

Indeed, when one considers the capacities that constitute a sense

ofjustice more closely, and sees that they are merely the underlying

willingness to seek and abide by terms of cooperation if assured

that others will (can) do likewise, it becomes quite clear that Rawls

attributes the possibility of convergence neither to individual de-

sires and motivation (cf. esp. PL, 82-86), nor to the use of certain

canonical procedures. Rather he locates the basis of reasonable

agreement among agents in the fact that they are to be conceived

of as citizens, indeed as fellow citizens, in a quite specific sense.

His account of the reasonable might therefore accurately be char-acterized as political not psychological, corresponding to his

view that ustice is political not metaphysical.

The power of Rawls's conception of public reason is drawn from

its connection to his account of citizens.Being a citizen with a sense

of political identityis much more than being one of a pluralityof

beings capable of rational and reasonable justification, and cog-

nizant of the limits placed on reasonableness by the burdens of

judgment: it is constitutive of reasonableness. Citizens conceive ofthemselves and one another as able to hold and to revise, and

entitled to advance, their comprehensive conceptions of the good

(PL, 30-33, 81), and they acknowledge that although they may

hold different comprehensive conceptions of the good, they can-

not resolve disagreements about them. They also conceive of them-

selves as the citizens of a certain societywith abilities to be normal

and cooperating members of society over a complete life (PL, 81).Even more strikingly,Rawls assumes that the society of which citi-

zens are members is conceived of as self-contained and as having

no relations with other societies. Its members enter it only bybirth

and leave it only by death (PL, 12). Indeed, the society is seen as

more or less complete and self-sufficientcheme of cooperation ...existing n perpetuity.. [that] produces and reproduces itself ndits nstitutions nd cultureovergenerations nd thatthere s no time

atwhich we expect it to windup. (PL, 18)8

The assumption that reasoning about justice can and should begin

by assuming a closed society has been constant throughout Rawls's

writing,from the earliest pages of A Theory fJustice, here he sees

8See also 40-41, 68, 301. It is tempting o think hat society hatmeetsthese conditions has formed a state:how else is closure to be maintained

indefinitely?

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POLITICAL LIBERAIJSM

the task as that of finding an account of ustice for the basicstructure f a society, onceived of for the time being as a closedsystem solated from other societies (TJ, 8) through to his lateessay The Law of Peoples. Questions of ustice beyond bordersare always taken as supplementary o the fundamentalquest forthe principlesof a just closed society.For this reason Rawls's ac-count of justice has been criticized for treating international(perhaps more accurately: nterstatal, r transstatal?) ustice assomethingof an afterthoughts

Yet the assumption that political justification presupposes aclosed society s, as Rawls acknowledges, a considerable abstrac-tion (PL, 12). To be more precise it is no mere abstraction, inceabstractions taken strictly)mit or bracketcertainpredicatestrueof the matter romwhich they bstract.Ratherthe idea of a closedsociety s an idealization hat assumes predicateswhich are false ofall existinghuman societies. dealizations can of course be of greathelp in theorybuilding. But theyhave to be handled withcare. In

particular, heyhave to handled withcare in practical reasoning,whose aspirationis to fit the world (to some degree) to certainconceptions or principles.In theoreticalreasoning an appeal toidealized conceptions (ideal gases, perfectvacuum) is disciplinedbythe fact that we seek to fittheoryto the world: an idealizationthat swide of the markwillreveal tsfailings.n practical easoningan inappropriate dealization is not exposed to the same stringent

test, nd it is easy to conclude that the world ratherthan the ide-alizationis at fault.In assumingan idealized, closed society s the context of polit-

ical ustification, awls takes t that the publicwho are theproperaudience forone another's attempts t ustification onsistsof fel-low citizens, mong whom there is in effectprior understandingthattheyform a people. That is whyhe can speak explicitly fcitizens s sharinga political dentityPL, xx), whyhe can designate

9In On Human Rights:The Oxford mnestyectures,d. Stephen Shuteand Susan Hurley (New York: Basic Books, 1993) 42-82, and notes, 220-30 (hereafter P); see 44, 46.

100n Rawls on international ustice see Charles Beitz, PoliticalTheoryand InternationalelationsPrinceton:PrincetonUniversity ress,1979) andThomas Pogge, RealizingRawls (Ithaca: Cornell University ress, 1989).Rawls returned to the subject of internationalustice soon after he pub-

lication of Political iberalismn his Amnesty ecture, Law of Peoples.

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ONORAO'NEILL

the search for ustice beyond borders as a search for a just law of

peoples,and whyhe can write,

Bypeoples I mean personsand theirdependentsseen as a corporatebody and as organized by their political institutions, hichestablishthe powers of government. n democratic societies persons will becitizens,while nhierarchical nd othersocietiestheywillbe members.

(LP, 221 n)

Yet it is all too well known that in real life persons are often unsure

about their sense(s) of political identity,that they may find that

those withwhom they live in closed societies are not identical withthose whom they regard as their own people, and that not all so-

cieties are closed. A central objective of politics may be the recon-

strual of political identities, the separation or the merging of des-

tinies rather than the working out of principles of justice to be

shared within a closed society.Boundaries and identities are a cen-

tral domain of thinking about justice rather than its fixed param-

eters.11Yet all these topics are elided from, or at least moved fardown, the political agenda by a conception of public reason that

draws its strengthfrom the assumption that public reason can have

currency only among fellow citizens in a closed society who share

a common political identity.

Rawls's reliance on this restricted conception of the public in

constructing his account of public reason has several corollaries.

One is that he cannot view all reasoning as public reasoning. Al-

though he thinks of all reasonableness as internaltoa defined roup,whose forms of shared identityare to supply premises for reason-

ing, he takes it that not all such groups can support publicreason-

ing. Rawls listsvarious nonpublicforms of reasoning, such as those

of churches, universities, and aristocratic and autocratic regimes

(PL, 213).The fact that the last two examples are included in a list of non-

1See Brian Barryand Robert E. Goodin, eds., FreeMovement:thicalIssues n theTransnational igrationfPeople nd ofMoney Universityark:Pennsylvania tateUniversityress,1992); WarrenF. Schwartz, d.,Justicein ImmigrationCambridge: Cambridge University ress, 1995); OnoraO'Neill, Justice nd Boundaries, in Political estructuringnEurope: thicalPerspectives,d. C. Brown, London: Routledge,1994), 69-88, and Trans-nationalJustice:Permeable Boundaries and Multiple dentities, n Social-ism nd theCommon ood, d. PrestonKing (London: FrankCass and Co.,

1996), 291-302.

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public forms of reason shows that the conception of public reason

advanced in PoliticalLiberalism ssumes not merely the shared sense

of political identity of citizens of a closed society, but specificallythe common sense of identity of fellow citizens in a democratic o-

ciety:

public reason is characteristicf a democraticpeople: it s thereasonof its citizens,of those sharingthe statusof equal citizenship. .. [Itis] public in threeways:as the reason of citizensas such, it is the

reason of the public; its subject s the good of the public and mattersof fundamentalustice; and its natureand content spublic. (PL, 213)

Although Rawls speaks of the public reason of a society as an

intellectual and moral power, rooted in the capacities of itshuman

members (PL, 213), it is evident that the specific character of his

conception of public reason owes little to these underlying individ-

ual capacities and everythingto the political contexts in which theyfunction. His conception of ustice is indeed political rather than

metaphysical, in thatwhat is to count as reasoned in the search for

political principles and standards is the thinking of citizens with a

common political identity,who seek additional areas of agreement

in building the basic principles and institutions of their shared

political life. Public reasoning is citizens' reasoning in the public

forum about constitutional essentials and basic questions of jus-

tice (PL, 10).

The fact that Rawls's conception of public reason is premised on

the conception of a self-contained, democratic society whose citi-

zens share a political identity explains whyhe need pay little atten-

tion to the gap between motivational and modal conceptions of

public reason. Within a closed democratic society,reasonable citi-

zens will indeed and unsurprisingly be willing to seek and abide

by shared principles and standards for the fundamental arrange-ments of life when this is possible. That is more or less what it is

to be a citizen of a democratic society.Hence, despite the fact that

Rawls makes no assumptions about individual motivation, his con-

ception ofjustification remains formallycontractualist. His account

of public justification is an account of the basis forthe convergence

of wills among fellow citizens. As in A Theory fJustice, awls seeks

to rework the theory of the social contract (TJ, 11).

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ONORAO'NEILL

3. Some Kantian Reflections

By buildingintohis account of public reasoning the shared polit-ical identity f a closed yetdemocratic society,Rawlsguaranteesthat it incorporatesstrongsources of convergenceand coordina-tion.The differences etween themotivational nd the modal con-ceptions of public reason whichhe initially esitatesbetweenaretherebyminimized.The most general principles nd standardsonwhich citizenswho sharetheirpolitical dentity an agree are likelyto be ones on which theywill agree. Once we thinkof reasoningamong fellow citizens as reasoning among those with whom weshare a political dentity,ven some aspectsof a political tradition,a sense of where borders belong and of who is one of us, thenthere are evidently owerful hared premisesfor practicalreason-ing, and powerfulmotivesforseeking agreementon basic princi-ples and institutions. et there s a price to be paid forusing thesepremises:public reasoningas Rawls construes t is citizens',hence

insiders',reasoning,so maynot convinceforeigners r outsiders-or citizenswho standback from hewaythings re, and askwheth-er they hould be thatway.

The sources of convergence assumed are nevertheless ncom-plete. Rawls's conception of public reasoningdoes not dispose ofas many haredpremises, r as much sharedmotivation, or there-fore of as manysources of agreement,as communitarianreason-ing. Communitariansview the more fully pecifiedshared socialidentity f membersof the same communitys a source of reasonsand motivation hat can yielda widerrange of agreement, nclud-ing agreement on conceptions of the good and of the virtues.While communitarians hinkof shared debate as guided bycom-mon traditions nd shared conceptions of the good, Rawlsianfel-low citizens,who mayshare much less, will ack anyreasoned wayof overcoming pluralismabout conceptions of the good. From a

communitarianperspective,Rawls's account of the basis of reason-ing about theprinciples nd institutionsf ustice assumesnot toolarge but too slendera shared sense of identity.

Yet seen from notherperspective t mayseem that,on the con-trary, awls assumes too much in building his account of publicreason on an account ofcitizens' shared sense ofpolitical dentity.If we did not assume thatthe contextofreason is a closed society

of democraticcitizens,we mightwellhave doubts about a concep-

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tion of reasonableness that s conditional on an assurance thatoth-ers will agree on the principles nd standardswe propose. Lookedat from the perspectiveof outsiders,others' agreement mightbethoughtto reflectmattersquite other than their reasonableness.Their refusal to agree might be thought to reflect ither the di-versities f dentities r conflicts etween real interests, ather hantheir unreasonableness. Their willingness to agree might bethought n indicatorof the rawness f domination or of compliantsubserviencerather han a conditionoftheirreasonableness.Some

cases ofreciprocitymaynot be reasonable.There may then be reason to look more carefully t the modalconception ofpublic reason, which does not takeit thatreasoningabout principlesand standards musttake place among those whoshare a sense of political identity hat provides a basis for reci-procity. modal conception of public reason wasfirst ut forwardby Kant,whose account of practicalreason does not assume thatthosewho reason mustshare a political identity, et arguably lso

manages to do withoutmetaphysical oundations.12Kant'saccountof public reason accordingly differsn numerous respectsfromRawls'smore Rousseauian conception, in which public reason isidentifiedwithcitizens' reason. 3

Kant takes t that the capacityofprinciplesand standardsto bemade public to all otherswithout estrictions constitutive ftheirreasonableness. Reasons are given and received, exchanged and

rebutted: unrestrictedreasons can be given and received, ex-changed or rebuttedunrestrictedly,venamong thosewho are notcitizensof the same democraticpolity nd who do not share thesame political identity. ant does not deny that there are modes

12The claim thatKant's conceptionof practicalreason is not metaphys-ical but modal is controversial, ut is also strongly upported by some ofhis central writings n the vindicationof reason. For some chapters andverses ee Onora O'Neill, Reason and Politics n theKantianEnterprise,in Onora O'Neill, ConstructionsfReason:ExplorationsfKant'sPractical hi-losophyCambridge: Cambridge Universityress, 1989), 3-27, and Vindi-cating Reason in The Cambridge ompanionoKant, d. Paul Guyer Cam-bridge: Cambridge University ress,1992), 280-308.

It is a complex matter o set out the waysRawls's politicalphilosophyis and is not Kantian. Some of themare discussed n Political iberalismsee99-101). One evidently ousseauianfeature fhis view s that he existenceof a people is treatedas a presuppositionof public reason and so of any

social contract nd of ustice.

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ONORAO'NEILL

of thought nd action thatcan be exchanged onlyamong restrict-ed audiences,whosemembers hare certainfurtherssumptions-

who, forexample, share a religionor a culture,or a sense of po-litical dentity. e calls thinking nd acting whose underlying at-ternsand principlescannot be made fully ublic privateuses ofreason, meaningthattheseare (at least to some extent)deficient,incomplete uses of reason. In Kant's eyes, a Rawlsianconceptionofpublic reason would not be fully ublic,nor therefore ully ea-soned.

This modal conception of public reason is discussedin manyofKant's writings, nd perhaps most forthrightlyn his 1784 essayWhat is Enlightenment? 4 where he distinguishes harplybe-

tween a use of reason that addresses the real public or theworld at large and privateuses of reason,which are adjusted toaddress limited audiences, and are intrinsicallynfit o address anunrestricted udience (IW, 57). On Kant's account, communica-tion that can reach only some sociallydefined and restricted u-

dience will not count as fully ublic, even ifthat audience is largeand the communicationtakesplace in a public forum.His exam-ples of merelyprivate reasoningare oftenof communication na public forum that addresses large numbersof people actingininstitutionallyefinedroles: a preacher preachingto a congrega-tion,an officer ommanding troops, civil ervant ddressingtax-payers, re all depicted as making privateuses of reason (WE, 55-

56). The feature that eads Kant to classify hese typesof commu-nication as privateuses of reason is that theyassume startingpoints or principlesthat undercuttheir normativeforce for theworldat large (forexample, they ssume the authority f certainoffice holders). Of course, the world at large may understandthese communications s instructions r ordersthatwould bind ifone accepteda certain authority they find the communication intel-

ligible),but they re offeredno reasonfor cceptingthat uthority,

hence none forviewing ts requirementsor recommendationsas

14Immanuel Kant, An Answer to the Question: What is Enlighten-ment? (hereafterWE), trans. H. B. Nisbet, n Kant:PoliticalWritings,ded., ed. Hans Reiss (Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity ress, 1991), 54-60; see 57. Other centraltexts orKant'saccount of reason and of the basisfor thinking hat reason must be public are to be foundin the Doctrineof Method of The CritiquefPureReason, rans.N. Kemp Smith London:

Macmillan, 1933). For furthereferences ee the articles ited in note 12.

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reasons foraction, or for doing as the functionaries ommand orfor thinking s they dvise. Such private reasoningis suited, n-

deed adapted, only to a restricted udience, and so incompletelyreasoned. Each less-than-publicse ofreason tacitlyppeals to theauthority f churchor state,or community r cult; each relies ata certainpointon mere authority ather han on reason (in Kant'smetaphor: on an alien authority ).Of course, since much rea-soningonly aspires to reach restricted udiences, thiscan be quiteacceptable-for those restricted urposes.

By contrast,on Kant's view fundamental reasoning about theprinciplesof politics and morality,bout ustice and virtue, houldnot, indeed cannot, be structured o reach only a limited, ociallyor politically efined audience. Rather t should be whollypublic.We cannot presuppose the contingenciesof a particular ocial or-der or group in raisingthe most basic questions about theproperstructure f society.We cannot presuppose the contingenciesof aspecific ense ofpolitical dentityn askingthemostbasic questions

about ustice.In requiringthe most general and basic uses of reason to be

public in thisdemanding sense, Kant requires thattheybe basedon principleswhich any,hence all, others,whatever heirpoliticaland social identitiesmay be, can follow.On Kant's account, publicreason sets the modal requirementthatreasons be exchangeableamong reasoners. In the domain of theory,reasoning must bebased on principleswhich all can follow n thought,that is, onprincipleswhich are intelligibleto all others. In the domain ofpractice, reasoning must be based on principleswhich can beadopted as principlesof action by any and so by all, and corre-spondinglymustrejectprincipleswhich cannotbe adopted as prin-ciples of action by all. We cannot coherentlyor reasonablyrec-ommend to others thattheyadopt principleswhichit is not pos-sible for them to adopt. In short,practicalreasoning s a matter f

conforming o the supremeprincipleofpracticalreason, the Cat-egorical Imperative,whose best knownformulation emands thatreasonable personsact on universalizablerinciples, hat s,on max-ims (principles)whichtheycan at the same time willas universallaws.15 (Universalizabilitys not, however matter f everybody e-

15Immanuel Kant, Groundworkf theMetaphysicf Morals,trans.H. J.Paton, (New York:HarperTorchbooks,1964), 421 (PrussianAcademypag-

ination). I leave it open here whether Kant's view that practicalreason-

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ONORA O'NEILL

ing able to actsuccessfully n the same principles, ince countlessobstaclesmay prevent his: t s simply matter feverybody eing

able to adoptprincipleswhich could be principlesforall.)Since the Kantian conception of public reason addresses the

worldat large, ratherthan a restricted ange offellow itizens nclosed but internally emocratic societies, t differsn many waysfromthe Rawlsian conception. Two fundamentaldifferences e-tween the twoare the vindications fferedfor the respective on-ceptions of public reason and the theoriesof ustice towhicheach

conception points.The vindicationofRawlsianpublicreason lies in the (degree of)shared sense of political identity hat inksfellow citizens.Wherethe bonds of fellowcitizenshiphave notyetemerged,or have col-lapsed, or are undemocratic, t will be unclear whetheranythingcan count as public reason. In prepoliticaland despotic societiesthere can perhaps be no more than variants f thenonpublicrea-son that Rawls ascribes to churches,universities, ristocratic nd

autocratic regimes (PL, 213). By contrast,the vindication ofKant's account of public reason lies in the thought that reasonsmust be exchangeable among reasoners, hence thatany reasonsthat are relevantfor all cannot presuppose the contingenciesofaparticular social or political formation.Universalizabilitys theheart of practicalreason for Kant in that t is the modal require-ment thatprinciples and standards be sharable by all, even whennot all can act on them successfully.

The theoryof ustice towhich Rawlsianpublic reasoning pointsis well known: ts twoprinciplesof ustice are ones on whichciti-zens who are reasonable in Rawls's sense of the term will agree,and the basic structure f a just societythat s informedbythoseprincipleswillmeet the termsof a just social contract.Kant's the-oryof ustice pointsto different rinciplesof ustice, namelythosethatare required ifprinciplesof action that cannot be adopted byall (that are nonuniversalizable)are to be rejected.On Kant's ac-count, principles ike those of injuryor offalsepromising,whichcannot be principlesforall, will count as unreasonable.'6 Public

ableness is a matterofuniversalizabilitys convincing.For some consider-ations see Onora O'Neill, VindicatingReason and Towards usticendVirtue: Constructiveccount fPractical easoning Cambridge:CambridgeUniversity ress, 1996), chap. 2.

16If a principle of injury could be universally dopted, at least some

injurerswould succeed, so creating t least some victims,whowould be in

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reason will require their rejection, whether or not others will agree

that they should be rejected.

As in Rawls's account, so in Kant's, the constraints of public rea-

son do not derive from metaphysical sources, from individual mo-

tivation, or from formal requirements. However, in contrast to the

Rawlsian account, Kant does not derive an account ofpublic reason

from an assumed shared sense of political identity.Kantian public

reason is no more than the modal requirement that underlying

principles and standards of thought, communication, and action

be accessible to any audience, so be something to which they canagree, even when it is not something to which theywill agree.

Kant's conception of reasonableness is highly controversial.

What makes it controversial is not that it assumes that the sole and

proper context of public reason is a closed society of democratic

citizens, but that it proposes no more than a slender modal crite-

rion to justify principles and standards of action, including prin-

ciples of justice, and derivativelythe institutions of a just society.

On the other hand, if a Kantian conception of public reason could

be defended, and could be shown to have sufficient substantive

implications, it would have advantages. One advantage would be

that it might serve to query or to justifyrather than to take for

granted the institutions that constitute political identities. It could

allow for the possibility and the importance of ustifyingthe wider

political order within which identities and states and their bound-

aries, and even democracy itself,may be constituted-or contest-ed-rather than presupposing that a given political order and the

reciprocity it encourages constitute the unquestionable context of

all more specific justification of principles and institutions of jus-

tice.

The justifications offered by a Kantian conception of public rea-

son will not be contractualist. They are mute on the question

whether an actual or even a hypotheticalonvergence of wills on anyspecific standards or principles is likely,or whether if it emerged

principleunable to make injurytheirown principle,contrary o the hy-pothesisof universal doption of the principleof injury. f a principleoffalse promisingcould be universally dopted, trustwould inevitably eeroded and some personsleft n principleunable to promisefalsely,on-traryo thehypothesis f universal doptionof theprincipleof falseprom-

ising.

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ONORAO'NEILL

it would amount to any sort of ustification. t allows thata con-sensus can be iniquitous.

Kantian ustification emands only thatwe reject principlesonwhich no convergenceof wills spossible. t insists nlythat nythingthat s to count as a reason must be something hatcan be offeredand accepted,discussed and rejected even across (or disregarding)the boundaries of states,even among those who are not alreadyfellowcitizenswith hared political dentities.Rawls sees ustice incontractualist erms;Kant views t as one very mportantdomain

of a reasoned theoryof obligation.These contrasting onceptionsofpublic reason as reciprocitynd as universalizabilityorrespondto contrasting onceptions of ustice as contractualistnd as obli-gation-based,and of the contextof ustice as internal to closedsocietiesand as reachingacross boundaries.

Newnham ollege, ambridge

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O'Neill - Political Liberalism

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