Constructivism and the Liberal Dilemma

Abstract

In this dissertation I show that constructivist liberal philosophers are confronted by a dilemma. On the one hand, the conceptions of persons that they appeal to are so thin that contradictory conclusions can be derived from those very same conceptions. Where one philosopher thinks that his or her conception excludes the capitalistic economic liberties from the list of basic rights, it is possible to show with great plausibility the opposite conclusion and vice-versa. The status of the capitalist economic liberties carries significant implications not only for the structure of the economy but also for the place and role of other normative values that more directly affect other areas of life. If it can be shown that a conception of persons leads to contradictory results when it comes to the status of the economic liberties in particular, then the general shape of society will change in significant and inevitable ways as well. In order to avoid this horn of the dilemma, some philosophers seek to thicken their conceptions of persons. In doing so, I maintain that they come to beg too many questions and subsequently undermine whatever normative conclusions they sought to derive from their conception of persons. I analyze this connection within the context of the theories of political philosophers writing from different traditions of liberal thought. To do so I first distinguish between how the concept of personhood has been employed in moral philosophy as opposed to political philosophy. The chapters then move from liberal theories more progressively oriented, such as John Rawls’s theory of justice, to more moderate positions, such as John Tomasi’s market democracy, to Robert Nozick’s libertarianism. In the first two cases I argue that the conceptions of persons employed by Rawls and Tomasi are thin, and that it is possible to show that their conceptions lead to conclusions in conflict with their own stated positions. In the case of libertarianism, I argue that libertarians generally construe self-ownership thickly by including the economic liberties within its very definition, rather than appealing to self-ownership in order to derive those liberties.