Moderate Conservatism

Reclaiming the Center

John Kekes (Autor)

Buch | Hardcover

256 Seiten

2023
Oxford University Press Inc (Verlag)
978-0-19-766806-1 (ISBN)

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Moderate Conservatism: Reclaiming the Center by John Kekes is a response to attacks on the United States' 300-year-old constitutional democracy by extremists on the left and the right. It makes a reasoned case for moderation and the defense of a political system that has endured because it has balanced the often-conflicting claims of justice, liberty, equality, prosperity, and security. That balance is now threatened by extremists who ignore all else but their grievances. They are blind to the destructive consequences of their attacks on the conditions on which the well-being of all Americans, including their own, depends.

The aim of Moderate Conservatism is to protect the United States' political system. It is a defense of what Americans have and are in danger of losing. Central to it is the rarely conscious patriotism of many millions of citizens who live private lives, earn a living, raise a family, and rely on the political system to protect the conditions in which they can continue to do so. They sustain life as Americans know it. And that life is now threatened by the destructive attacks of extremists. The United States is in urgent need of the balance and moderation this book describes and defends.

John Kekes is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy. He is the author of many books, including Hard Questions: Facing the Problems of Life and Wisdom: A Humanistic Conception. He has been visiting professor in Canada, England, Estonia, Hungary, Portugal, Singapore, and the United States Military Academy.

CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER TWO: FROM SIMPLICITIES TO COMPLEXITIES
The Aim of Moderate Conservatism
Conventional Lives
Common Decencies
Shared Modes of Evaluation
Sources of Complexities

CHAPTER THREE: PERENNIAL PROBLEMS
Overview
Contingencies
Conflicts
Compromises

CHAPTER FOUR: THE PROBLEM AND THE RESPONSE
The Problem
Complex Evaluations
Personal Attitudes and Our Political System
Negative Capability
Toward Reasonable Actions

CHAPTER FIVE: THE RULE OF LAW
The Approach
Procedural or Substantive?
Doubts about Priorities
The Moderately Substantive Requirement
Moderate Conservatism and the Rule of Law

CHAPTER SIX: JUSTICE
Justice as Desert
Why Should We Get What We Deserve?
Terms of Cooperation
The Test of Time
Justice as Desert: For and Against

CHAPTER SEVEN: LEGAL AND POLITICAL EQUALITY
The Aim
Contextuality
Conditionality
Practicality
Justification

CHAPTER EIGHT: LIBERTY
The Concept and Its Complexities
Negative Liberty
Reasons Against Negative Liberty
Positive Liberty as Autonomy
The Exclusivist Mistake
The Secular Faith and Its Problems
Limited Liberty

CHAPTER NINE: PROPERTY
The Reason for It
Its Importance
Interest-Based Justification?
Entitlement-Based Justification
Utility-Based Justification
Complex Justification

CHAPTER TEN: LAST WORDS

REFERENCES
INDEX

Erscheinungsdatum	11.11.2022
Verlagsort	New York
Sprache	englisch
Maße	211 x 145 mm
Gewicht	413 g
Themenwelt	Geisteswissenschaften ► Philosophie
Themenwelt	Sozialwissenschaften
ISBN-10	0-19-766806-2 / 0197668062
ISBN-13	978-0-19-766806-1 / 9780197668061
Zustand	Neuware