Liberal and Communitarian Approaches to Justification

Abstract

Liberals and communitarians differ most basically on the justification of values, a disagreement that leads to alternative approaches to social criticism. Liberals insist on cosmopolitan justification, which has universalistic criteria, while communitarians are committed to local justification based on the shared values of particular societies. Although communitarians correctly believe that justification cannot be foundationalist, the universalism of cosmopolitan justification is essential to the defense of values like freedom that are supported by both communitarians and liberals. Moreover, cosmopolitan justification is possible when understood in contextual terms. An exploration of the political implications of the human capacities of rationality and moral agency can derive universal principles as criteria for social criticism.