Stout’s Democracy without Secularism: But is it a Tradition?

Abstract

This article critiques Jeffrey Stout’s suggestion in Democracy and Tradition that the practice of critical democratic questioning itself forms part of a historically unique secular tradition. While the practice of democratic questioning makes a valuable contribution to the project of fostering an “enlarged mentality” among the adherents of any particular tradition, Stout’s contention that this practice itself points to the existence of a substantive tradition, one that stands apart from and is not reliant upon the moral sources of the traditions it engages, remains problematic. 1. Freedom, Constraint by Norms, and Faith “Freedom,” Jeffrey Stout tells us in Democracy and Tradition, “is a kind of constraint by norms.” In saying this, he is nodding his head toward those theologians and thinkers like Stanley Hauerwas, who emphasize the essential role that tradition, in particular the Christian religious tradition, plays in maintaining the commitments, institutions, and practices through which its members are able to acquire excellent skills, virtuous habits, and good characters. It is in the space created by such traditional constraints, Stout says, that people become free to do most things that are worthwhile doing. “These normative constraints,” he adds, “make possible specific kinds of expressive freedom, different roles and aspirations, and therefore different kinds of people.” 1 Stout also agrees in principle with Hauerwas that a society should be judged according to the kind of people it produces. For Stout, a society can be deemed good if the normative constraints it fosters and promotes (or discourages and opposes) free the development of virtuous character. Thus, the measure of any society consists in the virtuosity enabled by the tradition or traditions that find room to flourish within its borders. I hasten to add that Stout’s particular affirmation of tradition involves conceiving of these in a dialectical fashion. According to this conception, the normative constraints articulated within traditions emerge historically and evolve