First blog posts

By Prof. Martin

How to post: Log into Blogger; if you belong to more than one blog on Blogger, you may need to select "PPE2023" in the drop-down menu on the top left. In the menu on the left, select the first option, "Posts." Then click the "New Post" button on the top left. If you want to comment on an existing post, you can instead go to the url for the main page, PPE2023.blogspot.com, and click "comment" under the relevant post.

Remember you should blog before every seminar. The deadline for your post is noon the day before seminar. You should post at least 6 “main” posts over the course of the semester, and 3 of these should appear before Spring Break. The rest of your posts may be comments. You are welcome (encouraged!) to post more than the required amount.

You can use your posts to do any number of things: You can work out a difficult passage or argument; pose a challenge to one of the readings; connect, contrast, or otherwise compare different readings; explain why you find something confusing and ask for help; ask your classmates to reflect on a question or issue that’s puzzling you; …

For the first few seminars, I will also post possible discussion questions. We do not have to stick to these (indeed, we most likely will not), but they may help to get your thoughts going, if you’re feeling unsure where to start--you can pick one or two to think and blog about. Here are some questions for the first two readings, from Martin Luther King, Jr. and Danielle Allen:


  1. The first ethical demand issues from the “sacredness of human personality” or the “dignity and worth” of all human beings. King points out that segregation degrades human personality, but he does not explicitly address how the value of human personality calls for not only desegregation but also integration. How might his reasoning go, here?
  2. The second demand issues from the freedom King says is “the essence of man.” How does this freedom relate to the standard distinction within political theory, between negative and positive liberties?
  3. The third demand issues from humans’ basic social natures, “the solidarity of the human family.” What do you think about the connection King draws between mutually advantageous cooperation and people taking responsibility for each other?





  1. Allen argues that a certain “mathematical fantasy” has dominated the popular conception of the goal of integration, and that it “undermines our capacity to pursue an eminently worthy ideal” (151). How convincing do you find this argument?
  2. Allen connects King’s conception of “life-quality freedom” with positive liberties and positive rights, and also to material goods (151-3).  She also suggests that King conceives of this form or forms of freedom as “nonsacrificeable.” On the face of it, it’s not easy to think of material goods as nonsacrificeable. Do you see any ways around this potential challenge?
  3. How convinced are you by Allen’s argument that King’s three demands can be used to conceptualize not only the changes to spirit and attitude needed to achieve integration, but also the “practices and policies of our organizations” (160)?

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why Cowen and Anderson are both wrong-George

By
In their dialogue, both Cowen and Anderson fail to address important elements of each other's arguments. Cowen's failure is primarily empirical. He dismisses the significance of labor market monopsony out of hand (109). Although economists disagree about the relevance of employer labor market power, Cowen does not sufficiently address the credible evidence of its role in suppressing compensation. This evidence has only grown in the years since Private Government  was published. One consideration as to the relevance of monopsony is the pay-productivity gap. Although libertarian economists chafe immensely at any implication that workers do not benefit from higher productivity, and the popular understanding of the pay-productivity gap is indeed exaggerated, even the most pro-market economists are forced to admit to a degree of "delinkage" between the growth of labor productivity and the compensation of nonsupervisory employees. Interestingly, there is less evidence of de...
Read more

Responding to Jemma and Aara: Another consideration that Rawls does not discuss--- Luis

By
  Hey Jemma and Aara,   Thank you for the thought-provoking blogs! I definitely felt that Okin made her argument less favorable by structuring her last part of Chapter 6 with a sense of constructing a ladder of what social standing has a greater impact on "one's thinking of justice." I agree with you and Aara in that Okin's critique of the unequal gender-based structure is strong and needed to achieve Rawls's basic structure of a well-ordered society. I also believe that stating that gender is the most prevalent identity that will form an individual's concept of "justice" undermines intersectionality. I wanted to add another layer that is not accounted for by Rawls, which Okin hints on.  After reading both blogs, I initially thought about our seminar where Kat and I argued for what Aara was discussing, a knowledge of the global racial empire, or in other terms, the history of racism and colonialism in the original position. I was sold on that argumen...
Read more

Evaluating Harris Whiteness as Property--- Luis Mendoza

By
      In "Whiteness as Property," Cheryl I. Harris builds her work on the image of her grandmother and her ability to use "passing" in her labor and daily life (1710). The main advantage of passing, as stated by Harris, is that it "[increases] the [possibilities] of controlling critical aspects of one's life rather than being the object of other's domination" (1713). At this moment, I want to focus on her functions of whiteness which comes after her discussion that whiteness is property through its theoretical descriptions. More specifically, I will digest one attribute of whiteness as property: "the rights to transfer or alienability" (1731).              One of Harris's points is that because theories surrounding property state that it must have the aspect of alienability, it makes whiteness as property more difficult to process. The issue is that "whiteness," as Harris states, "is incapable of being trans...
Read more