Between Facts and Norms - Contributions to a ... - Blogs Unpad

63The Sociolo-,ry of Law vs. the Philosophy of justicefortunate heirs, should be able to recapitulate this impartial judgment.The presuppositions under which these parties make theiragreements elucidate a moral point of view that does not accrue tothe privilege of a particular culture but goes deeper, in fact isultimately anchored in the symmetries of the mutual recognitionof communicatively acting subjects in general.Of course, these abstract conditions that make impartial judgmentof practical questions possible do not coincide with the conditionsunder which we are disposed to act on moral insight. This leadsRawls to seek out the motivational thrust of an accommodatingpolitical culture, which he finds at the privileged site of a continuousconstitutional tradition that stretches back over two hundredyears. Though certainly challenged again and again by conflicts ofclass and race, this tradition has constantly been renewed andrevitalized by new interpretations. If one takes this relation totradition literally, though, the theory's politically convincing forceis limited to a few responsive contexts.This consequence leads Ronald Dworkin to look for a lesscontingent way of embedding normative theories. On no accountdoes he want the effectiveness of liberal principles to depend onlatent potentials that we can awaken from traditions we just happento inherit. Thus in a recent article Dworkin not only expects theoryto take on the burden of justification for abstract principles hangingin midair, as it were. He also sets it the task of providing theseprinciples with an ethical foundation. He opposes uncoupling apostmetaphysical concept of justice from more embracing butconcretely structured, and hence motivating, projects of a wellspentlife.In place of the deontological priority of the right over thegood, Dworkin wants a liberal ethicfor pluralistic societies. This ethicshould be sufficiently formal to go along with the disagreementsone can reasonably anticipate in regard to preferred life orientations,yet it should also be substantial enough to constitute amotivational base for implementing abstract liberal principles.This theory, cast as a single whole, is supposed to embed thedeontological concept of justice in a consonant ethic:Liberal philosophers who . .. adopt the restricted view that liberalism isa theory of the right but not the good face the problem of explaining whatreasons people have to be liberals . .. : they try to find motives people have,