Contemporary Political Philosophy: An Introduction 2nd Edition

I can truly say that this is one of the best written books on philosophy I've ever read. For my class, we essentially worked through the entire thing and kymlickas style made it easy to digest. Philosophy is never easy, but I think some of his, kymlicka's , writing style has resonated and even changed the way I am writing myself.

Good book! recommend it!

Great comprehensive look into modern political theory's

My book had about 20 pages misprinted -- they were completely blank.

I did not actually read this entire book but I read the introduction and the chapters on utilitarianism, liberalism, libertarianism, marxism, and communitarianism so my review will be about those sections.

Kymlicka's book serves as a good introduction to a number of the major strands of modern political thought from a liberal perspective. That Kymlicka favors liberalism is evident throughout the book. A great deal of the book is taken up with liberal critiques of the other main strands of political thought. While the chapters on the other strands of political thought are largely taken up with these liberal critiques Kymlicka does a good job offering fair and accurate summaries of the other strands of political thought before entering into his critiques and he is willing to salvage what he believes to be important insights from all the different strands of political thought he discusses in this book.

In my opinion Kymlicka's discussions of liberalism and libertarianism were the best parts of the book. In the section on liberalism Kymlicka provides overviews of John Rawl's and Ronald Dworkin's theories of justice. Since liberal theories of justice often have redistributive implications they are often considered to be defenses for the liberal welfare state. Kymlicka argues persuasively that the consequences of the liberal theories of justice are actually more radical than that, "For one thing liberal equality requires each person to start their life with an equal share of society's resources, and the sorts of policies needed to achieve this go far beyond the traditional welfare state approach. As we have seen, the welfare state is primarily concerned with the post factum correction of market inequalities, through tax and transfer schemes. But as Mill recognized a long time ago, to focus solely on post factum income redistribution is to make 'the great error of reformers and philanthropists...to nibble at the consequences of unjust power, instead of redressing the injustice itself'. If our goal is to achieve greater ex ante equality in endowments, we need to directly attack the entrenched economic hierarchies of modern societies" (89).

Kymlicka does an excellent job of defending the liberal concern for justice against critics. Some critics of the priority of the question of justice in political philosophy have argued that talk of justice and rights is only a substitute for the lack of genuine human feeling in the relationships within society. The reason it is not necessary to talk of justice in the family is because relations in the family are held together by love. If human relations within society as a whole were based on love there would be no need to talk of justice or rights since human beings would spontaneously respond to the needs of others. But as Kymlicka points out talk of justice and rights does not prohibit loving relationships of this kind, and the definition of a right does not prohibit the free relinquishing of those rights (I can, for example, freely relinquish my right to my property by giving a gift) but justice does attempt to ensure that human relationships are not "corrupted by domination or subordination" (210). Justice also ensures that the decisions to relinquish our rights are truly voluntary.

The section on libertarianism is also quite good and offers what I think are some truly excellent critiques of the libertarian position. Kymlicka provides an overview of three different forms of libertarianism: Nozick's libertarianism, mutual advantage libertarianism, and the libertarianism of liberty. Kymlicka presents solid critiques of all three strands but I think his critiques of the third strand are the best and most important. Libertarianism is not ultimately a very popular political doctrine but I think a number of the arguments presented by what Kymlicka calls the libertarianism of liberty find their way into popular political discourse in the United States.

There is a claim, for example, that the welfare state restricts freedom whereas capitalism does not but, as Kymlicka argues, this claim requires a shift in the definition of freedom half-way through the argument. One can define freedom in a moralized or a non-moralized way. The non-moralized definition of freedom claims that "we are free in so far as no one prevents us from acting on our (actual or potential) desires" (143). The libertarians must use a non-moralized definition of freedom when making their claim that the welfare state restricts freedom because if, for example, people have no moral right to the benefits which they accrue from their undeserved talents then the welfare state will not restrict people's freedom by redistributing those benefits. The problem is that if you define freedom in a non-moralized way then capitalism also restricts freedom. Private property, for example, limits the freedom of non-owners to use that property, "private property is a distribution of freedom and unfreedom" (150). If we accept a non-moralized definition of freedom then taxes do not actually limit freedom they simply redistribute it, i.e. they redistribute the right to use property from one person to another. No freedom is destroyed in this process it is simply redistributed.

In order to escape this consequence libertarians move to a different, moralized definition of freedom in their claim that capitalism does not limit freedom. People have a right to their private property and, therefore, the restrictions of freedom under capitalism are not really restrictions of freedom (putting up a no trespassing sign does not restrict my freedom since I had no right to use someone else's private property in the first place). The problem here is, if we accept a moralized definition of freedom, then libertarians cannot escape the debate about the justifications of their moral principles. One of the perceived strengths of libertarianism is that it does not require this kind of moral debate. Everyone is free to have their own moral beliefs about what is just or unjust as long as they do not encroach on the freedom's of others. Once we realize that the definition of freedom libertarians use requires a definition of moral rights this tactic will no longer work, "once we define liberty as the freedom to do what one has a moral right to do, then liberty can no longer play a role in deciding between competing theories of rights" (151). Libertarians will, therefore, have to offer some kind of defense for why the wealthy have a moral right to their wealth.

The section on utilitarianism was also quite good and offered some valuable critiques of the utilitarian position. The utilitarian position has always seemed implausible to me, however, so I was not quite as interested in this section. The section on marxism was interesting but I was a little disappointed that Kymlicka focused entirely on analytical marxism. I think the analytical marxists had some interesting things to say but they are not representative of most marxists. They accept a number of the premises of neoclassical economics (methodological individualism for example) as well as a number of the premises of liberal political theory (the importance of working out a theory of justice for example). For these reasons analytical marxism fits with the themes of Kymlicka's book better than standard marxist theory but it would be a mistake to assume that the analytical marxists are representative of marxism in general. I would recommend the reader who is interested in Marx look up books by David Harvey or take a look at Time, Labor, and Social Domination: A Reinterpretation of Marx's Critical Theory by Moishe Postone. The section on communitarism seemed good as well. Kymlicka presented what I think were some fairly solid liberal responses to communitarian critiques of liberalism. It seemed to me, however, that Kymlicka might not be presenting the best case possible for communitarianism before offering his critiques. Unfortunately I am not familiar enough to know for sure but I have read some of Charles Taylor, including his work Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity and I think very highly of Charles Taylor as a philosopher. The summaries that Kymlicka was offering of communitarianism seemed to me to represent views that were so clearly wrong I find it hard to believe a philosopher of Charles Taylor's status would endorse them in exactly the form that Kymlicka presented them in but, again, I have not read enough to know for sure.

All in all I would say Kymlicka's book is a good entry point into modern debates in political philosophy.

This is a first rate survey of modern political philosophy. Kymlicka devotes individual chapters to Utilitarianism, Liberal Equality views (eg, Rawls and Dworkin), Libertarianism, Marxism, Communitarianism, Citizenship Theory, Multiculturalism, and Feminism. Kymlicka's approach is the same in each chapter. He attempts to describe each position as fairly and charitably as possible, followed by criticism of the position. Kymlicka is an excellent critic and clear writer, logical and fair minded. In general, most positions, including Utilitarianism, Libertarianism, Marxism, and the different strains of Communitarianism receive vigorous criticism. Liberal Equality views, such as those of Rawls and Dworkin, fare better, though Kymlicka points out a number of problems with these positions as well. In Kymlicka's analysis, the Liberal Equality theories often capture the better features of alternative theories but without many of the inconsistencies and problems exhibited by these theories. Kymlicka does sometimes use a problematic argument. In some disucssions of non-Liberal theories, he will resort to appeals to intuition to attack those theories. For example, the strict application of some forms of Utilitarianism seems to violate our sense of the sanctity of human rights. This is a fair argument but it may have limitations not acknowledged by Kymlicka. Given that most readers of this book have been raised in essentially Liberal societies, its likely their intuitions will be Liberal in nature. What would happen if appealing to intuitions of people raised in a caste based or highly egalitarian society? Kymlicka has a thoughtful chapter on Multiculturalism, which is an area of considerable interest to him. He concludes with a weaker chapter on Feminism, which I think is a bit short sighted and underestimates the impact of present approaches to improving the state of women.
All chapters have fine footnotes and excellent bibliographies.