Abstract

Autonomy is a core value for all liberals. As such, it is used to justify particular socio-political claims, and it even plays a role in liberal justifications of the state. However, despite the important place autonomy holds for contemporary liberals, there are two important ambiguities in "that liberal account" of the role autonomy should play in a well-ordered society. The first ambiguity can be highlighted by reference to the question whether autonomy should be promoted in an unabashedly perfectionist way by liberals, or whether it is just one of many valuable forms of life which must compete with one another within a neutral liberal framework. The second ambiguity is concerned with the question whether the value of autonomy is importantly connected to the value of the choices it allows us to make, or whether it is an ideal which is valuable in and of itself. ;In this dissertation 1 explore both of these ambiguities through a discussion of several contemporary accounts of liberalism. I begin with a discussion of Rawls's move from the views expressed in A Theory of Justice to an explicitly "political" account, an account which relies for its plausibility on our ability to make a clear distinction between our purely "political" duties as citizens and our private comprehensive beliefs. I argue that it is unlikely that such a split can be adequately maintained, and examine Rorty's "foundationless" liberalism to show some of the problems that can arise if this is the form of liberalism we want to advocate. I then examine Raz's alternative approach, an approach which is unabashedly perfectionist. Raz argues that the value of autonomy is crucially connected to the value of the choices it allows us to make, and that well-ordered liberal societies have a duty to promote the autonomy of their members. I then briefly explore the concept of autonomy itself, and argue that its value is importantly connected to the value of the sorts of things it allows us to do, and that, furthermore, as liberals, whether we are autonomous or not, the sorts of choices we make must meet the demands of liberal justice. I then examine the question whether, as some claim, the active promotion of autonomy on the part of liberal societies would involve these societies in unacceptably paternalistic activities. I conclude that liberal societies should, as far as they are able, promote the autonomy of their members because autonomy is an essential ingredient in a particularly liberal account of human flourishing