Abstract

A major question in contemporary social theory is whether democratic politics can be given a universalistic normative justification. Historically, enlightenment universalism has been faced by the twin problems of over abstractness and latent dogmatic content. Jurgen Habermas's discourse ethic is a recent attempt to outline a universalistic political ethic which avoids the problems of its enlightenment predecessors. The discourse ethic has been widely criticized as itself overly abstract and dogmatic in various ways. If critics are right then democratic practice cannot be given a normative backing by appeal to the idea of universal participation in dialogue. In this dissertation, I defend the discourse ethical approach against charges of over abstraction and dogmatism. I argue that the ethic is concretely grounded in culture and society, that it is able to function as a practical political ethic, and that it is consistently critical of dogmatism and domination. ;I begin by discussing the normative universalisms of Kant, Hegel, and Marx, and show that each both abstracted from important political issues and incorporated uncritical political content. I then describe Habermas's project as an attempt to draw on aspects of these previous enlightenment theories while avoiding their salient difficulties. The rest of the dissertation is framed by responses to several of the most prominent criticisms of the discourse ethic. I discuss objections that discourse ethical universalism incorporates covert uncritical content which furthers domination, the ethic is disembodied, making it irrelevant to politics or biased in favor of some issues and groups, the ethic fails to do justice to the importance of context and caring relationships in political judgment, the ethic is founded upon an inappropriate distinction between universalistic moral issues and culturally relative ethical ones, the ethic yields no definite political judgments, and the ethic does not contribute to understanding the conditions for actual democratic activity or institutions. ;I argue that though such criticisms show important challenges for the application of the discourse ethic, they fail to refute it as a democratic political ethic. First, I argue that the ethic consistently calls for criticisms of any form domination and thus is not dogmatic or exclusive as critics charge. Secondly, I show that the discourse ethic is compatible with context sensitive judgement and the inclusion of various rhetorical styles. Third, I argue that the distinction between morality and ethics, properly understood, is defensible and necessary for a democratic ethic. Fourth, while acknowledging that a democratic philosophical ethic is necessarily limited in yielding precise political judgments, I argue that the ethic is useful in two related ways. First, it serves as a normative basis for social criticism, in which social norms can be seen as results of relatively undemocratic procedures. Second, in providing conditions for democratic legitimacy the discourse ethic can serve to guide political action at the level of institutions and social movements. In each chapter, I indicate ways in which the discourse ethic is both more practical and consistently critical as a political ethic than the I alternatives suggested by its critics