Pluralism - Philosophical Pluralism, Aristotle, German Historicism, Pragmatism, Cultural Pluralism, Political Pluralism, Conclusion
authority power single
Pluralism derives from the Latin plures, meaning "several" or "many," and it has formed the central concern of various intellectual traditions throughout the history of the West. Applied in philosophy, political theory, religion, and ethnic and racial relations, pluralism challenges the notion that a single authority or group must dominate all others. Rather than accepting the imposition of conformity to either a single standard of truth or a center of power, whether it is moral, political, cultural, or religious, pluralists have defended the right to diversity and difference. At its most promising, pluralism thus forms the basis of tolerance and the essential limitation of power and authority on behalf of human freedom.
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Philosophical pluralism's core belief consists of the notion that humans do not simply discover and copy, through the use of reason, a unified reality that exists independently of them. Rather, our view of reality, or that which we take as truth, is always influenced by our cultural and historical context. Truth, accordingly, can never be absolute, static, strictly objective, and monolithic…
Giambattista Vico (1668–1744) and Johann Gottfried von Herder (1744–1803), the founders of German historicism, deepened the rebellion against monism and absolutism. These critics of the great tradition of Western philosophy rejected that tradition's key assumption that natural laws operated to maintain an independent, objective reality, knowledge of which would yield absolute,…
At the dawn of the twentieth century, a new philosophical movement called pragmatism emerged, part of the modernist revolt against nineteenth-century orthodoxy. Influenced by the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) and the French thinker Henri-Louis Bergson (1859–1941), the movement included such leading figures as Charles S. Peirce (1839–1914), William James (1…
The pluralistic defense of cultural diversity typical of Vico, Herder, and James has grown more powerful in the modern world as ethnic and racial groups within multiethnic societies have increasingly sought to exercise political power and retain their cultural heritage in the face of demands for cultural conformity. In the United States the pragmatists Horace Meyer Kallen (1882–1974) and Ra…
In practice, the political variation on pluralist thought has attempted to disperse political power and authority in modern societies, with varying degrees of success. English political pluralists, for example, grappled with the problem of maintaining political diversity and liberty in the face of the growing power of the modern state in the early twentieth century. Influenced by the Whig traditio…
Reinhold Niebuhr captured the spirit of pluralism when he wrote: "Absolutism, in both religious and political idealism, is a splendid incentive to heroic action, but a dangerous guide in immediate concrete situations. In religion it permits absurdities and in politics … unbearable tyrannies and cruelties" (p. 199). As the horrific events of September 11, 2001, demonstrated, re…
Arendt, Hannah. Between Past and Future: Eight Exercises in Political Thought. New York: Viking, 1968. Aristotle. The Nichomachean Ethics. Translated by H. Rackham. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1939. Berlin, Isaiah. Personal Impressions. 2nd ed. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2001. Bourne, Randolph. "Transnational America." In his The Radical Will: Select…
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