Can We Really Ask the Oppressed to Be Reasonable? Serious Injustice, Civility, and Over-Demandingness

Abstract

Abstract On a Rawlsian definition, part of being reasonable is abiding by public reason and therefore being civil when pursuing political change. Critics maintain that in calling on citizens to be reasonable, political liberals are too demanding towards groups that, suffering from a long history of injustice, have every right to be uncooperative. Moreover, disruption and violence might well be their only chance to make progress towards redressing that injustice. This chapter replies to these critiques by arguing that under certain conditions, disruption and violence are perfectly reasonable political strategies. We stress that Rawls’s duty to comply with public reason is conditional on reciprocity. However, in contrast to other analyses of the applicability of public reason in non-ideal conditions, we highlight that Rawls does not consider reciprocity important in itself, but because compliance on the part of others is necessary to avoid sacrificing one’s core interests by following public reason. We then show that being at the receiving end of severe injustices constitutes evidence of a risk of self-sacrifice serious enough to relieve members of oppressed groups of the duty to obey public reason. We specify what injustices count as severe by drawing on Rawls’s definition of a reasonable conception of justice, and we start discussing what normative constraints apply to citizens who, relieved of public reason, are morally allowed to engage in disruption and violence. Indeed, while those suffering from severe injustice have a right to deviate from public reason’s civility, abandoning reasonableness should never be excused.