Certainty or Faith? Arendt's and Merleau-Ponty's Critique of Cartesian Foundationalism

Epistemological foundationalism has for centuries attempted to unify all scientific inquiry into the context of one grand science, the first philosophy. One of the most important tasks of this tradition has been to ground all knowledge on absolutely certain foundations. In this master s thesis I ask the following question: To what extent and under what conditions is it possible to achieve absolute certainty in the sense of the attempts of Cartesian foundationalism? By examining how the 20th century philosophers, Edmund Husserl (1859-1938), Hannah Arendt (1906-1975) and Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908-1961) interpret the epistemological methodology of René Descartes, I claim that the Cartesian achievement of absolute certainty rests on the implicit presupposition of an epistemologically prior form of faith in the world and trust (pistis) in other conscious beings. I show that knowledge is possible only within the context of a common world that is inhabited by several conscious beings that share a common linguistic system. This threefold element is shown to be the bedrock condition for any kind of philosophical inquiry. The main literature sources for this thesis are The Life of the Mind by Hannah Arendt, Le Visible et l invisible by Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Meditationes de Prima Philosophiae by René Descartes and Erfahrung und Urteil by Edmund Husserl.

Democratic Legitimacy and the Politics of Rights : A comparative analysis of the conceptual relationship between democracy and rights in contemporary political theories

Democratic Legitimacy and the Politics of Rights is a research in normative political theory, based on comparative analysis of contemporary democratic theories, classified roughly as conventional liberal, deliberative democratic and radical democratic. Its focus is on the conceptual relationship between alternative sources of democratic legitimacy: democratic inclusion and liberal rights. The relationship between rights and democracy is studied through the following questions: are rights to be seen as external constraints to democracy or as objects of democratic decision making processes? Are individual rights threatened by public participation in politics; do constitutionally protected rights limit the inclusiveness of democratic processes? Are liberal values such as individuality, autonomy and liberty; and democratic values such as equality, inclusion and popular sovereignty mutually conflictual or supportive? Analyzing feminist critique of liberal discourse, the dissertation also raises the question about Enlightenment ideals in current political debates: are the universal norms of liberal democracy inherently dependent on the rationalist grand narratives of modernity and incompatible with the ideal of diversity? Part I of the thesis introduces the sources of democratic legitimacy as presented in the alternative democratic models. Part II analyses how the relationship between rights and democracy is theorized in them. Part III contains arguments by feminists and radical democrats against the tenets of universalist liberal democratic models and responds to that critique by partly endorsing, partly rejecting it. The central argument promoted in the thesis is that while the deconstruction of modern rationalism indicates that rights are political constructions as opposed to externally given moral constraints to politics, this insight does not delegitimize the politics of universal rights as an inherent part of democratic institutions. The research indicates that democracy and universal individual rights are mutually interdependent rather than oppositional; and that democracy is more dependent on an unconditional protection of universal individual rights when it is conceived as inclusive, participatory and plural; as opposed to robust majoritarian rule. The central concepts are: liberalism, democracy, legitimacy, deliberation, inclusion, equality, diversity, conflict, public sphere, rights, individualism, universalism and contextuality. The authors discussed are e.g. John Rawls, Jürgen Habermas, Seyla Benhabib, Iris Young, Chantal Mouffe and Stephen Holmes. The research focuses on contemporary political theory, but the more classical work of John S. Mill, Benjamin Constant, Isaiah Berlin and Hannah Arendt is also included.

Asukaslähtöisyys ja kulttuurin instrumentaalinen rooli paikalliskulttuuriprojekteissa - tapausesimerkkinä urbaani luovuus ja kulttuuriraide

Tässä Pro gradu -tutkielmassa tarkastellaan kahta asukaslähtöisyyteen pyrkivää paikalliskulttuurihanketta. Helsingin kulttuurikeskuksen kulttuuriraide-yhteistyöverkostoa toteutetaan Mellunkylän alueella ja Metropolia Ammattikorkeakoulun Urbaani luovuus -hanketta Arabianrannan ympäristössä. Mielenkiintoni kohteena ovat paikalliskulttuuritoimintaa järjestävien tahojen ja paikallisaktiivien käsitykset asukaslähtöisyydestä ja hankkeiden tarkoituksesta. Työssä pyritään vastaamaan kahteen pääkysymykseen. Ensinnäkin: miten asukaslähtöisyys tulkitaan Urbaani luovuus -hankkeessa ja kulttuuriraide-verkostossa? Toinen tutkimuskysymykseni kuuluu, miten haastateltavat tulkitsevat kyseisten kulttuurihankkeiden tarkoitusta ja merkitystä? Työssä tarkastellaan paikalliskulttuuriprojekteja niiden keskeisten tekijöiden ja toimijoiden näkökulmista katsottuna. Näin ollen valitsin työni empiirisen osuuden menetelmäksi henkilöhaastattelun. Aineiston analysoinnissa käytetään niin kutsuttua ad hoe -menetelmää, eli yhdistellään vapaasti muun muassa tiivistämisen ja luokittelun tekniikoita. Asukaslähtöiset kulttuurihankkeet nojaavat jonkinlaiseen käsitykseen asukkaiden roolista ja osallisuudesta. Olen valinnut työni tulkintateoriaksi osallisuutta ja moniäänisyyttä korostavan käsitejärjestelmän, joka pohjautuu muun muassa Hannah Arendtin ja deliberatiivisen demokratian teoreetikon Joshua Cohenin ajatuksiin. Niissä korostetaan julkisen yhteistoiminnan ja keskustelevien käytäntöjen merkitystä moniäänisyyden ja inklusiivisyyden takaamisessa. Deliberatiiviset periaatteet ovat toimivia paikalliskulttuurihankkeiden yhteistoimintaprosessin tarkastelussa. Toinen mielenkiinnon kohteeni on kulttuurin instrumentaalinen rooli kaupunkipolitiikassa. Kulttuurisesta suunnittelusta on haettu apua niin kaupunkien kansainvälistymispyrkimyksiin kuin lähiöiden parannukseen. Lähestyn asiaa muiden muassa Charles Landryn tutkimusten pohjalta, joskin pyrin kartoittamaan ennen kaikkea käydyn keskustelun laajuutta. Urbaanissa luovuudessa asukaslähtöisyys ymmärretään pyrkimyksenä päästä tekemisiin asukkaiden kanssa. Metropolia suunnittelee ja toteuttaa alueelle vuorovaikutteisia sisältöjä, joihin asukkaiden toivotaan osallistuvan

An Analysis of the Concept of Citizenship: Legal, Political and Social Dimensions

The thesis aims at analyzing concept of citizenship in political philosophy. The concept of citizenship is a complex one: it does not have a definitive explication, but it nevertheless is a very important category in contemporary world. Citizenship is a powerful ideal, and often the way a person is treated depends on whether he or she has the status of a citizen. Citizenship includes protection of a person’s rights both at home and abroad. It entails legal, political and social dimension: the legal status as a full member of society, the recognition of that status by fellow citizens and acting as a member of society. The thesis discusses these three dimensions. Its objective is to show how all of them, despite being insufficient in some aspects, reach something important about the concept. The main sources of the thesis are Civic Republicanism by Iseult Honohan (Routledge 2002), Republicanism by Philip Pettit (Clarendon Press 1997), and Taking Rights Seriously by Ronald Dworkin (1997). In addition, the historical part of the thesis relies mainly on the works of Aristotle, Immanuel Kant, Adam Smith, Quentin Skinner, James Pocock and James Tully. The writings of Will Kymlicka, John Rawls, Chantal Mouffe, and Shane Phelan are referred to in the presentation and critique of the liberal tradition of thought. Hannah Arendt and Seyla Benhabib’s analysis of Arendt’s philosophy both address the problematic relations between human rights and nation-states as the main guarantors of rights. The chapter on group rights relies on Peter Jones’ account of corporate and collective rights, after which I continue to Seumas Miller’s essay on the (liberal) account of group rights and their relation to the concept of citizenship. Republicanism and Political Theory (2002) edited by Cécile Laborde and John Maynor is also references. David Miller and Maurizio Viroli represent the more “rooted” version of republicanism. The thesis argues that the full concept of citizenship should be seen as containing legal, political and social dimensions. The concept can be viewed from all of these three angles. The first means that citizenship is connected with certain rights, like the right to vote or stand for election, the right to property and so on. In most societies, the law guarantees these rights to every citizen. Then there is also the social dimension, which can be said to be as important as the legal one: the recognition of equality and identities of others. Finally, there is the political dimension, meaning the importance of citizens’ participation in the society, which is discussed in connection with the contemporary account of republicanism. All these issues are discussed from the point of view of groups demanding for group-specific rights and equal recognition. The challenge with these three aspects of citizenship is, however, that they are difficult to discuss under one heading. Different theories or discourses of citizenship each approach the subject from different starting points, which make reconciling them sometimes hard. The fundamental questions theories try to answer may differ radically depending on the theory. Nevertheless, in order to get the whole image of what the citizenship discourses are about all the aspects deserve to be taken into account.