“ASSOCIATIVE POLITICAL OBLIGATIONS:

IS POLITICAL MEMBERSHIP INTRINSICALLY VALUABLE AND DOES IT MATTER?”

Dr Robbie Arrell

Wuhan University

WHU Philosophy Spring Seminar Series

Wednesday 11 April 2018

Abstract

Some argue that certain of the duties one has towards one’s political society and/or co-members are relevantly similar to the duties one has towards one’s parents, children, friends, lover(s), etc. The “associative” political duties argument typically begins from the premise that (P1) membership of a political society is intrinsically valuable. It is then said that (P2) to participate in an intrinsically valuable association just is (amongst other things) to have associative duties towards those with whom one shares it (these duties being partially constitutive of, and justified by, the value of those associations). Thus, one has associative political duties towards one’s own political society/co-members that one does not have towards other political societies/non-members. In this paper, I reject this argument for associative political duties. First, I show that the conditionalism of the value of political membership that defenders of this argument invariably invoke internally undermines P1, suggesting political membership can only be extrinsically valuable. And, second, I challenge P2 as a claim about special associations generally, disputing the purported conceptual connection between intrinsically valuing one’s participation in some association and seeing it as a source of associative duties.

About the Speaker

DrRobbie Arrell is a Research Fellow in the School of Philosophy at Wuhan University, China. He previously held positions at the University of Melbourne and Monash University, Australia. His main research interests are in moral and political philosophy and ethics (both normative and applied).

Suggested Background Reading

Scheffler, Samuel (2018) ‘Membership and Political Obligation’, inJournal of Political Philosophy, 26, 1, 3–23.

When and Where

Pre-Seminar Briefing

·When: 14:30-15:30

·Where: B214 School of Philosophy

Tea/Coffee

·When: 15:30-16:00

·Where: Starbucks (all welcome, at own expense)

Seminar Presentation:

·When: 16:00-17:15

·Where: B214 School of Philosophy