Bernard Williams’s Political Philosophy: Necessary Truths, Contextualism and Left-Wittgensteinianism?

This seminar is organised by Contemporary Aristotelian Studies in Ethics and Politics (CASEP).

Speaker: Fabian Freyenhagen, University of Essex

Abstract

It is striking and puzzling—but has not yet been discussed in the literature—that Bernard Williams appeals to the idea of necessary truth at key junctures in his writings on politics and political philosophy. It is striking insofar such appeals are uncommon in contemporary political philosophy and because of the pivotal role they seem to play in his theory.

It is puzzling because such appeals seem, on the face of it, incompatible with what Bernard Williams says both in the very texts in questions and in others, which commits him to a robust historical contextualism. Yet, despite the striking and puzzling nature of the appeals—and for all the critical discussion that has ensued the 2005 publication of his posthumously published collection of essays, In the Beginning Was the Deed—there has not yet been a discussion of his appeal to necessary truths.

The discussion has mainly focused on the question of whether it is defensible that there is (as it is often put by commentators) ‘a distinctively political normativity’. This is, as we will see, a question that is related to his appeal to necessary truths, but is liable to be misconstrued if abstracted (as it has so far been in the literature) from this appeal.

To avoid such misconstrual, I will suggest, we need to attend to Williams’s (Left) Wittgensteinianism. This will reveal him to be a heterodox (analytic) political philosopher in rejecting a foundationalism that, I will also suggest, is baked into much of the mainstream political philosophy, making it difficult, if not outright impossible, for its proponents to even recognise his alternative as an alternative.