1st Edition

Political Reason and Interest A Philosophical Legitimation of the Political Order in a Pluralistic Society

By Herman H.H. van Erp Copyright 2000

    This title was first published in 2000:  Politics cannot be conceived of as just a subsystem of society, or as a network of particular interests. The concept of interests and their role within the normative political debate is given a new interpretation by this book, which examines how political interest, market mechanisms and rational choice theories exist in the light of democratic freedom and social justice. The book builds on different concepts of procedural justice, from Schumpeter, Buchanan and Habermas’s conceptions of democracy and the role of political compromise and coalition in the idea of consensus as a condition for political legitimation.

    Contents: State and society; The idea of the common interest; An analysis of the concept interest; A society founded on individual interests; Conflicts of interest and procedural justice; Individual freedom and distributive justice; Political justice and the constitution of the state; Conclusion; Index.

    Biography

    Herman H.H. van Erp