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Reply to Critics

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Abstract

One of the central moral challenges facing numerous political communities today is political reconciliation. In the aftermath of repression, conflict, and injustice, communities confront the task of repairing damaged relationships among citizens and between citizens and officials. In A Moral Theory of Political Reconciliation, I develop a theory of what this process entails and of its moral significance. My central claim is that political relationships are damaged when and to the extent that they fail to express reciprocity and respect for agency. Failures of reciprocity and respect for agency are how relationships go wrong during extended periods of repression and conflict, and it is in cultivating these two values in relations among citizens and officials that relationships are repaired. I am very grateful for the thoughtful, incisive, and stimulating comments provided by Cindy Holder, Tracy Isaacs, and Alice MacLachlan. In this reply to their commentaries, I first provide a brief background of the motivation for my project and an overview of the main theses that I defend over the course of my book. I then turn to three kinds of concerns raised by Holder, Isaacs, and MacLachlan. The first urges me to rethink the restriction of my analysis of political reconciliation to contexts of transition. The second challenges the particular way that I conceptualize the demands of reciprocity and respect for agency in political relationships. The final set turns to my analysis of the processes that can facilitate reconciliation.

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Notes

  1. For the argument for these criteria see the Introduction, A Moral Theory of Political Reconciliation (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010).

  2. For my analysis of the role of the rule of law see Chapter 1.

  3. This account of trust draws on the work of Karen Jones and is developed in Chapter 2.

  4. The framework of capabilities is the subject of Chapter 3.

  5. Holder, “Transition, Trust and Partial Legality: On Colleen Murphy’s A Moral Theory of Political Reconciliation,” doi:10.1007/s11572-014-9297-2.

  6. MacLachlan, “Political Reconciliation and Political Health,” doi:10.1007/s11572-014-9296-3.

  7. Ibid., p. xxx.

  8. Lon Fuller, “Human Interaction and the Law,” in Kenneth Winston (ed.), The Principles of Social Order: Selected Essays of Lon F. Fuller (rev. ed), (Portland: Hart Publishing, 2001), pp. 231–66, at p. 255.

  9. Holder, p. xxx.

  10. Ibid., p. xxx. Holder cites the following in her quote: Hurst Hannum, Autonomy, Sovereignty and Self-Determination, Revised Edition (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996); Ted Gurr, Peoples versus States: Minorities at Risk in the New Century (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace, 2000).

  11. MacLachlan, p. xxx.

  12. On this point see Jonathan Wolff and Avner de-Shalit, Disadvantage (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007).

  13. On this point see Chapter 1.

  14. MacLachlan, p. xxx.

  15. Ibid., p. xxx.

  16. Holder, p. xxx.

  17. For my discussion of truth commissions see Chapter 5.

  18. Isaacs, “International Criminal Courts and Political Reconciliation,” doi:10.1007/s11572-014-9294-5.

  19. Ibid., p. xxx.

  20. Ibid., p. xxx.

  21. Ibid., p. xxx.

  22. Ibid., p. xxx.

  23. See Tricia Olsen, Leigh Payne, and Andrew Reiter, Transitional Justice in the Balance: Comparing Processes, Weighing Efficacy (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2010).

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Correspondence to Colleen Murphy.

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This symposium is based on the Author Meets Critics session on my book at the 2012 Pacific meeting of the American Philosophical Association. Val Napolean was one of the critics at that session, and I am also grateful to her for her reflections on my book.

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Murphy, C. Reply to Critics. Criminal Law, Philosophy 10, 165–177 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11572-014-9295-4

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