The importance of pragmatism for liberal democracy: an anti-foundationalist and deliberative approach to multiculturalism

Abstract

The paper illustrates the desirability of an anti-foundationalist approach to normativity for the fullest realization of the liberal democratic project. The first section defends the viability, epistemic and normative, of an anti-foundationalism inspired to the antimetaphysical and anti-sceptical legacy of the founders of American pragmatism. The second section, drawing on the deliberative turn in democratic theory and the capability approach to autonomy, introduces what I regard to be the normative core of liberal democracy. The third section fleshes out the desirability argument by looking at how a pragmatist approach to normativity allows liberal democracies to address in a fully deliberative spirit the challenges posed by the growing cultural diversity of contemporary societies associated with contemporary processes of globalization.