Chung Fai Cheung
2006

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Table of Content

PREFACE

• Foreward
• Bibliography
• Introduction

I. MORAL PLURALISM

• A. The Radicalization of Universalism
• B. Abusive Universalism
  • 1. Jewish Religion
  • 2. Greek Philosophy
  • 3. Cover and Ideal
• C. Reiterative Universalism
  • 1. Theological Argument
  • 2. Philosophical Argument
    • a. A Universalist Particularism
    • b. A Particularist Particularism
    • c. Prohibitions and the Minimal Code of Morality
    • d. Prescriptions and Reiteration
• D. Practical Particularim
  • 1. A Phenomenological Analysis
  • 2. Thick and Thin Now

II. SHARED UNDERSTANDING OR MISUNDERSTANDING

§1. The Observable Moral Data

• A. The Complications of Shared Understanding
  • 1. The Equivocality of the Terminology
  • 2. The Semantics of Shared Understanding
• B. Social Fact and Social Meaning
  • 1. Émile Durkheim's Sociology of Morals
  • 2. Social Fact
  • 3. Between Fact and Meaning
    • a. Source
    • b. Relativity
    • c. Substance
    • d. Objectivity
• C. Cultural Tradition
  • 1. The Concept of Culture
  • 2. Twitch and Wink
  • 3. Sheep Raid
• D. The Interpretation of Shared Understandings

§2. The Objectivity of Social Meaning

• A. Simple Objectivity
• B. Complex Objectivity
  • 1. The Objectivity of Judgement
  • 2. The Objectivity of Social Construction

III. TIME AND INTERPRETATION

§1. Interpretation and Representation

• 1. The Path of Discovery
• 2. The Path of Invention
  • a. The Philosopher's Soliloquy
  • b. Maximalist Invention
  • c. Minimalist Invention
• 3. The Path of Interpretation
• 4. The Dilemma of Idealization

§2. Time and shared understanding

• A. Physical Time and Social Time
• B. Four Principles of Moral Interpretation
  • 1. The First Principle: The Long View
  • 2. The Second Principle: The Cycle
  • 3. The Third Principle: The Very Long View
  • 4. The Fourth Principle: Tradition Reflexivity
    • a. Reinterpretation
    • b. Coherence
    • c. Invention ex vetere

IV. THE PRACTICE OF SOCIAL CRITICISM

§1. The Failure and the Success of Social Criticism

• A. When Social Criticism Fails
  • 1. The Prophet and the Sage
    • a. Waiting in the Desert
    • b. Compulsive Globalization
    • c. Nation-Building
  • 2. The Vanguard
    • a. Herbert Marcuse and the Critic-at-Large
    • b. Michel Foucault and the Critic-in-the-Small
• B. The Causes of Critical Failure
  • 1. The Imitation of Heroism
  • 2. Julien Benda's Homage to the Ascetic Monk
• C. The Ancient and Honourable Company of Social Critics
  • 1. Critical Success
  • 2. The Prophet as Social Critic
  • 3. Randolph Bourne the Modern Prophet

§2. Critical Distance

• A. Absolute Opposition
  • 1. Jean-Paul Sartre's Smokescreen Politics
  • 2. Simone de Beauvoir the Assimilated Woman
• B. Connected Opposition
  • 1. Antonio Gramsci's Common Sense
  • 2. Ignazio Silone's Moral Sense
  • 3. George Orwell's Red Pillar-Box
• C. The Heaviness of Connection
  • 1. Albert Camus on the Wrong Side of History
  • 2. Martin Buber and the Palestine Tragedy
  • 3. Breyten Breytenbach and Apartheid

§3. Another Honourable Company of Social Critics

• 1. A Christian Questioning of Walzer's Prophetic Paradigm
  • a. Differently Connected
  • b. Transcendent Element
• 2. The Evangelical Paradigm

V. A MATURE MODERN SOCIETY

§1. The Structure of a Modern Society

• A. The Separation of Spheres
  • 1. Each according to Its Kind
  • 2. Spheres or No Spheres
  • 3. The Liberal Project
• B. The Transition from Liberalism to Democratic Socialism
  • 1. Three Interpretations of the Liberal Project
  • 2. The Shape of a Democratic Socialist Society
    • a. Membership
    • b. Security and Welfare
    • c. Money and Commodities
    • d. Political Power

§2. Justice, Liberty, and Equality

• A. The Separation of Justice from the Modern Ideal
  • 1. Justice and Shared Understanding
  • 2. Caste Society
• B. Liberty and Equality
  • 1. A Reinterpretation of Equality
  • 2. Simple Equality and Complex Equality
  • 3. Simple Inequality and Complex Inequality

VI. INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY

§1. The Just Use of Violence

• A. Between Realism and Pacifism
• B. Fight the Good Fight
  • 1. Self-Defence
  • 2. Interventions
  • 3. Global versus Local
• C. Fighting Well
  • 1. The Moral Equality of Soldiers
  • 2. Legitimate Targets
  • 3. Double Effect and Due Care
• D. Fighting Uglily
  • 1. Supreme Emergency
  • 2. Utilitarianism of Extremity
  • 3. Two Problems in Breaking the Rule
  • 4. Is Moral Absolutism Impractical?

§2. The Balance of Power

• 1. Toleration
• 2. The Reform of the World System
  • a. The First Argument
  • b. The Second Argument
  • c. Some Remarks on Walzer's Proposal

CONCLUSION

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