Liberal Democracy, Authority, and Care

This dissertation investigates the connection between political authority and care in order to solve one of the central problems facing liberal democrats today: how to identify and construct practices of political authority that facilitate human flourishing without excessively compromising core commitments to autonomy and equality. In contrast to the contemporary authority literature's focus on questions- of justification and legitimacy, I address this problem by turning to the concept of care. Though there is a long history of caregiving imagery in politics, today liberal theorists do not generally think of political authority as a provider of care. Caregiving is thought to be an activity that occurs at the margins of political life, administered in the private sphere tochildren, the sick, and, the elderly. At first glance, this might seem all for the best. Because caregiving metaphors have been used to defend highly authoritarian forms of rule, the language of care could seem out of place in a discussion of liberal democratic political authority. Yet while it is important to remain alert to the ways in which the language of care can be employed in the service of oppressive or authoritarian ends, I show that it is an essential concept for articulating dimensions of the political relationship that contemporary theory is apt to overlook.;Beginning with the publication of Carol Gilligan's In a Different Voice, a growing normative literature has emerged on care and caregiving relationships. Thinkers such as Nel Noddings, Eva Kittay, Virginia Held, and Sara Ruddick have outlined a care-centered ethical approach and defended it as a complement or alternative to a traditional, justice-based approach. More recently, authors such as Joan Tronto and Daniel Engster have begun developing a care-based political theory, arguing in favor of political policies and practices that place the value of caregiving at their center. I intervene in this developing literature in two ways. First, I pose a still more radical set of questions about the intersection of care and politics, arguing in favor of reconceptualizing the political relationship itself as a caregiving relationship. Second, I bring the contemporary conversation about care into dialogue with prominent thinkers in the Western philosophical tradition, which contains hitherto overlooked resources for theorizing the relationship between politics and care. Focusing in particular on Plato, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and William Godwin, I demonstrate that care plays a central role in their thinking on political authority. Because these three thinkers understand the relationship between political authority and care in insightful, surprising, and sharply contrasting ways, they serve as ideal starting points for thinking about the role political authority can and ought to play liberal democratic polities. Building on the theoretical contributions of Plato, Rousseau, and Godwin, I conclude by outlining a conception of political care to help us better articulate the place of authority in human life and develop practices of political authority capable of reconciling a commitment to autonomy, equality, and democratic discussion with the need for authoritative structures that promote individual and communal flourishing.