Associative Political Obligations:Justifying And Rejecting

Political obligation is regarded as the core issue of contemporary political philosophy.Compared with the consent theory, fair play, natural duty and gratitude theory, associative political obligation is a relatively recent attempt.It began in1986. Dworkin did related research in Law’s Empire. From then on, Horton, Tamir, Gilbert, Seglow inproved this theroy at different levels.Overall, the associative political obligation theorists hold that,political obligation neither originates from the voluntary consent of citizens, nor from interest received or granted by the State,even the gratitude to one’s country. It is rooted in their inherent political membership. If a person has a membership of a country, he then has the political obligation to obey the law of the country.The most attractive aspect of political obligation is that it is more in line with people’s moral intuitions and thus it makes a new contribution to the traditional way of justification.Dworkin believes that if a bare community meet four conditions including equal care and treatment to all its members, it will turn into a fraternal community or principle community.The community members are obliged to obey. But it is also necessary to meet the restrictions and other conditions of reciprocity. On the base of McPherson and McDonald’s conceptual arguement, Horton takes the family-country analogy as a correction to this path. He argues that political obligation is an constitutive element to the concept of membership.Tamir,who holds an standpoint of liberal nationalism,sets the political obligation on the base of a sense of connectedness.She believes that membership is a necessary condition for political obligation.But if one doesn’t have a sense of connectedness to his country and fellow citizens, his political obligation will not be established. Gilbert is an representative of nonvoluntarist contract theory. She believes that political obligation is from joint commitment made by plural subjects. If some people working together openly expressed mutual willingness to do something, they would constitute plural subjects, and this expression of intent will form a real contract with normative effect..Seglow’s relationship goods theory is the latest development of the theory of political obligation.He believes that the successful justification of political obligation should adhere to the non-reductionist.A theory is supposed to discover the source of political obligation in social relations among people, rather than something else. So he points out that the relationship goods produce obligation, and this theory is also applicable in the political field. This article will demonstrate the process of jutifying of the scholars above and then make an envaluation combined with the opinions of critics.It attempts to show the big picture of associative political obligation, and promote our understanding of the justification for political obligation.